Recreational Drugs European Network (ReDNet) project aims to use the Psychonaut Web Mapping Project database (Psychonaut Web Mapping Group, 2009) containing novel psychoactive compounds usually not mentioned in the scientific literature and thus unknown to clinicians as a unique source of information. The database will be used to develop an integrated ICT prevention approach targeted at vulnerable individuals and focused on novel synthetic and herbal compounds and combinations. Particular care will be taken in keeping the health professionals working directly with (...) young people showing problematic behaviors regularly updated in terms of novel compounds and combinations as well. A user-friendly project website will be developed aimed primarily at delivering the information/prevention approaches, but will also be a way of communicating with project partners and relevant stakeholders (e.g. thematic forum facilities, instant messages, blogs, video chat, wikiblog, newsletters distributed via mailing list). The website will support various ICT prevention tools, including an SMS alert service. Different areas and sections will be aimed specifically at the different target groups. -/- . (shrink)

Oppressive governments that use violence against citizens, e.g. murder and torture, are usually thought of as liable to armed revolutionary attack by the oppressed population. But oppression may be non-violent. A government may greatly restrict political rights and personal autonomy by using surveillance, propaganda, manipulation, strategic detention and similar techniques without ever resorting to overt violence. Can such regimes be liable to revolutionary attack? A widespread view is that the answer is ‘no’. On this view, unless a government is or (...) is likely to turn violent, revolution against it is disproportional. After all, revolution would involve launching potentially lethal attacks against oppressors who do not threaten the lives and bodily integrity of their subjects but pose only lesser threats. I argue that this claim of disproportionality is false. Armed revolution against Stably Non-violent Oppressive Regimes can be proportional under some circumstances, thus they may be liable to revolutionary attack. My argument relies on the Responsibility-Sensitive Account of Proportionality. This account holds that responsibility for posing threats renders agents liable to greater defensive harms than the harms with which they threaten. Even if non-violent oppressive regimes do not threaten citizens with murder, serious physical injury, or enslavement, their responsibility for creating an environment in which citizens’ political rights and personal autonomy are extremely restricted may loosen the proportionality requirement of inflicting defensive harm and render them liable to revolutionary attack. (shrink)

It is my endeavour in this paper to connect literary and philosophical texts with each other which all articulate the relation of the good sovereign to the supreme god. I try to show that despite the difference in age and genre these texts have some traits in common: the motiv of the eye looking benignly upon and/or bringing fertility to land and people, and the metempsychosis with the arrival of the king from the god and/or his return to the divine (...) sphere. I suggest that the recurrence of these motifs cannot be accidental and might reveal some continuity of tradition. Although the nature of such conceptual development is bound to be very complex and its starting point hard to trace, I nevertheless argue for a Pythagorean origin for the metempsychosis and the eye of the king, attested by Empedocles and Pindar, which mixed with the old belief of the king assuring fertility, as evidenced in Homer. (shrink)

In recent years the view that the non-instrumental value of democracy is a relational value, particularly relational equality, gained prominence. In this paper I challenge this relational egalitarian version of non-instrumentalism about democracy’s value by arguing that it is unable to establish a strong enough commitment to democracy. I offer an alternative view according to which democracy is non-instrumentally valuable for it establishes relationships of mutual service among citizens by enlisting them in the collective project of ruling the polity justly (...) together which is a self-standing source of value for them. Relating in the mode of mutual service is not a species of relating as equals; it is a distinct relational value. Democracy is uniquely suited to realize this relational value, for it renders citizens co-authors of the fundamental rules of the system of social cooperation under which they live, and only as co-authors of these rules are they able to mutually serve each other in a way that is appropriate within their relationship as citizens of the same polity. For this reason, a strong commitment to democracy can be based on the relational value of mutual service, which therefore better fits the theoretical purposes of non-instrumentalism than relational equality. (shrink)

I consider how photographic image manipulation and deception influence both interpretation and evaluation of photographs. First I distinguish between image manipulation and deception by clarifying that image manipulation does not necessarily lead to deception in terms of forming false beliefs. I also argue that image manipulation is not the only way of using photographs deceptively, and I provide examples for photographic deception that do not rely on image manipulation. Then I examine what role the readability of photographic properties plays in (...) their interpretation. I introduce the concept of photographic illocutionary acts to account for the interpretation of photographic images, and I argue that the default interpretation of photographs is always based on our knowledge of the specific ontological and epistemic status of photographs in general, and which distinguishes them from non-photographic images. I conclude that our knowledge about the ease and frequency of analogue or digital image manipulation does not alter our default interpretation with which we approach photographs. (shrink)

Journal Name: Philologus Issue: Ahead of print.

