External Objects Research Articles

Two Contemplation Models of Nāmamātra in the Yogācāra Literature

This article contextualizes the meaning of nāmamātra in the Mahāyānasūtrālaṃkārabhāṣya and explores the history of modifications of this term in the Yogācāra literature. The term already exists in the pre-Yogācāra literature, such as the Aṣṭasāhasrikā Prajñāpāramitā and the Bhavasaṃkrāntisūtra, where it means name only. The chapter Bodhisattvabhūmi of the Yogācārabhūmi applies this meaning and explains how to interpret it to understand the true nature of the contemplative object; that is, what is named is nothing but a name, and what exists is the inexpressible thing (vastu). When people lack this understanding and regard for the expressed object as existent, they suffer subsequent afflictions and suffering. A similar but slightly modified explanation is also found in the Madhyāntavibhāgabhāṣya, where the author states that a single object has two intrinsic characteristics (svalakṣaṇas), the conventional and the ultimate, and that the former is expressed by a mere name and is non-existent, while the latter is ineffable and existent. However, the Mahāyānasūtrālaṃkārabhāṣya and Sthiramati’s commentary on it, the *Sūtrālaṃkāravṛttibhāṣya, insert another meaning of nāmamātra: there are only mental factors. They also describe two contemplation phases, whereby practitioners should first understand the non-existence of the expressed object before recollecting the term nāmarūpa in the context of the five constituents (pañcaskandha) and concluding that material and physical factors (rūpa) do not exist; rather, only the mental factors do (nāmamātra). Finally, this second meaning of nāmamātra should be further contemplated, and the mere mental factors should also be regarded as ultimately non-existent because the external objects causing them were already considered non-existent. This examination of various Yogācāra explanations of nāmamātra sheds light on the multiple phases of modifications of Buddhist terms that occurred in the Yogācāra literature during the systematization of Yogācāra contemplation.

Uncovering the origins of mental images about the concept of light: the difference between novice and expert mediation levels profile

This study investigates the mental imagery formed by two Physics undergraduates following their interaction with a mobile application analyzing emission and absorption light spectra. The tool, an instance of extracerebral cognitive processing, served to illuminate the internal cognitive mechanisms the students employed to understand novel knowledge. Guided by the Cognitive Networks Mediation Theory (CNMT), which underscores the significance of external tools in facilitating cognition, and drawing upon Bachelard's Epistemological Profile and Mortimer's Conceptual Profile, a novel 'Mediation Level' Profile is proposed. This profile represents the preferred type of mediation each student employed to elucidate their observations and understandings. The research utilized the Report Aloud Protocol to analyze students' verbal and gestural communications, revealing a complex pattern of various mental images developed through interaction with external objects via different levels of mediation. Notably, the psychophysical and hypercultural mediation levels stood out among the students. The implications of these findings for Physics education and future research directions are discussed, underscoring the utility of mobile applications as a supplementary tool in laboratory settings and the complexity of mental imagery in understanding physical phenomena.

Interplay of virtual and physical channels in propagating green behaviour: A study integrating motivation-opportunity-ability and theory of planned behaviour

Traditional communication channels and new “human-computer interaction” spread channels are intertwined, facilitating the promote of the concept of “green for all”. This paper integrates the influence of virtual channel and physical channel attributes into the Motivation-Opportunity-Ability theory (MOA) and Theory of Planned Behavior (TPB) to explore the spread process of public green behaviors. The results show that: (1) In the composite effect, environmental responsibility (ER) and external objective factors (EOF) have no significant impact on the propagation of green behavior among the public. Both virtual channel attributes (VCA) and physical channel attributes (PCA) can accelerate the spread process of public green behavior, with PCA having the greatest impact on the propagation of public green behavior. (2) ER, VCA, PCA, EOF, and external subjective factors (ESF) can all promote the spread of public green behavior through the intermediary chain of spread motivation and spread intention. Among them, channel attributes more directly influence the spread of green behavior, and the chain mediating effect of ER through the chain was the most significant. At the same time, ESF plays a significant moderating role between the intention to spread and propagation behavior (PB), effectively bridging the gap between behavior and intention. (3) Further heterogeneity analysis shows that, compared with males, PCA has a greater promoting effect on the green behavior propagation of females, while VCA has a more significant positive effect on the green behavior propagation of the more educated public. Finally, this article examines the presence of intermediary and regulatory mechanisms among various income groups. Research has found that promoting the creation of conducive conditions for comprehensive green behavior propagation and developing targeted and mass-oriented green behavior propagation strategies by all societal stakeholders are crucial for enhancing public engagement in green practices.

