Clark1880, WGS1984, and ITRF08 are the reference systems used in Iraq. The ITRF08 and WGS84 represent the global reference frames. In the majority of instances, the transformation from one coordinate system to another is required. The ability of the artificial neural network to identify the connection between two coordinate systems without the need for a mathematical model is one of its most significant benefits. In this study, an ANN was employed for two-dimensional coordinate transformation from local Clark1880 to the global (...) reference system ITRF08. To accomplish so, 68 stations with known coordinates in both systems were utilized in this research and were split into two groups: the first set of data was used as the training data and the second set of data was used as the validation data. A root-mean-square error was used to examine the performance of each transformation. The results showed that the RMSE using the ANN was 0.08 m in the east and 0.17 m in the north. The results indicated that the ANN can be used for 2D coordinate transformation with the results that are better than those of the authorized techniques such as 2D conformal transformation and 2D conformal least square. (shrink)

Abstract: Background: In spite of the fact that computers continue to improve in speed and functions operation, they remain complex to use. Problems frequently happen, and it is hard to resolve or find solutions for them. This paper outlines the significance and feasibility of building a desktop PC problems diagnosis system. The system gathers problem symptoms from users’ desktops, rather than the user describes his/her problems to primary search engines. It automatically searches global databases of problem symptoms and solutions, and (...) also allows ordinary users to contribute exact problem reports in a structured manner. Objectives: The main goal of this Knowledge Based System is to get the suitable problem desktop PC symptoms and the correct way to solve the errors. Methods: In this paper the design of the proposed Knowledge Based System which was produced to help users of desktop PC in knowing many of the problems and error such as : Power supply problems, CPU errors, RAM dumping error, hard disk errors and bad sectors and suddenly restarting PC. The proposed Knowledge Based System presents an overview about desktop PC hardware errors are given, the cause of fault are outlined and the solution to the problems whenever possible is given out. CLIPS Knowledge Based System language was used for designing and implementing the proposed expert system. Results: The proposed PC desktop troubleshooting Knowledge Based System was evaluated by IT students and they were satisfied with its performance. (shrink)

Buildings energy consumption is growing gradually and put away around 40% of total energy use. Predicting heating and cooling loads of a building in the initial phase of the design to find out optimal solutions amongst different designs is very important, as ell as in the operating phase after the building has been finished for efficient energy. In this study, an artificial neural network model was designed and developed for predicting heating and cooling loads of a building based on a (...) dataset for building energy performance. The main factors for input variables are: relative compactness, roof area, overall height, surface area, glazing are a, wall area, glazing area distribution of a building, orientation, and the output variables: heating and cooling loads of the building. The dataset used for training are the data published in the literature for various 768 residential buildings. The model was trained and validated, most important factors affecting heating load and cooling load are identified, and the accuracy for the validation was 99.60%. (shrink)

The study aimed at measuring the dominant pattern of leadership and its relation to the performance of the administrative staff in the Palestinian universities. The study community consists of all the administrative staff from Al-Azhar University and the Islamic University, and through the census of the study society it was found to consist of (655) administrative staff. In order to achieve the objectives of the study, the researchers used the method of random sample in the study, and the study was (...) conducted on a sample of (221) administrative staff of the surveyed universities and the response rate was (82.35%). The study found that there is a high degree of satisfaction with the Dominant Pattern of Leadership in the Palestinian universities in Gaza Strip from the point of view of the administrative staff, which reached (71.67%). There is a high level of performance from the point of view of administrative staff, with a percentage of (82.53%). There is a direct correlation between the dominant pattern of leadership and the functional Performance of Administrative Staff, the absence of differences between the sample according to the gender variable in their perception of the dominant pattern of leadership and the functional Performance of Administrative Staff, the absence of differences in the perception of employees of the dominant pattern of leadership and the functional Performance of Administrative Staff depending on the age variable. There are differences of statistical significance according to the variable of scientific qualification in the Dominant Pattern of Leadership, while there were no differences in performance, the differences in the dominant pattern of leadership according to the scientific qualification were in favor of those who obtained the diploma degree compared to other practical qualifications, the absence of differences in the perception of employees of the dominant pattern of leadership and the functional Performance of Administrative Staff depending on the variable years of service, the absence of differences in the perception of employees of the dominant pattern of leadership and the functional Performance of Administrative Staff depending on the variable level of career (Director, Head of Department, and Administrative Officer). There were differences in the perception of workers to the dominant pattern of leadership depending on the variable of the workplace, where there were differences in favor of workers in deanships and colleges compared with the workers in the technical departments. While there were no differences in job performance according to the workplace variable, the existence of differences in the perception of workers to the dominant pattern of leadership depending on the university in which they work in favor of the Islamic University and the absence of differences in performance between the Islamic University and Al-Azhar University. The study reached a number of recommendations, the most important of which is that the interest of the managements of the Palestinian universities in improving the dominant pattern of leadership, to give universities the opportunity to participate in decision-making, the continued administration of universities interest and continuous improvement of the performance of its employees, enhance the periodic evaluation of job performance and to inform employees and express their opinion, solving workers' problems and giving them the opportunity to contribute to solving their own problems, the use of the staff rotation method periodically and strengthening the democratic the dominant pattern of leadership and empowering university staff. -/- . (shrink)

