The vision of an art masterpiece is associated with brain arousal by neural processes occurring quite spontaneously in the viewer. This aesthetic experience may even elicit a response in the motor areas of the observers. In the neurorehabilitation of patients with stroke, art observation has been used for reducing psychological disorders, and creative art therapy for enhancing physical functions and cognitive abilities. Here, we developed a virtual reality task which allows patients, by moving their hand on a virtual canvas, to (...) have the illusion of painting some art masterpieces, such as The Creation of Adam of Michelangelo or The birth of Venus of Botticelli. Twenty healthy subjects and four patients with stroke performed this task and a control one in which they simply colored the virtual canvas. Results from User Satisfaction Evaluation Questionnaire and the NASA Task Load Index highlighted an appropriate level of usability. Moreover, despite the motor task was the same for art and control stimuli, the art condition was performed by healthy subjects with shorter trajectories and with a lower perception of physical demand. In experiment 2, only the patients treated with artistic stimuli showed a reduction in the erroneous movements performed orthogonally to the canvas. This finding reminds the so-called Mozart effect that improves the performance of subjects when they listen to classic music. Thus, we called this improvement in the performance when interacting with an artistic stimulus as Michelangelo effect. (shrink)

Il pensiero critico appare oggi, in molti casi, relegato a circolare in luoghi chiusi ed asfittici. Tale condizione sembra risentire di un mancata connessione con l’ambiente che, attraverso le riflessioni di Deleuze e Guattari sulla geofilosofia, verrà definito come il luogo dell’accadere, ossia dell’incontro con il possibile. Mentre i due autori francesi sceglievano di nominare tale connessione – oggi deficitaria – tra il pensiero e l’ambiente “utopia”, l’articolo proporrà di sostituire tale termine con quello di “speranza”: è di quest’ultima che (...) la critica ha bisogno per tornare a respirare. La speranza verrà declinata, in particolare, in chiave postcritica come postura teorica situata nello spazio comune, come domanda aperta ai rischi della contingenza e come affetto performativo capace di una “careful translation” del nostro lessico politico. (shrink)

Deleuze has left to with two texts, ‘Post-scriptum sur les sociétés de contrôle’ and L’immanence: une vie.., which constitute his heritage. These two essays seem to stand far apart from each other, because while the first talks about the risk that individuals today will be reduced to a number by the machines that control our societies, the second is concerned with proposing the concept of an immanent and impersonal life. The aim of this article, however, is to connect these two (...) texts, in order to show, firstly, that contemporary society has indeed become a system of control, governed by machines and statistical methods. The concept of ‘algorithmic governmentality’, proposed by Antoinette Rouvroy, will be used to examine how today the individual is forced into anonymity. On the other hand, however, the second aim of this article is to rethink the Deleuzian notion of the impersonal, which is always associated with a life. In fact, impersonality stands in opposition to the Cartesian subject, which possesses its own unity and identity, yet in no way does it correspond to any anonymity imposed by forms of power. An impersonal life is, instead, a virtual multiplicity: today this seems to be the only strategy of resistance possible, against the regime of quantitative, digital truth that has been developed by our societies. (shrink)

La circulation du savoir philosophique à travers les traductions du grec au syriaque, du grec à l'arabe, du syriaque à l'arabe, de l'arabe au latin forme, depuis un siècle et plus de recherches savantes, un domaine scientifique à part entière. Ce volume réunit des spécialistes des disciplines du domaine voulant rendre hommage à un collègue dont l'activité a ouvert une voie, Henri Hugonnard-Roche. Spécialiste de la transmission du grec au syriaque de la logique aristotélicienne, Henri Hugonnard-Roche a montré par ses (...) recherches la continuité entre la philosophie de l'Antiquité tardive et la pensée des chrétiens de langue syriaque d'un côté, des savants musulmans écrivant en arabe, de l'autre. Réunis souvent par ce que Werner Jaeger avait autrefois désigné comme 'la portée œcuménique de l'Antiquité classique', des musulmans et des chrétiens faisant partie d'un cercle philosophique se penchaient, dans la ville de Bagdad au Xe siècle, sur le texte d'Aristote. Leur 'Aristote' était souvent celui de l'Antiquité tardive : l'Aristote de l'école néoplatonicienne d'Alexandrie que les intellectuels de la Syrie chrétienne avaient déjà rencontré quelque quatre siècles auparavant et qu'ils avaient traduit, en même temps que Galien, et parfois commenté. Des noms presque inconnus comme celui de Sergius de Resh'ayna (mort en 536) commencent dans nos manuels à en côtoyer d'autres bien plus connus, comme celui de Boèce, grâce aux recherches de Henri Hugonnard-Roche. (shrink)

