Numerous agricultural wastes are impractically discarded every day, and one of these is rice bran. This study investigated the production of a biodegradable straw made of cassava starch and powdered rice bran. It aimed to determine the effectiveness of the different treatments of Cassava Starch-Rice Bran in terms of water resistance, tensile strength, and biodegradability. An experimental design was used in conducting the study. There were three treatments made in making CSRB straws: the first, with more rice bran; the second, (...) with the same cassava starch and rice bran ratio; and the third, with more cassava starch. These treatments produced three replicates each. The straws were placed in a dehydrating machine for 24 hours at a temperature of 60° Celsius. The straws were then coated with beeswax after being removed from their respective molders. The CSRB straws were found to be water resistant due to the beeswax coating applied, although it had a weak tensile strength even with the presence of beeswax. The rate of biodegradability of the CSRB straw was fast due to it being made up of organic materials. The results revealed that straws made from Cassava Starch and Powdered Rice Bran are effective in terms of water resistance and biodegradability. (shrink)

The current COVID-19 pandemic and the previous SARS/MERS outbreaks of 2003 and 2012 have resulted in a series of major global public health crises. We argue that in the interest of developing effective and safe vaccines and drugs and to better understand coronaviruses and associated disease mechenisms it is necessary to integrate the large and exponentially growing body of heterogeneous coronavirus data. Ontologies play an important role in standard-based knowledge and data representation, integration, sharing, and analysis. Accordingly, we initiated the (...) development of the community-based Coronavirus Infectious Disease Ontology in early 2020. -/- As an Open Biomedical Ontology (OBO) library ontology, CIDO is open source and interoperable with other existing OBO ontologies. CIDO is aligned with the Basic Formal Ontology and Viral Infectious Disease Ontology. CIDO has imported terms from over 30 OBO ontologies. For example, CIDO imports all SARS-CoV-2 protein terms from the Protein Ontology, COVID-19-related phenotype terms from the Human Phenotype Ontology, and over 100 COVID-19 terms for vaccines (both authorized and in clinical trial) from the Vaccine Ontology. CIDO systematically represents variants of SARS-CoV-2 viruses and over 300 amino acid substitutions therein, along with over 300 diagnostic kits and methods. CIDO also describes hundreds of host-coronavirus protein-protein interactions (PPIs) and the drugs that target proteins in these PPIs. CIDO has been used to model COVID-19 related phenomena in areas such as epidemiology. The scope of CIDO was evaluated by visual analysis supported by a summarization network method. CIDO has been used in various applications such as term standardization, inference, natural language processing (NLP) and clinical data integration. We have applied the amino acid variant knowledge present in CIDO to analyze differences between SARS-CoV-2 Delta and Omicron variants. CIDO's integrative host-coronavirus PPIs and drug-target knowledge has also been used to support drug repurposing for COVID-19 treatment. -/- CIDO represents entities and relations in the domain of coronavirus diseases with a special focus on COVID-19. It supports shared knowledge representation, data and metadata standardization and integration, and has been used in a range of applications. (shrink)

The textbook presents the problematic aspect of historical and modern representations of the phenomenology of religion in academic discourse. The most important topics of the course are presented in a form that is easy to understand, questions for self-assessment and problems for analysis are formulated, and recommendations for organizing independent work of students are given. The textbook's material is systematized according to the principle of a problem to a specific example of its installation in religion, culture, science, and philosophy. The (...) textbook explores the interdisciplinary connections between philosophy, the philosophy of religion, and religious studies. The publication is addressed to students studying in the field of training "Religious Studies", and recommended to students studying philosophy, as well as to anyone interested in issues of understanding religion taking into account the achievements of the phenomenology of religion. (shrink)

The behavior of macroeconomic indicators (reflecting the development of both the national economy as a whole and that of individual economic sectors) testifies to the low current efficiency of the functioning of economic entities in the context of economic activities. This in turn necessitates scientific substantiation of developing and introducing theoretical and methodological recommendations to ensure innovative development of the country. One of the most effective ways to practically implement this task is to substantiate methods for quantitative assessment of potential (...) in the context of economic activities. The practical value of applying these methods is that the results of the integrated assessment of potential can be used as a criterion for the priority development of certain economic sectors or economic activities. (shrink)

The present study examined the endogenous release of luteinizing hormone-releasing hormone (LHRH) from superfused hypothalamic slices derived from Korean native cattie (KNC). In addition, the in vitro secretory pattern of LHRH release in '(NC was compared with that in imported cattle such as Holstein cow. The median eminences (ME) of hypothalamic tissues were dissected out, sliced, and quickly placed in an ice-cold superfusion chamber. Superfusion chambers containing ME slices were maintained in a constant temperature water-bath at 37∘C. Effluents were collected (...) on the ice at 10 min intervals for a 4 hr superfusion period and kept -20∘C prior to LHRH radioimmunoassay. LHRH release was analyzed by the PULSAR algorithm. The spontaneous release of LHRH from both cows was episodic during a 4 hr superfusion period. The mean LHRH release, pulse amplitude and pulse interval m KNC were 11.08± 1.50 pg/min/mg x 10-2, 21.43 1 7.28 pg/mg x 10-2, and 39.42 ± 3.08 min, which was quite similar to those observed in Holstein cows. The basic characteristics of the LHRH pulse generator of KNC appear important for a better understanding about the endocrine function of KNC. (shrink)

No matter how many words/gestures one uses to describe his/her qualia, I won't be able to know what it was like for him/her to experience his/her qualia. I know what it was like for me to experience my qualia, simply because I can remember what it was like for me to experience my qualia. -/- So, to me, there is no evidence that anyone else can experience his/her qualia. -/- So, one can't prove to others that he/she can experience his/her (...) qualia. One can’t (use any words/gestures to) prove to others that he/she can experience his/her qualia. -/- "What is it like to be a bat?" When I imagine what it is like to be a bat, I'm actually imagining that I am the bat. Or in other words, I’m imagining that the bat is me. -/- When I imagine that a bat is me, I’m actually imagining that a homunculus is sitting inside the bat’s body. What does this mean? What is that homunculus? That homunculus is a “clone” of me! That homunculus is another “me”! -/- So, when I imagine that a bat is me, I’m actually imagining that I am sitting inside the bat’s body. -/- So, the question “What is it like to be a bat?” is actually equivalent to the question “What is it like to be me?” or the question “If I sit inside a bat’s body (and control/feel the bat’s body) as the bat itself, what is it like to be me (under that situation)?”. -/- The question “What is it like to be me?” is actually equivalent to the question “If I sit inside a human’s body (and control/feel the human’s body) as the human himself, what is it like to be me (under that situation)?” or the question “If I sit inside my body (and control/feel my body) as myself, what is it like to be me (under that situation)?”. -/- Regarding its usage, the term “qualia” is equivalent to “(subjective) feeling” and “(subjective) experience”. -/- The term “qualia” draws our attention to the ontological question “What is the nature of (subjective) feeling/experience?”. The term “qualia” urges us to think about the ontological question “What is the nature of (subjective) feeling/experience?” endlessly. (shrink)

