Symbolic Expressions Research Articles

Sweeping Emblematics

The article valorizes Renaissance emblematics as an inherently tensional form, steeped in interchange and transition. Movement was not only a thematized topic in emblematic compositions, it was their basic textual strategy to activate meanings and foster interpretation, explore the possibilities and scopes of new forms of communication, and pave the way for a participatory readership. Emblematics was in fact conceived as a brand-new and transdisciplinary textual mode, a mongrel form whose complex interplay of signs favored multiplied discursive models thanks to the constant relay between visual and verbal elements, forcibly made to cohabit the same representational space. Unsurprisingly, these innovative features were soon co-opted and channeled into manipulative practices functional to interpellating and “re-creating” readers, thereby contributing to transform this luxuriant form into a static site of coherence and symbolical expression. The article, on the contrary, reassesses the importance of emblematics as a multifaceted construct which requires a similarly multifaceted theoretical perspective approaching it as a wide-ranging cultural construct, a textual space which ushered in an idea of communication as projective and dislocating, which deployed idiosyncratic meaning procedures and set new hermeneutic parameters, which triggered an incessant mobility in the reading experience, which was teeming with cognitive potentials and ideological bearings.

KINETIC MODELLING OF BIOCHEMICAL REACTIONS USING MATHСAD ANALYTICAL TOOLKIT

Background. The study of the kinetics of biochemical reactions provides a better understanding of how biological processes occur in living organisms. Understanding the peculiarities of such reactions is important for the development of new technologies, in particular for the production of biologically active substances and for the synthesis of drugs. A powerful tool for solving problems in biochemical reaction kinetics is mathematical modelling, which can be carried out using computer mathematical systems, in particular the MATHCAD analytical toolkit. Aim: to substantiate the feasibility and effectiveness of using the MATHCAD analytical toolkit to solve problems of kinetic modelling of biochemical reactions in pharmaceutical research, and to review the capabilities of MATHCAD for computer modelling in pharmacy. Materials and methods. In the context of studying the rate of enzymatic reactions and developing models, such as the Michaelis-Menten model, to describe reactions in which enzymes catalyze the transformation of substrates, the use of a computer mathematical system (CMS) is considered. CMS is a software package and environment for performing mathematical computations, modelling and visualization. The possibilities of using the MATHCAD system to create mathematical models of biochemical reactions based on kinetic equations are demonstrated. This involves the creation of differential equations describing changes in reagent concentrations over time. These equations were solved using numerical methods in MATHCAD. In addition, the results obtained are visualized using 3D graphics in MATHCAD. The stages of using the MATHCAD analytical toolkit in the kinetic modelling of biochemical reactions have been determined. Results. The use of MATHCAD in the kinetic modelling of biochemical reactions is effective for the study of: (1) the kinetics of enzymatic reactions, e.g. reactions in which an enzyme catalyzes the conversion of a substrate into a product; (2) biochemical reactions that take place in reaction vessels in which reagents mix and interact; (3) modelling of reactions in reaction vessels based on the solution of differential equations of reaction kinetics; (4) the effect of inhibitors or activators on enzymatic reactions; (5) scenarios of interaction of reagents to determine changes in the kinetics of reactions that occur when different active substances are introduced; (6) kinetics of biochemical reactions in cases where reactions are accompanied by diffusion of reagents through membranes or other semi-permeable barriers; (7) modelling the effect of diffusion processes on the kinetics of biochemical reactions; (8) models describing the kinetics of decomposition of substances, for example the decomposition of biologically active compounds in the body or in the environment; (9) predicting the effect of changes in the conditions of the reaction medium (temperature, pH, concentration of reagents) on the kinetics of biochemical reactions. It is substantiated that model descriptions of the kinetics of biochemical reactions are important for forming an understanding of the functions of biological systems, including metabolism, enzymatic reactions, and other physiological phenomena. Tools have been used to visualize the modelling results in the form of three-dimensional MATHCAD graphics, which improves the understanding of the reaction mechanism and allows a more thorough analysis of its kinetics. Conclusion. MATHCAD provides an optimized environment for kinetic modelling of biochemical reactions through its ergonomic interface. Particular advantages are the ability to work with symbolic expressions and to use a wide range of built-in functions and tools for exploring mathematical models and visualizing results. The obtained results may be important both for further scientific pharmaceutical research and for implementation in the training of future Masters of Pharmacy in the discipline of "Computer Modelling in Pharmacy" in higher medical education institutions.

