This paper deals with the study of the existence of weak positive solutions for sublinear Kirchhoff elliptic systems with zero Dirichlet boundary condition in bounded domainΩ⊂ℝNby using the subsuper solutions method.

The paper deals with the study of the existence of weak positive solutions for a new class of the system of elliptic differential equations with respect to the symmetry conditions and the right hand side which has been defined as multiplication of two separate functions by using the sub-supersolutions method.

By means of the averaging method of the first order, we introduce the maximum number of limit cycles which can be bifurcated from the periodic orbits of a Hamiltonian system. Besides, the perturbation has been used for a particular class of the polynomial differential systems.

To understand the variations in the financial characteristics, we examine the dynamical behaviors by considering the chaotic financial model with external force. First, the dynamical characteristics are analyzed by introducing the external driven force in the price index with commodity demand. We discover that the presence of an external force causes the alternate occurrence of oscillatory and steady states as a function of time. Interestingly, we find the existence of bifurcation delay during the transition from oscillatory to steady state or (...) vice versa. Bifurcation delay is a phenomenon in which the bifurcation does not occur at the actual bifurcation point but rather at a later time, which is referred to as bifurcation delay. To confirm the delay in bifurcation, we estimate the actual bifurcation point and compare it to the observed bifurcation transition. Furthermore, to understand the variations in the bifurcation delay, we estimate the delay time between each consecutive cycle and find random fluctuations in the BD. Following that, the BD is virtualized via a transformed phase portrait. In addition, we show decreasing the value of average BD while increasing the frequency of external forcing. Second, the presence of BD is explored by incorporating external forces into the investment demand with unit investment cost. We discover the existence of a similar phenomenon with a constant bifurcation delay. (shrink)

Virtual screening is the most critical process in drug discovery, and it relies on machine learning to facilitate the screening process. It enables the discovery of molecules that bind to a specific protein to form a drug. Despite its benefits, virtual screening generates enormous data and suffers from drawbacks such as high dimensions and imbalance. This paper tackles data imbalance and aims to improve virtual screening accuracy, especially for a minority dataset. For a dataset identified without considering the data’s imbalanced (...) nature, most classification methods tend to have high predictive accuracy for the majority category. However, the accuracy was significantly poor for the minority category. The paper proposes a K-mean algorithm coupled with Synthetic Minority Oversampling Technique to overcome the problem of imbalanced datasets. The proposed algorithm is named as KSMOTE. Using KSMOTE, minority data can be identified at high accuracy and can be detected at high precision. A large set of experiments were implemented on Apache Spark using numeric PaDEL and fingerprint descriptors. The proposed solution was compared to both no-sampling method and SMOTE on the same datasets. Experimental results showed that the proposed solution outperformed other methods. (shrink)

Fractional calculus is nowadays an efficient tool in modelling many interesting nonlinear phenomena. This study investigates, in a novel way, the Ulam–Hyers and Ulam–Hyers–Rassias stability of differential equations with general conformable derivative. In our analysis, we employ some version of Banach fixed-point theory. In this way, we generalize several earlier interesting results. Two examples are given at the end to illustrate our results.

In many areas, technology has facilitated many things, diagnosing diseases, regulating traffic and teaching students in schools rely on Intelligent systems to name a few. At present, traditional classroom-based education is no longer the most appropriate in schools. From here, the idea of intelligent e-learning for students to increase their culture and keep them updated in life began. E-learning has become an ideal solution, relying on artificial intelligence, which has a footprint in this through the development of systems based on (...) education without a teacher taking into account the individual differences of students. This study describes intelligent tutoring system for teaching the Data Manipulation Language (DML) Commands Using SQLite to non IT students to overcome the difficulties they face. The System was built as education system by using the researcher own authoring tool that based on mobile and web App. The basic idea of this system is a systematic introduction into the concept of Database and its DML query. The system presents the topic of DML Commands, help student to execute what they are learn from the system content using the practical part of the system and administers automatically adapted at run time to the student’s individual growth. The system was assessed by a group of teachers and students and the outcome showed as 91% from the database specialists, 94% from Diploma students group and 89% from the secondary school students group. (shrink)

