When Language Gives Out: Conceptualization,and Aspect‐Seeing as a Form of Judgment

This article characterizes aspect‐perception as a distinct form of judgment in Kant's sense: a distinct way in which the mind contacts world and applies concepts. First, aspect‐perception involves a mode of thinking about things apart from any established routine of conceptualizing them. It is thus a form of concept application that is essentially reflection about language. Second, this mode of reflection has an experiential, sometimes perceptual, element: in aspect‐perception, that is, we experience meanings—bodies of norms. Third, aspect‐perception can be “preparatory”: it may help us to decide what linguistic norms to develop and how to conceptualize—make the world thinkable. Fourth, the article discusses the forms of justification for which aspect‐perception allows—the necessity and normativity involved in employing this form of judgment.     

Antecedents and consequences of salesperson identification with the brand and company

To date, little research has investigated the antecedents and implications of salespersons' identification with the brands and the companies they represent. As the nature of the selling job is unique from other inside employee positions, with increased independence of the firm and loyalty that may be expanded to the customers rather than the firm itself, an investigation of this phenomenon within the sales context holds significant implication for sales force management. The salesperson also represents an extension of the marketing communication programme of the firm and thus has direct bearing on how the company and brand image are communicated to the customer. Therefore, the purpose of our paper is to hypothesize and empirically test the notion that higher levels of perceived congruence between a salesperson's own values and those values of the brand and company he or she represents will lead to higher brand identification and company identification which in turn should create higher job satisfaction, commitment and performance. We discuss our results and offer practical insights to sales managers. Further, we discuss limitations of our study and provide directions for future research.     

Collective fields of consciousness in the golden age

The present essay is a concise form of results obtained during many decades of research in the primeval foundations of collective social and consciousness fields. We point out that a yet unknown type of forces existed in the Golden Age, which we termed collective force. In the Golden Age mankind lived in communities which had a full unity. The communal life developed its collective forms, of which the most significant are the development of human speech, of language, share of work and the development of the communal fests. The law determining the primeval origins of mind is the cosmic law of interactions. It defines the substance of the Universe and the ways of its existence and activity. A detailed analysis is presented on the nature of the interaction there. One consequence of this fundamental principle is the general prevalence of the principle of mutuality, which plays a basic role in the understanding of the unfolding and degeneration of consciousness. The principle of mutuality determines the changes of every level of life. The laws of the generation of consciousness in the ages of evolution toward Homo and the Golden Age are analysed. Evidences were found proving the historical reality of the Golden Age, surviving in the traditions of mankind in every part of the world, and its overthrow before the Flood, which resulted in the dethronement of the primeval mind, the human consciousness of the Golden Age and the subsequent— and necessary—emergence of the superficial, rational mind.

Starting from the consideration that our mind is the imprint of history, we have recognised the phenomenon of the dual mind, the somewhat antagonistic duality of human consciousness. We think we have succeeded in solving the riddle of the dual mind and determining its substance. Our dual mind, consisting of the ‘upper’ or rational mind and the ‘underlying mind’, is the product of the two fundamental ages of mankind, that of the Golden Age and that of power domination. Therefore it reflects the duality of our history.     

Role of surface roughness in hysteresis during adhesive elastic contact

In experiments that involve contact with adhesion between two surfaces, as found in atomic force microscopy or nanoindentation, two distinct contact force (P) versus indentation-depth (h) curves are often measured depending on whether the indenter moves towards or away from the sample. The origin of this hysteresis is not well understood and is often attributed to moisture, plasticity or viscoelasticity. Here we report experiments which show that hysteresis can exist in the absence of these effects, and that its magnitude depends on surface roughness. We develop a theoretical model in which the hysteresis appears as the result of a series of surface instabilities, in which the contact area grows or recedes by a finite amount. The model can be used to estimate material properties from contact experiments even when the measured P–h curves are not unique.     

Variability and Noise in Continuous Force Production

In the present 3 experiments, the authors examined the hypothesis, derived from information theory, that increases in the variability of motor responses result from increases in perceptual-motor noise. Three different groups of participants (Ns = 10, 9, and 10, respectively, in Experiments 1, 2, and 3) produced continuous isometric force under either low, intermediate, or high target force levels. When considered together, the results showed that force variability (SD) increased exponentially as a function of force level. However, an index of information transmission (M/SD), as well as measures of noise in both the time (approximate entropy) and the frequency (power spectrum) domains, changed according to an inverted-U-shaped function over the range of force levels. The findings provide further evidence that increased information transmission is related to increases, and not to decreases, in the noisiness of the structure of force output.     

