AI enters more and more spheres of personal and public life, the topic becomes the object of much discussion. The expanding possibilities of these technologies give rise to the need to introduce ethical and legal regulation in order to control them. Hence the question arises as to how far a system can be considered an autonomous entity, similar to the individual possessing this capability. This article examines the question of whether a system with artificial intelligence can be considered a subject (...) in ethical and legal aspect. The aim is to demonstrate the difference between human thinking and behaviour and the activities performed by AI systems in order to outline a framework with ethical and legal norms governing the creation and use of AI. By applying a multidisciplinary approach combining the analysis of philosophical and legal notions of the subject, concepts such as intellect, autonomy, moral and legal responsibility are explored. The conclusion is that no matter how developed these systems are, they cannot be defined as subjects because they cannot perform fully conscious acts and cannot be held morally or legally responsible. (shrink)

The Eastern Enlargement of the European Union: Challenges to Democracy?1 Recent scholarship assesses the impact of the European Union's conditionality on democracy in Central and Eastern Europe in a contradictory way. On one hand, the EU is perceived as a key agent of successful democratic consolidation and on other hand, the return of nationalist and populist politics in new member states has been explored in the context of the negative consequences of the hasty accession that undermined government accountability and constrained (...) public debate over policy alternatives. This article explains this puzzle of the ambiguous effects of the EU's politics of conditionality, which promoted institutions stabilizing the horizontal division of powers, rule of law, human and minority rights protection, but which neglected norms and rules of participatory and/or popular democracy. (shrink)

The article analyses party documents and rhetoric from Kotleba’s People’s Party of Our Slovakia (ĽSNS) and demonstrates that it has a culturally conservative, instrumental and paternalist-populist attitude to gender issues. The thematic analysis indicates that the ĽSNS not only seeks to promote traditional gender roles and the exclusion of women from public space but also uses quasi-feminist arguments. These, for instance, call on women to engage more in public life but only in support of its patriarchal agenda. Our findings show (...) that gender related issues feature only peripherally in ĽSNS rhetoric, however they are used strategically as a theme that cuts across the party ideology, forming not its core but being purposely used in relation to the party’s main priorities. ĽSNS uses gender related themes as part of its political arsenal for (1) increasing the party’s support amongst women and (2) seeking to involve more women in the party’s activities to increase its acceptability among voters. (shrink)

The paper investigates the evolution of the first manned international space mission – a rendezvous and docking between a US and a Soviet spacecraft in 1975 known as the Apollo-Soyuz Test Project. The aim is to reconsider the rationales behind the ASTP from both a conceptual and an empirical perspective in order to get a better understanding of the evolution of international cooperation in the highly competitive and strategic field of space technology. Based on archival sources from Moscow, it sheds (...) some light on those factors that led to a change in the previous reluctance of Soviets to cooperate with the US in the manned spaceflight. From the theoretical point of view, it argues that the ASTP was as much a tool of competition as one of cooperation and resulted from an interplay between cooperative and competitive logics. To explain the turn towards cooperative practices, the article looks at the complex constellation of competitive relations that existed within the national and international context of space exploration and changed in the late 1960s and early 1970s. The decisive role in those changes was played by factors that can be subsumed under the notion of the so-called “third.”. (shrink)

The purpose of this paper is to present an overview of current studies on the general limitations of using the International Classification of Functioning, Disability and Health (ICF), as well as to review the results of its application in adults with visual impairment. The literature search was performed in ERIC, EBSCO-Host, ScienceDirect, PROKUEST, SCOPUS, and Google Scholar. Articles were selected if they reported on any of the strengths and weaknesses of the ICF, also its application to adults with visual impairment. (...) The literature review was performed using the PRISMA criteria. The search of relevant literature revealed 8 articles that met the eligibility criteria. The overall conclusion is that while the ICF is a valuable tool for describing how a person functions, it is not an evaluation instrument in itself. (shrink)

