This book has come into being as a result of scientific debates. And these debates have determined its structure. The first chapter is in the form of Socratic dialogues between a mathematician (MATH.), two physicists (pHYS. and EXP.) and a philosopher (PHIL.). However, although one of the authors is a theoretical physicist and the other a mathematician, the reader must not think that their opinions have been divided among the participants of the dialogues. We have tried to convey the inner tension of the topic under discussion and its openness. The attitudes of the participants reflect more...

An understanding of the processes involved in the basic and applied physics and chemistry of the interaction of plasmas with materials is vital to the evolution of technologies such as those relevant to microelectronics, fusion and space.
The subjects dealt with in the book include: the physics and chemistry of plasmas, plasma diagnostics, physical sputtering and chemical etching, plasma assisted deposition of thin films, ion and electron bombardment, and plasma processing of inorganic and polymeric materials.
The book represents a concentration of a substantial amount of...

The rift which has long divided the philosophical world into opposed schools-the "Continental" school owing its origins to the phenomenology of Husserl and the "analytic" school derived from Frege-is finally closing. But this closure is occurring in ways both different and in certain respects at odds with one another. On the one hand scholars are seeking to rediscover the concerns and positions common to both schools, positions from which we can continue fruitfully to address important philosophical issues. On the other hand successors to both traditions have developed criticisms of basic...

In this book I have collected many reports on the properties of bamboo. Since I started bamboo research in 1974, I have collected many publications on bamboo. However, in contacts with other researchers I became aware of the fact that several of these publications were unknown to them. Consequently their activities in research or in bamboo projects had to start at a lower level than if they had known some of these publications. Therefore, I discussed the need for a book like this with several colleagues, and I decided to start writing. In this book I present data on properties, as published...

AMERICAN SIGN LANGUAGE American Sign Language (ASL) is the visual-gestural language used by most of the deaf community in the United States and parts of Canada. On the surface, this language (as all signed languages) seems radically different from the spoken languages which have been used to formulate theories of linguistic princi ples and parameters. However, the position taken in this book is that when the surface effects of modality are stripped away, ASL will be seen to follow many of the patterns proposed as universals for human language. If these theoretical constructs are meant to hold...

o. COMPARATIVE GERMANIC SYNTAX This volume contains 13 papers that were prepared for the Seventh Workshop on Comparative Germanie Syntax at the University of Stuttgart in November 1991. In defining the theme both of the workshop and of this volume, we have taken "comparative" in "comparative Germanic syntax" to mean that at least two languages should be analyzed and "Germanic" to mean that at least one of these languages should be Germanic. There was no require ment as such that the research presented should be situated within the framework known as Principles and Parameters Theory...

Tense, Attitudes, and Scope is a model-theoretic inquiry into the semantics of tense in natural language. The book presents the view that the semantic contribution of tense is made in relation to structurally higher expressions (the relative tense theory') and argues against the view that tenses are all indexicals. This idea is formally encoded as a de se analysis of attitudes, originally proposed by Lewis, coupled with a sequence-of-tense rule posited for English. An auxiliary proposal is made to account for some exceptional cases (e.g. so-called double-access sentences),...

The study of sliding friction is one of the oldest problems in physics, and certainly one of the most important from a practical point of view. Low-friction surfaces are in increasingly high demand for high-tech components such as computer storage systems, miniature motors, and aerospace devices. It has been estimated that about 5% of the gross national product in the developed countries is "wasted" on friction and the related wear. In spite of this, remarkable little is understood about the fundamental, microscopic processes responsible for friction and wear. The topic of interfacial sliding...

A detailed study of the science, engineering and applications of terahertz technology, based on room-temperature solid-state devices, which are seen as the key technology for wider applications in this frequency range. The relative merits of electronic and optical devices are discussed and new device principles identified. Issues of terahertz circuit design, implementation and measurement are complemented by chapters on current and future applications in communications, sensing and remote surveillance.
Audience: The unique coverage of all aspects of terahertz technology will...

This book reviews problems associated with rare events arising in a wide range of circumstances, treating such topics as how to evaluate the probability an insurance company will be bankrupted, the lifetime of a redundant system, and the waiting time in a queue.
Well-grounded, unique mathematical evaluation methods of basic probability characteristics concerned with rare events are presented, which can be employed in real applications, as the volume also contains relevant numerical and Monte Carlo methods. The various examples, tables, figures and algorithms will also be appreciated....