Effects of anxiety on decision making and visual search behaviour in complex sport situations

Based on the Attentional Control Theory (ACT; Eysenck et al., 2007), performance efficiency is decreased in high-anxiety situations because worrying thoughts compete for attentional resources. A repeated-measures design (high/low state anxiety and high/low perceptual task demands) was used to test ACT explanations. Complex football situations were displayed to expert and non-expert football players in a decision making task in a controlled laboratory setting. Ratings of state anxiety and pupil diameter measures were used to check anxiety manipulations. Dependent variables were verbal response time and accuracy, mental effort ratings and visual search behavior (e.g., visual search rate). Results confirmed that an anxiety increase, indicated by higher state-anxiety ratings and larger pupil diameters, reduced processing efficiency for both groups (higher response times and mental effort ratings). Moreover, high task demands reduced the ability to shift attention between different locations for the expert group in the high anxiety condition only. Since particularly experts, who were expected to use more top-down strategies to guide visual attention under high perceptual task demands, showed less attentional shifts in the high compared to the low anxiety condition, as predicted by ACT, anxiety seems to impair the shifting function by interrupting the balance between top-down and bottom-up processes.

Law and science: risk assessment and risk management in the WTO agreement on the application of sanitary and phytosanitary measures

Assessing and managing risks relating to the consumption of food stuffs for humans and to the environment has been one of the most complex legal issues in WTO law, ever since the Agreement on Sanitary and Phytosanitary Measures was adopted at the end of the Uruguay Round and entered into force in 1995. The problem was expounded in a number of cases. Panels and the Appellate Body adopted different philosophies in interpreting the agreement and the basic concept of risk assessment as defined in Annex A para. 4 of the Agreement. Risk assessment entails fundamental question on law and science. Different interpretations reflect different underlying perceptions of science and its relationship to the law. The present thesis supported by the Swiss National Research Foundation undertakes an in-depth analysis of these underlying perceptions. The author expounds the essence and differences of positivism and relativism in philosophy and natural sciences. He clarifies the relationship of fundamental concepts such as risk, hazards and probability. This investigation is a remarkable effort on the part of lawyer keen to learn more about the fundamentals based upon which the law – often unconsciously – is operated by the legal profession and the trade community. Based upon these insights, he turns to a critical assessment of jurisprudence both of panels and the Appellate Body. Extensively referring and discussing the literature, he deconstructs findings and decisions in light of implied and assumed underlying philosophies and perceptions as to the relationship of law and science, in particular in the field of food standards. Finding that both positivism and relativism does not provide adequate answers, the author turns critical rationalism and applies the methodologies of falsification developed by Karl R. Popper. Critical rationalism allows combining discourse in science and law and helps preparing the ground for a new approach to risk assessment and risk management. Linking the problem to the doctrine of multilevel governance the author develops a theory allocating risk assessment to international for a while leaving the matter of risk management to national and democratically accountable government. While the author throughout the thesis questions the possibility of separating risk assessment and risk management, the thesis offers new avenues which may assist in structuring a complex and difficult problem

Veterinary medicine: the next decade; a symposium honoring Dr. C. A. Brandly, Dean of the University of Illinois College of Veterinary Medicine.

Mode of access: Internet.

Denkwürdigkeiten aus dem Feldzuge vom Jahre 1813.

Mode of access: Internet.

A simulator study of the combined effects of alcohol and marihuana on driving behavior. Phase II. Final report.

National Highway Traffic Safety Administration, Washington, D.C.

A simulator study of the combined effects of alcohol and marihuana on driving behavior. Phase I. Final report.

Mode of access: Internet.

Philosophische Aspekte des quantenmechanischen Messproblems

Das quantenmechanische Messproblem ist ein bekanntes Thema der Physik Anfang des 20. Jahrhunderts und bietet ein spannendes Feld interdisziplinärer Betrachtungen. Gerade die Philosophie, deren Arbeitsfeld methodisch oftmals auf einer Metaebene angesiedelt ist, liefert unterschiedliche Aspekte, um die Gesamtproblematik aus anderen Sichtweisen aus zu beleuchten. Im ersten Teil werden die physikalischen Hintergründe sehr allgemein und verständlich geklärt, woraufhin sich im zweiten Teil die Auswahl philosophischer Aspekte anschließt. So wird die quantenmechanische Theoriebildung mit Thomas S. Kuhns Wissenschaftsentwicklung rekonstruiert, das Messproblem unter dem Konzept Falsifikationismus von Karl R. Popper widerspruchsfrei dargestellt und eine nicht dichotomische Naturvorstellung durch Michael Esfelds ontischen Strukturenrealismus ermöglicht.

