scholarly journals Boulez – Xenakis: Two Converging Musical Heuristics

2021 ◽  
Vol 04 (05) ◽  
Author(s):  
Prof. Dr. Ricardo Mandolini ◽  
Keyword(s):  
Fixed Points ◽  
Driving Force ◽  
A Priori ◽  
Logical Truth ◽  
A Posteriori ◽  
The Creation ◽  
Mathematical Sciences

What is heuristics? The methods of imagination that prepares for invention and discovery, by accepting that all arguments are good if they can succeed in achieving the proposed goals. A principle is deemed to be heuristic, therefore, when it is considered not on the basis of the truth it supports but by the fact that it contributes wholly or partly to the realisation of some project. In order to compose a work, the creator has a certain number of dominant ideas, which function as pivots or fixed points around which the piece develops. The value of these ideas, which sometimes take the form of theories borrowed from the physical or mathematical sciences, is justified a posteriori, by the realisation of the works that emerge from them, and not a priori: the experimental or logical truth of what they assert, even if confirmed by experimental reality, is put here in brackets. These principles count as opinions for the composer; they are the heuristic principles of creation. The aim of this paper is to analyse the principles that operate as the driving force behind the creation of Boulez and Xenakis.

1968: On Social, Epistemic, and Historiographic(?) Revolutions

2015 ◽  
Vol 2 (1) ◽  
Author(s):  
Roberto D. Hernández
Keyword(s):  
Ethnic Studies ◽  
A Priori ◽  
Negative Consequences ◽  
The World ◽  
The Creation ◽  
Young Students ◽  
Historic Significance ◽  
Agent Of Change

This article addresses the meaning and significance of the “world revolution of 1968,” as well as the historiography of 1968. I critically interrogate how the production of a narrative about 1968 and the creation of ethnic studies, despite its world-historic significance, has tended to perpetuate a limiting, essentialized and static notion of “the student” as the primary actor and an inherent agent of change. Although students did play an enormous role in the events leading up to, through, and after 1968 in various parts of the world—and I in no way wish to diminish this fact—this article nonetheless argues that the now hegemonic narrative of a student-led revolt has also had a number of negative consequences, two of which will be the focus here. One problem is that the generation-driven models that situate 1968 as a revolt of the young students versus a presumably older generation, embodied by both their parents and the dominant institutions of the time, are in effect a sociosymbolic reproduction of modernity/coloniality’s logic or driving impulse and obsession with newness. Hence an a priori valuation is assigned to the new, embodied in this case by the student, at the expense of the presumably outmoded old. Secondly, this apparent essentializing of “the student” has entrapped ethnic studies scholars, and many of the period’s activists (some of whom had been students themselves), into said logic, thereby risking the foreclosure of a politics beyond (re)enchantment or even obsession with newness yet again.

A priori/a posteriori

2017 ◽  
Author(s):  
Heinrich Schepers ◽  
Giorgio Tonelli ◽  
Rudolf Eisler
Keyword(s):  
A Priori ◽  
A Posteriori

A Critique of Modernist Synthesis in Islamic Thought

1994 ◽  
Vol 11 (4) ◽  
pp. 475-503
Author(s):  
Masudul Alum Choudhury
Keyword(s):  
Scientific Inquiry ◽  
A Priori ◽  
Scientific Investigation ◽  
Muslim World ◽  
A Posteriori ◽  
Islamic Thought ◽  
And Behavior ◽  
Muslim Scholars

Is it the realm of theoretical constructs or positive applications thatdefines the essence of scientific inquiry? Is there unison between thenormative and the positive, between the inductive and deductivecontents, between perception and reality, between the micro- andmacro-phenomena of reality as technically understood? In short, isthere a possibility for unification of knowledge in modernist epistemologicalcomprehension? Is knowledge perceived in conceptionand application as systemic dichotomy between the purely epistemic(in the metaphysically a priori sense) and the purely ontic (in thepurely positivistically a posteriori sense) at all a reflection of reality?Is knowledge possible in such a dichotomy or plurality?Answers to these foundational questions are primal in order tounderstand a critique of modernist synthesis in Islamic thought thathas been raging among Muslim scholars for some time now. Theconsequences emanating from the modernist approach underlie muchof the nature of development in methodology, thinking, institutions,and behavior in the Muslim world throughout its history. They arefound to pervade more intensively, I will argue here, as the consequenceof a taqlid of modernism among Islamic thinkers. I will thenargue that this debility has arisen not because of a comparativemodem scientific investigation, but due to a failure to fathom theuniqueness of a truly Qur'anic epistemological inquiry in the understandingof the nature of the Islamic socioscientific worldview ...

