The paper analyses empirical research results comparing the impact of the medium (traditional, paper-based vs. screen-based) on the reading process and text comprehension. It focuses on two analytical approaches—the first looks at the construction of cognitive maps of texts and the other the material aspects of the medium – which enable readers to orientate themselves and to explore and interpret the text more comprehensively. The paper discusses differences in how readers approach textual meaning according to experience of using digital technologies, (...) the text, and reader experience and abilities. It concludes by arguing that strengthening these individual experiences and abilities is key to effective inference of textual meaning. (shrink)

Many years the academic community has been discussing issues of a universal metalanguage as the general conceptual framework of modern social and humanitarian research, especially of philosophy. The article questions the claim that the language of Western philosophy was already accepted as a unified tool in the 20th century. The peculiarities of perception and further application of Western philosophical terminology in Japan in late 19th – first half of the 20th centuries are investigated here as a factual evidence base of (...) argumentation. Special attention is given to examples of translation and interpretation of some concepts of Western origin, such as metaphysics, ethics, logic, substance, subject, etc., as observed in the works of eminent thinkers Nishi Amane, Inoue Tetsujiro, Nishida Kitaro, and Watsuji Tetsuro. The paper provides examples of new original concepts developed by modern Japanese philosophers, such as Kimura Bin, Hiromatsu Wataru et al. The author concludes that the general conceptual framework that modern philosophy operates with is a very dynamic and open system, capable of transforming in different cultural contexts and in keeping with newly emerging issues that require analysis. The article identifies factors that provide philosophical communication between different cultures at the conceptual level, that is, the presence of a common circle of problems and presence of partial overlap between the key concepts. The author poses the problem of the emergence of new approaches and ideas in a situation of “conflicting interpretations,” or incomplete equivalence of similar notions when used by the parties in a dialogue, casting doubt on possibility, necessity and reasonability of exact reproduction of meanings and “complete domestication” in other cultures. (shrink)

The search for the backbone of the types of rationality inherent in different cultures keeps on to be an open problem, which remains relevant to the need of closer intercultural interaction in the global world. At the same time, the analysis of the logic of language as the basis for the study of rationality types continues to occupy an important place. Meanwhile, the studies of grammatical structures and language models from the point of view of their connection to a certain (...) type of thinking and influence on the method of philosophizing are still quantitatively inferior to the researches of lexical aspects. Expansion of this type of research with the involvement of a diverse cultural material over time will allow us to reach the level of establishing regularities of a more general nature. This article contributes to the development of this issue. The author deals with the approaches to the defnition of the paradigm of Japanese rationality proposed by researchers of grammatical features of the Japanese language, on the one hand, and the “logic of place” concept and the “absolutely contradictory identity” principle of prominent philosopher Nishida Kitaro, on the other hand. A special attention is drawn to the structural similarity of the grammatical form highlighted by linguists, in which the decisive role belongs to the predicate, and to Nishida’s logical model reflecting specifcs of subject-predicate relationship as well as perception of opposition in terms of “contradictory self-identity.” In the conclusion of the article, the author demonstrates the relationship of this model with the certain idea of subject, the type of epistemology overcoming dualism, the processual and cosmocentric comprehension of the world that can be traced in Nishida’s statements. (shrink)

