Live streaming platforms such as Twitch that facilitate participatory online communities have become an integral part of game culture. Users of these platforms are predominantly teenagers and young adults, who increasingly spend time socializing online rather than offline. This shift to online behavior can be a double-edged sword when coping with difficult periods in life such as relationship issues, the death of a loved one, or job loss. On the one hand, platforms such as Twitch offer pleasure, (...) distraction, and relatedness with others to help with coping, and the increased sense of anonymity and control could stimulate self-disclosure. However, the prevalence of trolling and memes may also discourage people from opening up, and relationships that are built online—especially those with microcelebrity streamers—could be perceived as more meaningful than they actually are. To create a deeper understanding of Twitch as a new media platform embedded in game culture, and how users perceive its potential as a coping mechanism, we have conducted a first exploration by means of a survey. The questions focused on general Twitch behavior, the difficult period in life, and the role of Twitch during this period. It was distributed online among people who considered themselves active Twitch users, and who had gone through a difficult period. Eighty-four participants completed the entire survey. The majority of participants indicated that Twitch helped them cope, and that it became a larger part of their lives during the difficult period compared to regular viewing. Recurring themes were the entertainment, distraction, and sense of community Twitch offers. Viewing behavior during difficult periods appears to remain largely the same in terms of the streamers that are watched, although time spent viewing increases, and there is a change toward more time spent actively watching rather than having the stream on in the background. With this work, we aim to create a deeper understanding of Twitch as a platform, and its importance for gamers that are going through difficult periods in life. (shrink)

During the Mamlūk period (648-923/1250-1517), some developments such as the support of the state dignitaries for scholarly activities, the interest of the ʿulamā to the Mamlūk geography and the establishment of many scientific institutions increased the interest in scholarly activities in society. In this period of intensive scholarly activities, women also started to increasingly take part in this field, and as a result, many female scholars were trained. The fact that women scholars were encountered among the teachers of the famous (...) scientists of the period is a clear proof of this situation. As a matter of fact, the teachers of Najm al-Dīn Ibn Fahd, one of the famous muḥaddiths and historians of the 9th (15th) century, set an obvious example for this. Sixty-seven of his four hundred ninety-seven teachers were women. Najm al-Dīn Ibn Fahd, a member of a prominent ʿulamā family of Mecca, traveled to different cities in the Mamlūk geography and took lessons from many teachers, men and women. What is more valuable for our subject is that he wrote a work called Mu’jam al-shuyūkh, which contains extremely important information about his teachers. This article tries to assess women's participation in scholarly activities and social positions in Mamlūk society, based on his female teachers. This work, made up of two parts, first deals with women’s opportunities to pursue academic studies and their subsequent contributions to science. The second part is about their position in social life which stemmed from the families they belonged to and from their marriages. In this article, in which sixty-seven female scholars of Najm al-Dīn Ibn Fahd are discussed, some important results have been reached. This look into his sixty-seven female teachers shows how widespread women’s relationships with scholarly circles were in Mamlūk society, and that especially girls of families with scholarly traditions were included in academic circles from a young age. These girls were able to get their initial education from close relatives and then they were able to connect to academic circles easily via family relationships, taking courses with many scholars including women. Women have been instrumental in the transfer of knowledge more so than its production. Their efforts both during their studies and as scholars were focused on ḥadīth transmission. It is difficult to pinpoint the exact reason why ḥadīth sciences were the focus, but one can say that the ubiquity of ḥadīth sessions and their ease of accessibility must have been a factor. It is seen that young girls who participated in these sessions were encouraged to study with older scholars, thereby acquiring a strong isnād chain and becoming a source of information in later years for the transmission of knowledge. However, it is hard to say that every woman who got some education took a role in knowledge transmission. One can even claim, based on Najm al-Dīn Ibn Fahd’s female teachers, that a lot of women in academic circles did not take a role in knowledge transmission as scholars, despite their potential. The fact that no official institutions are mentioned with regard to women’s acquisition and transfer of knowledge may be indicative of the importance of teacher-student relationships rather than institutions, or, it can be that women were more active outside of these official institutions. Also, the fact that most of Najm al-Dīn Ibn Fahd’s female teachers were all taught by several common teachers shows the liveliness of academic activity outside of official institutions. There is very little narration regarding the social lives of women who were engaged in scholarly activities. Among the most important reasons why this is so is the desire to put their scholarly competencies to the forefront. However, it is possible to get some information about their families and marriages for many of them. One can see that Najm al-Dīn Ibn Fahd’s female teachers generally married men who were also engaged in scholarship. The fact that women, especially those in the scholarly class, married from among their relatives must have been related to this. All of the married women except one have at least one child. While divorce is not too common, marrying again as a result of the death of a husband or as a result of divorce is not rare. (shrink)

Quality of life is a difficult concept to define and to measure. An hypothesis is proposed which suggests that the quality of life measures the difference, or the gap, at a particular period of time between the hopes and expectations of the individual and that individual's present experiences. Quality of life can only be described by the individual, and must take into account many aspects of life. The approach is goal-orientated, and one of task analysis. (...) The hypothesis is developed in a diagramatic way, and several methods of testing the hypothesis suggested. (shrink)

In middle adulthood the intensity of stress is significantly higher than in the preceding developmental period. This stress is particularly significant in the case of chronically ill women, including those with type 2 diabetes. In this group, the disease-related stress intensifies the difficulties generated by the decrease of age-related organismic resources and in many instances impairs the quality of life. Therefore, an ability to cope with difficult situations is of crucial importance. The aim of the research was to (...) estimate the general level of life-satisfaction, as well as the frequency and effectiveness of proactive coping strategies in a group of middle adulthood women with type 2 diabetes compared to women not suffering from diabetes. The study was conducted with methods which have acknowledged psychometric properties as well as a survey collecting sociodemographic data. Women suffering from type 2 diabetes are less satisfied with their prior and current life, health and the physical dimension of their lives and environment. Only partially do they employ proactive coping strategies different from those used by the women from the healthy group. For life-satisfaction in its various aspects it is particularly important for the diabetic women to more often use the strategy of reflective coping and to less often seek emotional support while using the strategy of preventive coping or avoidance. The proactive strategies directed at anticipated stress are connected with the level of life-satisfaction and considered to be health resources. (shrink)

Max Ungar (1850-1930) was born in Boskovice, Moravia, and pursued an academic career in mathematics at Vienna University [Franz Brentano was one of his examiners]. His memoirs describe his escape from Orthodox Judaism into a century of high liberalism and the turning to science and knowledge and his failure to achieve the humanism that he was devoted to as a result of anti-Semitism. Although he wrote his memoirs chronologically, there is a recognisable leitmotif: on the one hand his escape from (...) Orthodox Judaism into a century of high liberalism and the turning to science and knowledge; while on the other hand it charts his failure as a devotee of the humanism he was dedicated to as result of his pursuit of science and knowledge. In this respect Max Ungar’s reminiscences written in 1928 but covering the period 1855 – 1892/1928 are particularly significant for their overlapping topics: for its Jewish history during the Austro-Hungarian monarchy in the 19th century and for the portrayal of identity in the modern period. He concentrates on important events in his life, passing the matura/school exam. Helping in his father's business. Falling in love, keeping the engagement a secret, while at university. His time at university and his love of mathematics. Also the academic intrigues and pettiness - not much has changed. Then leaving academic life and working in the business. Trying to get back into academia 5 years later, but without success. His home life, travels with family, visiting friends, information about his wider family: who married whom, how they met, who died, etc. Stories from the business. The difficult relationship with his father. His critical stance towards Judaism. He also relates incidents of anti-semitism in business but also at university. This is the first translation of Ungar’s memoir into English (originally written in German) - translated by Miroslav Imbrisevic. The book is free to download. (shrink)

Critical care of neonatesThe recently published report of the Nuffield Council on Bioethics, Critical care decisions in fetal and neonatal medicine, is a valuable contribution to the discussion of decision making in the critical care of neonates. Drawing upon medical evidence, the working party highlights the many practical difficulties arising in neonatal care and by setting out clearly the nature of the ethical and other issues arising in this area of medicine, and their relationship with neonatal development, the resulting report (...) has the potential to lead both to improved practice and to better informed communication between doctors and families when they face difficult decisions about how best to treat very premature babies. Based on medical evidence, the working party sets out guidelines on decision-making about the resuscitation of babies born before the gestational age of 25 weeks and 6 days, dividing this period into four chronological periods: before 21 weeks and 6 days when resuscitation should normally only take place within the context of a research project; between 22 weeks and 23 weeks when resuscitation should not normally be carried out unless the parents request it; at 23 or 24 weeks when parental views should take precedence; and, after 24 weeks when resuscitation should be the norm unless not in the child’s best interests.There are several practical ethical difficulties with this aspect of the advice. To what extent, for example, does the paediatric assessment of the child, intended to play a role in decision-making about the appropriateness of resuscitation, itself depend on the initiation of resuscitation? To what extent is it reasonable and humane to expect parents to take full responsibility for making decisions about resuscitation between 23 and 24 weeks? On what grounds is it acceptable to attempt to resuscitate a baby <21 weeks and 6 …. (shrink)

The author of this paper, interested in the issues of values preference, meaning in life and altruism among university students has attempted to show a relation between them in the present period of clearly noticeable socio-cultural change. The study was conducted in 2009-2010 in Kraków among university students. The age of the respondents ranged from 21 to 25. 200 sets of correctly completed questionnaires were used for the results analysis. In order to show values preference among university students Rokeach’s (...) ValueSurvey was used. The level of a sense of meaning in life was measured by means of Crumbaugh and Maholick’s Purpose in Life Test. Moreover, Śliwak’s Questionnaire of Altruism was applied to measure the level of altruism. It was found that students with a high level of altruism are accompanied by a higher level of meaning in life than students with a low level thereof. Terminal values significantly correlate with meaning in life in groups of students with a high and low level of altruism. Among terminal values, values personal in character appear to be more strongly related to meaning in life than values social in character. (shrink)

From the past to the present, it is an undeniable fact that there are many psychological problems in human life because of variety of stressors. There are many methods and ways of coping to face this reality and overcome the obstacles. Recently, pandemic is a huge topic which people have to be struggled. It is possible to say that preventing individuals from leaving the house by social isolation during the pandemic period causes depressive states by triggering feelings of loneliness, (...) and it is possible to say that the feelings of being blocked by deprivation of freedom brings along many psychological problems. In this period, anxiety and uncertainty of pandemic that eliminate the functionality of the person have great psychological effects. Because of the reasons which were aligned above, coping mechanisms are most needed to get over stressful effects of pandemic. The pandemic period is a difficult period in which many individual experience social, economic and especially psychological problems. During this period, people use various coping methods to eliminate their psychological problems. Especially, studies show that religious coping has an important role in coping with psychological problems. To start with explaining the variables in the present study, in its most basic sense, religious coping is explained with the tendency to cope with the difficulties that we encounter in life through religious values. Similarly, religious coping is a form of thought or behavior that helps individuals avoid stress and the negative emotions that it causes. Religious coping is defined as constantly changing cognitive and behavioral efforts to combat certain external and/or internal urges that exceed or strain one's resources. To continue with psychological disorders, in order to understand psychological disorders, first of all, we need to understand psychological health. Psychological health can be defined as emotional and psychological well-being of people. (shrink)

