Science & Philosophy: Ephemeris to Evolution - Historical Background

Science Encyclopedia

Epicureanism - Epicurus On Pleasure, Epicurus On Human Excellence, Epicureans And Stoics Compared, Other Aspects Of Epicureanism

While Epicureanism is not strictly an ethical theory, it has been most influential in the field of ethics. Epicurus emphasized empiricism, and his theories were foundationalist in the sense that he believed all sense perceptions were true (Inwood and Gerson, A53.63). In keeping with this, he denied that a theory of meaning was possible. Rather, we come to a "basic grasp" (prolepsis)…

1 minute read

Epidemic

An epidemic is an outbreak of a disease among members of a specific population that exceeds the extent of occurrence of the disease normally found in that population. Epidemics affect those members of the population who do not have an acquired or inherent immunity to the disease. Although most epidemics are caused by infectious organisms, the term can be applied to an outbreak of any chronic disea…

4 minute read

Epidemiology

Epidemiology is the study of the occurrence, frequency, and distribution of diseases in a given population. As part of this study, epidemiologists—scientists who investigate epidemics (widespread occurrence of a disease that occurs during a certain time)—attempt to determine how the disease is transmitted, and what are the host(s) and environmental factor(s) that start, maintain, and…

8 minute read

Epilepsy - Grand Mal Seizures, Petit Mal Seizures, Treatment - Status epilepticus

Though the cause of epilepsy remains unknown, the manner in which the condition is demonstrated indicates the area of the brain that is affected. Jacksonian seizures, for example, which are localized twitching of muscles, originate in the frontal lobe of the brain in the motor cortex. A localized numbness or tingling indicates an origin in the parietal lobe on the side of the brain in the sensory …

2 minute read

Episomes

An episome is a portion of genetic material that can exist independent of the main body of genetic material (called the chromosome) at some times, while at other times is able to integrate into the chromosome. Examples of episomes include insertion sequences and transposons. Viruses are another example of an episome. Viruses that integrate their genetic material into the host chromosome enable the…

2 minute read

Epistemology - Early Modern - Defining The Modern Tradition: Cartesian Beginnings, Nature As Mechanism, Theory Of Sense Perception, Skepticism And The Cartesian Framework

Modern philosophy is generally thought to be distinguished by an "epistemological turn." Prior philosophical tradition accorded special status to metaphysics, or "first philosophy" (the general philosophical investigation into the nature of reality). The modern tradition, by contrast, holds that it is necessary to determine the nature and bounds of human knowledge befor…

1 minute read

Epistemology - Modern - The Gettier Problem, Bibliography

The understanding of knowledge at work, implicitly or explicitly, in much of ancient and modern epistemology is that of knowledge as justified true belief. According to this traditional account (TAK), a subject, S, knows that p if and only if the following three conditions are met: (i) p is true; (ii) S believes that p; (iii) S is justified in, or has adequate evidence for, believing that p. While…

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Epstein-Barr Virus - Discovery, Disease, And Research, Origin And Development, Disease Transmission And Prevention

Epstein-Barr virus (EBV) is part of the family of human herpes viruses. Infectious mononucleosis (IM) is the most common disease manifestation of this virus which, once established in the host, can never be completely eradicated. Very little can be done to treat EBV; most methods can only alleviate resultant symptoms. Sleep and rest—complete bedrest in severe cases—is still the best …

1 minute read

Equality - Gender Equality - Equality, Liberalism, And Feminism, Equality And Sexual Difference, Gender Asymmetries And The Limits Of Formal Equality

The coupling of equality and gender may indicate a paradox, if not an oxymoron. If equality were to exist, would gender? Does the persistent salience of the idea of gender with regard to equality provide evidence of fundamental flaws or contradictions in theories and practices of equality? Can the pursuit of equality reproduce rather than undermine gender dominance? While these questions are centr…