THE CONFUSED WHALE OF THE CHINA SEA: WATER SYMBOLISM IN THE WORKS OF HAMZAH FANSURI

Perhaps the most valuable contribution of Hamzah Fansuri to the elevation of intellectual and spiritual traditions of Islam was his tireless efforts to create a harmonious atmosphere between the stern followers of religious law (shari‘ah) and the Sufi ways of self-purification (ṭariqah). The renowned 16th century Malay mystic used simple language to communicate his thoughts to average audience. In order to add clarity to his arguments he often resorted to symbols and metaphors that made his discussions more appealing. This essay begins with a brief introductory remark about the importance of water in religious traditions, followed by a passage on Sufi symbolism in Hamzah’s writings. Among the wide range of symbolic expressions adopted by Hamzah, water-related-metaphors occupy the highest place – both from the viewpoint of their frequent appearance, and in terms of profoundness of their suggestive meanings. Hence, the main body of the paper focuses on water symbolism in Hamzah’s treatises and poems, which is presented under seven headings namely: Waters of Life, Ocean of Unity, Currents of Creation, Waves of Manifestation, Bubbles of Identity, The Confused Whale, and The Brilliant Fish.

Paleolithic cave art at Simanya Gran (Northeast of Spain): New graphic and symbolic expressions in novel territories

Recent years have witnessed significant advancement in the understanding of prehistoric behavior, leading to the discovery of new assemblages that challenge established knowledge within the discipline. This study presents a newly discovered Paleolithic art site in the northeast region of the Iberian Peninsula, specifically within the Simanya Gran cave complex. Excavations conducted since 2019 have revealed Neanderthal human remains and a complex litho-stratigraphic sequence dating back to the Middle Paleolithic, indicating human occupation spanning multiple periods. The documented graphic device (engravings and painting) exhibits thematic and formal characteristics comparable to Paleolithic art found in Spain and France. Through stylistic and contextual analysis, the paper proposes a tentative chronology for the graphic evidence, situating it within the mid-late Magdalenian period. Furthermore, the study explores the concept of graphic territories, suggesting that the distribution of similar graphic motifs across distant regions reflects intense socio-cultural interactions among prehistoric human groups. The significance of this discovery extends beyond its immediate geographic location, contributing to a broader understanding of Paleolithic art in the Mediterranean region and highlighting the importance of continued research in this field.

Ideological Hatred and the New Social Cleavages

The war in Ukraine pushed a large part of the planet to reformulate its narratives, its arguments and rationalities to accommodate an impossible reality: a real, hot war in the European mainland where everybody had already embraced the mantra of a for-ever post-war-scenario. With the politicians re-using old and highly symbolical expressions, all of us were driven in the middle of a semantic turmoil. One year after, we may easily distinguish the opposite camps all around the world and the line between them drawn by the new, post-communist source of dissonances: the bare ideology covered in fluid, transparent inter-textual coats, as if the war itself were just a synthesis of history, geopolitics, religion, modernization and international relations altogether. However, beyond all these, there comes a well-known theory to seek its own updates: Julien Benda labeled three types of hatred, namely of race, class and nation. My claim is that this war in Ukraine added a full-fledged new category of ideological hatred, cutting across the above mentioned ones as if annulling their existence and subordinating all to the present commands of politics. I intend to explore these divisions, tracing a line to connect all four types while searching for the anatomy of the new (old) ghost: the ideological hatred, how it works with the sociological categories of race, class and nation encapsulating them to create new political subjects. The latter are the combating parts in this war and we may say that the war renovated the sociological division of roles through reconfiguring the players in the game.