The article is devoted to the philosophical views of Swami Vivekananda, reflected in his commentary on the Yoga Sutras of Patanjali. The text under study is one of the few Indian commentaries on the Yoga Sutras translated into Russian. The object of the study is a widespread translation of the commentary, made and published by Ya. K. Popov in 1906. The popularity of yoga as a health-improving practice increases interest in its spiritual component, therefore, the study of Vivekananda's commentary on (...) the Yoga Sutras seems to be an urgent task. The purpose of this article is to analyze Vivekananda's commentary for the authenticity of the transmission of the content of the ancient text and the reflection of the teachings of the Bengali thinker. Since Vivekananda's commentary on the Yoga Sutras has not been studied by domestic orientalists, and has not received comprehensive coverage in foreign studies, the results of his analysis contain scientific novelty. Using the hermeneutical method, it is revealed that the philosopher forms a commentary on the ancient text mainly to demonstrate the basics of his teaching. Vivekananda's work expresses his Orient-centric position, as well as the author's beliefs in accordance with the provisions of yoga to his contemporary science. Since the philosopher's views are in line with Advaita Vedanta, the ontological foundations of yoga are interpreted by him according to this philosophical school. The commentary of the late XIX century anticipates modern ideas of the healing potential of yoga and the superiority of experienced knowledge of the Divine, and also demonstrates the predictive talent of the Bengali thinker. (shrink)

BackgroundHumanitarian crises and emergencies, events often marked by high mortality, have until recently excluded palliative care—a specialty focusing on supporting people with serious or terminal illness or those nearing death. In the COVID-19 pandemic, palliative care has received unprecedented levels of societal attention. Unfortunately, this has not been enough to prevent patients dying alone, relatives not being able to say goodbye and palliative care being used instead of intensive care due to resource limitations. Yet global guidance was available. In 2018, (...) the WHO released a guide on‘Integrating palliative care and symptom relief into the response to humanitarian emergencies and crises’—the first guidance on the topic by an international body.AimsThis paper argues that while a landmark document, the WHO guide took a narrowly clinical bioethics perspective and missed crucial moral dilemmas. We argue for adding a population-level bioethics lens, which draws forth complex moral dilemmas arising from the fact that groups having differential innate and acquired resources in the context of social and historical determinants of health. We discuss dilemmas concerning: limitations of material and human resources; patient prioritisation; euthanasia; and legacy inequalities, discrimination and power imbalances.ImplicationsIn parts of the world where opportunity for preparation still exists, and as countries emerge from COVID-19, planners must consider care for the dying. Immediate steps to support better resolutions to ethical dilemmas of the provision of palliative care in humanitarian and emergency contexts will require honest debate; concerted research effort; and international, national and local ethical guidance. (shrink)

We study an extension of first-degree entailment (FDE) by Dunn and Belnap with a non-contingency operator |$\blacktriangle \phi $| which is construed as ‘|$\phi $| has the same value in all accessible states’ or ‘all sources give the same information on the truth value of |$\phi $|’. We equip this logic dubbed |$\textbf {K}^\blacktriangle _{\textbf {FDE}}$| with frame semantics and show how the bi-valued models can be interpreted as interconnected networks of Belnapian databases with the |$\blacktriangle $| operator modelling search (...) for inconsistencies in the provided information. We construct an analytic cut system for the logic and show its soundness and completeness. We prove that |$\blacktriangle $| is not definable via the necessity modality |$\Box $| of |$\textbf {K}_{\textbf{FDE}}$|⁠. Furthermore, we prove that in contrast to the classical non-contingency logic, reflexive, |$\textbf {S4}$| and |$\textbf {S5}$| (among others) frames are definable. (shrink)

The formation of public opinion in different countries of the world is important for the formation of global media discourse, since ambiguous opinions are produced in the Asian media, it is worth investigating and studying the linguistic nature of journalistic methods of influencing the audience and the peculiarities of communication with readers. The study aimed to decipher the explicit and implicit linguistic techniques employed to construct political narratives in the media domains of China and Japan, while also examining existing research (...) in the realm of media language. The methodological basis of the work is analytical-synthetic, comparative, contextual and lexical-semantic analysis, which were used in a complex. In this study, the peculiarities of the media discourse of China and Japan were determined based on the analysis of the objectivity of the depiction of events related to the war in Ukraine, and an idea was formed about the characteristics of the narratives that were laid at the level of explicit and implicit meanings, decoded using the study of linguistic means. Attention is focused on the contrast between the Chinese and Japanese positions regarding the war in Ukraine in the media discourse and the peculiarities of information coverage (neutrality or stylistic marking, the choice of lexical-semantic means, the level of artistic imagery). A contextual analysis of Chinese and Japanese online newspapers, which form the modern Asian media field, was carried out, which journalistic techniques are used and which linguistic means are used to achieve the basic communicative goal. This research can be used for further linguistic investigations regarding the formation of political narratives in different regions and countries of the world, in particular regarding the war in Ukraine, conducting a comparative analysis of the rhetoric of public opinion leaders and their influence on the general media discourse. (shrink)