We present a survey of the recent applications of continuous domains for providing simple computational models for classical spaces in mathematics including the real line, countably based locally compact spaces, complete separable metric spaces, separable Banach spaces and spaces of probability distributions. It is shown how these models have a logical and effective presentation and how they are used to give a computational framework in several areas in mathematics and physics. These include fractal geometry, where new results on existence and (...) uniqueness of attractors and invariant distributions have been obtained, measure and integration theory, where a generalization of the Riemann theory of integration has been developed, and real arithmetic, where a feasible setting for exact computer arithmetic has been formulated. We give a number of algorithms for computation in the theory of iterated function systems with applications in statistical physics and in period doubling route to chaos; we also show how efficient algorithms have been obtained for computing elementary functions in exact real arithmetic. (shrink)

1. Ḥāshīyat al-Ṣabbān ʻalá al-Sharḥ al-Ṣaghīr lil-Mullawī ʻalá al-Sullam al-murawnaq -- 2. Taqrīrāt Ḥasan ibn Riḍwān al-Ḥusaynī.

Last year marked a decade since the publication of the book “Islamic Biomedical Ethics” by religious studies professor Abdulaziz Sachedina in which he called for a critical and rigorous analytical approach to the ethical inquiry of biomedical issues from an Islamic perspective. Since the publication of this landmark work, some authors have continued to call into question the ways in which Islam as a religious tradition is engaged with in the secular bioethics literature. This paper describes common argumentative issues with (...) current Islamic bioethics scholarship and offers general pearls and strategies to facilitate better engagement with religious approaches to bioethical issues. (shrink)

In international politics, bridging the gap between the real and knowledge poses a persistent challenge as translating the real into concepts and narratives can nurture the epistemic fallacy. Critical realism addresses this by separating ontology from epistemology at the meta-theoretical level, yet in practical research, critical realism tends to impose assumptions about the ontological complexity of the real at the transcendental level. This paper examines the practical difficulty of overcoming the epistemic fallacy in International Relations inquiries, asserting that critical realism (...) does not effectively guide practical inquiries in separating ontology from epistemology at a methodological level. Despite the meta-theoretical separation, research inquiries can remain theory-laden and epistemically dependent. The solution lies in problematizing ontological presentation, and sustaining critique at the discursive level on International Relations theories, methodologies, and implications. This approach maintains a critical focus on ontological aspects at the practical level to deal with the challenge of the epistemic fallacy. (shrink)

This study investigates the association of a broad set of variables with the ethical decision making of management accountants in Libya. Adopting a cross-sectional methodology, a questionnaire including four different ethical scenarios was used to gather data from 229 participants. For each scenario, ethical decision making was examined in terms of the recognition, judgment and intention stages of Rest’s model. A significant relationship was found between ethical recognition and ethical judgment and also between ethical judgment and ethical intention, but ethical (...) recognition did not significantly predict ethical intention—thus providing support for Rest’s model. Organizational variables, age and educational level yielded few significant results. The lack of significance for codes of ethics might reflect their relative lack of development in Libya, in which case Libyan companies should pay attention to their content and how they are supported, especially in the light of the under-development of the accounting profession in Libya. Few significant results were also found for gender, but where they were found, males showed more ethical characteristics than females. This unusual result reinforces the dangers of gender stereotyping in business. Personal moral philosophy and moral intensity dimensions were generally found to be significant predictors of the three stages of ethical decision making studied. One implication of this is to give more attention to ethics in accounting education, making the connections between accounting practice and Islam. Overall, this study not only adds to the available empirical evidence on factors affecting ethical decision making, notably examining three stages of Rest’s model, but also offers rare insights into the ethical views of practising management accountants and provides a benchmark for future studies of ethical decision making in Muslim majority countries and other parts of the developing world. (shrink)

There has been growing consensus to develop relevant guidance to improve the ethical review of global health policy and systems research and address the current absence of formal ethics guidance.