Birth Care Belief Practices: Traditional Mother–Child Care During Birth in Rural Punjab, Pakistan

Abstract This article analyses the birth care beliefs practiced in a Punjabi village. Birth care is an important practice that ensures a safe and uncomplicated birth for both mother and child. The study presents an in-depth exploration of the human–divine connection and its symbolic manifestation in birth care rituals in rural Muslim communities. Utilising unstructured interviews with midwives, mothers, elderly women, and an imam, the research sheds light on the essential role of religious prayers, Quran recitation, charity, as well simulative imagery and amulets within the cultural care system of rural Punjab. Words, symbols, objects, and symbolic expressions emerge as powerful tools in facilitating faith healing and enhancing its perceived efficacy. The research deepens our understanding of the faith-based birth care process and highlights the essential interdependence of the human– divine connection and symbolic expression (manifestation of belief) within faith-based birth care practices.

SYREN-HALOFIT: A fast, interpretable, high-precision formula for the ΛCDM nonlinear matter power spectrum

Context. Rapid and accurate evaluation of the nonlinear matter power spectrum, P(k), as a function of cosmological parameters and redshift is of fundamental importance in cosmology. Analytic approximations provide an interpretable solution, yet current approximations are neither fast nor accurate relative to numerical emulators. Aims. We aim to accelerate symbolic approximations to P(k) by removing the requirement to perform integrals, instead using short symbolic expressions to compute all variables of interest. We also wish to make such expressions more accurate by re-optimising the parameters of these models (using a larger number of cosmologies and focussing on cosmological parameters of more interest for present-day studies) and providing correction terms. Methods. We use symbolic regression to obtain simple analytic approximations to the nonlinear scale, kσ, the effective spectral index, neff, and the curvature, C, which are required for the HALOFIT model. We then re-optimise the coefficients of HALOFIT to fit a wide range of cosmologies and redshifts. We then again exploit symbolic regression to explore the space of analytic expressions to fit the residuals between P(k) and the optimised predictions of HALOFIT. Our results are designed to match the predictions of EUCLIDEMULATOR2, but we validate our methods against N-body simulations. Results. We find symbolic expressions for kσ, neff and C which have root mean squared fractional errors of 0.8%, 0.2% and 0.3%, respectively, for redshifts below 3 and a wide range of cosmologies. We provide re-optimised HALOFIT parameters, which reduce the root mean squared fractional error (compared to EUCLIDEMULATOR2) from 3% to below 2% for wavenumbers k = 9 × 10−3 − 9 h Mpc−1. We introduce SYREN-HALOFIT (symbolic-regression-enhanced HALOFIT), an extension to HALOFIT containing a short symbolic correction which improves this error to 1%. Our method is 2350 and 3170 times faster than current HALOFIT and HMCODE implementations, respectively, and 2680 and 64 times faster than EUCLIDEMULATOR2 (which requires running CLASS) and the BACCO emulator. We obtain comparable accuracy to EUCLIDEMULATOR2 and the BACCO emulator when tested on N-body simulations. Conclusions. Our work greatly increases the speed and accuracy of symbolic approximations to P(k), making them significantly faster than their numerical counterparts without loss of accuracy.

Deterministic drag modelling for spherical particles in Stokes regime using data-driven approaches

In this paper, we develop a deterministic drag model for stationary spherical particles in a Stokes flow using a cascade of data-driven approaches. The model accounts for the variation in drag experienced by each particle within fixed random arrangements. The developed model is a symbolic expression that offers explainability, ease of implementation, and computational efficiency. Firstly, we generate particle-resolved direct numerical simulation data of the flow past periodic random arrangements of stationary spherical particles with volume fractions between 0.05 and 0.4 using the method of regularized Stokeslets. Secondly, we train graph neural networks (GNs) on the generated data to learn the pairwise influence of neighbouring particles on a reference particle. The GNs are converted to symbolic expressions using genetic programming (GP), unveiling repeated subexpressions. Finally, these subexpressions constitute the foundation of the proposed algebraic model, further refined via non-linear regression. The proposed model can qualitatively mimic the pairwise influences as predicted by the GN and can capture the drag variations with accuracy from 74% and up to 84.7% when compared to the particle-resolved simulations. Due to the interpretability of the proposed model, we are able to explore how neighbour positions alter the drag of a particle in an assembly. The proposed model is a promising tool for studying the dynamics of particle assemblies in Stokes flow.

