AimHealthcare workers have directly provided care for COVID-19 patients, and have faced many additional sources leading to poor mental health. The study aimed to investigate the mental health problems and related factors among healthcare staff in Vietnam.MethodsA descriptive cross-sectional mixed methods study, combining quantitative and qualitative research methods, was performed among 400 healthcare workers working at the National Hospital for Tropical Diseases and Ninh Binh General Hospital from the first day of treatment for COVID-19 patients to May 01, 2020.ResultsThe results (...) showed that 8.0% of participants had stress, 17.5% of participants had anxiety, and 14.8% of participants had depression. Approximately 50% of participants reported that they had at least one of these symptoms. The findings illustrated that stress, anxiety, and depression were associated with the position in a hospital, health status during the COVID-19 pandemic, family members/relatives infected with COVID-19, physical and mental support from friends, family, and community, department, years of working, and the average work hours per day of healthcare workers exposed to COVID-19.ConclusionDuring the COVID-19 pandemic, healthcare workers who worked in the hospital providing treatment and care for COVID-19 patients dealt with mental health problems such as stress, anxiety, and depression. It is necessary to promote mental health among healthcare workers, to contribute to the fight against the COVID-19 outbreak in Vietnam. (shrink)

This analysis used data, primarily from the 1997 Vietnamese Demographic and Health Survey (VN-DHS 1997), to determine the changes in contraceptive use in Vietnam. A descriptive analysis of individual, household and community characteristics was made to obtain a general description of contraceptive use. Multinomial logistic regression analyses were also performed on the currently married in (a) a sample of all women and (b) only those women who live in rural areas, to identify the strength of association that each variable has (...) with the use of modern contraceptives. The use of any contraceptive method and the use of modern methods increased from 1988 to 1997. The primary contraceptive method utilized is the IUD and its use has increased substantially from 1988 to 1997. Younger women (aged 15–24) were less likely to use any contraceptive method. Women not desiring additional children were significantly more likely to use contraceptive methods than those desiring more children. Education has a clear impact on both contraceptive knowledge and use by women, with higher educated women being more likely to use a contraceptive method. Illiterate women with no formal education were significantly less likely to use modern methods of contraception. Differentials in contraceptive use exist regarding place of residence. Urban women are more likely than rural women to use contraception, but the difference is not large. Women living in mountainous areas are less likely to use contraception, compared with women living in the lowlands. Living standards, especially the availability of electricity in the community, have a large effect on the methods of contraception adopted by women. Religion is not strongly related to the contraceptive behaviour of women. There were significant differences in the use of contraceptives in communities with good quality of care, with increased contraceptive use corresponding to the increase in availability of family planning workers at communes, provision of counselling services at health facilities, and the volume of mass media family planning messages. (shrink)

Implementation of Lenin's thought on the human rights in Vietnam.

Implementation of Lenin's thought on the human rights in Vietnam.

Coastal protection is crucial to human development since the ocean has many values associated with the economy, ecosystem, and culture. However, most ocean protecting efforts are currently ineffective due to the burdens of finance, lack of appropriate management, and international cooperation regimes. For aiding bottom-up initiatives for ocean protection support, this study employed the Mindsponge Theory to examine how the public’s perceived economic and cultural values influence their willingness to support actions to protect the ocean. Analyzing the European-Union-Horizon-2020-funded dataset of (...) 709 respondents from 42 countries, we discovered that perceived economic values have negative effects on the tendency of ocean protection supports (i.e., food, transportation, renewable energy, oil and gas, and recreation). In contrast, certain perceived cultural values can help increase the willingness to do so (i.e., mental well-being and sense of identity). However, the effects of perceived cultural values are only moderately reliable. These findings suggest that designing cultural information delivery campaigns can help promote coastal reserve supports, such as fundraisings and preserving the oceans from the community. (shrink)

Studying the psychology behind the purchase of eco-friendly products and second-hand items can offer valuable insights to promote sustainable consumer behavior. This paper examines factors influencing Italian consumers’ willingness to pay regarding bio-based clothing and second-hand items. Drawing from data collected from 402 Italian participants, we examine how motivations and socio-demographic factors are associated with willingness to pay in the context of sustainable fashion. Our findings reveal that motivations related to environmental concerns are positively associated with consumers’ willingness to pay (...) higher premiums for bio-based clothing. Higher income and education levels are also associated with the willingness to pay higher premiums. Meanwhile, motivation related to vintage appeal is associated with lower desired discounts for second-hand items, particularly among older consumers. Gender differences also influence discount preferences, with men seeking larger discounts on second-hand clothing compared to women. By providing insights into Italian consumers’ sustainable fashion choices, this study offers implications for businesses, policymakers, and researchers aiming to promote eco-conscious consumption and sustainability in the fashion industry. (shrink)

Using a nationwide survey of provincial institutional quality and a sample of private manufacturing small and medium scale enterprises, this paper contributes to the literature by considering for the first time the effects of corruption on the financial performance of Vietnamese private SMEs. Interestingly, contrary to previous findings, we find that corruption when measured by a dummy variable, does not affect firms’ financial performance after controlling for heterogeneity, simultaneity and dynamic endogeneity. However, the intensity of bribery and the majority of (...) the forms of corruption were found to have negative impacts on firms’ financial performance. Hence, a typical approach using only a dummy variable for bribery might not adequately evaluate the impact of bribe intensity or even ignores the negative impacts of some types of bribes on firms’ financial performance. The findings suggest that anti-corruption measures are vital for the development of the Vietnamese private SMEs. (shrink)

Currently, although the implementation of corporate social responsibility (CSR) practices and its incorporation into business strategies is emphasised widely in developed countries as a key to sustainable growth and economic profitability, this term is still new to the Vietnamese market because of the low awareness of the importance of CSR practices, which leads to the failure of many firms. Since Vietnamese firms do not prioritise CSR implementation, Vietnam is experiencing an increasing shortage of skilled employees owing to a lack of (...) motivation. Therefore, this study examines the relationship between the corporate strategic objective (CSO), CSR practices and employee commitment, to provide recommendations to enhance motivation. This study used a quantitative approach and data from a questionnaire delivered to 869 enterprises in 2019 in Vietnam. Results suggest that the CSO had direct and indirect effects on employee commitment through the mediation of CSR practices. (shrink)

