Derek Parfit, who died in 2017, is widely believed to have been the best moral philosopher in well over a century. The twenty new essays in this book were written in his honour and have all been inspired by his work - in particular, his work in an area of moral philosophy known as 'population ethics', which is concerned with moral issues raised by causing people to exist. Until Parfit began writing about these issues in the 1970s, there was almost (...) no discussion of them in the entire history of philosophy. But his monumental book 'Reasons and Persons' (1984) revealed that population ethics abounds in deep and intractable problems and paradoxes that not only challenge all the major moral theories but also threaten to undermine many important common-sense moral beliefs. (shrink)

AimsIn this pilot mixed-methods study, we examined the participants experiences of engaging in virtual drawing tasks and the impact of an olfactory stimulus on outcomes of affect, stress, self-efficacy, anxiety, creative agency, and well-being.MethodsThis study used a parallel mixed-methods, simple block randomization design. The study participants included 24 healthy adults aged 18 to 54 years, including 18 women and six men. The participants completed two 1-h immersive virtual art making sessions and were randomly assigned to receive either a fragrance or (...) a non-fragrance condition for the first session. Quantitative and qualitative datasets were collected concurrently and integrated during data analysis.ResultsThe quantitative results indicated that the fragrance condition demonstrated a significant reduction in negative affect, namely, reduced feelings of negativity when compared to the non-fragrance condition. A trend toward improvement in self-efficacy was also seen in the fragrance condition. No significant changes were found for fragrance or non-fragrance conditions for positive affect, anxiety, and creative agency. The qualitative findings included five themes related to art making experiences in virtual reality in both conditions: fun and joy; novelty of virtual media, experimentation, and play; relaxation and calm; learning curve; and physical discomfort and disorientation. Four themes were identified for virtual art content and visual qualities: nature imagery, references to memories and personal symbols, fantasy and play within imagery, and depiction of everyday objects.ConclusionsOverall, the participants reported positive responses to the novel virtual art making experiences which were further heightened by the inclusion of the fragrance stimulus for negative affect. These preliminary findings need to be replicated with larger sample sizes to confirm the outcomes and the trends that were seen in this pilot study. Further research is recommended to examine the differences between experiences of virtual and traditional art media and to examine different olfactory stimuli promoting focus and concentration. (shrink)

The relevance of the research is that university and business collaboration is the main implementation tool of the third university mission. University-business collaboration has risen to one of the top priorities for many higher education institutions, with its importance mirroring attention from scholars and policy makers worldwide. In the face of increasing global competition, business was challenged to seek new methods for creating their competitive advantage and at the same time, the decreasing budgets of higher education institutions were pressured to (...) find new streams of financing. In both cases, collaboration in different forms is an important method for achieving their objectives. Ten types of UBC are related quite directly to the missions of the university and the needs of business but one of them curriculum development and delivery is very important. Using this form for UBC, could help to develop human resources relevant to modern society. The main instruments and activities in this form of collaboration as identified by business is too little used. The research aim was to identify the activities of university and leisure organizations used for collaboration in curriculum development. The objectives of the research: to determine the forms of UBC, to identify the activities used for universities and leisure organizations collaboration in curriculum development. Analysis of recent research and publications. UBC became the subject of education and management sciences. Recently, much attention has been paid to UBC collaboration practices especially a lot of research on practices was done about universities collaboration in R&D and commercialisation of R&D. P. D'Este and M. Perkmann explored the factors of UBC, the types were identified by T. Davey, T. Baaken, V. Galan Muros, A. Meerman, T. Barnes, A. Gibbons and the levels of UBC were represented by B.N. Ponomariov, P.C. Boardman, T. Davey. The benefits of UBC to research quality have been studied by researchers M. Crespo and H. Dridi, as a collaborative factor for learning improvement by researchers K. Ramakrishnan, N.M. Yasin, A. Draghici, as a quality factor UBC was analysed by M. Perkmann, Z. King, S. Pavelin. The main researchers who analysed the UBC in curriculum development was the T. Davey, A. Healy, C. Plewa, T. Baaken. An overview of the study of this object shows that it was mostly analysed in vocational training and in last ten years’ period the publications is growing in UBC. Research methodology. The paper seeks to represent the collaboration forms, which was used by university with the business organizations from leisure industry. As well, it seeks to identify the activities of business collaboration in curriculum design, development and evaluation. Methods applied for the research was scientific literature review, a questionnaire survey for business organization leaders and mathematical statistics. Conclusion. The results of business organizations show the positive impact for increasing the university collaboration as a hole but in study programs, curriculum development shows that it is needed more business engagement. With the business engagement into curriculum academics, expect to be given the opportunity to transfer theoretical ideas into practical projects and to implement research in the real world. At the same time, the business engage in the curriculum development mostly through giving guest’s lectures and consultations, place for practice, or organizing the different events with the academics. (shrink)