The market relationships are being contested. This can be seen in the increasing number of alternative social experiments in the ‘North’ and the ‘South’ which propose to think out the present market relationships in a different way, in particular in establishing exchange value and in facilitating access to trade. These practical alternatives are supported by trends in academic circles that over the past three decades have opposed neoliberal capitalism and individualism in today's commercialised society. Calling for greater solidarity and social (...) justice in economic relationships, in particular, partisans of social and solidarity economics, identifying with these trends, demand new forms of exchange. The objective of this article is to re-examine these demands. What exactly do the SSE mean by ‘solidarity’ and ‘solidarity-based economy'? We would like to trace the contours of this theoretical and political project and to assess the practicability of the proposed alternative to neoliberal capitalism. (shrink)

Moral distress is a fundamental problem in the nursing profession that affects nurses. Critical care nurses are more susceptible to this problem due to the nature of their work. Moral distress may, in turn, lead to several undesirable consequences. This study aimed to determine the relationship between moral distress and intention to leave the ward among critical care nurses. This descriptive-correlational study was conducted by census method on all eligible nurses who worked in Coronary Care Unit and Intensive Care Unit (...) of AhVaz hospitals, Iran. Data was collected by Corley’s moral distress questionnaire and a researcher-made questionnaire to investigate the intention to leave the ward. Questionnaires were completed through self-report and data were analyzed using a t-test and Pearson correlation coefficient. The results showed that there was a direct association between moral distress and intension to leave the ward in critical care nurses. Also, the intensity of moral distress and the intention to leave the ward were significantly higher in ICU nurses. Given the high exposure of critical care nurses with moral distress and its association with leaving the ward, it seems that devising strategies to reduce or control moral distress and its negative consequences are necessary, particularly in ICU nurses. (shrink)

The present study examined how the pre-war debate of the US decision to invade Iraq (in March 2003) was discursively constructed in the US/British mainstream newspaper opinion/editorial (op/ed) argumentation. Drawing on theoretical insights from critical discourse analysis and argumentation theory, I problematised the fallacious discussion used in the pro-war op/eds to build up a ‘moral/legal case’ for war on Iraq based on adversarial (rather than dialogical) argumentation. The proponents of war deployed ‘instrumental rationality’ (ends-justify-means reasoning), ‘ethical necessity’ (Bush’s ‘Preemption Doctrine’) (...) and ‘humanitarian virtue’ (the bombing of Iraq to ‘save’ Iraqis from Saddam’s pestilent tyranny) to justify the pending invasion of Iraq. Their arguments intertextually resonated with Bush administration’s ‘war on terror’ rhetoric in a way that created a form of indexical association through ‘recontextualisation’. The type of arguments marshalled by the pro-war op/ed commentators uncritically bolstered the set of US official ‘truth claims’ and ‘presuppositions’. (shrink)

In recent years, scholars have sought to investigate the impact that ethical leaders can have within organisations. Yet, only a few theoretical perspectives have been adopted to explain how ethical leaders influence subordinate outcomes. This study therefore draws on social rules theory (SRT) to extend our understanding of the mechanisms linking ethical leadership to employee attitudes. We argue that ethical leaders reduce disengagement, which in turn promotes higher levels of job satisfaction and organisational commitment, as well as lower turnover intentions. (...) Co-worker social undermining is examined as a moderator of the relationship between ethical leadership and disengagement, as we suggest that it is difficult for ethical leaders to be effective when co-worker undermining prevails. To test the proposed model, questionnaires were administered to 460 nurses in Romanian hospital settings over three time points separated by two-week intervals and the hypotheses were tested using generalised multilevel structural equation modeling (GSEM) with STATA. The findings revealed that ethical leadership has a beneficial effect on employee attitudes by reducing disengagement. However, the relationship between ethical leadership and disengagement was moderated by co-worker social undermining, such that when undermining was higher, the significance of the mediated relationships disappeared. These results suggest that while ethical leaders can promote positive employee attitudes, their effectiveness is reduced in situations where co-worker undermining exists. (shrink)