The aim of this paper is to make a step towards a complete description of Special Relativity genesis and acceptance, bringing some light on the intertheoretic relations between Special Relativity and other physical theories of the day. I’ll try to demonstrate that Special Relativity and the Early Quantum Theory were created within the same programme of statistical mechanics, thermodynamics and Maxwellian electrodynamics reconciliation, i.e. elimination of the contradictions between the consequences of this theories. The approach proposed enables to explain why (...) classical mechanics and classical electrodynamics were “refuted” almost simultaneously or, in terms more suitable for the present discussion, why did the quantum and the relativistic revolutions both took place at the beginning of the 20-th century. I ‘ll argue that the quantum and the relativistic revolutions were simultaneous since they had common origin - the clash between the fundamental theories of the second half of the 19-th century that constituted the “body” of Classical Physics. The revolution’ s most dramatic turning point was Einstein’s 1905 light quantum paper, that laid the foundations of the Old Quantum Theory and influenced the fate of special theory of relativity too. Hence, the following two main interrelated theses are defended.(1)Einstein’s special relativity 1905 paper can be considered as a subprogramme of a general research programme that had its pivot in the quantum; (2) One of the reasons of Einstein’s victory over Lorentz consists in the following: special relativity theory superseded Lorentz’s theory when the general programme imposed itself, and, in so doing, made the ether concept untenable. -/- Key words: A.Einstein; H.Lorentz; I.Yu.Kobzarev; context of discovery; context of justification . (shrink)

[...] Rousseau bir yandan çağının yükselen değerlerinden yararlanırken diğer yandan bu değerlerin içeriden eleştirisini yapmayı başarabilen düşünürlerden biri olduğu için fikirleri ölümünden asırlar sonra bile önemini yitirmemiştir. Demokratik devletlerin meşruiyet krizinin giderek derinleştiği ve çoğunlukçu, majoritarian, ideolojilerin etraflıca sorgulanmaya başlandığı çağımızda, demokrasiyi çoğunluk kararına ek olarak “rıza”, “Yurttaşlık”, “sivil özgürlük”, “kamusal uzlaşı” ve “Genel İrade” kavramlarıyla birlikte ele alan Rousseau’yu yeniden okumak önemlidir [...] Rousseau-demokrasi ilişkisinin kazılıp ortaya çıkartılacağı bu metinde uğranılacak olan kavramsal duraklar sırasıyla: Eşitsizlik (doğal ve toplumsal), özgürlük (...) (doğal ve sivil), politik bütün (bodypolitic), Genel İrade, ortak iyi (common good) ve Egemen olmalıdır. Söz konusu kavramlar, Rousseau’nun onlara yüklediği özgün anlamları gözden kaçırılmadan sanki ilk defa karşılaşılıyormuşçasına bir zihin açıklığı ile okundukları zaman, onun demokrasi görüşü de gün ışığına çıkartılabilir. (shrink)