The Warring States period was without doubt a time when reason thrived. The Confucians, Mohists, and Daoists, respectively, displayed three of its intellectual inclinations. One was reason with an exceptionally prominent moral flavor, and the cultivation of human character as its object. It calls on men to uphold the dignity, tranquillity, and loftiness of their inner selves. One was reason with a very strong practical flavor, and the realization of beneficent profit as its object. It leads men to address ways (...) of maintaining the stability of society, material wealth to support men's livelihoods, and individual survival. Apart from these two, there was reason that has spiritual transcendence and human immortality as its object, and which was manifested as a tendency toward anti-intellectualism. It tries to protect individual survival and freedom of the spirit, despite social pressures. As for those mystical ideas and techniques that seemed absurd, they gradually regressed into simplistic ceremonies, fables, and symbols among the cultural workers who pursued reason. The psychological attitude of "sacrificing to spirits as if they were present" led many cultural aristocrats to distance themselves from mystical ideas and techniques. Mysticism gradually disappeared from among men of culture, especially once it became increasingly difficult for those divination methods and technical arts, used merely to satisfy concrete needs, to avoid the scrutiny of reason. Some late Warring States period texts can help us understand the direction this way of thinking took. "Xian xue" in the Hanfeizi says,When the shaman priests pray for someone, they say, "May you live a thousand autumns and ten thousand years!" But the "thousand autumns and ten thousand years" are only a noise dinning on the ear: No one has ever proven [zheng] that such prayers add so much as a day to anyone"s life. For this reason people despise the shaman priests.". (shrink)

The Council of Trent of 1545-1563, which, incidentally, was not only long lasting but also difficult to convene, reflected a completely unstable general Christian situation during a period of rapid reformation. It is known that its foundations amounted to 95 Luther abstracts, and the subsequent course of events necessitated the immediate convening of the Ecumenical Council. Pope Clement VII made real attempts to do so, but did not reach the goal as a result of the war. Bulla of June (...) 12, 1536, his successor Pope Paul III also ordered the convening of the Ecumenical Forum of Christians in May 1537, but, as in the first case, there was a war again in the event of its holding. For the same reason, the cathedral did not gather in November 1542. Only in March 1545 the cathedral was convened, and in December of the same year - officially opened in Trident. (shrink)

COVID-19 pandemic occurred as an unexpected experience affecting all countries around the globe. In addition to the obvious health, economic and political effects, the COVID-19 pandemic triggered immense changes in the social spheres. People and institutions were forced to adjust to the new circumstances, change habits and move most or all of their activity online. In the completely virtual world, pandemic became a fertile ground for the bloom of the conspiracy theories already existing, but struggling for the global attention. The (...) aim of the paper is to present three main conspiracy theories rapidly gaining popularity during the pandemic (the QAnon, anti-vaccination movements and anti-5G movements) and to analyse how they developed since the pandemic had been announced. In particular, the rising activity of the representatives of the movements will be analysed, as well as its acceleration in connection with pandemic and the resulting influence on social and political life. Finally, the paper will try examine whether the rapid development of conspiracy theories within societies has had any relations to the level of trust towards government-made decisions. The thesis being verified hereto is that pandemic accelerated the development of conspiracy theories due to the diminishing level of trust towards governments operating in the most difficult period in recent history. There are variety of reasons for the belief in conspiracy theories and they depend on the specificity of the theory and specificity of group of people it originates from. In general, it can be noted that all kind of conspiracies are developed by either (1) people who actually believe in them and are sharing them with good intentions (to warn other about the dangers hidden behind certain actions or institutions) or (2) malignant individuals whose aim is to discord or discredit an opponent or critic or, alternatively, distract attention from misconduct or lack of competence. (shrink)

In lieu of an abstract, here is a brief excerpt of the content:Bioethics in Azerbaijan:History and Development of Bioethics in AzerbaijanAdelia Avaz gizi Namazova (bio) and Tarana Qadir gizi Taghi-Zada (bio)HistoryAzerbaijan is a unique country with a centuries-old culture and history; it is a country located at the junction of Europe and Western Asia, uniting economic and cultural relationships between two continents and harmoniously combining the elements of various civilisations and cultures. Peculiarities of the historical development of Azerbaijan and its (...) geographical location, as well as the ethnic composition of the population created an opportunity for the flourishing of various religions. Idolatry, fire worship, Zoroastrianism, Judaism, Christianity, Islam and other religions were spread in the country during different periods. The multinational and confessional state (also known as a multicultural state), with its unique cultural inheritance, provided the opportunity not only to adhere to traditions and customs of previous generations, but also to develop spiritual-moral values that created respect and tolerance towards other religions. As a result of this cultural synthesis throughout the centuries, universal ethical values such as respecting the dignity of all persons, veneration of elderly people by youth, and principals of mercy, care and love to those in need and in the closing stages of life evolved. Numerous sources of ancient manuscripts bear witness that poetry, philosophy and the ethics of medical practice have always been part of the searching and thinking in medicine.One of the ancient religions, Zoroastrianism, begins from fire worship and was revealed to the religious teacher and prophet Zoroaster (seventh century BC, Holy Book Zend-Avesta). According to the basic understandings of Zoroastrianism, there are two principles which are always contradictory—Kindness and Evil. [End Page 433] Zoroaster called upon people to be fair and pure, to fight any kind of unfairness and disgracefulness.The name of the healer Logman is covered with legends and is well known among different nations of the East. Across generations in Azerbaijan the name Logman has been used, inspiring the sharing of medical secrets and advice, cure of different illnesses and their prevention.1 This is witnessed by the Logman Covenants. The first covenant warns of excessive consumption of alcohol and food, educating people in hygienic practices and developing that culture. Another covenant is dedicated to the high mission of the medic: “Every kindness on this planet created people. The kind beginning is there where you have a doctor.”The basic principles of humanitarian behaviour of the doctor have also been described in an ancient manuscript of Azerbaijani literature, the national epic “Kitabi-Dede Qorqud” (seventh century), which provides advice on how to maintain one’s health in good condition, and the importance of spiritual purity, health and morals.Outstanding philosophers, poets and scientists of the ancient land of Azerbaijan, such as Bakhmaniyar ibn Marzaban (eleventh century), Omar Osmanoglu (eleventh century), Khatib Tabrizi (1030–1109), Khagani (1120–99), Nizami Ganjavi (1141–1209), Nakchivani (thirteenth century), Makhmud Shabustari (1287–1320), Seid YakhyaBakuvi (1410–62), Fizuli (1498–1556), Vagif (1717–97) and many others, described in their doctrines the difficult, selfless activities of doctors and the positive results and outcomes.6Back in the eleventh2 century, when madrasas or spiritual schools, where theology and medicine were taught and, ecclesiastics and tabibs (medics) were prepared and educated, a medical school was established in Azerbaijan’s old capital Shamakha. Here, under the guidance of the most famous doctor and pharmacologist in all the East, Omar Osman oglu, training and education of medical workers took place. Having been widely educated, Omar Osman oglu was an adherent of the moral principles declared by Logman and taught his students that the main goal of any doctor’s activities should be based on love towards the other person. His understanding of a medic’s behaviour was contrary to major customs of that time, saying: “Don’t deny your enemy. Heal him.” Omar Osman oglu inspired his students to undertake spiritual pureness, patriotism and service to the nation. “Bring benefit to the nation, even if it is contrary with your personal benefit”, “do not be egotistical”, “do not try to find your way to heaven and do not be afraid of hell” were his slogans.The famous poet Khagani (1120... (shrink)

Editor's: In this essay, author Li Qiao first briefly introduces the calligraphy Nande hutu and its author, Zheng Banqiao. Further, through analysis of the different components of the postscript of the calligraphy, he elaborates on two common interpretations of the saying, that is an active and enterprising and a passive, “muddling through” interpretation. The author argues that because the contemporary interpretations contain much of the passive, “take-it-easy” component, it is very popular nowadays.The essay dates from 1986, which was a period (...) of previously rarely seen press freedom. As such, it is representative for the many articles on Nande hutu in the 1980s that were critical of the “unethical” use of this philosophy of life following the economic reforms, especially among shrewd officials and businessmen, but also among philosophers, namely as a “philosophy of the opportunist.”. (shrink)

The sons of famous men sometimes fail to succeed in life, particularly if they suffer parental neglect in their childhood and youth. Ira Daniel Aldridge is a case in point-a promising lad who in his formative years lacked sustained contact with his father, a celebrated touring black actor whose peripatetic career in the British Isles and later on the European continent kept him away from home for long periods. When the boy rebelled as a teenager, his father sent (...) him abroad, forcing him to make his own way in the world. Ira Daniel settled in Australia, married, and had children, but he found it difficult to support a family. Eventually, he turned to crime and wound up spending many years in prison. The son of an absent father, he too became an absent father to his own sons, who also suffered as a consequence. (shrink)

The sons of famous men sometimes fail to succeed in life, particularly if they suffer parental neglect in their childhood and youth. Ira Daniel Aldridge is a case in point-a promising lad who in his formative years lacked sustained contact with his father, a celebrated touring black actor whose peripatetic career in the British Isles and later on the European continent kept him away from home for long periods. When the boy rebelled as a teenager, his father sent (...) him abroad, forcing him to make his own way in the world. Ira Daniel settled in Australia, married, and had children, but he found it difficult to support a family. Eventually he turned to crime and wound up spending many years in prison. The son of an absent father, he too became an absent father to his own sons, who also suffered as a consequence. Ira Daniel’s story is not just a case study of a failed father-son relationship. It also presents us with an example of the hardships faced by migrants who move from one society to another in which they must struggle to fit in and survive. This is especially difficult for migrants who look different from most of those in the community they are entering, so this is a tale about strained race relations too. And it takes place in a penal colony where punishments were severe, even for those who committed petty offences. Ira Daniel tried at first to make an honest living, but finally, in desperation, he broke the law and ended up incarcerated in brutal conditions. He was a victim of his environment but also of his own inability to cope with the pressures of settling in a foreign land. Displacement drove him to fail. (shrink)

There are some radical practices of asceticism, such as wearing ṣūf (wool clothes), traveling without provisions, choosing to be single, and avoiding earning a living by working, which were generally seen in the 2nd century A.H. and were subject to criticism with the formation of classical Ṣūfism. Criticisms of these practices have started to appear in the literature since the 3rd century A.H. Early Ṣūfī writers such as Al-Ḥakīm al-Tirmidhī, Muḥāsibī, Abū Saʿīd al-Kharrāz, al-Sarrāj focused on this issue and criticized (...) these practices. How are these practices of ascetics viewed in the sects that were formed and spread in the 6th and 7th centuries? Our research seeks the answer to this question, but limits it to the example of Abū l-Ḥasan al-Shādhilī, the founder of Shādhiliyya. This question is important in two respects: First of all, it is investigated whether the determination of some researchers that al-Shādhilī taught comfort in the face of worldly blessings is also correct. Because, among contemporary researchers, there are those who believe that al-Shādhilī wears ostentatious clothes, rides horses, encourages economic competitiveness, and is therefore open to benefiting from worldly blessings to the fullest. Secondly, it includes an investigation of the validity of the belief that these practices belong to an early period in the history of Sûfism and have been completely abandoned over time. Although al-Shādhilī seems to have completed his spiritual education in Morocco with his sheikh, he later went to Tunisia with the latent command of his master. We see that in his first years in Tunisia, he went into seclusion in a cave and was completely isolated from the society and engaged in worship in a way that reminds us of the practices of the early ascetics. But in the second phase of his life in Tunisia, he went to the city on a spiritual sign, socialized, started to give sermons to people, and started to behave more flexible about eating and drinking. al-Shādhilī specifically states that he did not prefer socialization at this stage, but with a spiritual sign. Later, he went to Egypt again with a spiritual sign and got married there, started to deal with agriculture, and continued to socialize by establishing relations with the rulers. Therefore, it can be said that this new social period is a break both from the radical practices of the early ascetics and from the early period in Tunisia itself. It is also seen that in this new period of al-Shādhilī, he did not wear the clothes of ascetics like sūf (wool clothes) and did not want his followers to wear them. He also encouraged to have a profession and was generally against traveling without provisions. But there are two points to be noted here: First, these milder and more comfortable practices should not lead to a search for comfort and luxury. He continued to keep his distance from worldly blessings and to advise asceticism. Secondly, he had some of his distinguished disciples make some practices of the ascetics. The reason for the existence of these seemingly contradictory practices is that while he recommends moderate and sustainable practices to the general public and his followers, he can make the specialized sūfis more strict and difficult practices. While he was encouraging work and earning in general, not ignoring experience, including avoiding work; not ignoring seclusion while leading to sociality in general; while generally suggesting to resort to occasions, he also follows a path of implementing and enforcing radical practices such as traveling without food. Thus, al-Shādhilī is able to encompass all the seemingly incompatible practices of the previous sūfi accumulation with a point of view of spiritual rank and hierarchy. (shrink)