We revisit the flight-to-quality and flight-from-quality occurrences vis-à-vis the stock-bond nexus across differing investment time scales in the COVID-19 era, using a novel technique hinged on a denoised frequency-domain transfer entropy. Our findings divulge that flights, both FTQ and FFQ, could be attained during stress periods. Generally, in the intermediate term of the COVID-19 pandemic, both Islamic and conventional bonds could act as safe havens, diversifiers, and hedges for international equities, and the same could be observed for international equities. We (...) reiterate empirically that flights may improve the financial system’s stability and robustness by allowing diversity to be effective when it is most required. The findings have financial and portfolio implications for investors considering how to deploy their investments in the COVID-19 era. Our findings may impact policymakers’ responses to changes in various asset classes, allowing them to better monitor financial markets and adjust macroeconomic policies. (shrink)

Programming artificial intelligence to make fairness assessments of texts through top-down rules, bottom-up training, or hybrid approaches, has presented the challenge of defining cross-cultural fairness. In this paper a simple method is presented which uses vectors to discover if a verb is unfair or fair. It uses already existing relational social ontologies inherent in Word Embeddings and thus requires no training. The plausibility of the approach rests on two premises. That individuals consider fair acts those that they would be willing (...) to accept if done to themselves. Secondly, that such a construal is ontologically reflected in Word Embeddings, by virtue of their ability to reflect the dimensions of such a perception. These dimensions being: responsibility vs. irresponsibility, gain vs. loss, reward vs. sanction, joy vs. pain, all as a single vector. The paper finds it possible to quantify and qualify a verb as fair or unfair by calculating the cosine similarity of the said verb’s embedding vector against FairVec—which represents the above dimensions. We apply this to Glove and Word2Vec embeddings. Testing on a list of verbs produces an F1 score of 95.7, which is improved to 97.0. Lastly, a demonstration of the method’s applicability to sentence measurement is carried out. (shrink)

This study explains risk transfer, associated with debt-basedfinancing, as the main cause of financial crises in the world. It presents the casefor a financial architecture based on risk sharing that, in turn, is likely to makethe financial system less fragile and more stable. This study also highlights thesignificance of Islamic finance in this regard.

This paper deals with the comparison of students' misbehaviours in Turkish and English primary classrooms. A field study was conducted in order to discern students' misbehaviours based on students' age, gender, time of day, seating arrangement, types of learning activities and subject matter. Semi-structured in-depth interview and systematic classroom observation were used to collect data from two different cultural contexts. Participants in this study were 20 primary school teachers. The results show that there are differences and similarities between Turkish and (...) English primary classrooms in terms of the causes and types of students' misbehaviours. Certain misbehaviours that are caused by different cultural and educational contexts are frequently observed either in English or in Turkish classrooms. (shrink)

The study aimed to know the relationship between the nature of the work and the type of communication among the Employees in the Palestinian universities. A comparative study between Al-Azhar University and Al-Aqsa University. The researchers used the analytical descriptive method through a questionnaire that is randomly distributed among the employees of Al-Azhar and Al-Aqsa universities in Gaza Strip. The study was conducted on a sample of (176) administrative employees from the surveyed universities. The response rate was (85.79%). The study (...) reached a number of results, the most important of which is that there is a high degree of satisfaction with the nature of work prevailing in the Palestinian universities in Gaza Strip from the point of view of the administrative staff, where the percentage was (68.15%). There is an Mean level of communication from the point of view of administrative staff, with a percentage of (67.50%). There is a direct correlation between the nature of the work and the prevailing pattern of communication. There is an absence of differences between the sample according to the gender variable in their perception of the nature of work and the prevailing pattern of communication. There is an absence of differences in the perception of Employees nature of work and the pattern of communication prevailing depending on the variables (age, years of service, job level, and university). There are statistically significant differences between Al-Azhar University and Al-Aqsa University in favor of Al-Azhar University. The study reached a number of recommendations, the most important of which is that the interest of the management of the Palestinian universities in Gaza Strip in general, and Al-Aqsa and Al-Azhar Universities in particular should be provided with a good nature of work and communication. There is a need for continuing the management of universities to pay attention and continuous improvement of the performance of employees. There is an importance of solving the problems of Employees and giving them the opportunity to contribute to solving their own problems. Staff rotation should be used periodically and the need to strengthen the democratic leadership style and empower university Employees. (shrink)

The declining influence of religious approaches to bioethical issues in academic medical discourse has been increasingly evident over recent decades. Most bioethical scholarship today is dominated...

