Awe arises when one experiences something so extraordinary that it defies current understanding, prompting efforts to comprehend the initially incomprehensible. We situate awe within Dubourg and Baumard's framework for the prevalence and psychological underpinnings of imaginary worlds. We argue that imaginary worlds are powerful catalysts of awe, which, in turn, drive important individual and social outcomes.

Linguists rely on intuitive conceptions of structure when comparing expressions and languages. In an algebraic presentation of a language, some natural notions of similarity can be rigorously defined (e.g. among elements of a language, equivalence w.r.t. isomorphisms of the language; and among languages, equivalence w.r.t. isomorphisms of symmetry groups), but it tums out that slightly more complex and nonstandard notions are needed to capture the kinds of comparisons linguists want to make. This paper identihes some of the important notions of (...) structural similarity, with attention to similarity claims that are prominent in the current linguistic tradition of transformational grammar. @ 2002 Elsevier Science B.V. All rights reserved. (shrink)

In lieu of an abstract, here is a brief excerpt of the content:Frederick J. Streng Book Award:An Interview with Harold Kasimow, John Keenan, and Linda KeenanHarold Kasimow, John P. Keenan, and Linda Klepinger KeenanThe recipient of the Frederick J. Streng Book of the Year Award for 2004 is Beside Still Waters: Jews, Christians, and the Way of the Buddha, edited by Harold Kasimow, John P. Keenan, and Linda Klepinger Keenan. This book provides the reader with a (...) combination of reflection on the creatively transformative power of interreligious dialogue and documentation of that creative transformation in the lives of committed Jews and Christians in dialogue with Buddhism. The bulk of this book consists of candid, autobiographical essays by seven Jewish and Christian scholars in the form of personal testimony, which, taken as a whole, presents an extended argument for the value of interfaith dialogue in general and Buddhist-Christian-Jewish dialogue in particular. The final section of the book consists of four essays written from sociological, Jewish, Christian, and Buddhist perspectives by authors who have read the primary essays and reflect on interreligious dialogue more broadly in light of their own particular experience and research.Those who read Beside Still Waters as seekers will find themselves in the company of fellow pilgrims on the Way who offer their particular life stories filled with focused insight and theological sophistication. The strength of this collection of essays is that it robustly displays Jewish and Christian encounter with Buddhism as a new direction that contemporary Buddhist-Christian dialogue as practiced within the Society for Buddhist-Christian Studies would do well to emulate.Buddhist-Christian Studies asked the editors a few questions.Buddhist-Christian Studies: Why did you write Beside Still Waters?John Keenan: Because Harold and I wanted to write a book together. Each of us is much involved in our own tradition as well as in the study and practice of Buddhism, and we wanted to show that this kind of encounter with another religious tradition does not mutate one's own identity. For this reason, we wanted contributors to speak out of their personal experience rather than to address the philosophical and doctrinal issues that are engendered by such interfaith encounters—although these issues should of course be addressed elsewhere.Harold Kasimow: Perhaps the following Hassidic tale best answers this question: "Rabbi Eizik, son of Rabbi Yekel, travels to Prague in search of treasure. He ultimately discovers, after meeting with a Christian, that the treasure is in fact buried [End Page 205] at his family's home back in Krakow. Thus it is a Christian who helps Rabbi Eizik to find the treasure in Judaism, to perceive more profoundly the depth and uniqueness of the Jewish tradition." This has been my own experience and is the reason why I was interested in writing this book together with people with whom I have a very strong karmic connection.Was it difficult to solicit and edit the contributors' essays?Linda Keenan: Not at all. With only one exception, everyone we contacted agreed to write an essay for the book. In one or two instances, we pushed for something more personal than was first submitted, and we were very pleased with the final collection.How did the three of you work together?HK: I often spoke to Linda over the phone, and John could speak to her in person, and Linda did all the work.LK: Harold and John conceived the idea and contacted potential contributors. The three of us consulted a great deal over the telephone and by e-mail. And Harold kept us on task at each stage of the book and has been its greatest promoter.JK: The above is accurate, but the book was written by the contributors.Is there anything you would have done differently if you could do it over? Any contributors you missed this time for one reason or another that you would recruit for a new edition?LK: We would not change what we did, but there are certainly many more Jews and Christians who could make excellent contributions to a new edition of the book. In fact, the most difficult thing was knowing so many people—including, among others, most of the membership of the... (shrink)

