scholarly journals Closure of Earth’s Biosphere: Evolution and Current State

2019 ◽  
pp. 337-347
Author(s):  
Sergey I. Bartsev ◽  
Andrey G. Degermendzhi ◽  
Antonina B. Sarangova
Keyword(s):  
Trophic Levels ◽  
Geological Time ◽  
Theory Of Evolution ◽  
Current State ◽  
Time Period ◽  
Trophic Network ◽  
Material Cycling ◽  
Living Organisms ◽  
The One ◽  
Biosphere Evolution

The existence of the biosphere is determined by the presence of a constant circulation of substances, carried out by a highly branched trophic network of mainly closed material loops. How this largely self-contained system formed remains unclear. The theory of evolution cannot help answer this question since the closure of the biosphere is not an adaptive trait of an individual – this is the essence of the Vernadsky-Darwin paradox. The present paper discusses stages of the formation of the biosphere in the context of closure – a key property and parameter of the biosphere – and possible approaches to resolving the paradox. The authors assume that the appearance of the first living organisms did not mean the appearance of the biosphere as a system of interacting components. The formation of the biosphere in the true sense of the word was associated with the appearance of predation approximately 500 million years ago and the emergence of a highly branched trophic network. The authors obtain simple estimates showing that, on the one hand, living organisms are potentially capable of changing their environment at the global level in a negligible geological time period but, on the other hand, are capable of maintaining an accurate balance of global material cycling for several tens of thousands of years. A simple model was used to show the effect of stoichiometric constraints on the formation of closed material flow in simple ecosystems and to demonstrate the need for increased diversity at trophic levels to overcome these stoichiometric constraints

“Every Act of Preservation is an Act of Creation”: Paul Schrader’s Eco-theology in First Reformed

2020 ◽  
pp. 171-188
Author(s):  
Tatiana Prorokova
Keyword(s):  
Climate Change ◽  
Global Warming ◽  
The Other ◽  
Complex Relationship ◽  
Health Issues ◽  
Current State ◽  
Other Hand ◽  
Living Organisms ◽  
The One

This chapter scrutinizes the complex relationship between climate change and theology, as represented in First Reformed, as well as Paul Schrader’s understanding of humanity’s major problems today. Analyzing the issue of ecological decline through the prism of religion, Schrader outlines the ideology that presumably might help humanity survive at the age of global warming. Through the complex discussions of such issues as despair, anxiety, and hope, Schrader deduces the formula of survival in which preservation is the key component. Equating humans to God, Schrader, on the one hand, censures those actions that led to progress but destroyed the environment, yet, on the other hand, he foregrounds the fact that humans can also save the planet now. Schrader portrays both humans and Earth as living organisms created by God. He draws explicit parallels between the current state of our planet and the problems that we experience – from political ones, including war, to more personal ones like health issues.

The Development of Agritourism in the Podkarpackie Voivodeship in the Light of International and National Conditions

2017 ◽  
Vol 13 ◽  
pp. 244-261
Author(s):  
Mariola Tracz ◽  
Małgorzata Bajgier-Kowalska ◽  
Radosław Uliszak
Keyword(s):  
Development Strategy ◽  
Current State ◽  
Central Statistical ◽  
Central Statistical Office ◽  
Tourism Resources ◽  
The One ◽  
The Impact ◽  
District Offices ◽  
Socio Economic Factors

Podkarpackie Voivodeship is one of the regions of Poland in which the number of agritourism entities is very high. Therefore tourism plays a significant role in its development strategy. The aim of the paper is to identify the current state of agritourism and the changes that have occurred in the region in the years 2000–2016. Specific objectives are to determine the distribution of agritourism farms and their offer, together with a comprehensive analysis of the environmental and socio-economic factors, as well as the impact of the Slovak-Ukrainian border. The report was developed on the statistical materials from the Polish Central Statistical Office, Podkarpackie Agricultural Advisory Centre in Boguchwała and data collected from municipalities and district offices that is published on their websites, as well as through interviews with 100 owners of agritourism farms in the Podkarpackie Voivodeship. The research has shown, on the one hand, the decline in the number of farms in the region and, on the other hand, the increase in the diversity of the tourist offer of these entities. Distribution of agritourism farms is closely linked to the attractiveness of natural environment and quality of secondary tourism resources. Traditional agritourism has not yet fully used its countryside, as well as cross-border advantages of its location.