Bu kitapta, Ebû İshâk es-Saffâr’ın (öl. 534/1139) kelâmî görüşleri, Telḫîṣü’l-edille li-ḳavâʿidi’t-tevḥîd adlı eserinde Allah’ın isimlerinin anlamlarını açıklarken yaptığı yorumlar çerçevesinde ele alınmaktadır. Ebû İshâk es-Saffâr, 6./12. yüzyıl Hanefî-Mâtürîdî âlimlerinden biridir. Kelâma dair Telḫîṣü’l-edille eserinde esmâ-i hüsnâ konusuna ayrıntılı olarak yer vermektedir. İki cilt hâlinde yayımlanan bu eserin yaklaşık üçte birlik bir kısmını esmâ-i hüsnâ konusu oluşturmaktadır. Bu kısım incelendiğinde, Saffâr’ın Allah’ın varlığı, birliği ve sıfatları ile ilgili konular başta olmak üzere pek çok konuyu 175 esmâ-i hüsnâya dayanarak izah ettiği görülmektedir. (...) O, esmâ-i hüsnâ bölümünde yer vermediği bazı isimlere ise müstakil başlıklar altında değinmektedir. Örneğin el-Mütekkelim ismi kelâm sıfatını bağlamında ve halku’l-Kur’ân ile icâz’ul-Kur’ân gibi konularla ilişkili bir şekilde ele almaktadır. Bu isimler de listeye dahil edildiğinde sayı 178’e ulaşmaktadır. Bu durumda eserin yarısını esmâ-i hüsnâ konusu teşkil etmektedir. -/- Saffâr, esmâ-i hüsnâ bölümünde alfabetik bir sıra içerisinde ele aldığı ilâhî isimleri öncelikle lugavî (semantik) yönden izah etmektedir. Sonrasında ise değerlendirdiği ilahî ismi, bir kelâm konusu ile bağlantı kurarak kelâmî perspektifle açıklamaktadır Esmâ-i hüsnâ temelinde ele alınan konuların hilâfet meselesi hariç diğer kelâm bahislerini kapsadığı görülmektedir. Saffâr öncesi Hanefî-Mâtürîdî kelâm literatürü içinde esmâ-i hüsnânın bu kadar kapsamlı ele alındığı başka bir eser bilinmemektedir. -/- Bu kitap; üç ana bölümden oluşmaktadır. “Metodolojik Çerçeve” başlıklı giriş bölümünde çalışmanın konusu, önemi, amacı, yöntemi ve kaynakları hakkında bilgi verilmiştir. Birinci bölümde Saffâr’ın yaşadığı sosyokültürel çevre olan Mâverâünnehir bölgesi ile Buhara ve Merv şehirlerinin siyasî, sosyal ve dinî durumu ortaya konulmaya çalışılmıştır. İkinci bölümde esmâ-i hüsna konusunun anlaşılmasına temel oluşturan isim, tesmiye, müsemmâ, sıfat ve vasf gibi kavramlar ile esmâ-i hüsnânın sayısı ve ihsâsı gibi kelâmî tartışmalara değinilmiştir. Sonrasında Saffâr öncesi dönemde kaleme alınan esmâ-i hüsnâ litaratürü hakkında bilgi verilmiştir. Bölüm sonuna Saffâr’ın rivayet ettiği 178 ilahî isme dair ayrıntılı bir tablo eklenmiştir. Üçüncü bölümde öncelikle, Saffâr’ın esmâ-i hüsnâyı izah ederken dikkate aldığı kelâmî ilkeler tespit edilmeye çalışılmıştır. Sonrasında ise Saffâr’ın Telḫîṣü’l-edille’de ilâhî isimleri açıklarken ortaya koyduğu kelâmî görüş ve değerlendirmeler belirlenerek sistematik bir şekilde kategorize edilmiştir. Bu kapsamda ele alınan her konunun sonuna ilgili ilâhî isimleri ve bağlantılı olduğu tartışmaları içeren tablolar eklenmiştir. Sonuç bölümünde ise Saffâr’ın esmâ-i hüsnâ anlayışına dayanan kelâm yöntemine dair ulaştığımız sonuçlara yer verilmiştir. Bu kitapta onun, esmâ-i hüsnânın %75’inde kelâmî yorumlarda bulunduğu ve bilgi-varlık bahsinden âhiret hayatına kadar bütün kelâm konularını esmâ-i hüsnâ ile bağlantılı yorumladığı tespit edilmiştir. Ulaşılan bu sonuçlar, Saffâr’ın kelâm anlayışının ilâhî isimlerin yorumuna dayandığını ortaya koymaktadır. [his book discusses the theological views of Abū Isḥāq al-Ṣaffār d. 534/1139), within the framework of his comments on the meanings of Allah’s names, provided in his work titled Talkhīṣ al-adilla. Abū Isḥāq al-Ṣaffār is one of the Ḥanafite-Māturīdite scholars in the 6th/12th century. In his work titled Talkhīṣ al-adilla li-qawāʿid al-tawḥīd on kalām, he spared extensive space for al-asmāʾ al-husnā. Approximately one third of this work, published in two volumes, is devoted to al-asmāʾ al-husnā. An examination of the related section reveals that al-Ṣaffār explains many issues, particularly those related to the existence, unity and attributes of Allah, based on 175 al-asmāʾ al-husnā. He mentions some of the names that he does not include in the al-asmāʾ al-husnā section under separate headings. For example, the name al-Mutakallim is addressed within the context of the attribute of kalām and in relation to subjects, such as the khalq al-Qurʾān and i‘jaz al-Qurʾān. Upon the addition of these names to the list, the number names reaches 178. This means that half of the work deals with the subject of al-asmāʾ al-husnā. -/- al-Ṣaffār lists the divine names in alphabetical order and explains them semantically in the chapter of al-asmāʾ al-husnā. Then he goes on to clarify each divine name through a theological lens with a specific reference to the subject of kalām. In the pre-Saffar Ḥanafite-Māturīdite theological literature, there is no other work that addresses al-asmāʾ al-husnā in such an extensive way. -/- This book consists of three main sections. The first section titled “Methodological Framework”, elaborates on the focus, significance, purpose and method of the study, along with the sources used. The first part describes the political, social and religious status of Transoxiana (Mā-warāʾ al-Nahr) region and the cities of Bukhara and Marw, the sociocultural environment in which Saffar lived. The second chapter addresses various concepts, which promote the understanding of al-asmāʾ al-husnā, such as name, tasmiya, musammā, attribute and qualification in addition to the theological debates such as the number and iḥṣāʾ of al-asmāʾ al-husnā. Then, it provides information about the al-asmāʾ al-husnā literature produced in the pre- Ṣaffār period. The end of each chapter comes with a detailed table with the 178 divine names mentioned by al-Ṣaffār. In the third chapter, the author initially discusses the theological principles that al-Ṣaffār considered while explaining the essence of al-asmāʾ al-husnā. This section also determines and systematically categorizes the theological views and evaluations put forward by al-Ṣaffār while explaining the divine names in Talkhīṣ al-adilla. The tables with the divine names and the related discussions can be seen at the end of the discussion for each subject. The last section presents the conclusions reached, regarding the kalām method based on al-Ṣaffār’s understanding of the essence of al-asmāʾ al-husnā. The present study revealed that he made theological interpretations in 75% of the al-asmāʾ al-husnā and interpreted all theological issues ranging from the subjects of knowledge and existence to the Afterlife in connection with the al-asmāʾ al-husnā. These results indicate that al-Ṣaffār's understanding of kalām is based on the interpretation of the divine names.]. (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 thirteenth volume of Collected Papers is an eclectic tome of 88 papers in various fields of sciences, such as astronomy, biology, calculus, economics, education and administration, game theory, geometry, graph theory, information fusion, decision making, instantaneous physics, quantum physics, neutrosophic logic and set, non-Euclidean geometry, number theory, paradoxes, philosophy of science, scientific research methods, statistics, and others, structured in 17 chapters (Neutrosophic Theory and Applications; Neutrosophic Algebra; Fuzzy Soft Sets; Neutrosophic Sets; Hypersoft Sets; Neutrosophic Semigroups; Neutrosophic Graphs; Superhypergraphs; Plithogeny; (...) Information Fusion; Statistics; Decision Making; Extenics; Instantaneous Physics; Paradoxism; Mathematica; Miscellanea), comprising 965 pages, published between 2005-2022 in different scientific journals, by the author alone or in collaboration with the following 110 co-authors (alphabetically ordered) from 26 countries: Abduallah Gamal, Sania Afzal, Firoz Ahmad, Muhammad Akram, Sheriful Alam, Ali Hamza, Ali H. M. Al-Obaidi, Madeleine Al-Tahan, Assia Bakali, Atiqe Ur Rahman, Sukanto Bhattacharya, Bilal Hadjadji, Robert N. Boyd, Willem K.M. Brauers, Umit Cali, Youcef Chibani, Victor Christianto, Chunxin Bo, Shyamal Dalapati, Mario Dalcín, Arup Kumar Das, Elham Davneshvar, Bijan Davvaz, Irfan Deli, Muhammet Deveci, Mamouni Dhar, R. Dhavaseelan, Balasubramanian Elavarasan, Sara Farooq, Haipeng Wang, Ugur Halden, Le Hoang Son, Hongnian Yu, Qays Hatem Imran, Mayas Ismail, Saeid Jafari, Jun Ye, Ilanthenral Kandasamy, W.B. Vasantha Kandasamy, Darjan Karabašević, Abdullah Kargın, Vasilios N. Katsikis, Nour Eldeen M. Khalifa, Madad Khan, M. Khoshnevisan, Tapan Kumar Roy, Pinaki Majumdar, Sreepurna Malakar, Masoud Ghods, Minghao Hu, Mingming Chen, Mohamed Abdel-Basset, Mohamed Talea, Mohammad Hamidi, Mohamed Loey, Mihnea Alexandru Moisescu, Muhammad Ihsan, Muhammad Saeed, Muhammad Shabir, Mumtaz Ali, Muzzamal Sitara, Nassim Abbas, Munazza Naz, Giorgio Nordo, Mani Parimala, Ion Pătrașcu, Gabrijela Popović, K. Porselvi, Surapati Pramanik, D. Preethi, Qiang Guo, Riad K. Al-Hamido, Zahra Rostami, Said Broumi, Saima Anis, Muzafer Saračević, Ganeshsree Selvachandran, Selvaraj Ganesan, Shammya Shananda Saha, Marayanagaraj Shanmugapriya, Songtao Shao, Sori Tjandrah Simbolon, Florentin Smarandache, Predrag S. Stanimirović, Dragiša Stanujkić, Raman Sundareswaran, Mehmet Șahin, Ovidiu-Ilie Șandru, Abdulkadir Șengür, Mohamed Talea, Ferhat Taș, Selçuk Topal, Alptekin Ulutaș, Ramalingam Udhayakumar, Yunita Umniyati, J. Vimala, Luige Vlădăreanu, Ştefan Vlăduţescu, Yaman Akbulut, Yanhui Guo, Yong Deng, You He, Young Bae Jun, Wangtao Yuan, Rong Xia, Xiaohong Zhang, Edmundas Kazimieras Zavadskas, Zayen Azzouz Omar, Xiaohong Zhang, Zhirou Ma.‬‬‬‬‬‬‬‬. (shrink)

