BACKGROUND: There is a need for interdisciplinary research to better understand how pedagogical approaches in primary physical education (PE) can support the linked development of physical, cognitive and affective aspects of physical literacy and physical activity behaviours in young children. The Skill Acquisition Methods fostering Physical Literacy in Early-Physical Education (SAMPLE-PE) study aims to examine the efficacy of two different pedagogies for PE, underpinned by theories of motor learning, to foster physical literacy, especially for children living in disadvantaged areas. METHODS: (...) SAMPLE-PE will be evaluated through a cluster-randomised controlled trial targeting 5-6 year old children from schools located in areas of high deprivation in Merseyside, North-West England. Schools will be randomly allocated to one of three conditions: Linear Pedagogy, Nonlinear Pedagogy or Control. Nonlinear and Linear Pedagogy intervention primary schools will receive a PE curriculum delivered by trained coaches over 15 weeks, while control schools will follow their usual practice. Data will be collected at baseline (T0), immediately post-intervention (T1) and six months after the intervention has finished (T2). Children’s movement competence is the primary outcome in this trial. Secondary outcomes include physical activity, perceived competence, motivation, executive functions, and self-regulation. An extensive process evaluation will also examine implementation factors such as intervention context, reach, dose, fidelity and acceptability. DISCUSSION: The SAMPLE-PE project will enable better understanding surrounding how to operationalise physical literacy through enrichment of PE practices in early PE. The study will provide robust scientific evidence regarding the efficacy of underpinning PE pedagogy with theories of motor learning to promote the development of physical literacy. (shrink)

Philosophers and cognitive scientists address the relationships among the senses and the connections between conscious experiences that form unified wholes. In this volume, cognitive scientists and philosophers examine two closely related aspects of mind and mental functioning: the relationships among the various senses and the links that connect different conscious experiences to form unified wholes. The contributors address a range of questions concerning how information from one sense influences the processing of information from the other senses and how unified states (...) of consciousness emerge from the bonds that tie conscious experiences together. Sensory Integration and the Unity of Consciousness is the first book to address both of these topics, integrating scientific and philosophical concerns. A flood of recent work in both philosophy and perception science has challenged traditional conceptions of the sensory systems as operating in isolation. Contributors to the volume consider the ways in which perceptual contact with the world is or may be “multisensory,” discussing such subjects as the modeling of multisensory integration and philosophical aspects of sensory modalities. Recent years have seen a similar surge of interest in unity of consciousness. Contributors explore a range of questions on this topic, including the nature of that unity, the degree to which conscious experiences are unified, and the relationship between unified consciousness and the self. Contributors Tim Bayne, David J. Bennett, Berit Brogaard, Barry Dainton, Ophelia Deroy, Frederique de Vignemont, Marc Ernst, Richard Held, Christopher S. Hill, Geoffrey Lee, Kristan Marlow, Farid Masrour, Jennifer Matey, Casey O'Callaghan, Cesare V. Parise, Kevin Rice, Elizabeth Schechter, Pawan Sinha, Julia Trommershaeuser, Loes C. J. van Dam, Jonathan Vogel, James Van Cleve, Robert Van Gulick, Jonas Wulff. (shrink)

The aim of this article is to offer a view of the current status of women in medical physics and biomedical engineering, while focusing on solutions towards gender balance and providing examples of current activities carried out at national and international levels. The International Union of Physical and Engineering Scientists in Medicine is committed to advancing women in science and health and has several initiatives overseen by the Women in Medical Physics and Biomedical Engineering Task Group. Some of the main (...) strategies proposed by the Task Group to attain gender balance are: (a) identify and promote female role models that achieve successful work-life balance, (b) establish programs to develop female leaders, (c) create opportunities for females to increase the international visibility within the scientific community, and (d) establish archives and databases of women in STEM. (shrink)