Using a nationwide survey of provincial institutional quality and a sample of private manufacturing small and medium scale enterprises, this paper contributes to the literature by considering for the first time the effects of corruption on the financial performance of Vietnamese private SMEs. Interestingly, contrary to previous findings, we find that corruption when measured by a dummy variable, does not affect firms’ financial performance after controlling for heterogeneity, simultaneity and dynamic endogeneity. However, the intensity of bribery and the majority of (...) the forms of corruption were found to have negative impacts on firms’ financial performance. Hence, a typical approach using only a dummy variable for bribery might not adequately evaluate the impact of bribe intensity or even ignores the negative impacts of some types of bribes on firms’ financial performance. The findings suggest that anti-corruption measures are vital for the development of the Vietnamese private SMEs. (shrink)

Structure and organization seems to be at the root of many of the questions raised about institutional behaviour; however, with respect to research on university capacity building, few studies have examined research organizational problems, particularly in developing countries. This study investigates academic reactions to the structure and organization of research at four leading Vietnamese universities. Through document analysis and semi-structured interviews with 55 participants, the study finds that the four case-study Vietnamese universities have accomplished a number of the more visible (...) tasks of research management such as creating research and research management positions; deciding primary organizational units for research delivery; creating a research office; and creating research oversight committees. However, they seem to neglect the other less visible tasks of organizing and structuring research such as developing rules for research integrity; developing a mechanism for evaluating the quality of research outcomes; preparing researchers and research managers for the necessary skills and knowledge; and deciding vertical and horizontal decentralization. The study concludes that even though research has been formally structured and organized, the management of research has not yet been professionalized. The key problem in organizing and structuring research is the lack of an effective system for research behaviour formalization. A more effective system for better formalizing research behaviours should be developed so that Vietnamese universities can integrate more successfully into the global research. (shrink)

Recent significant changes in technology such as Artificial Intelligence and big data analysis have a wide impact in many areas of human societies, not least in education. Advances in efficien...

This study aims to predict the shear strength of reinforced concrete deep beams based on artificial neural network using four training algorithms, namely, Levenberg–Marquardt, quasi-Newton method, conjugate gradient, and gradient descent. A database containing 106 results of RC deep beam shear strength tests is collected and used to investigate the performance of the four proposed algorithms. The ANN training phase uses 70% of data, randomly taken from the collected dataset, whereas the remaining 30% of data are used for the algorithms’ (...) evaluation process. The ANN structure consists of an input layer with 9 neurons corresponding to 9 input parameters, a hidden layer of 10 neurons, and an output layer with 1 neuron representing the shear strength of RC deep beams. The performance evaluation of the models is performed using statistical criteria, including the correlation coefficient, root mean square error, mean absolute error, and mean absolute percentage error. The results show that the ANN-CG model has the best prediction performance with R = 0.992, RMSE = 14.02, MAE = 14.24, and MAPE = 6.84. The results of this study show that the ANN-CG model can accurately predict the shear strength of RC deep beams, representing a promising and useful alternative design solution for structural engineers. (shrink)

This paper conducted a preliminary study of reviewing and exploring bias strategies using a framework of a different discipline: change management. The hypothesis here is: If the major problem of implicit bias strategies is that they do not translate into actual changes in behaviors, then it could be helpful to learn from studies that have contributed to successful change interventions such as reward management, social neuroscience, health behavioral change, and cognitive behavioral therapy. The result of this integrated approach is: current (...) bias strategies can be improved and new ones can be developed with insight from adjunct study fields in change management; it could be more sustainable to invest in a holistic and proactive bias strategy approach that targets the social environment, eliminating the very condition under which biases arise; and while implicit biases are automatic, future studies should invest more on strategies that empower people as “change agents” who can act proactively to regulate the very environment that gives rise to their biased thoughts and behaviors. (shrink)

An association between age-related hearing loss and Alzheimer's Disease has been widely reported. However, the nature of this relationship remains poorly understood. Quantification of hearing loss as it relates to AD is imperative for the creation of reliable, hearing-related biomarkers for earlier diagnosis and development of ARHL treatments that may slow the progression of AD. Previous studies that have measured the association between peripheral hearing function and AD have yielded mixed results. Most of these studies have been small and underpowered (...) to reveal an association. Therefore, in the current report, we sought to estimate the degree to which AD patients have impaired hearing by performing a meta-analysis to increase statistical power. We reviewed 248 published studies that quantified peripheral hearing function using pure-tone audiometry for subjects with AD. Six studies, with a combined total of 171 subjects with AD compared to 222 age-matched controls, met inclusion criteria. We found a statistically significant increase in hearing threshold as measured by pure tone audiometry for subjects with AD compared to controls. For a three-frequency pure tone average calculated for air conduction thresholds at 500–1,000–2,000 Hz, an increase of 2.3 decibel hearing level was found in subjects with AD compared to controls. Likewise, for a four-frequency pure tone average calculated at 500–1,000–2,000–4,000, an increase of 4.5 dB HL was measured, and this increase was significantly greater than that seen for 0.5–2 kHz PTA. There was no difference in the average age of the control and AD subjects. These data confirm the presence of poorer hearing ability in AD subjects, provided a quantitative estimate of the magnitude of hearing loss, and suggest that the magnitude of the effect is greater at higher sound frequencies.Systematic Review Registration:https://www.crd.york.ac.uk/prospero/, identifier: CRD42021288280. (shrink)

Sweetpotato-pig production is an important system that generates income, utilizes unmarketable crops, and provides manure for soil fertility maintenance. This system is widely practiced from Asia to Africa, with many local variations. Within this system, pigs are generally fed a low nutrient-dense diet, yielding low growth rates and low economic efficiency. Our project in Vietnam went through a process of situation analysis, participatory technology development (PTD), and scaling up over a seven-year period to improve sweetpotato-pig production and to disseminate developed (...) technologies. The situation analysis included a series of pig production assessments in several provinces in northern and southern Vietnam, and pig supply-market chain identification was conducted in 13 provinces. The analysis of these studies informed the project of the following: (1) appropriate locations for our activities; (2) seasonal available feedstuff and farmers’ feeding practices; (3) market fluctuation and requirements; and (4) feeding and management improvement needs based on which the subsequent phase of PTD was designed. The PTD involved a limited number of farmers participating in sweetpotato varietal selection, sweetpotato root and vine silage processing, seasonal feeding combination, and pig feeding with balanced crop-feed diet and silage. Six years of multi-location and multi-season sweetpotato selection resulted in a few promising varieties that yielded up to 75% more dry matter and have since been formally released. The most significant results of silage processing and feeding trials include improved growth, higher feeding efficiency, increased year-round local feedstuff, and considerable labor reduction from eliminated cooking and vine cutting. Once these technologies were developed, a farmer-to-farmer training model was designed for scaling up the adoption and impact. Farmer trainers from seven communes in seven provinces received training in these technologies. In turn, they undertook the responsibility of training other farmers on sweetpotato selection, processing, and feeding. An impact study was also administered to monitor and evaluate (M&E) the dissemination process and to document the impact of the new technologies and farmer-to-farmer training model on pig growth and farmer income generation. The results showed that both participating and non-participating farmers have taken up the technologies, although the former demonstrates higher rates of adoption than the latter. The participants also generated more income and saved more labor from the adoption of the technologies. While the scaling up and M&E activities are on-going, the project has since broadened from a sweetpotato-pig system perspective to a pig-cropfeed system perspective based on farmers’ needs. It has included other crop feeds such as cassava and peanut stems in the research portfolio. New technologies based on on-going PTD will continuously be incorporated into the future training curriculum. (shrink)