Experimental and Simulation Study on Low-velocity Impact Damage of Composite Laminates under Temperature Environment

The composite material casing of aero-engine operates in different temperature environments and is inevitably impacted by external objects during use. The resin matrix composite materials are sensitive to temperature, which leads to more complex damage propagation and failure modes of materials under temperature environment. The influence of temperature environment on low-velocity impact damage of composite materials needs to be studied. In this paper, the T300/QY8911 composite laminates were subjected to low-velocity impact test and simulation study under three different temperature environments of 20°C, 120°C, and 180°C. The impact damage detection was carried out by visual inspection and ultrasonic C-scan to analyze the influence of temperature on the damage of composite laminates. Finite element simulation analysis was also conducted on the gradual expansion process of impact damage of composite laminates under different temperature environments to predict the impact damage area of laminates. The results show that the main damage forms are matrix cracking and delamination and the temperature has a significant effect on the low-velocity impact damage of composite laminates. Under the same impact energy, the length of the back crack and the cracking damage of the matrix of the laminate decreases as the temperature increases; the impact damage area and the delamination damage of the laminate increases as the temperature increases.

Exploring virtual reality object perception following sensory-motor interactions with different visuo-haptic collider properties

Interacting with the environment often requires the integration of visual and haptic information. Notably, perceiving external objects depends on how our brain binds sensory inputs into a unitary experience. The feedback provided by objects when we interact (through our movements) with them might then influence our perception. In VR, the interaction with an object can be dissociated by the size of the object itself by means of ‘colliders’ (interactive spaces surrounding the objects). The present study investigates possible after-effects in size discrimination for virtual objects after exposure to a prolonged interaction characterized by visual and haptic incongruencies. A total of 96 participants participated in this virtual reality study. Participants were distributed into four groups, in which they were required to perform a size discrimination task between two cubes before and after 15 min of a visuomotor task involving the interaction with the same virtual cubes. Each group interacted with a different cube where the visual (normal vs. small collider) and the virtual cube's haptic (vibration vs. no vibration) features were manipulated. The quality of interaction (number of touches and trials performed) was used as a dependent variable to investigate the performance in the visuomotor task. To measure bias in size perception, we compared changes in point of subjective equality (PSE) before and after the task in the four groups. The results showed that a small visual collider decreased manipulation performance, regardless of the presence or not of the haptic signal. However, change in PSE was found only in the group exposed to the small visual collider with haptic feedback, leading to increased perception of the cube size. This after-effect was absent in the only visual incongruency condition, suggesting that haptic information and multisensory integration played a crucial role in inducing perceptual changes. The results are discussed considering the recent findings in visual-haptic integration during multisensory information processing in real and virtual environments.

Indigenous Study of Psychologists as Witnesses: Ethical Considerations of Testifying in Court on Sexual Assault Issues