1 minute read

Equality - Overview - Ancient Views Of Equality, Equality In The Church And The Protestant Reformation, Liberalism, Civic Republicanism, And The Age Of Revolution

Though simple as a mathematical concept, equality is complex and contested as a political goal and philosophical concept. Many political struggles, both historical and ongoing, have engaged in the contests over the nature of equality. This contestation revolves around the basic question, What kinds of equality matter? The answer to this in part depends on whether the topic is approached from a pre…

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Equality - Racial Equality - Racism As Ideology, The Politics Of Racial Inequality, The Struggle For Racial Equality, The Continuing Struggle

Racial equality is the belief that individuals, regardless of their racial characteristics, are morally, politically, and legally equal and should be treated as such. Furthermore, it is the belief that different racial groups, as groups, are equal, with none being inherently superior or inferior in intelligence, virtue, or beauty. In the United States the term is commonly linked to the belief in e…

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Chemical Equation - Conventions And Symbols, A Few Examples - Applications

Chemical equations reveal the chemical species involved in a particular reaction, the charges and weight relationships among them, and how much heat of reaction results. Equations tell us the beginning compounds, called reactants, and the ending compounds, called products, and which direction the reaction is going. Equations are widely used in chemical engineering, they serve as the basis for chem…

1 minute read

Equinox

The Latin meaning of equinox is "equal night," the times of the year when day and night are equal in length. In astronomy, the equinox is the point at which the Sun appears to cross the equator as a result of Earth's rotation around the Sun. The vernal equinox, which occurs as the Sun moves from south to north across the equator, takes place around March 21 and marks the begin…

2 minute read

Erosion - Sources Of Erosional Energy, Erosional Settings, Agents And Mechanisms Of Transport, Products And Impacts Of Erosion - Weathering, Vegetation, Climate, Surface material, Slope angle

Erosion is a group of processes that, acting together, slowly decompose, disintegrate, remove, and transport materials on the surface of Earth. Among geologists, there is no general agreement on what processes to include as a part of erosion. Some limit usage to only those processes that remove and transport materials. Other geologists also include weathering (decomposition and disintegration). Th…

3 minute read

Error - Sources of error

Error is the amount of deviation in a physical quantity that arises as a result of the process of measurement or approximation. Another term for error is uncertainty. Physical quantities such as weight, volume, temperature, speed, or time must all be measured by an instrument of one sort or another. No matter how accurate the measuring tool—be it an atomic clock that determines time based o…

4 minute read

Escherichia coli

Escherichia coli is one of the most well-known and intensively studied bacteria. Often shortened to E. coli, the bacterium was discovered in 1885 by the German bacteriologist Dr. Theodor Escherich. Initially, the bacterium was termed Bacterium coli, but later the name was changed to honor Dr. Escherich. Escherichia coli inhabits the intestinal tract of humans and other warm-blooded mammals. It con…

4 minute read

Essentialism - Essences And Knowledge, Essences And Ethics, Empiricist Objections To Essentialism, Kripke: Essentialism Recast

Essentialism is a response to problems of recognition and meaning. Amid all the variety of empirical experience and the multiple forms that objects assume, how do we recognize many differently appearing things as instances of the same phenomenon? Where do the categories in and through which we organize empirical experience come from? As the Scottish philosopher David Hume (1711–1776) and ot…

1 minute read

Ester

Ester is an organic functional group that forms many sweet-smelling compounds. The chemical structure of an ester is represented by the general formula, R-CO-OR', where a central carbon atom that has two bonds to an oxygen atom (the carbonyl group), C=O, a single bond to another carbon atom represented by R, and a single bond to an oxygen atom connected to a carbon atom represented by R�…

4 minute read

Esterification

Esterification is the chemical process for making esters, which are compounds of the chemical structure R-COOR', where R and R' are either alkyl or aryl groups. The most common method for preparing esters is to heat a carboxylic acid, R-CO-OH, with an alcohol, R'-OH, while removing the water that is formed. A mineral acid catalyst is usually needed to make the reaction occur a…

