This paper presents a method of measuring the vibration patterns on facial surfaces by using a scanning laser Doppler vibrometer (LDV). The surfaces of the face, neck, and body vibrate during phonation and, according to Titze ( 2001 ), these vibrations occur when aerodynamic energy is efficiently converted into acoustic energy at the glottis. A vocalist's vibration velocity patterns may therefore indicate his or her phonatory status or singing skills. LDVs enable laser-based non-contact measurement of the vibration velocity and displacement (...) of a certain point on a vibrating object, and scanning LDVs permit multipoint measurements. The benefits of scanning LDVs originate from the facts that they do not affect the vibrations of measured objects and that they can rapidly measure the vibration patterns across planes. A case study is presented herein to demonstrate the method of measuring vibration velocity patterns with a scanning LDV. The objective of the experiment was to measure the vibration velocity differences between the modal and falsetto registers while three professional soprano singers sang sustained vowels at four pitch frequencies. The results suggest that there is a possibility that pitch frequency are correlated with vibration velocity. However, further investigations are necessary to clarify the relationships between vibration velocity patterns and phonation status and singing skills. (shrink)

Eukaryotic genes are divided into three categories according to the machineries by which they are transcribed. Ribosomal RNA genes (rDNA) are the only ones that are transcribed by RNA polymerase I and are under different control from other genes transcribed by RNA polymerase II or III. None the less, the regulation of rDNA is of prime interest in view of its close relationship to cell growth and differentiation. In this review I shall discuss the recent progress in the study of (...) transcription mechanisms of rDNA by the RNA polymerase I system. The structure of the rDNA promoter and the presence of possible upstream enhancer regions will be described. In addition, factors involved in the transcription initiation of this gene will be discussed with special reference to the formation of an initiation complex. (shrink)

One of the most characteristic cornerstones of Asay’s book, A Theory of Truthmaking, is the defense of what he calls the ontology-first perspective on what the truthmaker project is all about. He distinguishes it from and defends it over what he calls the explanation-first perspective, and he bases his overall theorizing about truthmaking on it. This critical notice aims to counter Asay’s challenges for the explanation-first perspective and reveal its theoretical advantages over its rival. First, I show how to escape (...) Asay’s presented dilemma for the explanation-first perspective by specifying the nature of the distinctive form of explanation that explanation-first truthmaker theorists should envisage. Second, partly based on my proposal in the preceding discussion, I provide an account of the cases that Asay thinks pose troubling questions concerning whether a certain entity really serves as the explanans of a truthmaking explanation. Third, I establish a way in which the explanation-first perspective can be beneficial to what the ontology-first perspective focuses on, namely, exploring the ontological requirements for truths. The overall discussion warns against the underestimation of the prospects for the explanation-first perspective. (shrink)

Some truthmaker theorists posit a distinctive kind of entity to solve the problem of providing ontological grounding for negative truths. Recently, A. M. Griffith has raised a general objection against these alleged truthmakers based on an explanatory constraint on truthmaking and the existence condition of these entities. This paper counters the objection by placing it on the horns of a dilemma: the argument must either specify that the existence condition in question is a conceptual matter or insist that the condition (...) is of properly metaphysical substance. I first argue that the former horn cannot be pursued because it makes the objection irrelevant to the alleged claims of truthmaking. I then argue that the latter horn is also highly problematic because simply insisting on the claim begs the question; appreciating this point leads proponents and opponents of the alleged truthmakers to a substantial debate about the metaphysical nature of these entities and the overall theoretical benefit of their postulation. The discussion shows that Griffith's argument fails to establish its conclusion and reveals what is actually required to argue for/against a particular proposal to provide ontological grounding for negative truths. (shrink)

人の始期から終期の「生」について、生殖医療、再生医療、ゲノム医療などの先端医療を紹介し、バイオエシックス教育の実際をみる。.