This tenth volume of Collected Papers includes 86 papers in English and Spanish languages comprising 972 pages, written between 2014-2022 by the author alone or in collaboration with the following 105 co-authors (alphabetically ordered) from 26 countries: Abu Sufian, Ali Hassan, Ali Safaa Sadiq, Anirudha Ghosh, Assia Bakali, Atiqe Ur Rahman, Laura Bogdan, Willem K.M. Brauers, Erick González Caballero, Fausto Cavallaro, Gavrilă Calefariu, T. Chalapathi, Victor Christianto, Mihaela Colhon, Sergiu Boris Cononovici, Mamoni Dhar, Irfan Deli, Rebeca Escobar-Jara, Alexandru Gal, N. (...) Gandotra, Sudipta Gayen, Vassilis C. Gerogiannis, Noel Batista Hernández, Hongnian Yu, Hongbo Wang, Mihaiela Iliescu, F. Nirmala Irudayam, Sripati Jha, Darjan Karabašević, T. Katican, Bakhtawar Ali Khan, Hina Khan, Volodymyr Krasnoholovets, R. Kiran Kumar, Manoranjan Kumar Singh, Ranjan Kumar, M. Lathamaheswari, Yasar Mahmood, Nivetha Martin, Adrian Mărgean, Octavian Melinte, Mingcong Deng, Marcel Migdalovici, Monika Moga, Sana Moin, Mohamed Abdel-Basset, Mohamed Elhoseny, Rehab Mohamed, Mohamed Talea, Kalyan Mondal, Muhammad Aslam, Muhammad Aslam Malik, Muhammad Ihsan, Muhammad Naveed Jafar, Muhammad Rayees Ahmad, Muhammad Saeed, Muhammad Saqlain, Muhammad Shabir, Mujahid Abbas, Mumtaz Ali, Radu I. Munteanu, Ghulam Murtaza, Munazza Naz, Tahsin Oner, ‪Gabrijela Popović‬‬‬‬‬, Surapati Pramanik, R. Priya, S.P. Priyadharshini, Midha Qayyum, Quang-Thinh Bui, Shazia Rana, Akbara Rezaei, Jesús Estupiñán Ricardo, Rıdvan Sahin, Saeeda Mirvakili, Said Broumi, A. A. Salama, Flavius Aurelian Sârbu, Ganeshsree Selvachandran, Javid Shabbir, Shio Gai Quek, Son Hoang Le, Florentin Smarandache, Dragiša Stanujkić, S. Sudha, Taha Yasin Ozturk, Zaigham Tahir, The Houw Iong, Ayse Topal, Alptekin Ulutaș, Maikel Yelandi Leyva Vázquez, Rizha Vitania, Luige Vlădăreanu, Victor Vlădăreanu, Ștefan Vlăduțescu, J. Vimala, Dan Valeriu Voinea, Adem Yolcu, Yongfei Feng, Abd El-Nasser H. Zaied, Edmundas Kazimieras Zavadskas.‬‬. (shrink)

It presents the basics of the “Relativistic theory of gravitation”, with the inclusion of original texts, from various papers, published between 1987 and 2009, by theirs authors: S. S Gershtein, A. A. Logunov, Yu. M. Loskutov and M. A. Mestvirishvili, additionally, together with the introductions, summaries and conclusions of the author of this paper. The “Relativistic theory of gravitation” is a gauge theory, compatible with the theories of quantum physics of the electromagnetic, weak and strong forces, which defines gravity as (...) the fourth force existing in nature, as a static field equipped with the transmitter particles of the virtual gravitons of spins 2 and 0, within the spirit of Galilei's principle of relativity, in his generalization of Poincaré's Special Relativity that allowed the authors to universalize that the physical laws of nature are complied with regardless of the frames of reference where they apply, integrated into the Grossmann-Einstein Entwurf theory, in its further development, by those authors, therefore, this theory preserves the conservation laws of energy-impulse and angular impulse of the gravitational field jointly to the other material fields existing in nature, in the Riemann's effective spacetime, through its identity with Minkowski's pseudo Euclidean spacetime. (shrink)