Argumentos duales: el principio de dualidad como una estructura argumentativa

El objetivo de la tesis es identificar una familia de argumentos que comparten una estructura con el principio de dualidad de la geometría proyectiva. Esta familia la denomino "argumentos duales". Para lograr este objetivo, tomo cuatro argumentos importantes de la filosofía analítica e identifico en ellos la estructura que comparten. Los cuatro argumentos son: (i) el acertijo de la inducción de Goodman; (ii) la indeterminación de la referencia Putnam; (iii) la indeterminación de la traducción de Quine; (iv) la paradoja del seguimiento de reglas de Wittgenstein.

Revisionsbegründung in Sachen des Schrifstellers Carl Wilhelm Batz in Wiesbaden und des Karl Voltz in Mainz, sowie des früheren Komponisten Richard Wagner in Bayreuth und nunmehr der Erben desselben, Cosima verw. Wagner in Bayreuth für sich und in natürlicher Vormundschaft ihres Sohnes Siegfried Wagner, Kläger, Berufunskläger, jetzt Revisionskläger gegen die Stadtgemeinde Leipzig, vertreten durch den Stadtrath daselbst, Beklagte, Berufungsbeklagte, jetzt Revisionsbeklagte, weben Aufführungsrechts an den Opern Rienzi, Fliegender Holländer, Tannhäuser und Lohengrin : dem Reichsgericht II. Zivil-Senat überreicht /

"Termin: Dienstag, den 10. Juni 1884."

Grundriss der mittelhochdeutschen Formenlehre, für Anfänger bearbeitet von Karl Barthel,

Mode of access: Internet.

Reise nach west-Sibirien im jahre 1876 : auf veranstaltung das vereins für die Deutsche Nord polarfahrt in Bremen unternommen mit Dr. A.E. Brehm und Karl Graf v. Waldburg-Zeil-Trauchburg /

Mode of access: Internet.

Die Karl Knorrsche Sammlung von Benin-Altertümern im Museum für Länder- und Völkerkunde in Stuttgart /

"Sonderabdruck aus dem XVII. u. XVIII. Jahresbericht des Württ. Vereins für Handelsgeographie."

Karl Popper's Philosophy of Science - And the Evolution of the Popperian Worlds

This doctoral thesis in theoretical philosophy is a systematic analysis of Karl Popper's philosophy of science and its relation to his theory of three worlds. The general aim is to study Popper's philosophy of science and to show that Popper's theory of three worlds was a restatement of his earlier positions. As a result, a new reading of Popper's philosophy and development is offered and the theory of three worlds is analysed in a new manner. It is suggested that the theory of three worlds is not purely an ontological theory, but has a profound epistemological motivation. In Part One, Popper's epistemology and philosophy of science is analysed. It is claimed that Popper's thinking was bifurcated: he held two profound positions without noticing the tension between them. Popper adopted the position called the theorist around 1930 and focused on the logical structure of scientific theories. In Logik der Forschung (1935), he attempted to build a logic of science on the grounds that scientific theories may be regarded as universal statements which are not verifiable but can be falsified. Later, Popper emphasized another position, called here the processionalist. Popper focused on the study of science as a process and held that a) philosophy of science should study the growth of knowledge and that b) all cognitive processes are constitutive. Moreover, the constitutive idea that we see the world in the searchlight of our theories was combined with the biological insight that knowledge grows by trial and error. In Part Two, the theory of three worlds is analysed systematically. The theory is discussed as a cluster of theories which originate from Popper's attempt to solve some internal problems in his thinking. Popper adhered to realism and wished to reconcile the theorist and the processionalist. He also stressed the real and active nature of the human mind, and the possibility of objective knowledge. Finally, he wished to create a scientific world view.