From many to one: Meditation and the plasticity of the predictive mind

2020 ◽  
Author(s):  
Ruben Laukkonen ◽  
Heleen A Slagter
Keyword(s):  
Cognitive Enhancement ◽  
The Self ◽  
Predictive Processing ◽  
Focused Attention ◽  
Conceptual Processing ◽  
Current State ◽  
Contemplative Science ◽  
Open Monitoring ◽  
Living Organisms ◽  
The Brain

How profoundly can humans change their own minds? In this paper we offer a unifying account of meditation under the predictive processing view of living organisms. We start from relatively simple axioms. First, the brain is an organ that serves to predict based on past experience, both phylogenetic and ontogenetic. Second, meditation serves to bring one closer to the here and now by disengaging from anticipatory processes. We propose that practicing meditation therefore gradually reduces predictive processing, in particular counterfactual cognition—the tendency to construct abstract and temporally deep representations—until all conceptual processing falls away. Our Many- to-One account also places three main styles of meditation (focused attention, open monitoring, and non-dual meditation) on a single continuum, where each technique progressively relinquishes increasingly engrained habits of prediction, including the self. This deconstruction can also make the above processes available to introspection, permitting certain insights into one’s mind. Our review suggests that our framework is consistent with the current state of empirical and (neuro)phenomenological evidence in contemplative science, and is ultimately illuminating about the plasticity of the predictive mind. It also serves to highlight that contemplative science can fruitfully go beyond cognitive enhancement, attention, and emotion regulation, to its more traditional goal of removing past conditioning and creating conditions for potentially profound insights. Experimental rigor, neurophenomenology, and no-report paradigms combined with neuroimaging are needed to further our understanding of how different styles of meditation affect predictive processing and the self, and the plasticity of the predictive mind more generally.

Summary of the current state of the pathogenesis of glaucoma

1927 ◽  
Vol 23 (8) ◽  
pp. 839-845
Author(s):  
V. P. Roshchin
Keyword(s):  
Single Case ◽  
Disease Process ◽  
The Other ◽  
Medical Attention ◽  
Blind People ◽  
Current State ◽  
Constant State ◽  
The One

The problem of glaucoma has, for many reasons, occupied and continues to occupy a prominent place in the ophthalmic press. It is enough to recall that 19% of all blind people owe their misfortune to glaucoma to understand why interest in this affliction has never faded among ophthalmologists. Furthermore, no ophthalmologist is quite sure that a certain method of treatment, even if the patient has timely applied for medical attention, can definitely prevent a sad outcome in every single case. This plus the absence of a unified and correct view of the essence of glaucoma keeps ophthalmologists in a constant state of flux, constantly striving to uncover the hidden springs of the disease process on the one hand, and to find a more radical means to combat it on the other.

Jan Hardy versus Likwidator. Comics als Medien der gesellschaftlichen Spaltung Polens

2021 ◽  
Vol 2021 (1) ◽  
pp. 43-62
Author(s):  
Agnieska Balcerzak
Keyword(s):  
Second World War ◽  
Culture War ◽  
Current State ◽  
Memory Culture ◽  
History Of ◽  
Projection Surface ◽  
The Republic ◽  
Political Spectrum ◽  
The One ◽  
Second World

