Essence and Cause: Making Something Be What It Is

Aristotle frequently describes essence as a “cause” or “explanation”, thus ascribing to essence some sort of causal or explanatory role. This explanatory role is often explicated by scholars in terms of essence “making the thing be what it is” or “making it the very thing that it is”. I argue that this is problematic, at least on the assumption that “making” expresses an explanatory relation, since it violates certain formal features of explanation. I then consider whether Aristotle is vulnerable to this problem by examining the explanatory role of essence in Posterior Analytics and Metaphysics Z 17

CONVERSION AND GLOBAL REACTION RATE COEFFICIENT IN THE ABSORPTION OF SO2 BY DIFFERENT TYPES OF LIMESTONE IN A FLUIDIZED BED REACTOR

This work concerns the study of the effect of limestone type on SO2 absorption in a bench fluidized bed reactor plant. Conversion and global reaction rate coefficients were established for conditions typical to fluidized bed combustion of coal. The bench plant is a bubbling bed reactor 160 mm internal diameter using silica sand as bed material, fluidized by pre-heated air. In order to simulate conditions close to the fluidized bed coal combustion ambience, the fluidizing air is pre-heated at high temperature (850 oC) and SO2 is added to the fluidizing air in a concentration typical of the process (1000 ppm). All the particulate, i.e. silica sand and limestone particles, was fed to the bed in a narrow size distribution between two subsequent ASTM sieves (with 545 μm mean diameter). In transient batch experiments charges of limestone are quickly injected into the bed, while the consequent variations of the exit concentrations of SO2, CO2 and O2 are continuously recorded. Analysis were performed on the effects of the type of limestone in the process, taking into account possible reaction controlling resistances, and considering possible effects of the calcination on the sulfation process

A cultivar de videira sémillon: características e comportamento no Rio Grande do Sul.

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Avaliação De Impacto De Alterações Na Temperatura Em Biomphalaria Glabrata Variantes Melânica E Albina Infectadas Com Schistosoma Mansoni

Fluctuations in population density of planorbid hosts of S. mansoni are influenced by climatic factors. The knowledge about interference from changes in water temperature in these populations is an important aspect of the epidemiology of schistosomiasis. In this experiment, it is explored the influence of different temperatures on the development of Schistosoma mansoni in Biomphalaria glabrata melanic and albino variants. The results indicated an intrinsic relationship between temperature and development of the parasite in the intramollusc phase, independent of the pigmentation of the mantle of the molluscs. The higher the temperature, the shorter the period necessary for the development of the parasite was while the higher the mortality of infected mollusks. It is concluded that, in the presence of climate change, the increasement of temperature in cold and flooded regions may encourage the establishment of new foci of transmission of schistosomiasis by changing the geographic extent and extending the epidemiological transmission potential. In warm climates, higher temperatures, however, could compromise the transmission of the disease because of biological stress suffered by parasite and host. Under these conditions, it can result in the death of the parasite or a change in their ability to infect new host species of molluscs in new areas. Mantle pigmentation patterns in molluscs have not shown significant interference in the development of the parasite.77

Porotaxia em larvas de Anocentor nitens e Haemaphysalis leporispalustris.

Estruturas tegumentares de larvas de Anocentor nitens e Haemaphysalis leporispalustris foram estudadas por microscopia óptica. Três tipos de estruturas tegumentares foram identificadas nas larvas das duas espécies: lirifissuras, pequenas glândulas e grandes glândulas de cera. Estas estruturas foram observadas isoladas ou associadas cobrindo todo o idiossoma, exceto no escudo onde não foram encontrados grandes glândulas de cera. Grandes glândulas de cera foram o tipo de estrutura mais estável dentro e entre as espécies, seguido pelas lirifissuras e pequenas glândulas. Pequenas glândulas, embora relativamente estáveis, mostraram um grande número de variações numéricas entre as espécies de carrapatos. Os padrões de lirifissuras, pequenas glândulas e grandes glândulas de cera mostraram diferenças marcantes quando comparadas entre si e com larvas de algumas espécies do gênero Amblyomma. Estas diferenças foram suficientes para diferenciar as larvas das espécies dos três gêneros.bitstream/item/24655/1/bpd51-carrapato.pd

Orbit determination of Transneptunian objects and Centaurs for the prediction of stellar occultations

The prediction of stellar occultations by Transneptunian objects and Centaurs is a difficult challenge that requires accuracy both in the occulted star position as for the object ephemeris. Until now, the most used method of prediction involving tens of TNOs/Centaurs was to consider a constant offset for the right ascension and for the declination with respect to a reference ephemeris. This offset is determined as the difference between the most recent observations of the TNO and the reference ephemeris. This method can be successfully applied when the offset remains constant with time. This paper presents an alternative method of prediction based on a new accurate orbit determination procedure, which uses all the available positions of the TNO from the Minor Planet Center database plus sets of new astrometric positions from unpublished observations. The orbit determination is performed through a numerical integration procedure (NIMA), in which we develop a specific weighting scheme. The NIMA method was applied for 51 selected TNOs/Centaurs. For this purpose, we have performed about 2900 new observations during 2007-2014. Using NIMA, we succeed in predicting the stellar occultations of 10 TNOs and 3 Centaurs between 2013 and 2015. By comparing the NIMA and JPL ephemerides, we highlighted the variation of the offset between them with time. Giving examples, we show that the constant offset method could not accurately predict 6 out of the 13 observed positive occultations successfully predicted by NIMA. The results indicate that NIMA is capable of efficiently refine the orbits of these bodies. Finally, we show that the astrometric positions given by positive occultations can help to further refine the orbit of the TNO and consequently the future predictions. We also provide the unpublished observations of the 51 selected TNOs and their ephemeris in a usable format by the SPICE library.Comment: 12 pages, 9 figures, accepted in A&

Estabelecimento de protocolos para seleção e indução da capacitação espermática em caprinos.

[Establishment of protocols for selection and induction of sperm capacitation in goat]