A Translation of Intuitionistic Predicate Logic into Basic Predicate Logic

Basic Predicate Logic, BQC, is a proper subsystem of Intuitionistic Predicate Logic, IQC. For every formula in the language {, , , , , , }, we associate two sequences of formulas 0,1,... and 0,1,... in the same language. We prove that for every sequent , there are natural numbers m, n, such that IQC , iff BQC n m. Some applications of this translation are mentioned.     

French adaptation of the Mini-IPIP: A short measure of the Big Five

IntroductionThe Big Five, or the Five-Factor Model (FFM) of personality, is the dominant model in trait psychology. Instruments to assess personality traits are usually long and not available in French. The Mini-International Personality Item Pool (Mini-IPIP) is a brief measure evaluating personality traits according to the Big Five model with promising psychometric properties.ObjectiveThe main purposes of this study were to develop and validate a French adaptation of the Mini-International Personality Item Pool.MethodIn Study 1, adaptation procedures that led to the translation of the French version as well as steps to maximize equivalence are described, in addition to internal consistency, temporal stability, and factor structure within a sample of 139 participants. In study 2, confirmatory factor analysis was carried out with a sample of 1308 participants, and convergent validity was explored with several pertinent constructs.ResultsInternal consistency and test-retest correlations over a four-week period suggest adequate reliability, with coefficients respectively ranging from .64 to .81 and .74 to .89. Exploratory factor analysis suggested a sharply delineated structure. In Study 2, confirmatory factor analyzes revealed a five-factor solution consistent with the Big Five model, and convergent validity with several constructs was detailed.ConclusionOverall, results pointed to a satisfactory equivalence between the original and the adapted instrument. The satisfactory indices of reliability and validity of the Mini-IPIP warrant the use of the French adaptation of the Mini-IPIP.     

Language-experience facilitates discrimination of /d-th/ in monolingual and bilingual acquisition of English

To trace how age and language experience shape the discrimination of native and non-native phonetic contrasts, we compared 4-year-olds learning either English or French or both and simultaneous bilingual adults on their ability to discriminate the English /d-th/ contrast. Findings show that the ability to discriminate the native English contrast improved with age. However, in the absence of experience with this contrast, discrimination of French children and adults remained unchanged during development. Furthermore, although simultaneous bilingual and monolingual English adults were comparable, children exposed to both English and French were poorer at discriminating this contrast when compared to monolingual English-learning 4-year-olds. Thus, language experience facilitates perception of the English /d-th/ contrast and this facilitation occurs later in development when English and French are acquired simultaneously. The difference between bilingual and monolingual acquisition has implications for language organization in children with simultaneous exposure.     

Medical Decision-Making: An Argument for Narrative and Metaphor

This study examines the processes ofdecision-making used by intensive care(critical care) specialists. Ninety-ninespecialists completed a questionnaire involvingthree clinical cases, using a novel methodologyinvestigating the role of uncertainty andtemporal-related factors, and exploring a rangeof ethical issues. Validation and triangulationof the results was done via a comparison studywith a medically lay, but highly informed groupof 37 law students. For both study groups,constructing reasons for a decision was largelyan interpretative and imaginative exercise thatwent beyond the data (as presented), commonlyresulting in different reasons supporting thesame conclusions and similar reasons supportingopposite conclusions. The skills of ethicalimagination and interpretation were related toan individual's prior lived experience,construed in the broadest sense. Application ofthese skills of ethical imagination andinterpretation always occurred, to some degree,in a state of uncertainty and almost alwaysinvolved temporal relationships.Using these results, a theory of ethicaldecision-making is proffered. Three levels ortypes of reasoning processes may be present.Type I decision-making involves the applicationof rules, usually in a deductive fashion. TypeII decision-making is characterised by aprocess where a plurality of reasons arebalanced, weighed and sifted with each other.Type III decision-making is intimately linkedwith respondents lived experiences and `crafts'the content of type I and II reasoningprocesses, via the application of ethicalimagination and interpretation. Relationshipsbetween these three types of reasoningprocesses, and with narrative ethics, are alsodiscussed.     

Truth as Translation – Part B

This is the second part of a paper dealing with truth and translation. In Part A a revised version of Tarski's Convention T has been presented, which explicitly refers to a translation mapping from the object language to the metalanguage; the vague notion of a translation has been replaced by a precise definition. At the end of Part A it has been shown that interpreted languages exist, which allow for vicious self-reference but which nevertheless contain their own truth predicate – this is possible if truth is based on a nonstandard translation mapping. However, this result has only been proved for languages without quantifiers. In Part B we now extend the result to first-order languages, and we show that this can be done in three different ways. In each case, the addition of a truth predicate to an interpreted language with a high degree of expressiveness leads to changes in the ontology of the language.     

中医药学应当融入现代医学

中医药目前生存状态堪忧。中医药由于缺乏吸纳一切科学成就、校正自身差错的结构体制,缺乏坚持实证主义科学精神的价值取向,缺乏将经验认识转变为科学认识的线路,因而使其远远落后于现代医学。中医药只有融入现代医学才有出路。     

质疑中医但不要否定中医

讨论了目前中西医争论的现状,分析了西医和中医的起源及发展过程,提出当现代医学向生物、心理、社会、医学模式转变时,中医可为这种转变提供思想和方法的借鉴,认为西医与中医是世界性医学与地方性医学的关系,根据医学发展的规律,地方性医学最终将能融入世界性医学之中,但在相当长时间内两者还会独立存在。     

How do we code the letters of a word when we have to write it? Investigating double letter representation in French

How do we code the letters of a word when we have to write it? We examined whether the orthographic representations that the writing system activates have a specific coding for letters when these are doubled in a word. French participants wrote words on a digitizer. The word pairs shared the initial letters and differed on the presence of a double letter (e.g., LISSER/LISTER). The results on latencies, letter and inter-letter interval durations revealed that L and I are slower to write when followed by a doublet (SS) than when not (ST). Doublet processing constitutes a supplementary cognitive load that delays word production. This suggests that word representations code letter identity and quantity separately. The data also revealed that the central processes that are involved in spelling representation cascade into the peripheral processes that regulate movement execution.     

The Chinese Version of the Revised Creativity Domain Questionnaire (CDQ‐R): First Evidence for its Factorial Validity and Systematic Association with the Big Five

The present study examines the factor structure of a Chinese version of the Revised Creativity Domain Questionnaire (CDQ‐R; Kaufman, Waterstreet, Ailaouni, Whitcomb, Roe, & Riggs, 2009) as well as its relation to Big Five personality traits within a Chinese sample (N = 787). Analyses indicate the appropriateness of the Chinese version of the CDQ‐R in terms of internal consistency, factorial validity as well as convergent and divergent validity concerning the Big Five personality factors. Revealing some culture‐specific variation, confirmatory factor analysis indicated a slight superiority of a five‐factor model for this Chinese sample over the existing four‐factor model established with American samples. This higher level of differentiation in terms of one factor of the creativity domain could be explained on the basis of the specific characteristics of the Chinese culture.