Can Human Beings Truly Be Considered Free?

There exists a complex relationship between human freedom and God\u27s divine foreknowledge; the questions surrounding this topic abound and are difficult to answer. The question arises, if God knows all that we think and do, now and in the future, and has Providence over all of our actions, are we truly free; do we have free will? I assert that we do. The arguments that would pit God\u27s foreknowledge and human freedom against each other as incompatible have a faulty foundation surrounding the nature of God\u27s knowledge, His Being, and our purpose in the world. Essentially, the nature of God\u27s knowledge is not deterministic, and His knowing does not necessitate that actions happen as they will; they do not happen because He knows, He knows because they happen. Additionally, God created us with a particular nature, and that nature includes a free will as human beings. God can neither impede nor prevent this nature, as He would actually, in effect, be contradicting His own nature as well as ours. We as beings are made to fulfill our natures, and thus we were made to act freely. God\u27s providence exists in that He made us, and made us to fulfill our particular natures, and as such, we are naturally inclined towards the good and towards our divine end and Creator. The divine end and purpose exists for us all, but it is our free will which allows us to choose to fulfill or not fulfill this nature. Once the true nature and metaphysics of God\u27s knowledge and being, our nature as humans, and our purpose as humans are understood, we can better attempt to reconcile the idea of God\u27s foreknowledge and providence with our freedom and free will as human beings

"I'm Not Rockefeller": 33 High net Worth Philanthropists Discuss Their Approach to Giving

Presents findings from interviews, conducted between September 2007 and April 2008, with 33 donor who were able to give $1 million annually. The study focused on how donors make giving decisions

Family of airfoil shapes for rotating blades

An airfoil which has particular application to the blade or blades of rotor aircraft such as helicopters and aircraft propellers is described. The airfoil thickness distribution and camber are shaped to maintain a near zero pitching moment coefficient over a wide range of lift coefficients and provide a zero pitching moment coefficient at section Mach numbers near 0.80 and to increase the drag divergence Mach number resulting in superior aircraft performance

Raskolnikov: Not the Typical Criminal Man

Criminologists in the nineteenth century gave much effort to identify, classify, and understand the physical, social, and psychological characteristics of the world’s criminals. Using the lens of these early criminological theories and the scholarly interpretations of Dostoevsky’s Raskolnikov, this paper explores the dimensions of Raskolnikov as a criminal character. Ultimately, these developing psychological and criminal anthropological theories are not successful in explaining the character of Raskolnikov. This exploration sheds light on a fundamental characteristic of human nature that Dostoevsky understands. Just as Raskolnikov is unable to be fully characterized by his utilitarian social theories, and by the theories of early criminologists, humanity is fundamentally unable to be reduced to a theory

High Lift, Low Pitching Moment Airfoils

Two families of airfoil sections which can be used for helicopter/rotorcraft rotor blades or aircraft propellers of a particular shape are prepared. An airfoil of either family is one which could be produced by the combination of a camber line and a thickness distribution or a thickness distribution which is scaled from these. An airfoil of either family has a unique and improved aerodynamic performance. The airfoils of either family are intended for use as inboard sections of a helicopter rotor blade or an aircraft propeller

Rightsizing Congregate Care: A Powerful First Step in Transforming Child Welfare Systems

Outlines Casey's initiatives in four sites to help child welfare systems reduce institutional placements, improve outcomes, and support community services by changing the array of services, frontline practice, finances, performance management, and policy

VET funding in Australia and the role of TAFE

In this speech, Mitchell Professorial Fellow Peter Noonan discusses the role of vocational education and training (VET) and calls for a sustainable investment base for VET and a more coherent funding model across the tertiary education system in Australia. Introduction The national VET system in Australia is very much at the crossroads. While workforce skills and capabilities are recognised as central to Australia’s future economic prosperity and to individuals’ life chances and well‐being, the VET sector ‐ which arguably is of greatest relevance to most Australians and to most Australian firms ‐ is facing a diminishing future. Almost all of the public commentary in relation to education funding in Australia over the past year has been in relation to funding for schools and higher education. However, the real funding crisis is in the VET sector

Approximating Shepp's constants for the Slepian process

Slepian process $S(t)$ is a stationary Gaussian process with zero mean and covariance $E S(t)S(t')=\max\{0,1-|t-t'|\}\, .$ For any $T>0$ and $h>0$, define $F_T(h ) = {\rm Pr}\left\{\max_{t \in [0,T]} S(t) < h \right\}$ and the constants $\Lambda(h) = -\lim_{T \to \infty} \frac1T \log F_T(h)$ and $\lambda(h)=\exp\{-\Lambda(h) \}$; we will call them `Shepp's constants'. The aim of the paper is construction of accurate approximations for $F_T(h)$ and hence for the Shepp's constants. We demonstrate that at least some of the approximations are extremely accurate