We argue that there is an incompatibility between the two basic principles of Molinism, i.e., God’s middle knowledge of counterfactuals of creaturely freedom, and divine immutability. To this end, firstly, we set out the difference between strong and weak immutability: according to the latter only God’s essential attributes remain unchanged, while the former affirms that God cannot change in any way. Our next step is to argue that Molinism ascribes strong immutability to God. However, according to Molinism, some counterfactuals of (...) freedom need to be actualized by divine will. We argue that this claim does entail a change in God because it attributes a knowledge to God that involves moving from possibility to actuality through divine will. Therefore, claiming God knows counterfactuals of freedom leads us to reject the strong sense of divine immutability. Further, we argue that assuming God’s knowledge encompasses counterfactuals of freedom cannot be consistent even with weak immutability because, according to Molinism, a change in God’s knowledge requires a change in His essence. We conclude that Molinism is incoherent. (shrink)

Les multiples histoires des idées qui retracent la constitution, relativement récente, de la discipline appelée «esthétique», mentionnent souvent le nom d�Alexander Gottlieb Baumgarten (1714-1762) en lui attribuant l�«invention» du néologisme «æsthetica». Très rapidement, ce terme latin, traduit en allemand, entre dans l�usage courant. De nos jours, il désigne un ensemble de discours souvent très hétérogènes sur les beaux-arts. Mais le sens originaire d�æsthetica, c�est-à-dire le contenu de l�ouvrage éponyme de 1750, demeure largement méconnu. Le présent article souhaite contribuer à souligner (...) l�importance du geste inaugural de Baumgarten, dont l�intérêt n�est pas seulement historiographique. Car ce philosophe instaure de manière durable un nouveau rapport à l��uvre d�art. Nous insisterons tout particulièrement sur l�inscription métaphysique de son projet. (shrink)

Einleitung -- al-Fārābī -- Nizām al-Mulik -- Ibn Taymiyya -- Ibn Khaldūn -- Afghānī, ʻAbduh, Riḍā und ʻAbd al-Rāziq -- Muḥammad Iqbāl -- Esad Bey -- Ḥasan al-Bannā -- Sayyid Quṭb -- Muḥammad Asad -- Khomeini -- Naṣr Ḥāmid Abū Zaid -- Elijah Muḥammad -- Qaraḍāwī.

Many take the possibility of hallucinations to imply that a relationalist account, according to which perceptual experiences are constituted by direct relations to ordinary mind-independent objects, is false. The common reaction among relationalists is to adopt a disjunctivist view that denies that hallucinations have the same nature as perceptual experiences. This paper proposes a non-disjunctivist response to the argument from hallucination by arguing that the alleged empirical and a priori evidence in support of the possibility of hallucinations is inconclusive. A (...) corollary upshot of the article is that whether hallucinations are possible or not is still an open empirical question. (shrink)

Assisted Reproductive Technologies (ARTs) have been practiced in Islamic societies within married couples since their introduction. However, there are divergent views over the issue of third-party donation among Sunni and Shia scholars. This paper illustrates the different perspectives of Shia Muslims surrounding, sperm, egg, and embryo donation and ethical aspects thereof. The study reveals that there are different views regarding sperm, egg, and embryo donation among the Shia religious leaders around the world. Many Shia religious scholars, including the Iranian supreme (...) religious leader Ali Hussein Khamenei allow sperm, egg, and embryo donation with certain conditions. However, the conditions stipulated by Shia religious scholars contradict the ethical and legal practices of sperm, egg, and embryo donation. Regarding sperm and egg donation, they declared that the donor child would inherit from a third-party donor and the commissioning parents would be adoptive parents. Thus, according to them, donor anonymity is impossible. Moreover, the Iranian act on embryo donation did not stipulate the right and responsibilities of the donor child and recipient couples and did not clarify the nature and number of embryos that can be donated and implanted. The paper argues that the lack of laws and guidelines on sperm, egg, and embryo donation raises many ethical problems. Based only on religious rulings, third-party donation has been practiced without foreseeing the well-being and safety of donor children, donors, and recipient couples. (shrink)