Cảm xúc là yếu tố cơ bản thúc đẩy con người đưa ra quyết định và xử lý thông tin. Sợ hãi là một trong những cảm xúc phổ biến nhất ảnh hưởng đến hành vi của nhà đầu tư cá nhân trên thị trường chứng khoán. Mặc dù nhiều nghiên cứu đã được thực hiện để khám phá tác động của nỗi sợ hãi đối với hiệu quả đầu tư và hành vi giao dịch của nhà đầu tư cá (...) nhân, nhưng vẫn còn rất ít thông tin về các yếu tố ảnh hưởng đến nỗi sợ hãi của nhà đầu tư cá nhân trong thời kỳ thị trường sụt giảm (hoặc những giai đoạn cực kỳ biến động). Vì thế, nghiên cứu này được thực hiện để tìm hiểu liệu các nguồn thông tin ảnh hưởng đến quyết định đầu tư của nhà đầu tư có ảnh hưởng đến sự sợ hãi của họ khi khủng hoảng xảy ra hay không. Nghiên cứu đã sử dụng phương pháp phân tích Bayesian Mindsponge Framework (BMF) trên bộ dữ liệu từ 1526 nhà đầu tư Trung Quốc và Việt Nam. Kết quả nghiên cứu chỉ ra rằng các nhà đầu tư tiếp cận các loại thông tin khác nhau khi đưa ra quyết định đầu tư sẽ ảnh hưởng đến tần suất phản ứng sợ hãi khác nhau. Cụ thể, các nhà đầu tư tham khảo thông tin từ chuyên gia hoặc tự phân tích khi đưa ra quyết định đầu tư ít bị đóng băng (biểu hiện của tâm lý sợ hãi) hơn trong thời kỳ thị trường sụt giảm. Ngược lại, những người đưa ra quyết định đầu tư dựa trên thông tin từ người quen hay bạn bè và trực giác sẽ bị đóng băng thường xuyên hơn. Kết quả nghiên cứu này giúp gợi ý nhà đầu tư cá nhân nên trang bị cho mình các kiến thức về tài chính cũng như tham khảo các ý kiến chuyên gia trên thị trường, hoặc những nguồn thông tin đáng tin cậy, khi đưa ra quyết định đầu tư. Bên cạnh đó, cơ quan quản lý thị trường cần có hoạt động phổ cập kiến thức về thị trường chứng khoán, hạn chế ảnh hưởng của các kênh thông tin không chính thống, và khuyến khích nhà đầu tư ít kinh nghiệm mua chứng chỉ quỹ của các quỹ đầu tư. (shrink)

Nghiên cứu này được thực hiện để tìm hiểu liệu các nguồn thông tin ảnh hưởng đến quyết định đầu tư của nhà đầu tư có ảnh hưởng đến sự sợ hãi của họ khi khủng hoảng xảy ra hay không? Nghiên cứu đã sử dụng phương pháp phân tích Bayesian Mindsponge Framework (BMF) trên bộ dữ liệu từ 1,526 nhà đầu tư Trung Quốc và Việt Nam. Kết quả nghiên cứu chỉ ra rằng, các nhà đầu tư tiếp cận (...) các loại thông tin khác nhau khi đưa ra quyết định đầu tư sẽ ảnh hưởng đến tần suất phản ứng sợ hãi khác nhau. Cụ thể, các nhà đầu tư tham khảo thông tin từ chuyên gia hoặc tự phân tích khi đưa ra quyết định đầu tư ít bị đóng băng (biểu hiện của tâm lý sợ hãi) hơn trong thời kỳ thị trường sụt giảm. Ngược lại, những người đưa ra quyết định đầu tư dựa trên thông tin từ người quen hay bạn bè và trực giác sẽ bị đóng băng thường xuyên hơn. -/- [English Abstract] This study was conducted to explore whether the sources of information priority during decision-making contribute to their fear reactions during crises. The research utilized the Bayesian Mindsponge Framework (BMF) analytics on data collected from 1,526 investors in China and Vietnam. The study results indicated that investors prioritizing different types of information when making investment decisions would have different frequency of fear reactions. Specifically, investors who prioritized information from experts or conducted self-analysis when making investment decisions experienced less freezing (an expression of psychological fear) during market downturns. Conversely, those who based their investment decisions on information from acquaintances, friends, and intuition tended to experience freezing more frequently. (shrink)

Après avoir appartenu au monde sinisé pendant deux mille ans, le Vietnam, conquis par la France en 1858, est entré dans une nouvelle ère. Les intellectuels vietnamiens, surtout ceux issus des écoles franco-indigènes et parlant bien le français, commencent à faire connaître les idées et les penseurs occidentaux à leurs concitoyens. C’est grâce à eux que Tolstoï devient alors célèbre à travers le pays. Dans cet article, nous tentons de donner un aperçu général de la réception de Tolstoï au Vietnam (...) dans la première moitié du XXe siècle. Nous analysons en particulier la biographie de Tolstoï publiée en 1939 et considérée comme l’une des biographies modernes les plus réussies. Conçue et rédigée par Nguyen Phi Hoanh qui souhaitait donner aux lecteurs une compréhension complète de la vie, de l’œuvre, mais aussi des idées de Tolstoï, cette biographie interroge également la pertinence de la philosophie du romancier russe, en particulier sa doctrine de la non-violence dans un contexte colonial. (shrink)

