Hasil untuk "Christianity"

Alejandro Gangui

The study of the spatial layout of Christian churches has been of great interest since late Antiquity and the beginning of the Early Middle Ages, and has received a new impetus in recent literature when it was recognized that the orientation of their main axes represents a key feature of their architecture. From the earliest Christian communities, the orientation of the church allowed the faithful to pray facing the east, towards the rising Sun. Several authors were careful to point this out in their writings; in particular, prior to the Council of Nicaea (325 AD), the Apostolic Constitutions indicated: "And let it be, first, the elongated building, with its head facing east". We present a detailed analysis of the spatial orientation of the historic churches located in the Jesuit towns of Chiquitania (Bolivia). We have measured in situ the main characteristics of eight churches currently standing and the ruins of a ninth construction. In all cases, we carry out a thorough survey of the landscape surrounding each church, trying to find some common pattern, possibly astronomical, that explains its orientations. To our list we also add the orientation measures of a tenth church based on work with plans and satellite maps. We complement our data with a detailed cultural and historical study of the characteristics of missionary towns. Unlike the churches of the Guarani towns of the historic province of Paraquaria where the meridian orientations stand out, in the case of the Jesuit churches of Chiquitos, half of the measured constructions show orientations that fall within the solar range, with three churches oriented equinoctially with high precision. We analyze the reasons for these orientations and delve further on the possible relevance that lighting effects could have had for the architects of these churches, which represent true hidden cathedrals in the virgin tropical forest.

Sharon Budihardjo

Sharon Budihardjo

Maria Florencia Muratore, Alejandro Gangui, Juan Antonio Belmonte et al.

This work is a study of the relationship between astronomy and landscape focused on the orientation of Christian churches of the three main Manorial (Señorío) Islands of the Canary archipelago (Spain): Lanzarote, La Gomera and Fuerteventura. As a background, we have the information provided by the texts of early Christian writers, which imposed that churches should be oriented towards the east [..]. The fieldwork that supports our comparative study is based on the measurement of the precise location coordinates, axis' azimuth and angular height of the horizon for most of the churches of the three islands, which amounts to about 120 sets of measurements. For the study of the sample, we have employed various analyses, both statistical, as well as calendric and orographic. Our results show that on all the islands, the pattern of double orientations is repeated, which contemplates the canonical tradition of orienting the altars of churches within the solar range (pointing either eastward or westward). Very few cases also occur where it is possible to identify constructions whose orientation follows solstitial patterns, perhaps as imitation of aboriginal worship. But this double pattern also includes a high proportion of churches with orientations far from this range. An example is Lanzarote and Fuerteventura, both islands subjected to the same flow of the prevailing trade winds in the region, but each with its own characteristics. Another example is given by the particular orography of deep ravines of La Gomera, which determines the orientation of the temples located in those geographical accidents. In this paper we show how the combination of elements of the land- and skyscape can, with a high degree of probability, offer a satisfactory explanation to the particular orientation of these insular centres of worship, which were built during the first decades after the European conquest.

Tomaž Košir, Petra Lazić, Matjaž Omladič

Almost seventy years old Marshall-Olkin copulas, then wider Marshall copulas, and finally even wider shock model (SM) copulas constitute a substantial part of nowadays copula theory due to numerous applications. Recently, Christian Genest with some coauthors introduced a new stochastic model for a special subclass of SM copulas which gives not only a new angle on these copulas but also widens the range of applications. In this paper we extend this type of stochastic model to all known subclasses of SM copulas. We also introduce a novel class of SM copulas and extend the new stochastic model to this class as well.

Carlos Rito, Christian Gleissner, Noah Ruhland

We present a computational method for detecting highly singular members in families of algebraic varieties. Applying this approach to a family of numerical Godeaux surfaces, we obtain explicit examples with many singularities. In particular, we construct a Godeaux surface whose singular locus consists of two $\mathsf A_1$ and two $\mathsf A_3$ singularities. We show that this surface admits a $\mathbb{Z}/2 \times \mathbb{Z}/4$ abelian cover which is a smooth minimal surface of general type with invariants $K^2=8$ and $p_g=0$, i.e. a fake quadric. Together with the result in the Appendix, this provides the first explicit construction of a fake quadric that does not arise as a quotient of a product of curves.