There is widespread agreement among large segments of western society that we are living in a period of hard times. At first glance such a belief might seem exceedingly odd. After all, persons in western society find themselves living in a time of unprecedented material abundance. Hunger and disease, evils all too familiar to the members of earlier generations, although far from eradicated from modern life, are plainly on the wane. Persons alive today can look forward to healthier, longer, (...) and more comfortable lives than those of their grand parents. Nevertheless, the feeling that life today is especially difficult is rampant in government, in the media, in popular books, and in academic circles. Western society is perceived in many quarters as wracked by crises of all sorts-of faith, of power, of authority, of social turmoil, of declining quality in workmanship and products, and of a general intellectual malaise afflicting both those on the Left and the Right. A tone of crisis permeates the language of public life. Editorials in major newspapers are full of dire warnings about the dangers of unbridled egoism, avarice and greed, and the risks and horrors of pollution, overpopulation, the arms race, crime, and indulgent lifestyles. (shrink)

I propose we abandon the unit concept of "the evolutionary synthesis". There was much more to evolutionary studies in the 1920s and 1930s than is suggested in our commonplace narratives of this object in history. Instead, four organising threads capture much of evolutionary studies at this time. First, the nature of species and the process of speciation were dominating, unifying subjects. Second, research into these subjects developed along four main lines, or problem complexes: variation, divergence, isolation, and selection. Some calls (...) for 'synthesis' focused on these problem complexes (sometimes on one of these; other times, all). In these calls, comprehensive and pluralist compendia of plausibly relevant elements were preferred over reaching consensus about the value of particular formulae. Third, increasing confidence in the study of common problems coincided with methodological and epistemic changes associated with experimental taxonomy. Finally, the surge of interest in species problems and speciation in the 1930s is intimately tied to larger trends, especially a shifting balance in the life sciences towards process-based biologies and away from object-based naturalist disciplines. Advocates of synthesis in evolution supported, and were adapting to, these larger trends. (shrink)

Meaning in life is too important not to study systematically, but doing so is made difficult by conceptual indeterminacy. An approach to meaning that is promising but, indeed, conceptually vague is Jonathan Haidt’s ‘cross-level coherence’ account. In order to remove the vagueness, I propose a concept of ‘good fit’ that a) captures central aspects of meaning as it is discussed in the literature; b) brings the subject of meaning under the survey of the dynamicist or ‘embodied-embedded’ philosophy of (...) cognition; and c) allows the theoretical discussion on meaning to become more focused and systematic. The article addresses two apparent problems with the idea of ‘good fit,’ namely the fact that both challenges and relations of an agent with the outside world are central to meaning. It is finally pointed out which implications adopting the concept of ‘good fit’ instead of ‘meaning’ would have. (shrink)

Editor’s: Around the 300th anniversary of Zheng Banqiao, many articles appeared dealing with the artist Zheng Banqiao and his works of art. Some of these dealt specifically with his calligraphy Nande hutu. Most of these articles address its philosophical meaning or socio-historical context. In this essay, author Wang Zisong elaborates on how the Chinese philosophy of muddled, synthetic thinking relates to Aristotelian, analytical thinking. The author first reflects on the origins of Western analytical, logical and categorical thinking, and argues that (...) “all cultures, philosophies, and schools are both analytical and synthetic.” What follows is a discussion of the weaknesses and strengths of analytical and synthetic reasoning. Subjects that are critically approached in this respect are the popularity of Nande hutu as a slick and too easy-going philosophy of life. In his criticism he also addresses the leaders and officials of that period. Ultimately, h... (shrink)

Religion is an important element of end-of-life care on the paediatric intensive care unit with religious belief providing support for many families and for some staff. However, religious claims used by families to challenge cessation of aggressive therapies considered futile and burdensome by a wide range of medical and lay people can cause considerable problems and be very difficult to resolve. While it is vital to support families in such difficult times, we are increasingly concerned that deeply (...) held belief in religion can lead to children being potentially subjected to burdensome care in expectation of ‘miraculous’ intervention. We reviewed cases involving end-of-life decisions over a 3-year period. In 186 of 203 cases in which withdrawal or limitation of invasive therapy was recommended, agreement was achieved. However, in the 17 remaining cases extended discussions with medical teams and local support mechanisms did not lead to resolution. Of these cases, 11 (65%) involved explicit religious claims that intensive care should not be stopped due to expectation of divine intervention and complete cure together with conviction that overly pessimistic medical predictions were wrong. The distribution of the religions included Protestant, Muslim, Jewish and Roman Catholic groups. Five of the 11 cases were resolved after meeting religious community leaders; one child had intensive care withdrawn following a High Court order, and in the remaining five, all Christian, no resolution was possible due to expressed expectations that a ‘miracle’ would happen. (shrink)

In the article, in which religious attitudes and behaviours in rural life and agricultural activities in Antalya have been studied, the religious mentality of the farmers engaged in agricultural activities has been analysed in the context of agricultural perceptions, agricultural production problems and religious attitudes scales. Human being has cultivated the soil to meet his most basic physiological needs, and the stages in these cultivation processes constitute the development stages of human history. In this way, it could be said (...) that the history of farming is the history of humanity. Farming, which has undergone a structural transformation with mechanization, is experiencing its most difficult period in the production-health equation today. The ever-increasing population in the world has led to the need to diversify products as well as to produce more. This brought the improvement of seeds, analysis of the soil, spraying in the production process all from the traditional form to a modern form, which brought the problem of trust towards the product and the producer to the fore. In our study, which focuses on the question of what is the effect of religious attitudes on the solution of agricultural production problems, the data have been obtained through face-to-face interviews with the farmers of Antalya and three scales have been developed as agricultural perception, agricultural production problems and religious attitudes. While the agricultural perceptions scale is dealt with three stages: farmers’ perceptions of soil, profession and technology, religious attitude scale is dealt with in four stages: fate, beliefs, traditional practices, and fiqh rules. The scale of agricultural production problems is discussed as one-dimensional. Data collected through each of these three scales has been analysed with the help of standard deviation and mean, t-test results and structural equation modelling (SEM) techniques. Within the framework of the structural equation model, four hypotheses have been developed and these hypotheses have been confirmed. According to structural equation modelling data, fate perception elaborates 17% of variance in farming perception and 12% of variance in religious attitude perception. While farming perception verbalises 31 % of variance in agricultural production problems, religious attitude perception explains 6 % of variance in agricultural production problems. (shrink)

L.I. Mandelstam, the outstanding Soviet physicist, leader of a prominent and productive scientific community, was educated as a physicist and started as a researcher and an university teacher at Strasbourg University. We consider the intellectual influence of the main currents in contemporary German science on Mandelstam's work in science.

In this article, I expound and assess two theories of meaning in life informed by the indigenous sub-Saharan African philosophical tradition. According to one principle, a life is more meaningful, the more it promotes community with other human persons. According to the other principle, a life is more meaningful, the more it promotes vitality in oneself and others. I argue that, at least upon some refinement, both of these African conceptions of meaning merit global consideration from philosophers, (...) but that the vitality approach is more promising than the community one for capturing a wider array of intuitions about what confers meaning on a life. I further argue, however, that there are objections that apply with comparable force to both theories; neither one does a good job of entailing that and explaining why certain types of reason and progress can make a life more meaningful. Although these objections are characteristic of a ‘modern’ western outlook, I maintain that they are difficult for contemporary African philosophers to ignore and consider some ways they might respond to the objections. (shrink)

Historically, the development of religions occurs according to the law of cyclic wave-like, where the maximal points of the sinusoid are represented by opposite states-markers. Thus, known periods in the history of religions, when dominated by internal or external signs of their development, when victory vulgar religion, in contrast to the elevation of theological revelations, when the teachings of modernity prevail, trying to get rid of orthodoxy anyway. In place of the newest trends in the understanding of God, man, (...) their relationship comes fundamentalism as a decisive trend in their development228. To find absolute modernist or fundamentalist epochs in religiongege, to calculate the duration of each of them, to clearly periodize them difficultly. Both the religions themselves and the society in which they existed quickly "tired" from the severity of the requirements of purity of faith, and from the unrestricted liberalization of religious life, which led to a periodic change in sentiment and orientation, either on fundamentalism, or on the modernization of religions. (shrink)

What is viral law? In order to being my discussion, I note that the last two years have been extremely difficult to understand and that we, meaning those who have lived through the pandemic, have struggled to make sense. Thus, I make the argument that the virus has impacted upon not only the individual’s ability to make sense in a world where every day routines have been upended, but also social and political structures that similarly rely on repetition to (...) continue to function. According to this thesis, Covid-19 is more than simply a biological organism, but also a cultural virus that undermines the organisation of social, political, and economic systems and requires new ways of thinking about how we might move forward into a post-Covid world. In the name of beginning this project of making sense of Covid-19, I track back in history to the comparable reference point of the Spanish flu pandemic of 1918–1920 and, in particular, a reading of Freud’s Beyond the Pleasure Principle, which the founder of psychoanalysis wrote in the shadow of the virus. In reading Freud’s attempt to write a psychology of death in the context of this funereal period of history, I argue that he set out first, a mythological theory of viral law concerned with the death drive, before turning to second, a techno-scientific, biological theory of the same law characterised by microbial immortality. Beyond this exploration of Beyond the Pleasure Principle, in the third part of the article I turn to a reading of Lacan’s interpretation of Freud’s work, where viral law becomes a story of cybernetics and nihilistic mechanisation. Here, perfect mechanisation, and the endless oscillation between message and noise, looks a lot like living death. Finally, I take up Derrida’s critique of Jacob’s molecular biology and, by extension, Freud’s theory of microbial immorality, that he thinks privileges an idea of repetitive sameness and opens up a space for cultural politics concerned with immunity against otherness. Derrida’s key point here is that this biological fantasy ignores the reality of viral sex that enables evolution to happen. What this means is that the other, even in its microbial form, is ever present, and that we must recognise the importance of difference to the possibility of social, political, and economic change. (shrink)

It is difficult to make sense of the notion of postmodernity, because “modernity” is clearly a shifter, in the sense of Jespersen and Jakobson: a term dependent for its meaning on its moment of enunciation. It is true that, from the Middle Ages onwards, several meanings of modernity have received an objectified reference. But in the arts, particularly in the visual arts, this is not true. Modernity has been defined as the ever-new transgression of norms established by the period (...) coming immediately before. In another sense, modernity is connected to urbanity, as it first took place (or at least was observed) in the coffeehouses of the seventeenth century and the boulevards of the nineteenth century. This meant a close connection of individuals having nothing to do with each other from the point of view of family relationships. At the same time as this concept of modernity is overhauled by the perpetual presence of the mobile phones, it is confirmed and extended by the Internet. A third kind of modernity, perhaps closely connected to the second one ( but essentially opposed to the first kind) is that of thinking, as initiated during the Enlightenment, striving to go beyond the divergent doxa of different cultures to some kind of rational understanding. Taking into account the standing of rationality in the history of humanity, postmodern philosophy really amounts to some kind of mobbing of the poorest and most feeble members of the crowd. (shrink)

