Based on in-depth interviews, this article examines a sample of 48 Canadian women’s feelings about their changed postpartum bodies, their sense of self, and the factors that affect both. Our findings suggest that understanding women’s postpartum feelings requires contextualizing them in the work of infant care and women’s life circumstances, as well as ideologies about mothering and feminine appearance. Motherhood afforded the women in this study a new appreciation of their bodies, and a positive embodied sense of themselves, but only (...) if they felt their bodies performed maternal functions well. Concerns about appearance persisted and became especially salient when women faced the return to paid work. Moreover, varied life circumstances influenced women’s overall feelings about their changed bodies as insecurities were displaced onto women’s body images. (shrink)

Bewildering features of modern physics, such as relativistic space-time structure and the peculiarities of so-called quantum statistics, challenge traditional ways of conceiving of objects in space and time. Interpreting Bodies brings together essays by leading philosophers and scientists to provide a unique overview of the implications of such physical theories for questions about the nature of objects. The collection combines classic articles by Max Born, Werner Heisenberg, Hans Reichenbach, and Erwin Schrodinger with recent contributions, including several papers that have never (...) before been published. -/- The book focuses on the microphysical objects that are at the heart of quantum physics and addresses issues central to both the "foundational" and the philosophical debates about objects. Contributors explore three subjects in particular: how to identify a physical object as an individual, the notion of invariance with respect to determining what objects are or could be, and how to relate objective and measurable properties to a physical entity. The papers cover traditional philosophical topics, common-sense questions, and technical matters in a consistently clear and rigorous fashion, illuminating some of the most perplexing problems in modern physics and the philosophy of science. (shrink)

A draft version of Chapter 11 of the edited volume 'Interpreting Bodies. Classical and Quantum Objects in Modern Physics',. The Chapter is devoted to illustrating the group-theoretic approach to the issue of physical objects. In particular, the Chapter discusses the group-theoretic constitution of classical and quantum particles in the nonrelativistic case.

In the context of astrophysical modeling at the solar system scale, we investigate the modalities implied by taking into account different levels of detail at which phenomena can be considered. In particular, by framing the analysis in terms of the how-possibly/how-actually distinction, we address the debated question as to whether the degree of plausibility is tightly linked to the degree of detail. On the grounds of concrete examples, we argue that, also in the astrophysical context examined, this is not necessarily (...) the case. (shrink)

This commentary addresses the proposal and argumentative line presented in the paper ‘Whole Body Gestational Donation’ (WBGD) by Anna Smajdor (2023), published as an intended ‘outrageous argument’ in a dedicated special issue of Theoretical Medicine and Bioethics. We believe that the paper is fatally flawed due to its lack of engagement with relevant approaches in ethics and essential sources in health sciences as well as its insufficient, superficial, and rash argumentation. Its critical weaknesses include, among others, that it does not (...) take any explicit ethical stance, it does not consider the societal impacts of its premise, and it hastily assumes a large degree of equivalency between WBGD and the usual organ donations. These scholarly flaws are made worse by the fact that the paper is not merely an academic thought experiment but contains important policy change proposals. As a consequence, the paper feeds into more general and systemic worries about the suitability of philosophy for public policy. (shrink)

This comment considers the Italian Law 194 on abortion forty years after its approval in 1978 and it focuses on how its meaning has emerged as a result of its interpretation and application over that forty-year period.

This essay discusses the ethical challenges and dilemmas in allocating scarce medical resources during the COVID-19 pandemic, using the German legislative process as a starting point. It is guided by the right to non-discrimination of people with disability and generally contrasts utilitarian and rights-based principles of allocation. Three approaches that were suggested in the German discussion, are presented, the lottery principle, the first come first served principle and the probability to survive principle. Arguments in favour and against each principle are (...) discussed. The focus is on the utilitarian probability to survive principle, which was adopted in German legislation in 2022, and its discriminatory potential against people with disability. The essay suggests ways to mitigate the concerns of discrimination related to the probability to survive principle. It concludes that resolving the triage dilemma requires a balanced approach between utilitarian and rights-based concerns, which promotes both maximising the number of patients surviving and the right not to be discriminated against and be treated equally. It calls for a further debate on how many ethical values such as equity, fairness and non-discrimination we are willing to sacrifice for a higher number of survivors and when we are willing to sacrifice survivors to secure ethical values. (shrink)