Characteristics of the Force Applied to a Pedal During Human Pushing Efforts: Emergent Linearity

The force seated humans exert on a translationally fixed pedal (foot force) may be directed at any angle because the fixed distance between the seat and the pedal axis kinematically constrains the lower limb. The authors' objective in the present work was to characterize such force. Participants (N = 7) generated force with their lower limb by pushing against the pedal in the most comfortable manner. Pushing efforts were repeated randomly 3 times at each of 97 sagittal-plane pedal axis positions and 10 additional times in 9 of those positions (2,895 total pushes). In 87% of the pushes, the measured sagittal-plane force exerted on the pedal by the foot changed magnitude and direction through time, such that the path of the head of the force vector traced a straight line. The linearity of the foot force paths reflected directional invariance in the changes of the foot force vector as the magnitude of the vector increased. The orientation of those linear force paths varied with limb posture in a similar manner across participants. The authors conclude mat the emergent linearity of the force path is consistent with minimization of path length in foot force space. Alternatively, the linearity of the force paths suggests a motor control strategy that simplifies the control to a monoparametric form.     

The Effect of Knee Joint Angle on Torque Control

The purpose of the author's investigation was to examine the effect of knee joint angle on torque control of the quadriceps muscle group. In all, 12 healthy adults produced maximal voluntary contractions and submaximal torque (15, 30, and 45% MVC [maximal voluntary contraction]) at leg flexion angles of 15°, 30°, 60°, and 90° below the horizontal plane. As expected, MVC values changed with respect to joint angle with maximum torque output being greatest at 60° and least at 15°. During the submaximal tasks, participants appropriately scaled their torque output to the required targets. Absolute variability (i.e., standard deviation) of torque output was greatest at 60° and 90° knee flexion. However, relative variability as indexed by coefficient of variation (CV) decreased as joint angle increased, with the greatest CV occurring at 15°. These results are congruent with the hypothesis that joint angle influences the control of torque.     

Variation of Isometric Response Force in the Rat

Hungry, unrestrained rats (N = 7) were rewarded for pressing a response beam in excess of 11 different force requirements. Changes in peak force production as a function of peak force requirement were examined by analyses of the first four moments of distributions of peak response forces: constant error, the within-subject standard deviation, skewness, and kurtosis. Results were similar to those previously obtained with human subjects: Constant error was positive at low and negative at high force requirements, the within-subject standard deviation increased as a negatively accelerating function of force requirement, and skewness and kurtosis were positive at low force requirements and decreased to negative values at the highest increments. Additional analyses of response kinetics indicated that rats, like humans, meet increasing force requirements by altering the rate of rise of force. The performance similarities suggest that common processes are engaged by the human and rat motor control systems to solve the problem of generating forces that are appropriate to the prevailing environmental constraints.     

The Relationship Between Balance Confidence and Cognitive Motor Interference in Individuals With Multiple Sclerosis

The authors examined and compared the development of oral and manual force control in preschool-aged children. In all, 50 typically developing children (aged 3-5 years) performed maximal strength tasks and submaximal visually guided tasks using tongue elevation, power, and precision grips. Dependent measures included strength, rate of force rise, initial force overshoot, force variability, and rate of force release. The authors performed age- and performance-related analyses. Results revealed similar changes for tongue, fingers, and hands across age- and performance-related measures for strength, initial force overshoot, and rate of force release. There were no significant changes in rate of force rise with increasing age. Force variability measures showed effector-specific changes with decreases across age- and performance-related measures for the hands and fingers but not for the tongue. Changes common across effector systems likely reflect biological development coupled with cognitive-strategic development. Effector-specific changes in force variability likely reflect experience gained through functional tasks influencing biological and cognitive-strategic development. Lack of change in force variability of the tongue suggests that fine control of the tongue is activity specific; thus, nonfunctional tasks are not likely to be sensitive to experience-related biological development.     

The Organization of Multisegmental Pulls Made by Standing Humans: II. Submaximal Pulls

Previously, an autonomous oscillator model with three parameters was derived that describes the relationship between anterior-posterior center of mass motions and pulling force for near-maximal, bimanual pulls made by standing subjects (Michaels, Lee, & Pai, 1993). The present study evaluated the extent to which a full range of pulling forces could be fit by the model and how the model's three parameters changed with intended pulling force. How much variation in force each parameter could contribute was determined by simulating the model. Qualitative and quantitative analyses of pulls made by 6 well-practiced subjects at 5%, 10%, 20%, 40%, 60%, 80%, and 95% of their maximum pulling force revealed that the model holds well, except for the least forceful pulls of some subjects. Two parameters appeared to be controlled; one, related to the position of the center of pressure, varied most among less forceful pulls; the second, related to the position of the center of mass at the time of handle-force onset, varied most among more forceful pulls. How these parameters might be set is discussed.