Church and Community in the Diocese of Lyon, 1500-1789 [Book Review]

Connoisseurs of the recent scholarly attention given to the social and cultural impact of the sixteenth-century religious reformations will welcome Hoffman's fine study of the Counter Reformation in the diocese of Lyons, even though much of his story will come as no surprise to readers of Bossy, Delumeau, Perouas and others. The rise of the seminary and the doctrinal "reeducation" of the Catholic clergy; the substitution of the priest as a moral and spiritual être à part in relation to the parish for the priest who had been an essential but barely distinguishable part of the village community; the coming of the new clerically controlled and devotional confraternities at the expense of the purely lay and somewhat festive confraternities that had been nearly congruous with the village; the crabbed campaign against quasi-sacral charivaris, sportive pilgrimages, and irreverent saints' days-the whole promiscuous intermingling of the sacred and the secular-all of these general features of the Catholic Counter Reformation find their particular variants in Hoffman's diocese of Lyons. More committed than his predecessors, however, to the Braudelian longue durée, Hoffman takes nearly the entire Old Regime as his province and carries his story to the onset of dechristianization on the eve of the French Revolution

On the stability of radiation-pressure-dominated cavities

Context: When massive stars exert a radiation pressure onto their environment that is higher than their gravitational attraction, they launch a radiation-pressure-driven outflow. It has been claimed that a radiative Rayleigh-Taylor instability should lead to the collapse of the outflow cavity and foster the growth of massive stars. Aims: We investigate the stability of idealized radiation-pressure-dominated cavities, focusing on its dependence on the radiation transport approach for the stellar radiation feedback. Methods: We compare two different methods for stellar radiation feedback: gray flux-limited diffusion (FLD) and ray-tracing (RT). We also derive simple analytical models to support our findings. Results: Only the FLD cases lead to prominent instability in the cavity shell. The RT cases do not show such instability. The gray FLD method underestimates the opacity at the location of the cavity shell and leads to extended epochs of marginal Eddington equilibrium in the cavity shell, making them prone to the radiative Rayleigh-Taylor instability. In the RT cases, the radiation pressure exceeds gravity by 1-2 orders of magnitude. The radiative Rayleigh-Taylor instability is then consequently suppressed. Conclusions: Treating the stellar irradiation in the gray FLD approximation underestimates the radiative forces acting on the cavity shell. This can lead artificially to situations that are affected by the radiative Rayleigh-Taylor instability. The proper treatment of direct stellar irradiation by massive stars is crucial for the stability of radiation-pressure-dominated cavities.Comment: 14 pages, 8 figures, accepted at A&

The Dutch sociology of education: Its origins, significance and future

Contains fulltext : 28833.pdf (publisher's version ) (Open Access)As in many other countries the Dutch sociology of education has blossomed into a fully-fledged specialised branch of sociology since the beginning of the 1970s. A tradition of policy-oriented research has also consolidated the position of the sociology of education at the universities. The strength of this relatively small group of specialists lies in the solid empirical basis and use of advanced research techniques and analyses in their work. Theory and reflection are not the strongest qualities of this group. A good organisational structure naturally helps keep the ranks closed. Recently, however, marginalisation of the specialism is threatening because of isolation from general sociology. Mainstream educationalists and policy-makers are also challenging the sociologists of education to make their contribution more explicit than ever

Trends in the nonvolcanic component of stratospheric aerosol over the period 1971–2004

The six longest records of stratospheric aerosol (in situ measurements at Laramie, Wyoming, lidar records at: Garmisch-Partenkirchen, Germany; Hampton, Virginia; Mauna Loa, Hawaii; São José dos Campos, Brazil, and SAGE II measurements) were investigated for trend by (1) comparing measurements in the 3 volcanically quiescent periods since 1970 using standard analysis of variance techniques, and (2) analyzing residuals from a time/volcano dependent empirical model applied to entire data sets. A standard squared-error residual minimization technique was used to estimate optimum parameters for each measurement set, allowing for first order autocorrelation, which increases standard errors of trends but does not change magnitude. Analysis of variance over the 3 volcanically quiescent periods is controlled by the end points (pre-El Chichón and post-Pinatubo), and indicates either no change (Garmisch, Hampton, São José dos Campos, Laramie-0.15 É m) or a slight, statistically insignificant, decrease (Mauna Loa, Laramie-0.25 É m), -1 ± 0.5% yr-1. The empirical model was applied to the same records plus 1020 nm SAGE II data separated into 33 latitude/altitude bins. No trend in stratospheric aerosol was apparent for 31 of 33 SAGE II data sets, 3 of 4 lidar records, and in situ measurements at 0.15 É m. For Hampton and Laramie-0.25 É m, the results suggest a weak negative trend, -2 ± 0.5% yr-1, while 2 SAGE II data sets (30–35 km, 30° and 40°N) suggest a positive trend of similar magnitude. Overall we conclude that no long-term change in background stratospheric aerosol has occurred over the period 1970–2004