Steve Chan, China, the U.S., and the Power- Transition Theory: A Critique

Une future guerre sino-américaine est-elle possible ? Et si elle éclatait, serait-elle initiée par la Chine, puissance émergente, ou plutôt par les États-Unis, hegemon sur le déclin ? De nombreux théoriciens de la transition du pouvoir ont interprété les guerres mondiales du XXe siècle comme des conflits engagés par l’Allemagne dans le but de remplacer la Grande-Bretagne comme hegemon mondial. L’application contemporaine de ce paradigme suggère que les États-Unis, encore dominants, pourraient..

Françoise Mengin et Jean-Louis Rocca éds., Politics in China : Moving Frontiers

Françoise Mengin et Jean-Louis Rocca ont réuni un groupe de chercheurs étonnamment international. Quatre des dix contributeurs à cet ouvrage travaillent en France et abordent en anglais (comme China Perspectives) des questions théoriques importantes, très présentes chez les sinologues d’Europe continentale. Mais des chercheurs travaillant aux Etats-Unis, au Japon, en Grande-Bretagne et à Hong Kong ont également participé à ce travail. Aucun ouvrage ne présente plus clairement les paradoxes de..

Steve Chan, China, the U.S., and the Power- Transition Theory: A Critique

Is a future Sino-American war probable or not? If it began, would it likely be started by China as a rising power, or by America as a declining hegemon? Many theorists of power transitions have seen the twentieth century’s world wars as conflicts started by Germany seeking to replace Britain as a world hegemon. Contemporary application of that paradigm suggests that America, while still strong, might muster resources to resist China’s rising power. Steve Chan argues, however, that this versio..

Françoise Mengin and Jean-Louis Rocca eds., Politics in China: Moving Frontiers

Mengin and Rocca have assembled a strikingly international set of researchers. Four of the ten chapters’ authors work in France, and they do us the service (as more generally does China Perspectives) of bringing to us in English important theoretical concerns salient among China scholars in continental Europe—although this book also includes contributors who work in America, Japan, Britain and Hong Kong. No book brings out the paradoxes of China's recent reforms more clearly. No other goes f..

Steve Chan, China, the U.S., and the Power- Transition Theory: A Critique

Une future guerre sino-américaine est-elle possible ? Et si elle éclatait, serait-elle initiée par la Chine, puissance émergente, ou plutôt par les États-Unis, hegemon sur le déclin ? De nombreux théoriciens de la transition du pouvoir ont interprété les guerres mondiales du XXe siècle comme des conflits engagés par l’Allemagne dans le but de remplacer la Grande-Bretagne comme hegemon mondial. L’application contemporaine de ce paradigme suggère que les États-Unis, encore dominants, pourraient..

Steve Chan, China, the U.S., and the Power- Transition Theory: A Critique

Is a future Sino-American war probable or not? If it began, would it likely be started by China as a rising power, or by America as a declining hegemon? Many theorists of power transitions have seen the twentieth century’s world wars as conflicts started by Germany seeking to replace Britain as a world hegemon. Contemporary application of that paradigm suggests that America, while still strong, might muster resources to resist China’s rising power. Steve Chan argues, however, that this versio..

Non-Orthogonal Refractive Lenses for Non-Orthogonal Astigmatic Eyes.

Purpose: To present a novel design method for non-orthogonal lenses to reduce the problem of residual astigmatism in non-orthogonal, astigmatic eyes Methods: A method to create spectacle trial lenses with non-orthogonal power axes was developed based on a novel optimised light ray-tracing algorithm rather than conventional lens design methods which could not fully eliminate spherical aberration. Using this method, three sets of refraction trial lenses were made with the angles between power axes of each set controlled at 80°, 70° and 60°, respectively. Within each set, the cylindrical power varied from -1.00 D to -6.00 D in 1.00 D steps in addition to a -0.50 D lens. Computer-based numerical simulation of the lenses optical performance was carried out to apply orthogonal and non-orthogonal lenses on simulated astigmatic eyes. Subsequently, three clinical trial cases were investigated. Results: Computer-simulated optical performance of non-orthogonal lenses showed the ability to achieve high performance in correcting non-orthogonal astigmatism. Subsequently, three patients with irregular astigmatism were refracted with the non-orthogonal lens sets, and clinically observed improvement at least two lines in the LogMAR chart was achieved in all three cases, compared with correction with orthogonal lenses, along with subjective improvement in image quality. Conclusions: Non-orthogonal astigmatism, which is commonly ignored by current eye prescription systems, is taken into account in this study in the design of spectacle and soft contact lenses. The new approach considers the possible non-orthogonal positions of the eye's two optical power meridians and appears to be better able to correct the vision of irregular astigmatic eyes and significantly reduce residual astigmatism

Tuning the magnetic ground state of Ce1−xYbxRhIn5 by Yb valence fluctuations

We characterize the properties of Ce1−xYbxRhIn5 single crystals with 0 ⩽ x ⩽ 1 using measurements of powder x-ray diffraction, energy dispersive x-ray spectroscopy, electrical resistivity, magnetic susceptibility, specific heat, x-ray absorption near edge structure (XANES), and neutron diffraction. The Yb valence vYb, calculated from the magnetic susceptibility and measured using XANES, decreases from 3+ at x = 0 to ∼2.1+ at xact = 0.2, where xact is the measured Yb concentration. A transition from incommensurate to commensurate antiferromagnetism is observed in neutron diffraction measurements along Q = (0.5, 0.5, l) between 0.2 ⩽ xact ⩽ 0.27; this narrative is supported by specific-heat measurements in which a second robust feature appears at a temperature TI (TI \u3c TN) for the same concentration range. Magnetic susceptibility measurements also reveal features which provide additional evidence of magnetic ordering. The results of this study suggest that the evolution of the Yb valence plays a critical role in tuning the magnetic ground state of Ce1−xYbxRhIn5