Breaking down a barrier: increasing perceived out‐group knowledge reduces negative expectancies about intergroup interaction

Although intergroup contact is an effective way of reducing prejudice, negative expectancies about interacting with out‐group members often create a barrier to intergroup contact. The current study investigated cognitive appraisals by which negative expectancies may arise. Specifically, we examined whether increasing Anglo Australians' appraisals of their knowledge about Muslims would reduce their negative expectancies about an (ostensible) upcoming interaction with a Muslim Australian. Participants (89 Anglo Australians) completed a test that provided positive feedback either on their knowledge about Muslims or on their general knowledge (control). As predicted, Anglo Australians who received positive feedback on their knowledge about Muslims had a lower threat appraisal and expected to feel less anxious during the intergroup interaction compared with those who were in the control condition. This provides support for the precursory role out‐group knowledge may have as a resource that is appraised upon the prospect of an intergroup interaction.     

Hydrothermal growth of ZnO nanoparticles under different conditions

In this study, a simple low-temperature hydrothermal method was used to synthesize ZnO nanoparticles. The structural, morphological and optical characterizations of the nanoparticles were evaluated with regard to the zinc content. To achieve this, the molar ratios of the precursors were changed from 0.05 to 0.1 M. The structural and morphological analyses showed that all samples had a polycrystalline hexangular wurtzite crystal structure and the shape of the ZnO nanoparticles changed with increasing zinc content. A possible growth mechanism of the ZnO nanoparticles is explained in terms of the zinc content. Optical measurement revealed that the shape of the nanoparticles affects the position of the band-edge emission as well as the shape of the luminescence spectrum.     

Two modes of unsaying in the early thirteenth century Islamic lands: theorizing apophasis through Maimonides and Ibn ‘Arabī

This comparative study juxtaposes two celebrated medieval examples of negative speech, apophasis, and theorizes the languages of unsaying in the great medieval thinkers, Maimonides (d.1204) and Ibn ‘Arabī (d.1240). The paper coins a distinction between ‘asymmetrical’ versus ‘symmetrical’ approaches to language as a heuristic to analyze the two philosophical apophatic accounts comparatively. While apophatic thinkers in Neoplatonic traditions generally oscillate between these two poles in their various apophatic moments, the paper argues that Maimonides and Ibn ‘Arabī represented the climax of these two non-linear poles in a visible tension and conversant with each other. I frame philosophical apophasis in the medieval Islamic lands in terms of the problem of God’s transcendence versus imminence. Maimonides celebrates apophasis and claims that negative speech, asymptotically approaching silence, is the only genuine praise to God. As an uncompromising exponent of absolute transcendence, and a severe critic of those who ascribe attributes to God, he privileges apophasis to kataphasis; he presents negative speech as a medium of purification and spiritual progress. Ibn ‘Arabī, on the other hand, is critical of this widespread asymmetry, and defends the gathering together of transcendence and imminence for human perfection. His intricate theory of transcendence and imminence appeals to a dialectical logic, explaining why kataphasis and apophasis are symmetrical in front of the Absolute. The productive tension between two apophatic minds challenges Hegelian habits of reading the history of thought, as well as various scholarly prejudices about medieval intellectual landscapes.