We discuss three varieties of affective dynamics ( affective instability, emotional inertia, and emotional differentiation). In each case, we suggest how these affective dynamics should be operationalized and measured in daily life using time-intensive methods, like ecological momentary assessment or ambulatory assessment, and recommend time-sensitive analyses that take into account not only the variability but also the temporal dependency of reports. Studies that explore how these affective dynamics are associated with psychological disorders and symptoms are reviewed, and we emphasize that (...) these affective processes are within a nexus of other components of emotion regulation. (shrink)

Philosophy and model theory frequently meet one another. Philosophy and Model Theory aims to understand their interactions -/- Model theory is used in every ‘theoretical’ branch of analytic philosophy: in philosophy of mathematics, in philosophy of science, in philosophy of language, in philosophical logic, and in metaphysics. But these wide-ranging appeals to model theory have created a highly fragmented literature. On the one hand, many philosophically significant mathematical results are found only in mathematics textbooks: these are aimed squarely at mathematicians; (...) they typically presuppose that the reader has a significant background in mathematics; and little clue is given as to their philosophical significance. On the other hand, the philosophical applications of these results are then scattered across disconnected pockets of papers, separated by decades or more. -/- The first aim of Philosophy and Model Theory, then, is to consider the philosophical uses of model theory. On a technical level, we try to show how philosophically significant results connect to one another, and also to state the best version of a result for philosophical purposes. On a philosophical level, we show how similar dialectical situations arise repeatedly, across fragmented debates in varied philosophical areas. -/- The second aim of Philosophy and Model Theory, though, is to consider the philosophy of model theory. Model theory itself is rarely taken as the subject matter of philosophising (contrast this, say, with the philosophy of biology, or the philosophy of set theory). But model theory is a beautiful part of pure mathematics, and worthy of philosophical study in its own right. (shrink)

This article argues that, in De Trinitate, Augustine’s ascent to God via a search for the Trinity is successful precisely because of the emphasis he places on the role of Christ in such an ascent. Unlike scholarship which reads this ascent as an exercise in Neoplatonism—whether as a success or as an intentional failure—this article asserts that Augustine successfully discovers an imago trinitatis in human beings by identifying the essential mediation of the temporal and eternal in the person of the (...) Incarnate Word. Of the work’s fifteen books, Books 4 and 13 focus extensively on the soteriological and epistemological role of Christ, who, in his humility, conquered the pride of the devil and reopened humanity’s way to eternity. The Christology in these books plays an important role in Augustine’s argument by allowing his ascent to move from self-knowledge to contemplation of God. Indeed, it is his understanding of the Christological perfection of the imago dei which allows Augustine to discover a genuine imago trinitatis in human beings. For Augustine, the imago is observable in humanity to the extent that an individual is conformed to Christ, the perfect image of the invisible God. Thus, it is only through Christ that a human being can successfully contemplate the Trinity in this imago. (shrink)

In lieu of an abstract, here is a brief excerpt of the content:ImagesSean P. Murphy (bio)[End Page 142] Click for larger view View full resolutionIMAGE: DIALECTICAL MATERIALISM, 2022 Acrylic paint on wood 8 x 8 x 1 inches[End Page 143] Click for larger view View full resolutionFORMALISM, 2022 Acrylic paint on wood 8 x 8 x 1 inches[End Page 3] Click for larger view View full resolutionNEW HISTORICISM, 2022 Acrylic paint on wood 8 x 8 x 1 inches[End Page 89] (...) Click for larger view View full resolutionDECONSTRUCTION, 2022 Acrylic paint on wood 8 x 8 x 1 inches[End Page 141]Sean P. Murphy Sean P. Murphy, PhD, MSN, PMHNPBC, is a Clinical Assistant Professor teaching in the University of Illinois Chicago's Psychiatric-Mental Health Nurse Practitioner doctoral program. He practices at university health and counseling centers, specializing in sexual and gender minority mental health, emerging adult populations, and trauma. Murphy holds a PhD in Literature, Cultural Theory, and Social Practice and was a tenured professor of English and Humanities prior to entering nursing. He uses visual art as a space to digest and metabolize emotions associated with clinical practice as well as to explore connections between the humanities, literary and critical theories, and science. Email: sean@murphynp.comCopyright © 2023 Cornell University... (shrink)