The cultural diversity and the culture of plural coexistence becomes the global problem of existence. Mutual penetration and leveling of the boundary having divided the world into Other and Own is relevant, as it challenges identity in the conditions of openness and unification. Own culture is able to reveal its potential and present its essential features and original character only in the context of a different cultural dimension. The complex intertwinings, connections, influences of the cultures of different peoples and their (...) worldviews in a single world cultural space are illuminated by the dialogue. Dialogue determines the nourishing interaction, which allows to get richer by knowing the unique, valuable experience of the Other, to expand the horizons of one’s own existence. The atmosphere created by the dialogue is marked by humanism, implies the dignity and the right of each participant to argue their own point of view, therefore, to use their own intellectual abilities, knowledge and values. (shrink)

The red tape and delays around research ethics and governance approvals frequently frustrate researchers yet, as the lesser of two evils, are largely accepted as unavoidable. Here we quantify aspects of the research ethics and governance approvals for one interview- and questionnaire-based study conducted in England which used the National Health Service procedures and the electronic Integrated Research Application System. We demonstrate the enormous impact of existing approvals processes on costs of studies, including opportunity costs to focus on the substantive (...) research, and suggest directions for radical system change. We have recorded 491 exchanges with 89 individuals involved in research ethics and governance approvals, generating 193 pages of email text excluding attachments. These are conservative estimates. The exchanges were conducted outside IRAS, expected to be the platform where all necessary documents are provided and questions addressed. Importantly, the figures exclude the actual work of preparing the ethics documentation. We propose six areas of work to enable system change: 1. Support the development of a broad range of customised research ethics and governance templates to complement generic, typically clinical trials orientated, ones; 2. Develop more sophisticated and flexible frameworks for study classification; 3. Link with associated processes for assessment, feedback, monitoring and reporting, such as ones involving funders and patient and public involvement groups; 4. Invest in a new generation IT infrastructure; 5. Enhance system capacity through increasing online reviewer participation and training; and 6. Encourage researchers to quantify the approvals processes for their studies. Ethics and governance approvals are burdensome for historical reasons and not because of the nature of the task. There are many opportunities to improve their efficiency and analytic depth in an age of innovation, increased connectivity and distributed working. If we continue to work under current systems, we are perpetuating, paradoxically, an unethical system of research approvals by virtue of its wastefulness and impoverished ethical debate. (shrink)

In this paper, we argue that the usual approach to modelling knowledge and belief with the necessity modality |$\Box $| does not produce intuitive outcomes in the framework of the Belnap–Dunn logic (⁠|$\textsf{BD}$|⁠, alias |$\textbf{FDE}$|—first-degree entailment). We then motivate and introduce a nonstandard modality |$\blacksquare $| that formalizes knowledge and belief in |$\textsf{BD}$| and use |$\blacksquare $| to define |$\bullet $| and |$\blacktriangledown $| that formalize the unknown truth and ignorance as not knowing whether, respectively. Moreover, we introduce another modality (...) |$\textbf{I}$| that stands for factive ignorance and show its connection with |$\blacksquare $|⁠. We equip these modalities with Kripke-frame-based semantics and construct a sound and complete analytic cut system for |$\textsf{BD}^{\blacksquare }$| and |$\textsf{BD}^{\textbf{I}}$|—the expansions of |$\textsf{BD}$| with |$\blacksquare $| and |$\textbf{I}$|⁠. In addition, we show that |$\Box $| as it is customarily defined in |$\textsf{BD}$| cannot define any of the introduced modalities, nor, conversely, neither |$\blacksquare $| nor |$\textbf{I}$| can define |$\Box $|⁠. We also demonstrate that |$\blacksquare $| and |$\textbf{I}$| are not interdefinable and establish the definability of several important classes of frames using |$\blacksquare $|⁠. (shrink)

