Online research in philosophy

In much the same way that it is possible to construct a model of hyperbolic geometry in the Euclidean plane, it is possible to model quantum logic within the classical propositional calculus.

With a certain graphic interpretation in mind, we say that a function whose value at every point in its domain is a nonempty set of real numbers is an Abacus. It is shown that to every collection C of abaci there corresponds a logic, called an abacus logic, i.e., a certain set of propositions partially ordered by generalized implication. It is also shown that to every collection C of abaci there corresponds a theory JC in a classical propositional calculus such (...) that the abacus logic determined by C is isomorphic to the poset of JC. Two examples are given. In both examples abacus logic is a lattice in which there happens to be an operation of orthocomplementation. In the first example abacus logic turns out to be the Lindenbaum algebra of JC. In the second example abacus logic is a lattice isomorphic to the ortholattice of subspaces of a Hilbert space. Thus quantum logic can be regarded as an abacus logic. Without suggesting "hidden variables" it is finally shown that the Lindenbaum algebra of the theory in the second example is a subalgebra of the abacus logic B of the kind studied in example 1. It turns out that the "classical observables" associated with B and the "quantum observables" associated with quantum logic are not unrelated. The value of a classical observable contains, in coded form, information about the "uncertainty" of a quantum observable. This information is retrieved by decoding the value of the corresponding classical observable. (shrink)

Sustainability is concerned with the impact of present actions on the ecosystems, societies, and environments of the future. Such concerns should be reflected in the strategic planning of sustainable corporations. Strategic intentions of this nature are operationalized through the adoption of a long-term focus and a more inclusive set of responsibilities focusing on ethical practices, employees, environment, and customers. A central hypothesis, that we test in this paper is that companies which attend to this set of responsibilities under the term (...) superior sustainable practices, have higher financial performance compared to those that do not engage in such practices. The target population of this study consists of the top 100 sustainable global companies in 2008 which have been selected from a universe of 3,000 firms from the developed countries and emerging markets. We find significant higher mean sales growth, return on assets, profit before taxation, and cash flows from operations in some activity sectors of the sample companies compared to the control companies over the period of 2006–2010. Furthermore, our findings show that the higher financial performance of sustainable companies has increased and been sustained over the sample. Notwithstanding sample limitation, causal evidence reported in this paper suggests that, there is bi-directional relationship between corporate social responsibilities practices and corporate financial performance. (shrink)

What is difficult to imagine is also surprising to perceive. This indicates that active visual imagery is an integral part of active visual perception. Erroneous mental transformations provide clues to prior assumptions in visual imagery, just as visual illusions provide clues to perceptual assumptions. Visual imagery and perception share generic assumptions about invariants in images of rigid objects.