Roommate relationships are fundamental to the social environment of many emerging adults. However, no validated, widely used, measure of roommate relationship quality exists for examining the impact of these relationships on individual functioning and health. In this report, we present preliminary evidence of the factor structure, concurrent validity, and construct validity of the Roommate Relationship Scale as a measure of roommate relationship quality using a sample of U.S. college students who participated in a multi-wave study. An exploratory factor analysis at (...) the first wave, and confirmatory factor analyses with independent samples of new participants at each of two subsequent waves showed stable factor loadings and adequate fit. Moreover, the scale demonstrated good fit and reliability in a longitudinal multilevel CFA framework. The RRS significantly positively correlated with relationship length, self-esteem, extraversion, agreeableness, and conscientiousness, and negatively correlated with symptoms of anxiety and avoidant attachment style, indicating concurrent validity of the scale with respect to these constructs. Consistent with findings from other relationship types, self-reported RRS scores decrease longitudinally, both across and between semesters of academic life, indicating construct validity of the scale. We conclude that the RRS is useful for evaluating roommate relationship quality among U.S. college students, and hopefully beyond. Further research should validate the scale’s utility in other, more diverse, populations and refine its underlying generating psychological process. (shrink)

Examines the pleasures, perils, and promises of professing one's sexual identity.

Graphical AbstractA recent study reported that longevity in Caenorhabditits elegans can be inherited over several generations. This is probably achieved through the following epigenetic mechanism: inherited demethylated histones at some central loci, such as miRNA, transcription factors or signaling regulators affect the expression of certain genes leading to the longevity phenotype.

Genetic variability is considered a key to the evolvability of species. The conversion of an adenosine (A) to inosine (I) in primary RNA transcripts can result in an amino acid change in the encoded protein, a change in secondary structure of the RNA, creation or destruction of a splice consensus site, or otherwise alter RNA fate. Substantial transcriptome and proteome variability is generated by A‐to‐I RNA editing through site‐selective post‐transcriptional recoding of single nucleotides. We posit that this epigenetic source of (...) phenotypic variation is an unrecognized mechanism of adaptive evolution. The genetic variation introduced through editing occurs at low evolutionary cost since predominant production of the wild‐type protein is retained. This property even allows exploration of sequence space that is inaccessible through mutation, leading to increased phenotypic plasticity and provides an evolutionary advantage for acclimatization as well as long‐term adaptation. Furthermore, continuous probing for novel RNA editing sites throughout the transcriptome is an intrinsic property of the editing machinery and represents the molecular basis for increased adaptability. We propose that higher organisms have therefore evolved to systems with increasing RNA editing activity and, as a result, to more complex systems. (shrink)

BackgroundKinarm Standard Tests is a suite of upper limb tasks to assess sensory, motor, and cognitive functions, which produces granular performance data that reflect spatial and temporal aspects of behavior. We have previously used principal component analysis to reduce the dimensionality of multivariate data using the Kinarm End-Point Lab. Here, we performed PCA using data from the Kinarm Exoskeleton Lab, and determined agreement of PCA results across EP and EXO platforms in healthy participants. We additionally examined whether further dimensionality reduction (...) was possible by using PCA across behavioral tasks.MethodsHealthy participants were assessed using the Kinarm EXO and EP. Four behavioral tasks were performed that quantified arm sensory and motor function, including position sense [Arm Position Matching ] and three motor tasks [Visually Guided Reaching, Object Hit, and Object Hit and Avoid ]. The number of components to include per task was determined from scree plots and parallel analysis, and rotation type was decided on a per-task basis. To assess agreement, we compared principal components across platforms using distance correlation. We additionally considered inter-task interactions in EXO data by performing PCA across all six behavioral assessments.ResultsBy applying PCA on a per task basis to data collected using the EXO, the number of behavioral parameters were substantially reduced by 58–75% while accounting for 76–87% of the variance. These results compared well to the EP analysis, and we found good-to-excellent agreement values between PCs from the EXO and those from the EP. Finally, we were able to reduce the dimensionality of the EXO data across tasks down to 16 components out of a total of 76 behavioral parameters, which represents a reduction of 79% while accounting for 73% of the total variance.ConclusionPCA of Kinarm robotic assessment appears to capture similar relationships between kinematic features in healthy individuals and is agnostic to the robotic platform used for collection. Further work is needed to investigate the use of PCA-based data reduction for the characterization of neurological deficits in clinical populations. (shrink)