Single-pulse and repetitive transcranial magnetic stimulation are used in clinical practice for diagnostic and therapeutic purposes. However, rTMS-based therapies that lead to a significant and sustained reduction in neuropsychiatric symptoms remain scarce. While it is generally accepted that the stimulation frequency plays a crucial role in producing the therapeutic effects of rTMS, less attention has been dedicated to determining the role of the electric field strength. Conventional threshold-based intensity selection approaches, such as the resting motor threshold, produce variable stimulation intensities (...) and electric fields across participants and cortical regions. Insufficient standardization of electric field strength may contribute to the variability of rTMS effects and thus therapeutic success. Computational approaches that can prospectively optimize the electric field and standardize it across patients and cortical targets may overcome some of these limitations. Here, we discuss these approaches and propose that electric field standardization will be instrumental for translational science frameworks aimed at deciphering the subcellular, cellular, and network mechanisms of rTMS. Advances in understanding these mechanisms will be important for optimizing rTMS-based therapies in psychiatry. (shrink)

Emotional reactions are rather flexible, due to the schema-like organization of complex socio-emotional situations. Some data on emotion development, and on certain pathological conditions such as alexithymia, give further support for the psychological constructivist view put forward by Lindquist et al. Narrative organization is a key component of this schematic organization. The self-related nature of narrative organization provides scaffolding to the contextual dependency of emotions.

Three studies examined how members of a national group react to in-group wrongdoings. We expected that perceived in-group moral superiority would lead to unwillingness to repair the aggression. We also expected that internal-focused emotions such as group-based guilt and group-based shame would predict specific, misdeed-related reparative intentions but not general approach motivation toward the victim groups. In Study 1, facing the in-group’s recent aggression, participants who believed that the Hungarians have been more moral throughout their history than members of other (...) nations, used more exonerating cognitions, experienced less in-group critical emotions and showed less willingness to provide reparations for the members of the victim group. Study 2 and Study 3 confirmed most findings of Study 1. Perceived in-group moral superiority directly or indirectly reduced willingness to provide either general or specific reparations, while internally focused in-group critical emotions predicted specific misdeed-related reparative intentions but not general approach motivation. The role of emotional attachment to the in-group is considered. (shrink)

In this paper I examine the question of what duties the principles of democratic legitimacy prescribe for receiving states towards asylum seekers in general, and towards those who belong to vulnera...

This paper argues that Michael Polányi’s account of how science, as an institution, establishes knowledge can provide a structure for a future institution capable of countering misinformation, or fake news, and deepfakes. I argue that only an institutional approach can adequately take up the challenge against the corresponding institution of fake news. The fact of filtering news and information may be bothering. It is the threat of censorship and free speech limitation. Instead, I propose that we should indicate reliable information (...) with a trademark and news signing-approved information and brand equity. I offer a method of creating a standard for online news that people can rely on (similar to high-quality shopping products). (shrink)

A personal report on a recent Web conference hosted by Cappadocia University, Turkey on the cultural impacts of pandemics. January 13-15, 2021.

The presence of utopian studies in Hungary is of growing importance. Hungarian scholars have provided significant contributions to the understanding of the phenomena of utopia—suffice it to mention the work of Karl Mannheim, Thomas Molnar, and Erika Gottlieb; yet it is also characteristic that all of these scholars, who were born in Hungary, reached their achievements abroad. This essay attempts to give a quick overview of the state of affairs of studies in utopianism in Hungary, listing scholars and seats of (...) study of the present and the recent past.The publication history of Hungarian translations of Thomas More’s Utopia represents the general attitude toward utopianism in Hungary.1 The first translation came... (shrink)

Journal of Social Philosophy, EarlyView.

