This paper analyses the way articles are published in scientific journals in the field of law in the Republic of Moldova, including an experiment with a previously published article. Lack of compliance with journal publishing standards, including peer reviewing of articles, leads to the fact that virtually any article can be published. The examined journals do not perform their natural functions, but are rather used by researchers to report that they have scientific outcomes. The study allows us to consider that (...) publishing in scientific journals is an indicator of the quality of scientific research, as well as an indicator of compliance with scientific research ethical principles. Scientific misconduct and lack of scientific meritocracy that are characteristic of some of the post-Soviet science, are very well reflected in the law field in the Republic of Moldova. (shrink)

Open Science becomes the basic concept in organizing and conducting the research and development process. The opening of the process of research and communication of science is supported and promoted both at the international level and at the national level in many countries through science policies and actions. At present, no Open Science policy is approved at the national level in the Republic of Moldova, but there are actions, undertaken by various organizations or within some projects, that promote this concept. (...) And recently, the national authority in the field of science policy has been concerned about the promotion of Open Science principles in the country. Policy development and implementation of Open Science principles is difficult without involving all stakeholders and without knowledge of the current situation, both in terms of technical and legislative issues, and especially in terms of awareness of the need and willingness of people to contribute to this process. In this context, we set out to carry out this study, taking into account the insufficient level of debates and analyzes on Open Science subject carried out in the Republic of Moldova. Its purpose is to determine the attitude, the level of awareness and involvement in issues related to Open Science and its elements in the Republic of Moldova, which will serve to develop Open Science policies and instruments at national and institutional levels. (shrink)

Gheorghe Sferlea | : Cet article examine les premières tentatives d’interprétation théologique du titre marial Theotokos au IVe siècle. Au coeur de cette histoire on retrouve Apollinaire, évêque de Laodicée et figure importante du camp pro-nicéen, qui a élaboré une théorie controversée sur l’unité du Christ, notamment en excluant l’intellect humain de la constitution du Sauveur. C’est dans le cadre de cette préoccupation plus large qu’il vit l’opportunité de tenter une appropriation théologique du titre Theotokos et qu’il en fit (...) un outil polémique dans la stratégie d’ériger sa propre position en orthodoxie christologique. L’idée que je défends ici est que Diodore de Tarse, Grégoire de Nazianze, Grégoire de Nysse et Théodore de Mopsueste se sont tous confrontés à l’interprétation proposée par Apollinaire et ont cherché les meilleurs moyens d’y réagir. | : This article examines the first attempts of theological interpretation of Marian title Theotokos in the fourth Century. At the centre of this history stands Apollinarius, bishop of Laodiceea and a significant character of the pro-Nicene movement, who elaborated a controversial account on the unity of Christ that excluded human intellect from Saviour’s constitution. It was within this broader concern that he saw the opportunity of attempting a theological appropriation of title Theotokos and made it a polemical tool in the strategy of establishing his own Christological stance as authoritative. My contention is that Diodore of Tarsus, Gregory of Nazianzus, Gregory of Nyssa and Theodore of Mopsuestia all found themselves confronted with Apollinarius’ interpretation and searched ways of reacting to it. (shrink)

Technology and society are deeply interconnected, as technology emerges from the existent cultural framework and consequently shapes society on the micro level of human interaction and the larger scale of social structure and system. This paper tackles the digital transformation present in Industry 4.0 and Society 5.0. We analyse disruptive digital technologies by focusing on the social or cultural context of their creation, their core philosophy, and the impact they seem to have or how society may be shaped by their (...) extended implementation and adoption. As technology is basically not neutral in its purpose, serving different personal and organizational interests, we use a multiple point-of-view approach to our study in order to elaborate an encompassing representation of the phenomenon. (shrink)

Serban Leoca, Purtãtori de adevãr Napoca Star, Cluj-Napoca; Galaxia Gutemberg, Tg. Lãpus, 2005.

