Speaker recognition under mismatched conditions is a challenging task. Speech signal is nonlinear and nonstationary, and therefore, difficult to analyze under realistic conditions. Also, in real conditions, the nature of the noise present in speech data is not known a priori. In such cases, the performance of speaker identification or speaker verification degrades considerably under realistic conditions. Any SR system uses a voice activity detector as the front-end subsystem of the whole system. The performance of most VADs deteriorates at the (...) front end of the SR task or system under degraded conditions or in realistic conditions where noise plays a major role. Recently, speech data analysis and processing using Norden E. Huang’s empirical mode decomposition combined with Hilbert transform, commonly referred to as Hilbert–Huang transform, has become an emerging trend. EMD is an a posteriori, adaptive, data analysis tool used in time domain that is widely accepted by the research community. Recently, speech data analysis and speech data processing for speech recognition and SR tasks using EMD have been increasing. EMD-based VAD has become an important adaptive subsystem of the SR system that mostly mitigates the effect of mismatch between the training and the testing phase. Recently, we have developed a VAD algorithm using a zero-frequency filter-assisted peaking resonator and EMD. In this article, the efficacy of an EMD-based VAD algorithm is studied at the front end of a text-independent language-independent SI task for the speaker’s data collected in three languages at five different places, such as home, street, laboratory, college campus, and restaurant, under realistic conditions using EDIROL-R09 HR, a 24-bit wav/mp3 recorder. The performance of this proposed SI task is compared against the traditional energy-based VAD in terms of percentage identification rate. In both cases, widely accepted Mel frequency cepstral coefficients are computed by employing frame processing from the extracted voiced speech regions using the respective VAD techniques from the realistic speech utterances, and are used as a feature vector for speaker modeling using popular Gaussian mixture models. The experimental results showed that the proposed SI task with the VAD algorithm using ZFFPR and EMD at its front end performs better than the SI task with short-term energy-based VAD when used at its front end, and is somewhat encouraging. (shrink)

Purpose. The article aimed at comprehending the phenomenon of education in its anthropological content, by comparing two versions for the analytics of the crisis state in education, given by Hannah Arendt and Evald Ilyenkov. Theoretical basis. For implementing this task, the method of in-depth reflexive reading of texts is used, when traditional academic concepts are considered in a new context determined by the analytics of real social problems. In this case, we are talking about the development of thinking not only (...) as a cognitive ability but as an ethical and ontological feature of a human being. In that event, thinking arises through its invisible belonging of one person to many others that both Arendt and Ilyenkov ascertain. Originality. Originality of the article is to identify the anthropological dimension of education and to establish the negative influence of such ways in organizing the educational process while it is under the dictation of current circumstances. The justification for this thesis is presented by identifying the consonance of the educational concepts from Hannah Arendt and Evald Ilyenkov. Conclusions. The opposition between action and thinking, revealed by Hannah Arendt, cannot be understood as a divorcement of thinking from reality, since another man appears to be the original reality for a person, namely, in thinking a person enters the space of a meeting with another man, put himself into another person’s mind and with this firstly attains his place in the world, becoming himself, acquiring the image of a man. So perceived education does not become manipulative training, but it is a real birth of a subject as creating himself. Undermining of the authority in the modern world is accompanied by the searching new forms in structuring the common space of human endeavor, which is possible when the educational status is determined by its attitude to the world rather than by the social environment. The authority of a teacher is effective when he relies on his responsibility for the world into which he introduces the child and which opens to him. Responsibility for peace and the resulting authority is associated with love for the world. Only with sufficient love for the world, a person is capable of taking responsibility for it. (shrink)

Neurological syndromes in which consciousness seems to malfunction, such as temporal lobe epilepsy, visual scotomas, Charles Bonnet syndrome, and synesthesia offer valuable clues about the normal functions of consciousness and ‘qualia’. An investigation into these syndromes reveals, we argue, that qualia are different from other brain states in that they possess three functional characteristics, which we state in the form of ‘three laws of qualia ’ based on a loose analogy with Newton’s three laws of classical mechanics. First, they are (...) irrevocable: I cannot simply decide to start seeing the sunset as green, or feel pain as if it were an itch; second, qualia do not always produce the same behaviour: given a set of qualia, we can choose from a potentially infinite set of possible behaviours to execute; and third, qualia endure in short-term memory, as opposed to non-conscious brain states involved in the on-line guidance of behaviour in real time. We suggest that qualia have evolved these and other attributes (e.g. they are ‘filled in’) because of their role in facilitating non-automatic, decision-based action. We also suggest that the apparent epistemic barrier to knowing what qualia another person is experiencing can be overcome simply by using a ‘bridge ’ of neurons; and we offer a hypothesis about the relation between qualia and one’s sense of self. (shrink)

