Intuitive Perception Research Articles

Strength Improvement of Loose Sandy Soils Through Cement Grouting

Grouting, which has several applications in the field of civil engineering, was once considered as a mysterious operation. The effectiveness of grouting requires a lot of understanding, skill, meticulous attention and an intuitive perception. Even though grouting was started 200 years ago, it was treated for a long time, as an art which eluded scientific investigation and improvement. Grout is injected under pressure into the material to be grouted until it fills the desired volume of material around the hole or until the maximum specified pressure is attained and a specific minimum grout flow is reached. This paper discusses the strength improvement of loose sandy soils through cement grouting. Various cement percentages (2, 4 and 6 %) were used for grouting medium sand beds in the loosest state. The effectiveness of grouting was evaluated based on the actual cross sectional area of the intact grouted mass at different depths and by determination of cement content at various depths and laterals distances of the grouted medium. The improvement in strength due to grouting was assessed with the help of load tests. 4 % cement grout was found to be more effective in medium sand compared to 2 and 6 %. The results undoubtedly prove the effectiveness of using grouting as an efficient technique in improving the foundation beds of loose sandy soils.

Breakfast: a multidisciplinary approach

BackgroundThe role of breakfast as an essential part of an healthy diet has been only recently promoted even if breakfast practices were known since the Middle Age. The growing scientific evidences on this topic are extremely sector-based nevertheless breakfast could be regarded from different point of views and from different expertises. This approach, that take into account history, sociology, anthropology, medicine, psychology and pedagogy, is useful to better understand the value of this meal in our culture. The aim of this paper was to analyse breakfast-related issues based on a multidisciplinary approach with input by specialists from different fields of learning.DiscussionBreakfast is now recommended as part of a diet because it is associated with healthier macro- and micronutrient intakes, body mass index and lifestyle. Moreover recent studies showed that breakfast improves cognitive function, intuitive perception and academic performance. Research demonstrates the importance of providing breakfast not only to children but in adults and elderly too. Although the important role breakfast plays in maintaining the health, epidemiological data from industrialised countries reveal that many individuals either eat a nutritionally unhealthy breakfast or skip it completely.SummaryThe historical, bio-psychological and educational value of breakfast in our culture is extremely important and should be recognized and stressed by the scientific community. Efforts should be done to promote this practice for the individual health and well-being.

Kant on Self-Awareness

This paper has three main parts. First, I discuss Kant on self-awareness in terms of inner sense, why he failed to make this account coherent, and why he failed to give such an account. Second, I give two reasons why such an account is bound to be inadequate. In the last section, I discuss another attempt Kant was tempted to give in terms of transcendental self-awareness involving a nonsensory intuitive perception that helps solve some of his problems.

Extracting Ontology Properties from the Web-Tables

Web-tables are ubiquitous in Web pages. Since tables themselves are organized structurally and semantically, they are good resources from which we can easily extract ontology. But, most Web-tables are designed for intuitive perception of humans, thus, it has a certain limit to interpret table content using only structural information of the table. So this paper focuses on the method for interpretation of table content based on semantic characteristics of the table. In order to obtain many property elements used for ontology inference, in this paper, the authors discuss how to extract ontology properties from Web-tables. The extracted properties include the following elements: Is-a relationship, class-instance relationship, triple, property domain, property range, symmetric property, transitive property, functional property, and inverse functional property, property for defining super-sub relationship. Through experiment, the authors show that their method can effectively extract property elements from Web-tables.

A 2D Flow Visualization User Study Using Explicit Flow Synthesis and Implicit Task Design

This paper presents a 2D flow visualization user study that we conducted using new methodologies to increase the objectiveness. We evaluated grid-based variable-size arrows, evenly spaced streamlines, and line integral convolution (LIC) variants (basic, oriented, and enhanced versions) coupled with a colorwheel and/or rainbow color map, which are representative of many geometry-based and texture-based techniques. To reduce data-related bias, template-based explicit flow synthesis was used to create a wide variety of symmetric flows with similar topological complexity. To suppress task-related bias, pattern-based implicit task design was employed, addressing critical point recognition, critical point classification, and symmetric pattern categorization. In addition, variable-duration and fixed-duration measurement schemes were utilized for lightweight precision-critical and heavyweight judgment intensive flow analysis tasks, respectively, to record visualization effectiveness. We eliminated outliers and used the Ryan REGWQ post-hoc homogeneous subset tests in statistical analysis to obtain reliable findings. Our study shows that a texture-based dense representation with accentuated flow streaks, such as enhanced LIC, enables intuitive perception of the flow, while a geometry-based integral representation with uniform density control, such as evenly spaced streamlines, may exploit visual interpolation to facilitate mental reconstruction of the flow. It is also shown that inappropriate color mapping (e.g., colorwheel) may add distractions to a flow representation.

