Physicality

Avatar is the phenomenon, which in its essence is the "representative" of the user the virtual environment. The avatar phenomenon contains the duality of its perception and its role in the sociocultural space. This ambivalence is clearly manifests in the positioning of the avatar in the visual arts and its “real” life in a virtual environment. In this article an attempt to understand the term "avatar" are taken. The historical insight allowed to outline the evolution of discourse and to draw conclusions about the fundamental difference between understanding the avatar features in the visual arts and in the sociocultural space. It was concluded that in a broad sense, an avatar realizes the need to “editting” the user's identity in the network and creates the illusion of superhuman, divine possibilities of influencing a character on a virtual network.

The boundaries between “the digital” and our everyday physical world are dissolving as we develop more physical ways of interacting with computing. This forum presents some of the topics discussed in the colorful multidisciplinary field of tangible and embodied interaction.

За последнее время занятия парными танцами в России получили широкое распространение как практики проведения досуга и поддержание хорошей физической формы.  В своем докладе я решила остановиться на двух направлениях: хастл и вест кост свинг, так как их сравнение кажется мне наиболее интересным ввиду того, что несмотря на внешнюю схожесть этих танцев и частичное пресечение двух сообществ (переход из сообщества танцующих хастл в вест кост свинг), в них есть ряд принципиальных отличий и особенностей как в социальном взаимодействии внутри групп, так и в телесном между партнерами по танцу.

Those who are on the path to Ascension, nowadays probably find the urge to often go WITHIN and explore the deeper side of their consciousness. The Light of consciousness has accelerated (at the same time, giving rise to the acceleration of time [134-136] that is commensurate with the upshift of planetary and personal natural frequency of consciousness vibration). There is now a tendency for transfiguration, translocation, eventually leading to transmigration of our consciousness to the higher dimensions with the intermediatory visitations of the Zero-Point Field. It is clear that there is now an outpour of Cosmic Light of Consciousness from the 6th Harmonic Universe, the 7 Higher Heavens, and the Cosmic Divine Rays emanating from the Trinity of the Godhead that include the Emerald Order, The Amethyst Order and the Gold Order, containing the highly potent plasmic Light of Aurora that is purposed to re-encrypt our damaged and reversed morphogenetic system, as well as clearing and cleansing our bioenergetics system of the alien AI genetic implants and mutations caused by the Black Goo [137-138] as well as the Miasma [139] contaminating our consciousness field that epitomizes a byproduct ‘exhaust effect’ of the negative aliens AI machinery. It is clear that many windows have opened to the higher dimensions of consciousness and that there are countless benevolent Light beings who currently have an active presence in the consciousness field of Earth trying to help with the process of Earth-humanity Ascension, including having readily access to one’s future selves and the HIGHERSELF. These spiritual identities currently are striving to guide humanity to ‘awaken’ [140] from their ‘amnesia’ traditionally imposed by the negative aliens, as well as providing humanity with spiritual guidance towards attaining a higher-expanded consciousness [141-143]. And, if you are among the spiritual educators who strive to awaken and spiritually enlighten the public, especially by trying to relay such divine messages to the public, especially via producing tutorials and written materials for the public, no doubt you would be indulging in such higher dimensional discourse and communications, leading to aspired publications for your fellow human beings. As a result, you often find your energies highly focused on such pure higher consciousness sojourns that epitomize visiting higher dimensional space-times. And, for those of you who spend a great deal of time in spiritual meditation, you will find yourself in a similar situation of expending a considerable amount of your energies converted to pure free flow, with your quanta of energy spinning at increased velocity (or acceleration) to visit such higher dimensional planes. And, if you are doing this for an extended time, you may find that you will put your bodies in a more deprived congealed energetic state due to its conversion to free flow energies of potent (high frequency) consciousness. As a result, as you return back to synchronize your congealed physical and free flow consciousness energetic, you may experience a new form of Ascension Symptom pertinent to feeling ‘ungrounded.’ This paper discusses such a new uncompromising energetic state and how to go about it to synchronize your physical and spiritual energies.  Finally, a simple exercise is suggested for sharpening you skills, acting on everything from the Zero-Point Field that serves to add to your tranquility, calmness, seeing pixels of reality with clarity as to experience your consciousness embodiment and life non-judgmentally and from a point of neutrality, acumen, and utter intelligence.

