Spotlight on e-Asia JRP

In East Asia, the e-ASIA Joint Research Program has been supporting research for nearly a decade. Now, the 2020 calls for proposal have been released, and the Program is seeking to nurture a variety of important and pertinent projects with the potential to shape the research landscape in the East Asian region and beyond.

Spotlight on e-Asia JRP

In East Asia, the e-ASIA Joint Research Program has been supporting research for nearly a decade. Now, the 2020 calls for proposal have been released, and the Program is seeking to nurture a variety of important and pertinent projects with the potential to shape the research landscape in the East Asian region and beyond.

Theophrastus on Perceiving

Many fragments from Theophrastus on perception are preserved by the late Neoplatonist, Priscian of Lydia. After preliminary source criticism concerning how to identify the fragments, I turn to Theophrastus’ discussion of perceiving and perceptual awareness. While he clearly rejects literalism, he also does not embrace “spiritualism”: he argues instead that we receive the defining proportions of perceptible qualities in the sense organ, though in different contraries than in the perceptible (thereby avoiding literalism). If Priscian’s report is faithful, Theophrastus also accepts a moderate capacity reading of De anima III.2, locating awareness in a central monitoring sense, common to the individual modalities; and this has further implications for the unity of consciousness. Theophrastus’ method, though aporetic in form, is nonetheless a constructive engagement with the same texts of Aristotle’s we have ourselves, in the service of a joint research program in psychology that he shared with his colleague and former teacher.

The Bay of Kiladha Project (Argolid, Greece): Bridging East and West

The project, a joint research program between the University of Geneva, under the aegis of the Swiss School of Archaeology in Greece, and the Greek Ephorate of Underwater Antiquities, aims at finding traces of prehistoric human activity in a small bay of the southern Argolid, near the Franchthi Cave, a major prehistoric site used from 40,000 years ago to 5,000 years ago. For most of these 35,000 years, because of global sea-level change in prehistory, the Bay of Kiladha was in fact a small coastal plain, where the sedentary farmers of the Neolithic period had probably their village.Research currently focuses on two parts of the bay: the Franchthi sector, close to the Cave (submerged Neolithic village) and the Lambayanna sector, just a few hundred meters to the north of Franchthi Cave (HA II fortified settlement).

Design Options for HLW Repository Operation Technology: Part II—Bentonite Block Forming and Vertical Emplacement

RWMC and JGC have been running an all-round R&D program for the period of 2000–2010 to develop the concept of Vertical Emplacement for disposal of vitrified waste. The conceptual design of its basic equipment was worked out in 2000, followed by forming the large-scale bentonite block in 2001–2004. Study has also been conducted on a mechanism to convey and position the large-scale block using a vacuum suction device. Subsequent to these developments, various technologies necessary for designing the Vertical Emplacement equipment have been reviewed, which would enhance engineering feasibility and reliability. Full-scale demonstration program under a joint research program with JAEA (Japan Atomic Energy Agency) started in 2008 with the twin objectives i) supporting of public relations and ii) technical verification. The large-scale bentonite block and part of the full-scale Vertical Emplacement equipment are now on view at the Full-scale demonstration facility in Horonobe, Hokkaido, Japan.