On-site visualization of building component erection enabled by integration of four-dimensional modeling and automated surveying

This research develops a new methodology for seamless integration of automated construction surveying with four-dimensional (4D) modeling in order to improve current practices of building component positioning and erection in terms of efficiency and quality. The building production models are represented in 4D and generated in consideration of construction engineering constraints, such as lifting capacity of tower cranes, construction method and activity sequence. The surveying data include identification, surveying time and coordinates of a limited quantity of tracking points that are marked on a building component. The data are processed using a special algorithm to derive transformation matrices, which encode movements and rotations of a solid object in the 3D space. As a result, the 3D model of the building component is updated to mirror its actual motion in the site during installation operations. Furthermore, by comparing the as-designed model and the actual model of the building product, any deviations between them are determined in terms of position offsets and rotation angles, which facilitate follow-up adjustment operations. A software system named as 4D-PosCon (acronyms of four-dimensional positioning controller) was prototyped based on the proposed methodology. Laboratory experiments were designed and carried out, validating the proposed methodology and demonstrating the prototype system of 4D-PosCon. In conclusion, the resulting 4D visualization is effective to facilitate positioning control in erecting a building component by providing intuitive perception and accurate comprehension of the relative orientation and position of the building component in reference to its final as-designed state.

Non-local intuition in entrepreneurs and non-entrepreneurs: results of two experiments using electrophysiological measures

Non-local intuition is the body’s perception of information about a distant or future event that is not based on reason or memories of prior experience. This work reports the results of two pilot experiments testing the measurement efficacy of two computer-administered experimental protocols for studying non-local intuition in entrepreneurs and non-entrepreneurs. Conducted on a small sample of repeat entrepreneurs from the Cambridge Technopol, UK, and a US sample of non-entrepreneurs, both experiments employed electrophysiological measures (skin conductance response and beat-to-beat heart rate) to detect non-local intuition, as used in previous studies. The results are promising: the use of conservative statistical procedure – random permutation analysis – found evidence of non-local intuition in both entrepreneurs and non-entrepreneurs. These results may constitute the first evidence in a population of entrepreneurs that electrophysiological measures appear able to detect intuitive perception of a future event.

Topology-Aware Evenly Spaced Streamline Placement

This paper presents a new streamline placement algorithm that produces evenly spaced long streamlines while preserving topological features of a flow field. Singularities and separatrices are extracted to decompose the flow field into topological regions. In each region, a seeding path is selected from a set of streamlines integrated in the orthogonal flow field. The uniform sample points on this path are then used as seeds to generate streamlines in the original flow field. Additional seeds are placed where a large gap between adjacent streamlines occurs. The number of short streamlines is significantly reduced as evenly spaced long streamlines spawned along the seeding paths can fill the topological regions very well. Several metrics for evaluating streamline placement quality are discussed and applied to our method as well as some other approaches. Compared to previous work in uniform streamline placement, our method is more effective in creating evenly spaced long streamlines and preserving topological features. It has the potential to provide both intuitive perception of important flow characteristics and detail reconstruction across visually pleasing streamlines.

Assessing 3D scores for protein structure fragment mining

Assessing 3D scores for protein structure fragment mining Frédéric Guyon1, Pierre Tufféry1,21MTi, INSERM UMR-S973, Université Paris Diderot-Paris 7, Paris, France; 2RPBS, Université Paris Diderot-Paris 7, Paris, FranceAbstract: Quantifying the 3D similarity between two proteins is a difficult task that has motivated the assessment of several 3D scores. New developments in protein modeling and analysis have led to the emergence of new interest towards mining structures at the local level. We assess in the context of fragment mining several dissimilarity scores. We revisit the concept of mirror conformation previously introduced at the level of complete structures and extend it to the more local level. We also consider an explicit criterion measuring the fragment boundary discrepancies. Whereas classical criteria such as the root mean square deviation (RMSd) fail to identify similar shapes in a consistent way, we show that local mirror and boundary mismatch filtering greatly supplements classical scores to select significant matches. The geometrical conditions defined by such criteria can be considered as signatures of fragment similarity. Furthermore, it is possible to tune the degree of similarity depending on the size of the mirrors accepted. This results in a more intuitive perception of the concept of similarity, and opens new perspectives for the rapid mining of large collections of structures.Keywords: protein fragments, similarity, distance, mining

Intentional-historical transformation of the major concepts of Russian philosophy in the intellectual intuition in Frank's philosophy

In Frank's sense-object and rationally-rational epistemology, basing in its historical intention on the most important concepts of Russian philosophy, such as "Love", "All-Unity", "Experience", "Spirituality", is supplemented with transrational form of knowledge - intuitive perception of the world in all its substantive and spiritual fullness of "living knowledge" as "knowledge - life".

