1,721,146 research outputs found
L'origine e il fondamento del tutto in Plotino. Il Principio primo come Identità assoluta The origin and the foundation of everything in Plotinus. The first principle as absolute identity
No full textThis paper aims to consider the nature of the first Principle - One Good and first God contemporaneously - in Plotinus' Neoplatonic perspective. It is regarded as archè (ton) panton, which means the Principle of all things. It is therefore not any one of all things, as it comes before everything: indeed, it is haploustaton, meaning «absolutely simple». This is the reason why archè cannot be positively described by way of cataphatic language, but only, so to speak, via remotionis, which means in an apophatic way: we cannot say what the first Principle is, but we can say what it is not. Although removed from every kind of determination, the Principle, as the very basis of the identity between Being and Intellect in the intelligible world, has a feature which is inherent in its own nature: the first Principle is the source and origin of the identity between being and thought in the intelligible reality whilst also being absolute Identity, meaning identity beyond every kind of relation and determination. The ascent itself to the One Good, which transcends both knowledge and thought, occurs via a sort of identification and fusion with it. The longing to reach the absolute Identity of the Principle arises from a need coming from the thought itself, in its own search for an authentic and ultimate foundation of all reality. Starting with Plotinus, in Western philosophical tradition the absolute Identity is regarded as being closely related with the nature of the Absolute, principle of all things, beyond every ontological determination and delimitation
The occurrence of paraffin and other petroleum waxes in the marine environment: A review of the current legislative framework and shipping operational practices
No full textAmong the various materials that make up marine debris, lumps of petroleum waxes such as paraffin and microcrystalline wax, are regularly found on beaches worldwide, although not included in the current definition of marine litter. Ingestion by marine organisms is occasionally documented in the scientific literature and mass beaching events are frequently reported along the European coasts, with obvious detrimental consequences to the local communities that have to manage the clean-up and disposal of this substance. According to Annex II of the MARPOL regulation, petroleum waxes are classified as "high viscosity, solidifying, and persistent floating products," whose discharge at sea of tank-washing residues is strictly regulated, but currently permitted within certain limits. Starting from the description of a large stranding event occurred along the Italian coasts in 2017, we review the existing knowledge and regulatory framework and urge the relevant authorities to address this issue, showing that wax pollution is creating evident damages to the European coastal municipalities. Pending further investigations on the potential hazard that this kind of pollution is posing to marine ecosystems, we suggest a careful and more stringent revision of the policies regulating discharges of these products at sea. © 2018 Suaria, Aliani, Merlino and Abbate
Marine litter detection and correlation with the seabird nest content
No full textA 3 year monitoring programme, realized in a citizen science context, from 2014 until 2016, allowed us to gather information on the prevalent quantities and qualities of anthropogenic waste in five Mediterranean coastal areas within the Pelagos Sanctuary, three of them located in Liguria, near La Spezia Gulf, and the other two in Tuscany. Here, we present results concerning the Polymeric Articles’ abundances registered during the survey. Moreover, we show the results of the first study devoted to describe and quantify the anthropogenic content of the nest of a pair of Northern Gannets (Morus bassanus), a pelagic bird that, starting from some years, has been reproducing regularly in La Spezia Gulf. This breeding is atypical for this species, as is associated with artificial structures such as piers, floating docks, or boats; the material used in the construction of the nest reflects the “anthropogenic” link with the chosen location and objects of polymeric origin in particular abound. We detect the existence of a correlation between the most abundant types of Anthropogenic Marine Debris found in the Northern Gannet’ nest (fragments of polypropylene nets) and one of the productive activities of the zones. © 2018, Accademia Nazionale dei Lincei
Feeling the pulse of public perception of science: Does research make our hearts beat faster?
