Vinzenz Pallotti Hospital Bensberg

Despite the myriads of literature on African philosophy, the question remains as to whether there is an African philosophy. Related to this is also the question of what ought be the basic role or relevance of such philosophy in the African society. In the gathering of intellectuals from different fields of life, the philosopher is often accused of usurping the role of either linguist or poet. When he is not accused of these, he is accused of either stealing the position of a lawyer or that of a priest. Hence, the philosopher suffers a crisis of relevance. Amid this crisis in sub-Saharan Africa, this chapter appraises the role of philosophy in the African society. Drawing on the German idealism of the 18th century (a system of thought judged as ambiguous and irrelevant, yet very impactful on the society), it demonstrates the ubiquity of philosophy, thereby acquitting it of the guilt of usurpation and en-robing it with the appropriate garment of a perfect grand master. In the fields of scholarship, politics, religion, entertainment, business and technology, philosophy has a lot to offer in the continent and beyond.

In this second installment (for the first, see Kantian Journal, 2024, vol. 43, no. 2), Kant’s references to ancient consolation writings are elaborated. The general aim is to make Kant’s proximity to the Roman Stoa, and his borrowings from it, more apparent. A comparison with his necrology for Funk then shows more explicitly how Kant takes up this ancient philosophy anew for his time, and for his fellow human beings. In so doing, he continued a trend that had begun in the Enlightenment. In Universal Natural History and Theory of Heavens, Kant showed that the world can exist without God’s constant intervention. Human being must understand his position in the cosmos and his radical finitude. Closeness to God can only arise through the moral feeling and the infinitely distant work of God, heaven itself — a famous motif Kant adopted from Seneca. Therefore, comfort and the resources for coping with life can no longer be drawn from irrational mystical moments and naïve biblical story telling. We can only find comfort in reason, the human capacity which brings us closest to God. Many of the reasons for consolation that Kant applies to Funk in the necrology can be found in Cicero, Seneca, and other authors of that period. With all this in mind, the necrology will have to be viewed philosophically in a completely different light from before. This is because Kant succeeds in reconciling Enlightenment tensions between the return to man alone and the distancing from God, as well as the resulting question of what to do, especially in those moments when it seems that only a God can help. The conclusion and appendix show that Gottsched’s influence on the journalism of the Enlightenment can also be observed in Kant’s reading and adoption of motives from Addison’s “Spectator”: Gottsched commissioned the translation. Kant refers in Funk’s necrology to a story (“The Visions of Mirza”) told by Addison, picturing human life as a dilapidated bridge with many traps. One misstep, and the protagonist falls into the abyss.

Kant’s mourning letter or necrology for his student Johann Friedrich von Funk (1760) has hardly been received. This study attempts to change this by explaining the contexts of the short missive. In the first part this concerns in particular the influence that Gottsched exerted on the style of such printed speeches or necrolo­gies. Kant’s references therefore to the ‘Royal German Society’ in Königsberg and its founder Flottwell, a friend of Gottsched’s, are described. The influence of the Roman Stoa then becomes much clearer through the influence of Gottsched’s rhetoric textbook. All in all, Kant attempts to present rational arguments for dealing with death, which can suddenly strike human life; he writes under the obvious influence of a Stoic mindset (see the second part). Most of the comments by Kant scholars on the little work to date have been negative or vague. Here, the text is to be made fruitful for the development of Kant’s thought by shedding light on its historical contexts. On this basis, the little treatise appears as an important link for Kant’s early thinking. It shows how he makes ancient tradition fruitful again for the Enlightenment as a substitute for rapturous and irrational mysticism as we know it from Jacob Böhme, for example.

Abstract The shallow crustal structure of Mars records the evolutionary history of the planet, which is crucial for understanding the early Martian geological environment. Until now, seismic constraints on the Martian crust have come primarily from the receiver functions (RFs). However, analysis of the Mars RFs did not focus on the shallow structure (1–5 km) so far due to the limitation of the signal‐to‐noise ratio at high frequencies for most events. Here, we take advantage of the S1222a and six other marsquakes, which exhibit high signal‐to‐noise ratios, to probe the shallow structure of Mars. We observe a converted S‐wave at approximately 1 s after the direct P‐wave in the high‐frequency P‐wave RFs. This suggests a discontinutity at 2‐km depth between highly fractured and more coherent crustal materials.