The article discusses the original critical dialectical approach of the Soviet philosopher Valentin F. Asmus. His publications on the heritage of Western philosophical thought in the journal Pod znamenem marksizma are examples of this approach. In the 1920s and 1930s, Asmus published a number of articles analyzing a variety of the ideas developed by Western European philosophers: “An Advocate for Philosophical Intuition (Bergson and His Critique of the Intellect)” (1926); “The Alogism of William James” (1927); “The Dialectics of Necessity and (...) Freedom in Spinoza’s Ethics” (1927); “Kant’s General and Transcendental Logic” (1928); “Cosmogony and Cosmology of Descartes” (1937); “Fichte and the Vocation of Scholar” (1937); “Nicholas of Cusa. Selected Philosophical Works” (1938); and “Tommaso Campanella” (1939). These articles differed from the journal’s usual rhetoric, which was shaped in accordance with the official Soviet state ideology. Asmus, through the thinkers he examined, showed the fundamental importance of philosophy for the human personality. This article argues that Asmus, despite his closeness to dialectical materialism, adapted the official terminology and issues in his historical and philosophical articles in a way that he advanced the human right to spirituality, creative activity, and individual freedom. (shrink)

Long since, people tried to solve the mystery of the way that led to the appearance and propagation of living entities. However, no harmonious understanding of this mystery existed, because neither the scientifically grounded source minerals nor the ambient conditions were proposed and because it was groundlessly taken that the process of living matter origination is endothermal. The Life Origination Hydrate Theory (LOH-Theory) first suggests the chemical way capable of leading from the specified abundant natural minerals to origination of multitudes (...) of multitudes of simplest living entities and gives an original explanation for the phenomena of chirality and racemization delay. The LOH-Theory covers the period up to origination of the genetic code. The LOH-Theory is grounded on the following three discoveries based on the available information and on the results of our experimental works performed using original instrumentation and computer simulations. (1) There is the only one triad of natural minerals applicable for exothermal thermodynamically possible chemical syntheses of simplest living-matter components. (2) N-base, ribose, and phosphdiester radicals and nucleic acids as whole are size-compatible with structural gas-hydrate cavities. (3) The gas-hydrate structure arises around amido-groups in cooled undisturbed systems consisting of water and highly-concentrated functional polymers with amido-groups.The natural conditions and historic periods favorable for simplest living matter origination are revealed. The LOH-Theory is supported by results of observations, biophysical and biochemical experiments, and wide application of original three-dimensional and two-dimensional computer simulations of biochemical structures within gas-hydrate matrix. The instrumentation and procedures for experimental verification of the LOH-Theory are suggested. If future experiments are successful, they, possibly, could be the first step on the way to industrial synthesis of food from minerals, i.e., to execution of the work that is performed by plants. (shrink)

The subject of the study is the cultural code "Rimon", covering phytomorphic symbolic images in the Jewish pictorial semiosis. The object of the study is the traditional symbolism in the pictorial practice of the Jews of the Crimea. The article uses the methods of semantic and semiotic analysis in deciphering the meanings of plant symbols of the pictorial semiosis of the Jews of the Crimea, the method of analysis of previous studies, the method of synthesis in structuring groups of signs. (...) The authors consider the following aspects of the topic: the codes of the pictorial semiosis of the Jews of the Crimea are designated, their morphology, semantics, key meanings and the main code are substantiated. The phytomorphic Rimon code and its features are considered in detail. The main conclusions of the study are: 1. As a result of studying the traditional culture of the Jews of the Crimea, five main codes of the Jewish pictorial semiosis were identified, covering the following groups of symbols: skewomorphic (subject), phytomorphic (plant), zoomorphic (animal), numeric. The source of all codes and the generalizing code is the Sefer code (Book). The interrelationships between the codes, four key meanings – Creation, Paradise, Torah persons and Messianic aspirations are revealed. The semantic center of the code system is defined – the Torah and Aron Hakodesh, as a repository of the Torah. 2. The considered phytomorphic code Rimon is a symbolism of traditional images of plants, the mention of which is found in the Torah, as well as in the Talmud and Midrash. The images of plants in the Jewish reading convey the meanings of human virtues and negative qualities, and also indicate the Messianic hopes laid down in the Torah and especially in the Midrash of the Talmud.The scientific novelty of the study consists in the fact that for the first time a semantic-semantic analysis was carried out and the interrelationships of cultural codes in the pictorial semiosis of the Jews of the Crimea were determined, with an emphasis on the Rimon code. (shrink)