Genetics: Medical, Theological and Ethical Aspects Tibbi, Dini ve Etik Boyutlariyla Genetik -/- Genetik bilimi biyolojinin botanik ve zooloji alanındaki uygulamalarını aşarak, sınırlarını önce antropolojiye sonra tıbba doğru hızla genişletmiştir. Öyle ki artık biyokimyadan onkolojiye kadar neredeyse tüm biyomedikal disiplinler, genetiğin kavramları, ilkeleri ve metodolojisi ile aşılanmıştır. Modern tıbbın uygulama alanında geniş bir yer tutan genetik bilimi, bir hastalığa dair risk analizi, teşhis ve tedavi seçeneklerinin belirlenmesi, prognozun değerlendirilmesi gibi klinik uygulamanın farklı evrelerinde söz sahibi olmaktadır. İçinde bulunduğumuz 21. yüzyılda (...) ise bu etkileşim eskisinden daha da güçlü hale gelerek devam etmektedir. Genetik biliminin klinikteki etkilerinin kapsamlı bir şekilde değerlendirildiği bu kitap, tüm dünyada tıbbın seyrini değiştirecek gelişmelere zemin teşkil eden genetik disiplininin olumlu ve olumsuz etkileri hakkında okuyucuya yetkili ağızlardan bilgiler taşımayı ve daha net bir fikir oluşturmayı hedeflemektedir. Kitapta dört ana bölüm bulunmaktadır. İlk bölümde doğum öncesi genetik uygulamalara, ikinci bölümde doğum sonrası (çocuk ve erişkinde) genetik testlere, üçüncü bölümde tıbbi genetiğin sıcak tartışma konusu olan Spinal Müsküler Atrofi’ye (SMA) ve dördüncü bölümde ise genetik bilgiyi felsefi bakışla ele alan makalelere yer verilmiştir. Genetiğin tıp pratiğini değiştirici ve dönüştürücü etkisine multidisipliner bir yaklaşımla ışık tutmayı amaçlayan bu eserin genetik hakkındaki Türkçe literatüre katkıda bulunmasını ümit ediyoruz. (shrink)

It presents the basics of the “Relativistic theory of gravitation”, with the inclusion of original texts, from various papers, published between 1987 and 2009, by theirs authors: S. S Gershtein, A. A. Logunov, Yu. M. Loskutov and M. A. Mestvirishvili, additionally, together with the introductions, summaries and conclusions of the author of this paper. The “Relativistic theory of gravitation” is a gauge theory, compatible with the theories of quantum physics of the electromagnetic, weak and strong forces, which defines gravity as (...) the fourth force existing in nature, as a static field equipped with the transmitter particles of the virtual gravitons of spins 2 and 0, within the spirit of Galilei's principle of relativity, in his generalization of Poincaré's Special Relativity that allowed the authors to universalize that the physical laws of nature are complied with regardless of the frames of reference where they apply, integrated into the Grossmann-Einstein Entwurf theory, in its further development, by those authors, therefore, this theory preserves the conservation laws of energy-impulse and angular impulse of the gravitational field jointly to the other material fields existing in nature, in the Riemann's effective spacetime, through its identity with Minkowski's pseudo Euclidean spacetime. (shrink)

Presentamos lo básico de la teoría relativista de la gravitación, con la inclusión de textos originales, de varios papeles, publicados entre 1987 y 2009, por sus autores: S. S Gershtein, A. A Logunov, Yu. M Loskutov y M. A Mestvirishvili junto con las introducciones, resúmenes y conclusiones elaborados por el autor de este papel. Esta es una teoría gauge, compatible con las teorías de la física cuántica de las fuerzas electromagnética, débil y fuerte, que define la gravedad como la cuarta (...) fuerza existente en la naturaleza, como campo estático dotada de la partícula transmisora del gravitón virtual de espines 2 y 0, dentro del espíritu del principio de relatividad de Galilei, en su generalización de la relatividad especial de Poincaré que le permitió a los autores la universalización de que las leyes físicas de la naturaleza se cumplen con independencia de los marcos de referencia donde se apliquen. No obstante, integrada a la teoría Entwurf de Grossmann-Einstein, en su desarrollo ulterior, por parte de estos autores, por lo tanto, preserva las leyes de conservación de la energía-impulso y del impulso angular conjuntamente del campo gravitacional y los demás campos materiales existentes en la naturaleza, en el espaciotiempo efectivo de Riemann, mediante su identidad con el espaciotiempo pseudo Euclídeo de Minkowski. (shrink)

Öz: Felsefenin benlik konusundaki geleneksel tutumu töz dualizmine başvurarak açıklanabilir. Çağdaş zihin araştırmalarında benlik ise, daha çok fizik dünyanın gerçekliği dolayımıyla ve genellikle bilinçli zihin durumu olarak olgusallık temelinde araştırılmaktadır. Bu çalışmada ise benliğin olgusallığı, olgu ve kurgu kategorilerinin bilgikuramsal bir çözümlemesi aracılığıyla ve mantığa uyarlık açısından ele incelenecektir. Bu bağlamda “olgu” ve “kurgu”yu bir tür karşıtlık ya da derin farklılıklar içeren iki kavram olarak açıklamanın haklı gerekçelere dayanmadığı öne sürülmektedir. Buna bağlı olarak da herhangi bir zihin araştırmasının benliği olgu (...) saymadan yapılamayacağı savunulmaktadır. Bu çalışmada özellikle deneyime ilişkin yeni bir kavrayışın gerekli olmasının sonucunda benlik tartışmalarının belli türden bir araştırma programı izlendiğinde gündemimize taşıyabileceği olanaklar soruşturulacaktır. (shrink)

This paper argues that, by construing emotion as epistemologically subversive, the Western tradition has tended to obscure the vital role of emotion in the construction of knowledge. The paper begins with an account of emotion that stresses its active, voluntary, and socially constructed aspects, and indicates how emotion is involved in evaluation and observation. It then moves on to show how the myth of dispassionate investigation has functioned historically to undermine the epistemic authority of women as well as other social (...) groups associated culturally with emotion. Finally, the paper sketches some ways in which the emotions of underclass groups, especially women, may contribute to the development of a critical social theory. (shrink)

Slurs possess interesting linguistic properties and so have recently attracted the attention of linguists and philosophers of language. For instance the racial slur "nigger" is explosively derogatory, enough so that just hearing it mentioned can leave one feeling as if they have been made complicit in a morally atrocious act.. Indeed, the very taboo nature of these words makes discussion of them typically prohibited or frowned upon. Although it is true that the utterance of slurs is illegitimate and derogatory in (...) most contexts, sufficient evidence suggests that slurs are not always or exclusively used to derogate. In fact, slurs are frequently picked up and appropriated by the very in-group members that the slur was originally intended to target. This might be done, for instance, as a means for like speakers to strengthen in-group solidarity. So an investigation into the meaning and use of slurs can give us crucial insight into how words can be used with such derogatory impact, and how they can be turned around and appropriated as vehicles of rapport in certain contexts among in-group speakers. In this essay I will argue that slurs are best characterized as being of a mixed descriptive/expressive type. Next, I will review the most influential accounts of slurs offered thus far, explain their shortcomings, then provide a new analysis of slurs and explain in what ways it is superior to others. Finally, I suggest that a family-resemblance conception of category membership can help us achieve a clearer understanding of the various ways in which slurs, for better or worse, are actually put to use in natural language discourse. (shrink)