S06-03 - Schizophrenia, epiphany and kafka's “the trial”

Schizophrenia, epiphany and Kafka's “The Trial”K. Conrad wrote Die beginnende Schizophrenie in 1958, but his description of the psychopathology of schizophrenia and his concepts of schizophrenia are still very enligthning to contemporary readers. One of several important concepts described is that of epiphany. In his description he stressed that this was a way of experiencing the whole world, perceptions, emotions, notions, etc. The schizophrenic patient not only experiences that every thing has a certain meaning attached to it, also this meaning has something to do with the patient. Nothing seems to be coincidential, but on the contrary seems to be specifically important for the patient. This sudden, intuitive perception of or insight into reality or essential meaning of the world resembles the experience of a revelation (=epiphany from ancient Greek). This way of experiencing/living in the world feels so “natural” to the patient, that he never questionswhat is obvious discrepancies and incompatibilities to others.Frans Kafka has been called the best descriptor of the schizophrenic world. His novel The Trial (Der Prozess) is commonly viewed as a description of bureaucracy, but can also be seen as a matchlessly description of the schizophrenic world. In the film the spectator sees every thing through the eyes of Joseph K and thereby has the opportunity to a first person experience of the self-reference, oddness and inconsistencies of the schizophrenic world. This brings the notion of epiphany to the lived world of the spectator.

A systematic review of the effect of breakfast on the cognitive performance of children and adolescents

Breakfast is recommended as part of a healthy diet because it is associated with healthier macro- and micronutrient intakes, BMI and lifestyle. Breakfast is also widely promoted to improve cognitive function and academic performance, leading to the provision of breakfast initiatives by public health bodies. Despite this positive and intuitive perception of cognitive benefits, there has been no systematic review of the evidence. Systematic review methodology was employed to evaluate the effects of breakfast on cognitive performance in well-nourished children and nutritionally at-risk or stunted children. Acute experimental studies, school feeding programmes and studies of habitual breakfast intake are reviewed. Comparisons of breakfast v. no breakfast and breakfasts differing in energy and macronutrient composition are discussed. Included are forty-five studies described in forty-one papers published between 1950 and 2008. The evidence indicates that breakfast consumption is more beneficial than skipping breakfast, but this effect is more apparent in children whose nutritional status is compromised. There is a lack of research comparing breakfast type, precluding recommendations for the size and composition of an optimal breakfast for children's cognitive function. Few studies examined adolescents. Studies of school breakfast programmes suggest that such interventions can have positive effects on academic performance, but this may be in part explained by the increased school attendance that programmes encourage. The present systematic review considers methodological issues in this field and makes recommendations for future research design and policy priorities.

Perception of Risk through Phases of Drug Research and Development: Questionnaire Survey

We used a web-based questionnaire survey to investigate how employees from the pharmaceutical and allied health industries perceive the importance of different steps within drug research and development for assessing the benefits and risks of developmental drugs to reach market registration and enter into clinical use. Key outcomes were that Pharmaceutical Processes were seen as least important while Toxicology was most important followed by Clinical Trials Phases 2 Late/3, Safety and Pharmacovigilance, and Clinical Trials Phase 2 Early. Nonparametric analysis showed that these outcomes were influenced by demographics of the selected employee target population. Since this survey was exploratory, we feel the expressed judgments of the study population are important for planning research surveys using more complex scenarios to investigate intuitive perception of risks and benefits in drug research and development.

AXIOLOGY, SELF‐DECEPTION, AND MORAL WRONGDOING IN BLAISE PASCAL'S PENSÉES

ABSTRACTBlaise Pascal is highly regarded as a religious moralist, but he has rarely been given his due as an ethical theorist. The goal of this article is to assemble Pascal's scattered thoughts on moral judgment and moral wrongdoing into an explicit, coherent account that can serve as the basis for further scholarly reflection on his ethics. On my reading, Pascal affirms an axiological, social‐intuitionist account of moral judgment and moral wrongdoing. He argues that a moral judgment is an immediate, intuitive perception of moral value that we willfully disregard in favor of the attractive, though self‐deceptive, deliverances of our socially constructed imaginations. We can deceive ourselves so easily because our capacity to evaluate goods is broken, a dark legacy of the fall. In the article's concluding section, I briefly compare Pascal to contemporary ethicists and suggest directions for future research.