Qualifier la qualité des données localisées numériques des réseaux d’eau et d’assainissement

2019 ◽  
Vol 11 ◽  
pp. 51-64
Author(s):  
M. LE MOAL
Keyword(s):  
A Priori ◽  
A Posteriori ◽  
Systèmes D’Information Géographique ◽  
Systèmes D’Information

Les systèmes d’information géographique (SIG) sont devenus incontournables dans la gestion des réseaux d’eau et d’assainissement et leur efficacité repose en très grande partie sur la qualité des données exploitées. Parallèlement, les évolutions réglementaires et les pratiques des utilisateurs augmentant notamment les échanges d’informations renforcent le rôle central des données et de leur qualité. Si la plupart des solutions SIG du marché disposent de fonctions dédiées à la qualification de la qualité des données, elles procèdent de la traduction préalable de spécifications des données en règles informatiques avant de procéder aux tests qualitatifs. Cette approche chronophage requiert des compétences métier. Pour éviter ces contraintes, Axes Conseil a élaboré un procédé de contrôle des données SIG rapide et accessible à des acteurs métier de l’eau et de l’assainissement. Plutôt qu’une lourde approche de modélisation a priori, le principe est de générer un ensemble d’indicateurs explicites facilement exploitables a posteriori par les acteurs du métier. Cette approche offre une grande souplesse d’analyse et ne nécessite pas de compétences informatiques avancées.

Kant’s ‘Transcendental Deduction’

2018 ◽  
Author(s):  
Barry Stroud
Keyword(s):  
A Priori ◽  
Human Mind ◽  
Critical Assessment ◽  
Structural Description ◽  
A Posteriori ◽  
Human Knowledge ◽  
Transcendental Deduction ◽  
The World ◽  
Empirical Realism

This chapter presents a straightforward structural description of Immanuel Kant’s conception of what the transcendental deduction is supposed to do, and how it is supposed to do it. The ‘deduction’ Kant thinks is needed for understanding the human mind would establish and explain our ‘right’ or ‘entitlement’ to something we seem to possess and employ in ‘the highly complicated web of human knowledge’. This is: experience, concepts, and principles. The chapter explains the point and strategy of the ‘deduction’ as Kant understands it, as well as the demanding conditions of its success, without entering into complexities of interpretation or critical assessment of the degree of success actually achieved. It also analyses Kant’s arguments regarding a priori concepts as well as a posteriori knowledge of the world around us, along with his claim that our position in the world must be understood as ‘empirical realism’.

Positive Psychology’s A Priori Problem

2017 ◽  
Vol 58 (3) ◽  
pp. 313-342 ◽  
Author(s):  
Barbara S. Held
Keyword(s):  
Conceptual Framework ◽  
A Priori ◽  
A Posteriori ◽  
Negative Numbers ◽  
Psychological States ◽  
Psychological Reality ◽  
Negative Results ◽  
Optimal Functioning ◽  
Conceptual Muddles ◽  
Negative Phenomena

The positive/negative distinction works well in many fields—for example, in mathematics negative numbers hold their own, and in medical pathology negative results are usually celebrated. But in positive psychology negativity should be replaced with positivity for flourishing/optimal functioning to occur. That the designation of the psychological states and processes deemed positive (good/desirable) and negative (bad/undesirable) is made a priori, independent of circumstantial particularity, both intrapersonal and interpersonal, does not seem to bother positive psychologists. But it should, as it results in conceptual muddles and dead ends that cannot be solved within their conceptual framework of positivity and negativity. Especially problematic is an ambiguity I find in positive psychologists’ a priori and a posteriori understandings of positivity and negativity, an ambiguity about constitutive and causal relations that pervades their science and the conclusions drawn from it. By eliminating their a priori dichotomy of positivity and negativity, positive psychologists might well find themselves in a better position to put back together the psychological reality that they have fractured in their ontologically dubious move of carving up psychological reality a priori into positive and negative phenomena. They then might find themselves better placed to “broaden and build” their own science of flourishing.