Reflecting Alan Robinson's fundamental contribution to computational logic, this book brings together seminal papers in inference, equality theories, and logic programming. It is an exceptional collection that ranges from surveys of major areas to new results in more specialized topics. Alan Robinson is currently the University Professor at Syracuse University. Jean-Louis Lassez is a Research Scientist at the IBM Thomas J. Watson Research Center. Gordon Plotkin is Professor of Computer Science at the University of Edinburgh. Contents: Inference. Subsumption, A Sometimes (...) Undervalued Procedure, Larry Wos, Ross Overbeek, and Ewing Lusk. The Markgraf Karl Refutation Procedure, Hans Jurgen Ohlbach and Jorg H. Siekmann. Modal Logic Should Say More than it Does, Melvin Fitting. Interactive Proof Presentation, W. W. Bledsoe. Intelligent Backtracking Revisited, Maurice Bruynooghe. A Science of Reasoning, Alan Bundy. Inductive Inference of Theories from Facts, Ehud Y. Shapiro. Equality. Solving Equations in Abstract Algebras: A Rule-based Survey of Unification, Jean-Pierre Jouannaud and Claude Kirchner. Disunification: A Survey, Hubert Comon. A Case Study of the Completion Procedure: Proving Ring Commutativity Problems, Deepak Kapur and Hantao Zhang. Computations in Regular Rewriting Systems I and II, Girard Huet and JeanJacques Levy. Unification and ML Type Reconstruction, Paris Kanellakis, Harry Mairson, and John Mitchell. Automatic Dimensional Analysis, Mitchell Wand. Logic Programming. Logic Programming Schemes and Their Implementations, Keith Clark. A Near-Horn Prolog for Compilation, Donald Loveland and David Reed. Unfold/Fold Transformations of Logic Programs, P. A. Gardner and J. C. Shepherdson. An Algebraic Representation of Logic Program Computations, Andrea Corradini and Ugo Montanari. Theory of Disjunctive Logic Programs, Jack Minker, Arcot Rajasekar, and Jorge Lobo. Bottom-Up Evaluation of Logic Programs, Jeffrey Naughton and Raghu Ramakrishnan. Absys, the First Logic Programming Language: A View of the Inevitability of Logic Programming, E. W. Elcock. (shrink)

The relevance of the research In the face of increasing global competition, business was challenged to seek new methods for creating their competitive advantage and at the same time the decreasing budgets of higher education institutions were pressured to find new streams of financing. In both cases, collaboration is seen as an important method for achieving their objectives but universities of today have as well to find the appropriate balance between teaching, basic and applied research, and entrepreneurship. Ten types of (...) university-business collaboration are related quite directly to the missions of the university and the needs of business. Curriculum development and delivery is one of that ten, which aim is to develop human resources to modern society. A summary of benefits was identified in the academic literature as arising from UBC in relation to curriculum design and delivery for multiple stakeholders including academics, students, university administration, business and community. Overall, UBC may take various forms that are influenced by different factors but even if all stakeholders seeks the main purpose of this process they may get different benefits. The research aim was to identify the benefits of universities and business organizations in curriculum development. The objectives of the research: to determine the instruments and activities used for universities and business organizations collaboration, to identify universities and business organizations benefits from collaboration to the various stakeholder groups. Analysis of recent research and publications. UBC became the subject of education and management sciences. P. D'Este and M. Perkmann explored the factors of UBC, the types were identified by T. Davey, T. Baaken, V. Galan Muros, A. Meerman, T. Barnes, A. Gibbons and the levels of UBC were represented by B.N. Ponomariov, P.C. Boardman, T. Davey, R. Laužackas. The benefits of UBC to research quality have been studied by researchers T. Davey, M. Crespo, N. Carayol, H. Forsyth, R. Laxton, S. Lamichhane, T. Nath Sharma, P. Van der Sijde and H. Dridi, as a collaborative factor for learning improvement by researchers K. Ramakrishnan, N.M. Yasin, A. Draghici. An overview of the study of this object shows that it was mostly analysed in vocational training and in last ten years’ period the publications is growing in UBC. Research methodology. The paper seeks to represent the UBC benefits for different stakeholders and collaboration forms, which was used by university with the business organizations from leisure industry. Quantitative research was used to gain quantify opinions of benefits and instruments of UBC – and generalize results from a larger sample population. Methods applied for the research was scientific literature review, a questionnaire survey for business organization leaders and mathematical statistics. Conclusion. The benefits of the UVB were grouped according to the type of stakeholder's: society, university administration, academics, entrepreneurs, students. The benefits of business stakeholders include additional funding, access to education resources, lecturer and coordinator, support in evaluating the program and developing new study subjects. The highest rated benefit to others stakeholders from their view could be reducing academic staff training costs, as well as business information available to student projects, skills development and student employment opportunities and human resource development in the region. (shrink)

The Travail of Nature shows that the theological tradition in the West is neither ecologically bankrupt, as some of its popular and scholarly critics have maintained, nor replete with immediately accessible, albeit long-forgotten, ecological riches hidden everywhere in its deeper vaults, as some contemporary Christians, who are profoundly troubled by the environmental crisis and other related concerns, might wistfully hope to find. This is why it is appropriate to speak of the ambiguous ecological promises of Christian theology.