<p>本研究旨在探討性侵受害當事人之心理師，受法院傳喚作證時，出庭過程中的倫理考量。研究方法採紮根理論取向，透過立意與滾雪球取樣徵得九位有出庭作證經驗之受訪者，透過個別訪談蒐集資料，並進行開放編碼、主軸編碼、選繹編碼與歷程編碼之質性分析步驟。研究結果發現心理師收到法院傳喚出庭作證時，會面臨是否出庭的意願考量，在決定出庭及準備過程中，則涉及專業知能、知情同意及保密等三個主要倫理判斷議題之考量，並經歷外在法律服從及內良心掙扎的過程，出庭作證時會為自己的專業辯護並發展因應的作為，同時會衡量保持中立的客觀角色，以及覺察個案的諮商動機。研究結論指出心理師會兼顧外在客觀的法律規範與內在主觀的良心考量以出庭作證，並把持中立客觀的專業角色，作真實的事實陳述，以期能同時符合法規的期待與良心的要求。最後，本研究依研究所得提出「心理師出庭之雙元倫理考量模型」與未來研究及實務之建議。</p> <p> </p><p>This study aimed to explore the ethical considerations of psychologists who counsel sexual assault victims and are summoned by the court to testify. Judicial proceedings for sexual assault victims often challenge conviction of perpetrators because of insufficient evidence. Therefore, the court regards the professional knowledge and testimonial information of psychologists as important reinforcing evidence. Thus, they involve ethical issues of whether to disclose and the degree of disclosure. Currently, there is no training in forensic psychology or legal risks in the Taiwanese school curricula. Because psychologists are unfamiliar with judicial rules and ethics, they may be at risk of making mistakes that could affect their future professional status. The ethical aspects addressed in this study included three major ethical judgment issues: professional knowledge, informed consent, and confidentiality. The research method adopted a grounded theory orientation. Nine interviewees with experience in court testifying were recruited through conceptualization and snowball sampling. Data were collected using individual interviews and qualitatively analyzed using open, axial, selective, and process coding.</p> <p>The research results show that when psychologists are summoned by the court to testify, they are faced with whether to appear in court. The decision to appear in court and the preparation involve three major ethical judgment issues: professional knowledge, informed consent, and confidentiality. Court-summoned psychologists have to understand the implications of their role and consider the ethics of being summoned to appear. This decision is based on civic responsibility rather than personal will. It requires interprofessional competencies and the ability to respond to courts and professional assessments, including knowledge of the laws regarding sexual assault. They should consider the rights of minors’ guardians and inform individual victims as much as possible to enable them to fully understand and provide informed consent. Victims’ privileged communications should be properly used and victim information disclosed in court should be filtered. Psychologists must be loyal to the victims’ original intentions, consider their best interests, and exclude irrelevant personal privacy information. Psychologists are also reminded to seek professional assistance when facing the court, including consulting lawyers or receiving supervision and educational training, and being equipped with court knowledge related to sexual assault. Psychologists testifying in court face a process of external legal obedience and an internal conscience struggle. They defend their professionalism and develop appropriate actions. Simultaneously, psychologists measure the objective role of maintaining neutrality and being aware of clients’ motivation for counseling.</p> <p>In conclusion, psychologists have to consider external objective legal norms and their internal subjective conscience when testifying in court and maintain a neutral and objective professional role. Finally, considering the research findings, this study proposes a “Dual-ethical Consideration Model for Psychologists Appearing in Court” and suggestions for future research and practice. Psychologists should accumulate different court experiences based on the number of court appearances. We recommend discussing whether the judicial role of psychologists has various stages of development based on the accumulation of court experience. Additionally, psychologists with different testifying roles will also have different ethical awareness and judgment processes, which can also be studied in depth. In practice, we recommended strengthening education and training on testifying in court, understanding that testifying in court is a citizen’s obligation, and carefully using victims’ privileged communication. Simultaneously, practical work manuals and workshops for court appearances should be developed to assist psychologists in conducting interviews through practical guidance and exercises. They should be prepared for the stress and circumstances of going to court.</p> <p> </p>

Modeling, simulations and experiments with generally routed cable-driven continuum robots and their application to three-fingered grippers

Abstract This paper deals with generally routed, pre-bent cable-driven continuum robots (CCR). A CCR consists of a flexible backbone to which multiple disks are attached. Cables are passed through holes in the disk, and when pulled, the flexible backbone and the CCR can attain different shapes based on their routing and backbone configuration. An optimization-based approach, using minimization of strain energy, is shown to give good results for the pose and motion of the CCR and to determine contact with external objects. The pose, motion, and the contact obtained from the model are shown to match very well with experimental results obtained from a 3D-printed CCR. An algorithm is proposed to generate the pre-bent backbone for a CCR which on actuation can attain the desired shape. Using the algorithm, three 3D-printed CCRs with pre-bent backbones are fabricated and these are used to demonstrate a compliant gripper that can grip a spherical object similar to that done by tentacles, and another three-fingered gripper with straight backbone CCRs is used to orient a square object gripped at the end.

Temporal windows of unconscious processing cannot easily be disrupted.