The author examines the fanatical type of mentality in its secular and religious forms based on the analysis of the works of Gabriel Marcel and Karen Armstrong. The origins of the phenomenon of fanaticism are found in the basic foundations of Modern culture as the time of the replacement of myth by logos (Armstrong) and the domination of the abstract spirit (Marcel). The understanding of the foundations of fanaticism as a broad phenomenon undertaken by the French philosopher and the British (...) religious scholar is associated with interpretations of the concept of the transcendent. Although the socio-spiritual situation in which Marcel and Armstrong work is different, their conclusions generally coincide and become especially relevant today, when the world is on the verge of a new world war. The author briefly formulates definitions of some basic categories of G. Marcel's philosophy - "philosophical experience", "first reflection", "second reflection", "fanaticized consciousness", "disparity", "abstraction", "abstract spirit", "collective violence", "property", "being", "ideologue", "intersubjectivity", "identity", etc. Gabriel Marcel's reflection on the fundamental difference between a true believer and a religious fanatic is discussed, despite the fact that both are spoken on behalf of absolute values. The will to refuse to "question" the object of one's faith presupposes immunity to the arguments of critical thinking, which by definition would be intended to act as a kind of antidote to fanaticism as a special type of radical consciousness. The basis of fanaticism turns out to be insensitivity to what is the fanatic's idefix, while modern fanatics, in contrast to the ordinary idea of them, are often well-educated people. This is a decentered consciousness dominated by "carnal thought". Such an idea may be called the idea of equality or justice, but it is not actually a thought born from experience and sympathy for people. (shrink)

If all things and events, including human actions, are predetermined by God since pre-eternity, then what space is left for human freedom of will, and hence, for moral responsibility? In the beginning of the 14th century, a non-Muslim scholar, probably of Jewish faith, confronted several Muslim scholars from Damascus and Cairo with precisely this question in versified form. Among them is the well-known Ḥanbalī theologian and jurist Ibn Taymiyya (d. 728/1328), who is said to have responded instantly with a 184-verse (...) poem (of which 125 verses are extant). This article provides an analysis of Ibn Taymiyya’s stance on the question of how it can be said that God is just in predetermining and judging human actions and compares it to that of Faḫr ad-Dīn ar-Rāzī. The article ends with the first full translation of the versified question and Ibn Taymiyya’s response into a European language. Both thinkers depart from similar positions, insofar as both deny human free will. However, while Ibn Taymiyya tries to show that the fact that God will hold human beings accountable for their predetermined actions does not go against our inborn sense of justice, ar-Rāzī adduces that fact as part of his strategy to show that God’s actions cannot be subject to rational moral assessment, as they would otherwise have to be declared as senseless and even harmful. (shrink)

It is hypothesized that iron from biological tissues, liberated during decay, may have played a role in inhibiting loss of anatomical information during fossilization of extinct organisms. Most tissues in the animal kingdom contain iron in different forms. A widely distributed iron‐bearing molecule is ferritin, a globular protein that contains iron crystallites in the form of ferrihydrite minerals. Iron concentrations in ferritin are high and ferrihydrites are extremely reactive. When ancient animals are decaying on the sea floor under anoxic environmental (...) conditions, ferrihydrites may initialize the selective replication of some tissues in pyrite FeS2. This model explains why some labile tissues are preserved, while other more resistant structures decay and are absent in many fossils. A major implication of this hypothesis is that structures described as brains in Cambrian arthropods are not fossilization artifacts, but are instead a source of information on anatomical evolution at the dawn of complex animal life. (shrink)

Some recently popular accounts of perception account for the phenomenal character of perceptual experience in terms of the qualities of objects. My concern in this paper is with naturalistic versions of such a phenomenal externalist view. Focusing on visual spatial perception, I argue that naturalistic phenomenal externalism conflicts with a number of scientific facts about the geometrical characteristics of visual spatial experience.

This paper argues that a common form of representationalism has trouble accommodating empirical findings about visual space perception. Vision science tells us that the visual system systematically gives rise to different experiences of the same spatial property. This, combined with a naturalistic account of content, suggests that the same spatial property can have different veridical looks. I use this to argue that a common form of representationalism about spatial experience must be rejected. I conclude by considering alternatives to this view.