A quantitative investigation on pyrolysis behaviors of metal ion-exchanged coal macerals by interpretable machine learning algorithms

Generalizing the rules from complex processes such as catalytic pyrolysis to guide their process control is always a difficult but attractive task. The influences of ion-exchange of metal ions (Na+, K+, Ca2+, Mg2+, Co2+ and Ni2+) on the pyrolysis behavior of vitrinite and inertinite from Shendong coal were investigated by thermogravimetric analyzer-Fourier transform infrared spectrometer (TG-FTIR), fixed-bed reactor (FBR), gas chromatograph-mass spectrometer (GC-MS) and X-ray diffractometer (XRD). A set of machine learning models was successfully constructed based on random forest, support vector machine, and Gaussian process regression, to quantify the relationships between pyrolysis behaviors and the properties of metals and macerals. The leave-one-out-cross validation showed that there are considerable determination coefficients (R2 > 0.9) between predicted and experimental values for most responses (17 out of 29). By combining genetic programming-based symbolic regression with the black-box algorithm, 23 symbolic regression expressions with high confidence were successfully constructed. This work is a pioneering attempt of optimization in small-scale experiments. By utilizing the highly interpretable models, a demand-orientated (multi-)optimization coal pyrolysis can be achieved. The bi-objective optimization was conducted on the yield of tar and the content of light aromatics in tar, and the results show that Co is the optimal loading metal.

A Symbolic and Ritualistic Exposition of Purification Rites in the Old Testament

This article explores the intricate tapestry of symbolic and ritualistic elements interwoven in the purification rites of the Old Testament. Elucidating the ancient religious practises of the Israelites, this scholarly exposition unravels the profound significance and ethnological underpinnings of purification rituals as documented in sacred or biblical narratives. The Old Testament, a cornerstone of Judeo-Christian tradition, provides a rich repository of symbolic expressions and rituals designed to purify individuals and communities from impurities and sins. Through a meticulous scrutinisation of biblical references and historical context, this article unmasks the multifaceted interplay between symbolism and ritual in the Old Testament. To do this, symbolic and ritualistic theoretical frameworks are applied to the discourse. The findings and discussion show that the performative dimensions of purification rites highlight the importance of collective participation in spiritual purification, bolstering the communal responsibility for maintaining ritual purity. By navigating through the layers of symbolism and ritual, this scholarly discourse endeavours to offer a comprehensive understanding of how purification rituals serve as a profound expression of the Israelite religious philosophy, configuring their cultural identity and spiritual belief systems.

Symbolism of Sacred Art in Water Conduits

Nepal is a country with abundance of traditional art, architecture and culture. Almost every monument comprises faith, belief, devotion and sacredness which are initiated to be expressed through symbolic representation. Historicity of water conduit of Kathmandu valley can be traced back to early Cristian Era. They were installed to fulfill basic need of water. Flowing water is compared to goddess Ganga. Thus, every water conduit is equated to goddess Ganga with depiction of a crocodile, her vehicle. Cent percent water conduits of the valley consists of sculptural art associated to Hindu or Buddhist deities and a few with architectural monuments. It also comprises sculptural art of several creatures as; serpent, fish, frog, chameleon, mongoose. These deities, monuments and creatures are found to be a symbolic expression of theme associated with religious belief and faith. In this context, finding out the theme of an art expressed in a water conduit, chief feature of sacred sculptural art of water conduits and symbolic representation of sculptural art of water conduits of Kathmandu valley have been focused as an objective of this research. This qualitative research is based upon historical fact. Thus, the facts are collected from historical monuments through survey, interview, collection of photographs and are analyzed in a descriptive way. Related literary sources have been consulted as a secondary source. From several references, it is to be considered that water conduits of the valley have been basically set up for social and religious utility with installation of several deities according to their faith. Art of each conduit as well as image portrays specific features belong to related historical age. Besides this, each sculptural art depicted on the conduit conveys symbolism of goddess Ganga and several pilgrimages composed within a precise pious abode.