Many practices available for use in health service psychology are ineffective or harmful. How we describe these practices is important to scientific discourse and science communication with policy-makers and the general public. The label “pseudoscience” is typically applied in these cases, though the meaning of pseudoscience varies widely creating a quagmire for transparent and accurate communication. To clarify this issue, we review several prominent definitions of pseudoscience as well as consider how the term is used amongst psychology scholars and science-communicators. (...) We define two additional terms adapted from the medical literature, contemporary and alternative psychotherapies and low-value practices, and discuss their strengths and limitations. Finally, we recommend the broader category of low-value practices for use due to its definitional clarity, lack of competing definitions, and potential for clarifying research programs. (shrink)

The issue of the employment of graduates in Algeria was born with the decoupling between training and employment in the state public sector. She became very acute in the late 80s with the transition to economic liberalism and is the subject of a new employment policy for at least twenty years. In this context, the reform of higher education introduced in 2004 under the name of “LMD reform” aims to “modernize” higher education and training to match the needs of employers. (...) This article specifically examines the devices to youth employment implemented by various government departments and the implementation of the “LMD”, especially in view of using it is supposed to provide young graduates to better be inserted in the labor market. (shrink)

Women entrepreneurs innovate, initiate, engage, and run business enterprises to contribute the domestic development. Women entrepreneurs think and start taking risks of operating enterprises and combine various factors involved in production to deal with the uncertain business environment. Entrepreneurship and technological innovation play a crucial role in developing the economy by creating job opportunities, improving skills, and executing new ideas. It has a significant impact on the income of the household. The study focused on investigating the role of women’s entrepreneurship (...) and innovation technologies in contributing to household income in the challenging situation of the pandemic COVID-19. The paper emphasized identifying the determinants of female entrepreneurial contribution toward household income. This study collected data from selected rural and urban areas of district Faisalabad through a self-administered questionnaire. Investigators interviewed female entrepreneurs and chose them through the snowball sampling technique from a population of purposively selected female-run businesses. Interviews were conducted with women entrepreneurs to gather relevant information for the survey investigation at their workplaces and home. The effects of various factors, including age, education, family size, income from other sources, time allocated to entrepreneurial activity, firm size, and location were estimated empirically using an ordered logit model. The study findings exhibited a positive and significant role of respondents’ education, family size, time allocated to entrepreneurial activities, and firm size. The survey outcomes also indicated that the contribution of entrepreneurial income to household income in the rural areas is significantly higher than that in urban areas. This study signifies that regulations against gender discrimination in public and private institutions are helpful. Besides, encouraging an environment for entrepreneurial culture among women in the country would increase family income. The study’s findings and policy implications directly link to Sustainable Development Goal 5 of Gender Equality and SDG 8 related to decent work and economic growth. (shrink)

ObjectivesThe emergence of the COVID-19 pandemic worsened Lebanon’s economic situation and generated worries about living conditions. This study aimed to explain personal economic worries patterns among Lebanese young adults while accounting for demographics and mental health characteristics.MethodsA total sample of 988 Lebanese responses were collected, using an online survey. The analysis was conducted using regression-based methods.ResultsMen exhibited higher economic worries than women. Lower levels of economic worries among people with higher wages were more pronounced. Lebanese retirees experience the highest economic (...) worries compared to other employment status groups. Individuals with higher life satisfaction are less concerned about the economy. Mental wellbeing factors were positively associated with personal economic worries.ConclusionThe current study presents a seminal insight into the differences in economic worries caused by COVID-19 pandemic among individuals in a developing country context. (shrink)

The paper explores the important but neglected field of primary schoolchildren's attitudes towards the environment using a specifically designed scale in Arabic and English. It reports attitude differences towards the environment and three domains -- pollution, waste and animals and plants -- according to nationality and gender. Overall the findings show that environmental education programmes produce only slightly positive attitudes. Consideration is given to the further research required to enhance such programmes.