The historical factors as well as the units of the cultural knowledge which are considered to have provided Chateaubriand’s books, and “The Genius of Christianity” in particular, with the success and the content are the subject of the present article. The following historical reasons which attracted the readers’ attention to the book have been defined: the disappointment of the society with the atheistic ideals of the revolution, the need for religious cult restoring, the authorities’ desire to stop strife in the (...) country and build relationships with Catholic Europe. The semantic content of the work also contributed to its popularity because it responded to the request of finding logic in the religion, had an emotional impact and dealt with the relevant issues of the morality by means of the cultural category of sinfulness. Scientific novelty of the research implies the following: the cultural category of sinfulness objectified in F.R. Chateaubriand’s book “The Genius of Christianity” having been analyzed for the first time as well as the author’s approach to the understanding and cultural information streamlining having been identified. More over cultural-historical factors promoting the book’s prominence among Chateaubriand’s contemporaries have been studied. The author’s using rational way while explaining the basis of the sin, resorting to the strict argumentation and the evidence-based methods, denying religious irrationality have been set. The conducted research has shown the key factors leading to the book’s relevance: the society’s necessity of the religion revival, the authorities’ support of this tendency specified by the political environment. (shrink)

A new concept of cognition also implies a novel approach to the study of metaphor. This insight is the starting point of this article presenting two innovations to comprehending and analyzing metaphor, one theoretical and one in terms of methodology. On a theoretical level we argue for a new orientation to metaphor and metaphoricity based on enactive cognition and distributed language and cognition. In recent years enactive and distributed cognition have been developing a new concept of cognition as an inter-bodily (...) and ecologically afforded achievement, and in light of this theoretical development we propose an approach to metaphor as a multi-body, multi-party, and multi-timescale phenomenon. On a methodological level we demonstrate a new way of analyzing metaphoricity in multimodal social interaction based on in-depth video analyses of two real life examples in which we introduce metaphorical identification criteria focusing on doubleness in meaning, affordances for co-action, co-ordination, and co-exper.. (shrink)

This paper reports an experiment that investigates interpretive distinctions between two different expressions of generalization in Spanish. In particular, our aim was to find out when the distinction between generic statements (GS) such as Tigers have stripes and universally quantified statements (UQS) such as All tigers have stripes was acquired in Spanish-speaking children of two different age groups (4/5-year-olds and 8/9-year-olds), and then compare these results with those of adults. The starting point of this research was the semantic distinction between (...) GS and UQS in that the former admit exceptions, unlike the latter. On the other hand, several authors have observed a Generic overgeneralization effect (GOG) consisting in allowing for UQS to be felicitous in the face of exceptions, thus proposing that this “error” stems from GS being defaults (simpler, more easily learned and processed). In the current paper we aimed to test the “Generics as Default” (GaD) hypothesis by comparing GS and UQS in three different age ranges. Our data show that, overall, the accuracy of GS is greater than the accuracy of UQS. Moreover, we also confirm a hypothesized interaction between age and NP type (GS vs UQS). Further, we present several data points that are not predicted by the GaD, including an observed decline in the accuracy of GS in the older group of children as well as in adults, and that children fail at rejecting statements that are not considered to be true generalizations. (shrink)