This fourteenth volume of Collected Papers is an eclectic tome of 87 papers in Neutrosophics and other fields, such as mathematics, fuzzy sets, intuitionistic fuzzy sets, picture fuzzy sets, information fusion, robotics, statistics, or extenics, comprising 936 pages, published between 2008-2022 in different scientific journals or currently in press, by the author alone or in collaboration with the following 99 co-authors (alphabetically ordered) from 26 countries: Ahmed B. Al-Nafee, Adesina Abdul Akeem Agboola, Akbar Rezaei, Shariful Alam, Marina Alonso, Fran Andujar, (...) Toshinori Asai, Assia Bakali, Azmat Hussain, Daniela Baran, Bijan Davvaz, Bilal Hadjadji, Carlos Díaz Bohorquez, Robert N. Boyd, M. Caldas, Cenap Özel, Pankaj Chauhan, Victor Christianto, Salvador Coll, Shyamal Dalapati, Irfan Deli, Balasubramanian Elavarasan, Fahad Alsharari, Yonfei Feng, Daniela Gîfu, Rafael Rojas Gualdrón, Haipeng Wang, Hemant Kumar Gianey, Noel Batista Hernández, Abdel-Nasser Hussein, Ibrahim M. Hezam, Ilanthenral Kandasamy, W.B. Vasantha Kandasamy, Muthusamy Karthika, Nour Eldeen M. Khalifa, Madad Khan, Kifayat Ullah, Valeri Kroumov, Tapan Kumar Roy, Deepesh Kunwar, Le Thi Nhung, Pedro López, Mai Mohamed, Manh Van Vu, Miguel A. Quiroz-Martínez, Marcel Migdalovici, Kritika Mishra, Mohamed Abdel-Basset, Mohamed Talea, Mohammad Hamidi, Mohammed Alshumrani, Mohamed Loey, Muhammad Akram, Muhammad Shabir, Mumtaz Ali, Nassim Abbas, Munazza Naz, Ngan Thi Roan, Nguyen Xuan Thao, Rishwanth Mani Parimala, Ion Pătrașcu, Surapati Pramanik, Quek Shio Gai, Qiang Guo, Rajab Ali Borzooei, Nimitha Rajesh, Jesús Estupiñan Ricardo, Juan Miguel Martínez Rubio, Saeed Mirvakili, Arsham Borumand Saeid, Saeid Jafari, Said Broumi, Ahmed A. Salama, Nirmala Sawan, Gheorghe Săvoiu, Ganeshsree Selvachandran, Seok-Zun Song, Shahzaib Ashraf, Jayant Singh, Rajesh Singh, Son Hoang Le, Tahir Mahmood, Kenta Takaya, Mirela Teodorescu, Ramalingam Udhayakumar, Maikel Y. Leyva Vázquez, V. Venkateswara Rao, Luige Vlădăreanu, Victor Vlădăreanu, Gabriela Vlădeanu, Michael Voskoglou, Yaser Saber, Yong Deng, You He, Youcef Chibani, Young Bae Jun, Wadei F. Al-Omeri, Hongbo Wang, Zayen Azzouz Omar. (shrink)

This sixth volume of Collected Papers includes 74 papers comprising 974 pages on (theoretic and applied) neutrosophics, written between 2015-2021 by the author alone or in collaboration with the following 121 co-authors from 19 countries: Mohamed Abdel-Basset, Abdel Nasser H. Zaied, Abduallah Gamal, Amir Abdullah, Firoz Ahmad, Nadeem Ahmad, Ahmad Yusuf Adhami, Ahmed Aboelfetouh, Ahmed Mostafa Khalil, Shariful Alam, W. Alharbi, Ali Hassan, Mumtaz Ali, Amira S. Ashour, Asmaa Atef, Assia Bakali, Ayoub Bahnasse, A. A. Azzam, Willem K.M. Brauers, Bui (...) Cong Cuong, Fausto Cavallaro, Ahmet Çevik, Robby I. Chandra, Kalaivani Chandran, Victor Chang, Chang Su Kim, Jyotir Moy Chatterjee, Victor Christianto, Chunxin Bo, Mihaela Colhon, Shyamal Dalapati, Arindam Dey, Dunqian Cao, Fahad Alsharari, Faruk Karaaslan, Aleksandra Fedajev, Daniela Gîfu, Hina Gulzar, Haitham A. El-Ghareeb, Masooma Raza Hashmi, Hewayda El-Ghawalby, Hoang Viet Long, Le Hoang Son, F. Nirmala Irudayam, Branislav Ivanov, S. Jafari, Jeong Gon Lee, Milena Jevtić, Sudan Jha, Junhui Kim, Ilanthenral Kandasamy, W.B. Vasantha Kandasamy, Darjan Karabašević, Songül Karabatak, Abdullah Kargın, M. Karthika, Ieva Meidute-Kavaliauskiene, Madad Khan, Majid Khan, Manju Khari, Kifayat Ullah, K. Kishore, Kul Hur, Santanu Kumar Patro, Prem Kumar Singh, Raghvendra Kumar, Tapan Kumar Roy, Malayalan Lathamaheswari, Luu Quoc Dat, T. Madhumathi, Tahir Mahmood, Mladjan Maksimovic, Gunasekaran Manogaran, Nivetha Martin, M. Kasi Mayan, Mai Mohamed, Mohamed Talea, Muhammad Akram, Muhammad Gulistan, Raja Muhammad Hashim, Muhammad Riaz, Muhammad Saeed, Rana Muhammad Zulqarnain, Nada A. Nabeeh, Deivanayagampillai Nagarajan, Xenia Negrea, Nguyen Xuan Thao, Jagan M. Obbineni, Angelo de Oliveira, M. Parimala, Gabrijela Popovic, Ishaani Priyadarshini, Yaser Saber, Mehmet Șahin, Said Broumi, A. A. Salama, M. Saleh, Ganeshsree Selvachandran, Dönüș Șengür, Shio Gai Quek, Songtao Shao, Dragiša Stanujkić, Surapati Pramanik, Swathi Sundari Sundaramoorthy, Mirela Teodorescu, Selçuk Topal, Muhammed Turhan, Alptekin Ulutaș, Luige Vlădăreanu, Victor Vlădăreanu, Ştefan Vlăduţescu, Dan Valeriu Voinea, Volkan Duran, Navneet Yadav, Yanhui Guo, Naveed Yaqoob, Yongquan Zhou, Young Bae Jun, Xiaohong Zhang, Xiao Long Xin, Edmundas Kazimieras Zavadskas. (shrink)

