Learned men have been writing about happiness since antiquity: from Greek times, there is Aristotle's treatise, included in the Nicomachean Ethics; from Roman, Seneca's De Vita Beata. Later came the Christian writings on this subject, especially another De Beata Vita, written by St. Augustine. The point of view is different from Aristotle's or Seneca's but the subject remains the same. In the Middle Ages also treatises on happiness were produced, and these eventually became part of the 'summae'. St. Thomas devoted (...) q. 2-5 of the Prima Secundae to happiness and q. 3 1-39 bear on it indirectly. In more modern times works on happiness continued to be written. Some authors carried on the Christian tradition which maintained that happi­ness is only attainable in the next world; to these belong the earliest works written in Polish. Other treatises - especially those of the Age of Reason - hold the opposite concept, that the only happiness man can expect is to be found on earth. In the 18th century there were so many of these treatises that it was possible to produce a whole anthology: The Temple of Happiness, or as it was originally called Le Temple du bonheur, ou recueuil des plus excellents traites sur Ie bonheur (2nd ed. , 1770). (shrink)

Problems connected with the questions of: being-nonbeing, existence, modes of existence and alike, belong to the basic and most important in metaphysics. The article discusses some answers to the aforementioned issues, as proposed by the ancient philosophers, St Thomas Aquinas, R. Ingarden and A.N. Whitehead. In the Appendix some remarks are made on Aristotle’s and S. Thomas’ theory of act and potency.

Published originally in Polish in 19627, it achieved bestseller status and acclaim as the best work of its kind in the world.

A fully quantum-mechanical description of the spontaneous emission from an excited two-level atom placed in front of a two-slit interferometer is given. Global modes of the electromagnetic field in a two slit system are derived within the Kirchhoff-Huygens diffraction approximation, serving as a base for the field quantization. The standard Fermi's golden rule, supplemented by a factor coming from the nontrivial mode structure caused by the presence of the two-slit interferometer, is used to show that interference results from the position-dependent (...) coupling between the atom and different field modes of the system. (shrink)

Sixty years that have passed since the Warsaw Uprising are meaningful on the life scale of human generations. The Uprising, planned for 2 or 3 days, lasted in fact for 63 days. That fact astounded the military experts and was even noticed by the German high command, which has to be mainly ascribed to the exceptional tension of patriotism of the soldiers and the population.The Germans suffered especially great losses on the average around 1,900 weekly, almost twice as many as (...) during the highest intensity of fighting in 1944/45. On our side the losses were estimated at 18,000 dead and about 6,500–7,000 wounded insurgents. However, the Warsaw Uprising and the whole nation counted around 150,000 dead among the civilians.During the two months of the uprising 25% of the pre-war buildings in Warsaw were destroyed, mainly due to the barbarian practice of burning the whole streets. Against the conditions of the capitulation agreement just signed, the majority of historical monuments were burned down.In Warsaw, the tradition of sacrifices and solidarity in action, bravery and the deep attachment to liberty, manifested in September 1939, was alive and brought results all the time of war through the acts of the patriotic resistance organizations. The leaders of the Warsaw Uprising belonged to the resistance fighters before World War I and during it. The battle for independence was their curriculum vitae, and the majority of the uprising participants, the youth, was educated in the independent Polish Republic, in respect for patriotic traditions of independence fights and insurrections.Jerzy Kirchmajer believes that the Warsaw Uprising was an error, as it did not suit the Soviets; Jan Ciechanowski from London—that it was against the plans of the British ally. It is said sometimes that the Uprising started without calculating the possibility of a helping hand.Faith played a major role during the Uprising. The clergy helped the community every way they could. (shrink)

The article reviews the book Los, zło, tajemnica: ku twórczym źródłom poezji Aleksandra Wata i Czesława Miłosza [Fate, Evil, Mystery: Toward the Creative Sources of Aleksander Wat's and Czesław Miłosz's Poetry], by Marek K. Siwiec.

Abstract Three main concepts of model in science are distinguished: (1) semantical model of a theory; (2) real model of another real thing; (3) mathematical model of a real thing. The last concept is the most important for the empirical sciences. The mathematical model is not identical with a theory: it is an ideal object which is directly described by the theory. We have here an intermediate level between reality and theory.

The axiological structure of man is by its nature defined by its relation to values. Its main task consists in their “implementation.” In this sense, the axiological structure has a teleological character. Its most important determining factor is the attitude of its subjects, man, towards values, or, to be more precise, towards the choice of values and their realisation within oneself. The arguments present a proposition of a multi-aspect stude of man in the context of values. It is remarkable that (...) so far this background has not been taken into consideration, or at least not satisfactorily enough, in attempts aiming at explaining the essence of personality. Yet it does seem that what we call “man’s axiological structure” significantly affects an individual’s personality, and possibily constitutes it. (shrink)

This paper considers the method of idealization and factualization as the main method of all advanced empirical science. The procedure is as follows. Some idealizing conditions are assumed: the vanishing of factors $(p_{i}=0)$ which never vanish in the real world. An idealization law is formulated -- a law which is exactly (non-vacuously) fulfilled only in an ideal model, not in any real system. Then the idealizing assumptions are abrogated one by one-it is a process of gradual factualization, of the transition (...) to the factual laws which are fulfilled in real systems. These laws may be directly applied and tested by experience. (shrink)

Pali Buddhist Texts-explained to the Beginner. Rune. E. A. Johansson. Scandinavian Institute of Asian Studies Monograph Series No. 14 Curzon Press, London, Second edition, revised and enlarged, 1977 160 pp. £4.00.

In this article, on the basis of questionnaire data collected for other purposes, the Authors want to show the consequences of various methods of shortening of tests and what may result from such an action for diagnosticians, researchers and examined individuals. The research aim of the work is to show the best method of shortening of the scale of questionnaires. Will shortening of a questionnaire according to different statistical techniques bring the same results? Will the quality of shortened scales be (...) comparable? Is any of statistical techniques better for shortening of the scale of a questionnaire? The obtained results suggest a poorly controlable effect of the methods of questionnaire shortening. Moreover creating a short version on the basis of the results collected with the use of the full version leads to obtaining a tool with unknown diagnostic and psychometric properties. (shrink)

Resource loss, coping, alcohol expectancies and drinking in students The aim of the study was to find relationships between resource loss treated as a stress indicator, coping, alcohol expectancies and drinking in college students. Results of a group of 125 first and second year students showed that there was a strong relationship between alcohol consumption and expectancies connected with alcohol. Some coping forms were also related to drinking but no relationship was found for resource loss.