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Topic Review
Buddhology
Buddhology is the study of the Buddha or Buddhahood. The term is also used as a synonym for Buddhist Studies, contemporary academic investigation of Buddhism. There are varied and nuanced understandings of the precise nature of a Buddha expressed in the different Buddhist traditions and movements.
  • 818
  • 02 Dec 2022
Topic Review
Chaos (Cosmogony)
Chaos (Ancient Greek:) refers to the void state preceding the creation of the universe or cosmos in the Greek creation myths, or to the initial "gap" created by the original separation of heaven and earth.
  • 817
  • 21 Nov 2022
Topic Review
Artificial Intelligence as a Tool for Architectural Design
Artificial intelligence (AI)-generated designs demonstrate significant potential, exhibiting competitive results in the categories of Attractiveness and Creativity. AI faces challenges in replicating the distinctive aspects of human design styles, pointing to the innate subjectivity inherent to design evaluations. These findings shed light on the role AI could play as a tool in architectural design, offering diverse design solutions and driving innovation.
  • 819
  • 18 Aug 2023
Topic Review
Similarity
In philosophy, similarity or resemblance is a relation between objects that constitutes how much these objects are alike. Similarity comes in degrees: e.g. oranges are more similar to apples than to the moon. It is traditionally seen as an internal relation and analyzed in terms of shared properties: two things are similar because they have a property in common. The more properties they share, the more similar they are. They resemble each other exactly if they share all their properties. So an orange is similar to the moon because they both share the property of being round, but it is even more similar to an apple because additionally, they both share various other properties, like the property of being a fruit. On a formal level, similarity is usually considered to be a relation that is reflexive (everything resembles itself), symmetric (if a is similar to b then b is similar to a) and non-transitive (a need not resemble c despite a resembling b and b resembling c). Similarity comes in two forms: respective similarity, which is relative to one respect or feature, and overall similarity, which expresses the degree of resemblance between two objects all things considered. There is no general consensus whether similarity is an objective, mind-independent feature of reality, and, if so, whether it is a fundamental feature or reducible to other features. Resemblance is central to human cognition since it provides the basis for the categorization of entities into kinds and for various other cognitive processes like analogical reasoning. Similarity has played a central role in various philosophical theories, e.g. as a solution to the problem of universals through resemblance nominalism or in the analysis of counterfactuals in terms of similarity between possible worlds.
  • 814
  • 03 Nov 2022
Topic Review
Spirit (Animating Force)
In folk belief, spirit is the vital principle or animating force within all living things. As recently as 1628 and 1633 respectively, both William Harvey and René Descartes still speculated that somewhere within the body, in a special locality, there was a "vital spirit" or "vital force", which animated the whole bodily frame, just as the engine in a factory moves the machinery in it. People have frequently conceived of spirit as a supernatural being, or non-physical entity; for example, a demon, ghost, fairy, or angel. In ancient Islamic terminology however, the term spirit (rūḥ), applies only to "pure" spirits, but not to other invisible creatures, such as jinn, demons and angels. Historically, spirit has been used to refer to a "subtle" as opposed to "gross" material substance, as put forth in the notable last paragraph of Sir Isaac Newton's Principia Mathematica. In English Bibles, "the Spirit" (with a capital "S"), specifically denotes the Holy Spirit. The concepts of spirit and soul often overlap, and some systems propose that both survive bodily death. "Spirit" can have the sense of "ghost", i.e. a manifestation of the spirit of a deceased person. "Spirit" is also often used to refer to the consciousness or personality.
  • 811
  • 10 Nov 2022
Topic Review
Jurimetrics
Jurimetrics is the application of quantitative methods, and often especially probability and statistics, to law. In the United States, the journal Jurimetrics is published by the American Bar Association and Arizona State University. The Journal of Empirical Legal Studies is another publication that emphasizes the statistical analysis of law. The term was coined in 1949 by Lee Loevinger in his article "Jurimetrics: The Next Step Forward". Showing the influence of Oliver Wendell Holmes, Jr., Loevinger quoted Holmes' celebrated phrase that: The first work on this topic is attributed to Nicolaus I Bernoulli in his doctoral dissertation De Usu Artis Conjectandi in Jure, written in 1709.
