An effective method is a computational method that might, in principle, be executed by a human. In this paper, I argue that there are methods for computing that are not effective methods. The examples I consider are taken primarily from quantum computing, but these are only meant to be illustrative of a much wider class. Quantum inference and quantum parallelism involve steps that might be implemented in multiple physical systems, but cannot be implemented, or at least (...) not at will, by an idealised human. Recognising that not all computational methods are effective methods is important for at least two reasons. First, it is needed to correctly state the results of Turing and other founders of computation theory. Turing is sometimes said to have offered a replacement for the informal notion of an effective method with the formal notion of a Turing machine. I argue that such a view only holds under limited circumstances. Second, not distinguishing between computational methods and effective methods can lead to mistakes when quantifying over the class of all possible computational methods. Such quantification is common in philosophy of mind in the context of thought experiments that explore the limits of computational functionalism. I argue that these ‘homuncular’ thought experiments should not be treated as valid. (shrink)

To solve the problem of user privacy disclosure caused by attacks on anonymous areas in spatial generalization privacy protection methods, a K and P Dirichlet Retrieval method based on k-anonymity mechanism is proposed. First, the Dirichlet graph model is introduced, the same kind of information points is analyzed by using the characteristics of Dirichlet graph, and the anonymous set of users is generated and sent to LBS server. Second, the relationship matrix is generated, and the proximity relationship between the (...) user position and the target information point is obtained by calculation. Then, the private information retrieval model is applied to ensure the privacy of users’ target information points. Finally, the experimental results show that the KPDR method not only satisfies the diversity of l 3 / 4, but also increases the anonymous space, reduces the communication overhead, ensures the anonymous success rate of users, and effectively prevents the disclosure of user privacy. (shrink)

The mandate to make disciples of all nations remains the churches’ task before the return of Christ. Church planting is the best way to achieve this mandate. Hence, the biblical patterns as exemplified by Paul the apostle and their relevance to achieving the Great Commission have been the focus of this work. Paul shows through his patterns of church planting the relevance and influence of the Holy Spirit in establishing new centres of worship. Thus, contemporary church planters must seek to (...) emulate Paul in obedience to the Great Commission through church planting, which remains the most effective evangelistic methodology. (shrink)

Background: Previous studies on the effectiveness of psychological interventions in oncology mainly used quantitative measures and no study was conducted with regard to both caregivers and patients. Aim: This study evaluates the effectiveness of psychoeducational support groups, both for women with breast cancer, and for their informal caregivers through the use of quantitative and qualitative measures. Methods: A longitudinal design was used comparing two psychoeducational support groups with other two groups in a standard care control condition. Participants were 28 women (...) with a diagnosis of breast cancer in the care of a hospital in Northern Italy, and 21 family caregivers. The quantitative data were collected by Cognitive Behavioral Assessment for Outcome Evaluation (CBA-OE) and the qualitative data through the use of semi-structured interviews. Results: The statistical analysis showed a significant change attributable to the psychological intervention that proves the effectiveness of such an intervention in the patients’ and caregivers’ group. The qualitative analysis allowed us to interpret the behavioral and psychological profile emerging from CBA-OE, by considering the subjective experience of the treatment groups. The group experience offered affective, relational and informative support, and allowed participants to create a network and to feel understood and reassured. Conclusions: The results suggest the usefulness of psychoeducational support groups for women with breast cancer and for their caregivers. The value of this kind of intervention is not only at an individual level but also at a systems level, and family involvement ensures the best positive outcomes. (shrink)

We give a general method for producing various effective Null and Positivstellensätze, and getting new Positivstellensätze in algebraically closed valued fields and ordered groups. These various effective Nullstellensätze produce algebraic identities certifying that some geometric conditions cannot be simultaneously satisfied. We produce also constructive versions of abstract classical results of algebra based on Zorn's lemma in several cases where such constructive version did not exist. For example, the fact that a real field can be totally ordered, or (...) the fact that a field can be embedded in an algebraically closed field. Our results are based on the concepts we develop of dynamical proofs and simultaneous collapse. (shrink)

