Usually the Lorentz transformations are derived from the conservation of the spacetime interval. We propose here a way of obtaining spacetime transformations between two inertial frames directly from symmetry, the isotropy of the space and principle of relativity. The transformation is uniquely defined except for a constant e, that depends only on the process of synchronization of clocks inside each system. Relativistic velocity addition is obtained, and it is shown that the set of velocities is a bounded symmetric domain. If (...) e=0, Galilean transformations are obtained. If e>0, the speed 1/√e and a spacetime interval are conserved. By assuming constancy of the speed of light, we get e=1/c 2 and the transformation between the frames becomes the Lorentz transformation. If e<0, a proper speed and a Hilbertian norm are conserved. (shrink)

This book is a study of the second-edition version of the 'Transcendental Deduction', which is one of the most important and obscure sections of Kant's Critique of Pure Reason. By way of a close analysis of the B-Deduction, Adam Dickerson makes the distinctive claim that the Deduction is crucially concerned with the problem of making intelligible the unity possessed by complex representations - a problem that is the representationalist parallel of the semantic problem of the unity of the proposition. Along (...) the way he discusses most of the key themes in Kant's theory of knowledge, including the nature of thought and representation, the notion of objectivity, and the way in which the mind structures our experience of the world. (shrink)

Ii is a well-known fact that the men of the Macedonian phalanx under Philip and Alexander were known collectively asor ‘foot companions’. Our first reference to the name comes from Demosthenes, who in his second Olynthiac tries unconvincingly to disparage the fighting qualities of Philip's mercenaries andDemosthenes adds no explanation, and it was left to commentators and lexicographers to unearth a relevant fragment from thePhilippicaof Anaximenes of Lampsacus.

The Groningen protocol allows for the euthanasia of severely ill newborns with a hopeless prognosis and unbearable suffering. We understand the impetus for such a protocol but have moral and ethical concerns with it. Advocates for euthanasia in adults have relied on the concept of human autonomy, which is lacking in the case of infants. In addition, biases can potentially influence the decision making of both parents and physicians. It is also very difficult to weigh the element of quality of (...) life on the will to live. We feel an important line has been crossed if the international medical community consents to the active euthanasia of severely ill infants and are concerned about the extension of the policy to other at risk groups. (shrink)

Dirac's equation is reviewed and found to be based on nonrelativistic ideas of probability. A 4-space formulation is proposed that is completely Lorentzinvariant, using probability distributions in space-time with the particle's proper time as a parameter for the evolution of the wave function. This leads to a new wave equation which implies that the proper mass of a particle is an observable, and is sharp only in stationary states. The model has a built-in arrow of time, which is associated with (...) a restriction to positive-energy solutions. The usual solution for a Coulomb field is retained, though it now implies a slightly different charge distribution. The conventional nonstationary solutions become invalid. The new formulation appears to offer a resolution of difficulties that have been associated with Dirac's equation. It also predicts the occurrence of virtual pairs at a level that may be experimentally testable, and suggests a mechanism for self-cancellation of the vacuum energy. (shrink)

A highly ordered universe is described in terms of neutrino and electrino alone as basic particles, and length and time alone as dimensional units. New theories are obtained of particles, nuclides, atomic spectra, general relativity, and gravitation.

Non-therapeutic ventilation of potential organ donors would increase the supply of kidneys for transplantation. There are no major ethical objections to it. The means of permitting it are forbidden by laws with an ethical basis. A law permitting it would need an ethical basis. Introducing a third legal method of diagnosing death would be unethical. Expanding the power of the advance directive to permit procedures involving minimal harm would be ethical but not helpful. Extending the power of proxies to permit (...) specific non-therapeutic procedures which caused or risked minimal harm to incompetent patients is the best way forward. (shrink)

Health care should be preferentially allocated to younger patients. This is just and is seen as just. Age is an objective factor in rationing decisions. The arguments against 'ageism' are answered. The effects of age on current methods of rationing are illustrated, and the practical applications of an age-related criterion are discussed. Ageist policies are in current use and open discussion of them is advocated.