Functional aspects of protein flexibility.

Proteins are dynamic entities, and they possess an inherent flexibility that allows them to function through molecular interactions within the cell, among cells and even between organisms. Appreciation of the non-static nature of proteins is emerging, but to describe and incorporate this into an intuitive perception of protein function is challenging. Flexibility is of overwhelming importance for protein function, and the changes in protein structure during interactions with binding partners can be dramatic. The present review addresses protein flexibility, focusing on protein-ligand interactions. The thermodynamics involved are reviewed, and examples of structure-function studies involving experimentally determined flexibility descriptions are presented. While much remains to be understood about protein flexibility, it is clear that it is encoded within their amino acid sequence and should be viewed as an integral part of their structure.

The bone marker plot: an innovative method to assess bone turnover in women

Biochemical markers of bone turnover reflect the resorptive and reconstructive effects that act on the skeleton. Although elevated markers are commonly interpreted as a sign of an increased turnover rate, the balance between bone resorption and formation is mostly neglected. We introduce a graphic report combining both complementary processes. Bone turnover markers were measured in 599 women (aged 25-74 years). To set up reference ranges, 269 from 599 women were selected because of having T-scores > -1 and inconspicuous basic laboratory data. Concentrations of resorption and formation markers were mathematically transformed to build up plots with four fields, symbolizing fast and slow resorption and fast and slow formation processes. The reference data of bone turnover were represented by a 95% confidence ellipse. For individual marker plots, we converted data of bone turnover markers from therapy follow-up profiles of patients in a similar manner. In pre-, peri- and postmenopausal women (n= 190, 39 +/- 6 years; n= 35, 51 +/- 6 years; n= 44, 55 +/- 5 years, respectively), the medians of the bone resorption marker CrossLaps and of the bone formation markers osteocalcin and aminoterminal propeptide of type I procollagen were 0.13/0.16/0.22 ng mL(-1), 21/21/25 ng mL(-1) and 36/35/45 ng mL(-1), respectively. In postmenopausal women, the marker plots revealed a shift towards accelerated bone resorption. A discrimination from osteopenic women (n= 138) failed. The proposed marker plot facilitates the intuitive perception of bone turnover in individual patients as well as in patient groups by a synopsis of the balance between bone formation and resorption with the rate of these processes.

CUSTOS DE CONFORMIDADE À TRIBUTAÇÃO: UMA ANÁLISE DA PERCEPÇÃO DE GESTORES E COLABORADORES EM UMA EMPRESA ESTADUAL DE SANEAMENTO

Os custos de conformidade à tributação correspondem aos dispêndios incorridos pelos contribuintes no cumprimento das determinações legais tributárias. Incluem os custos de tempo e recursos consumidos em atividades como cálculo e retenção de impostos e contribuições, preenchimento de declarações, atendimento a fiscalizações, e os gastos em planejamento tributário, pesquisas e treinamentos, entre outros. O objetivo do estudo é analisar a percepção de gestores e colaboradores de uma empresa estadual de saneamento a respeito dos custos de conformidade à tributação. A pesquisa classifica-se como de natureza qualitativa, com delineamento exploratório-descritivo. Quanto aos meios, trata-se de um estudo de caso único. Neste estudo, foram utilizadas como fontes de evidências: a pesquisa bibliográfica e documental, o questionário estruturado e roteiro de entrevista semi-estruturada. O tratamento desses instrumentos envolveu o uso de métodos quantitativos (análise exploratória dos dados) e qualitativos (análise de conteúdo). Os resultados mostraram que há uma percepção intuitiva da existência dos custos de conformidade à tributação, e de seu crescimento principalmente em decorrência da complexidade e instabilidade das normas fiscais, mas não há apuração ou controle desses custos na empresa pesquisada.