Perceptual experience has the phenomenal character of encountering a mind-independent objective world. What we encounter in perceptual experience is not presented to us as a state of our own mind. Rather, we seem to encounter facts, objects, and properties that are independent from our mind. In short, perceptual experience has phenomenal objectivity. This paper proposes and defends a Kantian account of phenomenal objectivity that grounds it in experiences of lawlike regularities. The paper offers a novel account of the connection between (...) phenomenology and intentionality. It also sheds some light on one of the central themes in Kant’s Critique of Pure Reason. (shrink)

In _Ibn Taymiyya and the Attributes of God_, Farid Suleiman offers a comprehensive study of Ibn Taymiyya’s views on God and His attributes, contextualizing his position within the century-old debates on this fraught theological issue.

An advanced introduction to the new philosophical anthropology and an understanding of the most contemporary developments in it.

Despite the gaining popularity of non-representationalist approaches to cognition, it is still a widespread assumption in contemporary cognitive science that the explanatory reach of representation-eschewing approaches is substantially limited. Nowadays, many working in the field accept that we do not need to invoke internal representations for the explanation of online forms of cognition. However, when it comes to explaining higher, offline forms of cognition, it is widely believed that we must fall back on internal-representation-invoking theories. In this paper, I want (...) to argue that, contrary to popular belief, we don’t yet have any compelling reason for assuming that non-representationalist theories are, as a matter of necessity, limited in scope. I will show that Clark and Toribio’s influential argument in terms of ‘representation-hungry’ cognition is, for various reasons, flawed. On closer inspection, we’ll see that the argument from representation-hunger is, on the one hand, built on an inconsistent notion of representation and, on the other hand, on a conflation of the explanandum with the explanans. I will suggest that, on closer inspection, the ARH seems to be getting its appeal mainly from the unscientific principle that “like causes like”. (shrink)

From religion to philosophy to science, all human systems of definition are formed by human brains. The nature and limits of the human brain are the nature and limits of those systems. This essay shows how the human brain works normally then unusually, and what this reveals about the limits of human knowledge. There are many conditions and instances where the brain processes information unusually, including mental disorders, physical events, and drug use. This essay focuses on the neurological events called (...) mystical experiences. (shrink)

There is a substantial shortage of organs available for transplantation in Bangladesh. This has resulted in the commodification of organs. This study analyzes the religious, cultural, and legal barriers to organ donation in Bangladesh. It is based on the examination of available literature and primary sources i.e. religious decrees and opinions of religious leaders of faith traditions, and the Bangladesh Organ Donation Act, 1999. The literature was retrieved from databases, such as PubMed, BioMed, and Google Scholar using the key words: (...) organ donation in Islam, organ donation in Bangladesh, organ donation and religions. The study found that although many Islamic scholars accept organ donation, both living and cadaveric, under some conditions, some Bangladeshi Muslim clerics oppose donation. They argue that organ retrieval violates the sanctity of the human body and retrieval of organs may harm a living donor or lead to death, and organ donation may encourage the commercialization of body parts. Both commercialization and harming oneself are considered sins. Thus, the divergent views of Muslim clerics are a major barrier to organ donation among the Bangladeshi Muslims. Cultural and social factors also have a negative impact. Most people desire to be buried with their bodies intact. Although the Bangladesh government promulgated the Bangladesh Organ Donation Act, 1999, and amended it in 2018, it restricted donors and recipients to members of the extended family, which also reduced the donor pool. This study argues that the Muslim Orthodox clerics’ stand against organ donation and other cultural and legal issues are the major obstacles to organ donation in Bangladesh. (shrink)

El presente artículo tiene como objetivo analizar la ansiedad en adultos de Quito, Ecuador; la muestra estuvo conformada por 135 hombres y mujeres de 18 a 73 años quienes no han presentado un diagnóstico previo de ansiedad. Se aplicó el Inventario de Ansiedad de Beck (BAI) y se identificó que el 14% de los participantes presentan ansiedad grave, 17% moderada, 36% mínima y el 33% leve, siendo los jóvenes quienes presentan mayor nivel de ansiedad de tipo grave en comparación con (...) los adultos. En relación con la sintomatología física y emocional se considera la preocupación, miedo y dificultades del sueño. (shrink)