4 minute read

Ethanol - History, Advantages Of Ethanol As An Alternative Fuel, Disadvantages Of Ethanol As An Alternative Fuel

Ethanol is an alcohol fuel that is manufactured by fermenting and distilling crops with a high starch or sugar content, such as grains, sugarcane, or corn. In the energy sector, ethanol can be used for space and water heating, to generate electricity, and as an alternative vehicle fuel, which has been its major use to date. Worldwide, ethanol is the mostly widely used alternative liquid fuel. Etha…

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Ether

Ether was first used as an anesthetic to kill pain by W. T. G. Morton (1819-1868), a Boston dentist. Morton had learned about ether from a chemist named Charles T. Jackson (1805-1880). Eventually Morton convinced Dr. J. C. Warren (1778-1856) to let him use ether as an anesthetic on one of his patients. In Massachusetts General Hospital on October 16, 1846, Morton put a Mr. Abbott to sleep with eth…

1 minute read

Ethnicity and Race in Africa - Race In Africa, The Concept Of Ethnicity, Ethnicity Debates In Africa, Ethnic Experiments In Africa

There is an abiding paradox in the concept of race. It is a biological fiction but a social reality. Biologically it is now established beyond doubt that there are no distinct races among human beings and that the genetic variation within particular groups of people is much higher than between groups. The view that people possess inherent personality characteristics attached to particular irreduc…

2 minute read

Ethnicity and Race in Anthropology - Franz Boas, Ethnicity, And Contemporary Physical Anthropology: Continuing Tensions, Cultural Fundamentalism And Instrumental Ethnicities

Ethnicity, as defined in the public domain, is "the cultural characteristics that connect a particular group or groups of people to each other" (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ethnicity). Twenty-first-century anthropologists, however, are likely to complicate simple notions of ethnicity, or they might refuse to accept a general definition of the concept without first demanding accounts…

4 minute read

Ethnoarchaeology

Ethnoarchaeology, a subfield of archaeology, is the study of contemporary cultures in order to interpret social organization within an archeological site. Traditionally, archaeology has been concerned with the identification, classification, and chronological ordering of remains. Archaeologists were able to describe a civilization according to its artifacts, but not to fully understand its culture…

2 minute read

Ethnobotany - The Diversity Of Plants, Plants As Food, Plants As Medicines And Drugs, Ethics In Ethnobotanical Research - Conservation of ethnobotanical resources

Ethnobotany is the study of the relationships between plants and people. Most often, however, the term is used in relation to the study of the use of plants by aboriginal people living relatively simple, pre industrial lifestyles. Plants have always played a central role within indigenous cultures. Plant products are used as food, as sources of medicine, and as raw materials for the weaving of fab…

3 minute read

Ethnocentrism - Definition, Universalizing Ethnocentrism, Conclusion, Bibliography

Ethnocentrism is a notion not widely used in the early twenty-first century. Coined by William Graham Sumner in the early twentieth century, the term owes what conceptual life it has to the likes of anthropology and intercultural communication. Dominant strains of these disciplines, especially anthropology, have examined the lives and cultural expressions of ethnically defined or identified groups…

less than 1 minute read

Ethnography - The Paradox, Intrinsic Features, The Native's Point Of View?, Ethnography And Globalization

Ethnography, often paraphrased as "participant observation," is a mode of deriving knowledge about particular, local worlds through direct engagement with their peoples and ways of life. As a mode of inquiry, it is primarily associated with the discipline of anthropology, the comparative study of human societies and cultures that took definitive shape as a scholarly field in the earl…

1 minute read

U.S. Ethnohistory - Bibliography

Ethnohistory, first used in Vienna in the 1930s by ethnologist Fritz Roack and the Viennese Study Group for African Cultural History, and a subfield of anthropology, is the use of ethnological and historical methods and materials to gain knowledge of the nature and causes of change in a culture defined by ethnological concepts and categories. This definition, as the ethnohistorian Robert C. Euler …