An experimental study was conducted on children aged 2;6–3;0 and 3;6–4;0 investigating the priming effect of two WANT-constructions to establish whether constructional competition contributes to English-speaking children's infinitival to omission errors. In two between-participant groups, children either just heard or heard and repeated WANT-to, WANT-X, and control prime sentences after which to-infinitival constructions were elicited. We found that both age groups were primed, but in different ways. In the 2;6–3;0 year olds, WANT-to primes facilitated the provision of to in target (...) utterances relative to the control contexts, but no significant effect was found for WANT-X primes. In the 3;6–4;0 year olds, both WANT-to and WANT-X primes showed a priming effect, namely WANT-to primes facilitated and WANT-X primes inhibited provision of to. We argue that these effects reflect developmental differences in the level of proficiency in and preference for the two constructions, and they are broadly consistent with “priming as implicit learning” accounts. The current study shows that children as young as 2;6–3;0 years of age can be primed when they have only heard particular constructions, children are acquiring at least two constructions for the matrix verb WANT, and that these two WANT-constructions compete for production. (shrink)

This paper examines philosophical debates about concepts of biodiversity, making the case for conceptual pluralism. Taking a pragmatist perspective, I argue that normative concepts of biodiversity and eco-centric concepts of biodiversity can serve different purposes. The former would help stress the values of local communities, which have often been neglected by both early scientific approaches to conservation, and by policy makers prioritizing the political or economic interests of specific groups. The latter would help build local research programs independent of pressures (...) from economic or political actors. I employ a case study on environmental research on walnut forests in Kyrgyzstan in support of my argument. Against tendencies to frame different understandings of biodiversity in terms of geographical areas, I propose an interpretation drawing on the philosophy of ecology. Adherence to environmental pragmatism enables a sufficiently complex picture of developing environmental research in the area, capturing issues about scientific framings and local understandings. (shrink)

This article deals with the strategies for constructing and handling knowledge in a multinational business context. The present case study focuses on the observation of a corporation in the energy production sector. The multiple levels of expert knowledge that characterize the multinational corporation activities are regulated by knowledge flows affecting all global regions where the multinational operates. The article describes and comments on these flows of knowledge, how they involve global processes of relocation of knowledge, and discusses the creation of (...) new forms of cultural interdependence. (shrink)

The article substantiates the possibility of interpreting expertise as a research communicative practice, in contrast to the expert “comparison with the sample”. Inside the so-called examinations, a counter-examination is institutionally integrated. The communication of expert and counter-expert position, which is a phenomenological personality choice, can take a form of personal institutionalized communication, and can be mediated by mediators and media texts. The results of examination and counter-interaction are determined by many factors, among which the coincidence (mismatch) of the images of (...) the future. Communication between a layman and an expert about science-dimensional situations can be considered in prism of various optics – linguistic, sociological, socio-political, psychological optics, fixing a number of several paradoxes (equality, limited choice, excess / deficit). (shrink)

The article analyzes the interdisciplinary methodology of city research within the philosophical and cultural approach. The authors argue that at present, besides sociological and economic approaches to the interpretation of the city, the cultural and philosophical examination of city is of special interest. It combines both theoretical issues and the practical aspects. The authors present the philosophical and cultural analysis of the city as well as the general concept of chronotopia. The concept of chronotope, proposed by M. M. Bakhtin and (...) his followers, is most often used as a tool for the analysis of fiction. According to the authors, the spatio-temporal diagnostics of the city also has significant theoretical and practical potential. The authors discuss various literary and philosophical texts analyzing the feautures and evolution of the “soul of the city” (written by Russians N.P. Antsiferov, I.M. Grevs, Y.M. Lotman, M.S. Kagan, I.I. Mitin as well as by foreign scholars Y. Slezkine, K. Schlogel, exploring the chronotope of Soviet cities). The article presents other modern Russian and foreign researchers who directly collaborated with the authors of this research in joint urban projects: M. Golovanivskaya (“syntax” of urban squares), “Ural matrix” (A. Ivanov, I. Lisovets, E. Trubina), chronotope of a small Israeli city (E. Rimon), Stanford chronotopes (J. Bender, D.E. Wellbery). Since the city, like any cultural phenomenon, manifests itself within a set of spatio-temporal coordinates, the chronotope can be considered as the basic tool for its philosophical and cultural interpretation. The article substantiates the practical aspects of applying chronotopia to the analysis of the city: chronotopes of the past and everyday life in cities of certain types, strategic opportunities and boundaries of the chronotopes of a given city. The authors concludes that the chro-notopia of city is a transdisciplinary field in the cultural and philosophical studies of the city. (shrink)

