Adenosine triphosphate, ATP, is the energy currency of living cells. While ATP synthases of archae and ATP synthases of pro‐ and eukaryotic organisms operate as energy producers by synthesizing ATP, the eukaryotic V‐ATPase hydrolyzes ATP and thus functions as energy transducer. These enzymes share features like the hydrophilic catalytic‐ and the membrane‐embedded ion‐translocating sector, allowing them to operate as nano‐motors and to transform the transmembrane electrochemical ion gradient into ATP or vice versa. Since archaea are rooted close to the origin (...) of life, the A‐ATP synthase is probably more similar in its composition and function to the “original” enzyme, invented by Nature billion years ago. On the contrary, the V‐ATPases have acquired specific structural, functional and regulatory features during evolution. This review will summarize the current knowledge on the structure, mechanism and regulation of A‐ATP synthases and V‐ATPases. The importance of V‐ATPase in pathophysiology of diseases will be discussed. BioEssays 30:1096–1109, 2008. © 2008 Wiley Periodicals, Inc. (shrink)

Arguably, the existence of bald-faced (i.e. knowingly undisguised) lies entails that not all lies are intended to deceive. Two kinds of bald-faced lies exist in the literature: those based on some common knowledge that implies that you are lying and those that involve tell-tale signs (e.g. blushing) that show that you are lying. I designed the tell-tale sign bald-faced lies to avoid objections raised against the common knowledge bald-faced lies but I now see that they are more problematic than what (...) I initially thought. Therefore, I will discuss these lies in more detail, refine the existing cases, and resolve some anticipated objections. I conclude that tell-tale sign bald-faced lies are genuine lies not intended to deceive. (shrink)

We conducted two experiments to determine whether common folk think that so-called _tell-tale sign_ bald-faced lies are intended to deceive—since they have not been tested before. These lies involve tell-tale signs (e.g. blushing) that show that the speaker is lying. Our study was designed to avoid problems earlier studies raise (these studies focus on a kind of bald-faced lie in which supposedly everyone knows that what the speaker says is false). Our main hypothesis was that the participants will think that (...) the protagonists from our examples lied without intending to deceive, and the results of our surveys confirmed this hypothesis: most of our participants rated tell-tale sign lies as lies not intended to deceive. Therefore, our analysis suggests that common folk think that some lies are not intended to deceive. (shrink)

According to one influential argument put forward by, e.g. Chisholm and Feehan, Pfister, Meibauer, Dynel, Keiser, and Harris, asserting requires intending to give your hearer a reason to believe what you say (first premise) and, because liars must assert what they believe is false (second premise), liars necessarily intend to cause their hearer to believe as true what the liars believe is false (conclusion). According to this argument, that is, all genuine lies are intended to deceive. ‘Lies’ not intended to (...) deceive are not genuine lies because they do not involve assertions and you need to assert in order to lie. In this paper, I reject this argument by arguing that the first premise is false: intending to give your hearer a reason to believe what you say is not necessary for asserting. (shrink)

A generic extension L[x]\documentclass[12pt]{minimal} \usepackage{amsmath} \usepackage{wasysym} \usepackage{amsfonts} \usepackage{amssymb} \usepackage{amsbsy} \usepackage{mathrsfs} \usepackage{upgreek} \setlength{\oddsidemargin}{-69pt} \begin{document}$${\mathbf{L}[x]}$$\end{document} by a real x is defined, in which the E0\documentclass[12pt]{minimal} \usepackage{amsmath} \usepackage{wasysym} \usepackage{amsfonts} \usepackage{amssymb} \usepackage{amsbsy} \usepackage{mathrsfs} \usepackage{upgreek} \setlength{\oddsidemargin}{-69pt} \begin{document}$${\mathsf{E}_0}$$\end{document}-class of x is a lightface Π21\documentclass[12pt]{minimal} \usepackage{amsmath} \usepackage{wasysym} \usepackage{amsfonts} \usepackage{amssymb} \usepackage{amsbsy} \usepackage{mathrsfs} \usepackage{upgreek} \setlength{\oddsidemargin}{-69pt} \begin{document}$${{\it \Pi}^1_2}$$\end{document} set containing no ordinal-definable reals.

