Search

The study focuses on the process of being aware of own I in children acquiring Slovak language at an early age and living in a Slovak family. The aim of the research is to understand the process of acquiring the means by which children refer to themselves in the interaction with an adult person. The research uses the qualitative longitudinal method of individual case study. A child’s speech is researched from the very first occurrence of a self-reference mean in 16th month up to the upper limit of early age (36th month) and all that is based on audio-visual records transcripts. The following are researched: (a) succession of self-reference means acquisition in early childhood, (b) function of self-reference linguistic means, (c) process of child’s self-awareness. The results obtained based on the linguistic data in Slovak language are compared with the results of similarly focused researches in English, French, Polish, Russian and Bulgarian language. The research reveals some constants in the development of self-reference instruments that can be observed throughout various language-cultural environments. The research is a part of solutions within the grant project VEGA 1/0099/16 Personal and Social Deixis in Slovak Language.

We have developed a new computed tomography (CT)-based 3-D volume difference reconstruction (VDR) method for building a model of soft tissue differences using facial self-referenced prototyping computation, and a computer-aided design (CAD) workflow for fabricating custom ocular prostheses (COPs). In facial self-referenced prototyping computation, an ocular prosthesis is constructed from a combination of a top surface, shape contour, and bottom surface, with key measurements being made with respect to the patient's healthy eye. The top surface is derived from the outer region of the healthy eyeball, using Hough transformation. In the meantime, the shape contour and bottom surface are computed from facial edges fitted to Fourier curves. Once these self-referenced parameters have been obtained, finite element analysis is used to generate a primitive prosthesis model. Before being converted into a format suitable for rapid prototyping techniques, the model is refined using surface equations. Oculists choose the final optimized model for printing. Geometric errors, compared with a manually-fabricated prosthesis which has gone through multiple rounds of time-consuming manual adjustment, are as low as 0.46%, and the fabrication time and human error have been greatly reduced. The fill density of the COP is 60%, the wall thickness is 1.6 mm and the weight is 1.59 g. The reconstructed contours and symmetry of the COP are satisfactory with doctors' evaluation and the patient is able to have a normal appearance. The CT-based VDR method we first proposed here can accurately build a model of the soft tissue difference. The full CAD workflow has improved prosthesis design and manufacturing efficiency. This flow can also be applied to other soft issue reconstruction.

Contributing to the debate on the multidimensional nature of resource-based conflicts in political ecology, and building upon Niklas Luhmann's Social Systems Theory, we have studied the persistent and shifting nature of conflicts as well as their dependencies on other conflicts in and around Loisaba conservancy. This private conservancy is situated in northern Laikipia (Kenya). For a long time, its management was focused on wildlife conservation, high-end tourism and commercial ranching. Developments and events at neighbouring ranches and community conservation areas shifted this focus. Decades of more or less peaceful regional co-existence has recently transformed into conflictual, sometimes even violent situations. At first sight, these emergent conflicts seem related to recurrent droughts, competing resource dependencies, national elections, or incitements by wealthy and influential politicians. For this study, however, we conceptualise conflicts as particular kinds of discourses that emerge, exist and change. This happens not only according to their own internal logics, but also through their dependencies with other conflict discourses. In this paper, we characterise the relations between conflicts on a range from tight to loose couplings and introduce three related forms of coupling (overpowering, resisting, and resonating) to provide a more detailed understanding of how conflicts may interrelate.