In lieu of an abstract, here is a brief excerpt of the content:Reviewed by:Aquinas on the Beginning and End of Human Life by Fabrizio AmeriniJohn LanganReview: Fabrizio Amerini, Aquinas on the Beginning and End of Human Life, trans. Mark Henninger, Harvard University Press, 2013The ongoing and apparently interminable debate over the moral and legal status of abortion has come over the years to resemble the Western front in World War I, with two contending armies facing each other with (...) limited maneuvering room, familiar and overused weapons, periodic artillery barrages, increasing casualties, not much new to report, and a deadly ‘no man’s land’ between them in which virtually nothing survives. Against the gloomy monotony of the abortion wars, in which reductivist accounts of the opponents’ views and repetitious restatements of familiar and cherished views predominate, this book by Fabrizio Amerini, a professor of philosophy at the University of Parma, appears as a refreshing surprise. It is surprising for a number of reasons, which I shall present later. But its refreshing character comes primarily from its moderate tone and the care with which its arguments are presented. Amerini is clearly familiar with the Catholic tradition on abortion and euthanasia; he is respectful of this tradition, which he does not directly challenge, but his sense of scholarly integrity prevents him from simply presenting Aquinas as a defender and synthesizer of all the positions championed in that tradition or by its papal custodians. He has an impressive command of the relevant texts in Aquinas and the Fathers of the Church, which he joins with a scrupulous style of [End Page E-103] philosophical argument which has an affinity with the clarifying labors of G. E. Moore in the early days of analytic moral philosophy. The result is not easy reading, but the reader can be confident that the desire to score rhetorical points and political victories will not distort the philosophical and historical analysis. The book is intended primarily for those who can benefit from careful scholarship, but it should be instructive for all who regard the questions of abortion and euthanasia as genuinely difficult and as deserving our best intellectual efforts.The most important surprise is Amerini’s focus on the issue of delayed versus immediate hominization in the development from embryo to complete human being. Since Pius IX in 1867, the Vatican has insisted that from the moment of conception the embryo becomes a human person whose life is sacred and deserves full protection. This view is ordinarily discussed as ‘immediate hominization’. In Amerini’s view, the embryo lacks the development and differentiation of organs which would enable it to have a sustainable potentiality to perform the acts which are proper to a human person, particularly reasoning and choosing. In the Vatican’s view, the soul is immediately infused by God, though it obviously requires many years of development before it is able to function as a complete and distinct human person. Amerini regards this position as untenable within Aquinas’s metaphysical system and finds in Aquinas’s own texts evidence that he teaches a discontinuous process in fetal life. Amerini regards the insistence on immediate hominization as an arbitrary effort to maintain an absolute uniformity of moral status in all the stages of embryonic and fetal life. He sees the Vatican’s position as leading to an equation of abortion and homicide which he regards as unjustified. He does, however, affirm that there is an identity of subject running from the embryo to the developed person and also that this grounds an ethic of respect for life in all of its stages. The practical conclusions in bioethics he would draw from this position “could allow space for a judicious and discriminating ethical evaluation of individual cases,” as he puts the matter in the concluding sentence of the book.Other surprises are the author’s discovering from a careful reading of Aquinas’s texts that he taught a progressive plurality of substantial forms in the development of the embryo. For Aquinas, it is the substantial form which answers the question about what sort of being the object of our inquiry is. In the case of human persons, the substantial form is the soul, which includes the intellectual properties of... (shrink)

The Umayyad State is widely criticized in the West as well as in its own region. Actually, this is normal situation. Because Hijaz Arabs who had no state experience, built a multinational state in short period of time. Yet, this caused serious matters. The fundamental point of the criticism is the payment of tax, also called jizya, which is taken from residents (mawālī) of Khorasan and Transoxania. However, in most studies on this subject, it is understood that the jizya taken (...) from mawālī is combined jizya and kharja, which is different type of tax. Although mawālī was tested for whether it passes religious criteria in critic periods or not, this situation did not last throughout the entire Umayyad history. It was continued for fifteen and twenty years. In this period, it was understood that the jizya tax taken from the mawālī, was caused by the unlawful practices of some regional governors, most of them were non-Muslim local tax officials and all their purpose was to collect the amount of combined jizya. It cannot be said that the Umayyad caliphs officially ordered written instructions in order to take the conceptual sense from the mawālī part. But some Khorasan governors, who detected that taxes were decreasing, blinked at the collection of the jizya from the mawālī.Summary: The tax policies of a state are of great importance for the political, social, and economic stability. A regular tax system minimizes the problems that the state mechanism might face. The establishment of a fair and just tax scheme is undoubtedly possible with a deep-rooted state experience. It is known that the Umayyad state which is the subject of this research has no state experience. Furthermore, ruling to the area which is on 13 million square kilometers and reaching to Kashgar in the East and to South France in the West and governing this multinational structure who are living on these regions, put the Umayyad government in a very difficult condition. With the vast borders and the stoppage of the conquests, some political, social and economic problems were experienced and these problems deeply affected the government. The groups which had argued with Shiites and Khārijites because of some various reasons led the country into collapsing. It is also known that many plague epidemics in the region of Damascus affected the society in a negative way, changing the capital and changing some of the border cities in favor of the Eastern Roman Empire.All these negativities certainly shaken the Umayyad state economically. It is understood from the data that the instability and political uncertainties in the country led to a decrease in the tax rates. For example, the Umayyad caliph ‘Abd al-Malik İbn Marwān period, only half of the tax was collected at the time of Hazrat ‘Umar could be collected. It can be said that the public who avoided the general policies of the state avoided giving tax, in other words, the tax evasion. Also, the increasing migration from village to city and due to that, the vacancy of tribute tax collected land, failure to obtain expected yield because of rent fights on fertile lands, and conversion process in non-Muslim community are included in other reasons of reduction of taxes.In the Umayyad period, the issue of taking the jizya from the mawālī can be considered in this context. We do not have an independent work or research article on how this practice was initiated, how it was and how it was taken from mawālī, and how it was a state policy, and how long it was sustained. The studies that touch on this subject are far from being holistic. Even in the main sources it is seen that the concepts of kharāj and jizya are not fully understood and therefore used interchangeably. This may be considered normal for the first period in which the concepts are not in place. However, in the following centuries, the works that were copyrighted and, except for a few, instead of understanding and explaining this confusion, chose to use the word jizya from these two words which can be used interchangeably in texts. Therefore, this approach has led to the widespread conviction that the Umayyad state has taken jizya from the mawālī in the conceptual sense.Al-Ḥajjāj ibn Yūsuf is claimed to have started the application of taken jizya from mawālī. However, Haccac aimed to provide the regularity of both agricultural products and the kharāj which is taken from farmers because of the status of the soil by sending Sawad villagers who migrated to the big cities and became Muslims by changing their religions. The status of the lands seized was decisive in taxation. According to this, the conquest and the territorial lands were taxed differently, but in some cases the same tax (kharāj) was taken. Non-Muslims who living in the territory of conquest were demanded jizya per capita. The jizya and kharāj tax collected from this category can be expressed as “joint jizya”. Regardless of whether the person is a Muslim or not, the fact that he was demanded from him due to the status of the land was interpreted by some researchers as juristic. However, in times of political instability, it is also a fact that mawālī is demanding jury in addition to the tribute tax. The point that is misunderstood or interpreted is that this practice was carried out throughout the entire Umayyad territory and the history. When examined, this distorted tax concept is actually concentrated in the area of Transoxania. Although some attempts were made to take the jizya from the mawālī to the country, the Umayyad caliphs have not allowed it. The practice of taking the jizya from the mawālī is actually followed by the killing Qutayba ibn Muslim al-Bāhilī (d. 96/715). This started political instability in the Transoxania and continued by some Khurāsān governors. These governors act according to the provocations of the Turkish governors and tax collectors of the region in order to be able to send their taxes completely. They claimed that the region in the region was not a sincere Muslim and, they continued to take the jizya from them.It can be said that jizya is not demanded as it is taken from non-Muslims in the common meaning from mawālī. Because any Umayyad caliph wrote no written instructions regarding this issue in the sources. It is understood that until the caliphate of ‘Umar b. ‘Abd al-‘Azîz, the Umayyad caliphs were not even aware of this distorted tax policy in the area of Transoxania. To put it once again, this practice was initiated by some Khurāsān governors with the concern that tax revenues might decrease. However, it should not be forgotten that this unfair practice after 96/715 is limited to certain governors. For example, during the tenure of Naṣr b. Seyyâr, the last governor of Khurāsān (120-131 / 738-748), the jizya tax was completely removed from the mawālī. Another activity that shows this action is regional and that was ordered by some governors of Khurāsān. Therefore, this practice does not reflect the Umayyad state policy. This is also apparent in the fact that the Shiites, Kharijites, and those who carried out the Abbasid Revolution for thirty-two years, did not make an anti-Umayyad propaganda with provoking the slave by the way of wrong application. (shrink)

In psychological and managerial literature, the meaning of work boasts a long tradition; in this topic, scholars and researchers have explored sources of meaning and meaningfulness of the working activity in workers' motivations, values, and beliefs. Less attention, however, is given to the function work has in terms of signifier of each individual's personal identity. This article aims at deeply examining the relationship between identity construction and meaning of work, focusing on this theme through the exploration of Charles Bukowski's narrative (...) world. My attention was particularly focused on representations and emotional connotations characterizing the relationship between identity and work, deduced by the content analysis of his literary production. Bukowski's difficult working experience sustainability intersects with the instability scenario of the second postwar period in the United States, recursively affecting the development of a self-reflexive thought around which an idea of oneself could be modeled. In this sense, the author's experience is paradigmatic for the contemporary condition, in so far as today's work experience, deprived of a shared meaning system, negatively influences the meaning attribution process involving one's own life experiences. (shrink)