  • 810
  • 14 Oct 2022
Topic Review
Dendrochronology
A significant part of our cultural heritage consists of wood. Research on historical wooden structures and artefacts thereby provides knowledge of people’s daily lives and the society in which they lived. Dendrochronology is a well-established dating method of wood that can also provide valuable knowledge about climate dynamics, environmental changes, silviculture, and cultural transformations. But dendrochronological surveys in the context of cultural heritage studies are rarely ultimately performed. In this study, we discuss how continuous communication between end users and dendrochronologists can significantly improve the quality of heritage studies based on dendrochronological results.
  • 809
  • 23 Aug 2021
Topic Review
Zephaniah Kingsley
Zephaniah Kingsley Jr. (December 4, 1765 – September 14, 1843), a Quaker born in England who moved as a child with his family to South Carolina, became a planter, slave trader, and merchant who built several plantations in the Spanish colony of Florida in what is now Jacksonville, Florida. He served on the Florida Territorial Council after Florida was acquired by the United States in 1821. Kingsley Plantation, which he owned and where he lived for 25 years, has been preserved as part of the Timucuan Ecological and Historic Preserve, run by the United States National Park Service. Kingsley was a relatively lenient slaveholder, who allowed his slaves the opportunity to be hired out and earn their freedom. He took four enslaved African women as common-law wives, practicing polygamy. His first wife, Anna Madgigine Jai Kingsley, was 13 years old when Kingsley purchased her in Havana. He said that he had married her, which he never said of his three other common-law wives. He emancipated Anna Jai when she turned 18, and trusted her with running his plantation when he was away on business. He had a total of nine mixed-race children with his wives. He educated his children to high standards and worked to ensure he could settle his estate on them and his wives. His interracial family and his business interests resulted in Kingsley being deeply invested in the Spanish system of slavery and society. As in the French colonies, certain rights were provided to a class of free people of color, and multiracial natural children were allowed to inherit property from white fathers. "In the Spanish Floridas free people of color ... enjoyed tremendously elevated status when compared to virtually any other person of African descent in North America.":61 Kingsley became involved in politics when control of the Florida colony passed in 1821 from Spain to the United States. He tried to persuade the new territorial government to maintain the special status of the population of free people of color, who were mostly multi-racial. He was unsuccessful in this effort, and in 1828 he published a pamphlet that defended a system of slavery that would allow slaves to purchase their freedom, and give rights to free blacks and free people of color. Faced with American laws that forbade interracial marriage, and discouraged "free people of color" (see Free black#Free negroes unwelcome) being allowed to stay or settle in the state, between 1835 and 1837, Kingsley relocated his large family to Haiti. (At that time it controlled part of what is today the Dominican Republic.) After his death, his estate in Florida was the subject of dispute between his widow Anna Jai and other members of Kingsley's family, but she was successful in gaining the estate he had bequeathed to her.
  • 809
  • 11 Oct 2022
Topic Review
Ganapati Atharvashirsa
The Ganapati Atharvashirsa (Sanskrit: गणपत्यथर्वशीर्ष, Gaṇapatyatharvaśīrṣa) is a Sanskrit text and a minor Upanishad of Hinduism. It is a late Upanishadic text dedicated to Ganesha, the deity representing intellect and learning. It asserts that Ganesha is same as the eternal underlying reality, Brahman. The text is attached to the Atharvaveda, and is also referred to as the Sri Ganapati Atharva Sirsha, the Ganapati Atharvashirsha, the Ganapati Atharvasirsa, or the Ganapati Upanishad. The text exists in several variants, but with the same message. Ganesha is described to be same as other Hindu gods, as ultimate truth and reality (Brahman), as satcitananda, as the soul in oneself (Atman) and in every living being, as Om.
  • 808
  • 17 Nov 2022
Topic Review
Theosophy and Politics
Modern Theosophy and politics, according to the statements of Helena Blavatsky and Henry Olcott, are not connected between themselves in any way.(Blavatsky, 1879) However, investigations of historians and religious studies scholars show that the Theosophical movement has played a significant role in consolidation of Indian nationalism. Similar to neo-Hinduism, Theosophy had supporting promotion the nationalist ideology, and this gave Prof. Mark Bevir a reason to consider it not only as a form of "political movement", but also as an "integral part" of neo-Hinduism.
  • 808
  • 02 Dec 2022
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