The Mechanical Imitation of Bird Flight

1904 ◽  
Vol 8 (29) ◽  
pp. 23-25
Author(s):  
Williams Cochrane

In commencing the paper which I am about to read I would like, first of all, to make a few remarks as to what has been done towards solving the difficult, yet extremely fascinating problem of aerial flight.In recent years much has been attempted, but, when all is weighed in the balance, I venture to think that comparatively nothing of any value has yet been accomplished, and the successful flying machine has yet to come. A debt of gratitude is due to M. Santos Dumont. M. Lebaudy, and other pioneers, for breaking down, as they have, prejudice against the subject; but, after all, do his or their machines embody any new principle ? Only by careful attention to certain mechanical details and a combination of mechanism already in existence have they accomplished what they have.It is unnecessary for me to go into details of the defects of navigable air-ships. Most students of aeronautics are, I think, agreed that the flying machine of the future will be one which is heavier than the atmosphere and presents the least surface of resistance when travelling horizontally.

Author(s):  
Garrett Hardin

An enduring problem of social life is what to do about the future. Can we predict it? Can we control it? How much sacrifice are we willing to make in the present for the promise of a better future? The questions are harrowing, and agreement comes hard. The year 1921 was a time of famine in some parts of the newly formed Soviet Union. An American journalist, visiting a refugee camp on the Volga, reported that almost half of the people had died of starvation. Noticing some sacks of grain stacked on an adjacent field, he asked the patriarch of the refugee community why the people did not simply overpower the lone soldier guarding the grain and help themselves. The patriarch impatiently explained that the seed was being saved for next season's planting. "We do not steal from the future," he said. It would be too much to claim that only the human animal is capable of imagining what is yet to come, but it is difficult to believe that any other animal can have so keen an appreciation of the demands of the future. Alfred Korbzybski (1879- 1950) called man "the time-binding animal." Binding the future to the present makes sense only if understandable mechanisms connect the two. This understanding was notably missing in the writings of the anarchist-journalist William Godwin. Unlike Malthus, he could make no sense of the fluctuations of human numbers. "Population," he said, "if we consider it historically, appears to be a fitful principle, operating intermittedly and by starts. This is the great mystery of the subject.. .. One of the first ideas that will occur to a reflecting mind is, that the cause of these irregularities cannot be of itself of regular and uniform operation. It cannot be [as Malthus says] 'the numbers of mankind at all times pressing hard against the limits of the means of subsistence.'" Rather than trying to see how appearances might be reconciled with natural laws, Godwin simply said there were no natural laws. His proposal to replace law with "fhfulness" led one of his critics to comment: "Perhaps Godwin was simply carrying his dislike of law one step farther. Having applied it to politics (1793) and to style (1797), he now applied it to nature (1820). He deliberately placed a whole army of facts out of the range of science."


2019 ◽  
Author(s):  
◽  
London Brickley

[ACCESS RESTRICTED TO THE UNIVERSITY OF MISSOURI AT REQUEST OF AUTHOR.] Folklore and science, along with the subject of the future which has slowly over time worked its way into the discourses of both, have a long, complicated history together. One that lives on in the present. (And one that might even prevail into the time to come). This work is not entirely that story. But it is a part of it, presented here as it is in the interest of opening new channels of discourse between two areas of research that are often seen by participants on all sides to be rather divergent, if not entirely oppositional to one another. This exploration culminates in a consideration of the contemporary status of popular science trends and how folklore might continue to operate within them--a proposal which identifies an increasingly emergent (although certainly not exclusively novel) form of folk expression that arises out of the friction caused by queries of scientific "truth," "promise," and "possibility" that is still stuck in a liminal wait for "the future." Both a widespread present-day phenomenon and subsequent set of narratives, expressions, beliefs, and actions that this work has chosen to call "science frictions."


1992 ◽  
Vol 34 (2) ◽  
pp. 19-28
Author(s):  
William Perry

The Purpose of this essay is to outline, at least in part, the Latin America agenda of the Republican Party for the 1990s as it appears to me. The subject is both timely and important. However, I can claim no special insight in this regard and, given the nature of the two parties, no one has, or really could, authorize my effort. Such an endeavor probably requires roughly equal measures of analysis, and speculation with respect to the future course of events here in the United States, within the region and around the globe. Given these caveats, I am pleased to try to lay out the Hemispheric policy agenda which I believe that the Republican Party should, and will, follow during the decade to come. Although my partisan sympathies will undoubtedly shine through, I can only hope that my viewpoints will not diverge too greatly from those of my esteemed friend and colleague, Ambassador Ambler H. Moss.