According to some commentators of the Iranian Civil Code, the definition of sale stated in Article 183 is influenced by Article 1101 of French Civil Code. They have concluded that the essence of sale is confined to mutual consent, i.e. the sale would not be valid without the consent of either party. They have taken even a step further and considered the contents of Article 338 of the civil code, which describes contract of sale, contradictory to Article 183 and argued (...) that the sale of a specified concrete object is not contained in Article 183 while the sale of unascertained goods is obliged to that article. They believe that the definition of Article 183 of civil code excludes not only all commitments, but also swap contracts because there are two mutual commitments and two agreeing legal contracts in a swap contract while there is no mentioning of them in Article 183. However, the objections are not rightfully lodged because first, the contracts and obligations are not incompatible with the definition of Article 338 as the seller and the buyer within a contract of sale are obliged to give authority to the other party over the object of sale or the price. It means that there are two commitments and the obligation of the seller to give authority over the object of sale appears in two ways: dominion over concrete object while making a transaction and dominion over non-specified object with the obligation that it does not attend to fulfil possession by the time of the sale. Secondly, Article 183 contains the phrase “their acceptance” which includes swap contract too because this phrase indicates that the acceptance is mutual. (shrink)

The present paper addresses the mutual relationship between society and law in shaping women’s law in Islam from the perspective of the sociology of law. It analyzes the role of pre-Islamic social, political, and economic structures in the Arabian Peninsula in modeling women’s law and highlights some customary laws which were rejected or revived and integrated in Islamic jurisprudence. In this regard, the paper reviews issues such as polygyny, rights to inheritance, marriage, the process of testimony and acceptable forms of (...) evidence in legal matters, diyya, the exclusion of women from the judiciary and the system of issuing fatwa, natural right of guardianship of underage children after divorce, and regulations related to the veil. Finally, referring to the manner of the Prophet of Islam, the paper suggests that ʿurf can be considered as a source of Islamic legislation alongside other commonly known sources of fiqh. (shrink)

Drawing on social exchange theory, this study examines a mechanism, namely organizational social capital, through which self-sacrificial leadership is related to two types of employee behaviours: organizational citizenship behaviours and counterproductive behaviours. The results of two different studies in Egypt showed that self-sacrificial leadership is positively related to OSC which, in turn, is positively related to OCBs and negatively related to CPBs. Overall, the findings suggest that self-sacrificial leaders are more likely to achieve desirable employee behaviours through improving the quality (...) of social relationships among employees. (shrink)

The primary and secondary sources of Islamic law often assume a binary distinction between ijtihād and taqlīd, ignoring a third level of engagement with the sources, which was conceptualized by some jurists as forming a distinct category. In this article I discuss the evolution of the terms ijtihād, taqlīd, and ittibāʿ, using a conceptual-historical approach. I argue that the use of taqlīd to mean “precedent-following” did not emerge as a technical term until after the time of al-Shāfiʿī. The distinction between (...) precedent-following and verifiable-following did not appear in legal discourse until the time of Aḥmad b. Ḥanbal. I also demonstrate that there were three approaches to these terms in legal discourse after the time of Ibn Ḥanbal, with three groups of jurists defining them in ways that advanced their different visions of law-making. I conclude with a discussion of the debate over the meanings of these terms in the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries. (shrink)

The growing importance of health systems research has opened debate about appropriate ethical frameworks and guidelines for the ethical review and conduct of health systems research. In this article we consider a detailed proposal from Hyder et al. and consider it in relation to the conventional criteria for ethics review of clinical research outlined by Emanuel et al. and argue that the Emanuel criteria can be usefully applied to the review of health systems research to supplement the Hyder et al. (...) proposals. We argue further that health systems researchers and reviewers would benefit from many of the debates that have characterized the ethics of clinical research over the past three decades. (shrink)

This is a survey article on algebraic logic. It gives a historical background leading up to a modern perspective. Central problems in algebraic logic (like the representation problem) are discussed in connection to other branches of logic, like modal logic, proof theory, model-theoretic forcing, finite combinatorics, and Gödel’s incompleteness results. We focus on cylindric algebras. Relation algebras and polyadic algebras are mostly covered only insofar as they relate to cylindric algebras, and even there we have not told the whole story. (...) We relate the algebraic notion of neat embeddings (a notion special to cylindric algebras) to the metalogical ones of provability, interpolation and omitting types in variants of first logic. Another novelty that occurs here is relating the algebraic notion of atom-canonicity for a class of boolean algebras with operators to the metalogical one of omitting types for the corresponding logic. A hitherto unpublished application of algebraic logic to omitting types of first order logic is given. Proofs are included when they serve to illustrate certain concepts. Several open problems are posed. We have tried as much as possible to avoid exploring territory already explored in the survey articles of Monk [93] and Németi [97] in the subject. (shrink)