The ground-state dispersion energy of a pair of axially symmetric molecules is calculated, to arbitrary order in the inverse intermolecular separation, on the basis of London's anisotropic oscillator model.

A study is made of the dominant terms of an earlier model-based formula describing the dispersion energy of axially symmetric interacting molecules. The existence of mixed-pole eighth-order terms is noted.

For many physicists quantum theory contains strong conceptual difficulties, while for others the apparent conclusions about the reality of our physical world and the ways in which we discover that reality remain philosophically unacceptable. This book focuses on recent theoretical and experimental developments in the foundations of quantum physics, including topics such as the puzzles and paradoxes which appear when general relativity and quantum mechanics are combined; the emergence of classical properties from quantum mechanics; stochastic electrodynamics; EPR experiments and Bell's (...) Theorem; the consistent histories approach and the problem of datum uniqueness in quantum mechanics; non-local measurements and teleportation of quantum states; quantum non-demolition measurements in optics and matter wave properties observed by neutron, electron and atomic interferometry. Audience: This volume is intended for graduate students of physics and those interested in the foundations of quantum theory. (shrink)

Quantum theory is one of the most fascinating and successful constructs in the intellectual history of mankind. Nonetheless, the theory has very shaky philosophical foundations. This book contains thoughtful discussions by eminent researchers of a spate of experimental techniques newly developed to test some of the stranger predictions of quantum physics. The advances considered include recent experiments in quantum optics, electron and ion interferometry, photon down conversion in nonlinear crystals, single trapped ions interacting with laser beams, atom-field coupling in micromaser (...) cavities, quantum computation, quantum cryptography, decoherence and macroscopic quantum effects, the quantum state diffusion model, quantum gravity, the quantum mechanics of cosmology and quantum non-locality along with the continuing debate surrounding the interpretation of quantum mechanics. -/- Audience: The book is intended for physicists, philosophers of science, mathematicians, graduate students and those interested in the foundations of quantum theory. (shrink)

Due to its extraordinary predictive power and the great generality of its mathematical structure, quantum theory is able, at least in principle, to describe all the microscopic and macroscopic properties of the physical world, from the subatomic to the cosmological level. Nevertheless, ever since the Copen hagen and Gottingen schools in 1927 gave it the definitive formu lation, now commonly known as the orthodox interpretation, the theory has suffered from very serious logical and epistemologi cal problems. These shortcomings were immediately (...) pointed out by some of the principal founders themselves of quantum theory, to wit, Planck, Einstein, Ehrenfest, Schrodinger, and de Broglie, and by the philosopher Karl Popper, who assumed a position of radical criticism with regard to the standard formulation of the theory. The aim of the participants in the workshop on Open Questions in Quantum Physics, which was held in Bari (Italy), in the Department of Physics of the University, during May 1983 and whose Proceedings are collected in the present volume, accord ingly was to discuss the formal, the physical and the epistemo logical difficulties of quantum theory in the light of recent crucial developments and to propose some possible resolutions of three basic conceptual dilemmas, which are posed respectively ~: (a) the physical developments of the Einstein-Podolsky-Rosen argument and Bell's theorem, i. e. (shrink)

On the occasion of his ninetieth birthday, Karl Popper's lifelong pursuit of answers in several areas of scientific and philosophical thinking is briefly traced, mainly with reference to excerpts from his own writings.

The focus of this article is on the incarnation of Jesus Christ, the Word become flesh, as a way of talking about and understanding mission and addresses at least two concerns in the contemporary debate about the missional church. Many missionary methods and strategies have contradicted both the teaching and actions of Jesus as he trained his disciples to continue his ministry. The message may have been the gospel, but the way the message was made known was often not congruent (...) with the gospel. The attempt to interpret mission in terms of the incarnation of Jesus suggests that the earlier forms of mission strategies should be replaced by a theology and praxis rooted in and defined by the life and ministry of Jesus. Ephesians 4 provides the key to the theology and praxis by giving us a direct link backward into the ministry that infused and led the early church in the life and the ministry of Jesus. (shrink)

The skopos of this new type of church Bible is: ‘How would the source texts of the Bible have sounded in Afrikaans in the context envisaged for its hypothesised first audience?’ Fully acknowledging the complexities of language as a dynamic and complex system embedded in the culture and conceptual world of its speakers, as well as the wide range of frames that are involved in the process of Bible translation as a difficult form of secondary communication, this article addresses two (...) of the challenges of this ambitious project. In the first section the incongruence between the world of the Old Testament and speakers of Afrikaans is treated. Examples are provided of instances where both the nature of difficult secondary intercultural communication as well as the subjective theories of the host audience constrains the ‘directness’ of the translation. In the second section, some of the challenges of distinguishing between the formal and functional features of Biblical Hebrew are dealt with. The article concludes that, although the notion ‘communicative clue’ provides a useful heuristic device to act as point of departure for negotiations on the construal of the meaning of the text in the source language and host language respectively, the notion has to be supplemented by insights from the fields of cultural anthropology, cognitive linguistics and linguistic typology. A better understanding of how meaning ‘works’ provides members of a translation team with some criteria to make informed decisions when they negotiate how the meaning of specific Biblical Hebrew constructions are to be construed ‘directly’ in Afrikaans.Keywords: Afrikaans Bibles; Bible translation; Biblical Hebrew; church Bible; code model; cognitive linguistics; cognitive semantics; communication model; communicative clue; direct translation; discourse marker; dynamic equivalent translation; functionalist tran. (shrink)

The incarnation of the missio Dei practice model for the Dutch Reformed Church of Africa. The decline of the church in the West is of great concern to many today. The Netherdutch Reformed Church of Africa (NRCA), experiences the same tendency. We are living in a time when survival is on the mind of most mainline congregations and denominations. The question is what shall we do to turn this situation around? The answer is to be found in the rediscovery of (...) what it means for the church to be missional. The knowledge about how the early church functioned helps us to rediscover the character of early Christian mission, much of what is drawn together in the concept of incarnational mission. This article examines incarnational mission as the understanding and practise of Christian witness that is rooted in and shaped by the life, ministry, suffering, death and resurrection of Jesus. Understanding mission incarnationally in this manner is an integrative way to approach the church’s missionary vocation and to avoid the typical Western reduction of mission to one of the many programms of the church. The article, by exploring the meaning of incarnational mission, endeavours to be both constructive with regard to the biblical and theological understanding of the message, and polemical with regard to the context and history of mission, especially in the Western tradition. This article follows Darrell Guder in arguing that the historical ‘happenedness’ of Jesus’ life both enables and defines Christian witness. In exploring the missional ignificance of the incarnation, the article tries to avoid any dilution of the centrality of the incarnation event. (shrink)