This seventh volume of Collected Papers includes 70 papers comprising 974 pages on (theoretic and applied) neutrosophics, written between 2013-2021 by the author alone or in collaboration with the following 122 co-authors from 22 countries: Mohamed Abdel-Basset, Abdel-Nasser Hussian, C. Alexander, Mumtaz Ali, Yaman Akbulut, Amir Abdullah, Amira S. Ashour, Assia Bakali, Kousik Bhattacharya, Kainat Bibi, R. N. Boyd, Ümit Budak, Lulu Cai, Cenap Özel, Chang Su Kim, Victor Christianto, Chunlai Du, Chunxin Bo, Rituparna Chutia, Cu Nguyen Giap, Dao (...) The Son, Vinayak Devvrat, Arindam Dey, Partha Pratim Dey, Fahad Alsharari, Feng Yongfei, S. Ganesan, Shivam Ghildiyal, Bibhas C. Giri, Masooma Raza Hashmi, Ahmed Refaat Hawas, Hoang Viet Long, Le Hoang Son, Hongbo Wang, Hongnian Yu, Mihaiela Iliescu, Saeid Jafari, Temitope Gbolahan Jaiyeola, Naeem Jan, R. Jeevitha, Jun Ye, Anup Khan, Madad Khan, Salma Khan, Ilanthenral Kandasamy, W.B. Vasantha Kandasamy, Darjan Karabašević, Kifayat Ullah, Kishore Kumar P.K., Sujit Kumar De, Prasun Kumar Nayak, Malayalan Lathamaheswari, Luong Thi Hong Lan, Anam Luqman, Luu Quoc Dat, Tahir Mahmood, Hafsa M. Malik, Nivetha Martin, Mai Mohamed, Parimala Mani, Mingcong Deng, Mohammed A. Al Shumrani, Mohammad Hamidi, Mohamed Talea, Kalyan Mondal, Muhammad Akram, Muhammad Gulistan, Farshid Mofidnakhaei, Muhammad Shoaib, Muhammad Riaz, Karthika Muthusamy, Nabeela Ishfaq, Deivanayagampillai Nagarajan, Sumera Naz, Nguyen Dinh Hoa, Nguyen Tho Thong, Nguyen Xuan Thao, Noor ul Amin, Dragan Pamučar, Gabrijela Popović, S. Krishna Prabha, Surapati Pramanik, Priya R, Qiaoyan Li, Yaser Saber, Said Broumi, Saima Anis, Saleem Abdullah, Ganeshsree Selvachandran, Abdulkadir Sengür, Seyed Ahmad Edalatpanah, Shahbaz Ali, Shahzaib Ashraf, Shouzhen Zeng, Shio Gai Quek, Shuangwu Zhu, Shumaiza, Sidra Sayed, Sohail Iqbal, Songtao Shao, Sundas Shahzadi, Dragiša Stanujkić, Željko Stević, Udhayakumar Ramalingam, Zunaira Rashid, Hossein Rashmanlou, Rajkumar Verma, Luige Vlădăreanu, Victor Vlădăreanu, Desmond Jun Yi Tey, Selçuk Topal, Naveed Yaqoob, Yanhui Guo, Yee Fei Gan, Yingcang Ma, Young Bae Jun, Yuping Lai, Hafiz Abdul Wahab, Wei Yang, Xiaohong Zhang, Edmundas Kazimieras Zavadskas, Lemnaouar Zedam. (shrink)

This eighth volume of Collected Papers includes 75 papers comprising 973 pages on (theoretic and applied) neutrosophics, written between 2010-2022 by the author alone or in collaboration with the following 102 co-authors (alphabetically ordered) from 24 countries: Mohamed Abdel-Basset, Abduallah Gamal, Firoz Ahmad, Ahmad Yusuf Adhami, Ahmed B. Al-Nafee, Ali Hassan, Mumtaz Ali, Akbar Rezaei, Assia Bakali, Ayoub Bahnasse, Azeddine Elhassouny, Durga Banerjee, Romualdas Bausys, Mircea Boșcoianu, Traian Alexandru Buda, Bui Cong Cuong, Emilia Calefariu, Ahmet Çevik, Chang Su Kim, Victor (...) Christianto, Dae Wan Kim, Daud Ahmad, Arindam Dey, Partha Pratim Dey, Mamouni Dhar, H. A. Elagamy, Ahmed K. Essa, Sudipta Gayen, Bibhas C. Giri, Daniela Gîfu, Noel Batista Hernández, Hojjatollah Farahani, Huda E. Khalid, Irfan Deli, Saeid Jafari, Tèmítópé Gbóláhàn Jaíyéolá, Sripati Jha, Sudan Jha, Ilanthenral Kandasamy, W.B. Vasantha Kandasamy, Darjan Karabašević, M. Karthika, Kawther F. Alhasan, Giruta Kazakeviciute-Januskeviciene, Qaisar Khan, Kishore Kumar P K, Prem Kumar Singh, Ranjan Kumar, Maikel Leyva-Vázquez, Mahmoud Ismail, Tahir Mahmood, Hafsa Masood Malik, Mohammad Abobala, Mai Mohamed, Gunasekaran Manogaran, Seema Mehra, Kalyan Mondal, Mohamed Talea, Mullai Murugappan, Muhammad Akram, Muhammad Aslam Malik, Muhammad Khalid Mahmood, Nivetha Martin, Durga Nagarajan, Nguyen Van Dinh, Nguyen Xuan Thao, Lewis Nkenyereya, Jagan M. Obbineni, M. Parimala, S. K. Patro, Peide Liu, Pham Hong Phong, Surapati Pramanik, Gyanendra Prasad Joshi, Quek Shio Gai, R. Radha, A.A. Salama, S. Satham Hussain, Mehmet Șahin, Said Broumi, Ganeshsree Selvachandran, Selvaraj Ganesan, Shahbaz Ali, Shouzhen Zeng, Manjeet Singh, A. Stanis Arul Mary, Dragiša Stanujkić, Yusuf Șubaș, Rui-Pu Tan, Mirela Teodorescu, Selçuk Topal, Zenonas Turskis, Vakkas Uluçay, Norberto Valcárcel Izquierdo, V. Venkateswara Rao, Volkan Duran, Ying Li, Young Bae Jun, Wadei F. Al-Omeri, Jian-qiang Wang, Lihshing Leigh Wang, Edmundas Kazimieras Zavadskas. (shrink)