All living entities are cognitive and dependent on ambiguous information. Any assessment of that imprecision is necessarily a measuring function. Individual cells measure information to sustain self-referential homeostatic equipoise (self-identity) in juxtaposition to the external environment. The validity of that information is improved by its collective assessment. The reception of cellular information obliges thermodynamic reactions that initiate a self-reinforcing work channel. This expresses as natural cellular engineering and niche constructions which become the complex interrelated tissue ecologies of holobionts. Multicellularity is collaborative cellular information management directed towards the optimization of information quality through its collective measured assessment. Biology and its evolution can now be re-framed as the continuous process of self-referential cellular measurement in the perpetual defense of individual cellular self-identities through the collective form. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The aim of the present study was to determine whether the self‐enhancement effect of voice attractiveness evaluation is due to general self‐positivity bias and/or the familiarity effect. The participants were asked to rate the attractiveness of their own voice, a friend's voice and strangers' voices. In addition, a self‐reference valence (SR‐valence) task was adopted in the experiment. Significant self‐enhancement effects in voice attractiveness ratings were demonstrated, regardless of whether the participants recognized their self‐voice or not. However, the friend‐enhancement effect was found in only those participants who successfully recognized their friend's voice. Moreover, a significant correlation was found between self‐positivity bias in the SR‐valence task and the self‐enhancement effect (but not the friend‐enhancement effect). Our findings suggest that both the familiarity effect and self‐positivity bias account for the vocal self‐enhancement effect, and the influence of self‐positivity bias could be implicit. The present study thus provides empirical evidence to clarify the potential explanations for the self‐enhancement of voice attractiveness assessment. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In this paper, we strengthen Hardy's [1995] and Ketland's [2005] arguments on the issues surrounding the self-referential nature of Yablo's paradox [1993]. We first begin by observing that Priest's [1997] construction of the binary satisfaction relation in revealing a fixed point relies on impredicative definitions. We then show that Yablo's paradox is ‘ω-circular', based on ω-inconsistent theories, by arguing that the paradox is not self- referential in the classical sense but rather admits circularity at the least transfinite countable ordinal. Hence, we both strengthen arguments for the ω-inconsistency of Yablo's paradox and present a compromise solution of the problem emerging from Yablo's and Priest's conflicting theses. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This research investigated associations between the lyrics of every song to have reached the weekly U.K. Top 5 singles chart from 1960 to 2015 and the number of people responsible for recording each song. Following computerized content analysis of the lyrics of the 4,534 unique songs, the results showed that the number of musicians involved was negatively related to use of cognitive terms, consistent with previous research on social loafing, and was also negatively related to instances of self-reference and use of language concerning social interaction, arguably in reflection of the inherent constraints on such that arise from collaborating with others. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

DMT practices aiming working organisations need to address organisational culture and structure, goal setting, management and relevant issues, specific to the working environment. We propose a creative approach informed by DMT and systems theory, based on our experience of the conjunctive use of Relational Creative Processes Model and Self-Referential Conceptual System model. The article includes basic notions from the two models and a step-by-step description of a 'programme for group empowerment, training and supervision', implemented on behalf of a refugees-supporting NGO, as an example of how this synthesis can support DMT interventions in work-environments. We also comment on DMT's potential, relative to the particular challenges faced by NGO teams on the field of the refugee crisis. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The aim of the article is to rethink the way in which images convince us to adopt the perspective of another, which is the image itself. Starting from W.J.T. Mitchell's theory on the desire and subjectivity of images, and Gottfried Boehm's theory of the imagery, I look at a photographic and narrative album of Gerhard Richter and Alexander Kluge. This turns to itself for self-presentative and self-referential purposes. However, they do not aim to explore the essence of their medium, but "drag" the viewer into or out of the performance. I analyse situations in which we are forced to transfer our gaze to the materiality and objectivity of a picture, to its own existence. Such situations reinforce the effect of compassion, going far beyond literal meanings and content, which can be managed discursively. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The autobiography of a consecrated writer implicitly includes a redefinition of the complex relationships between reading and writing. The story of Agnès Desarthe, Comment j'ai appris à lire (2013) provides an unprecedented restitution and reconstitution of reading experiences, a topic that claims the identity of not liking reading. Our approach aims to identify the configurations of self-representation and self-reference, specific to a retrospective exploration approach made by the writer. The purpose of our analysis is to determine the specificity of the creation process and the conduct of the creating subject in the particular case of a paradoxical detour where writing is the necessary step in learning to read. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The article presents the authors' view of informal education, which, being free from mandatory regulations and standardizations, implemented on the principles of voluntariness and initiative, in this context, is the place most likely to respond to societal demands in a pandemic. On the basis of the scientific literature analysis the essential features of informal education (attribution to human life, natural and necessary character, self-organization, continuity) have been revealed. It is noted that in the practice of informal education, discursive self-referential identity acts as a system that distinguishes and describes itself in practice, and in this self-description reveals their meaning. The informal education is seen as a form of social practice that plays a key role in self-development of the individual, in preserving individuality and internal independence from one's culture; as an element of a coherent continuous education system with an intrinsically complex structure. The conclusion is made about the resourcefulness of information education as a practice that triggers educational motivation, the growth of human potential. In the context of a pandemic and post-pandemic, informal education practices act as a means of mobile satisfaction of educational needs, allowing for the modernization of the education system to self- referential identity. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