Igor Fareniy

Alan R. Vincelette

Protection of the environment and its life forms has become a significant concern among philosophers and theologians alike in recent years. There is disagreement, however, over the best way to formulate the grounds of this concern. Some philosophers and theologians favor an instrumental or anthropocentric approach, claiming that adequate preservation of wildlife is warranted solely on the basis of benefits provided to humans, whether couched in terms of the satisfaction of material, medicinal, recreational, or psychological needs. Others claim that wild nature should be preserved for its own sake, due to its life forms possessing intrinsic value. How best to articulate and defend the intrinsic value of wildlife, however, has been much disputed. This paper first compares the adequacy of anthropocentric and non-anthropocentric approaches to environmental ethics. It concludes that a non-anthropocentric theory of the intrinsic value of living creatures is best suited to motivate care for and action on behalf of the environment, and, in addition, most accurately reflects the basis of human concern for the environment. This paper next goes on to examine the philosophical underpinnings required for a theory of the intrinsic value of nature. It argues that an objective account of the intrinsic value of nature, founded on some form of <i>non-naturalist ethics</i> or <i>minimal theism</i>, seems necessary to account for the intrinsic value of nature (in contrast with a purely subjective or naturalist approach). In particular, a sacramental view of nature wherein creation issues from a creator who is goodness itself seems ideal for grounding the intrinsic value of wildlife, along with motivating humans to contribute energy and resources to their conservation and even to sacrifice some of their interests in order to do so. This being the case, rather than being a hindrance to environmental ethics, religion, if properly formulated, can be a most helpful ally.

J. Boswell

Hale Sirin, Tom Lippincott

We present a novel combination of dynamic embedded topic models and change-point detection to explore diachronic change of lexical semantic modality in classical and early Christian Latin. We demonstrate several methods for finding and characterizing patterns in the output, and relating them to traditional scholarship in Comparative Literature and Classics. This simple approach to unsupervised models of semantic change can be applied to any suitable corpus, and we conclude with future directions and refinements aiming to allow noisier, less-curated materials to meet that threshold.

Michael Hahsler

The R arules package implements a comprehensive infrastructure for representing, manipulating, and analyzing transaction data and patterns using frequent itemsets and association rules. The package also provides a wide range of interest measures and mining algorithms, including the code of Christian Borgelt's popular and efficient C implementations of the association mining algorithms Apriori and Eclat, and optimized C/C++ code for mining and manipulating association rules using sparse matrix representation. This document describes the new Python package arulespy, which makes this infrastructure available for Python users.

Willem van Vlastuin

In Christian theological history, reflecting on the relationship between intellect and the will is an ongoing process. Roughly speaking, in Medieval Christianity, two concepts were employed to clarify the relationship between intellect and the will: intellectualism defended the primary role of the intellect, and voluntarism promoted the human will as decisive. These were represented respectively by Aquinas and Duns Scotus. After presenting these concepts as interpretive frameworks, the author examines Calvin. It appears that Calvin’s metaphysical structure of the human being can be characterised as intellectualistic. Richard Muller agrees with this, but he suggests that Calvin’s soteriology was influenced by voluntarism. From the fiducial character of faith, he argues the importance of the will in the fall from grace and suggests that Calvin placed himself in the voluntaristic tradition of Scotus. In this article, Muller’s arguments are investigated and evaluated, and the conclusion is drawn that there is no ground for soteriological voluntarism in Calvin. This conclusion led the author to question whether intellectualism can be spoken of in Calvin’s soteriology. His research into this question is answered affirmatively, leading to the conclusion that Calvin is best understood from an intellectualistic point of view in both his metaphysics and his soteriology. Contribution: Firstly, this article contributes to a historical-theological discussion of the relationship of will and reason in Calvin. Secondly, this discussion is important for a reformed anthropology. Thirdly, this historical insight is important for contemporary anthropological reflection, for example in relation to neuroscience.