The main thesis of this article is that Western societies risk becoming Balkanized if they confront the superdiversity issue without sound management of intolerance. The Balkanization process has some essential features that allow the use of this term outside the area of origin (namely the Balkan Peninsula). Thus: It always affects a diverse political unit that comprises an inextricable medley of racial, ethnocultural, religious, ideological, or gender identities. It emerges only where neither the hegemony principle nor the confederacy principle can (...) sustain a divided population’s peaceful coexistence. It entails “antagonistic and conflict-oriented relationships resistant to resolution” between the groups or classes dissociated from a diverse political unit. It increases the density of physical and psychological boundaries between the formerly associated parts. It is perpetuated by the great sponsors of the dissociated parts. Any diverse political unit can enter a process of Balkanization, regardless of its degree of culture and civilization. Balkanization does not have a fatal course. Just as there is no society immune to Balkanization, there is no diverse society doomed to Balkanization. Balkanization can be prevented, checked, stopped, or reversed, depending on society members’ individual and collective actions. To survive, the superdiverse liberal democracies from the Euro-Atlantic area need an agonistic public sphere, where actionable truths emerge from a genuine clash of educated opinions. If intolerance management is the first step in preventing the Balkanization of a superdiverse political unit, promoting social and political tolerance towards all people who express educated opinions is the best starting point to genuine tolerance. The return to Enlightenment rationalism values that underpinned our freedom of thought and expression will help us meet the challenges inherent in current and future superdiversity. By feeding enlightened conversations and debates with genuine, educated opinions, people learn to have tolerance for “unpleasant” pieces of knowledge. Then, they spread general tolerance – as a by-product – across the entire society. (shrink)

In order to decide whether a discursive product of human reason corresponds or not to the logical order, one must analyze it in terms of syntactic correctness, consistency, and validity. The first step in logical analysis is formalization, that is, the process by which logical forms of thoughts are represented in different formal languages or logical systems. Although each thought can be properly formalized in different ways, the formalization variants are not equally adequate. The adequacy of formalization seems to depend (...) on several essential features: parsimony, accuracy, transparency, fertility and reliability. Because there is a partial antinomy between these traits, it is impossible to find a perfectly adequate variant of formalization. However, it is possible and preferable to reach a reasonable compromise by choosing the variant of formalization which satisfies all of these fundamental characteristics. (shrink)

The main thesis of my article is that the viability of the European Union does not depend so much on its political structure as on its being anchored in a culture-based public sphere and on the establishment of a cultural European citizenship. The public sphere could be defined as an unique world, characterized by consensus and cooperation, in which only public goods can be sought and acquired, or as an unique world, characterized by rivalry and competition, in which everyone could (...) pursue their private interests, but only if there is a consensus regarding an objective and fair procedure. In any way, we cannot speak of a pluralism of public spheres - like the black public sphere, the LGBT public sphere, etc. - but (at the most) a plurality of interests represented in the public sphere, under the reserve of respecting a fair procedure, which allows the expression of axiological judgments. The EU needs a progressive citizenship, from civil citizenship to cultural citizenship, depending on the acquired skills, behavior and virtues. One deserves cultural citizenship and have the right (or, perhaps the privilege) to manifest - in the public sphere - a way of life and a cultural identity only if promote authentic values: virtues, rationality, free will etc. The problematic aspects of the European media sphere are obstacles on the way to establishing an authentic European cultural citizenship. They can be kept under control by assuming a healthy reactionary attitude and associating every element of change and contingent progress (speed, reductive simplicity, user's solitude, pictoriality, lateralness, data overload, immediacy, segmentation, social amnesia, etc.) with an element of moderation and equilibrium. Only thus can the media contribute in the making of a viable union of the European peoples, grounded on a well articulated European cultural citizenship. (shrink)

The main thesis of this paper is that justice is not a natural law that (re)establishes equilibrium and order in the universe, but a disposition enforced by a fighting will to render to every man his due in line with a regime of rights, powers, or immunities to use, enjoy and control some external goods. Inasmuch as there is no sense, feeling or instinct of justice, it is reasonable to assert that people regulate their conduct under the authority of a (...) legislative authority according to certain ideas of justice, which they adopt and promote through a steady effort of knowledge and will. Critical analysis of the main types of justice − associative justice, punitive justice, corrective justice, restorative justice, functional justice, normative justice, commutative justice and distributive justice − from a liberal democratic perspective highlights the formal requirements of justice in different social arrangements and in relation to various aspects of personal and social life. Because it lacks a natural foundation of justice and people have strong interests in enforcing a certain idea of justice, public debates about justice entail a clash of militant wills. Debaters engage in a struggle for political hegemony trying to exclude from the public sphere the rival ideas about justice. In other words, all substantive debates about justice are carried out in an agonistic public sphere. The more civilized and reasonable the agonistic debates about justice are, the more likely the idea of justice is to fit the vital interests of individuals and society. (shrink)