Structural injustice is injustice produced by largescale social structures and processes that create systemic disadvantages for large groups of people. Individuals have duties to counteract structural injustice. These duties are more demanding for people privileged by unjust social structures than for non-privileged individuals, even when the latter have equal ability to contribute. What explains this? I review and reject two common explanations, i.e., the Reparation Account and the Restitution Account. I offer a third view, the Domination Account; it holds that (...) the privileged have more demanding duties because they pose a constant threat of domination to non-privileged individuals by virtue of their structural positions. (shrink)

In this paper we discuss an often-neglected topic in the literature on the ethics of voting. Our aim is to provide an account of what states are obligated to do, so that voters may fulfil their role as public decision-makers in an epistemically competent manner. We argue that the state ought to provide voters with what we call a substantive opportunity for competence. This entails that the state ought to actively foster the epistemic capabilities that are necessary to achieve competent (...) participation in political decision-making practices. (shrink)

Rainer Bauböck is among the most renowned scholars in the field of citizenship and democracy. In a recent volume, Democratic Inclusion, he—together with other authors—addresses the so-called democratic boundary problem. This book is an extremely valuable resource for anyone working on this problem; Bauböck presents a complex and sophisticated theory of the principles of democratic citizenship while his respondents put forward crucial questions not only about his theory, but also about the debate in general. At the same time, the volume (...) also points to the limitations of this discourse and the formidable obstacles to reaching conclusive theoretical results about democratic inclusion. (shrink)

Warfare ideologies are as old as human civilization. By now, they have grown into an important and extended research field, including works analyzing the justification of war in ancient Indian epic...

This book affects a rapprochement between memory studies and eighteenth-century aesthetics with the aim of modifying received views on the role and fate of memory in the history of criticism. It argues that the philosophical problems characterizing conceptualizations of memory unsettle its opposition to the imagination and explain its relation to literary discourse. Moving from the Muses through Plato and Descartes to works by Pope, Addison, Gerard, and Kames, the book traces these problems through various "figures" representing notions of memory (...) and claims that eighteenth-century critical thought exploited a constructive sense of memory for accounts of the notion of the imagination. Komáromy thus argues for the persistence of the literary relevance of memory even in a poetics of the imagination, offering a new perspective on the changing relation of memory and imagination at a point in the history of criticism that has determined the critical assessment of these concepts. (shrink)

Hieroglyphic Luwian: An Introduction with Original Texts, 3rd Revised Edition. By Annick Payne. Subsidia et Instrumenta Linguarum Orientis, vol. 2. Wiesbaden: Harrassowitz Verlag, 2014. Pp. xiv + 217. €29.80.

In this paper I argue for a fully intended and carefully tailored allusion in Plato’s Phaedrus to Pindar’s Pythian 1 with the pivotal image of Typho. The analysis of verbal and conceptual links leads to a better appreciation of the nuances in the Platonic passage, including a hitherto utterly unexplored layer of the text, its musical metaphoricity. On this level several main themes of Plato’s thought, such as the problem of singleness vs. manyness, musical ethos and criticism, converge in an (...) extraordinarily dense expression. (shrink)

Many authors argue that refugees should be enfranchised independently of citizenship. The enfranchisement of refugees is often seen as crucial for affirming their agency in the politics of asylum. However, most arguments in the literature do not explain why precisely it matters that they exercise their agency in the realm of democratic decision-making, i.e. why it matters that refugees participate in collectively wielding the public power to which they are subjected, rather than passively enjoy protection against the excessive and intrusive (...) exercise of this power. This leaves it unclear what value refugee enfranchisement realises precisely, and what function or role it is meant to play within the overall provision of asylum. My goal is to propose a plausible explanation of the significance of democratic inclusion from the viewpoint of refugees' agency. I argue that refugee enfranchisement affirms refugees' agency by advancing their interest in acting as makers of justice within the political context in which they find themselves. (shrink)

Democracy is the form of government in which citizens have an equal say in political decision-making. But what does this mean precisely? Having an equal say is often defined either in terms of equal power to influence political decision-making or in terms of appropriate consideration, i.e., as a matter of attributing appropriate deliberative weight to citizens’ judgement in political decision-making. In this paper I argue that both accounts are incomplete. I offer an alternative view according to which having an equal (...) say is having a say as an equal. That is, having an equal say is to be defined in terms of citizens’ occupying a role of political decision-makers, i.e., the political office of the democratic co-ruler of the polity, such that no citizen is a secondary or auxiliary decision-maker; they rule together as equals. This view aligns with the traditional understanding of democracy as rule by the people while providing a coherent conceptual framework for specifying what it means for democratic citizens to have an equal say which incorporates the strengths of alternative accounts and overcomes some of their challenges. (shrink)