Ubuntu has been defined as a moral quality of human beings, as a philosophy or an ethic, as African humanism, and as a worldview. This paper explores these definitions as conceptual tools for understanding the cultural, educational, and philosophical landscape of post-apartheid South Africa. Key to this understanding is the Althusserian concept of state apparatus. Louis Althusser divides the state apparatus into two forces: the repressive state apparatus (RSA); and the ideological state apparatus (ISA). RSAs curtail the working classes, predominately (...) through direct violence or the threat of violence, whereas ISAs function primarily by ideology, including forms of organised religion, the education system, family units, legal systems, trade unions, political parties, and media. This paper discusses the link between increasing inequality in post-apartheid South Africa and education, with specific reference to Althusser’s ISAs and the abuse of Ubuntu as a subterfuge for socio-economic inequality. (shrink)

Despite the increasingly diversified discourses in international commercial arbitration, this device of socio-legal regulation remains a relatively under-theorized subject. In particular, far too little attention has been paid to analyzing international commercial arbitration through critical approaches such as Third World Approaches to International Law (TWAIL). TWAIL is broadly understood as a methodological reorientation in international law by highlighting the historical links between the foundations of this field of law and the history of capitalism and imperialism as well as the colonial (...) and Eurocentric legacies in the structure and operation of the current international legal regime. With this in mind, two fronts in international commercial arbitration invite a reexamination through a TWAIL perspective and by drawing on the concept of hegemony. One front is the transnational account of arbitration, and the other one is the epistemic community of arbitration. By examining these two notions through a narrative of hegemony of Western legal traditions, we posit that any effective attempt at redefining or reforming arbitral governance structure towards sustaining diversity requires a deeper understanding of historical and current world power structures and creating a vision for the prospect of dehegemonization. (shrink)

The search for cultural sociology -- New intellectual concepts for cultural sociology -- Social sciences need for the HS paradigm -- Theory of HS and the rules of collective behavioural patterns of influence on people's behaviors -- Culture profile from a different Islamic view -- The Aql-Naql theory of human symbols and the making of cultural sociology -- HS behind human longer lifespan -- Social science illiteracy of the other underdevelopment in post-colonial societies -- The Arab Muslim world set to (...) dialogue with the West : a cultural perspective. (shrink)

Cet essai relate le cheminement, à travers la Bible, d'une pensée libre, en opposition à la "rétention honteuse, chez les musulmans, pour aller à la découverte de la Torah et des Evangiles" (Youssef Seddik), et à leur "indifférence pour ce qui relève de la connaissance du monde juif, de son passé ou de sa pensée" (Victor Malka). En relevant, à travers l'épopée du peuple "inventeur du dieu unique", les codes qui fondent la morale juive, l'auteur a eu le sentiment de (...) découvrir en YHWH un "Grand Ordonnateur de feuilles de route". Une route rigoureusement balisée, avec ses bornes et ses "haies" de protection - qu'en hébreu on appelle des syagim. Ainsi, après quatre années passées à glaner sur les "terres" du judaïsme biblique, telle Ruth glanant sur les terres de Booz, après avoir étudié plus de cent textes juifs, anciens et contemporains, l'auteur interroge ici le rapport du Juif à son prochain (parent, voisin, étranger, allié ou ennemi). Une découverte. (shrink)

Physicist Percy Bridgman has been taken by Heather Douglas to be an exemplar defender of an untenable value-free ideal for science. This picture is complicated by a detailed study of Bridgman's philosophical views of the relation between science and society. The normative autonomy of science, a version of the value-free ideal, is defended. This restriction on the provenance of permissible values in science is given a basis in Bridgman's broader philosophical commitments, most importantly, his view that science is primarily an (...) individual commitment to a set of epistemic norms and values. Considerations of external moral or social values are not, on this view, intrinsic to scientific practice, though they have a broader pragmatic significance. What Bridgman takes as the proper relation between science and society is shown through analysis of his many writings on the topic and consideration of his rarely remarked upon involvement in the most problematic example of "Big Science" of his day: the atomic bomb. A reevaluation of Bridgman's views provides a unique characterization of what is at stake in the values in science debate: the normative autonomy of science. (shrink)

This essay was published in the September 2023 edition of Griffith Observer. It is an examination of the curious friendship between writer Aldous Huxley and astronomer Edwin Hubble and its philosophical basis: empiricism. I hope that by consideration of these two thinker''s lives and work light may be shed on each of their ideas and on the 20th century conceptions of empiricism more broadly.