Cognitive control of physical activity and sedentary behavior is receiving increased attention in the neuroscientific and behavioral medicine literature as a means of better understanding and improving the self-regulation of physical activity. Enhancing individuals’ cognitive control capacities may provide a resilient means to increase physical activity and reduce sedentary behavior. First, this paper reviews emerging evidence of the antecedence of cognitive control abilities in successful self-regulation of physical activity, and in precipitating self-regulation failure that predisposes to sedentary behavior. We then (...) highlight the brain networks that may underpin the cognitive control and self-regulation of physical activity, including the default mode network, prefrontal cortical networks and brain regions and pathways associated with reward. We then discuss research on cognitive training interventions that document improved cognitive control and that suggest promise of influencing physical activity regulation. Key cognitive training components likely to be the most effective at improving self-regulation are also highlighted. The review concludes with suggestions for future research. (shrink)

Magnetic resonance imaging (MRI) can provide a number of measurements relevant to sport-related concussion (SRC) symptoms; however, most studies to date have used a single MRI modality and whole-brain exploratory analyses in attempts to localize concussion injury. This has resulted in highly variable findings across studies due to wide ranging symptomology, severity and nature of injury within studies. A multimodal MRI, symptom-guided region-of-interest (ROI) approach is likely to yield more consistent results. The functions of the cerebellum and basal ganglia transcend (...) many common concussion symptoms, and thus these regions, plus the white matter tracts that connect or project from them, constitute plausible ROIs for MRI analysis. We performed diffusion tensor imaging (DTI), resting-state functional MRI, quantitative susceptibility mapping (QSM), and cerebral blood flow (CBF) imaging using arterial spin labeling (ASL), in youth aged 12-18 years following SRC, with a focus on the cerebellum, basal ganglia and white matter tracts. Compared to controls similar in age, sex and sport (N= 20), recent SRC youth (N= 29; MRI at 8 ± 3 days post injury) exhibited increased susceptibility in the cerebellum (p= 0.032), decreased functional connectivity between the caudate and each of the pallidum (p= 0.035) and thalamus (p= 0.021), and decreased diffusivity in the mid-posterior corpus callosum (p< 0.038); no changes were observed in recovered asymptomatic youth (N= 16; 41 ± 16 days post injury). For recent symptomatic-only SRC youth (N= 24), symptom severity was associated with increased susceptibility in the superior cerebellar peduncles (p= 0.011) and reduced activity in the cerebellum (p= 0.013). Fewer days between injury and MRI were associated with reduced cerebellar-parietal functional connectivity (p< 0.014), reduced activity of the pallidum (p= 0.002), increased CBF in the caudate (p= 0.005), and reduced diffusivity in the central corpus callosum (p< 0.05). Youth SRC is associated with acute cerebellar inflammation accompanied by reduced cerebellar activity and cerebellar-parietal connectivity, as well as structural changes of the middle regions of the corpus callosum accompanied by functional changes of the caudate, all of which resolve with recovery. Early MRI post-injury is important to establish objective MRI-based indicators for concussion diagnosis, recovery assessment and prediction of outcome. (shrink)