It is true in the Cohen, Solovay-random, dominaning, and Sacks generic extension, that every countable ordinal-definable set of reals belongs to the ground universe. It is true in the Solovay collapse model that every non-empty OD countable set of sets of reals consists of \ elements.

The small, the tiny, and the infinitesimal have been the object of both fascination and vilification for millenia. One of the most vitriolic reviews in mathematics was that written by Errett Bishop about Keisler’s book Elementary Calculus: an Infinitesimal Approach. In this skit we investigate both the argument itself, and some of its roots in Bishop George Berkeley’s criticism of Leibnizian and Newtonian Calculus. We also explore some of the consequences to students for whom the infinitesimal approach is congenial. The (...) casual mathematical reader may be satisfied to read the text of the five act play, whereas the others may wish to delve into the 130 footnotes, some of which contain elucidation of the mathematics or comments on the history. (shrink)

The Petrine-Pushkinian era lasted no more than two hundred years. It originated at the Battle of Poltava, where Russian troops first showed themselves not just equal to the Swedes, who were otherwi...

Qu'est-ce que la musique? Selon Jankélévitch, il y a dans la musique une double complication, génératrice de problèmes métaphysiques et de problèmes moraux. Car la musique est à la fois expressive et inexpressive, sérieuse et frivole, profonde et superficielle ; elle a un sens et n'en a pas. Il y a une ironique disproportion entre la puissance incantatoire de la musique et l'inévidence foncière du beau musical.

The author examines the key philosophical problem of theodicy and freedom as it was first formulated by Fyodor Dostoevsky and later developed by Nikolai Berdyaev.

This report of the roundtable that took place on 25 November 2021 at The Peoples’ Friendship University of Russia attempts to explain the obvious growth of interest in Neo-Kantian philosophy in general and the philosophy of the head of the Marburg School of Neo-Kantianism, Hermann Cohen, in particular. In their contributions, the participants in the discussion demonstrated that the current interest in Neo-Kantianism does not solely or even largely have to do with the history of philosophy but rather with the (...) relevance of many of the ideas of Marburg Neo-Kantianism for the modern theory of cognition, the philosophy of culture, ethics and the philosophy of religion. The course of the discussion highlighted the relevance of Cohen’s theory of cognition based on logic and rationality. The main outcome of the discussion was the conviction that the potential of many of Cohen’s ideas has yet to be fully tapped and there are grounds for considering them to be heralds of a new philosophy which, in many of its features, is only maturing. (shrink)

Although the concept of “pure knowledge” is one of the most interesting and singular concepts in the philosophical work of Vasily Seseman, it can only be presented after a comprehensive analysis of the philosopher’s numerous works devoted to ontological, epistemological and logical problems. Seseman believes that the main philosophical trends at the beginning of the twentieth century, namely neo-Kantianism, intuitionism and phenomenology, could not present this concept, although they did try. According to the philosopher, the main reason for the inability (...) of neo-Kantianism, intuitionism and phenomenology to start talking about pure knowledge is their inability to assert the essential difference between objective and non-objective knowledge. Sesemann pays special attention when substantiating his concept of “pure knowledge” to the difference between his approach and that of the founder of modern phenomenology. The philosopher points out that even Husserl, who concentrated attention on the specifics of inner experience, puts this specific, in the end, in dependence on the process of cognition and reflection, completely ignoring its ontological foundations. While pure knowledge, according to Seseman, is neither non-objective, nor objective knowledge, nor non-objective, nor objective being, it, in fact, is non-knowledge and non-being. It is precisely this understanding by the philosopher of this phenomenon that allows him to characterize pure knowledge as premiseless and limitless and, in general, as free from any ontological or epistemological determinations. However, on the other hand, Sesemann insists that the phenomenon of pure knowledge has the meaning of not just a regulatory idea, an infinitely distant ideal, but also a real constitutive meaning, as a principle that reveals and determines the human striving for knowledge as an interconnected and necessary process that ascends from the onto-gnoseological stage of non-objective knowledge to the epistemological, and then the logical stage of objective knowledge. (shrink)