2014 ◽  
Vol 11 (01) ◽  
pp. 35-42
Author(s):  
M. Hermans

SummaryThe author presents his personal opinion inviting to discussion on the possible future role of psychiatrists. His view is based upon the many contacts with psychiatrists all over Europe, academicians and everyday professionals, as well as the familiarity with the literature. The list of papers referred to is based upon (1) the general interest concerning the subject when representing ideas also worded elsewhere, (2) the accessibility to psychiatrists and mental health professionals in Germany, (3) being costless downloadable for non-subscribers and (4) for some geographic aspects (e.g. Belgium, Spain, Sweden) and the latest scientific issues, addressing some authors directly.


2020 ◽  
Vol 20 (2) ◽  
pp. 7-13
Author(s):  
G. Stankevych ◽  
L. Dmytrenko ◽  
A. Kats ◽  
V. Shpak

In the future, in Ukraine it is planned to increase the sown area for cereals, legumes and oilseeds, to increase the gross grain harvest to 80 million tons, and its export abroad was increased twice. Intensive construction in the southern ports of Ukraine of grain transshipment terminals with large metal silos will solve the problem of increasing grain export in the future. At these powerful terminals, the bulk of the grain comes mainly by rail, and is shipped to water. The aim of the work was to study the characteristics of the grain receiving from railway transport to the grain transshipment terminal of LLC “Ukrelevatorprom” in order to improve its works efficiency. The object of the study was the development of technology of grain receiving at the grain transshipment terminal; the subject of research is cereals, legume sand oil crops, as well as data from daily volumes of receiving and dispensing operations at the grain transshipment terminal of LLC “Ukrelevatorprom” for 2015-2016. The studies were carried out on the basis of processing data from the consignment notes for 2015-2016, according to which there was a summed amount of grain (net) daily transported by the railway. Further processing of the obtained data was carried out by a combined graphoanalytical method, for which, on the basis of tabular values for each studied year, the corresponding histograms and graphs were built and the necessary indicators were determined. Analysis of the structure of grain crops supplied by railway to LLC “Ukrelevatorprom” in 2015 and 2016 and their ratio showed that the main share was occupied by cereal crops (78.0 % and 73.1 % respectively), which were mainly represented by corn, share which was significantly dominated by other crops (wheat of various classes and barley) and amounted to 45.8 % and 44.5 %, respectively, which can be explained by its high demand in the international grain market, in which Ukraine occupies a leading position. Oilseeds (rapeseed) were taken in accordance with 19.1 % and 14.9 %, and legumes (soybeans) — 2.9 % and 12.0 %. An analysis of the timing of the unloading of grain wagons (hopper cars) showed that the total duration of this process, depending on the crops, averages 37...59 minutes. The longest steps for unloading wagons are to determine the grain quality indicators, especially rapeseed, and to spill grain from the wagons, therefore, to reduce their duration, it is necessary to form feeds of wagons with grain batches of the same quality and use more modern express analyzers to determine grain quality indicators, which will increase the productivity of the grain receiving line from the railway. According to the research results, the enterprise has the potential to increase by about 30 % the volume of grain intake. It was established that the periods of the grain receipt at the enterprise in 2015-2016 amounted to 349 and 353 days, respectively, the actual coefficients of the daily irregularity Kdaily for the grain receipt from the railway in these years are equal to 1.47 and 1.52, and the monthly irregularity Kmonth, respectively 1.33 and 1.21, does not exceed the standard values Kdaily = 2.5 and Kmonth= 2.0. This made it possible to clarify the database from the actual characteristics of the process of grain receiving by railway and can be used in design and verification calculations of equipment in technological lines for receiving grain from railway transport, and will contribute to increasing the efficiency of grain transshipment terminals. 


