Study of Extraction of Rare Earth Elements from Hard Coal Fly Ash

Rare earth elements (REEs) extraction from wastes and/or by-products is alternative possibility of their winning. The occurrence ofREEs, namely 50.1 ppm of La, 100.1 ppm of Ce and 44.3 ppm of Nd was confirmed in solid fly ash samples from the coal fired heatingplant (TEKO, Inc. Košice, eastern Slovakia). The submitted contribution presents laboratory results of REEs leaching from coal fly ashusing 3M HCl, HNO3, H2SO4 and H3PO4 at 80°C during 120 min.It was found, that recoveries 65.5% of La, 64.4% Ce and 64.3% of Nd into liquor may be attained after grain size reduction to below5 μm.

Representational and Computational Changes in Heritage Language Grammars

The notion of complexity has been applied to descriptions and comparisons of languages and to explanations related to ease and difficulty of various linguistic phenomena in first and second language acquisition. It has been noted that compared to baseline grammars, heritage language grammars are less complex, displaying morphological simplification and structural shrinking, especially among heritage speakers with lower proficiency in the language. On some recent proposals of gender agreement in Spanish and Norwegian (Fuchs et al., 2015; Lohndal & Putnam, 2020), these differences are representational, affecting the projection of functional categories and feature specifications in the syntax. An alternative possibility is that differences between baseline and heritage grammars arise from computational considerations related to bilingualism, affecting speed of lexical access and feature reassembly online in the minority language. We illustrate this proposal with empirical data from gender agreement and differential object marking. Although presented as alternatives, the representational and computational explanations are not incompatible, and may both be adequate to capture varying levels of variability modulated by linguistic proficiency. These proposals formalize bilingual acquisition models of grammar competition and directly relate the availability and type of input (the acquisition evidence) to the locus and nature of the grammatical differences between heritage and baseline grammars.

Policy Preferences Influence Vote Choice When A New Party Emerges: Evidence from the 2017 French Presidential Election

A common explanation for electoral victories is that the winning candidate adopted issue positions that appealed to voters, implying that citizens’ choices are based on policy preferences. However, it is not straightforward to determine the causal direction between citizens’ issue preferences and their party choice. An alternative possibility, strongly supported by prior research, is that voters adopt the positions of the parties they vote for to rationalize their votes. The 2017 French presidential election offers a unique opportunity to address that question, as it saw the victory of a candidate who was not backed by one of the established parties. Using panel data, we show that policy preferences measured prior to Macron’s emergence as a candidate led voters with a particular bundle of preferences to support him. We conclude that policy preferences clearly do matter to vote choice and that this effect is most visible when a new party emerges.

Beyond doubt in a dangerous world: The effect of existential threats on certainty expressions in societal discourse

What happens when entire populations are exposed to news of impending existential threats? In the current study, we address this question by investigating the association between existential threats and the certitude of societal discourse. According to appraisal theory, threats give rise to anxiety and perceptions of uncertainty; as such, it predicts that exposure to life-threatening events will increase expressions of uncertainty. An alternative possibility is that people will respond to threats by utilizing psychological compensation mechanisms that will give rise to greater expressions of certainty. Across two studies, we measured linguistic certainty in more than 3.2 million tweets, covering different psychological contexts: (i) the 15 major terrorist and school shooting events that took place between 2016-2018; (ii) the COVID-19 pandemic. Consistent with the idea of compensatory processing, the results show that levels of expressed certainty increased following intentional and natural existential threats. We discuss the implications of our findings to theories of psychological compensation and to our understanding of collective response in the age of global threats.

A seal of Solomon son of Azariah, “son of the exilarch of all Israel”

Publication of a seal of rock crystal in London (British Museum), with an inscription in Aramaic and Hebrew naming the bearer, one Solomon b. Azariah, as grandson (or perhaps son) of an exilarch. An identification of the bearer as Solomon, son of the Jewish exilarch Azariah b. Solomon (c. 975) and grandson of the exilarch Solomon b. Josiah (c. 951–3), is considered, as is the alternative possibility that the grandfather was the exilarch Solomon b. Hisdai (c. 730–58).