This eleventh volume of Collected Papers includes 90 papers comprising 988 pages on Physics, Artificial Intelligence, Health Issues, Decision Making, Economics, Statistics, written between 2001-2022 by the author alone or in collaboration with the following 84 co-authors (alphabetically ordered) from 19 countries: Abhijit Saha, Abu Sufian, Jack Allen, Shahbaz Ali, Ali Safaa Sadiq, Aliya Fahmi, Atiqa Fakhar, Atiqa Firdous, Sukanto Bhattacharya, Robert N. Boyd, Victor Chang, Victor Christianto, V. Christy, Dao The Son, Debjit Dutta, Azeddine Elhassouny, Fazal Ghani, Fazli Amin, (...) Anirudha Ghosha, Nasruddin Hassan, Hoang Viet Long, Jhulaneswar Baidya, Jin Kim, Jun Ye, Darjan Karabašević, Vasilios N. Katsikis, Ieva Meidutė-Kavaliauskienė, F. Kaymarm, Nour Eldeen M. Khalifa, Madad Khan, Qaisar Khan, M. Khoshnevisan, Kifayat Ullah,, Volodymyr Krasnoholovets, Mukesh Kumar, Le Hoang Son, Luong Thi Hong Lan, Tahir Mahmood, Mahmoud Ismail, Mohamed Abdel-Basset, Siti Nurul Fitriah Mohamad, Mohamed Loey, Mai Mohamed, K. Mohana, Kalyan Mondal, Muhammad Gulfam, Muhammad Khalid Mahmood, Muhammad Jamil, Muhammad Yaqub Khan, Muhammad Riaz, Nguyen Dinh Hoa, Cu Nguyen Giap, Nguyen Tho Thong, Peide Liu, Pham Huy Thong, Gabrijela Popović‬‬‬‬‬‬‬‬‬‬, Surapati Pramanik, Dmitri Rabounski, Roslan Hasni, Rumi Roy, Tapan Kumar Roy, Said Broumi, Saleem Abdullah, Muzafer Saračević, Ganeshsree Selvachandran, Shariful Alam, Shyamal Dalapati, Housila P. Singh, R. Singh, Rajesh Singh, Predrag S. Stanimirović, Kasan Susilo, Dragiša Stanujkić, Alexandra Şandru, Ovidiu Ilie Şandru, Zenonas Turskis, Yunita Umniyati, Alptekin Ulutaș, Maikel Yelandi Leyva Vázquez, Binyamin Yusoff, Edmundas Kazimieras Zavadskas, Zhao Loon Wang.‬‬‬‬. (shrink)

Value capture occurs when an agent’s values are rich and subtle; they enter a social environment that presents simplified — typically quantified — versions of those values; and those simplified articulations come to dominate their practical reasoning. Examples include becoming motivated by FitBit’s step counts, Twitter Likes and Re-tweets, citation rates, ranked lists of best schools, and Grade Point Averages. We are vulnerable to value capture because of the competitive advantage that such crisp and clear expressions of value have in (...) our private reasoning and our public justification. There is, however, a price. In value capture, we take a central component of our autonomy — our ongoing deliberation over the exact articulation of our values — and we outsource it. And the metrics to which we outsource usually engineered for the interests of some external force, like a large-scale institution’s interest in cross-contextual comprehensibility and quick aggregability. That outsourcing cuts off one of the key benefits to personal deliberation. In value capture, we no longer adjust our values and their articulations in light of own rich experience of the world. Our values should often be carefully tailored to our particular selves or our small-scale communities, but in value capture, we buy our values off the rack. In some cases – like decreasing CO2 emissions – the costs of non-tailored values are outweighed by the benefit of precise collective coordination. In other cases, like in our aesthetic lives, they are not. This suggests that we should want different values suited to different scales. We should want value federalism. Some values are perhaps best pursued at the largest-scale level, others at smaller scales. The problem occurs when we exhibit an excess preference for the largest-scale values – when we consistently let the universal metrics swamp our quieter interests. (shrink)

Art can be addressed, not just to individuals, but to groups. Art can even be part of how groups think to themselves – how they keep a grip on their values over time. I focus on monuments as a case study. Monuments, I claim, can function as a commitment to a group value, for the sake of long-term action guidance. Art can function here where charters and mission statements cannot, precisely because of art’s powers to capture subtlety and emotion. In (...) particular, art can serve as the vessel for group emotions, by making emotional content sufficiently public so as to be the object of a group commitment. Art enables groups to guide themselves with values too subtle to be codified. (shrink)

This paper is an attempt to advances research on walking, at a neighbourhood level of analysis for people with disabilities, by proposing a theoretical model that combines the knowledge of two disciplines: traffic planning and environmental psychology. The aim is to provide a guidance for a discussion and a planning of future interdisciplinary investigations, by proposing a model that accounts for the dynamic interaction between environmental characteristics, human processes, and walking experience among individuals with a disability. For this purpose, traffic (...) planners and environmental psychologists came together to discuss theories, concepts, and thematic of relevance in a series of focus group meetings. These meetings led to the selection of the Human Environment Interaction (HEI) model, originally developed from the field of environmental psychology, and operationalised to describe how walking experiences result from the interplay between individual abilities, emotional processes and physical and social characteristics of the environment (Küller, 1991). The proposed model aims to sustain interdisciplinary discussion and research planning around the topic of neighbourhood walking for people with disabilities. By operationalising each dimension in the model, a good fit between groups with disabilities and individual differences associated with walking experiences is assumed, which in turn will have the potential to provide a more conscious analysis of wellbeing-related outcomes such as, usability of the environment, frequency of mobility, and quality of life. However, to improve understanding of urban walking at a neighbourhood level for people with disabilities, empirical studies must be carried out to test the proposed model. (shrink)

The idea that gauge theory has `surplus' structure poses a puzzle: in one much discussed sense, this structure is redundant; but on the other hand, it is also widely held to play an essential role in the theory. In this paper, we employ category-theoretic tools to illuminate an aspect of this puzzle. We precisify what is meant by `surplus' structure by means of functorial comparisons with equivalence classes of gauge fields, and then show that such structure is essential for any (...) theory that represents a rich collection of physically relevant fields which are `local' in nature. (shrink)

We present an argument-based formalism of contract dispute resolution following a modern view that the court would resolve a contract dispute by enforcing an interpretation of contract that reasonably represents the mutual intention of contract parties. Legal doctrines provide principles, rules and guidelines for the court to objectively arrive at such an interpretation. In this paper, we establish the appropriateness of the formalism by applying it to resolve disputes about performance relief with the legal doctrines of impossibility and frustration of (...) purpose in common laws of contract. The formalism is based on modular argumentation, a recently proposed extension of assumption-based argumentation for modelling contract dispute resolution. (shrink)