I put forward precise and appealing notions of reference, self-reference, and well-foundedness for sentences of the language of first-order Peano arithmetic extended with a truth predicate. These notions are intended to play a central role in the study of the reference patterns that underlie expressions leading to semantic paradox and, thus, in the construction of philosophically well-motivated semantic theories of truth. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

I apply the notions of alethic reference introduced in previous work in the construction of several classical semantic truth theories. Furthermore, I provide proof-theoretic versions of those notions and use them to formulate axiomatic disquotational truth systems over classical logic. Some of these systems are shown to be sound, proof-theoretically strong, and compare well to the most renowned systems in the literature. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Contemplative practices are thought to modify one's experience of self and fundamentally change self-referential processing. However, few studies have examined the brain correlates of self-referential processing in long-term meditators. Here, we used the self-referential encoding task (SRET) to examine event-related potentials (ERP) during assessment of pleasant and unpleasant self-views in long-term meditators versus age-matched meditation-naïve control participants. Compared with controls, meditators endorsed significantly more pleasant and fewer unpleasant words as self-referential. We also found a between-group difference in the early component of the late-positive-potential (LPP) of the ERP characterized by a larger response to unpleasant versus pleasant words in controls and no difference in meditators. A cross-sectional design, such as the one used in the present study, has certain caveats like self-selectivity bias. If such caveats did not affect our results, these findings suggest that a long-term contemplative lifestyle, of which meditation training is an integral part, alters self-referential processing towards a more adaptive view of self and neural equivalence towards pleasant and unpleasant self-views. These findings suggest that long-term meditation training may affect brain and behavioural mechanism that support a more flexible and healthy relationship to one's self. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

A reductio ad absurdum argument is used to establish that a universal computer cannot exist. The proof uses a recursive process whereby an assumed universal computer attempting to simulate itself descends into an infinite regress. Appealing to a more powerful computer to do the simulation leads to the same unavoidable conclusion. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The article analyzes the theoretical foundations that made it possible to identify patterns and explanatory principles of assertive behavior of discursive self-referential identity in the sphere of interpersonal relationships. The process of self-reference is viewed through operations: self-determination, self-recognition, self-creation, self-reproduction, and self-realization. They help to distinguish and describe identity, where discourse is a communicative field of meaning against which the process of creating discursive self-referential identity takes place. The assertive behavior is viewed in the context of life meanings, emphasizing the need to enhance the subjectivity of life, which allows to build such relationships with the outside world that promote creative growth, expanding the degree of freedom and self-development based on responsibility for their feelings, actions and relationships with others acts of social interaction. The conclusion is made about the correspondence of assertive behavior with the content of the category “discursive self-referential identity” as self-representation, constructed in the process of self-reference. Qualitative characteristics of assertive behavior of discursive self-referential identity are revealed. It is noted that assertive behavior forms a model of transparent self-referential identity, which focuses on free, autonomous, transparent self-creation and self-realization in interpersonal communications. An indicator of the model is the need to “be yourself”, which, in the context of the uncertainty and volatility of social reality, allows us to build relationships with the outside world that facilitate the self-realization of the subject. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper gives a definition of self-reference on the basis of the dependence relation given by Leitgeb (J Philos Logic 34(2):155–192, 2005), and the dependence digraph by Beringer and Schindler (Reference graphs and semantic paradox, 2015. https://www.academia.edu/19234872/Reference%5fGraphs%5fand%5fSemantic%5fParadox). Unlike the usual discussion about self-reference of paradoxes centering around Yablo's paradox and its variants, I focus on the paradoxes of finitary characteristic, which are given again by use of Leitgeb's dependence relation. They are called 'locally finite paradoxes', satisfying that any sentence in these paradoxes can depend on finitely many sentences. I prove that all locally finite paradoxes are self-referential in the sense that there is a directed cycle in their dependence digraphs. This paper also studies the 'circularity dependence' of paradoxes, which was introduced by Hsiung (Logic J IGPL 22(1):24–38, 2014). I prove that the locally finite paradoxes have circularity dependence in the sense that they are paradoxical only in the digraph containing a proper cycle. The proofs of the two results are based directly on König's infinity lemma. In contrast, this paper also shows that Yablo's paradox and its ∀ ∃ -unwinding variant are non-self-referential, and neither McGee's paradox nor the ω -cycle liar has circularity dependence. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