Johannes Preiser-Kapeller

Around the turn of the first Millennium AD, both in Christian polities such as the Byzantine Empire as well as in Buddhist communities such as in Heian Japan, expectations of an end of times emerged. Although based on different religious and independent chronological interpretations, they gained attraction at the same time due to the parallel observation and interpretation of the same astronomical phenomena (such as sightings of Halley's Comet in 989 AD) or of simultaneous climate anomalies, which can partly be connected with the Oort Solar Minimum of the 11th century. This paper explores and compares the interplay between natural phenomena, political and religious unrest and apocalyptic interpretations on the basis of historical and natural scientific evidence.

S. B. F. Dorch, J. O. Petersen

About fifty years after the work that astronomer Tycho Brahe carried out while living on the island of Hven had made him world famous, King Christian IV of Denmark built the Trinity Buildings in Copenhagen. The Tower observatory was opened in 1642, and it housed the astronomers from the University of Copenhagen until 1861 when a new, modern observatory was built at Østervold in the eastern part of the city. In 1996, all the University astronomers from the observatories at Østervold and the small town of Brorfelde were relocated to the Rockefeller Buildings at Østerbro, and the two observatories were closed. In this paper we focus on the library at the observatory in Østervold, and its subsequent fate following the close-down of that observatory.

David W. Kling

Conversion – the turning from one religion, belief, or way of life to another informed by the saving activity of Christ – is a central theme of Christianity. From a theological perspective, conversion, the human experience of salvation, is distinguished from regeneration, the hidden, divine work of God. Although conversion is often associated with a particular strand of modern Christianity (evangelical) and a particular kind of experience (a sudden, shattering, complete event), it is, when examined over two millennia, a phenomenon far more complex than any one-dimensional profile would suggest. This entry examines Christian conversion from the perspective of the biblical record, scholarly approaches toward the phenomenon, historical episodes of conversion, and recurring themes and issues in the history of conversion.

Aleksander Sitnik OFM

Bernardyni polscy w XVI wieku byli postrzegani, także przez protestantów, jako zdecydowani obrońcy wiary i Kościoła katolickiego. Działalność tę podjęli bardzo wcześnie, bo już w latach 20. XVI wieku. Wykorzystywali w niej tradycyjne metody: kaznodziejstwo, spowiedź, liturgię, pieśń religijną, piastowane funkcje kwestarzy i kapelanów dworskich, organizowanie przyklasztornych bractw religijnych. Dzięki dobremu wykształceniu teologicznemu oraz prowadzeniu życia moralnego na odpowiednim poziomie jedynie trzech znanych z imienia i nazwiska bernardynów przeszło do obozu protestanckiego. Zakonnicy utracili na rzecz protestantów tylko jeden klasztor we Wschowie, a przejęli klasztory pruskie w Lubawie, Barczewie, Nowem, Gdańsku oraz Toruniu po upadłej w okresie reformacji saskiej prowincji zakonnej św. Jana Chrzciciela. W znacznej mierze jest to zasługa prowincjałów, którzy potrafili uchronić klasztory bernardyńskie przed reformacją.

Michael Rea

In Christian theology, the term ‘analytic theology’ refers both narrowly to a particular kind of scholarly activity and more broadly to an overall style or approach to doing theology. It may also refer to what some characterize as an intellectual culture – ‘a rough grouping within a particular intellectual discipline, such as philosophy or theology, that identifies itself as having a distinctive approach to its subject matter’ (Crisp, Arcadi, and Wessling 2019: 10). As an activity, analytic theology involves bringing the rhetorical style, theoretical methods, and literature of analytic philosophy to bear on theological topics. As a style or approach to doing theology, analytic theology is a self-consciously interdisciplinary enterprise that treats both the methodological virtues prioritized by analytic philosophers, as well as the theoretical developments available in the literature of analytic philosophy, as valuable tools and resources for theological theory-building. As an activity, analytic theology has its origins in the work of analytically oriented philosophers like Alvin Plantinga, Richard Swinburne, Robert Adams, Marilyn McCord Adams, Nicholas Wolterstorff, Eleonore Stump, and others who, in the latter half of the twentieth century, played a major role in the revival of philosophy of religion and the growth of philosophical theology within academic philosophy. But the concept of analytic theology and the overall approach to which it refers is of more recent origin, a product, in the first instance, of conversations and work by Oliver Crisp and Michael Rea that resulted in (among other things) the edited volume, Analytic Theology: New Essays in the Philosophy of Theology (2009), the decade-long series of Logos Workshops in Philosophical Theology at the University of Notre Dame, and the founding of the Journal of Analytic Theology. The intellectual culture of analytic theology has grown up in connection with these activities, as well as a wide variety of others undertaken by scholars in the United Kingdom, Germany, Austria, Finland, Israel, the United Arab Emirates, and elsewhere.