One of the most unpredictable things the pandemic brought to our societies was the closure of hospitals and other health services to visitors. Preventing the spread of infection was the main reason for these decisions in the early days of the pandemic when there was no clarity about the means of transmission and the origin of the virus. However, in view of the persistence of the restrictions to date and the numerous negative consequences they have had on the professional and (...) personal quality of life of doctors, nurses, patients and carers, the aim of this article is to analyse in depth the reasons why these decisions have been and, above all, are still being applied, also considering the hypothesis that the choices made so far in the training of health professionals should be questioned. The persistence of restrictions, the constant reduction of human and economic resources in the face of an increase in the demand for care have exacerbated the distance between health professionals and users, to the point of escalating into actual acts of violence and aggression. According to the Critical Pedagogy approach, educators can play a central role in activating formative and collaborative strategies, such as maieutic groups, to rebuild an alliance between those who today find themselves on opposite sides: health professionals on the one hand, and patients and families on the other. (shrink)

The World Bank’s premise that “gender equality is good business” characterizes the current gender and economic development model. Policymakers and development practitioners promote and encourage women’s entrepreneurialism from the conviction that increasing women’s market-based opportunities is key to lifting women, their families, and communities out of poverty, resulting in the construction of a gendered entrepreneurial subject. Based on ethnographic fieldwork and interviews with home-based garment workers in Ahmedabad, India, this article questions the portrayal of women informal workers as entrepreneurs. Employing (...) a social reproduction framework, I argue that the exploitative characteristics of informal work are falsely interpreted as features of entrepreneurialism. Because work is completed in the worker’s own home, work and care become a mutual burden in which woman’s sense of providing for her family is impeded by both these roles. A feminist social reproduction framework of embodied labor links women’s responsibility for and contribution to family well-being with women’s marginalized economic position. Examining home-based work through this lens reveals the contradiction of the entrepreneurialism discourse. (shrink)

The illness immersion condition prevents patients from enjoying everything worth living life for. In any case, according to Frank, this condition could represent one of the most insightful experiences towards understanding the meaning of life. Using the metaphor of phoenix taken from May, Frank identified four kinds of embodiments through which the phoenix can reveal itself in a patient after an illness immersion experience: the phoenix that could ever be and the phoenix that might have been; the recurrent and cumulative (...) phoenix and the reluctant phoenix. Based on these considerations, a qualitative study was conducted in order to give voice to the different phoenix embodiments focusing on several autobiographies of patients afflicted with severe or terminal illness. The analysis highlights several similarities that the different phoenixes shared ; however, a deep difference emerged in their worldview which proves able to lead them towards different epiphanies. These evidences reveal that every sick person should be understood, stimulated and accompanied throughout his lived experience of illness by an expressly designed and dedicated care. (shrink)

Living with a chronic condition represents a strenuous experience that often could be lived as a sequence of waiting and crisis times. Therapeutic path incidents could represent however a catalysts and revelatory time, useful to patients to discover their own resources. A qualitative study according to the phenomenological hermeneutic perspective was conducted to understand the kind of skills expressed by the patients during a difficult episode, and the characteristics that identify patients who can overcome them better. From September 2019 to (...) August 2020 twenty-three patients followed-up in four Hospital Units of Northeastern of Italy were enrolled. All the patients described an episode linked whit their pathological condition; they mentioned mainly supportive, reactive, or behavioral strategies and an acceptance attitude. The sample characteristics may explain the recurring acceptance attitude; however, the younger individuals, those with a higher level of education and those who faced precedent negative life experiences seem to better overcome challenging events. It can’t be taken for granted that patients possess all the skills necessary to overcome the frequent challenging episodes they have to face; for this reason, healthcare professionals should assess their learning and reactive attitude in order to tailor for them therapeutic education paths. (shrink)