10 minute read

Ethyl Group

Ethane is a gas at room temperature and burns very easily. The word ethane is derived from aithein, the Greek word for to blaze or to kindle. Ethane makes up about 15% of natural gas and can also be isolated from crude oil. It is used by industries for the production of ethylene and ethyl chloride. The incorporation of an ethyl group or chain of two carbon atoms into a molecule's structure …

4 minute read

Ethylene Glycol

Ethylene glycol is an organic (carbon based) molecule most widely used as antifreeze in automobile engines and as an industrial solvent, a chemical in which other substances are dissolved. The addition of ethylene glycol to water raises the boiling point of the engine coolant and reduces the chances of a car's radiator "boiling over." The name ethylene glycol communicates much…

1 minute read

Ethylenediaminetetra-Acetic Acid

Ethylenediaminetetra-acetic acid, typically shortened to EDTA, is a chemical compound with the ability to form multiple bonds with metal ions, making it an important chemical to analytical scientists and industry alike. The compounds used to create EDTA include ethylenediamine, formaldehyde, and sodium cyanide. When these compounds are mixed in an appropriate fashion, a series of chemical reaction…

2 minute read

Etiquette - A Civilizing Process, Manners In Modern Times, Bibliography

Though the Middle Ages in Europe witnessed the harnessing of knights to a code of chivalry and the flourishing of a romance troubadour culture demanding particular rules of conduct, it was the Renaissance that brought social codes and conventions to new heights of importance. Courts now served elites and sycophants as thriving centers of power, requiring the ability to fashion one's identit…

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Eubacteria

The eubacteria are the largest and most diverse taxonomic group of bacteria. Some regard this as an artificial assemblage, merely a group of convenience rather than a natural grouping. The eubacteria are all easily stained, rod-shaped or spherical bacteria. They are generally unicellular, but a small number of multicellular forms do occur. They can be motile or non-motile and the motile forms are …

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Eugenics - The Historical Development Of Eugenics, 1904–1950, Research Methods, Eugenics In The Public Arena, Criticisms Of Eugenics

The term eugenics, derived from the Greek eugenes, was first coined by the English mathematician and geographer Francis Galton (1822–1911) in his Inquiries into Human Faculty and Its Development (1883) to refer to one born "good in stock, hereditarily endowed with noble qualities." As an intellectual and social movement in the early twentieth century, eugenics came to mean, in…

3 minute read

Eugenics

Eugenics is the study of improving the human race by selective breeding. Its rationale is to remove bad or deleterious genes from the population, increasing the overall fitness of humanity as a result. Campaigns to stop the criminal, the poor, the handicapped, and the mentally ill from passing on their genes were supported in the past by such people as British feminist Marie Stopes and Irish playw…

1 minute read

Eukaryotae

Eukaryotae, or eukaryotic cells, are large and complex cells bounded by an outer plasma membrane. They contain many organelles within their cytoplasm and a nucleus separated from the cytoplasm by the nuclear membrane. Fossils of eukaryotic cells are present in rocks dated as 1.5 billion years old. All living things on Earth, except bacteria and blue-green algae (cyanobacteria), which are Prokaryot…

1 minute read

Eurocentrism - Examples, Twentieth-century Critics Of Eurocentrism, Eurocentrism, Anticolonialism, Modernity, Postcolonialism, Bibliography

Eurocentrism refers to a discursive tendency to interpret the histories and cultures of non-European societies from a European (or Western) perspective. Common features of Eurocentric thought include: Although Eurocentrism has been common through the ages, it has not been constant, nor has it affected the way Europeans have viewed all non-European societies equally. Moreover, Europeans have not al…

1 minute read

Europe - Forces That Made Europe, The Mediterranean Desert - Miscellaneous regions and events