Two things become one thing, something having parts, and something becoming something else, are cases of many things being identical with one thing. This apparent contradiction introduces others concerning transitivity of identity, discernibility of identicals, existence, and vague existence. I resolve the contradictions with a theory that identity, number, and existence are relative to standards for counting. What are many on some standard are one and the same on another. The theory gives an account of the discernibility of identicals using (...) phrases like “insofar as”. And it holds that standards for counting remain or shift depending on our purposes. (shrink)

It is crucial to actively detect the risks of transactions in a financial company to improve customer experience and minimize financial loss. In this study, we compare different machine learning algorithms to effectively and efficiently predict the legitimacy of financial transactions. The algorithms used in this study were: MLP Repressor, Random Forest Classifier, Complement NB, MLP Classifier, Gaussian NB, Bernoulli NB, LGBM Classifier, Ada Boost Classifier, K Neighbors Classifier, Logistic Regression, Bagging Classifier, Decision Tree Classifier and Deep Learning. The dataset (...) was collected from Kaggle depository. It consists of 6362620 rows and 10 columns. The best classifier with unbalanced dataset was the Random Forest Classifier. The Accuracy 99.97%, precession 99.96%, Recall 99.97% and the F1-score 99.96%. However, the best classifier with balanced dataset was the Bagging Classifier. The Accuracy 99.96%, precession 99.95%, Recall 99.98% and the F1-score 99.96%. (shrink)

I critically examine the semantic view of theories to reveal the following results. First, models in science are not the same as models in mathematics, as holders of the semantic view claim. Second, when several examples of the semantic approach are examined in detail no common thread is found between them, except their close attention to the details of model building in each particular science. These results lead me to propose a deflationary semantic view, which is simply that model construction (...) is an important component of theorizing in science. This deflationary view is consistent with a naturalized approach to the philosophy of science. (shrink)

This article provides an original account of slurs and how they may be differentially used by in-group and out-group speakers. Slurs are first distinguished from other terms and their role in social interaction is discussed. A new distinction is introduced between three different uses of slurs : the paradigmatic derogatory use, non-paradigmatic derogatory use, and non-paradigmatic non-derogatory use. I then account for their literal meaning and explain how a family-resemblance conception of category membership can clarify our understanding of the various (...) natural-language uses of slurs, -. The focus is restricted primarily to race-based and sex-based slurs used in the context of English speakers, and the article concludes with desiderata to be met by any subsequent analyses of slurs. (shrink)

Automatic detection of diseases and anatomical landmarks in medical images by the use of computers is important and considered a challenging process that could help medical diagnosis and reduce the cost and time of investigational procedures and refine health care systems all over the world. Recently, gastrointestinal (GI) tract disease diagnosis through endoscopic image classification is an active research area in the biomedical field. Several GI tract disease classification methods based on image processing and machine learning techniques have been proposed (...) by diverse research groups in the recent past. However, yet effective and comprehensive deep ensemble neural network-based classification model with high accuracy classification results is not available in the literature. In this thesis, we review ways and mechanisms to use deep learning techniques to research on multi-disease computer-aided detection about gastrointestinal and identify these images. We re-trained five state-of-the-art neural network architectures, VGG16, ResNet, MobileNet, Inception-v3, and Xception on the Kvasir dataset to classify eight categories that include an anatomical landmark (pylorus, z-line, cecum), a diseased state (esophagitis, ulcerative colitis, polyps), or a medical procedure (dyed lifted polyps, dyed resection margins) in the Gastrointestinal Tract. Our models have showed results with a promising accuracy which is a remarkable performance with respect to the state-of-the-art approaches. The resulting accuracies achieved using VGG, ResNet, MobileNet, Inception-v3, and Xception were 98.3%, 92.3%, 97.6%, 90% and 98.2%, respectively. As it appears, the most accurate result has been achieved when retraining VGG16 and Xception neural networks with accuracy reache to 98% due to its high performance on training on ImageNet dataset and internal structure that support classification problems. (shrink)

In the Bayesian approach to quantum mechanics, probabilities—and thus quantum states—represent an agent’s degrees of belief, rather than corresponding to objective properties of physical systems. In this paper we investigate the concept of certainty in quantum mechanics. Particularly, we show how the probability-1 predictions derived from pure quantum states highlight a fundamental difference between our Bayesian approach, on the one hand, and Copenhagen and similar interpretations on the other. We first review the main arguments for the general claim that probabilities (...) always represent degrees of belief. We then argue that a quantum state prepared by some physical device always depends on an agent’s prior beliefs, implying that the probability-1 predictions derived from that state also depend on the agent’s prior beliefs. Quantum certainty is therefore always some agent’s certainty. Conversely, if facts about an experimental setup could imply agent-independent certainty for a measurement outcome, as in many Copenhagen-like interpretations, that outcome would effectively correspond to a preexisting system property. The idea that measurement outcomes occurring with certainty correspond to preexisting system properties is, however, in conflict with locality. We emphasize this by giving a version of an argument of Stairs [(1983). Quantum logic, realism, and value-definiteness. Philosophy of Science, 50, 578], which applies the Kochen–Specker theorem to an entangled bipartite system. (shrink)

In order to better understand the topic of hope, this paper argues that two separate theories are needed: One for hoping, and the other for hopefulness. This bifurcated approach is warranted by the observation that the word ‘hope’ is polysemous: It is sometimes used to refer to hoping and sometimes, to feeling or being hopeful. Moreover, these two senses of 'hope' are distinct, as a person can hope for some outcome yet not simultaneously feel hopeful about it. I argue that (...) this distinction between hoping and hopefulness is not always observed or fully appreciated in the literature and has consequently caused much confusion. This paper then sketches what theorizing about hope looks like in light of this clarification and discusses some of its implications. (shrink)

In the present article, I offer a new reading of Hannah Arendt’s The Origins of Totalitarianism, specifically her argument that ideologies such as racism engender totalitarianism when the lonely and disenfranchised laborers of modern society develop a pathological fixation on formal logic, which I term “logomania.” That is, such logical deductions, from horrifically false premises, are the closest thing to thinking that individuals can engage in after their psyches, relationships, and communities have broken down. And it is only thus that (...) totalitarianism can achieve power, since it offers at least some form of connectedness and meaning, regardless how terrifying and violent. The danger persists, clearly, with the resurgence of the far Right, including in the extraordinary regime of Trump in the United States. From this I conclude that, along with the admirable calls to fight loneliness and rebuild our communities, we should also supplement all formal logical instruction and community education with instruction in creative thinking (including aesthetics), thereby discouraging the monomaniac reliance on formal logic as inadvertent weapon of totalitarianism. (shrink)

This editorial introduces the Journal of Consciousness Studies special issue on "Animal Consciousness". The 15 contributors and co-editors answer the question "How should we study animal consciousness scientifically?" in 500 words or fewer.