This paper examines Jacques Derrida's deconstruction of Giorgio Agamben's account of the history of bio-politics in the Beast and the Sovereign. In this account, the ‘threshold of bio-political modernity’ is identified with the collapse of an allegedly immemorial distinction between life and the law. According to Derrida, however, this in-distinction between life and the law, which supposedly marks the historical emergence of the bio-political, is in fact an originary event. Agamben, therefore, announces a bio-political modernity that has always already existed. (...) In this essay, I argue that Derrida, in the Beast and the Sovereign, fails to grasp the significance of one of the principal figures employed in Agamben's theory of the bio-political, the ‘threshold’. This figure, which Agamben opposes, elsewhere in his writings, to the Derridean notion of difference/deferral, does not refer to either an historical beginning or something that has always already existed. Rather, the threshold is defined as a particular moment in which an originary phenomenon becomes a decisive historical norm. In his ‘history’ of the bio-political, therefore, Agamben identifies the modernity of the latter in terms of the historical normalization of an in-distinction between law and life that has always already occurred. (shrink)

In the university system today, co-research may be a decolonising strategy. We evaluate teaching a ‘Modernization and Social Change’ course in Vietnam as an experiment in co-research anthropology t...

In lieu of an abstract, here is a brief excerpt of the content:Reviewed by:Live Like Nobody Is Watching: Relational Autonomy in the Age of Artificial Intelligence Health Monitoring by Anita HoTina Nguyen (bio)Live Like Nobody Is Watching: Relational Autonomy in the Age of Artificial Intelligence Health Monitoring by Anita Ho New York: Oxford University Press, 2023As the reach of artificial intelligence (AI)- and machine learning (ML)-enabled technologies continues to expand in the healthcare field, bioethicists have examined the ethical issues (...) that come as a result of using these technologies. In this ethical assessment, most bioethicists, myself included, have discussed how AI/ML violates the ethical principle of autonomy. The commonly cited definition of autonomy comes from Beauchamp and Childress's Principles of Biomedical Ethics (2019), where autonomy is the right of the individual to make decisions for themselves. However, autonomy regarding AI/ML in healthcare has not been or is rarely discussed from the feminist perspective. In Live Like Nobody Is Watching: Relational Autonomy in the Age of Artificial Intelligence Health Monitoring (further referred to as Live Like Nobody Is Watching), Anita Ho, in addition to other points, argues that AI for health monitoring needs to be examined through a relational autonomy lens. Not only is this perspective innovative but it also shows how a predominantly male field has shaped the narrative surrounding AI/ML. In this review, I provide a brief overview of the chapters, explore Ho's arguments for relational autonomy, and discuss future applications of this work.Live Like Nobody Is Watching begins with a preface where the readers are introduced to a real-life scenario. Ho describes a friend's experience of [End Page 101] debating with themself whether to use surveillance for their mother with early-stage dementia who claims someone has been moving her things. This sets up the rest of the book in which questions of should these technologies be used and in what context are they appropriate are debated using relational autonomy. The introduction serves as a brief primer to AI (ML and deep learning) and its role in healthcare followed by a layout of the subsequent chapters. Chapter 1 connects health monitoring AI with relational autonomy, where Ho suggests that the liberal view of autonomy is not appropriate for health monitoring technologies. This is due to the fact that the patient populations using these technologies are reliant, to various degrees, on social relationships. In chapters 2, 3, and 4, Ho addresses how health-monitoring AI requires relational autonomy through use cases concerning home-health monitoring, direct-to-consumer monitoring, and AI monitoring for medication adherence. Throughout these chapters, Ho discusses the claimed benefits of these AI/ML interventions and cautions about the ethical challenges, such as health inequities and testimonial injustice, that can arise with these technologies. Finally, chapter 5 serves as the conclusion, where Ho ultimately argues that health-monitoring AI should be viewed through relational autonomy instead of the traditional view, and she advocates for dialogic engagement (including bringing patients/patients' families into the conversation). The narrative goes full circle with the events in the preface being addressed in the epilogue, where the friend decided to incorporate a smart frame device that would allow them to have video calls with their mother. However, the friend is still grappling with the idea of surveillance given an incident in which another dementia resident accidentally wandered into their mother's room. To this, Ho ends the book by proposing better lighting in the hallways rather than immediately turning to the next high-tech innovation.Ho presents several arguments throughout the book but emphasizes the main argument that relational autonomy should be practiced over the traditional, liberal view of autonomy. Ho discusses the three elements of socio-relational autonomy (using Catriona Mackenzie's work): self-governance, self-determination, and self-authorization. Components of the traditional bioethical view of autonomy are seen in these three elements, with the process of informed consent being closely tied to the concept of autonomy. Under the traditional view, an autonomous individual should have decision-making capacity and be able to make a decision based on the information provided to them without coercion. In the informed consent process, patients should be provided adequate information along with... (shrink)

The book "An Encouragement of Learning" by Fukuzawa Yukichi (1834 - 1901) is among those that had a significant impact on Japan’s development in the late 19th century and early 20th century. It contains a wealth of original educational theory on a variety of topics, including the function of education, the subject, goal, content, and methodology of practical learning. Fukuzawa Yukichi's perspectives on practical learning still prove to have historical influence on the development of education today.

There seems to be a deep tension between two aspects of aesthetic appreciation. On the one hand, we care about getting things right. On the other hand, we demand autonomy. We want appreciators to arrive at their aesthetic judgments through their own cognitive efforts, rather than deferring to experts. These two demands seem to be in tension; after all, if we want to get the right judgments, we should defer to the judgments of experts. The best explanation, I suggest, is (...) that aesthetic appreciation is something like a game. When we play a game, we try to win. But often, winning isn’t the point; playing is. Aesthetic appreciation involves the same flipped motivational structure: we aim at the goal of correctness, but having correct judgments isn’t the point. The point is the engaged process of interpreting, investigating, and exploring the aesthetic object. Deferring to aesthetic testimony, then, makes the same mistake as looking up the answer to a puzzle, rather than solving it for oneself. The shortcut defeats the whole point. This suggests a new account of aesthetic value: the engagement account. The primary value of the activity of aesthetic appreciation lies in the process of trying to generate correct judgments, and not in having correct judgments. -/- *There is an audio version available: look for the Soundcloud link, below.*. (shrink)

We give complete sequent-like tableau systems for the modal logics KB, KDB, K5, and KD5. Analytic cut rules are used to obtain the completeness. Our systems have the analytic superformula property and can thus give a decision procedure. Using the systems, we prove the Craig interpolation lemma for the mentioned logics.