It has been argued recently (Beall in Spandrels of truth, Oxford University Press, Oxford, 2009; Beall and Murzi J Philos 110:143–165, 2013) that dialetheist theories are unable to express the concept of naive validity. In this paper, we will show that LP can be non-trivially expanded with a naive validity predicate. The resulting theory, LP Val reaches this goal by adopting a weak self-referential procedure. We show that LP Val is sound and complete with respect to the three-sided sequent calculus SLP Val . Moreover, LP Val can be safely expanded with a transparent truth predicate. We will also present an alternative theory LP Val ∗ , which includes a non-deterministic validity predicate. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper deals with the issue of interdisciplinarity in literature, tracing the mathematical influences -- and particularly those of the incompleteness theorems by Kurt Gödel -- on the literary works of Hans Magnus Enzensberger. Our attention is focused on Enzensberger's publications in mathematics, on his poem Hommage à Gödel, and his montage epos The Sinking of the Titanic. This paper submits a new, interdisciplinary interpretation of the poem Hommage à Gödel as a kind of art manifesto, and comes to the conclusion that the reason Enzensberger finds the incompleteness theorems so interesting is that they offer a scientific basis for undecidable problems and paradoxes. He applies Gödel's theorems to literature, where they enable a creative, playful oscillation between two positions or aspects of an undecidable problem and self-reference in literature. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Self-referential cellular homeostasis is maintained by the measured assessment of both internal status and external conditions based within an integrated cellular information field. This cellular field attachment to biologic information space-time coordinates environmental inputs by connecting the cellular senome, as the sum of the sensory experiences of the cell, with its genome and epigenome. In multicellular organisms, individual cellular information fields aggregate into a collective information architectural matrix, termed a N -space Episenome, that enables mutualized organism-wide information management. It is hypothesized that biological organization represents a dual heritable system constituted by both its biological materiality and a conjoining N -space Episenome. It is further proposed that morphogenesis derives from reciprocations between these inter-related facets to yield coordinated multicellular growth and development. The N -space Episenome is conceived as a whole cell informational projection that is heritable, transferable via cell division and essential for the synchronous integration of the diverse self-referential cells that constitute holobionts. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The article covers the problem of defining self-reference and socio-temporal homeostasis as factors in maintaining information security in the European societies. Absence of adjusters of sociocultural components of the society integrity represented by elite groups and deficiency of value-based consciousness may result in the impaired information security due to "information draughts" and "information leaks". In view of this, it outlines the main ways for development of counteractions to cultural and information wars as one of the important areas of social work at the current historical stage of genesis of the society. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This article analyses literary proteanism in Ramon Vinyes’ narrative and particularly in his short story “El llac d’Atitlán”. In this tale Ramon Vinyes turns into fiction his reflections about literary dynamism and the interconnection between literary systems. Literature facilitates knowledge transfer throughout epochs and cultures. Besides, the literary text is the result of various metamorphoses in which individuality and cultural hegemony play an outstanding role. “El llac d’Atitlán” fictionalises through the imagination of a Guatemalan poet the transfer of Renaissance philosophy in Latin America and its corruption under the influence of North American culture. Intertextuality and self-reference are the mechanisms to reshape knowledge. Literary proteanism becomes apparent through semantic and narratological transformation. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper is a continuation of [Łukowski, 2019], where it is shown that just like sets, sentences can also be understood in two ways: distributively or collectively. A distributive understanding of sets leads to the Russell antinomy, and a distributive understanding of sentences to liar antinomy. A collective understanding of sets frees up the set theory from Russell's antinomy. Taking a similar approach to sentences no liar like paradoxes appear. The aim of the paper is to examine Yablo's problem from this collective perspective. Given its nature, by using the content implication connective it becomes possible to assign logical values to all Yablo's sentences. Moreover, it seems that Yablo's problem is not a case of circularity. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The existence of solutions of a functional integro-differential equation with self-reference and state-dependence will be studied. The continuous dependence of the solution on the delay ...(t), the functional g and initial data x0 will be proved. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The paper analyzes Ross's theses about three kinds of logical indeterminacy which affect the law understood as a set of norms. First, the logical status of logically derived norms in the light of some undesirable consequences which follow from the application of deductive rules of inference to the normative domain (socalled Ross's paradox). Second, the indeterminacy of negation when applied to normative conditionals. Finally, the paper deals with the puzzle stemming from the application, to the rule on constitutional amendment, of the procedure that the same rule provides. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