New Methods of Series Expansions between Three Anomalies

The calculation of satellite orbit involves some very complex formula derivations and expansions, which are very difficult to manually derive and prone to errors. And the efficiency of manual derivation is not high. We can use computer algebra systems to derive complex formulas related to satellite orbits. This can avoid some of the drawbacks of manual derivation and significantly improve computational efficiency and accuracy. In the past, the relationship among three anomalies was generally represented in the form of a trigonometric series with the first eccentricity e as the parameter. In this paper, the trigonometric series with the parameter m=1−1−e2e is used, as determined by the Lagrange conjugate series. We can use the formula of the Lagrange conjugate series to derive the relationship between the true anomaly and elliptic anomaly. And the relationship between the elliptic anomaly and the mean anomaly is derived by using the symbolic iteration method. In this research paper, we calculated the accuracy of the trigonometric series expansion among three types of anomalies at the first eccentricity e equal to values of 0.01, 0.1, and 0.2. The calculation results indicate that the accuracy of the trigonometric series expansion with m as the parameter is better than 10−5. Moreover, in some cases, the trigonometric series expansion among the three anomalies with m as a parameter is simpler in form than the expansion expressed with parameter e. This paper also derived and calculated the symbolic expressions and extreme values of the difference among three anomalies and expressed the extreme values of the difference in the form of a power series of e. It can be seen that the extreme value increases with the increase in eccentricity e. And the absolute values of the extreme value of the difference between the elliptic anomaly and the mean anomaly, the true anomaly and the elliptic anomaly, and the true anomaly and the mean anomaly increase in this order. When the eccentricity is small, the absolute value of the extreme value of the difference between the true anomaly and the mean anomaly is about twice as large as the elliptic anomaly and the mean anomaly and the true anomaly and the mean anomaly.

Research on the Purchase Intention of Intangible Cultural Heritage Creative Products based on Tourist Perceived Value

This study aims to explore in depth the purchasing intentions of tourists towards creative products of intangible cultural heritage, aiming to reveal the level of recognition and importance that tourists place on the intangible value carried by intangible cultural heritage during the purchasing process. By using a questionnaire survey, a total of 500 valid samples of tourists from different backgrounds and experiences were collected, allowing for a more comprehensive understanding of their purchasing preferences and decision-making factors. The statistical analysis and discussion of data reveal a series of factors that affect tourist purchase intention. Firstly, uniqueness is an important influencing factor, and tourists tend to purchase products with unique cultural characteristics and historical significance because these products can arouse their interest and sense of identity. Secondly, the expression of cultural symbols also has a significant impact on purchase intention. Tourists are more willing to purchase products that reflect local culture and traditions, as these products not only have aesthetic value but also convey deep cultural connotations. In addition, emotional identification is also one of the important factors affecting purchase intention. Tourists tend to purchase products that can evoke emotional resonance and identification, as these products can stimulate their emotional experiences and memories. Finally, although price factors also have a certain impact on purchase intention, they are not decisive factors. Tourists are more willing to pay reasonable prices for products with rich cultural connotations and emotional experiences. Overall, this study reveals that tourists pay more attention to the cultural connotations, emotional experiences, and emotional identity of intangible cultural heritage creative products when purchasing them, rather than simple material attributes. This provides important references for relevant enterprises and organizations to better understand the needs and preferences of tourists, thereby developing more attractive and competitive intangible cultural heritage creative products.