No full textIn 2007 the Italian Ministry of Education identified the need of raising a new Humanism: students must receive adequate tools for knowledge, but must also understand and be able to handle the increasingly frequent transitions and changes they have to face as citizens and individuals. Orientation during the developmental phase must, hence, allow students to acquire all those key and context-independent competences, necessary for self-assessment of natural attitudes. Nevertheless, the label 'new Humanism', should not be the first step for giving even less importance to scientific education: there is no need to enhance the existing general lack of interest affecting Science, Technology, Engineering, and Mathematics (STEM) disciplines and literature; moreover, the social importance of scientific and technological research can't remain undervalued. All these issues are a matter of concern for the European Community and, in fact, the last European Directives concerning education and social development, are trying to redirect and enforce educational programmes towards a 'knowledge-based society and economy' that will support the societal challenges of the 21st century and the growing demand of scientific expertise in all sectors (necessary for boosting European economic development). The most interesting strategies for implementing these directives are all those activities that see a wide partnership of schools with public institutions, enterprises and research centres (e.g. science festivals, competitions and internships for high school students). Recent studies, and the same recommendations of the European Community, have also shown that these activities, when included since the earliest years of primary schools, have a deeper impact in the long term as they match with the evolutive period in which intrinsic motivation is strongly present. This study is, hence, aimed to build an instrument able for understanding if all these kind of activities are effective in increasing: (1) appreciation and interest towards scientific research and (2) number of young people considering a STEM career as a possible perspective for their future (the question is: 'does Science make our hearts beat faster?'). © 2015 IEEE
Going Beyond Counting First Authors in Author Co-citation Analysis
Full text linkThe present study examines one of the fundamental aspects of author co-citation analysis (ACA) - the way co-citation
counts are defined. Co-citation counting provides the data on which all subsequent statistical analyses and mappings
are based, and we compare ACA results based on two different types of co-citation counting - the traditional type that
only counts the first one among a cited work's authors on the one hand and a non-traditional type that takes into
account the first 5 authors of a cited work on the other hand. Results indicate that the picture produced through this non-traditional author co-citation counting contains more coherent author groups and is therefore considerably clearer. However, this picture represents fewer specialties in the research field being studied than that produced through the traditional first-author co-citation counting when the same number of top-ranked authors is selected and analyzed. Reasons for these effects are discussed
Variations on the Author
Full text link“Variations on the Author” discusses two of Eduardo Coutinho’s recent films (Um Dia na Vida, from 2010, and Últimas Conversas, posthumously released in 2015) and their contribution to the general question of documentary authorship. The director’s filmography is characterized by a consistent yet self-effacing form of authorial self-inscription: Coutinho often features as an interviewer that rather than express opinions propels discourses; an interviewer that is good at listening. This mode of self-inscription characterizes him as an author who is not expressive but who is nonetheless markedly present on the screen. In Um Dia na Vida, however, Coutinho is completely absent form the image, while Últimas Conversas, on the contrary, includes a confessional prologue that moves the director from the margins to the center of his films. This article examines the ways in which these works stand out in the filmography of a director who offers new insights into the notion of cinematic authorship
Appropriate Similarity Measures for Author Cocitation Analysis
Full text linkWe provide a number of new insights into the methodological discussion about author cocitation analysis. We first argue that the use of the Pearson correlation for measuring the similarity between authors’ cocitation profiles is not very satisfactory. We then discuss what kind of similarity measures may be used as an alternative to the Pearson correlation. We consider three similarity measures in particular. One is the well-known cosine. The other two similarity measures have not been used before in the bibliometric literature. Finally, we show by means of an example that our findings have a high practical relevance.information science;Pearson correlation;cosine;similarity measure;author cocitation analysis
Dispelling the Myths Behind First-author Citation Counts
Full text linkWe conducted a full-scale evaluative citation analysis study of scholars in the XML research field to explore just how different from each other author rankings resulting from different citation counting methods actually are, and to demonstrate the capability of emerging data and tools on the Web in supporting more realistic citation counting methods. Our results contest some common arguments for the continued
use of first-author citation counts in the evaluation of scholars, such as high correlations between author rankings by first-author citation counts and other citation
counting methods, and high costs of using more realistic citation counting methods that are not well-supported by the ISI databases. It is argued that increasingly available digital full text research papers make it possible for citation analysis studies to go beyond what the ISI databases have directly supported and to employ more
sophisticated methods
- …
