Who is entitled to ‘earn sovereignty'? Legitimacy and regime support in Abkhazia and Nagorno‐Karabakh

Abkhazia and Nagorno‐Karabakh are internationally unrecognised political entities, or so‐called de facto states, that have emerged as a result of the incomplete and contested state‐formation of their parent states and of the secessionist movements that emerged in the power vacuum of the post‐Soviet space. In addition to examining the conventional reliance on the self‐determination principle, usually followed by a call for international recognition (as often practised by emerging sovereigns), this article aims to survey whether these political entities have proved that they embody ‘rightful authority’ as such and whether they ‘have earned their sovereignty’. In other words, it attempts to examine the self‐determination claims in Abkhazia and Nagorno‐Karabakh based on legitimacy criteria that are widely accepted for liberal democratic societies using an analysis of the respective issues as they were represented in focus‐group discussions in these two regions.     

FUZZY PATTERN CLASSIFICATION OF STRONG GROUND MOTION RECORDS

Classification of earthquake strong ground motion (SGM) records is performed using fuzzy pattern recognition to exploit knowledge in the data that is utilised in a genetic algorithm (GA) search and scaling program. SGM records are historically treated as “fingerprints” of certain event magnitude and mechanism of faulting systems recorded at different distances on different soil types. Therefore, databases of SGM records of today present data of complex nature in high dimensions (many of the dimensions—or SGM parameters in time and frequency domain—are presently available from different archives). In this study, simple ground motion parameters were used but were combined and scaled nonlinearly such that the physical properties of the data could be preserved while reducing its dimensionality. The processed data was then analysed using fuzzy c-means (FCM) clustering method to explore the possibility of meaningfully representing earthquake SGM data in lower dimensions through finding subsets of mathematically similar vectors in a benchmark database. This representation can be used in practical applications and has a direct influence on the processes of synthesising ground motion records, identifying unknown ground motion parameters (e.g. soil type in this study), improving the quality of matching SGM records to design target spectra, and in rule generalisation for response. The results showed that the stochastic behaviour of earthquake ground motion records can be accurately simplified by having only a few of motion parameters. The very same parameters may also be utilised to derive unknown characteristics of the motion when the classification task on “training” records is performed carefully. The clusters are valid and stable in time and frequency domain and are meaningful even with respect to seismological features that were not included in the classification task.     

我国宗教文物保护的特殊性初探

宗教文物作为我国文化遗产的重要组成部分和传统文化的重要载体,近年来引起了业内及社会的广泛关注和讨论.作者在文中就”宗教文物”这一对象,从其特殊性、保存现状和问题、宗教文物的有形与无形价值,等几个方面进行了分析和讨论,强调了宗教文物的独特性,以及相关保护修复工作的特殊意义.     

The disappearance of a Rom community and the rejection of the politics of recognition

The politics toward Rom minorities in Italy is marked by a binary of recognition: on one hand, there exists the recognition of a nomad identity (present in various institutional practices), on the other a recognition of a cultural identity of Rom and Sinti (exemplified by many associations, either pro-Gypsy or Gypsy). But in the case of Melfi the predominant politics is a decisive refusal of recognition by Melfitani and Melfitani of Gypsy origins. The situation in Melfi should be read as the logical conclusion of a long process of assimilation which led to the dissolution of the historical Rom community.     

饭店低碳化水平评价指标的构建及实证研究

本研究以粤港澳中高星级饭店管理人员和国内外饭店研究者为调研对象,在文献分析、专家访谈、问卷调查的基础上,通过因子分析法对样本数据进行深入分析,提出了饭店低碳化水平评价指标体系。该指标体系由分属6个维度的21项指标构成,其6个维度被命名为：碳减排措施指标、低碳管理指标、低碳引导指标、碳排放指标、碳汇指标和碳源构成指标。研究结果表明：碳减排措施指标、低碳管理指标及碳排放指标是评价饭店低碳化水平的重要因素;而样本分组比较则指出,饭店管理人员与研究者、港澳与内地饭店管理人员在对某些评价指标的认同上存在一定的差异。     