Edgar Morin writes that “rethinking thinking” is what is urgently needed today. Indeed, it is possible to recognize a convergence in the understanding and practice of an integral and open ontology express and promote the living mystery of Being in its multicolored self-expression. This fact calls for a rereading of the tradition of thought, which has matured through history leading to this point. In this perspective the most significant fruit was produced by the inventio of the ontologically regulating concept of (...) God-Trinity as the interpretive key for the coming in human flesh of the Word/Son Who is God Himself. However, the concept of Trinity failed to completely generate that locus of experience and that relational and communitarian practice of thought corresponding to the Reality it had received and conceived. Our working hypothesis is that philosophy and theology can find the place again for a rebirth and reconfiguration of ontology in the guiding thought of the Trinity, taken up in its original irradiating meaning with the focus on the Christ’s cross/resurrection and examined in the still unfathomed promise it contains. (shrink)

This essay discusses Claudio Magris’s concept of Mitteleuropa—which is central to his view of Europe—by situating it within the context of Triestine cultural history. It first presents the reflections on Europe formulated by the early generations of journalists in La Favilla, the newspaper founded in Trieste in 1836. This is followed by a discussion of the cultural and political writings of Scipio Slataper (1888–1915) and Giani Stuparich (1891–1961). Like Magris these journalists and writers assumed the role of public intellectuals and (...) reflected on three pivotal periods in the history of Trieste by focusing on the question of cosmopolitanism (La Favilla), political and national identity (Slataper), and the feasibility of a European project after World War II (Stuparich). Against the prevailing totalizing nationalist vision, these writers explored the possibility of a non-national political identity based on a cultural notion of Europeanism. The different views of the nineteenth- and twentieth-century Triestine journalists and writers of the idea of Europe, of Trieste as a border city, and of European identity, are illuminated by Magris’s own theoretical elaborations on borders, on Europe, and on Mitteleuropa, which further highlight their historical and conceptual intricacies. (shrink)

Cet article examine une des thèses fondamentales de Thémistius dans sa paraphrase du De anima d’Aristote, c’est-à-dire le rapport entre l’intellect et ses objets, telle qu’elle figure dans la réception de deux lecteurs de Thémistius au Moyen Âge : Averroès et Thomas d’Aquin. La comparaison entre ces deux philosophes suggère que l’héritage (néo)platonicien présent dans l’interprétation thémistienne du rapport entre l’intellect et ses objets a été influent dans une certaine mesure, mais il a produit chez les deux philosophes des considérations (...) différentes. Un troisième lecteur, anonyme, est évoqué : un petit traité connu sous le nom de « Anonyme de Bâle », écrit entre 1308 et 1323, apporte un témoignage intéressant sur l’influence respective des lectures thémistiennes d’Averroès et de Thomas. (shrink)

In her Avicenne, Logica Françoise Hudry offers the long-expected critical edition of the Latin version of the opening treatise of Avicenna's Kitāb al-Šifāʾ. This gigantic summa, whose title translates as Book of the Cure, represents the best example in Arabic philosophy of the inspiration from, and adaptation of, the late antique model of philosophy as a systematic whole whose starting point is logic, and whose culmination is rational theology. The Neoplatonic orientation of this model is widely recognised in scholarship, in (...) particular with respect to the so-called Metaphysics. (shrink)

ABSTRACTThis article examines the Trinitarian anthropology inherent in the ‘charism of unity’ that characterizes the Focolare Movement stemming from the mystical experience of Chiara Lubich. After describing the theological cornerstones of this charism―namely the evangelical centrality of the commandment of reciprocal love, the circularity between theology and anthropology and Jesus Forsaken as the Christological key to understanding and achieving unity―the article studies its cultural implications as reflected in the philosophical and theological contribution of Klaus Hemmerle. In dialogue with modern thought, (...) Hemmerle in fact draws from and develops the anthropological meaning of the charism of unity as a feasible way to respond to the most acute challenges of today. (shrink)