Yichao Liu, Zongru Shao, Yueyang Teng et al.

Recognizing less salient features is the key for model compression. However, it has not been investigated in the revolutionary attention mechanisms. In this work, we propose a novel normalization-based attention module (NAM), which suppresses less salient weights. It applies a weight sparsity penalty to the attention modules, thus, making them more computational efficient while retaining similar performance. A comparison with three other attention mechanisms on both Resnet and Mobilenet indicates that our method results in higher accuracy. Code for this paper can be publicly accessed at https://github.com/Christian-lyc/NAM.

Adrian Di Paolo, Alejandro Gangui, Juan Antonio Belmonte et al.

We present a study of the relationship between astronomy and landscape centered on the orientation of Christian churches of the island of La Gomera, located in the Canary Archipelago. The fieldwork consisted of measuring the precise coordinates of 38 churches, which represents almost all of the island's religious constructions, which has an area of approximately 370 km2. For each church, we measured the azimuth and the angular height of the horizon taken in the direction towards which the altar of each temple points. The data obtained were corroborated with digital terrain models frequently used in archaeoastronomical studies. Finally, for the study of the sample, various analyzes were carried out: statistical, calendarical and orographic, trying to find clues that would allow us to understand the pattern of orientations found. From this analysis, we can infer that in some places the canonical tradition of orienting Christian temples in the solar range was respected. Also, it is possible that a few constructions were oriented with imitation patterns of the aborigine cult, especially in solstitial directions. However, we find that the orientation of the majority of the churches is towards the northeast and, in the absence of a better justification, we think that reason should be sought more in the terrestrial landscape than in the celestial one. Judging by the way in which several small groups of temples are distributed, we estimate this unusual pattern of global orientations is motivated by the particular orography of the island. A significant proportion of churches seems to adapt to the characteristics of their sites, orienting themselves according to the numerous geographical features where they are located. These results allow us to conjecture that the known "abrupt nature" of La Gomera is perhaps the main reason for the particular pattern of orientations of its worship sanctuaries.

Ezio Gamba

Cohen deals with the question of the possibility for art to represent God or the divine in some of his works, throughout all his philosophical production, but obviously above all in his main aesthetic work, sthetik des reinen Gefhls (1912). We can state that in Cohen's works this problem is posed with reference to three different religious fields: Greek polytheism, Jewish monotheism and Christianity. The topic of this essay will be Cohen's thought about the artistic representation of the divine in Christianity or in Christian art through the representation of Jesus. This topic will be examined with reference both to Kants Begrndung der sthetik (1889) and to sthetik des reinen Gefhls ; whereas in Kants Begrndung der sthetik Cohen devotes to the representation of Jesus just a short consideration in the historical introduction of the book, in sthetik des reinen Gefhls the representation of Jesus is object of far more attention. Here, Cohen's answer to the question of the possibility to represent the divine through the representation of Jesus is that Jesus' divinity, in the artistic representation of his figure, can only have a metaphorical value, the real meaning of which is that Jesus' story is the ideal story of the human being; in Kants Begrndung der sthetik and in other writings of the 80s, on the contrary, the idea of incarnation and of the divinity of Jesus is object of a different appreciation by Cohen. The comparison between these different stances can be a contribution to the comprehension of the changes in Cohen's view of Christianity through the years.