One of the more intriguing figures of the first period of the Successors is Nicanor, the lieutenant and admiral of Cassander. He came into prominence when he assumed command of the Macedonian garrison at Athens, late in 319 B.c. After distinguishing himself there he took a fleet to the Bosporus, where with Antigonus' collaboration he won a decisive victory over Polyperchon's royal navy. Subsequently his aspirations became sufficiently lofty to threaten his patron's security, and Cassander took elaborate precautions to ensure (...) his arrest and condemnation. Nicanor was clearly a figure of considerable importance; yet no source even hints at his origins and family background. Can conjecture go any way to filling the gaps? (shrink)

New evidence often complicates as much as it clarifies. That truth is well illustrated by Stephen Tracy's recent and brilliant discovery that a tiny unpublished fragment of an Attic inscription belongs to a known decree . The decree has hitherto been recognised as an enactment of the oligarchy imposed by Antipater in 322. Its proposer, Archedicus of Lamptrae, was a leading member of the new regime and held the most influential office of state, that of anagrapheus, in 320/19.2 Appropriately enough (...) the decree confers honours upon members of the Macedonian court, but as the stone now reveals, it is phrased in a remarkable and anomalous manner: ‘in order that as many as possible of the friends of the king and of Antipater may be honoured by the Athenian people and confer benefactions upon the city’. There is no question about the meaning. The decree refers to friends of an unknown king, who are also friends of Antipater. But after Alexander's death there was a dual kingship. Philip III Arrhidaeus and Alexander IV reigned jointly and are generally termed ‘the kings’. How can the singular singular be explained? (shrink)

Propaganda and history are often inseparable. Most governments are in a position to control the dissemination of evidence, and if an event is embarrassing or damaging, the relevant evidence is certain to be distorted or withheld. Moreover the writers of history, however innocent their motives, cannot disregard the official apologia of their rulers. One notes with interest that the learned authors of the official Soviet history of the world portray the invasion of eastern Poland on 17 September 1939 as a (...) crusade of liberation. Of course it might be true that the people liberated by the Red Army were glad to be rid of ‘the arbitrary despotism of the Polish Pans’ and that in the subsequent elections there was absolute freedom of choice and overwhelming support for union with the Ukraine, but the fact remains that it was impossible for membersof the Moscow Academy to contradict their government's justification of the invasion. (shrink)

The paper discusses regularisation of dualities. A given duality between (concrete) categories, e.g. a variety of algebras and a category of representation spaces, is lifted to a duality between the respective categories of semilattice representations in the category of algebras and the category of spaces. In particular, this gives duality for the regularisation of an irregular variety that has a duality. If the type of the variety includes constants, then the regularisation depends critically on the location or absence of constants (...) within the defining identities. The role of schizophrenic objects is discussed, and a number of applications are given. Among these applications are different forms of regularisation of Priestley, Stone and Pontryagin dualities. (shrink)

The validity of the double effect doctrine is examined in euthanasia and abortion. In these two situations killing is a method of treatment. It is argued that the doctrine cannot apply to the care of the dying. Firstly, doctors are obliged to harm patients in order to do good to them. Secondly, patients should make their own value judgments about being mutilated or killed. Thirdly, there is little intuitive moral difference between direct and indirect killing. Nor can the doctrine apply (...) to abortion. Doctors kill fetuses as a means of treating the mother. They also kill them as an inevitable side effect of other treatment. Drawing a moral distinction between the direct and the indirect killing gives counterintuitive results. It is suggested that pragmatic rules, not ethics, govern practices around euthanasia and cause it to be more restricted than abortion. (shrink)

Review: Valentin A. Bazhanov, Brain — Culture — Society: Kantian Programme in Cognitive Science. Moscow: Kanon+ ROOI “Reabilitatsiya”, 2019, 288 pp.