Backed by its technological achievements, modern science appears as the de facto source of truth to the majority of our contemporaries. Its sole reliance on reason and empirical data gives it an air of objectivity that has conferred upon it an almost unquestioning authority. Against the backdrop of this pervasive scientism, Philosophy of Science in the Light of the Perennial Wisdom is a daring attempt to offer an intellectual critique of modern science in its foundation by rigorously examining the intrinsic (...) limitations of rational thought and empirical investigation. Unique of its kind, this book offers a refreshing look at the traditional doctrines of epistemology and metaphysics as an antidote to the subjective as well as objective errors of modern science, which is thus revealed as no more than a belief system that falls radically short of offering a full knowledge of reality; this, in contrast to the perennial wisdom of the world's great religions that for millennia have offered humankind not only keys to true knowledge, but also the means of attaining it, which precisely constitutes man's reason for being. (shrink)

We study some representations of real numbers. We compare these representations, on the one hand from the viewpoint of recursive functionals, and of complexity on the other hand.The impossibility of obtaining some functions as recursive functionals is, in general, easy. This impossibility may often be explicited in terms of complexity: - existence of a sequence of low complexity whose image is not a recursive sequence, - existence of objects of low complexity but whose images have arbitrarily high time- complexity .Moreover, (...) some representations of real numbers that are equivalent from the viewpoint of recursive functionals, are very distinct from the viewpoint of complexity.We make a particular study of representations via continued fractions . We precise exactly what part of information available in the x's dfc is equivalent to the information available in its Dedekinds cut. We show that the sum of two reals whose dfcs are polynomial-time computable may be a real whose dfc has time complexity arbitrarily high.This work confirms that the unique representation of real numbers suitable for the ordinary calculus is via explicit Cauchy sequences of rationals.RésuméNous étudions différentes manières de présenter les nombres réels. Nous comparons ces présentations du point de vue des fonctionnelles récursives d'une part, et de celui des classes de complexité d'autre part.L'impossibilité d'obtenir certaines fonctions sous forme de fonctionnelles récursives est en général facile à établir. Cette impossiblité peut souvent être explicitée en termes de complexité: - il existe une suite de faible complexité dont l'image est une suite non récursive, - il existe des objets de faible complexité mais dont les images sont des objets de complexité arbitrairement grande .En outre, certaines présentations des réels équivalentes du point de vue des fonctionnelles récursives se distinguent nettement du point de vue de la complexité.Nous faisons une étude particulière concernant les développements en fraction continue . Nous précisions exactement quelle est la partie de l'information disponible dans le dfc d'un réel x qui équivaut à l'information disponible dans sa coupure de Dedekind. Nous montrons également que la somme de deux réels dont le dfc est calculable en temps polynomial peut être un réel dont le dfc est de complexité arbitrairement grande.Ce travail confirme que seule une présentation des réels via des suites de rationnels explicitement de Cauchy est adaptée aux calculs avec les réels. (shrink)

We give a polynomial time controlled version of a theorem of M. Hall: every real number can be written as the sum of two irrational numbers whose developments into a continued fraction contain only 1, 2, 3 or 4.

This book explores the spiritual potential of faith, mysticism and transcendence in answer to the dangers of a mythologised state and the sacro-sanctification of (liberal) democracy and its rule of law. It searches for a curative for the pathological transformation of these institutions into--so called--political religions. Along this line, it explores the importance of spirituality and transcendence for political legitimacy, democratic participation and international cooperation, law and politics. There being no general agreed-upon definition of 'spirituality', the authors examine what may (...) be seen as 'spiritual' dimensions of the political. These dimensions have in common a focus on transcendence as a vanishing point of rationality and rational justification. This vanishing point may become manifest, for example, in a primordial requisite of becoming an individual person; in responding--in freedom--to the call of theocracy; in the phenomenon of prophecy or political wisdom; in the remaining shards of formerly all-pervasive religious institutions; in tenacious hope for a democracy-to-come; in the courageous resilience and resistance of citizens of 'non-' or 'un-democratic' states; etc."--Page 4 of back cover. (shrink)

In the past decade, the use of the Chapter XI has soared to the detriment of many creditors, workers, and consumers. A good number of cases were not based on imminent insolvency, but on firms attempts to avoid litigation claims against them, to terminate labor or other contractual obligations, or to gain new financing.These filings for Chapter XI highlight the use of bank-ruptcy as a strategic option used by management in running a viable organization. This usage is even advised by (...) some academics and management consultants. (shrink)