The aim of this study is to develop a valid and reliable measurement tool for determining students' spiritual health and life orientation. For this purpose, the Spiritual Health and Life-Orientation Measure (SHALOM) inventory developed by Fisher (2010) is adapted to Turkish. The adaptation study was carried out on 1591 high school students in three study groups studying in Ankara and Muş. The original English measure consisting of four dimensions and twenty items was translated into Turkish, factor analysis, validity (...) and reliability tests were conducted on the sampling data. As a result of the study, the Turkish-adapted inventory consists of four dimensions (personal, social, environmental and transcendental) which resemble the original inventory. In addition, internal consistency coefficients of the inventory dimensions were in perfect harmony with the original inventory and served the purpose of the scale. In Conclusion The Turkish adaptation of the SHALOM Inventory can be used in different disciplines of psychology, educational sciences, and social sciences. Summary: The concept of religion, which is an important dynamic and carrier of the social field, has gone into a double distinction since the second half of the 18th century; the concept of spirituality has begun to be refined from the concept of religion. The concepts of religion and spirituality are very difficult to define; While the concept of religion focuses ideology and rules of belief, spirituality centers on individual experiences and interrelationships that extend religion. For this reason, different spirituality and religion definitions are made from different perspectives and different spirituality scales were developed within this framework. However, the results of these studies differ significantly from each other; this means that spirituality was defined and conceptualized based on the scale that was used. Early period studies on spirituality mostly focus on religion, health, psychology and work life. In these studies, after defining the concept of spirituality; the relationship between the concept and health, religion, psychology and business life or necessity for human life is discussed. In the West, until the 1950s, the concepts of religion and spirituality were used interrelated. However, today these two concepts are almost completely separated from each other.Literature consists of numerous inventory development studies to measure spirituality. The fact that the inventory works based on different conceptual foundations makes it difficult to draw a general, meaningful and consistent conclusion about spiritual health and life orientation. Furthermore, spirituality measurements reflecting the religion and values ​​of a particular culture cannot be comprehensive or universal. At this point, Fisher criticizes the measurement tools developed for the purpose of measuring spirituality: in terms of "mixing religion and spirituality", "relying on the world of values", "not taking into account cultural differences", "and questioning only the mystical/spiritual experience". As a result, it can be said that no measurement developed in the conceptual structure of the West does not take into account the cultural flexibility and accept its spiritual values as universal or prevalent.The SHALOM inventory developed by Fisher, which adapted to the Turkish culture in present study, is based on four basic (individual, social, environmental and transcendent) areas that constitute the world of interpersonal relationship. In this study, spirituality, as in Fisher's work, emphasizes the interaction with certain concepts of different intensities that are considered as independent from religion and above religions. In this context, the concept of spirituality communicates with one's personal space, social position, nature, and transcendental power. This adaptation study will provide useful information and comments on the students' spiritual health levels. This is the most important motive behind the idea of adapting the SHALOM inventory developed by Fisher to the Turkish culture. In addition, by adapting the SHALOM inventory, which is emphasized to have cultural flexibility and adapted to different languages, a new and different measurement tool will be available to understand the nature of the concept of spirituality.This research was carried out to adapt the inventory of Spiritual Health and Life Orientation scale developed for students to Turkish culture. This inventory adaptation study was performed with the data collected from three working groups in Ankara and Muş provinces and 1591 high school students. The first study group was carried out with 414, the second study group with 788, and the third group with 389 high school students. While the data collected from 414 students were used for Exploratory Factor Analysis (AFA) analysis, data collected from 788 students were used for Confirmatory Factor Analysis (CFA). In addition, 389 students were used to determine the criterion validity of the inventory. The original language of the SHALOM inventory, which is intended to be adapted into Turkish, is English, and translation studies are conducted separately by three linguistic experts who know the grammar and semantic characteristics of both languages. After the translation studies, the scale was applied to the sampling group and AFA was performed on the sample data. The AFA results showed that a factor roof resembling the original inventory was formed. Determining factors are given appropriate names (personal, enviromental, social and transcendental) by taking into consideration the theoretical names and the dimension names in the original form of the SHALOM. The structure was confirmed by DFA, and as a result of the DFA, X2/sd (1.72) ratio and IFI (0.96) fit indicator was found to be the appropiate fit for the model tested. As a result, it is understood that the Spiritual Health and Life Orientation Inventory consists of four dimensions as in the original inventory, the internal consistency coefficients of the inventory dimensions are in harmony with the original inventory and serve the purpose of the scale. In conclusion the Turkish adaptation of the SHALOM Inventory can be used in different disciplines of psychology, educational sciences, and social sciences. Spirituality should not only be defined within the framework of Western theories, but the nature and likelihood of the spirituality predicted by Islam should be discussed. Moreover, the types and dimensions of Islamic spirituality should be determined by taking into account the cultural subjectivity of an Islamic character. In the study of spirituality, the human model which modernity presents universally should not be accepted as the only truth. It should be tried to develop human models that come from Islamic culture and history and which are specific to us and define us. This should be taken into account not only in mental health / religious studies, but also in psychology of religion in general. In addition, culture-specificity should be given importance, and the experience gained from the cultural accumulation developed by the Turkish civilization with the Islamic doctrine should lead to the studies of spirituality. In this respect, this study aims to adapt the value and spiritual orientation of a different culture to Turkish culture, but it is problematic to construct the concept with Western values. Although Western values are similar to Islamic values and principles, it is envisaged that it may be difficult to measure the concept of spirituality in practice. (shrink)

Objective: To analyse the process of end of life decisions in a neurosurgical environment.Methods: All 113 neurosurgical patients, who were subject to so called end of life decisions within a one year period were prospectively enrolled in a computerised data bank. Decision pathways according to patient and physician related parameters were assessed.Results: Leading primary diagnoses of the patients were traumatic brain injury and intracranial haemorrhage. Forty-five patients had undergone an emergency neurosurgical operation prior to end of life (...) decision, N = 69 were conservatively treated, which included intracranial pressure recording, or they were not offered neurosurgical care because of futile prognosis. N = 111 died after a median of two days. Two, in whom the end of life decisions were revised, survived. Clear decisions to terminate further treatment were made by a senior staff member on call being informed by the senior resident on call , difficult decisions on the basis of extensive round discussions , and very difficult decision by an interdisciplinary ethical consult . Decisions were further substantiated by electrophysiological examinations in N = 59.Conclusion: End of life decisions are to be considered standard situations for neurosurgeons. These decisions may reach a high rate of “positive” prediction, if substantiated by electrophysiological examinations as well as on the grounds of clinical experience and respect for the assumed will of the patient. The fact that patients may survive following revision of an end of life decision underlines the necessity for repeated reassessment of these decisions. Ethical training for neurosurgeons is to be encouraged. (shrink)

The Covid-19 pandemic triggered a crisis affecting many spheres of socio-economic life. Both the authorities and entrepreneurs found themselves in a new and unusual situation. The lockdown introduced in the Polish economy in March 2020 has changed drastically environment and conditions for entrepreneurs and companies in Poland. The article touches on the problem of changes in the system of formal and informal institutions during that period. An attempt was made to answer the question: to what extent was the institutional (...) state order compatible with the spontaneous order during that period, did the paths of entrepreneurs and the government meet and an agreement was reached in the name of setting a common policy direction to support the economy in the difficult period of the pandemic, or did the paths of these parties diverge? The research hypothesis requiring verification was that the institutional crisis in Poland deepened during the Covid-19 pandemic, as reflected in the slow erosion of the principles of institutional governance. The analysis shows that the progressing institutional weakness of the state during the period under review deepened the crisis of institutions. Its symptom was the gradual disappearance of social dialogue and arbitrary decisions taken by the government. The rules of law did not take into account the needs of entrepreneurs. Over time, the trust in the government and the law has declined. In a response to the prolonged lockdown in many sectors of the Polish economy, some desperate entrepreneurs took steps to circumvent the law, and there were active protests of entrepreneurs against the government’s decisions. The government might defend its authority only with ineffective repressions applied to entrepreneurs. (shrink)

In lieu of an abstract, here is a brief excerpt of the content:Philosophy, Psychiatry, & Psychology 9.2 (2002) 123-125 [Access article in PDF] The Self as Relatum in Life and Language Grant Gillett THE STUDY REPORTED by van Staden is extremely interesting to any psychological theorist influenced by Jacques Lacan because of Lacan's insistence that the unconscious is not only structured like a language but actually reflects and is produced by linguistic interactions between the subject and others.The distinction he (...) draws, on the basis of Frege's analysis of logical and grammatical structure, is not straightforwardly evident on a superficial inspection of the sentences concerned. It is also less clear than the agent-patient or subject-object distinction that one might look for on the basis of considering the action being performed. van Staden makes both of these points in the course of illustrating the relevant deep grammatical property on which the study turns. In doing so he engages with the subtle work on subject and object by Strawson (1959) who was one of the first, in the "descriptive metaphysics" of Individuals, to explore the resonance between what we might call (after Frege) "logical grammar" and the deep metaphysical structure of our thought. Strawson noted that the position of grammatical subject in a sentence was typically occupied by a particular or individual substance rather than the accident or property of a substance so that the subject predicate structure of language reflects a basic feature of our world picture whereby the world is seen to be populated by particular objects that instance universal features.Chomsky is the other player whose thought is important in this area in that he argues that we have an innate sense of deep structure, which allows us to disambiguate any sentence so as to reveal the state of affairs that is being represented. Thus we discern that what is denoted by "John loves Mary" is the same thought as that conveyed by "Mary is loved by John." van Staden focuses on something more general—the deep structure that expresses semantic relations or positions. This is not the same as the agent or the simply grammatical subject and van Staden calls it the owner of the relation involved as distinct from the accident of that relation. The terms are well chosen because ownership is a term a la mode in postmodern thought to express the relationship of a human being to the events and attributes associated with him or her. When we look at this subtle grammatological or semantic feature of language we see that the linguistic feature in question is the kind of thing that could easily be overlooked were it not for a post-Fregean analysis of the type van Staden offers.The content that van Staden identifies in relation to what is signified or represented by an utterance is difficult to characterize. It is not what Frege would call logical content in that it does not contribute to the truth value of any of the propositions concerned. It is also problematic to call it psychological content because it is not part of the conscious message conveyed by the utterance. Nevertheless, the study concerned raises [End Page 123] the possibility that it is psychic in a very significant way, which is best approached by considering the relationships between language and the unconscious.Chomsky is regarded as having defined a number of linguistic operations that take propositional or meaningful content and transform it into the form in which it is uttered. The relevant cognitive operations are usually regarded as being performed by the cognitive unconscious, which in some sense applies the rules of grammar to yield well-formed utterances on the basis of speaker intentions. In any event, nobody would seriously question the idea that there are unconscious operations that underpin the production of grammatically structured utterances.If we add to this the possibility that a more dynamic aspect to the unconscious has a role to play in the semantic content of our utterances, then a fruitful line of thought begins to emerge. The dynamic unconscious has to do with self-image and those influences that form the psyche... (shrink)

Parents in Arab society did not take any responsibility for their children in the pre-Islamic era. The husband, as the head of the family, used to treat family members as his servants and forced them in the direction of his interests. No matter the rationale behind it, the burial of daughters in the pre-Islamic era is an outrageous and ill-treated tradition. In this study, it is possible to see which tribes in the Arab society started this repellent custom and which (...) ones were more common. In the society, it is possible to find that there were conscientious and virtuous people trying to prevent these events which can be called as a shame of this humanity, which does not approach the events with the value judgments of that day. Before shedding light on the motivations behind this tradition in the Jahiliyyah Arab society, the examination of the treatment towards daughters in other parts of the World in the same era, would be meaningful in terms of enlightening the phenomenon. This study aims to crystallize the causes, extent, and responses by wise people towards the burial of daughters in the pre-Islamic and Prophetic era.Summary: The burial of daughters or their slaughter in a variety of ways was not unique to the Arabs. At that time people and animals in many parts of the world were sacrificed to give thanks to the gods and to ease their anger. When the killings of girls are considered, Arab society comes to mind. In that time, other countries and nations in the world were not different from the Arabs. During this period, daughters were killed in different ways, not through the burial of living alive.During the Jahiliyya period, among the Arabs who murdered the children of the boys, the girls, and children who were considered to be the weakest members of the family were conducted with this treatment. Men who were the head of the family could tolerate having one or a maximum of two girls. When the number of girls increased, they regarded it as a matter of honour so that when a new daughter was born, the inevitable attempt was to murder her.In the Arabian peninsula - rich merchant families exceptional - families were trying to survive with scarce opportunities. The food and clothing materials used were usually exported and extremely expensive. Therefore, there was a necessity for male members of the family who would provide for the family. From this perspective, so many sons meant dignity. The economy of the day was based on looting and pillaging except for the trade of the elite. Therefore, one had to be strong. The birth of a daughter meant shame, sadness and grief instead of joy and happiness for them. The man would wait excitedly for good news. If the baby was a boy the family rejoiced. However, if it was a daughter the father would be upset. When a person said, “She was a daughter” she could not know what to do with her shame and how to hide from people.When the Arab tribes were examined in general, the burial of daughters was not extended to the whole population. The question of murdering the girl by burying her child was common among Bedouin Arabs who lived in the desert rather than the city. It was extremely difficult to see this tradition in the tribe of Quraish, which were regarded as the masters of the Arabs. When we look at the sources of Jahiliyya and Islamic history, it is observed that the examples of this outrages customs were generally realized in the near term. It is understood that the memory of society is not rich enough to comment. The main reason for this is that Arab society has not a written culture.For the Jahiliyya Arabs, her daughters were ashamed. If they married their daughters even before they had married their daughters into adultery, seeing it as lighter than their children. One of the main reasons was jealousy. The data show that this style was applied more intensely among the Bedouin tribes and especially the tribes of Temim, which is considered to have started the process of burying girls. It is also said that the most jealous tribe of the Arabs is the Rebia tribe. Because of this feature, it is accepted that the first burial of the girl was started in this tribe.Although the Arab society before Islam was known by the atrocities of ignorance and weakness, there were people who were not completely dead and consciously dead. Even though they buried girls alive in society, some people who were disturbed by this rite that destroyed human dignity were trying to prevent ignorant and cruel fathers. The most well-known of the these was the famous poet Ferezdak, grandfather Sasaa b. Naciye.One of the main reasons for the behavior of burying girls alive before Islam was the fear of poverty. Most of them were living in the midst of starvation, and they were considering their daughters as burdens for the family. So they were burying their daughters because of poverty and hunger.One of the reasons for the murder of girls was the sense of honour. In Jahiliyya when a man marries a woman does not come to mind this sense, while marrying his own daughter to someone else sees this as a matter of dishonesty and and he says “it was more sweet to me to bury my daughter with my own hands rather than to marry my daughter. The idea of honour among the Arabs was the idea that their daughters and women would one day be in the hands of the enemy and thus would become a concern for themselves.One of the attributes of the nobles of Arabs was pride and vanity. If someone become arrogant to him and he doesn’t reply, he would be considered a coward. This arrogance dominated the movements of the people of the ignorance. In their eyes, it was so bad to marry someone who was not equal, that they were more likely to die than marrying someone. They were doing this because they had a bit of compassion for them. According to them, girls could not shoulder the heavy burden of life. There were many ways to kill the girl before Islam. But the most common of these was to push him into a hole he had dug before and to throw soil over her and bury her alive. The most commonly used method of killing girls by dumping them in the pits, though, was that they were drowned in the water or strangled. (shrink)