ABSTRACT
The introduction presents merely roughly‭ (‬as they undergo change all the time‭) ‬the contemporary,‭ ‬insular,‭ ‬Anglo-Phone speculations‭ (‬supposedly by means of the discourse of philosophy and the socio-cultural practice of philosophizing‭) ‬about notions of consciousness and mind.

These,‭ ‬almost epistemological solipsistic,‭ ‬self-centered and anthropo-centered,‭  ‬restricted speculations about the notions of mind and consciousness are made by means of cognitively biased metaphysical,‭ ‬ontological,‭ ‬epistemological and methodological assumptions and selective interpretations of the nature and the doing of philosophy.‭ ‬Individuals or groups of them uttering those speculations form part of the professional academe and subscribe to the principles,‭ ‬attitudes,‭ ‬values and norms of a particular school,‭ ‬movement and community of Western academic philosophers.

The next sections situate the individuals who utter these pronouncements and/‭ ‬or argue for them by reasoning,‭ ‬logic and argumentation in the wider context of the multiverse,‭ ‬the universe,‭ ‬planet earth and our species as merely one type of contingent,‭ ‬living organism inhabiting and restricted to a certain eon,‭ ‬era,‭ ‬period,‭ ‬epoch,‭ ‬civilization,‭ ‬historical period and culture‭ (‬or time and place‭) ‬of this planet.‭ ‬In spite of this absolute restriction by place and time individuals try to depict from this restricted point of view an all-inclusive,‭ ‬god-like explanation of the nature,‭ ‬origin,‭ ‬meaning and functioning of every thing.‭

I suggest that because of conceptual misuse mental objects such as the mind and consciousness are imagined and thought to exist.‭ ‬Such misleading notions lead to the creation of unnecessary‭ ‘‬philosophical‭’ ‬problems such as the mind-body problem and notions about things such as‭ ‘‬qualia‭’‬.‭ ‬It is advisable to restrict any‭  ‬experiments to an investigation of particular senses and‭ ‘‬acts‭’ ‬of cognition and identify the areas in the body and brain that play a part in them‭ ‬-‭ ‬and to leave such research to experts of the specialized cognitive and‭  ‬neuroscientific fields and related disciplines,‭ ‬instead of trying to speculate about them or by the use of thought experiments,‭ ‬imaginary cases and simulations,‭ ‬fictional accounts and reasoning or arguments.

This article strives to make novel headway in the debate concerning esports' relationship to sports by focusing on the relationship between esports and physicality. More precisely, the aim of this article is to critically assess the claim that esports fails to be sports because it is never properly "direct" or "immediate" compared to physical sports. To do so, I focus on the account of physicality presented by Jason Holt, who provides a theoretical framework meant to justify the claim that esports is never properly immediate and therefore never sports. I begin by motivating Holt's account of physicality by contrasting it with a more classical way of discussing physicality and sports, namely in terms of physical motor skills. Afterwards, I introduce Holt's account of physicality as immediacy and engage with its assumptions more thoroughly to problematize the claim that esports is fundamentally indirect. Lastly, I argue that the assumption that esports necessarily lacks immediacy is based on a narrow understanding of body and, consequently, of space. In response, I offer a different way of thinking about body and space, focusing on the subjective, bodily engagement of the esports practitioners with their practice, whereby physical space and virtual space can be appreciated as immediately interconnected during performance in a hybrid manner. In providing such an account, the article contributes directly to the broader, growing discussion on the relationship between physicality and virtuality in an increasingly digital world.

During the Renaissance, religious and biblical art was portrayed in a myriad of different mediums and moods. The artist was careful in choosing the way in which they depicted their subject matter to fit in accordance to the patrons wishes, the configuration of the space, or even just in relation to their own previous works. And yet, regardless of choice, the psychology and presence of the artist materialized in the work in some form, whether it be literal, metaphorical, or both.This paper examines the physicality of blood in two famous depictions of Judith Slaying Holofernes and will use the concepts of gesture, tangibility, and the idea that every painter paints themselves to posit that Michelangelo Merisi di Caravaggio was actually more violent in life than in art, while Artemisia Gentileschi was more actively violent in her work.