As the ubiquity of technology-mediated communication grows, so does the number of questions about the costs and benefits of replacing in-person interactions with technology-mediated ones. In the present study, we used a daily diary design to examine how people’s emotional experiences vary across in-person, video-, phone-, and text-mediated interactions in day-to-day life. We hypothesised that individuals would report less positive affect and more negative affect after less life-like interactions (where in-person is defined as the most life-like and text-mediated as the (...) least life-like). In line with this hypothesis, the analysis of 527 unique interactions reported by 102 individuals (mean age = 19.3; 85.6% female) over the course of 7 days reveals that people feel lonelier, sadder, less affectionate, less supported, and less happy following less life-like interactions. Additional analyses show that the links between life-like communication and momentary experiences are independent of properties of individual interactions such as interaction length and participants’ overall evaluations of interaction quality. These findings provide initial evidence that there may be inherent properties of common technology-mediated communication tools that may lead to momentary changes in affective experiences and make social connection more challenging. (shrink)

Essence of innovative development of sphere of production of foodstuffs in the context of decision of problems of food safety is considered in the article. Home and foreign approaches are analyzed in relation to a structure and ways of optimization of food safety of population. One of the most effective ways of decision of modern contradictions of food safety of population and innovative development of sphere of production of foodstuffs is the concept of "stable development", which consists in appropriate combination (...) of three components, - hygiene of environment, social and physical health of human and also economic viability. Importance of market self-regulation as an economic mechanism of providing of food safety of population is reasoned. It is marked that effective government control in the field of production of foodstuffs requires system approach, first of all, to the design of development of the system of food security of the state. Modern transformations in the field of production of foodstuffs in two aspects (structural and territorial) and on four basic levels - macroeconomic, branch, regional and local are analyzed. Role of innovative development of sphere of production of foodstuffs in providing of food safety in modern terms is marked. Taking into account the basic tendencies of interpretation of category of food safety in modern world science, and also actual directions of innovative development of sphere of production of foodstuffs in the developed countries of the world, transformation of conception of providing of food safety in direction from the state to the human, and thus, increase of its human centricity are marked. In home realities the described tendency must be represented in positions of conception of intensification of innovative development of sphere of production of foodstuffs, the substantive provisions of which are offered by authors. (shrink)

Konisskiĭ, G. Obshchai︠a︡ filosofii︠a︡, razdelennai︠a︡ na chetyre otdela.

Implementing new school reforms in school practice is extremely challenging mostly because of teacher resistance to change, or uncertainty, fear, or nostalgia for the previous curriculum. Since 2016 a new preschool curriculum including a new early literacy curriculum has been in force in Slovakia. The aim of the study is to assess how well teachers follow the requirement to use a variety of texts in the classroom to promote early literacy development. The analysis is performed on 138 observations out of (...) a total of 215 structured observations, in which teachers used a text as part of an educational activity. The predominant use of narrative texts is linked to more traditional early literacy activities; however, the employment of different text genres relates to the use of different sources of text presentation, engagement with different ways of working with the text and is accompanied by different reading activities. (shrink)