Recently, Jonathan Tallant has argued that we should reject priority views, which hold that some objects are fundamental and others are dependent. Tallant’s argument relies on two proposed mereological possibilities: a gunky world, where everything has a proper part, and a junky world, where everything is a proper part. In this paper, I criticise Tallant’s argument and argue that neither of these possibilities threaten priority views per se; at most, they threaten only particular forms of priority views that contain a (...) certain independently controversial assumption. First, I defend priority pluralism against the gunk argument: the genuine conceivability of gunk can be plausibly doubted on the basis of a certain principle concerning metaphysical possibility, and even if this principle is false, the possibility of a gunky world poses no devastative problem for pluralism per se because it can be considered to be consistent with nonatomism. Second, I defend priority monism against the junk argument: the possibility of a junky world poses no devastative problem for monism per se because it can be considered to be consistent with nonholism in a twofold sense. Finally, I show that even monism as defined as genuinely holistic can be plausibly defended against the junk argument once the claim of the possible nonexistence of the maximal whole is reinterpreted based on the priority-based conception of existence. (shrink)

With growing globalization, the governments of many countries are tending to place a disproportionately large emphasis on economy, which often results in budget cuts in health, education and social welfare. Such a tendency has provoked arguments by many individuals concerned. The neo-conservatism represented by ex-US President Reagan and ex-UK Prime Minister Thatcher in the 1980s, known as Reaganomics and Thatcherism, caused public funds for health care and education to be substantially reduced. In developing countries a so-called structural adjustment policy, promoted (...) by the World Bank and the International Monetary Fund, is leading to shrinking budgets for health, education and social security in general. (shrink)

A senior physician with a government role in Japan made a widely reported and misleading statement about Thailand’s policy on HIV/AIDS patients. He claimed that in Thailand the policy is to spend public money on the prevention of HIV infection while allowing AIDS patients to die untreated. The author, a community nursing specialist in Japan with first-hand knowledge of HIV/AIDS policy in Thailand, thought that this statement would influence attitudes negatively in Japan. However, speaking out about this misrepresentation of the (...) facts carried certain risks. Although freedom of expression is valued in Japan, in practice it is not easy to contradict senior medical professionals. The author uses his experience of this difficult professional situation to teach nurses how to approach speaking out in the public interest. (shrink)

「人と天地との一体化」とは何か。儒学の「天人合一」説を独自の立論を通して再定義した伊藤仁斎の思想に焦点を当て、その思想的意義を問い直す。仁斎学の思想体系を平易明白に解説した入門書。.

Traditionally, the genealogy of Edo Confucianism, that is, Confucianism reinterpreted and reconstructed in the Tokugawa period, has been classified into the Chu-Hsi, Wang Yang-ming, Ancient, and Eclectic schools. These classifications are based on the most representative Confucian theories in the Tokugawa period and are useful for understanding their genealogy. However, when we try to capture the substance of Confucian thought from the interest of “education,” it is very difficult to understand the differences of each school’s educational thought based on this (...) classification. For example, according to the above classification of Confucian theories, the Jinsai and Sorai schools are also included in the Ancient school. However, it is no exaggeration to say that both educational ideas are completely different. In this study, although both Jinsai and Sorai are classified as Ancient schools, I will clarify how their educational theories are structured and how their contents are different. This study examines the content of Confucian thought from the perspective of “education.” I hope that the discussion will open up the possibility of a more precise understanding of the “educational thought” of Edo Confucianism. (shrink)

L’avocat japonais a été institué en 1872 à l’image de l’avocat français, au cours du mouvement de modernisation qui a suivi l’ouverture du pays. Mais l’état d’esprit y était et reste celui de la bureaucratie judiciaire. L’avocat n’a obtenu son indépendance qu’en 1949. Malgré les apparences, son rôle ne semble pas suffisamment développé pour permettre à la Justice d’avancer pleinement dans le sens de la protection des droits et libertés. Après avoir dressé un aperçu général de l’évolution et de l’état (...) actuel de la profession d’avocat, nous examinerons la possibilité d’étendre ses fonctions à de nouvelles activités. (shrink)