The continent of Europe is a landmass bounded on the east by the Ural mountains, on the south by the Mediterranean Sea, and on the north and west by the Arctic and Atlantic Oceans. Numerous islands around this landmass are considered a part of Europe. Europe is also the westernmost part of the Eurasian supercontinent (several continental masses joined together). Europe holds a unique place among t…

26 minute read

Idea of Europe - European Identity, European Regions, Political Integration And European Citizenship, Bibliography

In classical times Europe was above all a geographical and mythological notion, the word referring to one of the three known continents—Asia and Africa (or Libya) being the other two. In the famous story of "the rape of Europa," the daughter of Phoenix, king of Phoenicians, was kidnapped and abducted by the Greek god Zeus, who in the guise of a white bull brought her to the is…

2 minute read

Europe and the United States - Political And Religious Commonwealths, Markets, Individuals, And Interests, Intermediate Associations And The State

An ancient term of Western political and social theory, civil society has enjoyed enormous popularity in recent years and has outstripped its geographic origins to spread all over the world. Public leaders, newspaper writers, religious figures, social theorists, political activists, and commentators from many different perspectives now use the term on a regular basis. The term's meaning has…

1 minute read

Eutrophication

The process of heightened biological productivity in a body of water is call eutrophication. The major factors controlling eutrophication in a body of water, whether large, small, warm, cold, fast-moving, or quiescent, are nutrient input and rates of primary production. Not all lakes experience eutrophication. Warmth and light increase eutrophication, (which in Greek means "well nourished&#…

2 minute read

Evaporation

Evaporation is a process that is commonly used to concentrate an aqueous solution of nonvolatile solutes and a volatile solvent. In evaporation, a portion of the solvent is vaporized or boiled away, leaving a thick liquid or solid precipitate as the final product. The vapor is condensed to recover the solvent or it can simply be discarded. A typical example is the evaporation of brine to produce s…

3 minute read

Evapotranspiration

Evapotranspiration refers to the vaporization of water from both non-living and living surfaces on a landscape. Evapotranspiration is a composite of two words: evaporation and transpiration. Evaporation refers to the vaporization of water from surface waters such as lakes, rivers, and streams, from moist soil and rocks, and any other substrates that are non-living. Transpiration refers to the vapo…

2 minute read

Event Horizon

In early 2001, data gathered by NASA's Hubble Space Telescope and the Chandra X-ray Observatory independently provided strong evidence of an event horizon, the observable boundary region surrounding an unobservable black hole. The size of the event horizon surrounding a black hole is termed the Schwarzschild radius, named after the German astronomer Karl Schwarzschild (1873–1916), wh…

2 minute read

Everyday Life - Everyday Antiquities, The Everyday In Academic Discourse, The Discovery Of The Everyday, The History Of The Everyday

When everyday life was first considered a proper subject for reflection it is obviously impossible to say, but an increasing interest in the subject can be traced over the last few centuries, at least in the West. Mystics have long regarded everyday things and everyday routines as a way to become closer to God. From the fifteenth century onward, painters in the Netherlands in particular paid more …

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Evil - Evil, The Problem Of Evil, Moral And Natural Evil, Epicurus' Old Questions, Conclusion

The descriptive-normative term evil is a significant anomaly in our relativistic and noncognitivist age. Otherwise careful thinkers deploy it as if its extension were obvious and indisputable. And yet it is used in widely differing ways even in our own time. A narrow meaning confines it to the deliberate infliction of harm. This corresponds to only part of the so-called problem of evil, and it is …

2 minute read

Evolution - Historical Background, The Modern Synthesis, Evidence Of Evolution, Evolutionary Mechanisms, Species Diversity And Speciation

Evolution refers to biological change. Biological evolution involves change in the genetic constitution of populations over time such that complexity is achieved due to the formation of new genes or gene-encoded functions rather than harmful mutations. These changes are passed on from parents to their offspring, but biological evolution does not involve individual organisms. Individuals develop, b…

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