Structural Integrity of Stone Blocks From Charles Bridge in Prague

The Charles Bridge is the oldest, still-standing gothic bridge that crosses the Vltava River in Prague and up to now has belonged among the most sought-after historical monuments in the Czech Republic. The bridge has been repeatedly damaged due to floods and has been repaired several times. In the reconstructions, damaged sandstone blocks were substituted in facing. This experimental study focused on nonlinear ultrasonic spectroscopy for testing stone blocks that were extracted from the historical bridge structure. The objective of these experiments was verifying whether the methods can be applied to evaluating the internal structure of blocks, which are built-in in the structure in situ. Intact-structure blocks, blocks that had been repaired in the past, and damaged-structure blocks were measured. Two methods of nonlinear ultrasonic spectroscopy were applied—the method with single harmonic ultrasonic signal and with two harmonic ultrasonic signals. Measurement results of both applied methods proved resulting parameters correlation with block structure integrity quality.     

基于能量方法的江浙地区抬梁式及穿斗式传统民居木构件重要性分析

为研究中国传统木构建筑的结构构件重要性排序问题,以江浙地区抬梁式和穿斗式两种典型的传统民居木结构类型为研究对象,基于能量方法采用构件属性改变后对结构整体应变能的单位体积改变率作为构件重要性的评价指标,运用有限元软件Ansys(16.0)开发了基于生死单元法和改变弹性模量法的构件重要性评价程序。分析结果表明,改变弹性模量法更适用于中国传统木构建筑的结构构件重要性分析。通过对抬梁式和穿斗式的单榀框架和整体框架在竖向荷载、水平地震荷载两种工况下的结构构件重要性的计算分析,得到了构件的重要性系数和排序,并提取出了抬梁式和穿斗式传统木构的关键构件。研究结果可以为确定传统木构建筑遗产在修缮施工、维护以及结构健康监测过程中需要重点关注的构件提供科学合理的理论依据。     

When one heart can speak to another: the role of tenderness in Rousseau’s theory of passions

The aim of this paper is to show how tenderness (attendrissement) plays a key role in Rousseau’s theory of emotion. A deeper analysis of tenderness will shed light on the complex dynamics of Rousseau’s conception of the passions, which appears to be one of the principal means of understanding both the transition from the homme de la nature to the homme de l’homme and the development of human morality in the latter. Furthermore, the concept of attendrissement allows us to view from an unfamiliar, original standpoint a central problem of Rousseauian ethics, which has been debated, particularly in recent literature, namely that of recognition. Tenderness, thanks to its authentic and spontaneous nature, is able to retain the principles of the law of nature – pity and love of the self – while elevating them to an ethically superior height. For this reason, it might be considered a positive fulfillment of amour-propre capable of eliminating the pathological and competitive aspects that connote, from a historical but not constitutive point of view, the reciprocal interdependence of consciences.     

The recognition of multiple spatial patterns: a case study from the French upper paleolithic

A pattern recognition approach to spatial analysis is applied to artifact distributions from the Magdalenian site of Pincevent, Section 36. Patterning is investigated using a κ-means cluster analysis that permits iterative mapping of artifact distributions at several scales of spatial complexity. Multiple scales of patterning are recognized in the Pincevent distributions. These patterns are assessed in terms of those discovered by the excavators through intensive visual inspection of the materials. Basic concordance is seen between these two approaches. Finally, the analysis detects more detailed patterning. A relationship between artifact abundance and location seems to hold constant throughout the site.     

“满洲国”承认问题与国民党的对日政策

伪满洲国成立后,日本一直设法迫使中国在事实上承认东北的傀儡政权,国民政府对此拒绝让步。《塘沽协定》的缔结,使伪满洲国和华北之间出现了所谓的缓冲区,国民政府极力淡化这一协定的政治性。山海关内外的通车、通邮谈判过程中,中日双方围绕伪满洲国的承认问题,出现了尖锐对立,日方并未达到目的。1935年以后,日本还是不断提出承认伪满的议题。蒋介石为代表的国民党又做出了让步,冻结东北问题：虽然不承认伪满,但也不谈收复东北,这种状况一直持续到1943年《开罗宣言》的发表。