• Recursive formal systems, Turing machines and Cellular Automata are deeply related. • These frameworks can produce universal computation and generate undecidable dynamics. • Undecidability is generated by self-reference, infinite computation and negation. • Computational novelty can be created by agents using the diagonalization argument. • Complex systems are dynamical systems with undecidable or unprestatable dynamics. In this paper we explore several fundamental relations between formal systems, algorithms, and dynamical systems, focussing on the roles of undecidability, universality, diagonalization, and self-reference in each of these computational frameworks. Some of these interconnections are well-known, while some are clarified in this study as a result of a fine-grained comparison between recursive formal systems, Turing machines, and Cellular Automata (CAs). In particular, we elaborate on the diagonalization argument applied to distributed computation carried out by CAs, illustrating the key elements of Gödel's proof for CAs. The comparative analysis emphasizes three factors which underlie the capacity to generate undecidable dynamics within the examined computational frameworks: (i) the program-data duality; (ii) the potential to access an infinite computational medium; and (iii) the ability to implement negation. The considered adaptations of Gödel's proof distinguish between computational universality and undecidability, and show how the diagonalization argument exploits, on several levels, the self-referential basis of undecidability. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

By articulating a pragmatic approach of the labor market intermediaries with a systemic approach of the interactions at the State's counters, the authors study the follow-up and accompaniment procedure of jobseekers in Belgium, within three public employment services. This procedure appears today as the most successful realization of a reform process, within the employment policies, that is still in progress since the middle of the 1990, under the influence of the European institutions (the European employment strategy). The authors analyze the role of the National Employment Office's facilitators, the agents who are in charge of the jobseekers' following-up procedure, that is the control of their effort to find a job. They also focus on the role of the employment counselors of two regional public services by showing that the employability – the official target of the activation policies – operate as a way to speak abstractly of employment and unemployment, as a way to sustain and to intensify the communication at the State's counters. The action of the labor market intermediaries, qualified by the authors as a moral enterprise, can be characterized by its self-referential nature: to socialize the job seekers, to make them sensitive to the norms and standards of employability that are at stake in the three public employment services. According to the authors, the 'labor market' acts as a fiction: a simplified reconstruction of the world of work, within the political system, that serve as a readily available reference for the public action of intermediation. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper explores the connection between the natural language and a formal language from a particular point of view: self-referential constructions. Such constructions lead to some kind of limits of thought, either in the form of paradoxical constructions (Liar-type or Grellingtype), or in the form of the so called limitative theorems in mathematical logic (e.g. Gödel's theorem). By deriving Gödel's significant results from paradoxical constructions the limitative character of such self-referential constructions is preserved, but they open the ways for a new representation of a great variety of arguments in the field of logic, mathematics and philosophy. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

We investigated whether the strategy of self-reference can benefit memory for multi-element events, a kind of relational memory that is relatively less studied but highly relevant to daily life. Young and older adults imagined different person-object-location events with reference to themselves and two famous others (i.e., George Clooney and Oprah Winfrey), rated the likelihood that each event would happen, and then completed incidental memory tests on different pairs of elements within the event. We found that self-reference enhanced memory for object-location and person-object pairs in both age groups. Such self-reference effects were observed consistently only for events rated as likely to happen. There was also an overall memory advantage for the higher-likelihood events, which did not differ between young and older adults. Further, the self-reference effects were not correlated with memory functioning in either age group. Retrieval of within-event associations showed a significant level of dependency, which did not differ as a function of reference condition or likelihood category. These findings highlight the ways in which self-reference and prior knowledge improve relational memory, and suggest that the advantage of self-reference is not attributable to increased dependence of elements within complex events. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In this follow-up study, self-referential videos of success and failure were used for mood provocation to investigate mood, neural, and endocrine activity among 26 internationally competitive athletes using functional Magnetic Resonance Imaging (fMRI) and salivary hormone measures. The initial sample of 14 athletes who had experienced career-threatening failure was contrasted to 12 athletes with exceptional success. Endocrine data were added to the preliminary report to round out a psychoneuroendocrinology perspective on success and failure. On-line and prepost mood ratings confirmed successful mood provocation. fMRI BOLD signals revealed significantly greater activation in right premotor cortex and left sensorimotor cortices following self-reference video for successful athletes than (previously reported) failed athletes. Percentage gains in the ratio of testosterone to cortisol from Time 1 to Time 2 among success athletes positively correlated with right premotor cortex BOLD activity. Overall, the results suggest that affect associated with self-reference corresponds to an integrated neural and endocrine response to competitive challenge. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