In lieu of an abstract, here is a brief excerpt of the content:Journal of the History of Philosophy 41.3 (2003) 410-411 [Access article in PDF] S. P. Ward. Penology and Eschatology in Plato's Myths. Lewiston, NY: Edwin Mellen Press, 2002. Pp. v + 295. Cloth, $99.95.In this work the author begins by asking himself the following question: What is an eschatological myth? The adjective "eschatological" indicates that the discourse it qualifies is concerned with the last things; that is, death and (...) the judgment of souls that follows it. Hence, the relation that may be established between eschatology understood in this sense and penology, which refers to the punishments the soul undergoes at the end of its earthly existence. As far as the meaning of 'myth' is concerned, the author, influenced by G. S. Kirk (The Nature of Greek Myths [Penguin, 1974]), adopts a relativist position. He does not think it possible to give a general definition; therefore, he limits himself to pointing out some of the characteristics of this type of discourse, on the basis of passages from the Platonic corpus which are usually considered as myths.Having set his analytical tools in place, the author proposes a commentary on the eschatological myths at the end of the Gorgias (523a-527e), at the end of the Phaedo (107c-115a), at the end of Republic X (614b-621d), in the Phaedrus (246a-249d), in some parts of the Timaeus (42b-d, 91a-92c), and in the Laws (903a-905d). He then examines the relations between penology and eschatology in the dialogues of the first period, the intermediary period, and old age.Although Plato takes his inspiration from traditional myths, those that appear in the dialogues are distinguished from traditional myths by two features: a scientific background, which indicates an influence from the Presocratics; and the role played by elements proper [End Page 410] to the Platonic doctrine. The insertion of considerations of a scientific nature into myths makes them more credible, but is not enough to make them into true discourses. Thus, the question of the relation in Plato between these myths and his philosophical doctrine remains open. Nevertheless, and although it is sometimes difficult to justify particular points in the myths, it is still true that we can note a great deal of coherence between what they recount and the ethical questions developed in the dialogues in which they appear.In spite of this consistency, one observes an evolution in the way these myths are presented. In the Gorgias, the punishments inflicted on the soul by the gods are presented as intended to make the soul better. The idea of reincarnation plays no role here, but it is present in the Phaedo. In this dialogue, however, the question arises of how to harmonize reincarnation with post-mortem punishments which, because of it, no longer seem to be necessary. In the Republic, emphasis is placed instead on the role of individual responsibility in the process of reincarnation. The Phaedrus continues in this direction, but is characterized by its allusions to the theory of intelligible forms. In the Timaeus, by contrast, Plato abandons the theme of a way of life and that of the judgment of souls, for a vision of the process of reincarnation that is integrated, not without difficulty, within a cosmological vision. The Laws continue along this path.This analysis shows that Plato evolved on questions of eschatology and penology, even if he did not radically change his mind. Yet there is one point on which he never varied: even if he did not establish precise frontiers between science and religion, Plato never thought his myths to be true discourses, but he always considered their capacity for ethical edification and their pedagogical value.This work is clear and well structured. It is completed by a bibliography and a general index, is easy to read, and presents a genuine usefulness. One also notes, on the part of the author, a good overall knowledge of the whole of Greek literature, from the origins to the end of Antiquity. Nevertheless, three criticisms may be made: (1) This publication merely reproduces the format... (shrink)

In lieu of an abstract, here is a brief excerpt of the content:The Incoherence of Determining Death by Neurological Criteria: A Commentary on Controversies in the Determination of Death, A White Paper by the President’s Council on Bioethics*Franklin G. Miller** (bio) and Robert D. Truog (bio)Traditionally the cessation of breathing and heart beat has marked the passage from life to death. Shortly after death was determined, the body became a cold corpse, suitable for burial or cremation. Two technological changes (...) in the second half of the twentieth century prompted calls for a new, or at least expanded, definition of death: the development of intensive care medicine, especially the use of mechanical ventilators, and the advent of successful transplantation of vital organs. Patients with profound neurological damage, leaving them incapable of breathing on their own and in an irreversible coma, could be maintained for some period of time with the aid of mechanical ventilation. The situation of these patients posed two ethical questions. Is it appropriate to stop life-sustaining treatment? If so, is it acceptable to retrieve vital organs for transplantation to save the lives of others before stopping treatment?In 1968, the Ad Hoc Committee of the Harvard Medical School to Examine the Definition of Brain Death proposed that death could be determined on the basis of neurological criteria, thus providing a positive answer to these two questions (Ad Hoc Committee 1968). According to the position of this committee, patients diagnosed with the cessation of brain function are dead, despite the fact that they breathe and circulate blood with the aid of mechanical ventilation. [End Page 185] Because they are dead, it is appropriate, indeed imperative, to stop mechanical ventilation. And because they are dead, it becomes ethical to procure vital organs for transplantation before stopping what otherwise would be life-sustaining treatment. Remarkably, this innovative neurological determination of death became, with little debate or controversy, the established position in medical ethics and the law throughout the United States.The Harvard Committee articulated the diagnosis of “irreversible coma,” but merely asserted that this condition constituted death. No explanatory rationale was provided. It fell to the President’s Commission for the Study of Ethical Problems in Medicine and Biomedical and Behavioral Research to provide an authoritative rationale in its 1981 report, Defining Death. The second paragraph of the report set the stage as follows: “The question addressed here is not inherently difficult or complicated. Simply, it is whether the law ought to recognize new means for establishing that the death of a human being has occurred” (President’s Commission 1981, p. 3). The Commission claimed that “death is a unitary phenomenon” (p. 7) and that the determination of death by neurological criteria, in terms of the absence of all brain function, is consistent with the traditional conception of death as the cessation of vital functioning of the organism as a whole. The key issue is the integrative functioning of the human organism, which ceases to exist, according to the Commission, when the whole brain, including higher cortical areas and the brain stem, fails to function. Although “brain-dead” patients do not appear to be dead—i.e., the reality of their death is “masked” by the activity of mechanical ventilation—the patient’s body has irreversibly lost all capacity for integrative functioning. In the words of the Commission: “When artificial means of support mask this loss of integration as measured by the old methods [cessation of respiration and heart beat], brain-oriented criteria and tests provide a new window on the same phenomenon” (p. 33). The President’s Commission was instrumental in developing and establishing “The Uniform Definition of Death Act”: “An individual who has sustained either (1) irreversible cessation of circulatory and respiratory functions, or (2) irreversible cessation of all functions of the entire brain, including the brain stem, is dead” (p. 2).Although the question posed by the President’s Commission was easy to articulate, the answer, over time, has proved complicated and controversial. The coherence and cogency of determining death by neurological criteria has been challenged. Various experts have demonstrated that “brain-dead” patients maintained on mechanical ventilation display a range of vital, integrative, functioning, which conflicts with the judgment that they are dead (Truog and... (shrink)

One of the issues covered by Muʿtazila’s idea of justice is the subject of the imposition of moral obligation (taklīf). The concept of the obligation (taklīf), which expresses that God imposes some difficult acts on His servants and asks them to fulfill them, is important because it explains God’s justice for His servants and His wisdom in creating them. For this reason, the main emphasis in the matter of imposition has been on the veneration of the servants and rendering (...) benefits to them in return for imposition. As a matter of fact, God offers His servants such a reward that it is not possible to achieve with anything other than obligation. This article presents examples of hypothetical obligations emphasizing the same issue. Al-taklīf al-zāid is an additional imposition period meaning that God does not end the life that he determines for the morally obliged (mukallaf), but prolongs the life of the servant in such a way that changes the result of his imposition. In Muʿtazilite thought, the issue of the additional imposition basically takes place in the form of two separate discussions about unbeliever and believer. While the additional imposition of the unbeliever deals with the situation of the unbeliever who is known to believe when his imposition (or life) is prolonged; the additional imposition of believer deals with the situation of the believer who is known to disbelieve when his imposition (or life) is prolonged. Abū ʿAli thinks that it is obligatory (wajib) for God to keep this unbeliever alive when it is known that he would come to believe if He did not kill him and his imposition had been prolonged. His argument in this regard is his thought that the additional imposition is a favour (lutf) for the unbeliever to believe. Abū Hāshim, on the other hand, says that it is not obligatory for God to prolong the imposition of unbeliever in such a situation, and that it would be good (hasan) to kill the unbeliever, even though it is known that he would have believed if his imposition had been prolonged. Because, according to Abū Hāshim, God already gave the unbeliever the opportunity to attain rewards in his first imposition. The unbeliever reached this end because he made a wrong choice in his imposition and it cannot be obligatory for God to re-present the circumstances that will change this outcome. According to him, the additional imposition of an unbeliever is not a favour (lutf), but it is like the enabling to act (tamkīn) and is not obligatory. As for the additional imposition of a believer, Abū ʿAli, Abū Hāshim and the Bahshamites agree that it is good to prolong the imposition of the believer who is known to be an unbeliever if his imposition was prolonged. The reason for their view is that God has endowed the servant with a reward, which would otherwise be unattainable, in return for the prolonged imposition. However, the Husaynites believe that prolonging the imposition of believer in this situation would not be good. Because the believer deserves a reward for his first imposition and in this case, his additional imposition will be a corruption (mafsada) for him. As a result of these different views, when we look generally, it is seen that the main concern in Muʿtazilite thought is to make the most appropriate decision for the benefit of the servant in all the impositions that God has imposed and is likely to impose. The Bahshamites have always prioritized offering more rewards to the servant. However, Abū ʿAli regarding the additional imposition of the unbeliever, and the Husaynites regarding the additional imposition of believer, prioritized the imposition’s resulting in belief, and they thought that it was more suitable for the benefit of the servant. Since the purpose of the imposition in Muʿtazilite thought is to provide the opportunity to attain the degrees that it could never been reached in any other way, regardless of the outcome, it should be said that the views of the Bahshamites on both additional obligations are more consistent within the general system of Muʿtazila. (shrink)