The article presents the definition of polylingual education, aсcepted in the scientific and expert community abroad. The positive practices of multilingual education in Europe are summarized on the basis of the analysis of the project of European centre for modern languages of the Council of Europe, allowing to assess adequately the significance of the transformation of the language policy of the Russian Federation, using the experience of European countries in the development of polylingual personality. Arguments are given regarding the prospects (...) for the development of multilingual education in Russia, and one of the possible models for its implementation in higher education is proposed. (shrink)

Resumen Hay imágenes poderosas y hay imágenes potentes. Todavía más, hay imágenes potentes que hacen resistencia al poder, que son acto y gesto de resistencia en sí mismas. Entre marzo y agosto del año 2017 la sociedad venezolana vivió uno de los períodos más sensibles de la ya prolongada crisis institucional del país, caracterizada visiblemente por cotidianas protestas de calle duramente reprimidas por las fuerzas de seguridad del Estado, fenómeno que fue nombrado por los medios de comunicación internacionales como la (...) Primavera venezolana o la Rebelión de Abril. En un contexto hipermediatizado por las imágenes recirculadas por las redes sociales digitales y la prensa internacional, principalmente, destacan para mí los trabajos realizados por tres fotógrafos venezolanos: Gabriel Osorio, Vladimir Marcano Sifontes y Gabriel Méndez, cuyas fotografías testimonian experiencias traumáticas colectivas de resistencia al poder político en su propio «aquí y ahora» contingente, y articulan sus reflexiones desde el diálogo con ese otro sin nombre (el venezolano común, anónimo) en imágenes potentes que se tornan gestos de resistencia y migración. (shrink)

In this paper I introduce the concept of biodiversity by means of its peculiar story and defend the importance of biodiversity as an autonomous object of scientific enquiry (Sections 1 and 2). I then discuss two difficulties, (i) the lack of an agreed definition and (ii) the elusiveness of the notion of biodiversity. While I argue that (i) is a problem that can be handled, I suggest that (ii) follows from the vagueness of the concept of diversity and its cognate (...) kind (Sections 3 and 4). Yet, the notion of kind, connecting biodiversity to taxonomy, indicates the path to follow in order to explore what biodiversity is, even though it is a way full of hurdles to overcome (Sections 5 and 6). (shrink)

This article introduces a different insight on the role of leadership in the process to develop sustainability and achieve lasting improvement in quality of life. Authors bring together the societal, organizational and individual levels of sustainability in one conceptual framework and discuss the interconnectedness among these three levels. The conclusion is that an effective approach to sustainability starts from the inside, i.e. from the individual level. This implies a decisive role for personal leadership in the change path towards sustainability. It (...) brings new challenges and responsibilities for higher education in the preparation of a new generation of managers and leaders who can think and act from a sustainability perspective. (shrink)

Though research on sustainable tour operating practices is increasing, its focus is mainly on large tour operators. Moreover, most research is geographically limited to Europe. Literature on inbound tour operators (ITOs) based in destination countries such as Africa is almost non-existent. In an effort to reduce the gap on literature available on sustainable tour operating in third world destinations, this research focuses on ITOs in Kenya. Its aim is to identify gaps between attitudes, intentions and behavior towards sustainable tourism of (...) ITOs in Kenya and shade some light on how these gaps can be addressed. A dedicated questionnaire survey was developed for this research and sent out to 300 ITOs in Kenya. Moreover, 10 in-depth interviews were held. This paper describes the background of the research, both from a scholarly and management perspective, and the developed research instruments. During the IABS 2011 conference full results will be presented. (shrink)