BACKGROUND: Ontologies play a major role in life sciences, enabling a number of applications, from new data integration to knowledge verification. SNOMED CT is a large medical ontology that is formally defined so that it ensures global consistency and support of complex reasoning tasks. Most biomedical ontologies and taxonomies on the other hand define concepts only textually, without the use of logic. Here, we investigate how to automatically generate formal concept definitions from textual ones. We develop a method that uses (...) machine learning in combination with several types of lexical and semantic features and outputs formal definitions that follow the structure of SNOMED CT concept definitions. RESULTS: We evaluate our method on three benchmarks and test both the underlying relation extraction component as well as the overall quality of output concept definitions. In addition, we provide an analysis on the following aspects: How do definitions mined from the Web and literature differ from the ones mined from manually created definitions, e.g., MeSH? How do different feature representations, e.g., the restrictions of relations' domain and range, impact on the generated definition quality?, How do different machine learning algorithms compare to each other for the task of formal definition generation?, and, What is the influence of the learning data size to the task? We discuss all of these settings in detail and show that the suggested approach can achieve success rates of over 90%. In addition, the results show that the choice of corpora, lexical features, learning algorithm and data size do not impact the performance as strongly as semantic types do. Semantic types limit the domain and range of a predicted relation, and as long as relations' domain and range pairs do not overlap, this information is most valuable in formalizing textual definitions. CONCLUSIONS: The analysis presented in this manuscript implies that automated methods can provide a valuable contribution to the formalization of biomedical knowledge, thus paving the way for future applications that go beyond retrieval and into complex reasoning. The method is implemented and accessible to the public from: https://github.com/alifahsyamsiyah/learningDL. (shrink)

The purpose of the study is to determine the impact of entrepreneurial initiative on the development of innovation activity of country enterprises. The theory of entrepreneurship by clarifying the essence of entrepreneurial initiative got further elaboration in the article. The methodical approach to the analysis and evaluation of the entrepreneurial initiative and its impact on the innovation activity of the enterprises, the results of which are the basis for further development of proposals to stimulate entrepreneurial initiative and development of their (...) innovation activity is suggested. The estimation of innovation activity of 1758 enterprises of Ukraine by calculating the integral indicator of innovation activity revealed its low level for innovation active enterprises. The method of one-dimensional linear regression has determined that an increase in the number of business structures per 10 thousand people of the country's population at a rate of 1.0 causes an increase in the indicator of innovation activity by 0.172. It is proved in the article that development of infrastructure of enterprenerial environment and creation of centers for entrepreneurship development act as an important mechanism of increasing innovation activity of enterprises of the country. (shrink)

The purpose of the study is to reveal the relationship between the justification of strategic decisions and the increase in efficiency of transnational corporations (TNC). The conceptual bases of the justification of strategic decisions for increasing the efficiency of TNC are suggested, the development of which involves research of the preconditions on which their implementation is based, analysis of the main aspects of TNC's activity and accordance with the principles of justification of strategic decisions, strategic decision-making. The results of the (...) comprehensive diagnostic examination of TNC of leading bearings manufacturers are presented, which revealed the problems of their functioning on the market, changes in the dynamics of performance indicators, differences in the use of opportunities, financial state, strategic positions on the market, the efficiency of made decisions. A model for selecting a decision strategy for TNC is suggested. Practical recommendations of implementing strategic decisions for increasing the efficiency of activity of TNC of leading bearings manufacturers are given. (shrink)

The purpose of this investigation is to develop a new methodological basis for studying the market opportunities of the multinational corporation (MNC) on the basis of the synthesis of modern scientific methods for further forecasting their change. The results showed the degree of dependence of the effectiveness of business management on the trends in the field development and competitor’s actions, market access opportunities, the use of MNC opportunities, their strategic positions, and the totality of internal factors that determine the profitability (...) of activities. The practical value of the obtained results is to identify areas for increasing the efficiency of MNC business management and forecasting the dynamics of sales volumes of their products on the market. (shrink)

In the present-day information burst and information revolution epoch the mankind must realize the adaptation to the new conditions of its existence in the limited time. The most important problem is the problem of the human being successful adaptation to the modern information medium. The information medium is the factor demanding absolutely new adaptation of human being. Modern information medium specific character leads to correction of existing nature and social human being adaptation mechanisms and creation of new mechanisms. Information technologies (...) as a modern civilization core change not only quality and substance of present time human being life, but they threaten to transformate his way of existence in the modern world. (shrink)