I provide an account of the physical appropriate to the task of the physicalist while remaining faithful to the usage of “physical” natural to physicists. Physicalism is the thesis that everything in the world is physical, or reducible to the physical. I presuppose that some version of this position is a live epistemic possibility. The physicalist is confronted with Hempel’s dilemma: that physicalism is either false or contentless. The proposed account of the physical avoids both horns and generalizes a recent (...) proposal by Vicente (2011). My account defines physicalism as the thesis that there are no objects that cannot be described by physical quantities. A dimensional account of physical quantities is given: quantities are determined by measurement procedures. (shrink)

One of the main arguments intended to show that content externalism undermines the privileged access thesis is the ‘slow switching argument’, originally proposed by Boghossian. In this argument, it is supposed that a subject is unknowingly switched back and forth between Earth and Twin Earth: then it is claimed that, given externalism, when the subject is on Earth thinking that water is wet, he cannot know the content of his thought a priori, for he cannot, by mere reflection, rule out (...) the relevant alternative hypothesis that he is on Twin Earth thinking that twater is wet. One of the controversies surrounding this argument stems from the fact that it is not clear which epistemological principle underlies it. Here, I examine two suggestions made in the literature as to what that underlying principle might be. I argue that neither of these suggested principles is plausible, and thus that the slow switching argument never gets off the ground. (shrink)

Along the lines of a previous work, the geometrical structure of Hibert bundles describing extended quantum free particles is repeated with Galilei external and internal independent symmetries. Then, in order to introduce the interaction, this structure is extended by replacing configuration and momentum spaces by the socelled spaces of trajectories and extended velocity boosts, respectively. These provide representations giving the probability amplitudes for the particle to follow certain trajectories. The interaction can be introduced in the transformation law from functions on (...) the space of trajectories (free dynamics) to functions on spacetime (intracting dynamics). This transformation law, which makes use of a universal distribution, is seen as a functional in our work according to a quantum functional theory which generalizes the ideas of de Broglie. Intertwining of induced representations gives the free propagator in the space of trajectories and, henceforth, the propagator with interaction in space-time for the extended particle. (shrink)

The quality of the products coming from different lines of production requires some tests called comparative life tests. For lines having the same facility, the lifetime of the product is distributed by Burr XII, the lifetime distribution, and units are tested under type-I generalized hybrid censoring scheme. The observed censoring data are used under maximum likelihood and the Bayes method to estimate the model parameters. The theoretical results are discussed and assessed through data analysis and Monte Carlo simulation study. Finally, (...) we reported some brief comments obtained from numerical computation. (shrink)

Objectivity is one of the most basic and difficult issues in modern and contemporary philosophy. The present paper is devoted to this issue from view- point of Husserl’s transcendental phenomenology. Since perception, particularly sense perception, in view of intentionality, as lowest level of objectivity can act as the base for perceiving the objectivity of other objects, whether real or unreal, it has been discussed in this paper. To do this, objectivity of the sense perception and its role in leading the (...) mind toward essential and ideal objects, and conversely, the role of latter objects in objectivity of the perception itself will be explored. Because the concepts of objectivity and evidence are correlate in Husserl’s philosophy, and since evidence as the self-given manifests itself, from the very beginning, in the lowest level, namely the objects of sense perception, and considering that evidence and objectivity of sense perception concern this lowest level, the critical viewpoint of Husserl’s phenomenology provides a firm and new basis for objectivity if taken at its full competence. (shrink)

In this paper a symmetry argument against quantity absolutism is amended. Rather than arguing against the fundamentality of intrinsic quantities on the basis of transformations of basic quantities, a class of symmetries defined by the Π-theorem is used. This theorem is a fundamental result of dimensional analysis and shows that all unit-invariant equations which adequately represent physical systems can be put into the form of a function of dimensionless quantities. Quantity transformations that leave those dimensionless quantities invariant are empirical and (...) dynamical symmetries. The proposed symmetries of the original argument fail to be both dynamical and empirical symmetries and are open to counterexamples. The amendment of the original argument requires consideration of the relationships between quantity dimensions. The discussion raises a pertinent issue: what is the modal status of the constants of nature which figure in the laws? Two positions, constant necessitism and constant contingentism, are introduced and their relationships to absolutism and comparativism undergo preliminary investigation. It is argued that the absolutist can only reject the amended symmetry argument by accepting constant necessitism. I argue that the truth of an epistemically open empirical hypothesis would make the acceptance of constant necessitism costly: together they entail that the facts are nomically necessary. (shrink)