An ultrasensitive nanosculptured thin film (nSTF) based self-referenced SERS sensing platform for the detection of melamine in milk samples is developed. The self-referenced SERS platform consists of a monolayer of 4-aminothiophenol (4-ATP), sandwiched between Ag nSTF and Ag nanoislands (NIs), deposited over a Si substrate. The SERS signal from the sandwiched 4-ATP monolayer acts as a self-referenced signal. The self-referenced platform offers the advantage of independence of Raman signal on the laser power, integration time of the detector of the spectrometer, or ambient conditions. The dynamic range of the sensor, mostly limited by the limits on laser power and integration time of spectrometer, can now be extended due to the independence of the sensor from these two parameters. A significant enhancement in the Raman signal of rhodamine 6G of the order of 1013 is achieved for the SERS active substrate. The self-referenced SERS sensor offers a linear response over the extended dynamic range from 0.001 to 10 ppm for melamine in spiked milk samples. The achieved limit of detection for melamine in spiked milk samples is 1 ppb. The self-referenced sensor will be of great value for real-time detection of melamine in milk samples, and food safety. • A self-referenced SERS sensor (Si/NIs/4-ATP/nSTF) with extended dynamic range has been developed. • Self-referenced SERS platform offers the advantages of laser power- and integration time- independent detection of melamine. • An enhancement factor of the order of 1013 has been estimated for R6G. • The limit of detection for melamine in spiked milk has been achieved to be 1 ppb. • An extended dynamic range from 0.001 to 10 ppm of melamine in spiked milk samples has been achieved. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Neo-Darwinism presumes that biological variation is a product of random genetic replication errors and natural selection. Cognition-Based Evolution (CBE) asserts a comprehensive alternative approach to phenotypic variation and the generation of biological novelty. In CBE, evolutionary variation is the product of natural cellular engineering that permits purposive genetic adjustments as cellular problem-solving. CBE upholds that the cornerstone of biology is the intelligent measuring cell. Since all biological information that is available to cells is ambiguous, multicellularity arises from the cellular requirement to maximize the validity of available environmental information. This is best accomplished through collective measurement purposed towards maintaining and optimizing individual cellular states of homeorhesis as dynamic flux that sustains cellular equipoise. The collective action of the multicellular measurement and assessment of information and its collaborative communication is natural cellular engineering. Its yield is linked cellular ecologies and mutualized niche constructions that comprise biofilms and holobionts. In this context, biological variation is the product of collective differential assessment of ambiguous environmental cues by networking intelligent cells. Such concerted action is enabled by non-random natural genomic editing in response to epigenetic impacts and environmental stresses. Random genetic activity can be either constrained or deployed as a ‘harnessing of stochasticity’. Therefore, genes are cellular tools. Selection filters cellular solutions to environmental stresses to assure continuous cellular-organismal-environmental complementarity. Since all multicellular eukaryotes are holobionts as vast assemblages of participants of each of the three cellular domains (Prokaryota, Archaea, Eukaryota) and the virome, multicellular variation is necessarily a product of co-engineering among them.

Usually associated with notions such as deviation, relevance, or salience, the trope is often described as simultaneously singular and ordinary. In order to invalidate this paradox, our contribution further analyzes the operations which enable the emergence of trope. We propose to replace the notion of deviation with a multi-levelled interface formalization which makes it possible to describe the tropical process in such a way that it can be intergrated in a modeling of the semiosis. The theoretical basis of the model is the concept of epilinguistic subjectivity, of which we propose a dynamic and retroactive conceptualization correlated to a formalization.