To investigate the effect of community of inquiry method on improvement of interpersonal relationship skills, based on Matthew Lipman’s theory and practice, an experiment was designed and conducted in Tehran among primary school students of third, fourth and fifth grades. 190 student were randomly selected and assigned to experimental and control group . The experimental group was taught based on community of inquiry methodology for twelve ninety minute sessions. Interpersonal relationship skills were measured by Ardly & Asher’s questionnaire. Results (...) show that means of both experimental and control group on the pre-test didn't have any significant difference. But, the results of pre-test and post-test of both experimental and control group indicated that the mean of post-test scores of experimental group in relation to pre-test in interpersonal relationship skills increased, while the mean of the control group remained the same in the post-test, and the mean of the experimental group in the post-test was higher than the mean of the control group. In order to investigate the persistence of the treatment effect, the students were rechecked after 4 months, and the results appeared to be stable. Therefore, this semi-experimental study has shown that the community of inquiry method has positively affected interpersonal relationship skills in experimental group of children, with effects that continued for at least 4 months after the treatment. (shrink)

In this paper, an efficient chaos-based image encryption scheme is proposed, which uses the imitating jigsaw method containing revolving and shifting operations. In this scheme, there are three processes in encryption: preprocessing, encryption process, and postprocessing. In the preprocessing, the original image is partitioned into 64 × 64 pixel image blocks and then randomly revolved and shifted under control sequences which are generated by the hyperchaotic Lorenz system whose initial conditions are calculated by original image and keys. Therefore, the (...) preprocessing is sensitive to plain image against differential attacks. In the encryption process, the after-preprocessing image is partitioned into 32 × 32 pixel image blocks; next they are randomly revolved and encrypted by control sequence and key blocks which are generated by the skew tent map. In postprocessing, the after-encryption image is partitioned into 16 × 16 pixels’ image blocks, and they are randomly revolved and shifted again under control sequences which are related with encrypted image and keys. The postprocessing further increases the diffusion characteristics. Moreover, the test experiment and security analyses are given; the results show that our proposed cryptosystem has both security and speed performance. (shrink)

Many philosophers have considered logical reasoning as an inborn ability of mankind and as a distinctive feature in the human mind; but we all know that the distribution of this capacity, or at any rate its development, is very unequal. Few people are able to set up a cogent argument; others are at least able to follow a logical argument and even to detect logical fallacies. Nevertheless, even among educated persons there are many who do not even attain this relatively (...) modest level of development. According to my personal observations, lack of logical ability may be due to various circumstances. In the first place, I mention lack of general intelligence, insufficient power of concentration, and absence of formal education. Secondly, however, I have noticed that many people are unable, or sometimes rather unwilling, to argue ex hypothesi; such persons cannot, or will not, start from premisses which they know or believe to be false or even from premisses whose truth is not, in their opinion, sufficient ly warranted. Or, if they agree to start from such premisses, they sooner or later stray away from the argument into attempts first to settle the truth or falsehood of the premisses. Presumably this attitude results either from lack of imagination or from undue moral rectitude. On the other hand, proficiency in logical reasoning is not in itself a guarantee for a clear theoretic insight into the principles and foundations of logic. (shrink)

(1981). Cost‐effectiveness Analysis as a Method of Assessing ‘A’ level Performance in Different Educational Establishments. Educational Studies: Vol. 7, No. 2, pp. 95-103.

Feedback plays a crucial role in the writing processes. However, in the literature on foreign language writing, there is a dearth of studies that compare the effects of teacher feedback and automated feedback on both cognitive and psychological aspects of FL writing. To fill this gap, the current study compared the effects of teacher feedback and automated feedback on both revision quality and writing proficiency development, and perceived usefulness and perceived ease of use of the feedback in English writing among (...) English learners as an FL in China. It also investigated students’ perceptions of the strengths and weaknesses of the two types of feedback. The study adopted a mixed-methods design. The quantitative method collected the data through a pre-test and a post-test, which measured the participants’ English writing proficiency development; a writing task, which received either teacher feedback or automated feedback; and a close-ended questionnaire, which examined students’ perceived usefulness and perceived ease of use of the feedback. The qualitative method collected the data through an open-ended questionnaire, which examined the participants’ perceptions of the strengths and weaknesses of teacher feedback or automated feedback depending on the type of feedback they received. Chinese university EFLs in two English classes taught by the same English teacher participated in the study: one class received teacher feedback while the other received automated feedback using Pigaiwang. While the students in the two classes did not differ significantly on the pre-test of students’ writing proficiency, students who received teacher feedback scored significantly higher on revision than those who received automated feedback. Students in the teacher feedback class also had significantly higher ratings on perceived usefulness and perceived ease of use of the feedback than those in the automated feedback class. However, students in the automated feedback class obtained significantly higher scores on the post-test of the writing proficiency. The qualitative results identified three themes of strengths and two themes of weaknesses for the teacher feedback and the automated feedback, respectively. The results suggest that while teacher feedback has a more positive effect on the psychological aspect of FL writing, automated feedback may be more effective in developing FL writing proficiency in the long run. (shrink)