Стаття присвячена проблемі становлення та розвитку системи військово-топографічних обстежень у Російській імперії в ХІХ ст. Аналізуючи проблему створення військово-топографічних описів, автор перш за все приділяє увагу дослідженню джерельної бази описово-статистичних джерел, установленню рівня їхньої репрезентативності та достовірності. Завдяки залученню історико-порівняльного методу автору дослідження вдалося повністю реконструювати джерельну базу військово-статистичних творів, установити рівень володіння укладачами описів методами джерелознавчої критики. Подібне дослідження відкриває нові можливості для переосмислення проблеми інформативності військово-топографічних описів України кінця 40-х - початку 50-х рр. ХІХ ст.

У статті автор пропонує своє бачення процесу становлення системи кадастрового обліку в національних районах Російської імперії . Аналізуються нормативно-правові документи, що слугували юридичною основою для проведення генерального межування та обліку земельних дач на південноукраїнських землях. Досліджуються технічні засади межування та основні проблеми, з якими стикалися співробітники межових контор під час вимірювальних робіт на Півдні України.

This study investigates the online process of reading and analyzing of sketchnotes (visual notes containing a handwritten text and drawings) on Russian language material. Using the eye-tracking method, we compared the processing of different types of sketchnotes (‘path’ (trajectory), linear, and radial) and the processing of a verbal text. Biographies of Russian writers were used as the material. In a preliminary experiment, we asked 89 college students to read the biographies and to evaluate each text or sketch using five scales (...) (from -2 to +2). The best example for each of three formats of sketchnotes and a verbal text were chosen. In the main experiment, twenty-one secondary school students examined four different biographies in four different formats (three sketchnotes and a verbal text), answered to the factual and analytical questions to these texts and estimated the difficulty of each text. We measured the total dwell time, the total fixation count, the average fixation duration for each stimulus as well as for separate zones inside the sketches including verbal and non-verbal information. Our results show that readers process the information better and faster while reading sketchnotes than a verbal text. In the trajectory sketchnotes, the readers followed the order of elements aimed by the author of the sketchnotes better than in the radial and linear sketchnotes. The analysis of participants’ eye movements while processing the stimuli made it possible to propose several recommendations for creating effective sketchnotes. (shrink)

In religious studies, the issue of Christian spirituality is not sufficiently developed. In this regard, an interesting analysis of Christian spirituality in its connection with isihastic anthropology in the study of S. Khoruzhogo. However, the definition of Christian spirituality in this work is absent, although the term itself is used in the form of a synonym of isichasm, which is understood as its tradition and current. The philosopher asserts that the basis of Christian spirituality is the idea of ​​the deification (...) of man, the acquisition of human nature by God. Therefore, Christian spirituality is the deification of man. This statement is an important methodological basis for the study of this phenomenon. The operational aspect of the spiritual experience of asceticism is emphasized, the latter is understood as the continuous work of self-transformation, autotransformation, mystical experience of transcendental and transcendental communication. (shrink)

The article aims to analyze the relationship between food and identity from an aesthetic and ethical perspective. New media and technology are seen as a tool for constructing and demonstrating identity. Eating practices and the understanding of food in the modern world are explored from the perspective of symbolic meanings. The analysis focuses on the concept of identity in social networks and popular culture. The methodology is textual and visual content analysis in new media. The text distinguishes between the traditional (...) approach to food with a central concept of 'taste' and the new media context where the approach focuses on 'image'. From an ethical point of view, the relationship between the (non) consumption of meat and animal products and the identity that is widely advocated in the modern lifestyle culture is analyzed. (shrink)