This paper aims to measure the quality of all Romanian cities’ websites in 2019 and 2022, before and after the disruptive event of COVID-19. Since the official websites are the core instrument of e-governance, the changes in the quality of Romanian cities’ websites reflect the changes in the development of urban e-governance in Romania. The COVID-19 lockdowns and contact restrictions and the moving of most activities into the online environment had the potential to impact the performance of Romanian cities’ websites (...) significantly and catalyze the progress of local e-governance. The quality of Romanian cities’ official websites was measured using an adapted survey instrument proposed by Holzer and Kim and Manoharan, Melitski, and Holzer. The tool covers five critical criteria of website quality or performance: personal data security, usability, content, services, and citizen participation. The research results may seem contrary to expectations: the improvements of websites have been incremental rather than transformational. Although our research provides only a case study, we may assert that the reform of traditional administration remains a step-by-step process. Our study’s main contribution consists in showing that the progress of e-governance is an incremental process even in a situation of emergency that requires the moving of most activities into the online environment. (shrink)

This investigation discusses the relation between ontology and metaphysics. They are different, but how different? While metaphysics is transcendental and has as purpose the justification of being as existence, it establishes it, too. Metaphysics is speculation (as theoretical approach in the strong meaning of the term) on being. This relation can only emphasize the aporetic quality of metaphysics.

The main goal of this study is to develop a conceptual framework meant (a) to present the essential traits of persuasion, (b) to explain resistance to persuasion (mainly when the persuader tries to shape, reinforce, or change an attitudinal response), and (c) to provide a feasible strategy to overcome the coping behaviors associated with resistance to persuasion. Defined as the communication process in which “someone makes other people believe or decide to do something, especially by giving them reasons why they (...) should do it, or asking them many times to do it”, persuasion ensures a noncoercive social control by shaping, reinforcing, or changing target audience’s cognitions, feelings, attitudes, beliefs, and behaviors. Persuasion involves volitional behaviors (that are inextricably intertwined with spontaneous, impulsive, mindless, or compulsive behaviors) and a significant cognitive load. Even if persuasion does not elicit negative feelings like various shortcuts to compliance (coercion, bribery, deception, manipulation of the dominant instincts, etc.), it generates ipso facto resistance to persuasion. Public relations specialists and other communication professionals can reduce or cope with resistance to persuasion by creating a low-pressure persuasion context, using evidential reasons, and following evidential rules. (shrink)

Abstract. The strong similarity between the use of ostension and that of a simple demonstrative to predicate something of an object seems to conflict with equally strong intuitions according to which, while “this” does usually refer to an object, the gesture of holding an object in your hand and showing it to an audience does not refer to the demonstrated object. This paper argues that the problem is authentic and provides a solution to it. In doing so, a more general (...) thought is given support by the approach used. Namely, the thought that our abilities to directly refer to things require some basic referential abilities exhibited in ostension and the use of demonstratives which, in their turn, rest upon our abilities to cooperate in performing non-communicative actions on our environment. Several concepts introduced in order to solve the initial problem can be used to articulate this thought in more detail. (shrink)

Migration is a recurrent phenomenon of human history because it is a successful adaptive strategy of human beings. Although migration today is not of a greater magnitude than in the past, it attracts a great deal of media and academia attention. The present wave of non-Western immigrants into the United States and Europe caused, apart from myriad economic, social and political problems, an ideological dispute between globalism and right-wing populism. Both ideological approaches attract many zealots who spread extreme opinions and (...) poison the whole political life. Using the scholastic method, I examined some opposing points of view of globalists and right-wing populists on several topics regarding non-Western immigration: border control, illegal immigration, limitations of legal immigration, refugee relocation quotas and cultural integration of immigrants. The globalists’ and right-wing populists’ theses and arguments were checked in regard with established authorities, available factual data and human reason. Highlighting some important topics relating to immigration problem and weighing the main arguments used by globalists and right-wing populists, I also indicate several points of compromise that could help people to moderate their political opinions. (shrink)

