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The aim of the article is to present the key aspects of the Church's presence in virtual space and to show the paths which need to be followed in order that the message of the Gospel might reach Internet users more effectively. The result of the analysis is an answer to the question: How the Church can successfully initiate evangelistic ministry among people in virtual space, considering the qualitative requirements of the 21st century? The results of the analysis show that the Church has many possibilities for the propagation of faith in the digital world. However, numerous forms demand constant work on the quality of the message that aims at effective preaching. Internet portals that enjoy great popularity constitute an agora for contemporary Catholics. There are, however, many threats which need to be considered to avoid future mistakes. The Internet as a pulpit requires proclamation of the foundations of faith in ways that are both accessible and rooted in the doctrine. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Novels that cover action taking place in the 21st century refer to all kinds of social phenomena, including the ways in which people communicate, which are very different from those popular only 40 years ago. Literary works provide the names of devices (computer, laptop, palmtop, iPhone, iPad, tablet, smartphone), as well as the companies which manufacture them (Dell, Apple, Nokia, Samsung). Novels include the names of computer software (Windows, Word, Excel), social media (Facebook), and internet communicators (Messenger). There are also words that denote the activities performed while using these devices and applications (to log in, to click, to email, to google). The majority of these words originate from English and have international scope. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Up to the middle of the 20th century, big cities, as economic units and communities that were characterized by the very varied professional and social structure of their inhabitants, marked not only administrative borders but also clear linguistic and cultural borders for the traditional monolithic village. After the Second World War, due to various socio-economic processes which resulted in big cities absorbing the surrounding villages, the administrative borders also started to change. Migrations from villages to cities and improved education began the process of blurring cultural and linguistic borders in the 20th century. At the beginning of the 21st century, the phenomenon of linguistic-cultural unification was facilitated by the trend of inhabitants of big cities starting to move to suburban villages. However, the rapid intensification of this phenomenon was mainly influenced by the common availability of the internet. The English language and the American style of culture became the factors that unified the linguistic and cultural differences between Polish cities and villages. The first quarter of the 21st century marked the beginning of the process of blurring not only the cultural differences between the city and the village, but also the virtual borders between Polish culture and the foreign culture of the Western world. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The research material in the article covers the period from the earliest gravestones from the fourteenth century to contemporary ones of the twenty-first century. Among iconic motifs taken into account are those which are specific for women’s gravestones, and from texts in inscriptions—those corresponding to artistic motifs. The aims of this study are the following: to distinguish thematic groups, determine the range of iconic motifs used and the chronology and frequency of their occurrence, as well as to juxtapose them with normative content from religious writings of Judaism and with rites and customs. The following conclusions emerge from the research: In the early period (until the fourth quarter of the eighteenth century), there was no differentiation on tombstones between separate motifs ascribed to men (except for the Kohanim and Levites) and separate motifs ascribed to women. Among the common motifs, the bird motif dominated on women’s gravestones, while the crown motif acquired its specific character. In the fourth quarter of the eighteenth century, the motif of a candlestick appeared on women’s gravestones; it spread very quickly and became a visual identification feature. In the nineteenth century, with the introduction of vanitas motifs on gravestones, they began to be used on women’s gravestones. The connection of motifs with the names of the deceased is also noticeable (e.g. Feigl–bird, Rachel–fairy, Royza–rose, or scenes related to biblical namesakes). The contents of women’s epitaphs presented as praise or description of virtues largely concern traditional female duties toward the home, husband, and children. Women’s gravestones contain no attributes or references to the study of Torah and scholarship, or else to activities in the public sphere—to professions, both religious and later secular—which obviously results from the position and role of women in the patriarchal community. Such information does not appear until the interwar period on the tombstones of women from families assimilated into the surrounding culture which is also evidenced by non-traditional tombstone forms and inscriptions in non-Jewish languages. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The advent of the new era in which societies now live is forcing a reconstruction of global educational systems. It turns out that the methods and forms of work used thus far in education are often serving societies which no longer exist. In the face of these inevitable changes, questions arise, whose clear and certain answers are difficult to find. What educational tools should be used today to take into account a holistic approach to teaching and education? Are there any universal methods and forms of work that would meet the educational expectations of the 21st century? The guidelines of the report “Learning – the treasure within” by the International Commission on Education for the 21st Century, chaired by Jacques Delors, include the modest Japanese soroban – an abacus known in the Far East since the 16th century. Japan’s technological development has not excluded this old medium from general school education. It turns out that it is used not only to perform quick mathematical calculations, but also has strictly pedagogical and even therapeutic values. Using this old abacus in a new learning culture helps in holistic early childhood education. The skills acquired in mastering the use of the soroban are important when learning all school subjects. The growing number of schools in Poland offering soroban courses, as well as the educational and developmental successes of children and youth who have acquired the ability to use this abacus proficiently, call for a scientific study of this issue. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Salt is one of the materials with many uses. For centuries, its therapeutic values have been emphasized. Former salt mining centres, in which graduation towers were used to concentrate brine, played a special role. Along with changes in the technology of obtaining salt, these devices were gradually withdrawn from the use. Some of them began to perform a spa function, which resulted from the impact of the specific microclimate around them on treatment options, including upper respiratory tract diseases. At the turn of the 20th and 21st centuries, a great interest in the graduation towers was noted, due to which new facilities began to be built, and adapted to perform the therapeutic function. The literature on the subject is basically limited to analyses of the individual historical objects in terms of history and technology as well as popular-scientific guidebooks and informational studies. The purpose of this study is to give an idea of the genesis and current state of the construction of external graduation towers in Poland (89 facilities have been inventoried), taking into account the dynamics of this state, and the diversity of graduation towers due to its form, size and method of funding. Particular attention was paid to the spatial diversity of this phenomenon. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

At the beginning of the third decade of the 21st century, when the world stopped because of the SARS-CoV-2 pandemic, COVID-19-related information resources dominated the news on the web. The pandemic highlighted the opportunities used by publishers in the process of publishing and disseminating digital scientific resources. The aim of the paper is to recognize the offer of open scientific resources about COVID-19 on the websites of the libraries at the Polish universities of technology. The analysis of the data shows that not only scientific and governmental institutions but also financial institutions, associations, publishers, researchers and journals make scientific resources related to coronavirus available free of charge. Open scientific resources available in different ways in different projects have been separated by publishers from journals, books, archive databases and in the news section, in thematic blocks in their own and foreign resources. The offer is enhanced by audio and video recordings, intelligent tools for delivering, archiving and distributing online content and links to countless public sources. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The passenger rail transport in Poland lets us travel between regions faster every year. But in the first years of the twenty-first century the only way to travel from, for example, the Tatra Mountains to the Baltic coast, was travelling by night train. They were run on long, cross-city routes. Despite a long time of journey, they were still popular, especially in tourism. As a result of investments in Polish railways, the number of fast daily trains has significantly increased, taking some potential passengers of the night trains. On the other hand, there are still some regions located on the peripheries, which demand night trains to have long-distance connections with other Polish regions. The future of those trains in Poland is not clear. Recently a trend of internationalization of night trains has been observed. For example, in the summer of 2020 new night trains connecting Czechia and Polish Baltic resorts are planned to be run. The topic of the future of night trains in Poland, compared to the past, should be well deliberated and planned to maintain high efficiency of rail transport. The aim of this paper is to discuss the past and the potential future of night trains in Poland. Furthermore an author's formula estimating the demand in trains is presented in order to define the efficiency of night trains compared to the day trains. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This text is an attempt to summarize the three decades (1989– 2019) of NGO activity in the broadly understood Polish-German borderland, with a particular emphasis on the area of the so-called Central Nadodrze. Two organizations, The Society of Witnica’s Friends and the daughter organization of the Polish- German Educatio Association “Pro Europa Viadrina,” were chosen as an exemplification of a certain way of coping with cultural reality, also in the historical aspect in the border area. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The study determines the frequency of monthly thermal anomalies in the Mediterranean Basin (approx. south of 45oN), in the area from Lisbon in the west to Van in eastern Turkey, changes in the frequency of such anomalies over six decades, as well as the location and size of the area over which they occurred. The present study is based on the average monthly air temperature values from 80 meteorological stations in the years 1951-2010. Thermally anomalous months are considered to have occurred when the average air temperature t at a given station differed from the corresponding tav. by at least 2 standard deviations (s); for anomalously cold months (ACMs: t£tav.-2s) and for anomalously warm months (AWMs: t=tav.+2s). One feature that distinguishes the Mediterranean Basin from the rest of Europe located in the temperate climate zone is the prevalence of AWMs over ACMs. The number of ACMs and AWMs showed significant variations over the 60-year period. The years 1971-1980 were the coldest ones, while the 21st century saw the highest temperatures. The vast majority of ACMs and AWMs occur over small areas. There were 22 anomalous months (11 ACMs and AWMs) that covered larger areas (at least 25% of the stations). [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The articl e reveals the significance of geopolitics in the political and academic achievements of Antoni Sujkowski, a Polish geographer of the generation which witnessed the rebirth of independent Poland in 1918. It describes political activity of Sujkowski, the only geographer who served as a minister in the government of the Second Polish Republic. The most attention is paid to his contribution to the controversy over proposals of the territory of Poland during the Paris peace conference in 1919, when he advocated the creation of "vast strategic Poland," i. e. a federation of Poland and historical Lithuania (including Belarus). As an academic geopolitician Sujkowski is especially the author of The geography of lands of the old Poland. That was the first book in geohistory (or "geographical history") of Poland, considering the influence of geographic environment on the historical development of the Polish state. The literature used in research includes works by Sujkowski, other geographical and geopolitical writings of his time (as primary sources), memoirs, contemporary biographies and studies in geopolitics, the history of Poland and Polish science in the first half of the twentieth century (as secondary sources). [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The article covers the way in which human experience, fear and observation are transformed during transmission into a story - informing, warning, moralizing. Examples are based on belief-type threads, contained in stories gathered at the beginning of the twenty-first century, during research in Zagłębie Dąbrowskie. The purpose of the analysis is to describe the fiction scheme of this genre, and thus the way the folklore warns about a hazard. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The study is based on the review of the world literature of the 90s of the last century and the first decade of the 21st century and contains the analysis of causes of surprising bankruptcies of flagship American corporations and the genesis of the world crisis of 2008-2009. On this base a criticism of liberal current of economics was presented and the main changes of the current of economics in the first decade of this century were characterised. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Public sector is one of the most important participants in the economic process. Its task is the legal definition of a framework of market, especially in formulating the procedures for the exchange of goods and services. The capabilities of this sector are becoming more limited in terms of crisis, mainly on the global financial market, which slows the rate of GDP growth. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The main aim of this paper is an attempt to evaluate the effectiveness of special economic zones located in the Lower Silesian region, that is Special Economic Zones for Medium Business of Kamienna Góra, Special Economic Zone of Legnica and Special Economic Zone "INVEST-PARK" of Wałbrzych and their influence on the surrounding socio-economic space. The author analyzed the effects of the zones on the region from 2002 to 2010. There were assessed, among others, the number of valid permits for conducting business in specific zones, incurred capital expenditure, created jobs, capital expenditure in infrastructure construction and the financial results of the companies managing the zones. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The author's reflections on the value of information. The context is limited to the issues relevant and important for the librarians in Poland in the first decade of the 21st century. The article concerns (among others): expected attributes and features of information, information imperative, values in human and social life, knowledge as a value, mutual relations of information and knowledge, devaluation of knowledge, and misusage of the "knowledge" term. Answering the title question the author states, referring to sociological and axiological contexts, that we are witnessing the crisis of the value of knowledge nowadays. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]