This article at the intersection of cultural studies of popular and memory culture deals with the genre of comics as an identity-forming (protest) medium and projection surface for the ideologised “culture war” between traditionalists and modernists in contemporary Poland. The analysis focuses on two historical comics that combine facts and imaginary and refer back to the Second World War, the communist period and the recent history of the Republic of Poland after 1989. The article juxtaposes two title heroes and their comic worlds, which represent opposite ends of the political spectrum and reveal the problem areas of Poland’s dividedness along the underlying canon of values and symbolic worlds: Jan Hardy, the national-conservative “cursed soldier”, and Likwidator, the relentless “anarcho-terrorist”. The characters and their adventures exemplify fundamental memory cultural, religious, nationalist and emancipatory discourses in Poland today. The focus of the analysis lies on the creation context and the (visual) language with its narrative-aesthetic intensifications, which illuminate Poland’s current state of conflict between national egoism and traditional “cultural patriotism” on the one hand and liberal value relativism with its progressive-emancipatory rhetoric on the other.

Ewolucja. Twórcza moc selekcji

2021 ◽  
Author(s):  
Jerzy Dzik
Keyword(s):  
Developmental Biology ◽  
Natural Selection ◽  
Cultural Evolution ◽  
Political Institutions ◽  
Social Life ◽  
Evolutionary Developmental Biology ◽  
Homeotic Genes ◽  
Time Dimension ◽  
Geological Time ◽  
Theory Of Evolution

An instructive introduction to the theory of evolution and its applications in biology, physics, chemistry, geology and humanities. The author shows that evolution is a physical process, occurring in geological time dimension, describes how the Darwin’s theory of natural selection works in immunology, neurobiology, sociology as well as in certain aspects of culture and political institutions. He also shows the effects achieved through the action of selection in different areas of biological and social life. He discusses such problems as: the ambiguity of the term “theory of evolution”, the falsifiability of evolutionary hypotheses, connection between evolution and thermodynamics, the concept of reductionism, methodological background of phylogenetics, cladistics, evolutionary developmental biology and homeotic genes, as well as the cumulative nature of social and cultural evolution.

scholarly journals The General Characteristics of Extremism and Analysis of the Current State of the Fight Against Extremist Crimes

Legal Concept ◽  
2020 ◽  
pp. 13-20
Author(s):  
Svyatoslav Biryukov ◽  
Mikhail Bobovkin ◽  
Mikhail Shmatov
Keyword(s):  
The State ◽  
Law Students ◽  
Teaching Staff ◽  
General Description ◽  
Public Response ◽  
The Public ◽  
Current State ◽  
Quality Of Protection ◽  
Natural Tendency ◽  
The One

Introduction: the Constitution of the Russian Federation and other Federal laws in this country guarantee the protection of the population against crimes, including criminal attacks of extremist orientation. However, recently there has been a steady trend towards an increase in the number of committed crimes of extremist orientation, which determines the need to improve the quality of protection of individual rights, and along with them, the constitutional framework of the state, since demonstratively committed extremist crimes cause a great public response and contribute to the undermining of state power. The crime statistics show a significant increase in the number of extremist crimes; there is a natural tendency to spread the ideas of extremism among the population. Unfortunately, only some of the extremist crimes are counted as such in the official statistics. The crimes of this category are often registered without taking into account the qualifying feature – the motive of national, racial, religious hatred or enmity, and, as a result, are not considered in the group of crimes of extremism. Another reason for not fully accounting for these crimes is their latency: not all victims of such criminal actions declare this for various objective and subjective reasons. The public danger of crimes of the group in question is due, on the one hand, as usual, to their group character, and on the other hand, such illegal actions incite interethnic and other hatred, which is very harmful in the context of the efforts being made to build a civil society. Currently, the legislative bodies do not clearly pay enough attention to the organization of counteraction to extremism as an anti-social phenomenon. For example, over the past ten years, the problems of countering extremism have been resolved through the adoption of only four normative legal acts of a national nature. In this regard, the authors aim to give a general description of such a phenomenon as extremism and the state of the fight against such crimes. Methods: the methodological framework for this research is a set of methods of scientific knowledge, among which the main ones are the methods of information processing and logical analysis, synthesis, induction, deduction and generalization. Results: the authors’ content of the general characteristics of extremism and analysis of the current state of the fight against crimes of extremist orientation actualizes the problem of the need to improve the state of the theoretical base, prepare recommendations based on it, which would contribute to improving the efficiency of the state authorized bodies in the fight against various manifestations of extremism, and primarily in order to solve and investigate crimes of extremist orientation. Conclusions: the study has given the general characteristics of extremism and the analysis of the current state of the fight against extremist crimes in order to inform law students, and the teaching staff of law schools and practitioners to better understand the characteristics and dangers of this phenomenon.