The main characteristic of the modern environment is the negative change by its people – destruction and pollution. Man is part of the biosphere and the technogenic transformations of the biosphere inevitably affect him. Under the influence of technogenic civilization, all spheres of human activity undergo changes, and science above all. Ecology is especially keenly aware of the challenges of technogenic civilization. It focuses on anthropogenic factors, works with the human environment. At the same time, its problem field is expanding (...) due to interdisciplinary research and the allocation of knowledge of new environmental disciplines into an independent industry. The interdisciplinarity of modern ecology is most clearly visible on the example of such a direction as informational ecology. The presence of the digital environment in human life has grown so much that it requires the separation of the digital information environment into a separate subsystem. Information ecology studies the laws of the influence of information on the formation and functioning of man. In turn, interdisciplinarity, assuming the use of knowledge from various branches of science, brings us to the problems of the collective agent of cognition and distributed knowledge. In ecology, the problems of the collective agent of cognition are implemented through crowd-sourcing technology. Ecology is a science that requires massive collection of observation data (samples of water, air, soil pollution in various, sometimes hard-to-reach corners of the planet, observation of fluctuations in the number of species of animals and plants). The popularity of crowdsourcing projects in the field of ecology is explained by the fact that the challenges and threats of anthropogenic civilization have generated such a trend of our time as environmental orientation or environmentalism. Ecological crowdsourcing projects, inspired by the philosophy of environmentalism, can serve as an answer to the challenges of technogenic civilization. (shrink)

Implementing the key functions, any company is faced with issues related to the formation and analysis of the range of goods, products, services. Regardless of the field of activity, enterprises need to analyze each product line separately in order to make timely adjustments to the product range policy, which directly affects the economic efficiency of the enterprise as a whole. The purpose of the study is to reveal the content of matrix methods of assortment analysis. The article deals with the (...) concepts of "assortment", "product assortment", their meaning and impact on the company's activities; matrix methods: BKG matrix; Dibb-Simkin matrix; Markon matrix. The scientific novelty lies in the author's interpretation of the comparative characteristics of these methods, summarized in a tabular form, allowing enterprises to choose the optimal method when analyzing assortment positions in real business conditions. (shrink)

The term "spirituality" now has several interpretations, and the part acquires an excellent, even opposite, meaning in both religious and philosophical doctrines. At the same time, each under the indicated phenomenon understands something of its own. Some authors have in mind historical consciousness, others - the integrity of mental activity, others relate spirituality, first of all with the world of emotions. Undoubtedly, every interpretation of spirituality covers a certain part of the truth. It is worth noting that speaking about spiritual, (...) spirituality and its significance in human being can only be achieved by overcoming the existing bias in the scientific circles and ideological distrust of the very concept of "spirit" and "spiritual." It is not a secret that the spirituality problem was underestimated in the domestic science for a long period, which negatively affected, in particular, the understanding of its content and essence, the treatment of this phenomenon only from the point of view of materialism. From this perspective, the study of S.Prolev, who states that the spiritual exists and manifests itself in various subject forms, whose range is wide - from processes and phenomena of the human psyche to social institutions that provide spiritual production, worthy of attention. Spiritual is understood as a special reality, the "spiritual sphere" of human life. (shrink)

In their letter to the Editor in this issue, Kolstoe and Carpenter challenge a core aspect of our recently published case study of research approvals [BMC Medical Ethics 20:7] by arguing that we conflate research ethics with governance and funding processes. Amongst the key concerns of the authors are: 1) that our paper exemplifies a typical conflation of concepts such as governance, integrity and ethics, with significant consequences for claims around the responsibility and accountability of the organisations involved; 2) that, (...) as a consequence of this conflation, we misrepresent the ethics review process, including in fundamental aspects such as the ethics approval-opinion distinction; 3) that it is difficult to see scope for greater integration of processes such as applying for funding, research approvals, Patient and Public Involvement, etc., as suggested by us. Here we present an alternative point of view towards the concerns raised. (shrink)