I argue via examples that there are cases in which things that are not two distinct things qualitatively differ without contradiction. In other words, there are cases in which something differs from itself. Standard responses to such cases are to divide the thing into distinct parts, or to conceive of the thing under different descriptions, or to appeal to different times, or to deny that the property had is the property lacked. I show these responses to be unsatisfactory. I then (...) gather and systematize available ways of talking about such cases with phrases like ‘insofar as’, ‘qua’, ‘to the extent that’, ‘in some respect’, etc., while paying special attention to the scope of ‘not’ when used with these phrases. This allows me to show how we can speak of self-differing without contradiction. (shrink)

This paper assesses the role of the Refutation of Idealism within the Critique of Pure Reason, as well as its relation to the treatment of idealism in the First Edition and to transcendental idealism more generally. It is argued that the Refutation is consistent with the Fourth Paralogism and that it can be considered as an extension of the Transcendental Deduction. While the Deduction, considered on its own, constitutes a 'regressive argument', the Refutation allows us to turn the Transcendental Analytic (...) into a 'progressive argument' that proceeds by the synthetic method. (shrink)

How is it possible for David Hume to be both withering skeptic and constructive theorist? I recommend an answer like the Pyrrhonian answer to the question how it is possible to suspend all judgment yet engage in active daily life. Sextus Empiricus distinguishes two kinds of assent: one suspended across the board and one involved with daily living. The first is an act of will based on appreciation of reasons; the second is a causal effect of appearances. Hume makes the (...) same distinction, only he extends the sort of assent involved in daily life to theoretical matters as well. He is a skeptic both in finding no reason to grant the first sort of assent and in being subject to the second. (shrink)

Cognitive categories in the geographic realm appear to manifest certain special features as contrasted with categories for objects at surveyable scales. We have argued that these features reflect specific ontological characteristics of geographic objects. This paper presents hypotheses as to the nature of the features mentioned, reviews previous empirical work on geographic categories, and presents the results of pilot experiments that used English-speaking subjects to test our hypotheses. Our experiments show geographic categories to be similar to their non-geographic counterparts in (...) the ways in which they generate instances of different relative frequencies at different levels. Other tests, however, provide preliminary evidence for the existence of important differences in subjects’ categorizations of geographic and non-geographic objects, and suggest further experimental work especially with regard to the role in cognitive categorization of different types of object-boundaries at different scales. (shrink)

According to the “internal” conception (Quong), political liberalism aims to be publicly justifiable only to people who are reasonable in a special sense specified and advocated by political liberalism itself. One advantage of the internal conception allegedly is that it enables liberalism to avoid perfectionism. The paper takes issue with this view. It argues that once the internal conception is duly pitched at its fundamental, metatheoretical level and placed in its proper discursive context, it emerges that it comes at the (...) cost of public dogma. The paper examines this problem and argues that a plausible response to this problem is to go beyond the internal conception and adopt a more inclusive, dynamic conception. But this calls for a form of perfectionism. Thus, the internal conception of political liberalism, far from showing how liberalism can be had without perfectionism, effectively calls for perfectionism as a remedy for its problems. (shrink)

The paper advances a non-orthodox reading of political liberalism’s view of political legitimacy, the view of public political justification that comes with it, and the idea of the reasonable at the heart of these views. Political liberalism entails that full discursive standing should be accorded only to people who are reasonable in a substantive sense. As the paper argues, this renders political liberalism dogmatic and exclusivist at the level of arguments for or against normative theories of justice. Against that background, (...) the paper considers aspects of a more plausible, deeper and more inclusive idea of public political justification that builds on a thinner, potentially cosmopolitan idea of the reasonable. The paper considers what content such an idea may have, and identifies a method of inclusive abstraction through which it may be enriched in content to render it fruitful for the purposes of a justification of principles of political justice. But the move toward more depth and inclusiveness faces constructivism with two challenges. First, inclusivism about the scope of political justification might not be able to avoid dogmatism unless it invokes perfectionist considerations. And second, the authority and appeal of a fruitfully rich idea of the reasonable depends on whether the addressees of political justification already value wide acceptability. (shrink)

Ontology, since Aristotle, has been conceived as a sort of highly general physics, a science of the types of entities in reality, of the objects, properties, categories and relations which make up the world. At the same time ontology has been for some two thousand years a speculative enterprise. It has rested methodologically on introspection and on the construction and analysis of elaborate world-models and of abstract formal-ontological theories. In the work of Quine and others this ontological theorizing in abstract (...) fashion about the world was supplemented by the study, based on the use of logical methods, of the ontological commitments or presuppositions embodied in scientific theories. In recent years both types of ontological study have found application in the world of information systems, for example in the construction of frameworks for knowledge representation and in database design and translation. As ontology is in this way drawn closer to the domain of real-world applications, the question arises as to whether it is possible to use empirical methods in studying ontological theories. More specifically: can we use empirical methods to test the ontological theories embodied in human cognition? We set forth the outlines of a framework for the formulation and testing of such theories as they relate to the specific domain of geographic objects and categories. (shrink)

Hume discusses the distinction of reason to explain how we distinguish things inseparable, and so identical, e.g., the color and figure of a white globe. He says we note the respect in which the globe is similar to a white cube and dissimilar to a black sphere, and the respect in which it is dissimilar to the first and similar to the second. Unfortunately, Hume takes these differing respects of resemblance to be identical with the white globe itself. Contradiction results, (...) undermining his theory of abstraction. The way out is apparently to admit an intrinsic complexity in even simple things. (shrink)