Beowulf 501b and the authority of Old English poetical manuscripts

In his Old English grammar, A. Campbell put forward his theory of Old English accentuation, according to which disyllabic words like Bēowulf and ǣniġ receive a half-stress only if made trisyllabic by the addition of an inflection (as in Bēowulfes or ǣniġra), provided the middle syllable is heavy. A. J. Bliss tacitly rejected Campbell’s analysis when he postulated the existence of metrical type 3B2, a rare rhythmical pattern in which trisyllabic forms like Bēowulfes and ǣniġra must exceptionally be assumed to lose their otherwise conventional half-stress. Bliss based his analysis on the evidence afforded by four readings from the text of Beowulf: ll. 501b, 932b, 949b, and 1830b. Even though Bliss expressed reservations about his own analysis, he still preferred it to the alternative possibility of emending these four exceptional verses (a possibility that he did not even consider in his book). Non-metrical arguments in support of the emendation of at least one of these verses (1830b), however, had been advanced well before The metre of Beowulf was first published. Since then, ll. 932b and 949b have also been emended on grounds other than metre. This article offers new linguistic reasons for the emendation of l. 501b, the one remaining reading for which no alternative explanation had yet been proposed. It concludes that Bliss was unnecessarily cautious in his treatment of these four aberrant verses, and that, as Kenneth Sisam memorably stated in 1946, conjectural emendation is, and still remains, a useful tool for the study of Old English poetical manuscripts.

Synthesis of Cyclic Phosphinates by Microwave-Assisted Ionic Liquid-Promoted Alcoholysis

A series of 1-alkoxy-3-methyl- and 3,4-dimethyl-3-phospholene 1-oxides, as well as 1-alkoxy-3-methylphospholane 1-oxides were prepared in good yields by the microwave (MW)-assisted [bmim][PF6]-catalyzed transesterification of the corresponding methyl or ethyl esters. The alcoholyses studied represent another case, where MW irradiation has had a crucial role on the course of the reaction. The method developed is an alternative possibility to other esterifications starting from the corresponding phosphinic chlorides and acids.

Provincial Monarchs as an Eastern Arcanum Imperii: ‘Client Kingship’, the Augustan Revolution and the Flavians

This paper re-examines the role of ‘client kings’ in the Roman east in the early Principate. Contrary to previous emphasis on continuity with the republican past, it proposes that Octavian-Augustus enacted a set of measures that fundamentally changed the relations of certain eastern monarchs with the imperial centre. These ‘provincial monarchs’ became a new elite of Roman administrators, personally loyal to the domus Augusta and distinct from ‘client kings’ earlier and elsewhere. This Augustan systemisation complemented the provincial division of 27 b.c.e., creating a ‘divide and rule’ dynamic between provincial monarchs and imperial legates which was expedient to the Julio-Claudians. This model is then used to challenge the view that the Flavians systematically ‘provincialised’ the east as part of a reorganisation of the frontier. It raises the alternative possibility that provincial monarchy gradually died out, following the Flavians’ realisation that its continued maintenance was detrimental to their public image in Rome.

Critical Theory and the Critique of Capitalism: An Immanent Critique of Nancy Fraser's “Systematic” “Crisis-Critique” of Capitalism as an “Institutionalized Social Order”

The predominant approach to contemporary critical theory lacks a critical theory of capitalist society. Nancy Fraser has endeavored to provide such a critical theory in her “systematic” “crisis–critique” of capitalism as an “institutionalized social order.” Yet Fraser's “systematic” theory is not systematic, but fragmentary and internally inconsistent. The Marxian premises of Fraser's theory are at odds with its ensuing Habermasian notions of capitalism, contradiction, crises, and emancipation, and her theory consequently lacks a robust explication of these dynamics. This raises the alternative possibility of developing a contemporary critical theory of the crisis–ridden reproduction of the negative totality of capitalist society that brings Adorno and Horkheimer's critical theory together with the subterranean strand of contemporary critical theory: the New Reading of the critique of political economy as a critical social theory.