Conscious perception is preceded by long periods of unconscious processing. These periods are crucial for analyzing temporal information and for solving the many ill-posed problems of vision. An important question is what starts and ends these windows and how they may be interrupted. Most experimental paradigms do not offer the methodology required for such investigation. Here, we used the sequential metacontrast paradigm, in which two streams of lines, expanding from the center to the periphery, are presented, and participants are asked to attend to one of the motion streams. If several lines in the attended motion stream are offset, the offsets are known to integrate mandatorily and unconsciously, even if separated by up to 450ms. Using this paradigm, we here found that external visual objects, such as an annulus, presented during the motion stream, do not disrupt mandatory temporal integration. Thus, if a window is started once, it appears to remain open even in the presence of disruptions that are known to interrupt visual processes normally. Further, we found that interrupting the motion stream with a gap disrupts temporal integration but does not terminate the overall unconscious processing window. Thus, while temporal integration is key to unconscious processing, not all stimuli in the same processing window are integrated together. These results strengthen the case for unconscious processing taking place in windows of sensemaking, during which temporal integration occurs in a flexible and perceptually meaningful manner.

Trouble factice imposé à soi-même et syndrome de Munchausen : mise au point

Factitious disorder imposed on self (FDIS) is a mental disorder characterized by conscious manipulative behavior from patients with no clearly identifiable external objective. It affects subjects with a wide range of characteristics, only some of whom fit the stereotypical profile of the young female working in the health sector. It can take the form of a variety of symptoms or clinical signs, and is likely to involve all specialties. Munchausen syndrome is a particular form of FDIS, more prevalent in men and marked by its severity. Psychiatric comorbidities are common in patients with FDIS. Death is rare but possible, either as a result of the disease itself, complications of examinations or treatments, or suicide. The diagnostic approach must seek to identify positive arguments in favor of the disorder. Diagnosis by elimination remains possible when no other hypothesis can explain a clinical picture suggestive of FDIS. The prognosis is often poor, at least in the short and medium term. Avoiding unnecessary prescriptions is essential to prevent iatrogenesis. The management of FDIS is poorly codified. In all cases, the practitioner must adopt a non-aggressive, empathetic attitude.

Interactive learning for multi-finger dexterous hand: A model-free hierarchical deep reinforcement learning approach

When a multi-fingered dexterous hand interacts with the external environment, it encounters various challenges, including the utilization of complex control techniques and the intricate coordination of finger motion sequences. Previous studies have primarily concentrated on investigating the interaction between multi-fingered dexterous hands and external objects, usually using model-based control or model-free reinforcement learning techniques. However, during practical implementation, various constraining factors are encountered, such as intricate modeling and limited interaction capabilities. In practical scenarios, the utilization of multi-fingered dexterous hands is imperative for the swift and efficient execution of a wide range of interactive tasks, including but not limited to throwing a ball and playing rock-paper-scissors. These tasks require skilled manual dexterity to demonstrate both precise control and quick responsiveness. To tackle this issue, we propose a hierarchical control approach for multi-fingered dexterous hands with interactive functionalities, utilizing model-free deep reinforcement learning. The complex interaction task is decomposed into simple sub-tasks using hierarchical strategy and action primitive decomposition, which effectively reduces the complexity of the action space, and achieves the motion planning and end finger trajectory control of dexterous hand. In a simulated environment, the aforementioned method has successfully executed interactive tasks, including ball throwing and playing rock-paper-scissors. It achieved a maximum normalized reward of 0.83 and an 84 % success rate. These results are noteworthy in terms of both control accuracy and response speed. This study offers novel insights into the effective resolution of the intricate challenges associated with interactions involving multi-fingered dexterous hands and human-computer interaction.

Intelligent Monitoring of Protection Devices in Power system with Enhanced Faster R-CNN

Relay protection devices are necessary to guard the power system safety and stability. With the significant number of substations and relay protection devices, the maintenance workload has become difficult due to limited manpower, posing hidden dangers to the reliable operation of protection devices. In view of this, this article proposes an enhanced Faster R-CNN algorithm to diagnose the relay protection devices based on image monitoring. The proposed algorithm uses RestNet50 as the main tool to recognize features from input images to generate feature maps. Meanwhile, to improve the image detection accuracy, the Non-Maximum Sup-pression (NMS) algorithm in regional suggestion network (RPN) is optimized from solid thresh-old to soft threshold. By combining the images captured by the surveillance camera, intelligent inspections are conducted on the status of the pressing plate, fiber bending, external object retention, and other items in the relay protection device. A great number of samples are used to train networks for different tasks. The results indicate that the enhanced Faster R-CNN has a higher image recognition rate, and the recognition accuracy of each inspection item for the protection device is higher than 95%.