The rise of large-scale collaborative panel studies has generated a need for fast, reliable, and valid assessments of cognitive abilities. In these studies, a detailed characterization of participants’ cognitive abilities is often unnecessary, leading to the selection of tests based on convenience, duration, and feasibility. This often results in the use of abbreviated measures or proxies, potentially compromising their reliability and validity. Here we evaluate the mini-q (Baudson & Preckel, 2016), a three-minute speeded reasoning test, as a brief assessment of general cognitive abilities. The mini-q exhibited excellent reliability (.96 – .99) and a substantial correlation (r = .57; age-corrected r = .50) with general cognitive abilities measured with a comprehensive test battery, supporting its potential as a brief screening of cognitive abilities. Working memory capacity accounted for the majority (54%) of the association between test performance and general cognitive abilities, whereas individual differences in processing speed did not contribute to this relationship. Our results support the notion that the mini-q can be used as a brief, reliable, and valid assessment of general cognitive abilities. We therefore developed a computer-based version, ensuring its adaptability for large-scale panel studies. The paper- and computer-based versions demonstrated scalar measurement invariance and can therefore be used interchangeably. We provide norm data for young (18 to 30 years) and middle-aged (31 to 60 years) adults and provide recommendations for incorporating the mini-q in panel studies. Additionally, we address potential challenges stemming from language diversity, wide age ranges, and online testing in such studies.

An unrecognised copy (1665) in Kant’s private library of Michael Piccart’s Isagoge (1605), an introduction to the system of Aristotelian philosophy together with Kant’s own remarks on this author (Refl 4160, AA 17, p. 439) can be established as an original source for the Kantian ‘ideosphere’. First, I point out contexts and consequences of Piccart’s Altdorfian Aristotelianism, in contrast to the Königsbergian Aristotelianism (emphasised by Tonelli’s research). To further check the quality of Piccart as a source of Kant’s, a conceptual case-study is elaborated with Kant’s critical distinction between analytics as a “logic of truth” (KrV, B 85) and dialectics as a “logic of illusion” (KrV, B 86). Hereby, dialectics is understood as part of an Aristotelian division of logic in analytics, dialectics and sophistics (Königsberg/Rabe versus Altdorf/Piccart). As will be shown by the paradigmatic case of the famous Königsbergian proponent of Aristotelianism, Paul Rabe, Kant cannot have received the suggestion for his own critical distinction from Rabe’s Cursus Philosophicus. Instead, Piccart refers to a passage of Aristotle’s Metaphysics, which suggests the very distinction between an analytic philosopher who searches for scientific truth and dialecticians and sophists. For different reasons, they do not claim any scientific seriousness.

BackgroundParastomal hernia (PH) is a common long-term complication in persons with an ostomy. Although the cause of PH may be multifactorial, the surgical technique employed for the creation of a stoma may be a risk factor for the development of PH. The traditional technique of cruciate fascia incision may predispose to increased pressure zones at the ostomy exit site, thereby increasing the risk of PH. A circular excision of the abdominal fascia at the ostomy exit site enables a uniform pressure distribution, thereby reducing the risk of PH. This hypothesis was tested in this in vitro experimental simulation study.MethodsThe effect of the surgical technique for ostomy creation on the risk of PH development was investigated in this in vitro experimental simulation study. The pressure development at the stoma site was compared for the traditional cruciate incision vs. circular fascia excision.ResultsThe pressure at the ostomy site was about four-times higher in the tradition cruciate incision technique compared to the circular excision technique. This finding was independent of unilateral (e.g. peritoneal) pressure application.ConclusionThe main finding from this study suggests that the traditional cruciate incision of the abdominal fascia for the creation of an intestinal ostomy predisposes to increased pressures at the ostomy site, thus increasing the risk of PH. This effect is not seen in the experimental setting following a circular excision of the fascia. Thus, this surgical aspect may be adopted as a possible means of reducing the risk of parastomal hernia in patients undergoing ostomy surgery.