Arrian is regarded as the most authoritative of the extant sources for the reign of Alexander the Great. It is his work that is usually chosen to provide the narrative core of modern histories, and very often a mere reference to ‘the reliable Arrian’ is considered sufficient to guarantee the veracity of the information derived from him. What gives Arrian his prestige is his reliance on contemporary sources, Ptolemy and Aristobulus. It is recognized that Arrian's narrative is based primarily upon (...) Ptolemy, and, as long as Ptolemy is regarded as an impeccable mine of facts for Alexander's reign and Arrian's work is accepted as a faithful reproduction of Ptolemy, the Anabasis Alexandri stands out as a uniquely authoritative record of Alexander's reign. (shrink)

Alexander's satrapal appointments in Syria have long been a focal point of scholarly dissension, for the relevant passages in the ancient sources are uniformly inconsistent and sometimes disconcertingly corrupt. A running debate continued until 1935, when Oscar Leuze presented a monumental survey of the ancient evidence together with exhaustive refutation of the hypotheses advanced by earlier scholars. Since then the problems of Syria under Alexander have been left virtually undisturbed, which is a pity. In the first place, Leuze's treatment is (...) not impregnable. His massive discussion tends to convince through sheer accumulation of argument rather than by the cogency of its logic, which can often be faulted. (shrink)

Concentrating on the thought of Canada's major scientists, philosophers, and clerics - men such as William Dawson and Daniel Wilson, John Watson and W.D. LeSeur, G.M. Grant and Salem Bland - A Disciplined Intelligence begins by reconstructing the central strands of intellectual and moral orthodoxy prevalent in Anglo-Canadian colleges on the eve of the Darwinian revolution. These include Scottish common sense philosophy and the natural theology of William Paley. The destructive impact of evolutionary ideas on that orthodoxy and the major (...) exponents of the new forms of social evolution - Spencerian and Hegelian alike - are examined in detail. By the twentieth century the centre of Anglo-Canadian thought had been transformed by what had become a new, evolutionary orthodoxy. The legacy of this triumphant intellectual movement, British idealism, was immense. It helped to destroy Protestant denominationalism, provide the philosophical core of the social gospel movement, and constitute a major force behind the creation of the United Church of Canada. Throughout the nineteenth century and continuing into the twentieth, however, the moral imperative in Anglo-Canadian thought remained a constant presence. (shrink)

English title: "The early literary education of the young José Gaos in Valencia (1915-1919)"Resumen: Nuestra intención en este texto es investigar acerca de los primeros años de formación del pensamiento de José Gaos (1900-1969); así pues, no parece ser demasiado erróneo pensar que aquél, hacia 1915 no era, aún, puramente “filosófico”: la Filosofía representaba parte de su formación, cumpliendo el mismo papel —eso sí: básico y fundamental— que desempeñó la Literatura. El primer auténtico encuentro con la Filosofía se daría antes (...) de su llegada a Valencia, en ese mismo año de 1915; pero ese también es el año en que Gaos recibirá una sólida formación estético-literaria a través de prensa y revistas filosóficas, especialmente en el grupo que conformó junto con Max Aub, José Medina Echeverría y su hermano Carlos Gaos. Abstract: This paper investigates in detail about the early years of José Gaos (1900-1969) and his education in philosophy and literature. Therefore, we know that their studies (academic or not) were not purely “philosophical” in 1915. Literature and philosophy played in Gaos an equally important role. The first real encounter with philosophy happens before he comes to Valencia in 1915; but in this year Gaos also receives a strong education, in aesthetic and literary, through press and philosophical journals, and especially within the group formed with Max Aub, José Medina Echeverría and his brother Carlos Gaos. Palabras clave: José Gaos, literatura, juventud, formación, Valencia. Keywords: José Gaos, literature, youth, education, Valencia. (shrink)

A new theory of particles proposed in an earlier paper is now applied to explain energy. Having earlier derived the Rydberg formula for atomic spectra without using the Pauli principle, the authors now derive the photoelectric effect, deflection of light by gravitation, and Planck's law for blackbody radiation without using Planck's assumption on energy quanta or Einstein's theory of general relativity.

A 4-space formulation of Dirac's equation gives results formally identical to those of the usual Klein paradox. However, some extra physical detail can be inferred, and this suggests that the most extreme case involves pair production within the potential barrier.