A Brief Discussion on Technical Points in the Restoration of an Ancient Building in Lanzhou City

With the change and development of The Times, the existing buildings are gradually aging and damaged, coupled with external objective factors and human factors, many building structures are seriously damaged or difficult to maintain the original architectural style. This paper will adopt Revit modeling and combine the principles of ancient building restoration and protection, take the restoration project of Tianqi Temple in Chengguan District of Lanzhou City as an example, analyze the damage of ancient buildings, discuss the reasons for the damage, focus on the analysis of ancient building restoration technology, simulate the construction process of ancient buildings, and provide reference for the future restoration and protection measures of ancient buildings.

Root causes of the climate crisis and political obstacles: a Catholic Social Teaching perspective

ABSTRACT The objective of this article is to explore some of the main obstacles for earnest and successful political engagement with the climate crisis. Firstly, an account will be given on the place of the human person in creation from a Catholic Social Teaching perspective. This is followed by an analysis of ‘the technocratic paradigm’ that has as its aim gaining control over external objects to possess, master, and transform using rational procedures. It has been influential in particular for our dominating economic system and conceptions of ‘the good life’. The last part touches upon the role of politics and some very practical challenges. Overcoming the ‘technocratic paradigm’ seems necessary from a Catholic Social Teaching perspective to heal the disharmonious relation between the human person and nature that lies at the centre of our current crises.

Enhanced Domino Wireless Power Transfer for Transmission Line Monitoring: Overcoming External Metal Object Interference and Optimizing Coil Design

Enhanced Domino Wireless Power Transfer for Transmission Line Monitoring: Overcoming External Metal Object Interference and Optimizing Coil Design

Anti-penetration response and response mechanism of laminated structures made of different composite materials under impact load

Composite laminated structures are often subjected to high-speed impact from external objects in high impact environments, resulting in unpredictable forms of damage and even uncontrollable damage modes. To ensure the safety and reliability of these structures, research was conducted on the anti-penetration response and response mechanism of laminated structures made of different composite materials. Using carbon fiber reinforced plastic (CFRP) laminated structures and glass fiber/epoxy resin composite aluminum alloy (GLARE) laminated structures as research objects, a high-impact experimental setup was constructed based on a first-stage light gas gun to explore the relationship between the energy absorption characteristics and impact energy of composite laminates. Combined with the ballistic limit equations, the ballistic limit values of the composite laminated structures were determined, and the ballistic limits of the 2 mm thick CFRP laminated structure and the 2 mm thick GLARE laminated structure were 138.3 m/s and 215.6 m/s, respectively. The damage modes of CFRP laminated structure are mainly fiber fracture on the impact surface and fiber delamination, fiber tensile fracture and fiber bundle splitting on the back surface, while the damage modes of GLARE laminated structure are mainly plastic deformation, internal fiber fracture and crack extension at the penetration. At the same time, the cohesion unit is introduced to carry out numerical simulation research, which shows that the damage pore morphology of the cohesion unit between layers of composite laminated structures are closely related to their fiber layups, and the damage mode of cohesion unit between layers of composite laminated structures have been investigated, which reveals the damage mechanism in high-impact environments. The research results provide theoretical basis and common technical support for reverse design of composite laminated structures suitable for high impact environments.

Movement-goal relevant object shape properties act as poor but viable cues for the attribution of motor errors to external objects.

When a context change is detected during motor learning, motor memories-internal models for executing movements within some context-may be created or existing motor memories may be activated and modified. Assigning credit to plausible causes of errors can allow for fast retrieval and activation of a motor memory, or a combination of motor memories, when the presence of such causes is detected. Features of the movement-context intrinsic to the movement dynamics, such as posture of the end effector, are often effective cues for detecting context change whereas features extrinsic to the movement dynamics, such as the colour of an object being moved, are often not. These extrinsic cues are typically not relevant to the motor task at hand and can be safely ignored by the motor system. We conducted two experiments testing if extrinsic but movement-goal relevant object-shape cues during an object-transport task can act as viable contextual cues for error assignment to the object, and the creation of new, object-shape-associated motor memories. In the first experiment we find that despite the object-shape cues, errors are primarily attributed to the hand transporting the object. In a second experiment, we find participants can execute differing movements cued by the object shape in a dual adaptation task, but the extent of adaptation is small, suggesting that movement-goal relevant object-shape properties are poor but viable cues for creating context specific motor memories.