Probability of survival of patients with vulvar cancer directly depends on the lymph node status. Surgery of lymph nodes can be performed as radical inguinofemoral lymphadenectomy or in cases with certain conditions as sentinel lymph node surgery. The aim of this study is to obtain an overview of the intervention-related morbidity and quality of life in patients with vulvar carcinoma after lymphadenectomy. Quality of life and morbidity was compared between patients who underwent radical inguinofemoral lymphadenectomy with those who underwent sentinel lymph node surgery. All recorded postoperative complications occur more frequently in the non-sentinel group, Significant difference was shown for the occurrence of lymphedema (p-value = 0.024) and sensitivity loss (p-value = 0.024). Recurrence of disease was more frequent in the non-sentinel group (38 % vs. 20 %, p = 0.621, n.s.) and satisfaction with groin surgery is slightly higher in the sentinel group (94 % vs. 89 %, p = 1.000, n.s.). We could demonstrate a significantly lower morbidity of sentinel lymphadenectomy compared to conventional inguinofemoral lymphadenectomy while maintaining the same oncological safety. The low morbidity of sentinel- lymphadenectomy does not seem to influence the postoperative quality of life significantly. However, recording of the individual burden of lymphadenectomy by questionnaires should be optimized.

<p>Since early February 2019, the SEIS seismometer deployed at the surface of Mars in the framework of the NASA-InSight mission has been continuously recording the ground motion at Elysium Planitia. In this work, we take advantage of this exceptional dataset to put constraints on the crustal properties of Mars using seismic interferometry (SI). This method use the seismic waves, either from background vibrations of the planet or from quakes, that are scattered in the medium in order to recover the ground response between two seismic sensors. Applying the principles of SI to the single-station configuration of SEIS, we compute, for each Sol (martian day) and each local hour, all the components of the time-domain autocorrelation tensor of random ambient vibrations in various frequency bands. A similar computation is performed on the diffuse waveforms generated by more than a hundred Marsquakes. For imaging application a careful signal-to-noise ratio analysis and an inter-comparison between the two datasets are applied. These analyses suggest that the reconstructed ground responses are most reliable in a relatively narrow frequency band around 2.4Hz, where an amplification of both ambient vibrations and seismic events is observed. The average Auto-Correlation Functions (ACFs) from both ambient vibrations and seismic events contain well identifiable seismic arrivals, that are very consistent between the two datasets. We interpret the vertical and horizontal ACFs as the ground reflection response below InSight for the compressional waves and the shear waves respectively. We propose a simple stratified velocity model of the crust, which is most compatible with the arrival times of the detected phases, as well as with previous seismological studies of the SEIS record. The hourly computation of the ACFs over one martian year also allows us to study the diurnal and seasonal variations of the reconstructed ground response with a technique call Passive Image Interferometry (PII). In this study we present measurements of the relative stretching coefficient between consecutive ACF waveforms and discuss the potential origins of the observed temporal variations.</p>

Abstract The instrument package SEIS (Seismic Experiment for Internal Structure) with the three very broadband and three short‐period seismic sensors is installed on the surface on Mars as part of NASA's InSight Discovery mission. When compared to terrestrial installations, SEIS is deployed in a very harsh wind and temperature environment that leads to inevitable degradation of the quality of the recorded data. One ubiquitous artifact in the raw data is an abundance of transient one‐sided pulses often accompanied by high‐frequency spikes. These pulses, which we term “glitches”, can be modeled as the response of the instrument to a step in acceleration, while the spikes can be modeled as the response to a simultaneous step in displacement. We attribute the glitches primarily to SEIS‐internal stress relaxations caused by the large temperature variations to which the instrument is exposed during a Martian day. Only a small fraction of glitches correspond to a motion of the SEIS package as a whole caused by minuscule tilts of either the instrument or the ground. In this study, we focus on the analysis of the glitch+spike phenomenon and present how these signals can be automatically detected and removed from SEIS's raw data. As glitches affect many standard seismological analysis methods such as receiver functions, spectral decomposition and source inversions, we anticipate that studies of the Martian seismicity as well as studies of Mars' internal structure should benefit from deglitched seismic data.