In lieu of an abstract, here is a brief excerpt of the content:Buddhist-Christian Studies 22 (2002) 139-147 [Access article in PDF] A Mahayana Theology of Salvation History John P. Keenan Middlebury College Salvation history is a Western theological strategy based on biblical ideas about how God acts in history to bring about the salvation/deliverance of God's people. It begins with the scriptural accounts of creation as the inception of God's plan. It moves to describe Israel's deliverance from slavery in (...) Egypt and goes on to depict the guidance the Lord Yahweh provides for his people throughout their journeys and despite their trials and reverses.Israel may be idealized in scripture as God's domain, sovereign among the nations, but in fact it was a small country sandwiched between the two superpowers of the day—Egypt and Assyria (or Babylon), and subject to the rise and fall of those empires. 1 The New Testament goes on to describe God's plan in sending his son Jesus to effect salvation and unite all people in him (Eph. 1:1-16). The passion, death, and resurrection of Jesus comprise the central drama, in which we all are invited to participate. The author of Luke/Acts gives an account of how God moves through the teachings and the life and death of Jesus to establish his Church and how that Church evolves from a small and marginal community to enter and permeate the very heart of the Empire at Rome. The story continues in postscriptural Christian history, from Constantine's vision at Milvian Bridge to the Christianization of Europe, and further to the missionary endeavors to convert all peoples to the path of the Gospel. In the twentieth century, Liberation theology is heir to these notions, insisting that conversion means not simply becoming Christian, but the furtherance of justice and peace among all peoples, even non-Christians.A Mahayana reading of this schema is not at first glance very promising. Mahayana knows nothing of God, much less of God acting in history. Nor, indeed, of history itself as a purposeful unfolding of events. Indian thought is known for its ahistoricity. No histories were produced in ancient India at all. No Herodotus, no Thucydides. The first Buddhist histories were written not in India but in Tibet, some thousand years after the birth of the Buddha Sakyamuni. Indian traditions in their focus on the eternal truth (sanatana dharma) turned away from the concrete flow of events and from any recording of their progression. [End Page 139]The task before us is challenging. To tackle it best, I will divide this essay into three parts, and thus attempt to argue for a Mahayana reading of salvation history. The first part will treat Mahayana philosophy and argue that despite its Indian lack of historical consciousness, it does possess the tools for writing history. Its teaching that all events are empty (sunyata) is coterminous with its teaching that all events arise in dependence upon a host of causes and conditions (pratitya-samutpada). In a word, emptiness itself entails a radical insight into the contingent and conventional historicity of events (dharmas). Beyond this, since all events are seen as empty of any abiding core essence, Mahayana deconstructs the very idea of an eternal world truth over and apart from the everyday world of events. It proclaims, rather, that to an awakened person, all is "worldly convention-only" (samvrti-matra). 2 This focus on the radical conventionality of events can serve, I would argue, as a needed corrective to a literalistic reading of salvation history. Looked at from this perspective, the story of the New Testament writers can perhaps become more apparent—how they are writing of God's design, purpose, and plan in order to counter the regnant patterns of Greek and Roman arrogance, and to substitute insight into the mystery of our being and of our being here.The second part of this article will address the Western doctrine of salvation history, focusing on the New Testament, particularly Pauline theology as expressed in one passage from Ephesians about how salvation is attained through Jesus as the unfolding plan of God's purpose... (shrink)

On one popular view, the general covariance of gravity implies that change is relational in a strong sense, such that all it is for a physical degree of freedom to change is for it to vary with regard to a second physical degree of freedom. At a quantum level, this view of change as relative variation leads to a fundamentally timeless formalism for quantum gravity. Here, we will show how one may avoid this acute ‘problem of time’. Under our view, (...) duration is still regarded as relative, but temporal succession is taken to be absolute. Following our approach, which is presented in more formal terms in, it is possible to conceive of a genuinely dynamical theory of quantum gravity within which time, in a substantive sense, remains. 1 Introduction1.1 The problem of time1.2 Our solution2 Understanding Symmetry2.1 Mechanics and representation2.2 Freedom by degrees2.3 Voluntary redundancy3 Understanding Time3.1 Change and order3.2 Quantization and succession4 Time and Gravitation4.1 The two faces of classical gravity4.2 Retaining succession in quantum gravity5 Discussion5.1 Related arguments5.2 Concluding remarks. (shrink)