The moral foundations theory (MFT) proposes that there are five moral foundations that work as the standard to make moral judgments. Among them, the purity foundation is a complex concept. It is considered to be a distinctive foundation compared with the other ones partly because it involves religious beliefs. The assumption underlying the purity foundation is Christian beliefs, so the MFT was developed and made prevalent mostly in the Western cultures. However, because of that assumption, cultural differences in perceiving the (...) purity foundation should be observed with a non-Western sample, such as Japan. It would be important to discuss and clarify the Japanese unique aspect of their orientation toward the pure and impure. We constituted a scale to measure people's tendency toward purity orientation–pollution avoidance (POPA), based on the purity/sanctity subscale of the MFT. For validation, we administered several scales along with POPA. In Study 1, we developed the scale and measured the relationship between the degree of one's POPA, disgust, and animism. We identified four factors as POPA subscales. In Study 2, we investigated the test–retest reliability of POPA and conducted questionnaire surveys to measure attitudes toward paranormal phenomena and the degree of concern for each of the moral foundations. The results showed the validity of the scale, based on the moderate correlations with other scales. The POPA can be a promising tool to better understand the phenomena involving the purity foundation in a Japanese context. (shrink)

徳川慶喜のブレーンにして明治政府の高級官僚。翻訳論、日本語論、軍事論。知の百面相・西周初の入門書。.

We correct a mistake in the paper “Generalized periodicity and primitivity for words” [4] and justify the existence of regular languages all of whose roots are not even context-sensitive.

Starting from six kinds of periodicity of words we define six sets of words which are primitive in different senses and we investigate their relationships. We show that only three of the sets are external Marcus contextual languages with choice but none of them is an external contextual language without choice or an internal contextual language. For the time complexity of deciding any of our sets by one-tape Turing machines, n2 is a lower bound and this is optimal in two (...) cases. The notions of roots and degrees of words and languages, which are strongly connected to periodicity and primitivity, are also considered, and we show that there can be an arbitrarily large gap between the complexity of a language and that of its roots. (shrink)

Athletes in sport are not only physical beings but also spiritual beings. Sport is referred to sport as an issue of human self. What kind of inner self do athletes have in the context of modern sports? To consider the issue of self in sport, we focused on its two aspects, athletics and training. In conclusion, we proposed to combine individual training like Japanese shugyo influenced mainly by Zen philosophy with athletics developed in the West since the time of the (...) Greeks. When these are separated, the self of an athlete is still incomplete, and it is hard to attain genuine excellence or achievement. An athlete in such a separate state ofmind possibly ends up using irrational force or power when relying on individual training. On the other hand, an athlete who focuses only on competitions will have a strong inclination to be affected by the media and commercialism, while having chances to be approved by others. It is hence essential to combine the two approaches. If we redefine playing sports as the phenomenon that comprehends both our self-reflection and our encounters with others, it will serve as an occasion of great significance for people living in today’s world. (shrink)

In tennis, service requires a variety of complicated movements. Given the importance of taking the initiative to obtain points in a tennis match, it is crucial to make full use of speed and spin rate of service. Generally, a service that requires a higher spin rate would slow down, and a service that has increased speed would have a decreased spin rate. For players who are disadvantaged in height, although controlling spin rate is essential, slowing down service speed should be (...) avoided. For these players, the challenge of service is to improve the speed without decreasing the spin rate. Players must also be trained to build physical strength required for this skill. It is not uncommon to work on physical training without a racket; however, few studies have reported on the effects of cultivated physical strength on on-court tennis performance. Therefore, this study aimed to propose physical measurements that could be used as indices to improve service performance in 58 elite Japanese junior male players. To test service performance, we used TrackMan tennis radar device to assess speed, spin rate, impact height, and impact depth. To test physical strength, we measured 5- and 20-m sprint, broad jump, medicine ball throw. We used a significant multiple regression equation to predict the first service speed obtained from the broad jump and the Medicine ball throw. Additionally, a strong correlation was obtained between the predicted and measured values. In addition to physical strength, we suggest that the depth of the impact point is important for improving the first service speed. However, we were not able to identify the physical strength test items that improve service spin rate. Other item should be examined in the future to determine the physical strength associated with spin rate. This result could help connect physical training and service performance. (shrink)