Volume 20, Issue 7, July 2020, Page 150-152.

Responding to a major pandemic and planning for allocation of scarce resources under crisis standards of care requires coordination and cooperation across federal, state and local governments in tandem with the larger societal infrastructure. Maryland remains one of the few states with no state-endorsed ASR plan, despite having a plan published in 2017 that was informed by public forums across the state. In this article, we review strengths and weaknesses of Maryland’s response to COVID-19 and the role of the Maryland (...) Healthcare Ethics Committee Network in bridging gaps in the state’s response to prepare health care facilities for potential implementation of ASR plans. Identified “lessons learned” include: Deliberative Democracy Provided a Strong Foundation for Maryland’s ASR Framework; Community Consensus is Informative, Not Normative; Hearing Community Voices Has Inherent Value; Lack of Transparency & Political Leadership Gaps Generate a Fragmented Response; Pandemic Politics Requires Diplomacy & Persistence; Strong Leadership is Needed to Avoid Implementing ASR … And to Plan for ASR; An Effective Pandemic Response Requires Coordination and Information-Sharing Beyond the Acute Care Hospital; and The Ability to Correct Course is Crucial: Reconsidering No-visitor Policies. (shrink)

Стаття висвітлює досягнення соціального вчення Католицької Церкви в справі подолання «культури смерті» через утвердження миру як складової системи цінностей і принципів «культури життя».

The goal of this study was to determine whether it is possible to teach children with serious decoding problems four text comprehension strategies in listening contexts. The subjects were 9-11 year old students from special schools for children with learning disabilities. All the students were very poor at decoding; half of the group were also poor listeners, whereas the other half consisted of normal listeners. The experimental children were trained in strategies of clarifying, questioning, summarising and predicting through a combination (...) of reciprocal teaching and direct instruction. The results indicated significant programme effects on a strategic listening comprehension test. A transfer effect on general listening comprehension and general reading comprehension tests was not found. The poor listeners within the experimental group did not perform better than the normal listeners. (shrink)

El siguiente trabajo se enmarca en una investigación acerca de las fuentes históricofilosóficas que dan cuenta de los fundamentos de la tendencia de la filosofía a interpretarse a sí misma como una ciencia. Hemos tomado algunos de los diálogos socráticos de Platón para pesquisar cómo opera esto ahí, cuál es su motivación última y cuál su sentido. El supuesto básico es que cabe, en algún sentido, pensar la actividad filosófica como un “saber del saber”. El hilo conductor lo constituye el (...) examen de ciertos pasajes ejemplares en donde aparece la llamada “analogía del arte”, a través de la cual se ponen al descubierto ciertos caracteres esenciales del saber. Finalmente se concluye que la motivación de un “saber referido al saber” no puede ser “epistemológica” sino fundada en la preocupación por alcanzar una vida de excelencia. (shrink)

Abstract:This article is about how a very specific section of the Rio Grande was transformed through human intervention over the course of the twentieth century. Geographically, I focus on the stretch of river between and around the twin border towns of El Paso, Texas and Ciudad Juárez, Chihuahua. This is an important area of analysis not only because of the historic importance of the urban complex to U.S.-Mexico relations, but also because it is a desert. I analyze two major river (...) engineering projects, one in the 1930s, the other in the 1960s, as well as the transformation of the water itself due to increased toxicity beginning in the 1990s. In sum, the river was straightened, completely relocated, lined in concrete, and poisoned. No other place on the entire international divide underwent such extreme changes. I explain this by arguing that both political forces and environmental conditions combined to produce such totalizing interventions in the riverine ecosystem. I also argue that these processes reversed the age-old meaning of water in the desert. Historically, water in the desert has been associated with life and biodiversity, but over the course of the twentieth century the desert section of the Rio Grande border was converted into a deadened zone. (shrink)

A course of lectures delivered at Cambridge in the summer of 1953. They include pieces by Moore, Broad, and Ryle. Körner's "Some Types of Philosophical Thinking" and Ryle's "The Theory of Meaning" are especially stimulating; the book as a whole presents an absorbing picture of contemporary British philosophy.--A. C. P.

New technology has a prominent place in the theory and practice of innovation, but the association between high tech and innovation is not inevitable. In this paper, we discuss six metaphorical heroes of agricultural innovation, starting with the dominant hero of frontier science and technology. At first sight, our six heroes can be divided in those who are pro- and those who are anti-technology. Yet in the end technology, and more specifically GM technology, does not emerge as the main issue. (...) Empowering the poor, finding solutions for urgent climate problems, and enhancing the quality of our daily relations to food and the environment – these are the issues the heroes are fighting for. Relations between innovation and technology are better seen as a matter of pragmatic consideration, we will argue. (shrink)