Si Vernant est célèbre pour avoir appliqué aux mythes grecs la méthode structurale élaborée par Lévi-Strauss, on essaiera ici de montrer que l’absence de la notion de transformation dans ses travaux révèle la distance qui sépare sa psychologie historique de l’anthropologie structurale. Au lieu d’analyser les relations qui unissent les variantes d’un mythe, Vernant cherche à appréhender la cohérence interne d’une œuvre, afin de reconstituer la mentalité qu’elle exprime. Cette démarche s’oppose profondément à celle de Lévi-Strauss, qui soutient pour sa (...) part que le fonctionnement de la pensée sauvage n’apparaît qu’à travers les opérations qui permettent de traduire les uns dans les autres des mythes issus de cultures différentes. (shrink)

Carta escrita por Gilda de Mello e Souza, remetida ao colega Oswaldo Porchat, que se encontrava em Berkeley, quando a ditadura civil-militar brasileira, recrudescida desde a implantação, em agosto de 1968, do AI-5, representava uma verdadeira ameaça a estudantes e docentes da Universidade de São Paulo, especialmente se lhe fizessem qualquer tipo de oposição. Porchat trocou uma sequência de cartas com Gilda nessa época, nas quais relata sua desilusão com a Faculdade de Filosofia, e com os acontecimentos políticos no Brasil. (...) Ao mesmo tempo, confessa estar encantado com a descoberta de novos elementos da Lógica, e com a atmosfera mais amena dos Estados Unidos. Porchat sabe que Gilda enfrenta momentos difíceis, tendo de assumir a Presidência do curso em meio à tentativa do reitor Miguel Reale de submetê-lo a um interventor. Enfrentando a dúvida sobre se valeria a pena retornar ao Brasil naquele momento, Porchat escreve à amiga. A carta a seguir expressa, dentro do que era possível na época, quando as correspondências eram vigiadas, o parecer de Gilda sobre as indagações do amigo, sobre os rumos da ditadura, e sobre o que ela pensava de sua própria atitude de resistência naquele contexto. A carta original, assim como a sequência de correspondências da qual faz parte, está depositada no Fundo Gilda de Mello e Souza, no Instituto de Estudos Brasileiros (IEB/USP). Agradeço à família de Gilda, especialmente a Ana Luisa Escorel e a Laura Escorel, pela disponibilização desse documento para a presente publicação. (shrink)

Volume 20, Issue 7, July 2020, Page W4-W6.

Despite the growing popularity of nonrepresentationalist approaches to cognition, and especially of those coming from the enactivist corner, positing internal representations is still the order of the day in mainstream cognitive science. Indeed, the idea that we have to invoke internal content-carrying, thing-like entities to account for the workings of mind and cognition proves to be particularly resilient. In this paper, my aim is to explain at least partially where this resilience of the reified notion of representation comes from. What (...) I want to show is that, crucially, positing inner representations isn’t so much warranted by the scientific practice itself – as is commonly held – but much more motivated by nonscientific and pre-theoretical elements that largely stem from, what I will call, linguistic contingencies. Otherwise put, much of what makes the reified notion of representation an attractive posit can be explained, not by the science, but by the way we, including cognitive scientists, speak. What I want to do here, then, is first, rehearse what reification means in the context of representationalism and, second, specify which linguistic contingencies can account for why the idea of positing representations remains for many not only a viable option, but an indispensability for anyone interested in explanations of mind and cognition. (shrink)

It is common to hold that our conscious experiences at a single moment are often unified. But when consciousness is unified, what are the fundamental facts in virtue of which it is unified? On some accounts of the unity of consciousness, the most fundamental fact that grounds unity is a form of singularity or oneness. These accounts are similar to Newtonian views of space according to which the most fundamental fact that grounds relations of co-spatiality between various points (or regions) (...) of a space is the fact that these points (or regions) are parts of the same single space. In this paper, I sketch and defend an alternative account of unity of consciousness. Very roughly, the view holds that experiences are unified when they are connected in the right way. In this respect, the view is analogous to Leibnizian views of space according to which the oneness of space emerges from certain conditions over spatial relations. The Leibnizian alternative has significant implications for our understanding of the metaphysics of conscious experience, the cognitive architecture of the mind and our assessment of the conditions under which unity of consciousness breaks. (shrink)

This short peer-reviewed text is a concise look at the psychology of how human beings make decisions, including how they form their worldviews and make arguments.

