Search results for "Naturalness"
showing 10 items of 21 documents
When Ethics and Aesthetics Are One and the Same: A Wittgensteinian Perspective on Natural Value
2015
Many environmental philosophers have held naturalness to be a primary source of nature’s value. Seen this way, the nature that is most valuable is wild nature, and ‘wild’ is that which is unmodiled by human activity. However, accounts of our attributions of value to the wild often have an aura of elusiveness to them, as if what really matters about nature being wild could not ultimately be captured by words. In an attempt to account for what really matters, I relate our fascination with wild nature to a famous Wittgensteinian quote—‘Ethics and Aesthetics are one and the same’ (Tractatus 2006a: 28, §6.421)—and inspect the ways in which important dimensions of our attributions of value to wil…
Wood-inhabiting fungal responses to forest naturalness vary among morpho-groups
2021
The general negative impact of forestry on wood-inhabiting fungal diversity is well recognized, yet the effect of forest naturalness is poorly disentangled among different fungal groups inhabiting dead wood of different tree species. We studied the relationship between forest naturalness, log characteristics and diversity of different fungal morpho-groups inhabiting large decaying logs of similar quality in spruce dominated boreal forests. We sampled all non-lichenized fruitbodies from birch, spruce, pine and aspen in 12 semi-natural forest sites of varying level of naturalness. The overall fungal community composition was mostly determined by host tree species. However, when assessing the …
Evaluation of the ARCore Indoor Localization Technology
2020
Augmented reality has become a very powerful tool nowadays. With the recent technological advance, smartphones have the ability to display augmented content on the screen. What makes the difference is the naturalness with which the multimedia content is superimposed over the video stream acquired with the phone's camera. This perfect overlay depends on the accurate estimation of the position and orientation of the smartphone's camera relative to the 3D representation of the space. ARCore is an augmented reality framework that computes the position and orientation of the smartphone. In order to assess the possibility of integrating ARCore within a virtual and augmented reality platform, we e…
Dubbing dialogues… naturally: a pragmatic approach to the translation of transition markers in dubbing
2012
Although research in Audiovisual Translation is said to have come of age in the past decade, there are still several key issues that have not received the scholarly attention they deserve. In the case of dubbing, the study of the naturalness of dubbed dialogue is a case in point. The aim of the present article is to analyse the use of transition markers in dubbing in order to look precisely at the naturalness of dubbed dialogue while taking into account the dubbing constraints at play. This analysis is carried out by comparing the dubbed dialogue (English-Spanish) of a popular American sitcom to the non-translated but prefabricated dialogue of a Spanish sitcom and finally to spontaneous con…
Forest Naturalness in Northern Europe: Perspectives on Processes, Structures and Species Diversity
2011
Saving the remaining natural forests in northern Europe has been one of the main goals to halt the ongoing decline of forest biodiversity. To facilitate the recognition, mapping and efficient conservation of natural forests, there is an urgent need for a general formulation, based on ecological patterns and processes, of the concept of âforest naturalnessâ. However, complexity, structural idiosyncracy and dynamical features of unmanaged forest ecosystems at various spatio-temporal scales pose major challenges for such a formulation. The definitions hitherto used for the concept of forest naturalness can be fruitfully grouped into three dimensions: 1) structure-based concepts of natural …
Agricultural landscapes and biodiversity conservation: a case study in Sicily (Italy)
2015
The diversity of life is made up not only of the diversity of plants and animal species, habitats and ecosystems, but also of the diversity of human cultures. These diversities interact with one another in complex ways and express the mutual adaptation between humans and the environment at local level. Sicilian traditional agro-ecosystems, due to the history of the territory and the resulting social and economic context, are configured in a heterogeneous mosaic rich in residual features of environmental value, which enhance the connectivity of the ecological network and support a high proportion of species that are rare or of conservation concern. As a case study we analyzed the characteris…
Ambienti umidi effimeri e naturalità del paesaggio in Sicilia
2009
I luoghi umidi temporanei sono ambienti acquatici che alternano periodicamente una fase d’invaso ed una fase secca ed ospitano espressive fitocenosi adattate a queste peculiari condizioni. Indagini condotte tra il 2003 ed il 2009 hanno consentito di individuare, in Sicilia, oltre 200 siti, costituiti generalmente da diverse pozze o piccoli stagni. L’estrema fragilità di questi habitat li rende molto vulnerabili a qualunque tipo di alterazione ambientale e pertanto risultano essere indicatori molto sensibili della pressione antropica sul territorio. Infatti, la conservazione di questi biotopi non può prescindere da una corretta gestione del contesto territoriale che li circonda. Il presente …
Geobotanical approach to detect land-use change of a Mediterranean landscape: a case study in Central-Western Sicily
2018
A landscape is a palimpsest of the interactions between human activities and ecological dynamics. In an interdisciplinary perspective of dialogue between the ‘Two Cultures’ (Natural Sciences and Humanities), a study of a rural area has been carried out through a reading of plant ecosystems as signs of human impact. The purpose of this paper—as part of the project ‘Harvesting Memories’: Ecology and landscape archaeology of Castro/Giardinallo Valley and Mt. Barrau district (Corleone, Palermo, Sicily)—is to analyse the formative-processes of a Sicilian rural landscape and its changes in the last century. A key element in the reconstruction of the formation of the present landscape is the serie…
G.I.S. context analysis for environmental recovery suitability evaluation
2009
The attributes of every single patch in a land mosaic constitute the database that landscape ecologists use for processing and analysis. Nonetheless spatial and ecological relationships between adjacent patches can play a key role in understanding the overall functionality of land mosaics. Defining the ecological role of a single tessera within an ecosystem is not possible if that patch is regarded as an insular element; on the other hand global analysis on the entire land mosaic would grant just a small amount of new information on each tessera and none on its functional role. To recognize areas susceptible of improvement through environmental recovery and to define priorities for interven…
Behavioral reasoning perspectives to brand love toward natural products: Moderating role of environmental concern and household size
2021
Abstract Consumers do not easily trust brands’ claims of naturalness, making it essential to understand the drivers of loyalty and the underlying brand love for such products. Responding to this need, the present study developed a conceptual model based on the Behavioral Reasoning Theory (BRT) to examine the antecedents of brand love. The model was tested using data collected through a cross-sectional survey. The findings suggest that health consciousness is positively associated with reasons for consuming natural products and attitude, which, in turn, are also positively associated with each other. At the same time, reasons for consuming natural products and attitude are positively associa…