Norms provide a valuable mechanism for establishing coherent cooperative behaviour in decentralised systems in which there is no central authority. One of the most influential formulations of norm emergence was proposed by Axelrod :1095–1111, 1986). This paper provides an empirical analysis of aspects of Axelrod’s approach, by exploring some of the key assumptions made in previous evaluations of the model. We explore the dynamics of norm emergence and the occurrence of norm collapse when applying the model over extended durations. It (...) is this phenomenon of norm collapse that can motivate the emergence of a central authority to enforce laws and so preserve the norms, rather than relying on individuals to punish defection. Our findings identify characteristics that significantly influence norm establishment using Axelrod’s formulation, but are likely to be of importance for norm establishment more generally. Moreover, Axelrod’s model suffers from significant limitations in assuming that private strategies of individuals are available to others, and that agents are omniscient in being aware of all norm violations and punishments. Because this is an unreasonable expectation, the approach does not lend itself to modelling real-world systems such as online networks or electronic markets. In response, the paper proposes alternatives to Axelrod’s model, by replacing the evolutionary approach, enabling agents to learn, and by restricting the metapunishment of agents to cases where the original defection is observed, in order to be able to apply the model to real-world domains. This work can also help explain the formation of a “social contract” to legitimate enforcement by a central authority. (shrink)

This article exploits the synergy of critical discourse studies and Corpus Linguistics to study the pervasive representation of Islam and Muslims in an approximate 670,000-word corpus of US news media stories published between 2001 and 2015. Following collocation and concordance analysis of the most frequent topics or categories which revolve around the representation of Islam and Muslims in US news stories, the Discourse-Historical Approach to critical discourse analysis was adopted to investigate how the discursive strategies of nomination and predication are (...) used in US news media stories. The findings indicated that, in general, Islam and Muslims are associated with violence, religious radicalism, and Islamic extremist militants. Finally, the article discusses the discursive themes resulting from the analysis of personal pronouns as well as the educational implications of the findings for social studies and multicultural education. (shrink)

À travers le présent entretien, Salah Stétié, écrivain au carrefour d’au moins deux traditions culturelles, envisage son rapport singulier à la question de l’entre-deux. Il évoque en particulier le lien très étroit qui l’unit aux civilisations de la Méditerranée ; la question de l’intervalle l’amène à parler du sens de son écriture poétique, de son rapport à la langue et à la traduction. Plus surprenant sans doute est le contexte premier qu’il donne à son exploration poétique, selon une inspiration (...) très orientale : une physique spirituelle de l’énergie — de la danse de l’énergie, au centre de laquelle le poète se tient, à « la source des vertiges ». C’est une entité quasi impersonnelle et insituable qui écrit, à la croisée des dimensions mentales, spirituelles et verbales — et d’un inconscient qui serait beaucoup plus large que le personnel. Cependant, pour Salah Stétié, le poète, loin de ne résider nulle part, développe une « citoyenneté surplombante » qui lui permet de circuler dans toute l’étendue du réel, de l’embrasser dans son ensemble et d’en témoigner sans exclusive. Through this interview, Salah Stétié, writer in the crossroads of at least two cultural traditions, envisages his singular relationship in the question of the in-between. He evokes in particular the very narrow link which unites him with the civilizations of the Mediterranean Sea ; the question of the interval leads him to speak about the sense of its poetic writing, about its relationship in the language and in the translation. More surprising doubtless is the first context which he gives to his poetic exploration, according to a very oriental inspiration: a spiritual physics of the energy—of the dance of the energy, in the center of which the poet stands, near to “the spring of the dizzinesses”. It is a quasi-impersonal and insituable entity who writes, between the mental, spiritual and verbal dimensions—and of an unconsciousness which would be much wider than the personal one. However, for Salah Stétié, the poet, far from livig in Utopia, develops an “overhanging citizenship” who allows him to travel in all the areas of the reality, to embrace them and to testify of them without any exclusive. (shrink)

Abstract: Tomatoes are part of the major crops in food security. Tomatoes are plants grown in temperate and hot regions of South American origin from Peru, and then spread to most countries of the world. Tomatoes contain a lot of vitamin C and mineral salts, and are recommended for people with constipation, diabetes and patients with heart and body diseases. Studies and scientific studies have proven the importance of eating tomato juice in reducing the activity of platelets in diabetics, which (...) helps in protecting them from developing deadly blood clots. A tomato classification approach is presented with a data set containing approximately 5,266 images with 7 species belonging to tomatoes. The Neural Network Algorithms (CNN), a deep learning technique applied widely in image recognition, is used for this task. (shrink)