In recent years, increasing pressures have been brought to bear upon nurses and others more closely to inform, involve and support the rights of parents or guardians when crucial ‘life and death’ ethical decisions are made on behalf of their seriously ill child. Such decisions can be very painful for all involved, and may easily become deadlocked when there is an apparent clash of moral ideals or values between the medical team and the parents or guardians. This article examines (...) a growing number of such cases in New Zealand and analyses the moral parameters, processes, outcomes and ethical responses that must be considered when life and death ethical decisions involving children are made. The article concludes with a recommendation that nurses should be recognized as perhaps the most suitable of all health care personnel when careful mediation is needed to produce an acceptable moral outcome in difficult ethical situations. (shrink)

In lieu of an abstract, here is a brief excerpt of the content:The Incoherence of Determining Death by Neurological Criteria: A Commentary on Controversies in the Determination of Death, A White Paper by the President’s Council on Bioethics*Franklin G. Miller** (bio) and Robert D. Truog (bio)Traditionally the cessation of breathing and heart beat has marked the passage from life to death. Shortly after death was determined, the body became a cold corpse, suitable for burial or cremation. Two technological changes (...) in the second half of the twentieth century prompted calls for a new, or at least expanded, definition of death: the development of intensive care medicine, especially the use of mechanical ventilators, and the advent of successful transplantation of vital organs. Patients with profound neurological damage, leaving them incapable of breathing on their own and in an irreversible coma, could be maintained for some period of time with the aid of mechanical ventilation. The situation of these patients posed two ethical questions. Is it appropriate to stop life-sustaining treatment? If so, is it acceptable to retrieve vital organs for transplantation to save the lives of others before stopping treatment?In 1968, the Ad Hoc Committee of the Harvard Medical School to Examine the Definition of Brain Death proposed that death could be determined on the basis of neurological criteria, thus providing a positive answer to these two questions (Ad Hoc Committee 1968). According to the position of this committee, patients diagnosed with the cessation of brain function are dead, despite the fact that they breathe and circulate blood with the aid of mechanical ventilation. [End Page 185] Because they are dead, it is appropriate, indeed imperative, to stop mechanical ventilation. And because they are dead, it becomes ethical to procure vital organs for transplantation before stopping what otherwise would be life-sustaining treatment. Remarkably, this innovative neurological determination of death became, with little debate or controversy, the established position in medical ethics and the law throughout the United States.The Harvard Committee articulated the diagnosis of “irreversible coma,” but merely asserted that this condition constituted death. No explanatory rationale was provided. It fell to the President’s Commission for the Study of Ethical Problems in Medicine and Biomedical and Behavioral Research to provide an authoritative rationale in its 1981 report, Defining Death. The second paragraph of the report set the stage as follows: “The question addressed here is not inherently difficult or complicated. Simply, it is whether the law ought to recognize new means for establishing that the death of a human being has occurred” (President’s Commission 1981, p. 3). The Commission claimed that “death is a unitary phenomenon” (p. 7) and that the determination of death by neurological criteria, in terms of the absence of all brain function, is consistent with the traditional conception of death as the cessation of vital functioning of the organism as a whole. The key issue is the integrative functioning of the human organism, which ceases to exist, according to the Commission, when the whole brain, including higher cortical areas and the brain stem, fails to function. Although “brain-dead” patients do not appear to be dead—i.e., the reality of their death is “masked” by the activity of mechanical ventilation—the patient’s body has irreversibly lost all capacity for integrative functioning. In the words of the Commission: “When artificial means of support mask this loss of integration as measured by the old methods [cessation of respiration and heart beat], brain-oriented criteria and tests provide a new window on the same phenomenon” (p. 33). The President’s Commission was instrumental in developing and establishing “The Uniform Definition of Death Act”: “An individual who has sustained either (1) irreversible cessation of circulatory and respiratory functions, or (2) irreversible cessation of all functions of the entire brain, including the brain stem, is dead” (p. 2).Although the question posed by the President’s Commission was easy to articulate, the answer, over time, has proved complicated and controversial. The coherence and cogency of determining death by neurological criteria has been challenged. Various experts have demonstrated that “brain-dead” patients maintained on mechanical ventilation display a range of vital, integrative, functioning, which conflicts with the judgment that they are dead (Truog and... (shrink)

During the pandemic lockdown period, residents had to stay at home and increased stress and other mental health problems have been associated with the lockdown period. Since most public parks were closed, community parks within gated residential areas became the most important green space in Chinese cities, and the use of such space might help to reduce the residents’ stress levels. This study aimed to investigate to what extent urban residents in China used community parks, engaged in outdoor activity during (...) the lockdown period and if the use of such spaces helped to reduce their stress levels. An online questionnaire survey was carried out from 23 March to 23 April 2020. Ordinary Least Squares regression was used to analyse the association between community park use, outdoor activity, willingness to engage in outdoor activity, and stress level. All results have been further analysed by two-sampled t-test to explore the difference between young and old age groups. We found that the overall self-reported stress level of the respondents was relatively moderate during the lockdown period. Respondents had generally reduced their use of community parks and engagement in outdoor activity. There was no significant association between stress level and the use of community parks or the engagement in outdoor activities. However, we found that older people showed much lower stress levels, used community parks more frequently, and engaged in more outdoor activities than younger adults. The findings suggest that outdoor activities and spatial characteristics in urban China differ from Western studies and advance the need to integrate the stress management role of community parks with urban green space policy to optimise the use of community parks blended in with everyday life, particularly during the lockdown period. (shrink)

The II. constitutional period is a period of renewal in many areas. Political, social and educational changes also had influences in the field of religious education. One of the examples of these changes is the ʻAmelī I҆lmiḥal textbook written by Halim Sabit (DOD. 1946) in five volumes for both teachers and student. This study particularly aims to assess this textbook in terms of religious education. Accordingly, the following questions are addressed: “What are the topics covered in the ilmihal books written (...) for students and teachers? Is the content of the subjects taught appropriate for the religious education? Which methods, techniques, and essential matters are discussed in the ilmihal books for teachers? As having first grade elementary school textbooks for both teachers and students, the research is made just based on these books. Data were collected through the examination of the document, and the texts in Ottoman Turkish were transcribed into Turkish. Content analysis method was used in the analysis of the data. By examining both books, this study shows that belief, worship, and social issues were taught, and prayers and sūras were addressed as need to be memorized knowledge in the book. The books included inappropriate contents for first grade children regarding the belief issues such as fear of Allah, hell, and the hereafter. Summary: Education I҅lmiḥal, occupies an important place in the history of Islamic religious education. According to the religion of both adults and children to learn the principles of faith and worship, it is aimed to shape the daily life. In this context, for example, during the Ottoman period, In the period of II. Mahmut, boys were required to attend the primary school. Thus, it was ensured that children could learn I҅lmiḥal and Islamic sharia properly. Children are taught alif ba for Qurʾān readings in primary schools, as simple as required by religious duties, writing skills have been acquired and the four processing rules are memorized. The II. constitutional period is a period of renewal in many areas. Extreme innovative thinking is also reflected in education. Especially after the Balkan wars, the idea that the collapsing state would be saved through education was dominant. For the first time, a higher education institution for girls and a kindergarten for young children were opened. By recognizing the importance of pedagogy knowledge in teaching, the students have switched to a system where they can search for observation and experiment. Innovations in educational methods have started to be seen. It was seriously opposed to memorization, and the question and answer was seen as old methods. Instead, it was proposed to use sightseeing observation and discovery. Political, social and educational changes are also reflected in the field of religious education. As a reflection of the newly introduced methods, there have been changes in the ʻAmelī I҆lmiḥal books prepared for children. One of the examples of this is the ʻAmelī ʻIlmiḥal textbook, which was written by Halim Sabit in five volumes. This ʻAmelī I҆lmiḥal was prepared in 5 volumes for teachers and students.The main purpose of this study is to evaluate ʻAmelī I҆lmiḥal textbook in terms of religious education This study particularly aims to assess this textbook in terms of reigious education. Accordingly, the following questions are addressed: “What are the topics covered in the ilmihal books written for students and teachers? Is the content of the subjects taught appropriate for the religious education? Which methods, techniques, and essential matters are discussed in the ilmihal books for teachers? As having first grade elementary school textbooks for both teachers and students, the research is made just based on these books. Data were collected through the examination of the document, and the texts in Ottoman Turkish were transcribed into Turkish. The textbook prepared for the students of the first year consists of 21 boards/sheets. The sentences are quite self and short. The contents of the board/sheet are well suited to be discussed and explained. There are no headlines on the boards/sheets. The language of text is Ottoman. It is possible to express the topics covered in the book under the following themes:Prayer and Sūras: Basmala, Kalima Tawḥīd, Kalima Shahāda, Fātiḥa, Subḥana Rabbiyal Aʿala, Subhana rabbiyal ʿAẓim, As-salāmu ʿalaykum va Raḥmatullah, Taḥiyyat, Salawat Sharif, Iḥlas, Kawthar, Subḥanaka Prayer, Qunut Prayers.Faith Issues: Allāh, the fear of Allāh, thanks to Allāh, the Qurʾān, Prophets, Prophet Muḥammad, The Hereafter, Heaven Hell, Angels.ʿIbādat Issues: Zakāt, Ablution, Prayer, Adhān, worship in General (Salāt, Ṣawm, Zakāt, Ḥajj)Social Issues: Friendship, affection for minors, affection for parents, Muslims are Brother, human love, respect for the elderly, respect for scholars.The textbook prepared for the teachers of the first year; consists of 21 pages, 69 pages and Ottoman. As the students do not include the topics in the textbook, it is appropriate to mention the names of the subjects in the textbook of the teacher:1. Subject: Memorization of the Word of Tawḥīd and word of Shahāda; 2. Topic: Raising ideas about the nation in children; 3. Subject: The adjectives of Allāh Almighty; 4. Subject: Love of Allāh; 5. Subject: Angels; 6. Subject: The Divine Books; 7. Subject: Prophets 8. Subject: The Hereafter; 9. Subject: Thank Allāh; 10. Subject: Repentance; 11. Topic: Protecting the language from bad words and threats; 12. Subject: Zakāt and charity; 13. Subject: Riya҆ and his goodness engrave; 14. Subject: Love to the prophet Muḥammad; 15. Subject: Parental love; 16. Subject: The brotherhood of Islam; Subject: Human love; 18. Subject: Ablution; Subject: Prayer; 20. Subject: Respect for the elderly; 21. Subject: Love to ʿulamāʾ; 22. Subject: Fear of Allāh.Halim Sabit also gave information about the methods and techniques to be used in the course and emphasized that the teacher told his / her not by looking at the book. He thought it would be only influence the student in this way. It is recommended to use the appropriate language for the child, to make an introduction in the subjects that will be learned in the new subjects and to draw attention to the subject and to teach the subject gradually. An important advice is the knowledge that the teacher wants him / her to do in the long-term memory in the present sense. The teacher must repeat a subject several times while teaching a subject, and should not immediately remind a student of forgotten subjects, talk to a student and has finded to him. A subject should not be passed without being thoroughly understood, and the classroom needs to be opened by the teacher in order not to forget the learned subjects. The first fifteen minutes of each course should be reserved for the repetition of previously learned subjects. Content analysis method was used in the analysis of the data. By examining both books, this study shows that belief, worship, and social issues were taught, and prayers and sūras were addressed as need to be memorized knowledge in the book. The books included inappropriate contents for first grade children regarding the belief issues such as fear of Allah, hell, and the hereafter. (shrink)