The words 'true value' assume an existential relationship with the thing being measured. There is assumed to exist some aspect of the thing being measured that is independent of its relationship to the person who is interested in the result of the measurement. Yet measurement is a response to the need of an observer to know something about the real world. There is therefore an epistemological aspect to measurement. Some aspect of measurement has to do with the observer as a (...) knower of the result of the measurement. The paper considers electrical measurement. It proposes that these relationships correspond to two distinct kinds of measurement: one has the characteristic that there does exist such a thing as a true value, though it cannot be known: in the other kind, no such thing as true value even exists. The notion of true value is very useful, and for the kind of measurement where such a thing does not exist, the paper defines an alternative that has the advantage that it can actually be known under some circumstances in calibration. (shrink)

_Early Psychoanalytic Religious Writings_ presents, in one edited volume, many of the foundational writings in the psychoanalytic study of religion. These translated works by Abraham, Fromm, Pfister, and others, complement Freud’s seminal contributions and provide a unique window into the origins of psychoanalytic thinking.

Descartes, René, 1596-1650; Modern philosophy.

Purpose of the study is to shed light on the role of psychophysiology in the creative process, namely, the style corrections connected with pathological changes in the artist’s organism, deviating from empirical-descriptive methods. Theoretical basis of the study implies the interpretation of the notions style and disease not in their narrow professional limitation but from the standpoint of expanding the parameters of these concepts to philosophical dimensions. Based on the principle of analogy, the research findings prove that non-mimetic creative process (...) manifests itself exclusively in connection with a human from a bodily viewpoint through anthropological mimesis, which can program the propensity to certain capabilities of the individual organism. C. G. Jung was the first who pointed to the productivity of this method in his work "Theoretical Reflections on the Nature of the Psyche". The creativity phenomenon reflects not only "pure" psychology and the intellectual and spiritual component but also its relation to the artist as a physical being. It, outside its belonging to and being conditioned by transcendent factors, includes a quantitative aspect related to the moment of intensity. The disease acts to some extent as a stimulator of the production/change of aesthetic enzyme. In this context, the dialectic method is also effective because the subject of study cannot be comprehensively argued using naturalistic approaches only and requires a semantic explanation too. The essence of it is the logic of contradictions. In this case, the antinomy of matter-spirit plays a conceptual role in the projection on the plane of word-formation. Originality of the research findings is in the expansion of the causal relationship range of the creative process, namely the inclusion of the factor of psycho-physiological pathology into the system artist-work. This factor performs important stylistic functions. Conclusions. In contrast to scientific studies, where 1) style is analyzed separately and 2) the figure of the artist, this study argues the need to correlate these issues, taking them beyond descriptiveness to avoid schematics and one-dimensionality. (shrink)

Volume 20, Issue 7, July 2020, Page 150-152.

يتناول محمد حيان السمّان في كتابه في "تدبير القداسة: الحجابة والحجاب - أدب الدخول على السلطان في التراث العربي الإسلامي"، الصادر عن المركز العربي للأبحاث ودراسة السياسات، العلاقة بين السلطة السياسية والمجتمع في السياق العربي - الإسلامي، من خلال موضوع الحجابة والسلطان المحتجِب عن رعيته، والوقائع المتصلة بالقدوم على أصحاب السلطة من خلفاء وملوك وسلاطين ووزراء وغيرهم، وانتظار الإذن بلقائهم. يتألف الكتاب (407 صفحات بالقطع الوسط، موثقًا ومفهرسًا) من مدخل، وقسمين فيهما عشرة فصول. في المدخل، تأسيس وإضاءة، يعالج المؤلف مسألة (...) الحجابة والحاجب من حيث اللغة والاصطلاح، ومسألة الحجابة عند ابن خلدون من منطلق الحضارة الداعية إلى انتحال الألقاب وتمييزها، ومسألة الاستئذان الشرعي والحجابة والفرق بينهما. (shrink)

This paper provides a critique of Bostrom’s concern with existential risks, a critique which relies on Adorno and Horkheimer’s interpretation of the Enlightenment. Their interpretation is used to elicit the inner contradictions of transhumanist thought and to show the invalid premises on which it is based. By first outlining Bostrom’s position this paper argues that transhumanism reverts to myth in its attempt to surpass the human condition. Bostrom’s argument is based on three pillars, Maxipok, Parfitian population ethics and a universal (...) notion of general human values. By attempting to transcend the human condition, to achieve post-humanity, transhumanism reverts to myth. Thus, the aim of this paper is to provide a critical examination of transhumanism which elicits its tacit contradictions. It will also be argued that transhumanism’s focus on a universal, all-encompassing, notion of humanity neglects any concern with actual lived lives. This absence is problematic because it clearly shows that there is a discrepancy, between transhumanism’s claimed concern for all of humanity and the practical implications of proposing a universal notion of humanity. This paper will conclude, that transhumanism’s lack of concern with actual lives is due to its universal and totalising gestures. Gestures which allow for universal claims such as general values or Earth-originating intelligent life. (shrink)