This paper aims to provide two abductive considerations adducing in favor of the thesis of Necessitism in modal ontology. I demonstrate how instances of the Barcan formula can be witnessed, when the modal operators are interpreted 'naturally' -- i.e., as including geometric possibilities -- and the quantifiers in the formula range over a domain of natural, or concrete, entities and their contingently non-concrete analogues. I argue that, because there are considerations within physics and metaphysical inquiry which corroborate modal relationalist claims (...) concerning the possible geometric structures of spacetime, and dispositional properties are actual possible entities, the condition of being grounded in the concrete is consistent with the Barcan formula; and thus -- in the geometric setting -- merits adoption by the Necessitist. (shrink)

This paper presents a comprehensive study of argumentation frameworks with necessities (AFNs), a bipolar extension of Dung Abstract argumentation frameworks (AFs) where the support relation captures a positive interaction between arguments having the meaning of necessity: the acceptance of an argument may require the acceptance of other argument(s). The paper discusses new main acceptability semantics for AFNs and their characterization both by a direct approach and a labelling approach. It examines the relationship between AFNs and Dung AFs and shows the (...) gain provided by the former in terms of concision. Finally, the paper shows how to represent an AFN as a normal logic program (LP) and vice versa and in both cases establishes a one-to-one correspondence between extensions under the main acceptability semantics (except for semi-stable semantics where the correspondence is not completely full) of an AFN and particular cases of 3-valued stable models of normal LPs. (shrink)

PurposeThe purpose of this paper is to investigate the effect of internet filtering, and its impact on marginalized groups including non‐governmental organizations, female activists, ethnic, and religious minorities, the younger generation and the increase of the digital divide in Iran.Design/methodology/approachThe paper raises two main questions: to what extent do information and communications technologies and in particular, the internet, promote freedom of speech, and gender equality in Iran? What is the impact of state censorship and ICT filtering on these activities? To (...) answer these research questions, the author uses narratives of the internet's usage along with a comparison study with other Middle Eastern countries to analyze the impact of ICTs on citizen's freedom of expression.FindingsThe paper argues that restrictions imposed on ICT tools and services by the Government of Iran which has been claimed to protect country's national security against the corruption and immorality imposed by Western countries not only affect the expansion of ICTs negatively but also civil liberties – thus increasing the digital divide internally, regionally, as well as on a global scale.Research limitations/implicationsAlbeit this research is limited to the case study of Iran, the author believes that lessens learned from the Iran's case study can be applied to other Islamic countries and in particular countries located in the Middle East region.Practical implicationsICT tools and services such as the internet and short message service are effective emancipatory media for citizens' participation and mobilization in democratic processes.Originality/valueThis paper contributes to the existing knowledge and understanding of the impact of ICTs on freedom and democracy. (shrink)

In today's global marketplace, the Philippines provide a unique example of an Asian culture with established economic ties to the West. In this study, Philippine and United States undergraduate business students responded to 13 vignettes describing questionable ethical actions in business situations. Results reveal significant differences between groups for 9 of the 13 vignettes. For 4 vignettes, Philippine participants were more disapproving of the actions, and for another 5, United States participants were more disapproving. The study suggests that cultural differences (...) continue and the implications of these differences should be considered in today's global economy. (shrink)

An important conceptual shift can be discerned within contemporary philosophy of perception. Whereas proponents of the idea that perceptual experience is contentful used to relate perceptual content to truth conditions, authors nowadays prefer to think of perception as evaluable for accuracy. This transition from truth to accuracy becomes particularly clear in the influential work of Susanna Siegel. Importantly, Siegel actually provides an extensive argument for this shift. Yet this article argues that this transition from truth to accuracy conditions is ill‐motivated, (...) confused and pernicious for the so‐called Content View, the view that all experience has truth or accuracy evaluable content. (shrink)

opinionated review of some of the recent work on the phenomenal unity of consciousness.