One of the important areas of study of religious psychology is to examine the reflection of worship in the spiritual life of individuals in the context of worship psychology. In this field survey, the relations between the level of meaning in life and hopelessness of individuals who performed the ʿUmra worship are examined. The study is conducted with 214 Turkish participants who performed ʿumra in Saudi Arabia. The collected data is analyzed by questionnaire technique. "Personal Information Form", " (...) Meaning in Life Questionnaire (MLQ)" and "Beck Hopelessness Scale" are used as data collection tools. The obtained data is analyzed in the SPSS 23.0 statistical program. One Sample t-Test, Pearson Moments Multiplication Correlation Analysis, Independent Sampling t-Test, One Way ANOVA and Tukey HSD tests are used to analyse the data. It is found that the research group's level of meaning in life above average; the level of hopelessness is below average significantly. There is a significant negative correlation between meaning in life and hopelessness, feelings about the future, loss of motivation, expectation about the future. There is a significant positive correlation between searched meaning and hopelessness and loss of motivation.Summary: Many religions have some types of worship involving visiting places considered as sacred and performing some rituals there. In Islam it is called ʿUmra, which is visiting the Kaʿba without being dependent on a certain time frame except for the pilgrimage month. There are certain rites to perform ʿumra, such as entering a state of iḥrām (ritual purity in which certain actions are not permissible), completing circumambulation, and saʿy (striving to do a certain act; walking) between the hills of al-Ṣafā and al-Marwa. ʿUmra worship is a comprehensive and versatile worship, which contains psychological, sociological, physical and financial characteristics.Studying the relationship between religious beliefs and practices, the religious rituals and their psychological effects and functions of ceremonies are the some essential research topics of Psychology of Religion. Existing research in this area usually reveals the existence of a positive relationship between the religious beliefs and practices and between meaning in life and hope. Individuals who believe in a religion can find a meaning and purpose in life through prayer and worship, and at the same time have more positive future expectation to endure the difficulties of life. Meaning and hope are intertwined, which complete each other. Hopelessness is closely related to depression and suicidal desire. There is a need to find meaning and purpose in life in order to hold on to life, and for looking to the future with confidence, and overcoming difficulties.It is known that people tend to be more religious and concentrating worship during periods of loss of meaning for various reasons. ʿUmra, which includes almost all type of worship, is a special worship, which has the potential to contribute to the individual's intense emotional life for gaining new awareness and developing different behaviours to cope with such difficulties. It is because the individual would have many experiences to see the cause of existence, the meaning of his/her life, and his/her future expectation during the ʿumra worship. Thus, he/she can overcome his/her hopelessness and loss of meaning and look to the situation from different perspectives. Therefore, in this study, the following questions are explored: Does ʿumra make a positive contribution to the psychological experience of the individuals, as expected? Does ʿumra has any effect on the level of loss of meaning and hopelessness that accompanies the psychological troubles? How does the demographic variables make difference in the level of meaning in life and hopelessness of individuals who perform ʿumra? In order to find answers to these questions, the relationship between the meaning of life - the hopelessness and the ʿumra was investigated. For this purpose, the meaning and hopelessness levels of the individuals who are performing ʿumra worship were measured by psychometric methods and the relations between them were analyzed. In addition, it has been tested whether there is a difference in the meaning in life and hopelessness according to demographic variables such as gender, marital status and educational status. 214 people aged between 18-82 years participated in the research. The survey data was collected from Turkish participants who perform ʿumra in the cities of Mecca and Medina in Saudi Arabia in May 2015. "Personal Information Form", " Meaning in Life Questionnaire (MLQ)" and "Beck Hopelessness Scale" were used as data collection tools. The obtained data were analyzed in the SPSS 23.0 statistical program. One Sample t-Test, Pearson Moments Multiplication Correlation Analysis, Independent Sampling t-Test, One Way ANOVA and Tukey HSD tests were used for the purpose of analysis of the data.The most important finding of the survey is meaning in life scores of individuals who are performing the ʿumra are above average (t = 20,50; p ˂ 0,01); and scores of hopelessness are below average significantly (t = -29,80; p ˂0,01). There is a significant negative correlation between presence of meaning subscale and hopelessness (r = -,288; p ˂ 0,01); and positive correlation between search for meaning subscale and hopelessness (r =,169; p ˂ 0,05) and loss of motivation (r =,285; p ˂ 0,01). The findings show that ʿumra can affect the meaning in life positively and the hopelessness negatively. There was no significant difference between the meaning in life scores and education level and gender variable (p ˃ 0,05). As the level of education increases, hopelessness scores decrease significantly (F = 2, 627; p ˂ 0,05). Hopelessness scores show a significant difference according to gender (t = -2,708; p ˂ 0,01). Men's hopelessness levels are significantly higher than women’s. Moreover, the meaning in life of married individuals is significantly higher than single individuals (F = 3,859; p ˂ 0,05). As the age and developmental stages progressed, meaning in life (F = 7,274; p ˂ 0,01) and hopelessness scores (F = 8,119; p ˂ 0,01) significantly increased.ʿUmra may have a rapid and intensive effect on the psychology of the individual and his/her sense of world. Relevant studies in the literature also imply such results. Since ʿumra is both a journey and a collective worship, it involves many types of worship, such as praying, reading scripture, repentance and so on. The findings of this study were discussed with reference to the findings about pilgrimage and the findings of study of meaning in life and hopelessness in different samples. On the other hand, the conditions in which the data collected, the study group chosen, the instruments and techniques used for this research constitute the limitations of the present study. However, the time period in which the worship was practiced and reaching the participants in these places of worship, and the measurement of the level meaning in life and hopelessness associated with their worship of ʿumra indicates the importance and originality of this research. The results can be used in other research projects. Studies on the different psychological effects of ʿumra worship can be enriched by longitudinal investigations. (shrink)

Previous chapter During the first two centuries of the current era, the Roman Empire was under the rule of the Principate. The tremendous civil violence that marred the end of the Republic disappeared. The whole Mediterranean was unified and the exchange between the Greek Eastern and the Latin Western worlds flourished. The Roman aristocracy was entirely “domesticated” but benefited from this period of peace, growth and intercultural exchange to develop new behaviors and interests. - Médecine – Nouvel article.

Editor’s: This article by Li Shaolong defines the thought of “being muddled is difficult” as a special feature of the mode of thinking and surviving in Chinese culture. The author argues that the occurrence of the thought of “being muddled is difficult” was a necessity of the development of Chinese culture. According to the author, the core connotation of Nande hutu is not being muddled in a conventional sense, nor is it deference and retreat in a pure sense. (...) Rather, it represents active contemplation and enterprise in society and life, along with the suffering, hesitation, helplessness, and sorrow that comes with it. In a more philosophical sense, the core meaning relates to a deep understanding and identification with human existence and concern with the world. However, in feudal society “muddledness” served as a strategy of survival through mental rest, and the “being muddled is difficult” idea became the embodiment of oppression of human nature by the autocratic feudal monarchy.... (shrink)

This chapter provides a brief overview of the increasing importance of experimentation in the life sciences from the seventeenth century to the present day. In the wake of the Scientific Revolution initiated in physics, numerous scientists have regularly attempted to introduce experimentation and the quantification of phenomena into the life sciences. These attempts have been difficult and have systematically come up against the fact that living organisms are individuals, i.e. both totalities that are difficult to decompose (...) and transient results of an evolutionary process that gives them specific characteristics. Experimentation has thus only been possible in biology thanks to the adaptation of a mechanistic perspective to such particularities of living bodies. (shrink)

Most studies conducted in the West on the role played by intergenerational families in co‐parenting have focused mostly on families with a single mother or those in difficult circumstances, while little is known about the experiences of members of intergenerational intact families during the early postpartum period. This study aimed to explore the intergenerational co‐parenting experiences of young parents and grandmothers in China, focusing on how they shared the responsibility of caring for the new mother and infant during the (...) postpartum period. A total of 16 eligible intergenerational intact families, including 16 mothers, 15 fathers and 12 grandmothers, were interviewed. The data set was analysed using the approach of directed content analysis guided by Feinberg's Ecological Model of Co‐parenting. The data were categorized into four themes: ‘division of labour’, ‘postpartum and infant care agreement’, ‘support‐undermining’ and ‘joint family management’. An additional theme, ‘expressed a need for family support’, emerged from the data on these intergenerational families. The findings emphasize the importance of intergenerational co‐parenting relationships in families where two generations co‐parent the newborn together. (shrink)

In lieu of an abstract, here is a brief excerpt of the content:Setting the Stage for a Dialogue:Aesthetics in Drama and Theatre EducationAlistair Martin-Smith (bio)For us, education signifies an initiation into new ways of seeing, hearing, feeling, moving. It signifies the nurture of a special kind of reflectiveness and expressiveness, a reaching out for meanings, a learning to learn.—Maxine Greene, Variations on a Blue Guitar1Examining the aesthetics of the complementary fields of educational drama and theatre is like looking through a (...) kaleidoscope. If you turn it one way, you see one colorful pattern; if you turn it the other way, you see yet another. The multiplicity of approaches to drama and theatre education, each with its own aesthetic pattern, often obscures the common ground they all share. As a result, in its unique emphasis on art, pedagogy, and society, each may have its own aesthetic pattern; yet only by looking closely at each distinct pattern can we understand more of the power of drama and theatre to develop human consciousness.In Western education, aesthetic learning seems incidental to the assessment of learning. How did this happen? For Descartes, whose Cartesian philosophy dissociated mind from body, aesthetic feelings are irrational, since they originate in the body's senses rather than in the mind. Theories of education focused on the primacy of cognition, denying feelings in the erroneous belief that learning is independent of its context. Conversely, aesthetic education is concerned with the quality of experience, how it is felt. Dewey believed that "learning by doing" was a "consummatory" experience for the learner; it was dramatic, dialogic, and felt. The confusion between subjective and objective aspects of the aesthetic experience makes aesthetic evaluation difficult, and this may be why cognitively dominated education has steered clear of aesthetics. Richard Courtney recognized that there is an important distinction to be made between aesthetic symbols and [End Page 3] artistic symbols: "Aesthetic symbols emphasize feeling; artistic symbols are context-dependent—they only have meaning in the context of art."2David Best argues that "the failure to recognise the distinction between the aesthetic and the artistic contributes largely to the trivialisation of the potential of the arts in education."3 He points out that "... it may often be necessary to take into account, at least implicitly, wider factors... in order to judge whether [an] appraisal was aesthetic or artistic."4 What are these wider factors, and how can audiences attend to them? As Christopher Havell reminds us,There is increasing pressure on drama teachers to use their teaching expertise purely for the development of social and life-skills training. This instrumental work may, at times, closely resemble the drama process, but the intentions will be confined to an experience that simulates or resembles those "real-life situations" that it is expected students will encounter. The aesthetic search for the "universal" at the centre of the particular will not be a relevant aim in any vocational training! One can only hope that the emerging interest in the aesthetic nature of drama and its place in a coherent arts education will encourage teachers and students to reflect on the final inadequacy of any instrumental view.5I believe that it is through the power of aesthetic education that audiences for drama and theatre will come to appreciate the artistic.In Caravaggio's painting David with the Head of Goliath (1606-10), the viewer is confronted with three time periods simultaneously. In his depiction of David, Caravaggio paints the shepherd-king of the Old Testament who prefigures Christ, but he is also modeled on Caravaggio's lover. David holds the severed head of Goliath down low in such a way as to engage the private viewer rather than to evoke the public spectacle.6 As I understood that the head of Goliath was actually a self-portrait of the painter not long before his death, I experienced a moment of instantaneity that shocked me into a new awareness of my own mortality, my relation to life and death. As it is Caravaggio's last journey, so is it our own. While Caravaggio's penultimate painting is recognized in terms of its artistic achievement, the moment of self-recognition on the part of the... (shrink)