From the ancient Egyptian tale of a Shipwrecked Sailor through to Sinbad and Robinson Crusoe, the stranded castaway living and philosophizing alone on a strange, desert island is a theme which has captured the imaginations of writers spanning cultures and millennia. Most familiar to Western literary historians is Daniel Defoe’s Robinson Crusoe, which inspired generations of writers from Jonathan Wyss and William Golding to Michel Tournier and J.M.Coetzee. However, little attention has been paid to Defoe’s antecedents, such as the remarkable (...) HayyIbn Yaqzan by twelfth-century Arab physician and philosopher, Muhammad Ibn Tufayl. Mahmoud Baroud here conducts a detailed comparative textual analysis of Hayy Ibn Yaqzan and Robinson Crusoe, and concludes that Daniel Defoe was likely to have been deeply influenced by Ibn Tufayl’s Arabic text. This book will be of interest to students and scholars of comparative literature, along with medieval Arabic literature, culture, and philosophy. (shrink)

This paper deals with the mystical experiences in Virginia Woolf’s artistic creation. Woolf denies any form of modernism that cannot transcend reality. There are moments, where reality is never what it is but a vision — a perspective — whose meaning is beyond the graspable. Reality, thus, becomes un-reality — a halo, and the artist becomes a contemplator — a devotee to such visionary manifestation. Virginia Woolf does not make an exception to this rule. She is par excellence a mystic. (...) The artistic design of her novels, mainly, To the Lighthouse, is of transcendental dimension. Both, Mrs Ramsay’s and Lily Briscoe’s perceptions of life are beyond the palpable: their selves merge within a process of sublimation comparable to that of mysticism. In other words, art (mainly fiction) becomes a process of change from the factual to the transmutable. (shrink)

The aim of this contribution is to examine and unveil the Augustinian time process and self-examination in Virginia Woolf’s “To the Lighthouse.” The latter is a successful (re)presentation of the interrelation between human consciousness and time “control”. The self cannot be defined without time dimension. Woolf seems to confirm that time is more interior than exterior and is an essential part of human being: it is through it that human being is felt as a part of the world. There are (...) some powerful statements of her characters that show strange similarities to Augustine’s doctrine of time, memory and existence. This triad characterizes his works, mainly “Confessions.” Woolf’s characters are so contemplative. We find them looking outward in order to discover their inside. The internal and the external are the focus of time knowledge and self-discovery. They are dialogically interrelated and define one another. The self is an ever “IS” within the presentness of the present: the “was” (past) is only a memory (“the no-longer”) and the “will be” (future) is only the “not-yet” that has to come in order to become a present. In Augustine’s doctrine, the past and the future do not exist because they are absent in the present. Yet, their only existence is the present – the NOW. Consciousness preserves one’s past within itself. The individual meets and examines himself through consciousness. Mrs. Ramsay in “To the Lighthouse” experiments these dimensions and tries to define herself through time. (shrink)

Does translation of the literary text really need a theory? If yes which one among so many, which complicate more than simplify the matter? Which strategy do we adopt to at least communicate something of the original to a target reader, who does not know anything of the source language? The key problem is the meaning. Is it really grasped? If yes, is it of the text, or of the author, or of the reader? Meaning is not restricted to linguistic (...) parameters; it is more cognitive and essentially based on the interpreter’s own world knowledge. The text is not only a product but essentially an on-going process of meaning. Though it has precise time and space when produced, it is, nonetheless, timeless and spaceless. When we animate it, through reading, it becomes a text within the scope of a new space and a new time. That is, the meaning in the process of translation becomes anew. The text is autonomous and its autonomy makes it have its own specificity and existence. And so, the meaning in/of the text is ever-changing: there is no one meaning in/of the text, as there is no one reader of the text. (shrink)

This dissertation draws upon historical studies of scientific practice and contemporary issues in the metaphysics and epistemology of science to account for the nature of physical quantities. My dissertation applies this integrated HPS approach to dimensional analysis—a logic for quantitative physical equations which respects the distinct dimensions of quantities (e.g. mass, length, charge). Dimensional analysis and its historical development serve both as subjects of study and as a sources for solutions to contemporary problems. The dissertation consists primarily of three related (...) papers on: (1) the methodological and metaphysical foundations of dimensional analysis, (2) the use of dimensional analysis in determining physical symmetries, (3) the use of dimensional analysis in securing metrological extension. (shrink)