* This paper was submitted for as the final project for a graduate class in the Art History department of the University of Toronto*

This research is ‘in motion’ moving forwards in its investigation about learning through movement, towards the question: ‘what does it mean to be physically educated?’ This article is a mid-way report which describing the ground covered so far and maps the path ahead for the researcher. From rich philosophical territory concerning body-mind, meaning and intelligence, this qualitative inquiry started with questionnaires and is proceeding to physical ‘mobile methods’ – interviews on the move, to explore facets of thinking about intelligence as may be exercised through the body, while a person is exercising. A high degree of researcher reflexivity is a central feature of this work, to grapple with (i) challenging philosophical concepts, (ii) qualitative methodology and (iii) analysing the data in a quest for meaning. As the project has gathered momentum, the researcher’s positionality with these three areas are critiqued, including his own readjustment to what a concept of ‘research’ might be, beyond the shadows which Westernised concepts of ‘science’ have traditionally, and sometimes unhelpfully cast. In closing, it is hoped this grounded philosophical study might inform some reasoning and practices in Physical Education and Outdoor Education to engage the body in learning activities that promote becoming and being, physically educated.

The performances with gestural controllers and sensors today have not come to significantly diversify the standard instrumental practice with live electronics. In this paper, I discuss the history and evolution towards gestural performances while looking at the composers of the American avant-garde in the 1950s and 1960s as well as the developments in Amsterdam’s STEIM centre for electro acoustic instrumental research from 1980s to present time. I discuss the technical aspects of sensors and gestural controllers, highlight some artists who are working with similar sensor interfaces as myself, discuss my own practical research while illustrating difficulties and challenges in working with sensors and gestural control-like interfaces involving physicality and embodiment.

Since the second half of the twentieth century, sport has reflected crucial
changes in the cultural valuation and perception of human physicality. The axiological breakthrough that has begun in the sphere of sport is currently noticeable in the dynamically developing world of computer games, especially those with so called open worlds. The article subjects to a preliminary analysis two phenomena evidencing that: accepting in the sphere of Olympic sport disabled contestants (on the example of the runner O. Pistorius) and the ability to impersonate Geralt of Rivia, the main character in the game The Witcher 3: Wild Hunt.

This article is concerned with the ways in which gendered subjectivities are re-constituted within and through contemporary cinematic depictions of dance in films such as Center Stage (2000), Save the Last Dance (2001), Dirty Dancing: Havana Nights (2004), Step Up (2006) and The Company (2003). My discussion explores the insightful, but largely unaccounted for, areas of overlap between feminist critiques of dance and cinema, particularly with regard to the significance and function of the "female form" on stage/on screen/in front of the mirror (Daly, 1997: 111). Specifically, I draw on debates around embodiment, subjectivity and looking in order to explore the ways in which depictions of dance as a bodily practice that places contradictory demands on the female body may disrupt cinema's hetero-normative representational conventions. Mainstream cinema in particular has a long tradition of staging the female body as to-be-looked-at spectacle, as an object of desire that lacks subjectivity and agency. [2] By definition, the dance film appears to continue this tradition. Dance performances largely epitomise the moments of staged spectacle that are said to disrupt straightforward narrative development, allowing the spectator to gaze at the body on display. However, I want to argue that the display of the female body in the dance film carries ambiguous and at times contradictory significance, that centres on the subject-object tensions 'embodied' by the female dancer.

Since the second half of the twentieth century, sport has reflected crucial
changes in the cultural valuation and perception of human physicality. The axiological breakthrough that has begun in the sphere of sport is currently noticeable in the dynamically developing world of computer games, especially those with so called open worlds. The article subjects to a preliminary analysis two phenomena evidencing that: accepting in the sphere of Olympic sport disabled contestants (on the example of the runner O. Pistorius) and the ability to impersonate Geralt of Rivia, the main character in the game The Witcher 3: Wild Hunt.

