The aim of this study was to test red - green dichromats' ability to discriminate between illuminant and surface-reflectance changes in natural scenes. Stimuli were simulations of natural scenes presented on a colour monitor with 10-bit resolution per gun. The natural scenes were obtained with a fast hyperspectral imaging system. Six different scenes (including rocks, foliage, and buildings) were tested. In each trial, two images were presented in sequence, each for 1 s, with no interval. The images differed in the (...) phase of daylight on the scene: first with correlated colour temperature 25 000 K, then 6 700 K. The spectral reflectance of a region in the second image was changed randomly, consistent with a local change in daylight. The observer's task was to decide whether a particular surface in the successive images was the same (pure illuminant change) or different (illuminant change with a surface-reflectance change). The performance of four deuteranopes and five protanopes varied considerably across the scenes tested, with mean colour constancy indices (± 1 SEM) of 0.48 (± 0.13) and 0.19 (± 0.10), respectively (1.0 representing ideal performance). Deuteranopes seemed less disadvantaged than protanopes, performing close to normal with some scenes. (shrink)

The number of discriminable colours is often assumed to be of the order of several million but the extent of detectable chromatic diversity present in individual natural scenes is an open question. Here, the aim was to estimate the number of discriminable colours seen in natural scenes. Hyperspectral data were obtained from a set of natural scenes over the range 400 - 720 nm at 10 nm intervals (Nascimento et al, 2002 Journal of the Optical Society of America A 19 (...) 1484 - 1490) and the representation of each scene in CIELAB space computed for all pixels of the image. The number of discriminable colours was estimated by counting the number of unit volumes in the three-dimensional volume defined by the scene when represented in CIELAB space. We found that the number of discriminable colours estimated in a scene could vary by an order of magnitude from scene to scene, but rarely exceeded 105, indicating a limited chromatic diversity. (shrink)

Neuronal activities have recently been reported to exhibit power-law scaling behavior. However, it has not been demonstrated that the power-law component can play an important role in human perceptual functions. Here, we demonstrate that the power spectrum of magnetoencephalograph recordings of brain activity varies in coordination with perception of subthreshold visual stimuli. We observed that perceptual performance could be better explained by modulation of the power-law component than by modulation of the peak power in particular narrow frequency ranges. The results (...) suggest that the brain operates in a state of self-organized criticality, modulating the power spectral exponent of its activity to optimize its internal state for response to external stimuli. (shrink)

Ocherk 1. Voprosy ontologii -- Ocherk 2. Voprosy ėtiki i ėstetiki -- Ocherk 3. Voprosy gnoseologii i aksiologii.

誕生から今日まで、文芸・演劇が芸術に占める位置ばどう変わっているのか?古今東西の具体的な動きに即しつつ、類型論的・理論的パースペクティブを示す。.

Many studies have reported neural correlates of visual awareness across several brain regions, including the sensory, parietal, and frontal areas. In most of these studies, participants were instructed to explicitly report their perceptual experience through a button press or verbal report. It is conceivable, however, that explicit reporting itself may trigger specific neural responses that can confound the direct examination of the neural correlates of visual awareness. This suggests the need to assess visual awareness without explicit reporting. One way to (...) achieve this is to develop a technique to predict the visual awareness of participants based on their peripheral responses. Here, we used eye movements and pupil sizes to decode trial-by-trial changes in the awareness of a stimulus whose visibility was deteriorated due to adaptation-induced blindness. In the experiment, participants judged whether they perceived a target stimulus and rated the confidence they had in their perceptual judgment, while their eye movements and pupil sizes were recorded. We found that not only perceptual decision but also perceptual confidence can be separately decoded from the eye movement and pupil size. We discuss the potential of this technique with regard to assessing visual awareness in future neuroimaging experiments. (shrink)