scholarly journals Face Mask Use Conditionally Decreases Compliance With Physical Distancing Rules Against COVID-19: Gender Differences in Risk Compensation Pattern

2021 ◽  
Author(s):  
Martin Aranguren
Keyword(s):  
Social Status ◽  
Face Mask ◽  
Risk Compensation ◽  
High Status ◽  
Compensatory Behavior ◽  
Traffic Lights ◽  
Time Period ◽  
The Face ◽  
The One ◽  
Lower Adherence

Abstract Background In the context of the COVID-19 emergency, the concern has been raised that people may compensate the reduction in risk ensured by mask use with an increase in risk induced by lower adherence to physical distancing rules. Purpose The paper investigates if people compensate risk in this manner when their interaction partner wears a face mask, examining if risk compensation further depends on gender, signaled social status and perceived race. Methods An experiment was conducted in two waves (June, n = 1396 and September 2020, n = 1326) in front of the traffic lights of four busy roads in Paris. A confederate asked a randomly selected pedestrian for directions following a script and keeping the recommended distance. Confederates were locally recognizable as Blacks or Whites and alternatively presented themselves with a costume indicative of high or low social status. An observer recorded whether the pedestrian kept the recommended distance. Results Both in June and September, men are less likely to comply with the distancing rule when the confederate wears the face mask, and particularly so when the confederate signals high status. When the confederate wears the mask, female pedestrians observe less the one-meter rule in September than in June. Conclusions Men’s risk compensatory behavior is constant over time. In contrast, women’s depends on the time period.

scholarly journals Inscriptiones Graecae Between Present and Future

Axon ◽  
2019 ◽  
Author(s):  
Peter Funke
Keyword(s):  
The Other ◽  
Future Perspectives ◽  
Workshop Report ◽  
Current State ◽  
Other Hand ◽  
Geographic Regions ◽  
The One

In the first part of my ‘workshop report’, I will provide information about the current state of the epigraphical editions of the Inscriptiones Graecae. Subsequently, I will focus on the plans for the upcoming years. In this context, questions pertaining to epigraphic research in new geographic regions, on the one hand, and the revision of past editions, on the other hand, are paramount. In the second part of my report, I will outline the current state and future perspectives of the digitisation of the IG.

scholarly journals Using models of energy consumption from influencing factors to assess the current state and energy efficiency forecasting

2020 ◽  
Vol 220 ◽  
pp. 01024
Author(s):  
Deniz Moroz ◽  
Nadzeya Hruntovich ◽  
Aliaksei Kapanski ◽  
Yauhen Shenets ◽  
Mikhail Malashanka ◽  
...  
Keyword(s):  
Energy Efficiency ◽  
Influencing Factors ◽  
Factor Model ◽  
Energy Resource ◽  
Energy Resources ◽  
Simple Relationship ◽  
Production Program ◽  
Current State ◽  
The One ◽  
The Mathematical Model

A complex of tasks that can be solved using mathematical models of the dependence of consumed energy resources on influencing factors are considered in the article. The main type of model for industrial consumers with a simple relationship between energy and technology, is the one-factor model “consumed energy resource-volume of output”. For industrial consumers with a complex relationship between energy and technology, the mathematical model of the dependence of energy resources on technology is determined by several factors. Methods for assessing the current state of energy efficiency, as well as predicting it for the future in the context of the introduction of energy saving measures and changes in the production program were proposed.

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