The question of whether knowledge is definable in terms of belief, which has played an important role in epistemology for the last 50 years, is studied here in the framework of epistemic and doxastic logics. Three notions of definability are considered: explicit definability, implicit definability, and reducibility, where explicit definability is equivalent to the combination of implicit definability and reducibility. It is shown that if knowledge satisfies any set of axioms contained in S5, then it cannot be explicitly defined in (...) terms of belief. S5 knowledge can be implicitly defined by belief, but not reduced to it. On the other hand, S4.4 knowledge and weaker notions of knowledge cannot be implicitly defined by belief, but can be reduced to it by defining knowledge as true belief. It is also shown that S5 knowledge cannot be reduced to belief and justification, provided that there are no axioms that involve both belief and justification. (shrink)

Recently implemented Chinese health insurance schemes have failed to achieve a Chinese health care system that is family-oriented, family-based, family-friendly, or even financially sustainable. With this diagnosis in hand, the authors argue that a financially and morally sustainable Chinese health care system should have as its core family health savings accounts supplemented by appropriate health insurance plans. This essay’s arguments are set in the context of Confucian moral commitments that still shape the background culture of contemporary China.

In the late 1940s and early 1950s, there emerged a radically new kind of music based on recorded environmental sounds instead of sounds of traditional Western musical instruments. Centered in Paris around the composer, music theorist, engineer, and writer Pierre Schaeffer, this became known as musique concrète because of its use of concrete recorded sound fragments, manifesting a departure from the abstract concepts and representations of Western music notation. Furthermore, the term sound object was used to denote our perceptual images (...) of such fragments. Sound objects and their features became the focus of an extensive research effort on the perception and cognition of music in general, remarkably anticipating topics of more recent music psychology research. This sound object theory makes extensive use of metaphors, often related to motion shapes, something that can provide holistic representations of perceptually salient, but temporally distributed, features in different kinds of music. (shrink)

In his 1936 paper,On the Concept of Logical Consequence, Tarski introduced the celebrated definition oflogical consequence: “The sentenceσfollows logicallyfrom the sentences of the class Γ if and only if every model of the class Γ is also a model of the sentenceσ.” [55, p. 417] This definition, Tarski said, is based on two very basic intuitions, “essential for the proper concept of consequence” [55, p. 415] and reflecting common linguistic usage: “Consider any class Γ of sentences and a sentence which (...) follows from the sentences of this class. From an intuitive standpoint it can never happen that both the class Γ consists only of true sentences and the sentenceσis false. Moreover, … we are concerned here with the concept of logical, i.e.,formal, consequence.” [55, p. 414] Tarski believed his definition of logical consequence captured the intuitive notion: “It seems to me that everyone who understands the content of the above definition must admit that it agrees quite well with common usage. … In particular, it can be proved, on the basis of this definition, that every consequence of true sentences must be true.” [55, p. 417] The formality of Tarskian consequences can also be proven. Tarski's definition of logical consequence had a key role in the development of the model-theoretic semantics of modern logic and has stayed at its center ever since. (shrink)

The purpose of this article is to analyze the variability of the "Self-made-man" idea in the context of the Christian Middle Ages in its primarily historical and philosophical presentation. Research is based on the historical and philosophical analysis of the medieval philosophy presented foremost by the works of Aurelius Augustine, P. Abelard, Thomas Aquinas, and also by the modern researches of this epoch. Theoretical basis. Historical, comparative, and hermeneutic methods became fundamental for this research. Originality. The conducted analysis allowed to (...) draw a conclusion that, despite the still existing view of the Middle Ages as a kind of an ideological gap in the formation of the self-determination idea, the Christian philosophy of this period not only does not reject but also gives essentially the universal character of the ancient intention to recognize the individual’s right to self-determination and self-government, makes it not only religiously acceptable but also obligatory. Conclusions. Despite to general theocentrism, providentialism and fatalism of Christian medieval philosophy and culture in general, at its epicenter there is a man of a special type, focused on preserving spiritual autonomy and identity in the social dimensions of their existence, and at the same time, on personal responsibility for their own destiny. Such focus became a logical and somewhat unexpected result of the complex interaction of numerous factors of medieval culture, as well as the ideas and intentions inherited from Antiquity. In particular, the idea that a person who does not act freely cannot be morally responsible for what he does, as well as the intentions of the ancient sage to autonomy, autarky, and apoliticism. In the Middle Ages, this intention became essentially universal, as it became a right, even an obligation of every Christian to be free, at least from the worldly, in determining and realizing his own destiny. The gradual compromise recognition that personal salvation is possible only as a result of synergy, i.e. the co-participation of God’s grace and human freedom, legitimizes and strengthens its focus on active personal efforts and personal responsibility for one’s own salvation, in fact for one’s own destiny. All this in historical perspective was found in its radicalized and purified from all sorts of mystical and religious layers of expression in the idea of "Self-made-man". (shrink)