This article addresses the relationship between content, voice, and body language in persuasive communication and the contribution of these three elements of persuasive performances to its overall persuasiveness. Findings are presented from two separate laboratory experiments. In the first experiment three versions of a video displaying a speech were shown to three different groups of participants: without vocal emphasis and without gestures of the speaker, with vocal emphasis but without gestures, with vocal emphasis and gestures. Audio tracks of the first (...) two experimental conditions were later used in the second experiment to analyze the effects of vocal emphasis when no visual cues are present. Measurement included a questionnaire as well as Real Time Response-measurement. It was found that content dominates the effect of the speech; emphasis and gestures, however, improved the perception of some features of the speech, such as liveliness and power. Audio-only versions yielded similar results but were rated more favorably in general. (shrink)

Publication date: 30 March 2017 Source: Author: Poonam Bala, Tanivir Kaur, Maninder Kaur This is an experimental study conducted on the upper primary school students in the district of S.B.S Nagar, Punjab. The study was conducted on the students of 6th and 7th class of an international School. Total of 100 students were enrolled for this experimental study who met the inclusion criteria and were randomly divided into 2 equal groups by simple randomization technique. They received either the lecture (...) class='Hi'>method teaching or the smart class method teaching. For conducting the experiment, the investigator used pre-test and post-test comparison group design. For collection of data, a structured questionnaire and a structured teaching programme was used. t-test was used for analysis and interpretation of the data. The results of the study revealed that the lecture method of teaching was more effective as compared to a smart class method of teaching. (shrink)

This paper integrates theoretical and methodological evaluations of the effect of group size on helping. Bystander theory includes a reward–cost model for understanding the general helping context and a more specific designation of three psychological processes that produce the bystander effect. The three processes include: diffusion of responsibility, audience inhibition, and social influence. The present analysis identifies incompatibilities between the general model and the three processes and incompatibilities between the three processes and the definition of the bystander effect. Implications of (...) these problems in the theory extend to the passive confederate design, one of the two major methods used in bystander research. This method is an attempt to test the bystander effect by manipulating social influence. But, because of a previously unrecognized disjunction between social influence and the bystander effect, we conclude that passive confederate studies do not actually test the bystander effect. (shrink)

With the post-pandemic situation, digitalization has revolutionized physical teaching into online teaching and has become a common practice. The engagement of students has been essential for their good academic performance which can be ensured by the active participation of the students and this is a real challenge for the teachers. However, sometimes in online and physical teaching, teachers are also involved in rationalized knowledge hiding, which leads to the disengagement of the students, and this ultimately affects their academic performance. Therefore, (...) the present study aims at measuring the students’ disengagement in the teaching classes, both physical and online. The population of the present study is the students from the universities of China belonging to different fields of study. The sample size for this study is 246. The data are obtained through the Questionnaire surveys. The existing study has assessed the role of teachers’ rationalized knowledge hiding behaviors in the disengagement of students and their lesser grades. It has been found that rationalized knowledge hiding in online teaching does not affect students’ performance; however, it makes students disengage from their studies in physical classes. Interestingly, the rationalized knowledge hiding in physical teaching has negatively affected the performance of the students. Furthermore, the mediating role of the students’ disengagement has been found significant in this study. Organizations, especially universities, can ensure maximum knowledge sharing by motivating the instructors through positive reinforcements. This study will be useful for the curriculum coordinators of different departments in ensuring the maximum outcome of the teaching classes, workshops, and seminars conducted either physically or online to avoid the rationalized knowledge hiding of the teachers. (shrink)

The aim of this study was to find out whether the achievement of high school social studies students differs significantly according to whether they are taught by the reflective teaching method or the lecture approach method. A stratified random sample of 215 year three social studies students was randomly assigned to two groups: 107 students into the reflective approach group and 108 into the lecture approach group. An achievement test was used as the pre‐ and the post‐test. The (...) means of the aggregate mean performance scores were compared by the use of Student's t‐test. There was no significant difference between the two groups on the pre‐test scores but there was a significant difference between the post‐test scores, in favour of the group taught by the reflective approach method. (shrink)