This chapter demonstrates that the doctrines contained in the Consolatio philosophiae unite and reconcile, in an elegant and balanced way, pagan Platonist philosophy and Christian faith. The most fertile ground for verifying this thesis is the third book of the Consolatio, with its Timaeus-inspired O qui perpetua hymn (III.m9), its talk of deification (III.10.24–5), its biblical paraphrase of Wisdom 8:1 (III.12.22), and its account of God understood in terms of happiness, goodness, and unity. As Boethius tells us in his second commentary on Aristotle’s On Interpretation (80.1–6), he thought that the philosophies of Plato and Aristotle were, if properly interpreted, complementary expressions of one truth. I argue that Boethius took a similar view regarding pagan Platonist philosophy and Christianity: although on the surface there might be some disagreement, both can be harmonized in such a way as to offer complementary expressions of the one truth. The pagan and Christian references in Book III support the conclusion that the Consolation enacts a harmonization of pagan Platonist philosophy and Christianity without distorting either.

Research points out that one reason that many individuals fail to achieve and/or maintain sobriety is that they have inadequate coping skills for dealing with stressful situations and painful feelings. Therefore, the key to preventing relapse is to gain and practice new skills for coping with both anticipated and potentially unforeseen challenges. Yet, simply acquiring these coping skills does not guarantee sustained recovery. One also needs to effectively practice these skills and work a sustainable recovery program. This is evidenced by the fact that addiction treatment and relapse prevention programs have high rates of relapse, despite individuals having a plethora of skills available to them and often being highly motivated for recovery. What the authors highlight in the workbook is that there is a mind-body system, called the I-System, that hinders individuals in recovery from effectively applying these skills and recovery practices, saps their motivation, and causes them to veer off their chosen recovery pathways. From a psychological standpoint, the I-System serves as a regulatory mechanism that maintains psychic balance and prevents psychic disintegration. The approach outlined in the workbook teaches the reader how to recognize and “befriend” this hindrance – so that instead of it being an impediment, it can serve as a compass that guides them through their activities of daily living to stay true to their chosen recovery pathways. The practices in the workbook centers on discerning mind-body practices that support regulation of both mental and physical health, preserving the inherent resilience of our true self. The introduction provides an overview of the workbook and brief introduction to the theory that informs the workbook. The workbook is structured progressively, with each section building on information provided previously. The exercise questions are easy to understand and apply, aiming to heighten the reader’s self-awareness of the dynamics that underlie their addictive behaviour in several key areas of life. The workbook is divided into six sections, each detailing an aspect of a Recovery Resilience Practice and outlining various exercises to help foster their recovery resilience and well-being. Initial exercises aim to unearth what might be hindering their resilience, ultimately resulting in diminished mental and physical functioning. The authors equip readers with a baseline measurement to monitor progress as they gradually introduce various practices and exercises in a systematic way.

This brief introduction asks what a compositional technique actually is, and what sorts of skills, knowledge, and experience a composer needs to draw on when working with music and sound. It thinks first about the idea of musical genre and function, before briefly addressing musical technology, style, and finally the importance of listening as a core compositional technique.

Eigenvalues of the Laplacian matrix of a graph have been widely used in studying connectivity and expansion properties of networks, and also in analyzing random walks on a graph. Independently, statisticians introduced various optimality criteria in experimental design, the goal being to obtain more accurate estimates of quantities of interest in an experiment. It turns out that the most popular of these optimality criteria for block designs are determined by the Laplacian eigenvalues of the concurrence graph, or of the Levi graph, of the design. The most important optimality criteria, called A (average), D (determinant) and E (extreme), are related to the conductance of the graph as an electrical network, the number of spanning trees, and the isoperimetric properties of the graphs, respectively. The number of spanning trees is also an evaluation of the Tutte polynomial of the graph, and is the subject of the Merino–Welsh conjecture relating it to acyclic and totally cyclic orientations, of interest in their own right. This chapter ties these ideas together, building on the work in [4] and [5].

Does the US administration exercise more informal influence over the World Bank when it has less control over US bilateral aid because of opposition from Congress? Replicating four studies of the World Bank, we show that years with a divided US government account for earlier findings of informal influence. This link between donor domestic politics and the exercise of influence in multilateral settings is important for understanding informality in international organizations and provides an alternate explanation to persistent questions about the role of international organizations in the international political economy.

The author takes a detailed look at decision-makers’ plans for unified commands in the Pacific from 1947 onwards and elaborates on the debates within the Truman administration over naval deployment in post-war East Asia and its overall international security goals. The author further argues that the wartime competition for leadership in the Pacific between MacArthur and Nimitz did not end with World War II but persisted in the immediate post-war period. The United States regarded the Pacific as its lake, but the United States’ Navy–Army division resulted in it being a divided lake in terms of authority: the Army led the Far East Command and the Navy held the Pacific Command according to the 1947 unified command plan. This chapter also shows the inextricable link between international and regional turbulence and America’s construction of unified commands in the Pacific. Mainland China, which the US Navy chose as a springboard where it could build its maritime order in post-war East Asia, was not included in either the Far East Command or the Pacific Command. Truman administration’s ambiguous China policy and the Navy–Army competition for leadership in the Pacific blurred the contours of America’s maritime East Asia.

This chapter discusses the necessary components of second language acquisition, that is, input, interaction, and output. While all language learning theories support the importance of input (written and spoken), they diverge in ways which input is connected to second language acquisition. The chapter then examines some of the second language acquisition theories, such as the interaction hypothesis, the noticing hypothesis, the cognitive-interactionist approach, the output hypothesis, and sociocultural theory, all of which explains how interaction leads to second language acquisition. The chapter moves onto specific pedagogical frameworks that support interaction, including communicative language teaching and task-based language teaching. Finally, the chapter delves into the role that output plays by discussing its functions for second language acquisition.

The ever-increasing disclosure requirements we impose on public companies are, at best, not read, and at worst, are likely reducing the quality of investor decision-making. More environmental and social (ESG) disclosure has been touted as a popular solution to climate change and social issues. However, the evidence suggests this is highly unlikely, as it is very difficult for shareholders to understand the impact of corporate actions and the viable alternatives. Making matters worse, the very information shareholders require is information that assists a firm’s competitors and therefore is information that, if disclosed, has the effect of reducing the incentives for ESG innovation. Shareholders possess few legal tools capable of constructively engaging with corporate behavior. The empirical evidence about these theoretical points is evaluated, along with an examination of the real-world evidence about the outcomes of shareholder ESG interventions.

This section lays the foundation for the analysis of random marine dynamics. A platform’s dynamics, which result from excitation due to irregular waves, can generally by expressed in a Fourier series - a consequence of linearity and the principal of linear superposition. Fourier representation, either through Fourier series or Fourier transforms, allows for frequency or time domain analysis, both of which are developed in this chapter. The frequency domain representation implies a harmonic solution in time. Consequently, the system of second order ordinary differential equations with constant coefficients become a set of simultaneous linear algebraic equations whose solutions are the complex motion amplitudes. This system of equations represents the response to harmonic forcing and does not include transient behavior associated with initial conditions. A time domain representation of floating bodies requires a means to include system memory effects. These memory effects are modeled by convolution integrals in the equations of motion where the kernel function in the convolution integral is related to the Fourier cosine transform of the damping coefficient of the floating body.