Despite the police preventing special fraud victimisation of older adults, both the number of cases and the amount of damage have remained high in Japan. ‘Special fraud’, in Japan, is a crime in which victims are tricked by fraudsters who through phone or postcards impersonate the victims’ relatives, employees and other associates, to dupe the victims of their cash or other valuables. The number of recognised cases of special fraud has been turned to increase in 2021. Although police or consumer (...) affairs administrations have been conducting all-encompassing enlightenment or public education for prevention, it is also necessary to reach out to those who are vulnerable to fraud. In this study, we determine the psychosocial characteristics of victims of special fraud in Japanese older adults. We analysed the age, gender, education, residential status, household satisfaction, risk perception and scam vulnerability scale of 56 older adults aged 60 years or older who had been victims of special fraud and 99 older adults aged 60 years or older who had never been victims of special fraud. The study found that the victimised older adults were more likely to be females who live alone and go out less frequently than the non-victimised older adults. The total scores of the scam vulnerability scale were higher among the elderly victims of special fraud compared to those who had never been scammed, suggesting that the psychosocial characteristics of victims of special fraud among older adults are being female, living alone, going out infrequently, having high confidence against fraud victimisation and responding quickly to phone calls and unknown visitors. Therefore, government agencies or family members should take care of older women who meet these characteristics to reduce their contact with fraudsters. (shrink)

Prologue, invitation to thinking about God In the Hebrew Bible? -- Part I, questions about God? -- Why does God in the Bible have a body? -- What do God's body parts in the Bible mean? -- Why is God angry in the Bible? -- Does God in the Bible have gender or sexuality? -- Part II, questions about God in the world? -- What can creation tell us about God? -- Who-or what-is the Satan? -- Why do people suffer (...) according to the Hebrew Bible? -- Epilogue, God in the Bible and beyond. (shrink)

Many books explain what is known about the universe. This book investigates what cannot be known. Rather than exploring the amazing facts that science, mathematics, and reason have revealed to us, this work studies what science, mathematics, and reason tell us cannot be revealed. In The Outer Limits of Reason, Noson Yanofsky considers what cannot be predicted, described, or known, and what will never be understood. He discusses the limitations of computers, physics, logic, and our own thought processes. Yanofsky describes (...) simple tasks that would take computers trillions of centuries to complete and other problems that computers can never solve; perfectly formed English sentences that make no sense; different levels of infinity; the bizarre world of the quantum; the relevance of relativity theory; the causes of chaos theory; math problems that cannot be solved by normal means; and statements that are true but cannot be proven. He explains the limitations of our intuitions about the world -- our ideas about space, time, and motion, and the complex relationship between the knower and the known. Moving from the concrete to the abstract, from problems of everyday language to straightforward philosophical questions to the formalities of physics and mathematics, Yanofsky demonstrates a myriad of unsolvable problems and paradoxes. Exploring the various limitations of our knowledge, he shows that many of these limitations have a similar pattern and that by investigating these patterns, we can better understand the structure and limitations of reason itself. Yanofsky even attempts to look beyond the borders of reason to see what, if anything, is out there. (shrink)

"Sir Hermann Bondi, NatureThe late S. Chandrasekhar was best known for his discovery of the upper limit to the mass of a white dwarf star, for which he received ...

This chapter develops a perceptual solution to the epistemological problem of other minds, relying on central ideas from Maurice Merleau-Ponty's phenomenology. The Merleau-Pontian account is contrasted with another attempted perceptual solution to the other minds problem, and it is argued that only the former meets the phenomenologists' desideratum of providing an alternative to inferential solutions. The chapter also provides responses to various objections to the perceptual solution, including a pair of objections recently put forward by Alec Hyslop.

Richard Janko's acclaimed translation of Aristotle's _Poetics_ is accompanied by the most comprehensive commentary available in English that does not presume knowledge of the original Greek. Two other unique features are Janko's translations with notes of both the _Tractatus Coislinianus_, which is argued to be a summary of the lost second book of the Poetics, and fragments of Aristotle’s dialogue On Poets, including recently discovered texts about catharsis, which appear in English for the first time.

"Williams's masterful translation satisfies (at last!) a long-standing need. There are lots of good translations of Augustine's great work, but until now we have been forced to choose between those that strive to replicate in English something of the majesty and beauty of Augustine's Latin style and those that opt instead to convey the careful precision of his philosophical terminology and argumentation. Finally, Williams has succeeded in capturing both sides of Augustine's mind in a richly evocative, impeccably reliable, elegantly readable (...) presentation of one of the most impressive achievements in Western thought--Augustine's Confessions." --Scott MacDonald, Professor of Philosophy and Norma K. Regan Professor in Christian Studies, Cornell University. (shrink)