Ordinary usage gives a way to think of identity through time: the Pittsburgh of 1946 was the same city as the Pittsburgh of today is--namely Pittsburgh. Problem: The Pittsburgh of 1946 does not exist; Pittsburgh still does. How can they have been identical? I reject the temporal parts view on which they were not but we may speak as though they were. Rather I argue that claiming their identity is not contradictory. I interpret ‘the Pittsburgh of 1946’ as ‘Pittsburgh as (...) it was in 1946’ and suggest that the apparent contradiction results from an ambiguity in the scope of ‘as’. (shrink)

Psychiatric patients sometimes ask where to draw the line between who they are – their selves – and their mental illness. This problem is referred to as the self-illness ambiguity in the literature; it has been argued that solving said ambiguity is a crucial part of psychiatric treatment. I distinguish a Realist Solution from a Constructivist one. The former requires finding a supposedly pre-existing border, in the psychiatric patient’s mental life, between that which belongs to the self and that which (...) belongs to the mental illness. I argue that no such border exists, and that attempts to find it might even render the felt ambiguity worse. Instead, any solution must be constructivist; the patient (and others) should deliberate and discuss what to identify with or not. I further argue that psychiatric patients need not see their mental illness as wholly distinct from themselves to avoid ‘identifying with their diagnoses' in a problematic way. Finally, we can excuse problematic behaviour by mentally ill people – in fact, we can do so in a more nuanced and constructive way – while rejecting the view that the mental illness is wholly distinct from the patient’s self. (shrink)

Intuitions play an important role in contemporary philosophy. It is common for theories in epistemology, morality, semantics and metaphysics to be rejected because they are inconsistent with a widely and firmly held intuition. Our goal in this paper is to explore the role of epistemic intuitions in epistemology from a naturalistic perspective. Here is the question we take to be central: (Q) Ought we to trust our epistemic intuitions as evidence in support of our epistemological theories? We will understand this (...) question as employing an epistemic ‘ought’ – insofar as we aim at developing a correct epistemological theory, ought we to trust our epistemic intuitions as evidence for or against our epistemological theories? As it stands, (Q) needs further clarification. Whether something is trustworthy is relative to what (a) what it is and (b) what we’re asking it to do. Sam might trust Marie but not George to care for his children, while he might trust both to care for his pet fish. So in order to address (Q), we first need to explore two questions: What are epistemic intuitions? And what sort of epistemological theories do we want? We will take up each of these questions in the following sections. (shrink)

Aesthetic non-cognitivists deny that aesthetic statements express genuinely aesthetic beliefs and instead hold that they work primarily to express something non-cognitive, such as attitudes of approval or disapproval, or desire. Non-cognitivists deny that aesthetic statements express aesthetic beliefs because they deny that there are aesthetic features in the world for aesthetic beliefs to represent. Their assumption, shared by scientists and theorists of mind alike, was that language-users possess cognitive mechanisms with which to objectively grasp abstract rules fixed independently of human (...) responses, and that cognizers are thereby capable of grasping rules for the correct application of aesthetic concepts without relying on evaluation or enculturation. However, in this article I use Wittgenstein’s rule-following considerations to argue that psychological theories grounded upon this so-called objective model of rule-following fail to adequately account for concept acquisition and mastery. I argue that this is because linguistic enculturation, and the perceptual learning that’s often involved, influences and enables the mastery of aesthetic concepts. I argue that part of what’s involved in speaking aesthetically is to belong to a cultural practice of making sense of things aesthetically, and that it’s within a socio-linguistic community, and that community’s practices, that such aesthetic sense can be made intelligible. (shrink)

This chapter identifies and explores a series of challenges raised by the clinical concept of delusion for theories which conceive autonomy as an agency rather than a status concept. The first challenge is to address the autonomy-impairing nature of delusions consistently with their role as grounds for full legal and ethical excuse, on the one hand, and psychopathological significance as key symptoms of psychoses, on the other. The second challenge is to take into account the full logical range of delusions, (...) which may take the form of true or false factual beliefs, positive or negative evaluations, as well as the paradoxical delusion of mental illness. The third and final challenge is to make room for non-pathological or, autonomy-preserving delusions and to offer a credible way of distinguishing between these and pathological or, autonomy-impairing delusions. By setting out these challenges, we are able to, firstly, distinguish between two separate conceptions of objectivity that may be at work in existing accounts of delusions and, secondly, to put a spotlight on an elusive yet inescapable notion of agential success that underlies our thinking about autonomy as well as mental disorder. (shrink)

Attempts have been made to prove God's non-existence. Often this takes the form of an appeal to the so-called Argument from Evil: if God were to exist, then he would not permit as much suffering in the world as there actually is. Hence the fact that there is so much suffering constitutes evidence for God's non-existence. In this essay I propose a variation which I shall call ‘The Argument from Non-belief’. Its basic idea is that if God were to exist, (...) then he would not permit as much non-belief in the world as there actually is. Hence the fact that there is so much non-belief constitutes evidence for God's non-existence. (shrink)

The paper argues that applications of the principle that “ought” implies “can” (OIC) depend on normative considerations even if the link between “ought” and “can” is logical in nature. Thus, we should reject a common, “factualist” conception of OIC and endorse weak “normativism”. Even if we use OIC as the rule ““cannot” therefore “not ought””, applying OIC is not a mere matter of facts and logic, as factualists claim, but often draws on “proto-ideals” of moral agency.

This paper develops co-ordinated multiple-domain supervenience relations to model determination and dependence relations between complex entities and their constituents by appealing to R-related pairs and by making use of associated isomorphisms. Supervenience relations are devised for order-sensitive and repetition-sensitive mereologies, for mereological systems that make room for many-many composition relations, as well as for hierarchical mereologies that incorporate compositional and hylomorphic structure. Finally, mappings are provided for theories that consider wholes to be prior to their parts.

Leibniz’s mechanistic reduction of colors and other sensible qualities commits him to two theses about our knowledge of those qualities: first, that we can acquire ideas of sensible qualities apart from any direct acquaintance with the qualities themselves; second, that we can acquire distinct (i.e., non-confused) ideas of such qualities through the development of physical-theoretical accounts. According to some commentators, however, Leibniz frequently denies both claims. His views on the subject are muddled and incoherent, they say, both because he is (...) ambivalent about the nature of sensible qualities, and because he gets confused about confusion, losing sight of his own distinction between the confusion proper to perceptions and that proper to ideas. In opposition to this, I argue that the critics have misunderstood Leibniz’s views, which are both consistent over time and coherent. The key to understanding his position is to appreciate what he characterizes as a kind of redundancy in our ideas of sensible qualities, a crucial feature of his view overlooked by the critics. (shrink)