Wild Emptiness: A Zen Approach to Environmental Ethics

When Buddhism took root in China and integrated with the nation’s Taoist intellectual climate, the tradition retained the orthodox central objective of overcoming suffering. While conserving this principal aspiration, the rise of Zen is associated with deviation from the orthodox practice of monasticism and toward the practical embodiment of emptiness while integrated in society, which can be likened to the practice of unwavering compassion. This piece offers a Zen approach to environmental ethics such that it is an attempt to explicate how and why an individual practicing Zen should compassionately engage with the earth. With respect to the Buddhist employment of skillful means, different approaches are offered as tailored ethical frameworks to appeal to individuals at different stages in their path to awakening. Furthermore, the environmental ethic appealed to by the awakened individual is explicated as spontaneous harmonization with the flow of emptiness, that which the Buddhists regard to be the driving force of the phenomenal realm. The awakened individual is considered to non-deliberately take on a lifestyle that provides perpetual intimacy with the rhythms of wild emptines

Monetary Perspective On Underground Economic Activity In The United States

There are widespread reports of a growing underground, or unobserved, economy in the United States and in other countries. The unobserved economy seems to develop principally from efforts to evade taxes and government regulation. Although no single definition of such activity has been universally accepted, the term generally refers to activity – whether legal or illegal – generating income that either is underreported or not reported at all (see Chapter 1 in this volume). Some authors narrow the definition to cover income produced in legal activity that is not set down in the recorded national income statistics. Recent discussion of underground economic activity was stimulated by publication of two estimates, one by Gutmann (1977) and the other by Feige (1979), of the size of the underground economy in the United States; these estimates were derived from aggregate monetary statistics. In the ensuing years, numerous other estimates have been made of the underground economy in the United States and in other countries. The magnitude of some of these estimates has prompted congressional hearings and various government studies. In 1979, the Internal Revenue Service (IRS, 1979) estimated that, for 1976, individuals failed to report between $75 billion and$100 billion in income from legal sources and another $25 billion to$35 billion from three types of illegal activity – drugs, gambling, and prostitution. In a more recent study, the IRS estimated that unreported income from legal sources rose from $93.9 billion in 1973 to$249.7 billion in 1981 whereas unreported income from these same three illegal activities rose from $9.3 billion to$34 billion (IRS, 1983)

Your EQ Skills: Got What it Takes?

Your EQ skills: got what it takes? So you thought the CPA exam was your last test? Read on. Question: Is success in life and career determined primarily by rational intelligence (the IQ or intelligence quotient) or emotional intelligence (the EQ or emotional quotient)? In other words, what\u27s more important: intelligence or intuition? Historically the professional accounting literature has placed little emphasis on behavioral issues such as EQ, although human behavior underlies most of what is written and taught about professional accounting. Now managers place increased value on behavioral skills that help people in the workplace. Look at this statistic: The productivity of one-third of American workers is measured by how they add value to information. Doesn\u27t that describe CPAs exactly? This article will examine the ways in which EQ is crucial to CPAs\u27 success and how they can cultivate EQ if they haven\u27t got a lot of it. The AICPA and the Institute of Management Accountants recognize that emotional intelligence skills are critical for the success of the accounting profession. In CPA Vision 2011 and Beyond: Focus on the Horizon (www.cpavision.org), the AICPA identifies emotional ..

Expanding Public Safety in the Era of Black Lives Matter

The narrative of "Black Lives Matter" offers a new framework for policymakers, activists, practitioners, and other stakeholders to think about a public safety strategy that is not solely defined by arrests and admissions to prison. This essay provides an overview of evidence-based approaches for public safety interventions that exist outside of law enforcement interactions

Taxonomy of the fouling cheilostome bryozoans, Schizoporella unicornis, (Johnston) and Schizoporella errata (Waters)

Figure 1. (A–D) Images of Wood's Pliocene specimen from the Coralline Crag, Suffolk (NHM B1675) described in Busk (1859). (A) Group of autozooids at growing edge of colony within small bivalve shell. (B) Autozooids exhibiting deep V-shaped sinus. (C) Frontal shield with paired avicularia and deep V-shaped sinus. (D) Detail of primary orifice and sinus. (E, F) Lectotype of Schizoporella unicornis [NHM 1847.16.174 (a)] bleached portion. (E) Group of autozooids at the distal edge of colony with adventitious avicularia, paired, single or absent. (F) Ovicellate autozooids showing radially aligned scalloped grooves. Scale bars: 500 µm (A); 250 µm (B); 100 µm (C, E); 50 µm (D,F).Published as part of Tompsett, Scott, Porter, Joanne S. & Taylor, Paul D., 2009, Taxonomy of the fouling cheilostome bryozoans Schizoporella unicornis (Johnston) and Schizoporella errata (Waters), pp. 2227-2243 in Journal of Natural History 43 (35-36) on page 2231, DOI: 10.1080/00222930903090140, http://zenodo.org/record/521715

DFT-Assisted Design and Evaluation of Bifunctional Amine/Pyridine-Oxazoline Metal Catalysts for Additions of Ketones to Unactivated Alkenes and Alkynes

Bifunctional catalyst systems for the direct addition of ­ketones to unactivated alkenes/alkynes were designed and modeled by density functional theory (DFT). The designed catalysts possess bidentate ligands suitable for binding of pi-acidic group 10 metals capable of activating alkenes/alkynes, and a tethered organocatalyst amine to ­activate the ketone via formation of a nucleophilic enamine intermediate. The structures of the designed catalysts before and after C–C bond formation were optimized using DFT, and reaction steps involving group 10 metals were predicted to be significantly exergonic. A novel oxazoline precatalyst with a tethered amine separated by a meta-substituted benzene spacer was synthesized via a 10-step sequence that ­includes a key regioselective epoxide ring-opening step. It was combined with group 10 metal salts, including cationic Pd(II) and Pt(II), and screened for the direct addition of ketones to several alkenes and an ­internal alkyne. 1H NMR studies suggest that catalyst-catalyst inter­actions with this system via amine–metal coordination may preclude the desired addition reactions. The catalyst design approach disclosed here, and the promising calculations obtained with square planar group 10 metals, light a path for the discovery of novel bifunctional catalysts for C–C bond formation

Effect of interfacial oxide layers on the current-voltage characteristics of Al-Si contacts

Aluminum-silicon contacts with very thin interfacial oxide layers and various surface impurity concentrations are studied for both n and p-type silicon. To determine the surface impurity concentrations on p(+)-p and n(+)-n structures, a modified C-V technique was utilized. Effects of interfacial oxide layers and surface impurity concentrations on current-voltage characteristics are discussed based on the energy band diagrams from the conductance-voltage plots. The interfacial oxide and aluminum layer causes image contrasts on X-ray topographs