As previous pandemics, the coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) has direct and indirect effects on mental health and well-being. The purpose of the current study was to examine whether meaning in life mediated the association between coronavirus suffering and satisfaction with life and whether stress-related growth moderated the mediating effect of meaning in life on the association between these variables. Stress-Related Growth Measure (SGM) was also conducted for the purpose of this study. The participants were 402 (66% women) young adults who (...) completed the Suffering Measure During COVID-19, Meaningful Living Measure, Satisfaction With Life Scale, and SGM. The results indicated that the SGM has adequate psychometric properties with unidimensional structure of stress-related growth in the face of adversity. Moderated mediation analysis revealed that coronavirus suffering directly influenced satisfaction with life as well as indirectly by its effect on meaning in life. Additionally, stress-related growth was found as a moderator in the relationship between coronavirus suffering–meaning in life and coronavirus suffering–satisfaction with life. These results suggest that meaning in life mitigates the effect of coronavirus suffering on satisfaction with life, and this mediating effect is moderated by stress-related growth in young adults. While meaning in life helps explain the relationship between coronavirus suffering and satisfaction with life, the stress-related growth functions as a protective factor against the adverse effect of coronavirus experiences. (shrink)

All these activities of living beings, and the functioning of their organs, and the functioning of instruments demand a teleological explanation. Why do human beings toil? Why do living beings try to maintain the activities of the organism? What are the functions of specific organs or instruments? Intelligible answers can be given in teleological terms. Of course, one could ask many questions about these situations that would not require the teleological explanation; for example, questions concerning the mechanical structure of living (...) beings or of instruments. Yet this fact would not eliminate the legitimacy nor the utility of the teleological category. (shrink)

We show that large fragments of MM, e. g. the tree property and stationary reflection, are preserved by strongly -game-closed forcings. PFA can be destroyed by a strongly -game-closed forcing but not by an ω2-closed.

The urgency of the research topic lies in the author's search for the elimination of environmental and other threats to the existence of mankind. The population of Homo Sapiens increases quantitatively, intensify the rate of degradation of the natural environment and accelerates the movement to the total Collapse. Scientists in the world create only "appeals" and “warnings” of danger, but even the UN decision and three environmental forums 1992, 2002 and 2012 do not indicate real means of salvation. The purpose (...) of the study is a critical analysis of the works of scientists of the world and their environmental projects and plans. The objectives of the study are to offer a real way of saving humanity through the replacement of industrial technologies with environmentally safe nootechnologies, the development and use of the noosciences. The methodology of the study is based on the authors' foundations of the basis of many new exact and humanitarian noosciences - noophilosophy, nooecology, noohistory, noosociology, noocognitiology, and others. We use the noointegral, systemic and noohistorical methods within the framework of a promising principle of global evolutionism with transdisciplinary approaches. The result of the study is unquestionable evidence that in the flow of nanotechnologies since 2000 ecologically safe appears, which we propose to call "wise" - neotechnologies. Their number is small and the number is growing slowly, but the trends of world science evidenced by the inevitability of the victory of nootechnologies and elimination of all industrial technologies. The main result of the study is the list of noosciences and nootechnologies, which are "terms from the future". They form the Nooglossary for which we received the copyright certificate - a legal document of our author's priority. The conclusion is that humanity will be saved not by the "third industrial revolution" by J. Rifkin and not by the "fourth" K. Schwab or “smart-activity”, but by the development of the nooosciences and the massive use of environmentally safe nootechnologies. Nooera has already begun, but humanity does not notice it yet. The first nootechnologies exist, but they are still too small. We have created the Nooglossary to accelerate the progression of noofuture. (shrink)