The list of Apollo's virtues in the second hymn of Callimachus describes, in the context of the appearance of the god, a mysterious healing substance which trickles from the hair of the patron of medicine. Hymn 2.38–41:αἱ δὲ κόμαι θυόεντα πέδῳ λείβουσιν ἔλαια⋅οὐ λίπος ᾿Απόλλωνος ἀποστάζουσιν ἔθειραι,ἀλλ᾽ αὐτὴν πανάκειαν⋅ ἐν ἄστεϊ δ᾽ ᾧ κεν ἐκεῖναιπρῶκες ἔραζε πέσωσιν, ἀκήρια πάντ᾽ ἐγένοντο.Apollo's hair distils flagrant drops of unguent to the ground: Apollo's curls shed no oil but panacea itself. In the city where (...) those dewdrops fall to earth, all things are safe. (shrink)

Das Widerspiel von mythischer und historischer Zeit ist ein wesentliches Merkmal der antiken Zeitauffassung, wie sie uns in reinster Form die antike Literatur widerspiegelt. Es stellt auch einen wichtigen Unterschied zu unserer modernen Zeiterfahrung dar, sodass die angelegentliche Untersuchung jeder Spielart dieser παλίντονος ἁρμονίη von Mythischem und Historischem einer Herausforderung gleichkommt, die Eigenart antiker Zeitauffassung verstehen zu lernen. Auf den folgenden Seiten geht es um diese Problematik in einem einzigen Gedicht einer bestimmten Gattung eines begrenzten Zeitalters: Das Zeitalter ist die (...) Hochblüte des Hellenismus, die Gattung die Hymnendichtung, das Gedicht der Hymnos auf Artemis des Kallimachos. (shrink)

Luwian Hieroglyphic Texts in Late Bronze Age Scribal Tradition. By Fred C. Woudhuizen. Dresdner Beiträge zur Hethitologie, vol. 53. Wiesbaden: Harrassowitz Verlag, 2021. Pp. 343, illus. €84 (paper).

Análisis estético, sociológico y político de la obra de Goethe Las desventuras del joven Werther, partiendo de las tesis estético-literarias de Georg Lukács, claramente influenciadas por Friedrich Schiller, y de las consideraciones que el mismo Goethe realizó posteriormente acerca de su vida y obra en su inconclusa autobiografía Poesía y verdad . El objetivo es realizar un pequeño estudio de la obra pero, en especial, del tipo de sujeto que ejemplifica su personaje principal: el sujeto del humanismo burgués revolucionario , (...) un sujeto que podemos caracterizar en palabras de Lukács como demoníaco y que, por su estructura constitutiva, está condenado al fracaso de sus expectativas vitales. (shrink)

Plato claimed that the regular solids are the building blocks of all matter. His views, commonly referred to as the geometric atomistic model, had enormous impact on human thought despite the fact that four of the five Platonic solids can not fill space without gaps. In this paper we quantify these gaps, showing that the errors in Plato’s estimates were quite small. We also develop a mean field approximation to convex honeycombs using a generalized version of Plato’s idea. This approximation (...) not only admits to view convex mosaics in$$d=3$$d=3dimensions as a continuum but we also find that it is quite accurate, showing that Plato’s geometric intuition may have been remarkable. (shrink)

This article aims to present an overall interpretation of a poem by Callimachus that centres on the dead Ptolemaic queen Arsinoe II. Firstly the position of the Ektheosis Arsinoes in Callimachus’ œuvre, the genre to which it belongs and its structure will be investigated. This leads to the analysis of the highly allusive character of the work (above all to Hesiod, Ibycus, Simonides and Pindar as well as to hymnic poetry). In addition, realia (the historical background) and textual difficulties arising (...) from the fragmentary transmisson will also be treated. The appendix discusses a hitherto unnoticed testimony to the poem’s reception in the Roman epicist Ennius. (shrink)