The ability to communicate intentionally begins when infants start referring to external objects. Although social gaze has specific communicative functions, it remains unclear what they are. Beyond dyadic—infant-parent—emotional sharing, infant social gaze within the infant-parent-object triad becomes an increasingly complex communicative modality. We argue that the communicative function of infant social gaze is driven by the knowledge shared between the infant and the parent on the referent of the social gaze, namely the object. Although objects have affordances, they are used (...) in conventional ways shared between users (i.e. common ground). Parents transmit to infants the conventional use of objects, which infants progressively learn and master. Accordingly, we hypothesize that within triadic interactions, the communicative function of infant’s gaze toward the parent is shaped by the degree of common ground shared between the two communicative partners on the conventional use of the object. Based on three prototypical vignettes of mother-infant joint toy play sessions of one 8 month-old child and of two 16 month-old children, we provide a qualitative analysis of the function of infant gaze based on 1) infant’s mastery of the conventional use of the toy, and 2) the parental response to the infant’s gaze. Analyses of gaze patterns reveal that when infants do not master object’s conventional use, parents do not interpret infant’s gaze as meaningful. Conversely, when the infant masters object’s conventional use and thus shares with the parent common ground about the object, parents more likely interpret infant’s gaze as meaningful. Our findings highlight the key role that socio-materiality plays in early communicative development. Namely, when referring to objects for which the infant and the parent share common ground, the function of infant’s social gaze becomes communicatively meaningful for the parent. The knowledge on the communicative referent (i.e. the object) shared between the infant and the parent shapes the course of communicative behavior, constitutes and reflects the interactive function of gaze, and cues parents into tailoring their communicative response according to infant’s developmental needs, which in turns feeds back into infant’s learning and development. (shrink)

King Ferdinand VII of Spain was often compared to the Ottoman sultan. It was a rhetorical operation that continued a tradition in Western Christendom by which Christian rulers were compared to oriental despots not because they were considered to be equal to them, but to show how far astray from the ideal of good government they were. This article examines the multiple dimensions of this comparison. To what extent was it a reaffirmation of the construction of the Turk as a (...) radical other? Or were there new essential elements, and therefore the metaphor of the Turk can also be interpreted within a new universalistic discourse that opposed tyrants to oppressed peoples across cultural and religious barriers? Our examination leads to a reflection on the transnational character of the discursive frameworks in which the metaphor of the Turk was built and rebuilt, on its circulation and limits, and on its specific uses. (shrink)

Maria Dimitrova (Sofia University, Bulgaria) in response to Jerard Bensussan (University of Strasbourg, France), Jeffrey Andrew Barash (University of Amiens, France), Jacob Rogozinski (University of Strasbourg, France) and Ernst Wolff (University of Pretoria, South Africa) commenting on Emmanuel Levinas' philosophy. This book is essential reading for those interested in the current debates in ethics, metaphysics, and social and political philosophy. The discussed issues are presented from the perspective of phenomenology. This publication is not simply a pure and abstract academic (...) work but has a much broader scope, touching upon the most important dimensions of human relationships. The book tries to find a new way to articulate these. It will be of significant help to scholars and graduate students in all fields of the humanities, as well as to policy makers and social workers who feel themselves challenged by the question of humanism and justice. (shrink)

This essay probes into the possibility of encountering the Deleuzian sense-event in four Tom Stoppard radio plays, Moon (1964), Boot (1964), Glad (1966) and Artist Descending A Staircase (1972). Itself an incorporeal – an occurrence of the interface – the wonderful and strange protagonist of Gilles Deleuze's 1969 Logic of Sense is approached in apophatic gestures, with a glimpse at the various vestiges it has left upon texts. Within this exercise in indirection, ‘empty forms’ present themselves as the texts’ circulating (...) words. Informed by and receiving infusions from two parallel flows of Deleuzian signifiers and signifieds, these entities are singled out as the texts’ pointers that open up a cleavage where the sense-event can issue forth. (shrink)