Introduction: Probationers, offenders with less serious and non-violent offences, and under statutory supervision, have low levels of self-esteem and physical health, and high level of family conflict, and poorer quality of family relationships. This study examined the effectiveness of the existing probation service and the additional use of a positive family holistic health intervention to enhance physical, psychological, and family well-being in probationers and relationships with probation officers.Methods: Probationers under the care of the Hong Kong Social Welfare Department were randomized (...) into a care-as-usual control group, a brief intervention group receiving two 1-h individual sessions [of a brief theory-based positive family holistic health intervention integrating Zero-time Exercise and positive psychology themes of “Praise and Gratitude” in the existing probation service], or a combined intervention group receiving BI and a 1-day group activity with family members. The outcomes were physical activity, fitness performance, self-esteem, happiness, anxiety and depression symptoms, life satisfaction, quality of life, family communication and well-being, and relationships with probation officers. Self-administered questionnaires and simple fitness tests were used at baseline, 1-month and 3-month follow-up. Linear mixed model analysis was used to compare difference in the changes of outcome variables among groups, adjusted of sex, age, and baseline values. Focus group interviews were conducted. Thematic content analysis was used.Results: 318 probationers were randomized into CAU, BI, or CI group. CAU showed enhanced physical activity, fitness performance and psychological health, and family communication with small effect sizes. BI and CI showed further improved physical activity, family communication and family well-being. Additionally, CI reported greater improvements in the relationships with probation officers than CAU with a small effect size. CI also reported greater increases in physical activity and family communication than BI with small to moderate effect sizes. Qualitative feedbacks corroborated the quantitative findings.Conclusion: Our trial provided the first evidence of the effectiveness of probation service and the additional use of an innovative, relatively low-cost, theory-based brief positive family holistic health intervention. This intervention may offer a new model for enhancing probation service.Trial Registration: The research protocol was registered at the National Institutes of Health. (shrink)

David Friedell has recently discussed the relationship between intrinsic and extrinsic properties of art, specifically in music. Friedell claims that normative social rules dictate who can change the intrinsic or extrinsic properties of a piece of music. I claim that in text-based theater—as a particular art form—the dividing line between intrinsic and extrinsic properties of a play is sometimes tenuous. This tenuousness is due to a play's bifurcated existence as a dramatic text and as many theatrical performances.

Purpose. The research is based on the comprehension of the anthropological tendencies of the metamodernism, which presupposes the consistent solution of the following tasks: a) explication of the content of post-postmodernism in modern philosophical literature; b) identification of the ideological basis of metamodernism anthropology; c) characteristics of the problem field of metamodernism anthropology and the state of man in the modern era. Theoretical basis. Anthropology of the metamodernism for the first time defines socio-cultural context through the hesitative state between the (...) values of modernism and their rejection by the postmodernism, which makes it possible to formulate the peculiarity of the time as a desire to reconstruct a Holistic Man, impartial to the dominant worldview attitudes of a social nature. Anthropology of the metamodernism is presented as the individualization of the socio-cultural space in the form of human self-reconstruction at all anthropological levels. An era without an unambiguously expressed moral guideline is based on the ethics of all-acceptance, the only justification of which is the existence of a universal right to beingness. Digitalization as a process of digital transformation of society creates conditions for the value realization of the free choice of metamodernism man, through which a Holistic Man is accomplished. Originality. It is substantiated that metamodernism as a descriptive position of the modern cultural dominant of the digitalized era is characterized by a state of hesitation between the values of modernism and postmodernism. The anthropology of the metamodernism manifests itself in the form of the reconstruction of the holistic man and the self-reconstruction of the inner man. The peculiarities of the human metamodernism are recognized as the mutual complete determinability of the individual and the mass. Conclusions. Metamodernism is the formulation of the problem of a man in a new perspective: what to be and how to survive between the extremes of semantic poles, without losing dignity and unique intrinsic value. Proceeding from this, the fate of a metamodernism man is determined in pursuit of the endlessly receding horizons of the anthropology of incompleteness, which is carried out through post-irony, naive sincerity, optimistic openness to the world. (shrink)

The article is devoted to dynamic processes in the field of artificial intelligence, namely in the tasks of neurodynamics. The problems of stability of transient processes in neural networks, which dynamics can be described by systems of weakly nonlinear difference equations, are considered. Conditions are formulated in terms of the direct Lyapunov method.