scholarly journals Changes in Power Plant NOx Emissions over Northwest Greece Using a Data Assimilation Technique

Atmosphere ◽  
2021 ◽  
Vol 12 (7) ◽  
pp. 900
Author(s):  
Ioanna Skoulidou ◽  
Maria-Elissavet Koukouli ◽  
Arjo Segers ◽  
Astrid Manders ◽  
Dimitris Balis ◽  
...  
Keyword(s):  
Power Plant ◽  
Data Assimilation ◽  
Energy Production ◽  
Power Plants ◽  
Transport Model ◽  
A Priori ◽  
Filter Method ◽  
Nox Emissions ◽  
A Posteriori ◽  
Data Assimilation Technique

In this work, we investigate the ability of a data assimilation technique and space-borne observations to quantify and monitor changes in nitrogen oxides (NOx) emissions over Northwestern Greece for the summers of 2018 and 2019. In this region, four lignite-burning power plants are located. The data assimilation technique, based on the Ensemble Kalman Filter method, is employed to combine space-borne atmospheric observations from the high spatial resolution Sentinel-5 Precursor (S5P) Tropospheric Monitoring Instrument (TROPOMI) and simulations using the LOTOS-EUROS Chemical Transport model. The Copernicus Atmosphere Monitoring Service-Regional European emissions (CAMS-REG, version 4.2) inventory based on the year 2015 is used as the a priori emissions in the simulations. Surface measurements of nitrogen dioxide (NO2) from air quality stations operating in the region are compared with the model surface NO2 output using either the a priori (base run) or the a posteriori (assimilated run) NOx emissions. Relative to the a priori emissions, the assimilation suggests a strong decrease in concentrations for the station located near the largest power plant, by 80% in 2019 and by 67% in 2018. Concerning the estimated annual a posteriori NOx emissions, it was found that, for the pixels hosting the two largest power plants, the assimilated run results in emissions decreased by ~40–50% for 2018 compared to 2015, whereas a larger decrease, of ~70% for both power plants, was found for 2019, after assimilating the space-born observations. For the same power plants, the European Pollutant Release and Transfer Register (E-PRTR) reports decreased emissions in 2018 and 2019 compared to 2015 (−35% and −38% in 2018, −62% and −72% in 2019), in good agreement with the estimated emissions. We further compare the a posteriori emissions to the reported energy production of the power plants during the summer of 2018 and 2019. Mean decreases of about −35% and−63% in NOx emissions are estimated for the two larger power plants in summer of 2018 and 2019, respectively, which are supported by similar decreases in the reported energy production of the power plants (~−30% and −70%, respectively).

scholarly journals Laying ghosts to rest

2021 ◽  
Author(s):  
Donnchadh O’Conaill
Keyword(s):  
New York ◽  
Philosophy Of Mind ◽  
A Priori ◽  
A Posteriori ◽  
Rule Out

AbstractOne of the most widely-discussed arguments against physcialism appeals to the conceivability of zombies, being which are physically or functionally identical to humans but which have no conscious experiences. Philip Goff (Philos Phenomenol Res 81(1): 119–139, 2010; Consci Cognit 21(2): 742–746, 2012a; in Sprevak M, Kallestrup J (eds) New waves in philosophy of mind. Palgrave, 2014) has recently presented a number of different anti-physicalist arguments appealing to the conceivability of ghosts, entities whose nature is exhausted by their being conscious. If ghosts are conceivable, this would rule out a priori physicalism. If the conceivability of ghosts entails that they are metaphysically possible, then this forms the basis for arguments against a posteriori physicalism. Drawing on work on conceivability by Peter Kung (Philos Phenomenol Res 81(3):620–663, 2010, Noûs 50(1): 90–120, 2016) and my own discussion of arguments which appeal to the conceivability of zombies (O’Conaill in Mihretu P Guta (ed) Consciousness and the ontology of properties. Routledge, New York, 2019), I shall argue that ghosts are conceivable, but that what allows us to conceive of them (our ability to make certain stipulations about the scenarios we conceive) undermines the belief that conceivability is a reliable guide to possibility. While this does not undermine Goff’s argument against a priori phyiscalism, it suggests that a posteriori physicalists need not be haunted by ghosts.

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