Elements of Animate and Inanimate Nature in the Practice of Avadhāna

Water is the most important component determining the structure and properties of countless elements of animate and inanimate nature. The ability to respond to even the most insignificant external influences makes it a unique object of study. In this work, we studied the effect of the low-intensity electromagnetic field of radio frequency range (f = 100–200 MHz) on the physical and chemical properties of deionized water, which depend on such intermolecular forces as heat, evaporation rate, cohesion, adhesion, etc. At atmospheric pressures, irradiated water is shown to boil at higher temperatures (Tb= 102.0 °С), with the evaporation heat of irradiated water exceeding that of non-irradiated water by 6.5%. At the temperature of 22 °C, irradiated water evaporates more slowly than non-irradiated water and is characterised by higher values of surface tension, work of cohesion and contact angle. In addition, the contact angles of irradiated water on a polystyrene surface increase by 19–23% as compared to that of non-irradiated water. The effectiveness of electromagnetic radiation depends on the frequency and time of exposure. Exposure to field frequencies of 130 MHz and 180 MHz for 1–3 hours caused maximum changes. A further increase in the duration of exposure was ineffective. Irradiated water retained its properties throughout the entire observation period. It is shown that increased cohesive forces reduce the adhesion of irradiated water to the polystyrene surface, thus decreasing its wetting ability. A minimal adhesion of water to a solid surface was observed for water exposed to a field frequency of 130 MHz. The negative values of spreading coefficients, defined as the difference between the work of adhesion and the work of cohesion, indicate that water does not spread over the polystyrene surface. The obtained experimental data prove that exposure to an electromagnetic field strengthens the supramolecular organisation of water, as well as enhances intermolecular interactions in aqueous media. Strengthening of cohesion can lead to a change in the solvation of molecules and ions dissolved in water, as well as to a disruption of their transportation through biological membranes, which affects the functioning of individual cells and the activity of the organism as a whole.

The article considers the tourist traffic as possible to elements of inanimate nature in protected areas. The highest form of protection in Poland - national parks, has been taken into account. The main goal is to diagnose the situation based on the analysis of official documents elaborated by the national park authorities. One of the important elements is to diagnose the threat to nature and indicate ways to neutralize it. At the beginning, the geotouristic potential of these parks was presented, where this type of resources is considered important from the point of view of tourism. The tourist function of the most important attractions in Poland was indicated. In the top ten there are as many as 4 national parks, including Tatrzański which takes first place. The size of tourist traffic in all 23 parks was analyzed. As a result, it was shown that the most popular, where tourist flow is of mass character, include mountain parks with significant geotouristic potential. Next, the current protection plans for them were analyzed: Tatrzański, Karkonoski, Table Mountains and Pieniński, where the annual tourist flow varies between 0.5 million and almost 4 million visitors per year. Threats were assigned to 4 groups: existing internal threats, potential internal threats, existing external threats and potential external threats. In each of the types of threats special attention was paid to those related to inanimate nature. It also indicated the ways in which park managers want to influence the change of negative trends. The basic conclusion was indicated, which boils down to the postulate of a balanced approach to the protection of both types of nature: animate and inanimate. In the case of animate nature, threats and suggestions for improving the situation seem to be much better diagnosed than in the case of inanimate nature.

The article is devoted to a comparative study of the naturmorphic images underlying the internal form of emotive phraseological units in Slavic and Turkic languages (Russian, Bulgarian, Polish, Czech, Tatar). These images are noted to correlate with the corresponding code of culture, which assumes a figurative interpretation of the realia of the world with consideration of knowledge about both living and inanimate nature. The revealed images of animals, birds, insects, plants, natural objects and phenomena, elements constitute a well-arranged system, the components of which are analyzed in terms of both frequency and universality/ethnospecificity. These images are actualized when describing a wide range of emotions (joy, sadness, love, resentment, shame, excitement, etc.), but most of them relate to negative states, primarily fear and anger. The most productive are zoomorphic images, as well as images of natural objects, phenomena and elements (such as the sky, thunder, fire, water, etc.), which often reveal universality due to external factors. The inner form of many emotive phraseological units is based on the metonymic principle, according to which emotions are described by referring to their bodily symptoms (chills, tears, facial expressions, etc.). The universality and ethnospecificity of images are proved to have linguistic and extralinguistic reasons.