An analysis of female language choices and cultural identity in digital advertisement

The digital advertisement may affect cultural identity and language choice in society. Language choice gives the impact on marketing success and the perceptions of consumers towards the commercial products. It can influence cultural identity revealing the expression of cultural beliefs or core symbols deriving from the style of dress, labels, norms, and behaviours of especially the females. Thus, this study investigated concerning the following research questions: (1) How the female language choices reflected in the digital advertisement, (2) how does female cultural identity reflected in a digital advertisement. The objectives were to extent female language choices reflected in the digital advertisement and to extend female language choices reflected in digital advertisements. Method used in this study was desk research method. The data collected was advertisement selected from January to December 2022 through Youtube channel. The requirements to select the advertisements are as follows: (1) the digital advertisement promotes the beauty products that need to have women being linguistically portrayed in advertisements, (2) the Advertisement uses pictures without words excluded, and (3) the digital advertisements are well known by the customers in Indonesia context, (4) the content of digital advertisements reflects female's identity in Indonesia. The advertisements were selected as follows: (1) Dove, (2) Ms Glow Cream, (3) Wardah Cosmetics, and (5) Lux Botanical Body Wash. Language choice plays important role in advertisements. The language choice is taken into consideration to emphasize the effectiveness of the product that can persuade the female customers to be interactive to be beautiful or have positive characteristics that reflect the female’s identity in the information delivered. Moreover, the females represented their values and their identity as potential, talent, expression, characteristics, brave, and beauty that represent their values and their identity.

A Liturgical Examination of Lighting and Lighting Elements in Religious Buildings from the Middle Ages to the Present

There have been different historical processes in the use of lighting. It started with a fire in the Paleolithic Period and continued until the Modern Age with lighting elements such as torches, candles, and kerosene. The differences in this process are related to the change in sociological needs and often stem from the form. Especially in the lighting of religious buildings, sociological needs, symbolic narratives, and liturgy were the main elements of differences until the modern age. This research investigates the various forms that lighting elements have taken throughout history, based on different functions, from the Middle Ages to the present. These forms are examined in terms of their liturgical meanings based on their intended use, as well as their requirement for effective symbolic expression in lighting elements as part of the mission they undertake in religious buildings.

Dynamic Modeling and Improved Nonlinear Model Predictive Control of a Free-Floating Dual-Arm Space Robot

With the increasing demand for space missions, space robots have become the focus of research and attention. As a typical representative, the free-floating dual-arm space robot has the characteristics of multiple degrees of freedom, a floating base, and dynamic coupling between the manipulator and the base, so its modeling and control are very challenging. To address these challenges, a novel dynamic modeling and control method is proposed for a free-floating dual-arm space robot. First, an explicit dynamic model of a free-floating dual-arm space robot is established based on the explicit canonical multi-rigid-body dynamic modeling theory and combined with the concept of a dynamic equivalent manipulator. The establishment process of this model is not only simple and canonical to avoid the definition and calculation of many intermediate variables, but the symbolic result expression of the model also has the characteristics of iteration, which is convenient for computer automatic modeling. Next, aiming at addressing the problem of trajectory tracking and the base attitude stability of a free-floating dual-arm space robot with parameter perturbation and external disturbance, an improved nonlinear model predictive control method introducing the idea of sliding mode variable structure is proposed. Theoretical analysis shows that the proposed controller has better robustness than the traditional nonlinear model predictive controller. Then, an in-orbit service task is designed to verify the effectiveness of the proposed dynamic modeling and control strategy of the free-floating dual-arm space robot. Finally, the dynamic modeling and control methods proposed are discussed and summarized. The proposed methods can not only realize the tracking of the desired trajectory of the arms of the free-floating space robot, but can also realize the stable control of the base of the free-floating space robot. This paper provides new insights into the difficult problems regarding the dynamics and control of free-floating dual-arm space robots.

Understanding Spontaneous Symbolism in Psychotherapy Using Embodied Thought.