A preliminary step toward intelligent forming of fabric composites: Artificial intelligence-based fiber distortions monitoring

This work presents a prototype of an intelligent quality inspection tool for application to fibers distortion monitoring in the fabric composites forming processes. To this end, a series of hemisphere draping tests on a typical commingled fiberglass/polypropylene twill weave were conducted at the dry form, and the defects (in-plane and out-of-plane) for each formed part were inspected via camera vision. By gathering data from around 30 samples and over 1200 images from different forming regions, different machine-learning algorithms were trained and validated. As an application scenario in a smart factory, the developed simple AI tool would be used by an operator, or a robot, to scan different areas of the formed parts and identify ‘defected’ (fail) versus ‘non-defected’ (pass) scenarios. It was found that the K-nearest neighbors and Support Vector Machine models detect the defects with an error rate of less than 5% in the present case study, regardless of the background noise in the images such as external objects, marks on samples, or blurriness.

Veil of Light: The Role of Light in Cavendish’s Visual Perception

Margaret Cavendish’s views about the nature of bodies and perception leave her with a potentially problematic implication: that light has no role in visual perception. For her, perception occurs through the self-motion of animate matter, not through a mechanical system that appeals to local motions and collisions of contiguous bodies. This means that motion is not transferred from external objects with light playing a mediating role; the matter of our eyes simply moves itself to copy the sensible qualities of external bodies. However, Cavendish cannot ignore the simple empirical fact that we appear to have visual perceptions in the presence of light but not in the presence of darkness. Light must play some role. I argue that light for Cavendish plays an intermediary role but does not transfer motions as the mechanical model suggests. Rather, light behaves like our eyes by moving itself to form copies of external objects. Our eyes then see these copies. For Cavendish, we are directly acquainted with a “veil of light” rather than the objects themselves.

의미론적 분할 기반 모델을 이용한 조선소 사외 적치장 객체 자동 관리 기술

In the shipyard, aerial images are acquired at regular intervals using Unmanned Aerial Vehicles (UAVs) for the management of external storage yards. These images are then investigated by humans to manage the status of the storage yards. This method requires a significant amount of time and manpower especially for large areas. In this paper, we propose an automated management technology based on a semantic segmentation foundation model to address these challenges and accurately assess the status of external storage yards. In addition, as there is insufficient publicly available dataset for external storage yards, we collected a small-scale dataset for external storage yards objects and equipment. Using this dataset, we fine-tune an object detector and extract initial object candidates. They are utilized as prompts for the Segment Anything Model(SAM) to obtain precise semantic segmentation results. Furthermore, to facilitate continuous storage yards dataset collection, we propose a training data generation pipeline using SAM. Our proposed method has achieved 4.00%p higher performance compared to those of previous semantic segmentation methods on average. Specifically, our method has achieved 5.08% higher performance than that of SegFormer.

Implementing Cognitive Semantics of Autoepistemic Membership Statements: The Case of Categories with Prototypes

This article presents a model of an architecture of an artificial cognitive agent that performs the function of generating autoepistemic membership statements used to communicate beliefs about the belonging of an observed external object to a category with a prototype. The meaning of statements is described within the model by means of cognitive semantics. The presented proposal builds upon a pre-existing architecture and a semantic model designed for a simpler case of categories without a prototype. The main conclusion is that it is possible to develop an interactive cognitive agent capable of learning about categories with prototypes and producing autoepistemic membership statements fulfilling requirements of Rosch’s standard version of prototype semantics and satisfying pragmatic and logical rules for generating equivalents of these statements in natural languages. Detailed results include the following: an original proposal for an agent’s architecture, a model of an agent’s strategy of learning categories with a prototype, a scheme for determining the computational complexity of particular implementations of the learning strategy, definitions of cognitive semantics for particular cases of autoepistemic membership statements, and an analytical verification of properties of the proposed cognitive semantics. Finally, this article discusses the directions of further development and potential variants of the proposed architecture.