This paper aims to make an anti-canonical reading of the avivakṣitavācya-variety of dhvani conceptualized by the ninth century Sanskrit literary critic Ānandavardhana in his seminal work Dhvanyāloka. In this paper, I argue that avivakṣitavācya-dhvani opens up a signifier to new significations that are not conventionally associated with it through a process of deterritorialization. In any language, convention functions as a structuring mechanism upon a signifier by clearly demarcating a rigid semantic ambit for it. By the term ‘conventional semantic ambit’, I (...) mean the boundary of signification set by convention for each signifier. The primary problem associated with the imposition of a definite territory upon a signifier is that it prevents an individual signifier from representing any new significations that are not conventionally attached to it. For example, in the conventional semantic ambit, the word ‘cat’ cannot represent the idea of a ‘dog’. In the act of mapping a fixed territory for each signifier, convention also structures the individual-user of the language by forcing him or her to confine to a specific plan of dealing with signifiers. Thus, the individual user of language within a conventional semantic ambit is rendered absolutely passive, as s/he has nothing new to contribute or create, other than reproducing an always-already existing plan of functioning. It is precisely this structuring tendency of convention that gets challenged in Ānanda’s avivakṣitavācya-dhvani. Such a mechanism is definitely a liberating experience for both the signifier and the individual-users of the language who are forced to accept the signifiers in a specific fashion. Along with the exposition of avivakṣitavācya-dhvani’s resistance to a signifier’s conventional semantic ambit, this paper also aims to conceptualize the figure of the reader that avivakṣitavācya-dhvani anticipates for itself. (shrink)

The proceedings of the Round Table on "Reason vs Post-Truth: Ontology, Axiology, Geopolitics".Authors of the proceedings:V.V. Mironov K.K. Momdzhyan A.V. Belokobylskyi A.P. Kozyrev O.A. Efremov M.V. Bratersky A.V. Pilko V.S. Levytskyy.

A t first glance you might not noorder, which afflicts about 0.5 percent of tice anything odd on meeting a American children. Neither researcher young boy with autism. But if had any knowledge of the other’s work, you try to talk to him, it will and yet by an uncanny coincidence each quickly become obvious that gave the syndrome the same name: autism, something is seriously wrong. He may not which derives from the Greek word autos, make eye contact with (...) you; instead he may meaning “self.” The name is apt, because avoid your gaze and fidget, rock his body the most conspicuous feature of the disorto and fro, or bang his head against the der is a withdrawal from social interacwall. More disconcerting, he may not be tion. More recently, doctors have adopted able to conduct anything remotely resemthe term “autism spectrum disorder” to bling a normal conversation. Even though make it clear that the illness has many rehe can experience emotions such as fear, lated variants that range widely in severity rage and pleasure, he may lack genuine but share some characteristic symptoms. empathy for other people and be oblivious Ever since autism was identified, reto subtle social cues that most children searchers have struggled to determine would pick up effortlessly. what causes it. Scientists know that sus- In the 1940s two physicians—Americeptibility to autism is inherited, although.. (shrink)

An interview with Anthony Freeman, in which one of the original authors of ‘The Science of Art’ [JCS, 6, No. 6/7, 1999] responds to to ongoing commentary.

In recent years, very little that is new has happened in that branch of particle physics which investigates the structure of particles. In an earlier period, certain doubts had existed about the applicability of quantum electrodynamics at distances of the order of 10-14 cm. Experiments that are universally known, in which pairs of electrons and mu-mesons arose, contradicted the theory somewhat. Later, however, it became clear that all this was a consequence of certain methodological inaccuracies.

Hegel's teachings on the state, law, and society constitute a philosophy of law and were developed by him as the philosophy of the objective spirit. In addition to providing a basis for historically concrete views on political matters, the Hegelian philosophy of law, as an application of dialectics to a specific realm of subject matter in societal, governmental, and political-legal phenomena, contains the logic of that realm of subject matter. The independent meaning of this domain of research transforms logic and (...) gives it politically significant features despite the conscious Hegelian attitude of "logicizing" politics. This is clearly manifested in the political and legal results of Hegel's employment of a conceptual apparatus and theoretical constructs in the dialectical investigation of the objective spirit. Therefore, it is valid to single out two aspects of the political content of Hegel's philosophy of law: the historically concrete political views developed by Hegel in his Philosophy of Right; and the totality of politically meaningful propositions deriving from his application of dialectics to the sphere of politics — which we here call Hegel's dialectics of politics. (shrink)

Издание адресовано научным работникам, преподавателям, студентам и аспирантам, а также практикам, интересующимся вопросами философии.

The interaction of the organism with the environment requires not only reactive, but also active behavior (i.e., search activity) which helps subject to meet the challenge of the uncertainty of the environment. A positive feedback between active behavior and immune system makes the selection process effective.

Here we outline a simple method of using two mirrors which allows one to stand outside oneself. This method demonstrates that registration of vision with touch and proprioception is crucial for the perception of the corporeal self. Our method may also allow the disassociation of taste from touch, proprioception, and movement.

The target articles on sleep and dreaming are discussed in terms of the concept of search activity integrating different types of behavior, body resistance, REM sleep/dream functions, and the brain catecholamine system. REM sleep may be functionally sufficient or insufficient, depending on the dream scenario, the latter being more important than the physiological manifestation of REM sleep. REM sleep contributes to memory consolidation in the indirect way. [Nielsen; Revonsuo; Solms; Vertes & Eastman].