In the article the possibility of using a smartphone with an integrated set of necessary technical means for implementing the technology of video recording of vehicle speed is investigated and established. The main algorithmic and software components of a smartphone are proposed, which allow to identify and to accompany a vehicle, as well as to determine its speed. Installation and initial setup of the device is simple. It is only necessary to measure and enter in the device height of its (...) arrangement. In the article the possibility of using a smartphone with an integrated set of necessary technical means for implementing the technology of video recording of vehicle speed is investigated and established. The smartphone has a low cost and power consumption, the ability to operate in the required temperature range, as well as a set of physically built-in necessary technical means: several video cameras, accelerometers, gyroscope, magnetometer, GPS sensor, GSM and Wi-Fi wireless communication. Due to its low power consumption, it can also run on solar panels during the day when no other power source is available. The cost of a smartphone with very good characteristics does not exceed 10,000 UAH. The paper proposes the main components of the algorithmic support of the device. The use of the Lucas-Kanade method for the implementation of tracking and the calculation in the interpixel space of the coordinates of the points of the vehicle's trajectory will improve the accuracy of measurements of the traveled distance and the vehicle's speed on short sections of the trajectory. The proposed algorithm for calculating the vehicle speed requires entering only one parameter - the height of the device. Therefore, installation and initial setup of the device is simple. It is enough to measure and enter this parameter into the device. Large-scale introduction of a device for measuring vehicle speed, built on the basis of a smartphone, is possible due to relatively small investments in the development of its mechanical part, algorithmic and software. (shrink)

This article isolates ten prepositions, which constitute the undercurrent paradigm of contemporary discourse of health disease and medicine. Discussion of the interrelationship between those prepositions leads to a systematic refutation of this paradigm. An alternative set is being forwarded. The key notions of the existing paradigm are that health is the natural condition of humankind and that disease is a deviance from that nature. Natural things are harmonious and healthy while human made artifacts are coercive interference with natural balance. It (...) is suggested that the current paradigm is influenced by the world of finances and by instrumental reason. The alternative model suggests that human nature cannot be delineated. Humans fashion their own selves and nature by artificial means, medicine among them. The article discusses the implications of the paradigm adapted in various scholarly and popular debates such as the use of sex hormones for contraception, the care of the elderly, holistic medicine and distributive justice in health care. Medicine is not an isolated or a privileged realm. There is no unique entitlement to health care. It is always part of a broader agenda of social values and institutions. A open view of human societies, values and practices as they are situated within concrete material conditions is the platform required for an integrative and creative discourse of health care. (shrink)

The purpose of this study is to explore the emotional dimension of the student-teachers’ experiences, which is marked by anxiety. This study is based on a combination of a phenomenological informed theoretical framework and a phenomenographic approach. The empirical material refers to in-depth interviews with student-teachers. Through an abductive analysis of the material, anxiety experiences appeared to be a significant matter in the student teachers’ emotional life. Our study showed that anxiety in different variations to a large extent characterized the (...) emotional dimension of the student teachers’ experiences. The variations were expressed through three overarching categories of anxiety. The first category of anxiety is about losing one’s dignity, the second about not being recognized as a person, and the third about doing something very wrong. To operationalize the purpose of this study, we will discuss the importance of considering anxiety experiences as a didactical content component in teacher education. (shrink)

This essay revisits the significance of Kaufmann's Toledot ha-emunah ha-yisre'elit in Jewish intellectual history, as its reception has hitherto been somewhat reductive. His work is generally viewed as an anti-Christian polemic with a Zionist agenda that sought to glorify the formative period of his people. A closer look at his intellectual background, as well as his theoretical framework, leads us to a different understanding of his work in general and of its alleged nationalistic features in particular. The essay shows, inter (...) alia, that Kaufmann was already making a Diltheyan hermeneutic turn decades before others in his field. (shrink)

Although increasing in usage, surrogacy remains the most controversial method of assisted reproductive technology. Many Christian ethicists have either objected tout court or expressed strong reservations about the practice. Behind much of this caution, however, lies essentialist assumptions about pregnant women or an overemphasis on the statistical minority of well-publicized disasters. The question remains whether Christian ethical reflection on surrogacy might change if informed by social scientific studies on the surrogacy triad. I offer a feminist Christian framework for surrogacy comprised (...) of seven principles drawn from this literature, the reproductive justice paradigm, human rights, and Reformed theo-ethical norms. I ultimately advance surrogacy under certain conditions as a moral good and focus on “altruistic” arrangements—including my own—without concluding that only non-commercial contracts could pass ethical muster. (shrink)

For a world mired in catastrophe, nothing could be more urgent than the question of survival. In this theoretically and methodologically groundbreaking book, Adam Y. Stern calls for a critical reevaluation of survival as a contemporary regime of representation. In Survival, Stern asks what texts, what institutions, and what traditions have made survival a recognizable element of our current political vocabulary. The book begins by suggesting that the interpretive key lies in the discursive prominence of "Jewish survival." Yet the Jewish (...) example, he argues, is less a marker of Jewish history than an index of Christianity's impact on the modern, secular, political imagination. With this inversion, the book repositions Jewish survival as the supplemental effect and mask of a more capacious political theology of Christian survival. The argument proceeds by taking major moments in twentieth-century philosophy, theology, and political theory as occasions for collecting the scattered elements of survival's theological-political archive. Through readings of canonical texts by secular and Jewish thinkers—Hannah Arendt, Walter Benjamin, Franz Rosenzweig, and Sigmund Freud—Stern shows that survival belongs to a history of debates about the sovereignty and subjection of Christ's body. Interrogating survival as a rhetorical formation, the book intervenes in discussions about biopolitics, secularism, political theology, and the philosophy of religion. (shrink)