2020 ◽  
pp. 301-323
Author(s):  
Natalya I. Kikilo ◽  

In the Macedonian literary language the analytic da-construction used in an independent clause has a wide range of possible modal meanings, the most common of which are imperative and optative. The present article offers a detailed analysis of the semantics and functions of the Macedonian optative da-construction based on fiction and journalistic texts. The first part of the article deals with the specificities of the optative as a category which primarily considers the subject of a wish. In accordance with the semantic characteristics of this category, optative constructions are used in those discourse text types where the speakers are explicitly designated (the most natural context for the optative is the dialogue). The analysis of the Macedonian material includes instances of atypical usage of the optative da-construction, in which the wish of the subject is not apparent and thereby produces new emotional tonalities perceptible to the reader of a fiction/journalistic text. The study describes Macedonian constructions involving two different verb forms: 1) present tense form (da + praes) and 2) imperfective form (da + impf). These constructions formally designate the hypothetical and counterfactual status of the optative situation, respectively. Thus, the examples in the analysis are ordered according to two types of constructions, which reflect the speaker’s view on the probability of the realisation of his/her wish. Unrealistic wishes can be communicated through the present da-construction, while the imperfective construction denotes situations in which the wish can be realised in the future. The second part of the article is devoted to performative optative da-constructions, which express formulas of speech etiquette, wishes and curses. The analysis demonstrates that these constructions lose their magical functions, when used outside of the ritual context, and begin to function as interjections.


Author(s):  
Chakravarthi Ram-Prasad

The Introduction outlines the various chapters. It then situates the question of ‘body’ in the modern Western philosophical tradition following Descartes, and argues that this leaves subsequent responses to come under one of three options: metaphysical dualism of body and subject; any anti-dualist reductionism; or the overcoming of the divide. Describing the Phenomenology of Merleau-Ponty as a potent example of the third strategy, the Introduction then suggests his philosophy will function as foil to the ecological phenomenology developed and presented in the book. Moreover, one approach within the Western Phenomenological tradition, of treating phenomenology as a methodology for the clarification of experience (rather than the means to the determination of an ontology of the subject) is compared to the approach in this book. Since classical India, while understanding dualism, did not confront the challenge of Descartes (for better or for worse), its treatment of body follows a different trajectory.


Author(s):  
Benjamin R. Levy

After John Cage’s 1958 Darmstadt lectures, many European composers developed an interest in absurdity and artistic provocation. Although Ligeti’s fascination with Cage and his association with the Fluxus group was brief, the impact it had on his composition was palpable and lasting. A set of conceptual works, The Future of Music, Trois Bagatelles, and Poème symphonique for one hundred metronomes, fall clearly into the Fluxus model, even as the last has taken on a second life as a serious work. This spirit, however, can also be seen in the self-satire of Fragment and the drama and irony of Volumina, Aventures, and Nouvelles Aventures. The sketches for Aventures not only show the composer channeling this humor into a major work but also prove to be a fascinating repository of ideas that Ligeti would reuse in the years to come.


2002 ◽  
Vol 96 (4) ◽  
pp. 879-880
Author(s):  
David Goldfischer

As Michael O'Hanlon concludes in his excellent contribution to Rockets' Red Glare: “We should…get used to the debate over ballistic missile defenses. It has been around a long time, and no final resolution is imminent” (p. 132). In one sense, a review of these three recent books makes clear that many analysts had grown a bit too used to positioning themselves in terms of the 1972 ABM Treaty. Preoccupied with arguments over whether the treaty should be preserved, modified, or rewritten in light of a changing strategic and technological context, no one seemed to have anticipated that President George W. Bush would simply withdraw from it, invoking Article XV's provision that either party could withdraw if “extraordinary events related to the subject matter of this Treaty have jeopardized its supreme interests.” Even many strategic defense supporters who deemed the treaty obsolete (as Robert Joseph persuasively maintains in his contribution to Rockets' Red Glare) generally believed that it should only—and would only—be scrapped if negotiations over U.S.-proposed changes broke down. (“The Bush Administration,” surmises O'Hanlon, “will surely try very hard to amend it before going to such an extreme”) (p. 112). In the event, the president's team disavowed even the word “negotiation,” saying they were willing only to “consult” the Russians regarding the treaty's impending demise.


2021 ◽  
pp. 2516600X2110059
Author(s):  
Som Sekhar Bhattacharyya ◽  
Rajesh Chandwani

The COVID-19 pandemic highlighted the necessity of good quality and adequate quantity of healthcare infrastructure facilities. Healthcare facilities were provided for COVID-19 facilities with improvisation and supplementary lateral infrastructure from other sectors. However, the main point of contemplation going into the future was regarding how to quickly develop healthcare facilities. The subject domain of ‘industrial engineering’ (IE) and its associated perspectives could provide some key insights regarding this. The authors undertook a conceptual literature review and provided theoretical argumentation toward this. The findings provided insights regarding the application of industrial engineering concepts in healthcare facilities and services.


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