Spontaneous, unwilled subjective imagery and symbols (including dreams) often emerge in psychotherapy that can appear baffling and confound interpretation. Early psychoanalytic theories seemed to diverge as often as they agreed on the meaning of such content. Nevertheless, after reviewing key findings in the empirical science of spontaneous thought as well as insights gleaned from neuroscience and especially embodied cognition, it is now possible to construct a more coherent theory of interpretation that is clinically useful. Given that thought is so thoroughly embodied, it is possible to demonstrate that universalities in human physiology yield universalities in thought. Such universalities can then be demonstrated to form a kind of biologically directed universal "code" for understanding spontaneous symbolic expressions that emerge in psychotherapy. An example is given that illustrates how this can be applied to clinical encounters.

A Guide to Stylistic Analysis: A Case Study of Daud Kamal’s “An Ode To Death”

This study was aimed at finding the stylistics features used in the poem An Ode to Death. The researcher has explored the poem from five levels of stylistics namely phonological, graphological, semantic, morphological, and lexical. The researcher has highlighted the theme of death in Duad Kamal’s “An Ode to Death”. The poet has used different symbolic expressions and other figurative devices to prove his point of death’s inevitability and life’s fragility. The poet has also used strong imagery that creates clear visual scenery in the reader’s. The findings also show that the poet has used language in a finest way. The use of language in “Ode to Death” by Daud Kamal is so simple and ordinary that even a normal reader can comprehend the poem in a better way. The poet has not used any bombastic vocabulary for embellishment or style. The form of the poem is very simple and the theme of death is very clear from words like “pine tree”, “match-stick”, and “ashtray”. Readers can get the idea of decline and decay, and most importantly the idea of death from the aforementioned words.

Uniform diffracted fields of the extended theory of BDW from the circular aperture on a perfectly magnetic conductive surface

PurposeThis paper aims to examine the uniform diffracted fields from a perfectly magnetic conductive (PMC) surface with the extended theory of boundary diffraction wave (BDW) approach.Design/methodology/approachMiyamoto and Wolf’s symbolic expression of the vector potential was used in the extended theory of BDW integral. This vector potential is applied to the problem, and the nonuniform field expression found was made uniform. Here, the expression is made uniform, using the detour parameter with the help of the asymptotic correlation of the Fresnel function. The BDW theory for the PMC surface extended the diffracted fields, and the uniform diffracted fields were calculated.FindingsThe field expressions obtained were interpreted with the graphs numerically for different aperture radii and observation distances. It has been shown that the BDW is continuous behind the diffracting aperture. There does not exist any discontinuity at the geometrically light-to-shadow transition boundary, as is required by the theory.Originality/valueThe results were graphically compared with diffracted fields for other surfaces. As far as we know, the uniform diffracted fields from the circular aperture on a PMC surface were calculated for the first time with the extended theory of the BDW approach.

Sound symbolism in Japanese names: Machine learning approaches to gender classification.

This study investigates the sound symbolic expressions of gender in Japanese names with machine learning algorithms. The main goal of this study is to explore how gender is expressed in the phonemes that make up Japanese names and whether systematic sound-meaning mappings, observed in Indo-European languages, extend to Japanese. In addition to this, this study compares the performance of machine learning algorithms. Random Forest and XGBoost algorithms are trained using the sounds of names and the typical gender of the referents as the dependent variable. Each algorithm is cross-validated using k-fold cross-validation (28 folds) and tested on samples not included in the training cycle. Both algorithms are shown to be reasonably accurate at classifying names into gender categories; however, the XGBoost model performs significantly better than the Random Forest algorithm. Feature importance scores reveal that certain sounds carry gender information. Namely, the voiced bilabial nasal /m/ and voiceless velar consonant /k/ were associated with femininity, and the high front vowel /i/ were associated with masculinity. The association observed for /i/ and /k/ stand contrary to typical patterns found in other languages, suggesting that Japanese is unique in the sound symbolic expression of gender. This study highlights the importance of considering cultural and linguistic nuances in sound symbolism research and underscores the advantage of XGBoost in capturing complex relationships within the data for improved classification accuracy. These findings contribute to the understanding of sound symbolism and gender associations in language.