In lieu of an abstract, here is a brief excerpt of the content:The Prospects for a Mahāyāna Theology of EmptinessA Continuing DebateJohn P. KeenanTwo articles in recent issues of Buddhist-Christian Studies—Lai Pan-chiu’s “A Mahāyāna Reading of Chalcedon Christology: A Chinese Response to John Keenan” 1 (2004) and Thomas Cattoi’s “What Has Chalcedon to Do with Lhasa? John Keenan’s and Lai Pan-chiu’s Reflections on Classical Christology and the Possible Shape of a Tibetan Theology of Incarnation” 2 (2008)—discuss my book (...) The Meaning of Christ: A Mahāyāna Theology (1989),3 prompting me to add my voice to the conversation.In “A Mahāyāna Reading of Chalcedon Christology: A Chinese Response to John Keenan,” Lai Pan-chiu reads from the perspective of a Chinese Christian thinker my formulation of a Christology informed by Indian Mahāyāna philosophy. He would prefer to configure a rather different Mahāyāna theology, wherein the polarity expressed in traditional Chalcedonian theology would be reinvested in a Chinese Mahāyāna dynamic, with its ability to hold in creative tension what are often seen as exclusionary opposites. Lai proposes to take as leitmotif for this project the Chinese Mahāyāna theme of Buddha Nature (C. fóxìng ) and its Indian precursor of Tathāgatagarbha (Skt. “matrix of the Buddha”) thought. Although—for reasons I will discuss below—I would not myself choose this approach in writing Christology for a western audience, I certainly would commend Lai Pan-chiu’s effort to do so for a Chinese audience and beyond.In “What Has Chalcedon to Do with Lhasa? John Keenan’s and Lai Pan-chiu’s Reflections on Classical Christology and the Possible Shape of a Tibetan Theology of Incarnation,” Thomas Cattoi contends that Lai has not gone far enough in responding to The Meaning of Christ. Cattoi himself then proceeds with a critique of Mahāyāna theology that reveals both his own unwavering commitment to traditional ontological theology and his apparent disinterest in engaging Buddhist Mahāyāna philosophy in depth. He makes little or no reference to the Mahāyāna philosophical themes that I discuss in detail in The Meaning of Christ—themes that I then employ to enunciate a Mahāyāna Christology. Moreover, the alternative “Tibetan Christology” that Cattoi proffers in this article also appears to avoid any deep or detailed engagement [End Page 3] with Mahāyāna thought. He seems satisfied to employ Tibetan Buddhist terminology simply to reaffirm what we have long affirmed in the Greek, emphasizing the embodiment of Christ as the unicum, the one and only embodiment of God, and the transformation of the very fabric of the universe effected thereby.4 His Christology functions as a description of that transformation and, to my lights, leaves scant room for any Trinitarian theology of the Spirit. He argues against the notion that any discourse can empty the ontological claims of “the Christian position.” For him, only the ontological theology of our Greek ancestors is adequate—apparently culturally privileged because providentially inspired.I will address herein some of the many, often convoluted, issues raised, for these issues are basic to Mahāyāna theology and to critiques against its viability. I choose not to detail the many instances in which Thomas Cattoi misreads, mischaracterizes, and misrepresents my work; I must only trust that those who have read The Meaning of Christ are well aware that Cattoi’s characterizations of that book reflect neither its content nor its tone.5 I shall use this space instead to further clarify the shape of a Mahāyāna theology that employs the principal themes of Mādhyamika and Yogācāra, and will discuss in a more general way Cattoi’s fundamental inattentiveness to those themes and to the manner in which they inform Mahāyāna theology.6 I shall also discuss Lai Pan-chiu’s very interesting proposal for a Chinese Mahāyāna theology.Ontology and MahĀyĀna Realms of UnderstandingMahāyāna theology is not Cattoi’s “Mādhyamika dualism.”7 Mahāyāna theology does not represent a Buddhist “position,” but rather the emptiness of all... (shrink)