The paper argues that the balanced relationship between freedom and justice enables man to achieve the social good ontologically speaking, i.e. the one that holds together everything that exists. Reflecting the ontological Good on a social level is made on zoon politikon translated by “being together with the others,” where freedom and justice coexist in equilibrium. Justice and thus lay contribute to the achievement of ontological Good by the fair sharing of the existing goods on a social level and by (...) human equality before courts. (shrink)

Wittgenstein’s Private Language Argument was received within the Pittsburgh School of Philosophy as raising new and interesting difficulties for the traditional empiricist model of knowledge justification. While McDowell’s attempt to solve the difficulties in question is still debated, I claim that a different solution to the same difficulties might have been suggested by Wittgenstein himself in On Certainty.

The paper contains a conceptual proposal, its key idea being that the successful functioning of a rule embedding artifact designed to regulate a practice (not pertaining to its use) produces the same result as the successful performance of the rule-invoking non-communicative actions belonging to the practice in case.

The vacuum is the lowest energy state of a field in a certain region of space. This definition implies that no particles can be present in the vacuum state. In classical physics, the only features of vacuum are those of its geometry. For example, in the general theory of relativity the geometry is a dynamical structure that guides the motion of matter, and, in turn, it is bent and curved by the presence of matter. Other than this, the classical vacuum (...) is a structure void of any physical properties, since classically properties are strictly associated with physical objects such as particles and finite-amplitude fields. The situation is very different in quantum physics. As I will show in this paper, the difference stems from the fact that in quantum physics the properties are not strictly tied to objects. We know for example that physical properties come into existence - as values of observables - only when the object is measured. Thus, quantum physics allows us to detach properties from objects. This has consequences: one does not need pre-existing real objects to create actual properties, and indeed under certain perturbations the quantum vacuum produces observable effects such as energy shifts and creation of particles. An open question is if by necessity the vacuum comes with an embedded geometry, and if it is possible to construct viable physical theories in which geometry is detached from the vacuum. (shrink)

Comme tous les autres projets humains, les politiques de santé publique sont souvent affectées par des imperfections et des erreurs. Cependant, elles sont mieux ancrées dans les résultats de la recherche scientifique que d’autres actions humaines en général, et politiques gouvernementales en particulier. D’une manière générale, les données sur lesquelles reposent les politiques de santé publique remplissent les conditions suivantes : méthodes de recherche rigoureuses, tests indépendants et précis, reproductibilité des résultats, mesure du taux d’erreur, capacité à écarter des hypothèses (...) rivales et un degré d’acceptation satisfaisant au sein de la communauté scientifique. Les politiques de santé publique comprennent des campagnes de vaccination de la population, en particulier des enfants. Ces actions de vaccination sont considérées comme sûres et efficaces par les institutions publiques, les organisations de santé, les médecins et les chercheurs en santé. Malgré cela, un nombre croissant de parents choisit de ne pas vacciner leurs enfants. Les fausse nouvelles sur les vaccins publiées dans les médias, en particulier dans les nouveaux médias, par les influenceurs, ont contribué certainement à cette tendance. Ces influenceurs sont insuffisamment qualifiés ou totalement non qualifiés pour commenter l’innocuité et l’efficacité des vaccins dans les médias. Par conséquent, ils ne peuvent pas produire des données fiables et des opinions qualifiées, c’est-à-dire des informations indépendantes, précises, pertinentes, fiables et complètes. Cependant, ces influenceurs parviennent à influencer, dans une large mesure, le comportement des parents en matière de vaccination. La stratégie de lutte contre les fausses nouvelles en publiant des preuves contraires est évidemment nécessaire, mais pas suffisante parce que beaucoup de fausses infos sur les vaccins fonctionnent comme des mythes. Etant fixées d’une manière partiellement irrationnelle, les mythes anti-vaccination ne peuvent être démystifiés seulement avec les dernières preuves scientifiques. C’est pourquoi il est nécessaire d’envisager des stratégies de relations publiques capables d’influencer des opinions collectives irrationnelles. (shrink)