Global mental health in a changing world -- Contemporary humanitarianism -- Humanitarian ethics -- Professional and personal challenges in humanitarian work -- Managing ethical challenges in global mental health -- Aspirational guidance : principles of humanitarian assistance -- Operational guidance : IASC guidelines -- Ethical dilemmas : damned if you do and damned if you don't -- Ethically questionable practices -- Safety imperative and self-care -- Values-based ethical framework and core competencies in global mental health -- Ethical considerations for refugee (...) mental health providers in the United States -- Conclusion and future directions. (shrink)

This article traces two trends in the evolution of subjectivity in philosophy: the concept of subjectivity introduced by Protagoras and the Sophists, which is related to the characterization of human knowledge, and the understanding of subjectivity in Descartes, who viewed it as a special reality that determines the essence of the individual as a “thinking thing.” The author examines the major turning points in interpreting subjectivity: Protagoras’ empirical interpretation, the metaphysical shift in Descartes, and the anti-metaphysical shift in postmodernism that (...) signified a return to the empirical understanding of subjectivity, predicting its “disappearance” along with the concepts of individuality and human in the “post-human” reality. In addition, the article discusses the trend of “de-subjectivizing” the human in contemporary philosophy. There are two ways of eliminating the subject: traveling backward from its metaphysical to its empirical understanding as its consequence of redefining the goals and... (shrink)

We show that the so-called quantum probabilistic rule, usually introduced in the physical literature as an argument of the essential distinction between the probability relations under quantum and classical measurements, is not, as it is commonly accepted, in contrast to the rule for the addition of probabilities of mutually exclusive events. The latter is valid under all experimental situations upon classical and quantum systems. We discuss also the quantum measurement situation that is similar to the classical one, described by the (...) Bayes formula. We show the compatibility of the description of this quantum measurement situation in the frame of purely classical and experimentally justified straightforward frequency arguments and in the frame of the quantum stochastic approach to the description of generalized quantum measurements. In view of derived results, we argue that even under experiments upon classical systems the classical Bayes formula describes particular experimental situations that are specific for context-independent measurements. The similarity of the forms of the relation between the transformation of probabilities, which we derive in the frame of the quantum stochastic approach and in the frame of the approach, based on straightforward frequency arguments, underlines once more that the projective (von Neumann) measurements represent only a special type of measurement situations in quantum physics. (shrink)

The purpose of the study is to determine the prospects for the export of Russian information technologies and cooperation in the fields of artificial intelligence and cybersecurity with the countries of the Association of Southeast Asian Nations. The article discusses the request of the ASEAN countries in the field of AI and cybersecurity, the level of development of the digital economy in this region and its impact on the prospects for Russian IT-exports; in addition, the structure and dynamics of Russian (...) IT-exports to the world market are presented. The scientific novelty lies in the reassessment of the prospects for cooperation between Russia and the ASEAN countries in the field of IT, AI and cybersecurity. As a result, the factors influencing the competitiveness of Russia in the field of IT were identified and the leading Russian IT-companies and their experience in the global market were analyzed. Based on this, a conclusion was made about the prospects for the export of Russian IT and cooperation in the field of AI and cybersecurity with the ASEAN countries. (shrink)

In recent years, a ''change in attitude'' in particle physics has led to our understanding current quantum field theories as effective field theories (EFTs). The present paper is concerned with the significance of this EFT approach, especially from the viewpoint of the debate on reductionism in science. In particular, I shall show how EFTs provide a new and interesting case study in current philosophical discussion on reduction, emergence, and inter-level relationships in general.

: By introducing us into core concepts of Niklas Luhmann’s theory of social systems, Elena Esposito shows their relevance for contemporary social sciences and the study of unsettled times….