Much of the literature supports the moral development theory as a justification for teachers to care, where teachers should care for their students because it contributes to their moral education as caring persons. If no causal relationship can be established, the question remains whether we would want teachers to care, preferably one that does not merely import its external normative significance into teaching. I argue that an understanding of teaching, and moreover, of good teaching already has embedded within it conceptions (...) of care. Understanding that teaching involves care would then challenge virtue/character-based conceptions of the good teacher. While these clarifications are modest in scope, taking caring seriously in teaching has implications on how we conceptualize the good teacher, which in turn affects how both teacher education and professional ethics might be understood. (shrink)

I propose to study one problem for epistemic dependence on experts: how to locate experts on what I will call cognitive islands. Cognitive islands are those domains for knowledge in which expertise is required to evaluate other experts. They exist under two conditions: first, that there is no test for expertise available to the inexpert; and second, that the domain is not linked to another domain with such a test. Cognitive islands are the places where we have the fewest resources (...) for evaluating experts, which makes our expert dependences particularly risky. -/- Some have argued that cognitive islands lead to the complete unusability of expert testimony: that anybody who needs expert advice on a cognitive island will be entirely unable to find it. I argue against this radical form of pessimism, but propose a more moderate alternative. I demonstrate that we have some resources for finding experts on cognitive islands, but that cognitive islands leave us vulnerable to an epistemic trap which I will call runaway echo chambers. In a runaway echo chamber, our inexpertise may lead us to pick out bad experts, which will simply reinforce our mistaken beliefs and sensibilities. (shrink)

Semi-Post algebras of any type T being a poset have been introduced and investigated in [CR87a], [CR87b]. Plain Semi-Post algebras are in this paper singled out among semi-Post algebras because of their simplicity, greatest similarity with Post algebras as well as their importance in logics for approximation reasoning ([Ra87a], [Ra87b], [RaEp87]). They are pseudo-Boolean algebras generated in a sense by corresponding Boolean algebras and a poset T. Every element has a unique descending representation by means of elements in a corresponding (...) Boolean algebra and primitive Post constants which form a poset T. An axiomatization and another characterization, subalgebras, homomorphisms, congruences determined by special filters and a representability theory of these algebras, connected with that for Boolean algebras, are the subject of this paper. (shrink)

In our life with science, we trust experts; we form judgements by inference from past evidence. We conduct ourselves very differently in the aesthetic domain. We avoid deferring to aesthetic experts. We form our judgements through direct perception of particulars rather than through inference. Why the difference? I suggest that we avoid aesthetic testimony and aesthetic inference, not because they’re unusable, but because we have adopted social norms to avoid them. Aesthetic appreciation turns out to be something like a game. (...) We have laid down certain rules and restrictions in order to shape a kind of activity we cherish. And aesthetic properties turn out to be a kind of social construct. Much like the goal of a game, they are constituted in part by our obedience to certain rules. The norms of aesthetic life are different from those of science because our purposes are different. We engage in science to get the right answers; we engage in aesthetic appreciation to be absorbed in the activity of the sensuous perception of particulars. Our aesthetic practices are a constructed shelter from science; they restore to us a small domain where we may once again engage in our own sensuous perception of particulars. (shrink)

What is the primary intellectual aim of philosophy? The standard view is that philosophy aims to provide true answers to philosophical questions. But if our aim is to settle controversy by answering such questions, our discipline is an embarrassing failure. Moreover, taking philosophy to aim at providing true answers to these questions leads to a variety of puzzles: How do we account for philosophical expertise? How is philosophical progress possible? Why do job search committees not care about the truth or (...) falsity of a candidate’s philosophical views? We argue that philosophy does not aim at discovering true answers to philosophical questions. Instead, its primary intellectual aim is understanding. We argue that many familiar aspects of philosophy become intelligible once we accept this hypothesis. (shrink)

Climate change has become one of the most pressing problems that can threaten the existence and development of humans around the globe. Almost all climate scientists have agreed that climate change is happening and is caused mainly by greenhouse gas emissions induced by anthropogenic activities. However, some groups still deny this fact or do not believe that climate change results from human activities. This essay discusses the causes, significance, and skeptical arguments of climate change denialism, as well as the roles (...) of scientists and science communication in addressing the issues. Through this essay, we call for the active participation of scientists in science communication activities with the public, the opening of new science communication sectors specified for climate change, and more attention to social sciences and humanities in addressing climate change issues. (shrink)

In a series of closely connected papers, Rosenthal has defended what has come to be known as “the higher-order thought theory of state-consciousness.” According to this theory, a mental state which one instantiates is conscious if and only if one is conscious of being in it in some relevant way, and one’s being conscious of being in the state which is conscious consists in one’s having a contemporaneous thought to the effect that one is in that state. The main aim (...) of this paper is to disarm a Searle-style objection to Rosenthal’s account of state-consciousness, one that takes mentality, in particular intentionality, to presuppose state-consciousness. It is argued that the Searlean attempt to convict Rosenthal’s hypothesis of circularity fails, because the postulation of what Searle called “subjective ontology,” as well as the requirement that there be an uncancelable connection between mode of representation and state-consciousness, is unreasonable. While defending Rosenthal against Searle, this paper also aims to develop a fresh objection to the higher-order thought conception of state-consciousness. (shrink)

What could ground normative restrictions concerning cultural appropriation which are not grounded by independent considerations such as property rights or harm? We propose that such restrictions can be grounded by considerations of intimacy. Consider the familiar phenomenon of interpersonal intimacy. Certain aspects of personal life and interpersonal relationships are afforded various protections in virtue of being intimate. We argue that an analogous phenomenon exists at the level of large groups. In many cases, members of a group engage in shared practices (...) that contribute to a sense of common identity, such as wearing certain hair or clothing styles or performing a certain style of music. Participation in such practices can generate relations of group intimacy, which can ground certain prerogatives in much the same way that interpersonal intimacy can. One such prerogative is making what we call an appropriation claim. An appropriation claim is a request from a group member that non-members refrain from appropriating a given element of the group’s culture. Ignoring appropriation claims can constitute a breach of intimacy. But, we argue, just as for the prerogatives of interpersonal intimacy, in many cases there is no prior fact of the matter about whether the appropriation of a given cultural practice constitutes a breach of intimacy. It depends on what the group decides together. (shrink)