Laparoscopic low rectal anastomosis using a new stapling device: Early experience with the Contour™ stapler

Rectal cancer was initially considered a contraindication for the laparoscopic approach to low rectal resection due to the greater difficulty of deep pelvic dissection, but several studies have demonstrated its potential clinical advantages. The currently accepted technique for this intervention includes total mesorectal excision, which entails complete dissection of the mesorectum followed by low transection of the rectum. The laparoscopic approach provides good visualization and magnification of the operative field, but transection of the rectum may be more difficult. This is illustrated by the conversion rate of around 15% in most series, mainly due to technical difficulties. Contour™ placement may overcome these difficulties. Two key points support the interest in the use of devices with the features of the Contour™. First, the current feeling and evidence indicate that with presently available laparoscopic devices, the section of the low rectum in selected patients (males and mid‐third rectal tumors) is often difficult. Secondly, allthough the Contour™ device was designed for open surgery, surgeons have the intuitive perception that it perfectly accomplishes the functions an ideal laparoscopic stapler should include.There is clearly a need for more appropriate laparoscopic instruments for low rectal transection. The Contour™ device could be considered a prototype because it meets the surgeon’s requirements when operating on the low rectum, providing one shot, simultaneous sewing and cutting function and a symmetric rectum section. However, a number of technical modifications would enhance the utility of the instrument in this setting.

The tension between common sense and scientific perception of animals: recent developments in research on animal integrity

A distinction can be made between aesthetic or intuitive perception in holistic biology and in daily life, and reductionistic scientific perception based on the search for causal mechanisms. Going from our observations of animals in daily life to observations of animals in scientific experiments implies a transformation. Scientific experiments exclude all values that are important in daily life. For research on the concept of animal welfare it can be shown that excluding values is impossible as this issue lies too close to our daily experience. This means that the empirical and the moral domain of the concept cannot in fact be separated. And by means of the moral domain, background theories about man's relation to nature, about the role of natural science, and about what is morally relevant play a role in definitions of animal welfare. This is illustrated for two bioethical theories: zoocentrism and biocentrism. In the zoocentric theory, only sentient animals are morally relevant. Some consider the argument that genetic engineering violates the integrity of an organism not a moral issue, but an aesthetic one. In a biocentric ethical theory, all living beings have moral relevance; moral and aesthetic issues are then closely related. In such a theory the characteristic nature of an animal is respected and knowledge of this nature is intimately related to a more aesthetic and holistic perception of animals. This paper shows that the ethical attitude towards nature is directly linked to the way human beings perceive nature. In experimental reductionistic science, nature is seen as a material object, subject to mechanistic analysis: when animals are subjected to scientific experiments it is impossible to completely avoid ethical issues, but they are restricted to utilitarian ones. The genetic engineering of animals enhanced awareness of ethical issues directly relating to the technology itself and to the attitude towards nature underlying it, irrespective of the consequences. These issues only come up when the animal is perceived in a holistic way, which comes close to our perception of animals in our daily life.

Birth and hatching: Key events in the onset of awareness in the lamb and chick

The neuroanatomical and neurophysiological development of the embryo and fetus and unique features of the physiological environment of the fetal brain, features which are lost at birth, support recent conclusions that under normal circumstances awareness (or consciousness) is probably not exhibited by the ovine embryo-fetus before birth and that it appears for the first time only after birth. However, there has apparently been no evaluation of whether or not similar mechanisms modulate awareness-related functions in domestic chicks before and after hatching. This comparative review, in seeking to rectify this, arrived at the following conclusions. First, the neural apparatus of both lambs and chicks appears to be too immature to support any states resembling awareness during at least the first half of pregnancy or incubation. Second, electroencephalographic (EEG) activity, which evolves subsequently, shows that states of sleep-like unconsciousness are likely to be continuously present in lambs until after birth, and that such states at least predominate in chicks until after hatching. Third, as in fetal lambs, epochs of so-called ‘wakefulness’ previously reported in chick embryos do not seem likely to represent short periods of awareness in ovo. Fourth, several neurosuppressive mechanisms, with some unique features, also operate or have the potential to operate in chicks before hatching, but a dearth of published information currently hinders a full comparison with those demonstrated to operate in fetal lambs. Fifth, contradicting the intuitive perception that vocalisation pre-hatching by the chick indicates the presence of awareness, published evidence suggests that vocalisation before and during hatching occurs mostly during EEG states indicating sleep-like unconsciousness. Sixth, as seems to be the case for newborn lambs after birth, it is possible that demonstrable awareness may appear for the first time only after hatching in chicks, presumably through waning neurosuppression and burgeoning neuroactivation, but such awareness seems to take longer to manifest itself. However, additional research in chicks is recommended to further assess this suggestion. Particular attention should be given to the status of vocal interactions between hen and chick which begin several days before hatching, and to the operation of neurosuppressive and neuroactivating mechanisms throughout the last 40% of incubation and during and after hatching.