In lieu of an abstract, here is a brief excerpt of the content: "Étymologiquement, pour autant que je sache, la notion première de réflexion est la notion physique ; une vitre, par exemple, réfléchit les rayons du soleil. La physique étudie cela, comme elle étudie la trajectoire mécanique d’une boule de billard qui sert ici de modèle. Quel rapport entre cette réflexion (la réflexion optique) et celle qui nous importe à nous, philosophes ? Je pense que le lien est fourni par un type particulier de réflexion optique, à savoir la réflexion spéculaire. Les miroirs réfléchissent la lumière, et quand ils le font, le miroir renvoie à l’observateur l’image symétrique inversée de ce qui se trouve devant le miroir (typiquement l’observateur lui-même). Je regarde dans le miroir, et je me vois ! Dans le phénomène spéculaire, nous trouvons ce qui est au cœur de la ou des notion(s) non plus physique(s) mais mentale(s) de réflexion : la notion philosophique, et aussi la notion ordinaire (comme lorsqu’on dit de quelqu’un qu’il réfléchit, ou lorsqu’on propose des réflexions sur un sujet donné). Ce qui caractérise la réflexion mentale, sous toutes ses formes, est quelque chose que l’on retrouve aussi dans la réflexion spéculaire et qui fait que celle-ci sert souvent de modèle pour la réflexion mentale : c’est la réflexivité."

Una percepción bastante pesimista de la situación que atraviesa actualmente la teología obliga a reflexionar sobre los motivos que afectan a su pérdida de relevancia, como una condición previa que permita dilucidar posibles estrategias de futuro. Se propone, en un segundo momento, asumir una actitud más falibilista y abierta a la corrección; una orientación empírica e interdisciplinar; y asumir un modelo más evolucionista. Por último, se plantean grandes retos que determinan las posibilidades de futuro de la teología: que contribuya a frenar la marea secularizadora; que acompañe la búsqueda espiritual; que se adecue a la mentalidad científica; y que recupere su capacidad veritativa y normativa dentro de la Iglesia. La propuesta de futuro debe partir de una revisión de las limitaciones que se observan en el momento actual. Abstract: A rather pessimistic perception of the current situation that afflicts theology invites us to reflect on the reasons for its loss of relevance, as a precondition for elucidating possible future strategies. It is proposed, in a second moment, to assume a more fallibilist attitude and open to correction; an empirical and interdisciplinary orientation; and to assume a more evolutionary stance. Finally, big challenges need to be addressed for a theology with some future: that it contributes to curb the secularizing tide; that it might accompanie the spiritual search; that it might suit in the scientific mentality; and that it recovers its veritative and normative capacity within the Church. Any proposal for the future must start from a review of the limitations observed at the present time.

Autism spectrum disorder (ASD) is characterized by a fundamental change in self-awareness including seemingly paradoxical features like increased ego-centeredness and weakened self-referentiality. What is the neural basis of this so-called “self-paradox”? Conducting a meta-analytic review of fMRI rest and task studies, we show that ASD exhibits consistent hypofunction in anterior and posterior midline regions of the default-mode network (DMN) in both rest and task with decreased self–non-self differentiation. Relying on a multilayered nested hierarchical model of self, as recently established (Qin et al. 2020), we propose that ASD subjects cannot access the most upper layer of their self, the DMN-based mental self—they are locked-out of their own DMN and its mental self. This, in turn, results in strong weakening of their self-referentiality with decreases in both self-awareness and self–other distinction. Moreover, this blocks the extension of non-DMN cortical and subcortical regions at the lower layers of the physical self to the DMN-based upper layer of the mental self, including self–other distinction. The ASD subjects remain stuck and restricted to their intero- and exteroceptive selves as manifested in a relative increase in ego-centeredness (as compared to self-referentiality). This amounts to what we describe as “Hierarchical Model of Autistic Self” (HAS), which, characterizing the autistic self in hierarchical and spatiotemporal terms, aligns well with and extends current theories of ASD including predictive coding and weak central coherence.

In this paper, we provide a fairly general self-reference-free proof of the second incompleteness theorem from Tarski's theorem on the undefinability of truth. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

When axiomatizing a body of truths, one first concentrates on obtaining a set of axioms that entail all and only those truths. The theorist expects that this complete system will have some needlessly strong axioms that can later be weakened or even deleted. What happens if the theorist includes in his system recognition of this superfluity? Contradiction! Even admitting the possibility of superfluity dashes all hope of consistency. Any suspicion of superfluous information must be voiced from outside the system. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]