Purpose. The research is aimed at clarifying the essence of virtual reality and its productive role in the self-realization of the individual, as well as the importance in the process of self-realization of the individual to expand the dimensions of his identity by including virtual dimensions. To do this, the process of formation of the phenomenon of virtual identity in the environment of virtual reality is revealed and the influence of productive human activity in virtual reality on the nature of (...) virtualization of its identity is turned out. Theoretical basis of the work is understanding virtual reality as a combination of conscious productive imagination as its attribute, on the one hand, and the technological component in the form of a computer and related programs on the other hand. An anthropological prerequisite for virtual reality is the ability of the man’s creative imagination to calculate and choose the best model from many mental design ones, using, among other things, horizontal computer networks, which form a virtual identity. Originality. It was found that a necessary condition for the formation of a virtual identity is the exchange of results of productive and intermediary activities between Internet users, which they carry out in Internet networks with the help of virtual reality itself. Accordingly, philosophical studies of virtual reality are gradually supplemented by research in the field of virtual identity. Competitive production and distribution of human livelihoods through creative project work in virtual reality in interaction and communication with Others in a rapidly changing society requires the expansion of identity, including virtual dimensions. In the modern world self-realization of the individual includes the expansion of identity through its virtualization. Conclusions. A person’s productive activity in computer virtual reality – as an auxiliary tool of his creative imagination –creates his virtualized identity in solidarity and competitive interaction with Others, promotes self-realization of his personality and makes his holistic identity more flexible. Accordingly, philosophical studies of virtual reality over time are supplemented by philosophical anthropology studies of virtual identity. (shrink)

In heterogeneous markets, one of the many consumer groups is that of green product buyers. With rising ethical values, the green market is assuming its place in a general growth trend. Given this, it is important to determine the profile of green product buyers. This study aims to find out whether there are sub-markets for green product buyers, based on their personal values and consumption values, and to determine a detailed profile for these buyers. Both personal values and consumption values (...) are basic factors guiding consumer behaviour and affecting consumption preferences. The data was collected, through surveys in Turkey, from green consumers who were members of the TEMA (the Turkish Foundation for Combating Soil Erosion, for Reforestation and the Protection of Natural Habitats) council. The result of our clustering analysis indicates that green product buyers could be segmented into subgroups according to their personal values and consumption values. (shrink)

Following Henkin’s discovery of partially-ordered (branching) quantification (POQ) with standard quantifiers in 1959, philosophers of language have attempted to extend his definition to POQ with generalized quantifiers. In this paper I propose a general definition of POQ with 1-place generalized quantifiers of the simplest kind: namely, predicative, or “cardinality” quantifiers, e.g., “most”, “few”, “finitely many”, “exactly α ”, where α is any cardinal, etc. The definition is obtained in a series of generalizations, extending the original, Henkin definition first to a (...) general definition of monotone-increasing (M↑) POQ and then to a general definition of generalized POQ, regardless of monotonicity. The extension is based on (i) Barwise’s 1979 analysis of the basic case of M↑ POQ and (ii) my 1990 analysis of the basic case of generalized POQ. POQ is a non-compositional 1st-order structure, hence the problem of extending the definition of the basic case to a general definition is not trivial. The paper concludes with a sample of applications to natural and mathematical languages. (shrink)

I present first what I take to be a more interesting item than the others. O.C 716–19. δ' ερετμος κπαγλ' λα χερ σ ✝παραπτομναπλτα θρσκει, τν κατομπδων νηρῄδων κλουθος. The above is Pearson's text, except that I have transferred the last syllable of his 716 to the beginning of my 717. Careful consideration of the metre of this stasimon has convinced me that 716 is rightly regarded by Schroeder as an ionic trimeter ; further, that 717 is what most people (...) call a glyconic, as is also 718. Naturally therefore I follow Hermann and Jebb as regards the text in 704, and have thus no use for the three conjectures mentioned by Pearson as substitutes for our admittedly corrupt παραπτομνα. (shrink)