In lieu of an abstract, here is a brief excerpt of the content:A Mahāyāna Theology of the Real Presence of Christ in the EucharistJohn P. KeenanMahāyāna theology is an approach to thinking about the Christian faith within the philosophical context of the great Mahāyāna Buddhist thinkers: philosophers of emptiness such as Nāgārjuna, Āryadeva, and Candrakīrti in the Mādhyamika tradition; and philosophers of consciousness such as Maitreya, Asaçga,Vasubandhu, Sthiramati, Paramārtha, and Hsūan-tsang in theYogācāra tradition. The advantage of employing Mahāyāna philosophy in (...) the doing of Christian theology is that this philosophical tradition developed with the dual purpose of supporting and encouraging faith and practice while eliminating absolutist claims for metaphysically fixed and unalterable ideas.Mahāyāna is deconstructive without any of the aloofness that modern French philosophers apparently feel they must adopt vis-à-vis theology and the Church. Just as Plato did for the Fathers of the early church and Aristotle did for Aquinas, Mahāyāna opens avenues of thought and questioning for contemporary theologians that will gift our cultures with the grace of new theological insight into the meaning of Christ's presence to and among human beings.And so I would like to do some theology here, demonstrating how a Mahāyāna thinker like myself might envisage the real presence of Jesus in the Eucharist.The Real Presence of ChristThe theology of the real presence of Jesus in the Eucharist has had a long and fascinating development. For the first eight centuries, the issue did not arise with any doctrinal insistence.1 Christians were content to see Christ's presence in the performance of the Eucharistic rite as a medicine of immortality that would heal their souls and embody for them the reality of the risen Christ. It was only later, in the condemnation of the theologian Ratramnus2 and the development of the doctrine of transubstantiation, that the classical formulation took shape.3 That doctrine was expressed in philosophic terms that were then current, concepts that were accepted as clear and valid frameworks for thinking.Medieval theologians, especially the great St. Thomas Aquinas in the thirteenth [End Page 89] century, had just rediscovered Aristotle and gloried in the subtle intricacies and vast overviews that this "new" learning provided them.4 They philosophized by seeking insight into and defining the very act of existence itself, discussing the "essences," or "substances" of things as the underlying realities that we encounter in our life and in our faith. In this view, Christ "subsists"—that is, he really exists—as the substance of the bread and wine in the Eucharist. This is the philosophic view that is stressed even today in the Roman Catholic Church. Modern Catholic theologian Bernard Cooke explains the real presence of Christ in the Eucharist as follows:Christ bespeaks in the action of the Mass the presence of his own risen body beneath the appearance of food and drink. He effects this by changing the inner reality (the "substance") of the bread and wine into his risen humanity. This is the unique change that the Church has for centuries called transubstantiation—the change of the substance of the bread into the substance of Christ's risen body. Before the transubstantiation in the Mass, the inner reality (the substance) of the bread and wine is what sustains the external appearances in existence. These appearances tell us of the presence of the inner reality of bread and wine (which itself is not visible). After the transubstantiation, the risen humanity of Christ is what sustains these external appearances in existence. Consequently, they now tell us of the presence of Christ.5The disputes about the real presence of Christ in the Eucharist hinged precisely on this issue—what is the inner reality of the sacrament? Another scholar of these arguments, Francis Clarke, writes:All the Eucharistic controversies... hinge upon one question: What is the substance of the sacrament? "If we did once agree in that, the whole controversy [concerning the sacrifice] would soon be at an end," for the answer to that question decides "whether Christ's body be there offered indeed unto the heavenly Father by the... (shrink)

We illustrate a novel conception of linguistic invariant which applies to grammars of different natural languages even though they may use different categories and have difl'erent rules. We illustrate formally how semantically defined notions, such as "is an anaphor" may be invariant in all linguistically motivated grammars, and we show that individual morphemes, such as case markers, may be invariant in grammars that have them in exactly the same sense in which properties, such as "is a Verb Phrase" or relations (...) such as "is a constituent of". (shrink)

When behaviors assemble into combinations, then synergies have a central role in the discovery of productive patterns of behavior. In our view—what we call the Synergy Emergence Principle (SEP)—synergies are dynamic attractors, drawing interactions toward greater returns as they happen, in the moment. This Principle offers an alternative to the two conventionally acknowledged routes to discovery: directed problem solving, involving forethought and planning; and the complete randomness of trial and error. Natural selection has a role in the process, in humans (...) favoring the maintenance and improvement of certain key underlying capabilities, such as prosocial helping and episodic foresight, but selection is not required for discovery by synergy (which occurs too rapidly for selection anyway). Here we discuss the consequences of the SEP for the evolution in humans of key synergies such as tool usage and interactions that reward cooperation, show how discovery by synergy and the selection of synergy-supporting abilities formed a positive feedback loop, and show how synergies can combine, forming clusters and packages that are the core of institutions and cultures. Finally, clusters and packages represent an intermediate level of organization above the individual and below whole society, with consequences for our understanding of the major transitions in evolution. (shrink)