Nature is a composite phenomenon of all the physically identifiable and visible objects. However, there is an invisible nature which exists in human mind. The reflection of bodily existent things or matters or images appear in the mind which finally work as principle sources of basic knowledge in human thought processes. The mental state here is to be considered as the sky in a natural atmosphere. Thus, the human mind acts not only as a reservoir of memory function rather it also works like a camera which takes the picture of seen or perceived objects and stimulates the person to think, to contemplate or to enjoy or feel sorrow - confounding the criteria of the natural objects or images. This is why the types of elements or the shape of nature is important to form a child’s mind. Creative elements such as games, TV serials, books or other study materials, have more impact than the natural one which might divert a child from natural mental growth to a synthetic or superficial manifestation. In most of the cases these creative elements are designed and motivated by the subjective notion of the politicians - government officials or state organs to try to model their citizens.
 The paper, providing with the definition of natural and phenomenal objects, analyses the issues related to nature, mind, self, perception, individuals, society, and more specifically relations between the acquisition of child perception and the effect of creative and natural elements using primary and secondary sources of materials. Finally it will make a proposition for the responsible authorities in order to enable them to understand how to help the children and the youths to get appropriate atmosphere of achieving perfect knowledge.

The proverbs and idioms have significant educational and pedagogical potential for achieving many teaching goals and forming the student's cultural identity. These short lexical forms can be assimilated into the child's speech, which contributes to the enrichment of vocabulary and the traditional transmission of folklore to new generations. The aim of this paper is to analyze the usage of idioms and proverbs that have elements of a living and inanimate nature in their structure or contain a comparison with natural phenomena. The research was carried out on the content of the textbook and a workbook of Nature and Society as well as the textbook of Serbian language for the third grade of elementary school. The paper emphasizes the necessity of an integrative approach toward explaining the meaning of these typical proverbs and idioms. Proposals for their methodical processing have been given so that students can easily understand the real connections between natural phenomena and the human need for the use of elements of nature in lexical constructions where they have a vividly conveyed meaning with a unique message.

An article discusses a necessity of combination of historical and contemporary architectural concepts in the process of selection of strategy for sustainable urban development. Working out a dynamic balance between this two concepts provides sustainability of area development, which is required for incorporation of new architectural objects in existing structure of a city. At that, usage of historical architectural concepts will allow to preserve cultural identity of developed city, while usage of modern architects’ concepts would promote quick reaction on continuously changing social, technical and ecological conditions of formation. An expressed hypothesis in the article regarding a necessity of such dynamic balance is illustrated with interaction of historical concept of ensemble development of urban space with modern architects’ concepts based on combination of elements of live and inanimate nature. Interaction of these concepts occurs after assessment of an ensemble potential state or potential of ensemble self-development of a particular urban space. This helps to determine probable directions of urban space development in line with already incorporated genetic program (peculiarities) of formation of an examined territory. Considering determined ensemble potential the following options of usage of modern architectural concepts which are based on combination of live and inanimate nature elements are suggested: for regeneration of at one time destroyed or degrading districts by means of inclusion of new unique buildings and complexes; for increase of importance of reorganized urban spaces at incorporation of architectural and city developments objects as well as engineering infrastructure objects; for enrichment of city environment by employing natural structures and materials, imitations of relief, landscape, natural texture in developed objects and complexes. Foregoing the above, combination of historical and modern concepts discussed in the article would provide maintenance of urban spaces in the state of sustainable development.

The paper presents the legal protection status in the areas of landscape parks in Poland, whose current number is 126. The structure and effectiveness of provisions pertaining to the protection plans for landscape parks have been presented, mainly in the context of inanimate nature elements. It has been concluded that currently fewer than half of the landscape parks have valid protection plans and that their provisions and the level of detail vary greatly from park to park. After analysing the existing protection plans, it has been noticed that the provisions concerning the protection of inanimate nature elements constitute a definite minority in relation to the provisions concerning animate nature, cultural and historical, or landscape values. The consequences of the lack of regulations and actual actions in the sphere of permanent, organised monitoring of inanimate nature elements have been indicated. The paper also points out how the necessity for the park protection plans to obtain the status of a local legal act, at least in the part concerning broadly understood spatial planning, would be important and beneficial for the management of active nature conservation in the area of the entire landscape park. Furthermore, the paper underlines the importance of obtaining an appropriate amount of data from inventory and scientific research, as well as constant monitoring of animate and inanimate nature resources located in each of the parks.