This article proposes a multidisciplinary work perspective on couples who undergo assisted reproductive technology treatments, with particular attention paid to the treatment of women. The epistemological references underlying a vision of infertility and sterility that respect the psyche–soma unity of the person are illustrated: the biopsychosocial model and the psychoneuroimmunology and psychosomatic contemporary models of health and illness. Based on clinical experience in a private and institutional setting, different steps in the course of treatment are described with the related areas (...) of psychological work: from the search for pregnancy to the choice of adhering to an ART treatment, to conception, up to delivery and beyond. The implications of the work are targeted at a better qualification of psychological interventions in this specific multidisciplinary area. (shrink)

This study examines the antecedents of corporate scandals. Corporate scandals are defined as rare events occurring at the apex of corporate fame when managerial fraud suddenly emerges in conjunction with a significant gap between perceived corporate success and actual economic conditions. Previous studies on managerial fraud have examined the antecedents of illegal acts in isolation from strategic decisions and in terms of CEOs’ individual responses to the external context. This study frames the antecedents of corporate scandals in terms of the (...) interplay of CEOs’ personal traits with corporate strategy and stakeholders’ cohesion. With this aim, this study builds on extant theory to examine the case of Banca Popolare di Lodi, an Italian bank involved in a corporate scandal in year 2005. The model contributes to advance understanding of the complex dynamics underlying the emergence of corporate scandals. (shrink)

Es un error buscar en la religión la justificación para la igualdad entre mujeres y hombres. Estos intentos ya se dieron en los años 70 en Argelia, Marruecos y Túnez. Los tres países árabes donde el pensamiento reformista tuvo más representantes y mayor impacto. Numerosas asociaciones feministas reclamaron el derecho de las mujeres al acceso a la esfera pública y exigieron la derogación de las leyes más discriminatorias, como el repudio o la poligamia. Para dotarse de mayor legitimidad en países (...) que mantenían el islam como religión del Estado, el feminismo laico dejó de lado su universalismo y buscó aliarse con la religión, intentando encontrar elementos feministas en el Corán, tal y como explica la abogada argelina Wassyla Tamzali. Sin dejar de poner el foco sobre el trabajo y la condición de las mujeres para mostrar la desigualdad existente, aseguraba que los ideales de igualdad eran plenamente compatibles con las Escrituras sagradas. (shrink)

This paper discusses contemporary advancements in the affective sciences that can inform the music-emotion literature. Key concepts in these theories are outlined, highlighting their points of agreement and disagreement. This summary shows the importance of appraisal within the emotion process, provides a greater emphasis upon goal-directed accounts of behavior, and a need to move away from discrete emotion “folk” concepts and toward the study of an emotional episode and its components. Consequently, three contemporary music emotion theories are examined through a (...) skeptical lens. This critique highlights the over-reliance upon categorization and a lack of acknowledgment of appraisal processes, specifically goal-directed appraisal, in examining how individual experiences of music emerge in different contexts. Based on this critique of current music-emotion models, we present our skeptically informed CODA model - Constructivistly-Organised Dimensional-Appraisal model. This model addresses skeptical limitations of existing theories, reinstates the role of goal-directed appraisal as central to what makes music relevant and meaningful to an individual in different contexts and brings together different theoretical frameworks into a single model. From the development of the CODA model, several hypotheses are proposed and applied to musical contexts. These hypotheses address theoretical issues such as acknowledging individual and contextual differences in emotional intensity and valence, as well as differentiating between induced and perceived emotions, and utilitarian and aesthetic emotions. We conclude with a sections of recommendations for future research. Altogether, this theoretical critique and proposed model points toward a positive future direction for music-emotion science. One where researchers can take forward testable predictions about what makes music relevant and meaningful to an individual. (shrink)

This article reviews the text and interpretation of some ancient evidence on the pronunciation of syllable coda m in Latin. Crucial textual emendations are suggested for passages by Annaeus Cornutus and Velius Longus, and the resulting evidence is reinterpreted in the light of current phonological theories. Some of the accepted views on the pronunciation of –m are challenged by highlighting the likely sound variation in neutralization contexts. The evidence from both grammarians and inscriptions reveals that the possibility of m (...) sounding [n] in the internal preconsonantal position could have been more widespread than previously thought. (shrink)