This paper explores the expression of physicality and construction of alterae personae in text-only electronically mediated communication on the example of text-messages.
I argue that communication through written discourse can take the form of enactment through discursively constructed alterae personae, which are not only explicitly defined in the choice of names, nicknames, and categories, but characterised by enacted physicality. I discuss three aspects of personae which texters construct discursively: (self-)identified persona, visual persona, and audible persona. I also introduce the term phoneticon to refer to discursive representation of auditory information in textbased communication. The design of alterae personae is informed by the interactants’ familiarity with each other and accepted conventions as well as modality affordances. This paper points to the need for a more thorough study of text-messages and other forms of text-based interactions between remotely located participants in order to better understand conscious self-presentation from the point of view of identity as well as physicality.

Following recent work by Don Ross (Ross, 2000; Ross & Spurrett, 2004), I contrast the influential theories of Daniel Dennett and Paul Churchland in information-theoretic terms. Dennett makes much of the fact that the morphological shorthand which emerges before a witness as she looks upon cohesive aggregates of matter commands some measure of predictive power. This, for him, speaks against eliminating recourse to an intentional vocabulary. By contrast, the eliminative materialism defended by Churchland does not gloss such informational compressibility as an explanatory desideratum, and thus regards the informational noise which accrues at higher levels of description as patently unacceptable. Yet, since it is unlikely, as Ross et al. (2007) have recently suggested, that anything remains once we subtract the appeal to patterns, I argue that the ubiquity of informational compression in scientific explanation seriously undermines the claim that talk of the mental could be eliminated.

This paper describes an instance of what we call `curated research', a concerted thinking, making and performance activity between two research teams with a dedicated interest in the creation of experimental musical instruments and the development of new performance practices. Our work builds theoretically upon critical work in philosophy, anthropology and aesthetics, and practically upon previous explorations of strategies for facilitating rapid, collaborative, publicly-oriented making in artistic settings. We explored an orientation to making which promoted the creation of a family of instruments and performance environments that were responses to the self-consciously provocative theme of `One Knob To Rule Them All'. A variety of design issues were explored including: mapping, physicality, the question of control in interface design, reductionist aesthetics and design strategies, and questions of gender and power in musical culture. We discuss not only the technologies whi...

This paper offers a critical feminist review of how the notion of physicality has been used within the sport sociology literature. Despite the lack of conceptual rigor associated with the term, and the tendency for physicality to be associated with men's sporting experiences, a discussion ensues regarding not only its viability as a concept when examining the physically active experiences of women, but also its importance vis-à-vis sport feminist research. A reconceptualization of physicality is called for, and it is argued that our conceptual usage of it must be situationally specific. Drawing on research in progress, the author sets out one particular way in which a concept of physicality, grounded in the physically active, bodily experiences of women, can be developed.

This paper describes an instance of what we call `curated research', a concerted thinking, making and performance activity between two research teams with a dedicated interest in the creation of experimental musical instruments and the development of new performance practices. Our work builds theoretically upon critical work in philosophy, anthropology and aesthetics, and practically upon previous explorations of strategies for facilitating rapid, collaborative, publicly-oriented making in artistic settings. We explored an orientation to making which promoted the creation of a family of instruments and performance environments that were responses to the self-consciously provocative theme of `One Knob To Rule Them All'. A variety of design issues were explored including: mapping, physicality, the question of control in interface design, reductionist aesthetics and design strategies, and questions of gender and power in musical culture. We discuss not only the technologies whi...

This paper builds upon an earlier exploratory discussion about the term physicality that called for conceptual clarity regarding our theoretical understanding and use of it within the context of women's lives. In light of fieldwork conducted, physicality is suggested to be the complex interplay of body perception, agency, and self-perception. This article focuses on examining one feature of this construct by assessing the relevance of body perception to two groups of women's experiences of their physicalities through two differently gendered activities: aerobics and wilderness canoe-tripping. Pivotal to this has been qualitatively understanding the lived-body as experienced and understood by the women. In-depth interviews and participant observation were used to explore the meaning and significance these women derived from experiencing their bodies/themselves through these activities. Of specific interest was understanding the effects of these experiences in terms of shaping their understandings of their physicalities particularly beyond that of appearance. Central to this has been apprehending the physically and socially empowering effects of these experiences, especially at the level of their identity. Through the data analysis, body perception was found to be relevant to the women's physical activity involvement in two distinct ways: as a factor initiating activity involvement and as a perception emerging through the experience. In turn, these differing perceptions of the body were found to impact diversely upon their physicalities, either broadening them or contributing to alternative ways of understanding them.