What elements of nature do people involved in conservation projects seek to protect, and why? How do they identify and relate to nature? Answers to such fundamental questions are shaped by normative assumptions that can result in distinct conservation strategies and practices. Despite their importance, normative assumptions are rarely explicitly stated in conservation sciences, possibly because an epistemology of modern science suggests that normative backgrounds are not relevant to the production of objective knowledge, or because researchers and practitioners are unaware of the diversity of positions that exist. Using a combination of qualitative and quantitative methods, we created a catalogue of existing normative positions in conservation literature and described their key characteristics. We described 72 distinctive normative positions about human–nature relationships. Each position was characterized by unique combinations of value-states belonging to one or more of the following five dimensions: ontology (the positionality of human with respect to nature), axiology (value systems and ethical frameworks), pragmatism (extent of human interventions), epistemology (knowledge sources), and agency (agents of change). We then scored each position in terms of its alignment (support, opposition, or neutrality) with respect to all value-states within each dimension. A fuzzy correspondence analysis revealed that the field of conservation is heterogeneous beyond the conventional gradient of intrinsic–instrumental–relational values. The frequency and circumstances under which stakeholders adopt different normative positions are unknown, but the list of dimensions and associated values provided in this study may serve as a checklist for scoping this diversity. Consideration of values stemming from alternative normative positions may help broaden support for conservation actions.

This perspective article provides a justification for and an overview of the use of narrative as a pedagogical tool for educators to help physical therapist students, residents, and clinicians develop skills of reflection and reflexivity in clinical practice. The use of narratives is a pedagogical approach that provides a reflective and interpretive framework for analyzing and making sense of texts, stories, and other experiences within learning environments. This article describes reflection as a well-established method to support critical analysis of clinical experiences; to assist in uncovering different perspectives of patients, families, and health care professionals involved in patient care; and to broaden the epistemological basis (ie, sources of knowledge) for clinical practice. The article begins by examining how phronetic (ie, practical and contextual) knowledge and ethical knowledge are used in physical therapy to contribute to evidence-based practice. Narrative is explored as a source of phronetic and ethical knowledge that is complementary but irreducible to traditional objective and empirical knowledge-the type of clinical knowledge that forms the basis of scientific training. The central premise is that writing narratives is a cognitive skill that should be learned and practiced to develop critical reflection for expert practice. The article weaves theory with practical application and strategies to foster narrative in education and practice. The final section of the article describes the authors' experiences with examples of integrating the tools of narrative into an educational program, into physical therapist residency programs, and into a clinical practice.

An intravenous injection of heparin releases diamine oxidase (DAO) from villous tip enterocytes. In a previous study, we found that postheparin plasma DAO (PHD) values were significantly lower in patients with malabsorption syndrome and small bowel atrophy at jejunal biopsy than in normal subjects. In this study we performed the PHD test in 14 coeliac patients before and after three and six months of gluten free diet to show whether the enterocytes maturing processes induced by the diet joined with enhanced PHD values and to assess the clinical usefulness of this test. In all subjects jejunal biopsy carried out after six months showed a partial but consistent histological recovery. The clinical status, xylosuria and daily faecal fat excretion improved progressively and there was a significant increase (p less than 0.001) in mean PHD activity that reached the normal range after three months. After six months a further slight increase of the mean PHD value was recorded. These data indicate that PHD values rise together with the improved intestinal absorptive functions of coeliac patients on gluten free diet and that this test is a useful tool in monitoring recovery of the small bowel mucosa.

Moth to Cloth: Silk in Africa

This paper examines the terminology related to sounds of the inanimate world in the poetry of Stanisława Plewińska. The terms were stratified semantically and grouped into: SOUNDS OF INANIMATE NATURE and OTHER SOUNDS OF THE SURROUNDING WORLD. The analysis of the material indicates that the rural environment audiosphere brings a sense of tranquility, dominated by sounds produced by the elements of inanimate nature (i.e. the Sun, the sky, water), complemented by the noises of artifacts (e.g. creaking which implies old age/decay). The repertoire of terms used by the folk poet to describe sounds produced by the inanimate world is conventional and relatively limited.