Daga (the Bulgarian word for “rainbow”) was a Bulgarian comic magazine launched in 1979 and regularly published until 1992. Its remarkably westernized aesthetic greatly impacted an entire generation of readers. Included in its variety of stories (history, sci-fi, literary classics) is an action-packed account of Spartacus’ exploits. For ten consecutive issues (1979–1983), the story spanned the hero’s life from a more fanciful narrative of his early years in Thrace to the better-documented events in Italy and his death. The paper explores (...) the plotline, characterization, and visual aspects of “Spartak” to reveal the eponymous hero’s significance for young Bulgarian readers in the 1980s. Drawing on the cultural and historical context, I argue that Spartacus was well suited to serve as a role model and a national hero by embodying the proletarian anti-imperialist struggle and also, notably, because of his supposed place of birth near the river Strimon in modern-day Bulgaria. I also look at examples of contemporary comics, including a new graphic novel based on Daga’s story published in 2020, and consider the transmutations of the hero to suit the post-communist (and anti-communist) ideological agenda, characterized by a departure from the proletarian image of Spartacus in favor of more conservative, aristocratic features. (shrink)

This paper is focused, firstly, on the status of Christianity (as a whole) after a long period of secularization—examining in particular its “protective mechanisms”— and, secondly, on the modern tendencies that are transforming the present into an age of desecularization. The central interest here is the interaction between the civil and Christian values in the context of the two historical periods. The article provides a comparison between the aggressive use of reason during the Enlightenment and postmodern religious indifferentism in an (...) attempt to illuminate the present status of Christianity. (shrink)

The present paper aims to view three ways of thinking time by Emmanuel Levinas. We distinguish existential, historical, and eschatological time demonstrating how they are connected with his central notion of responsibility toward the Other. The following analysis reorders and interprets what Levinas has said in response of Martin Heidegger’s and Hegel’s position. The text does not make any other claims but aims to offer a possible reading and exegesis of Levinas’s philosophy and open a further discussion on these topics.

The present paper aims to view three ways of thinking time by Emmanuel Levinas. We distinguish existential, historical, and eschatological time demonstrating how they are connected with his central notion of responsibility toward the Other. The following analysis reorders and interprets what Levinas has said in response of Martin Heidegger’s and Hegel’s position. The text does not make any other claims but aims to offer a possible reading and exegesis of Levinas’s philosophy and open a further discussion on these topics.

This text will comment on some of the important aspects of the connection between Eastern Orthodoxy and contemporary civilization, the historical development of which has been designated as post-modernity. Being neither modern, nor postmodern, nor anti-modern, Orthodoxy has to answer the question as to whether globalization is analogous to the “cosmic liturgy” sought by the Christian religion as a whole, or to the contrary, is moving away from it. The other basic problem of Orthodoxy – especially in what were formerly (...) designated as East European societies – is that it should be identified with nationality. To be Orthodox often means to be a Bulgarian, a Serb, a Russian, a Romanian, etc. Ethnic affiliation and Orthodox affiliation are often interchangeable. Thus, the nationalization of Orthodoxy is becoming a major problem that the Church must resolve. (shrink)

This article explores the notion of meditation and devotionalism in the Radhasoami tradition of the 19th, 20th and 21st centuries, a tradition of reform that questions and transcends traditional Hinduism in many ways. In the following, we study several texts and ritual practices of the Radhasoami tradition, in the example of the elaborate meditation called surat śabda yoga (yoga of the sound of the inner current). Our goal is to explore the complex interactions between meditation and devotion. In addition, we (...) wish to address yogic, meditative and devotional embodied practices, such as the collective meditation during the satsaṅg. (shrink)

The politicization of the intellectuals in the early 1990s now seems like a closed chapter in the history of the Eastern Bloc. Political life became more regulated before experiencing the entry of “unexpected” actors, labeled as “populists”. The academics’ political commitments, movements or believes have been interpreted as expression of “dissidence”, after 1989. The question of resistance, dissidence or opposition to the Soviet‑type socialist regimes caught the attention of many researchers. The social scientists became particularly interested in peripheral presentations and (...) written productions, as intellectual alternatives to the official line. Most of the studies insisted on the political repercussions of these actions, living little doubt on the inherent political sense they carried. Does this heritage, developed over the past three decades, shape the present relation to politics? This article aims to question the relationship that two generations of academics have with politics. Particular affiliations impacted the processes of political and academic transformations. The analysis, based on research carried out in Bulgaria, aims to shed light on the dynamics that cross the “post‑socialist” space and time. (shrink)