Starting with the fourth grade, nature studies form part of the natural science curriculum of the secondary school. Under the new curriculum, prior to such systematic study, pupils in the primary grades acquire an elementary knowledge (in the form of notions and concepts) of the elements of inanimate nature (minerals, water, and air) and animate nature (plants and their parts, domestic and wild animals, etc.), of human anatomy and health protection (elements of hygiene), and of seasonal changes in living nature and their dependence on the sun's elevation over the horizon and the length of day and night. Serious attention is devoted to the study of the natural environment, the means by which man utilizes it, and the conservation of natural resources.

In Lithuanian healing incantations, as well as in all others, we can designate a system of disease control strategies, which presents ways of influencing the disease in order to combat it. These models of behavior are perfectly reflected in the texts of Lithuanian incantations. By using the correct strategies, the disease is expelled. In this case, the thread of determining the location of the expulsion becomes an important element of the incantation. The main principle in this issue is to refer the disease to a place from which there is no return or to the place of its origin. That is why it is supposed to be a distant, foreign, untamed, closed or dead space, which belongs to a dimension other than that of a human being. In Lithuanian healing incantations we can indicate several “directions” of disease referral, which are related to the basic spaces of the world – earth, water and air spheres. EARTH – a binary space combining the world of life and fertility as well as the chthonic world, the sphere of dying and death. The disease is assigned to this dimension and sent during treatment. STONE – similarly to earth the space denoted by stone can have differing meanings: it can appear as the cosmological center of the world, or as an element of inanimate nature, by its very concept devoid of life and dynamics, a chthonic space. FIRE – first and foremost, the element that removes disease, containing superb healing and cleansing powers; in Lithuanian folklore it appears as the goddess Gabija; a recurring theme is the search of where fire resides in stones; roosters and blood (often: the blood of a rooster) are another important aspect related to the metaphorical meaning of fire, as they serve as a peculiar personification and incarnation of fire. WATER – mythological and media space; the surface of the water is a natural border between the human world and another dimension – the underworld or a parallel world, which is inaccessible to humans. This means that it is a suitable place for expelled disease. What’s more, it acts as a substance that cleanses the body physically and mentally, soaks up the disease and overcomes it (immersion, melting the disease).

The assessment of geoheritage and geodiversity is a necessary prerequisite for the development of measures to preserve unique geological and geomorphological objects. Various foreign and domestic researchers have developed a low-level methodology for evaluating and determining the recreational value of geological and geomorphological objects. Leading developers of methodological approaches in the field of geoheritage assessment are foreign scientists Reynard (Reynard, 2012), Brilha (2016), Rocha (2014), Pereira (2013), Ferrero (Ferrero, 2012), Gray (2013 ), Fassoulas (Fassoulas, 2012), Zouros (Zouros, 2007), Asrat (Asrat et al., 2012) and others. In Ukraine, V. Hrytsenko (2006), Yu. Zinko (2003, 2009, 2019), V. Brusak (2011, 2013, 2014, 2019), S. Bortnyk, V. Stetsyuk, etc. (2020), V. Stetsyuk, (2021), G. Bayrak, L. Teodorovych (2020), G. Bayrak, A. Manko (2021) and others are engaged in the study of geological and geomorphological objects promising for geoconservation. The meaning of the concepts "geoheritage", "geodiversity" and "geoconservation" and their relationship should be distinguished. Geoheritage is geological and geomorphological objects that have special value in scientific, educational, aesthetic, recreational and other aspects, and geoconservation is the process of protecting and preserving these objects. Geoheritage is a part of geodiversity, which, in addition to geological and geomorphological properties, includes pedological, hydrological and other elements of inanimate nature in certain territories. Geodiversity, along with biodiversity, is a component of the World Natural Heritage. Geoheritage is studied at five levels – global (world), continental, national, regional and local. Two types of geoheritage assessment methods have been developed – direct and indirect. According to the evaluation procedure, the methods are divided into qualitative, quantitative, and qualitative-quantitative. Qualitative assessment consists in determining the total value of objects based on the results of descriptive studies and without any quantitative expression. Quantitative evaluation consists in defining clear evaluation criteria, their gradation and assigning certain points for each degree of evaluation gradation. Each of the criteria is divided into sub-indices that allow covering the entire spectrum of qualitative assessment of geoheritage objects. Scientific, educational, recreational, economic, prospective and other values are distinguished as evaluation criteria. The total final value of the geoheritage site is determined by the sum of points. The choice of methods for evaluating geoheritage objects was chosen depending on the characteristics of the object of study and the natural features of the studied territory. Key words: geoheritage; geoconservation; geodiversity; geoheritage assessment methods.