Scientific peer reviewers play an integral role in the grant selection process, yet very little has been reported on the levels of participation or the motivations of scientists to take part in peer review. The American Institute of Biological Sciences developed a comprehensive peer review survey that examined the motivations and levels of participation of grant reviewers. The survey was disseminated to 13,091 scientists in AIBS’s proprietary database. Of the 874 respondents, 76% indicated they had reviewed grant applications in the (...) last 3 years; however, the number of reviews was unevenly distributed across this sample. Higher review loads were associated with respondents who had submitted more grant proposals over this time period, some of whom were likely to be study section members for large funding agencies. The most prevalent reason to participate in a review was to give back to the scientific community and the most common reason to decline an invitation to review was lack of time. Interestingly, few suggested that expectation from the funding agency was a motivation to review. Most felt that review participation positively influenced their careers through improving grantsmanship and exposure to new scientific ideas. Of those who reviewed, respondents reported dedicating 2–5% of their total annual work time to grant review and, based on their self-reported maximum review loads, it is estimated they are participating at 56–87% of their capacity, which may have important implications regarding the sustainability of the system. Overall, it is clear that participation in peer review is uneven and in some cases near capacity, and more needs to be done to create new motivations and incentives to increase the future pool of reviewers. (shrink)

The National Science Foundation's (NSF) role in, and influence on, the National Nanotechnology Initiative (NNI) can best be understood through an examination of the NSF's history. Because of the NSF's weakened position at its founding in 1950 and obstacles faced throughout its history, the NSF developed a discursive strategy that focuses on making a causal link between support for basic science and societal benefits, and an operational strategy focused on growing its constituency through infrastructural support. The hallmarks of both of (...) these strategies are present in the NNI. (shrink)

Seamon, Luo, and Gallo reported evidence that nonconscious processes could produce false recognition in a converging-associates task, whereby subjects falsely remember a nonstudied lure after studying a list of related words . Zeelenberg, Plomp, and Raaijmakers failed to observe this false recognition effect when list word recognition was at chance. We critically evaluate the evidence for nonsconscious processing and report the results of a new experiment designed to overcome previous methodological limitations. Consistent with Seamon et al., we found that (...) conscious activation of a related lure during study was not necessary for its subsequent recognition; consistent with Zeelenberg et al., we found no evidence for recognition of related lures under conditions where there was no memory for studied words. It is currently unknown whether conscious recollection of the studied items is necessary for false recognition or if nonconscious activation of the lure is sufficient. (shrink)

Despite the presumed frequency of conflicts of interest in scientific peer review, there is a paucity of data in the literature reporting on the frequency and type of conflicts that occur, particularly with regard to the peer review of basic science applications. To address this gap, the American Institute of Biological Sciences conducted a retrospective analysis of conflict of interest data from the peer review of 282 biomedical research applications via several onsite review panels. The overall conflicted-ness of these panels (...) was significantly lower than that reported for regulatory review. In addition, the majority of identified conflicts were institutional or collaborative in nature. No direct financial conflicts were identified, although this is likely due to the relatively basic science nature of the research. It was also found that 65 % of identified conflicts were manually detected by AIBS staff searching reviewer CVs and application documents, with the remaining 35 % resulting from self-reporting. The lack of self-reporting may be in part attributed to a lack of perceived risk of the conflict. This result indicates that many potential conflicts go unreported in peer review, underscoring the importance of improving detection methods and standardizing the reporting of reviewer and applicant conflict of interest information. (shrink)

Numerical tables are important objects of study in a range of fields, yet they have been largely ignored by historians of science. This paper contrasts and compares ways in which numerical tables were used by Galileo and Mersenne, especially in the Dialogo and Harmonie Universelle. I argue that Galileo and Mersenne used tables in radically different ways, though rarely to present experimental data. Galileo relied on tables in his work on error theory in day three of the Dialogo and also (...) used them in a very different setting in the last day of the Discorsi. In Mersenne's case they represent an important but so far unrecognized feature of his notion of universal harmony. I conclude by presenting a classification of different ways in which tables were used within the well-defined disciplinary and temporal boundaries of my research. In doing so, however, I provide a useful tool for extending similar investigations to broader domains. (shrink)

In December 1924 Wolfgang Pauli proposed the idea of an inner degree of freedom of the electron, which he insisted should be thought of as genuinely quantum mechanical in nature. Shortly thereafter Ralph Kronig and, independently, Samuel Goudsmit and George Uhlenbeck took up a less radical stance by suggesting that this degree of freedom somehow corresponded to an inner rotational motion, though it was unclear from the very beginning how literal one was actually supposed to take this picture, since it (...) was immediately recognised that it would very likely lead to serious problems with Special Relativity if the model were to reproduce the electron's values for mass, charge, angular momentum, and magnetic moment. However, probably due to the then overwhelming impression that classical concepts were generally insufficient for the proper description of microscopic phenomena, a more detailed reasoning was never given. In this contribution I shall investigate in some detail what the restrictions on the physical quantities just mentioned are, if they are to be reproduced by rather simple classical models of the electron within the framework of Special Relativity. It turns out that surface stresses play a decisive role and that the question of whether a classical model for the electron does indeed contradict Special Relativity can only be answered on the basis of an exact solution, which has hitherto not been given. (shrink)

Perhaps no philosopher is more of a conundrum than Nietzsche, the solitary rebel, poet, wayfarer, anti-revolutionary Aufklärer and theorist of aristocratic radicalism. His accusers identify in his 'superman' the origins of Nazism, and thus issue an irrevocable condemnation; his defenders pursue a hermeneutics of innocence founded ultimately in allegory. In a work that constitutes the most important contribution to Nietzschean studies in recent decades, Domenico Losurdo instead pursues a less reductive strategy. Taking literally the ruthless implications of Nietzsche's anti-democratic (...) thinking - his celebration of slavery, of war and colonial expansion, and eugenics - he nevertheless refuses to treat these from the perspective of the mid-twentieth century. In doing so, he restores Nietzsche's works to their complex nineteenth-century context, and presents a more compelling account of the importance of Nietzsche as philosopher than can be expected from his many contemporary apologists. (shrink)

Cassirer’s concept of symbolic forms represents a cultural-philosophical approach in which specific modes of objectification, the symbolic forms themselves, establish an independent truth. This truth does not consist in a purely analytical truth, but in the fact that we live along these symbolic forms in a specific stubbornness. When we use language, we live and experience language in its specific autonomy. The same applies to the other symbolic forms developed by Cassirer. Both before the cultural-philosophical phase of creation and within (...) the philosophy of symbolic forms, Cassirer refers to mathematics several times. An interesting tension arises as to whether Cassirer could have understood mathematics as a symbolic form in its own right. On the one hand, cultural-historical considerations in Cassirer’s work speak in favour of this; on the other hand, Cassirer embeds mathematics as a mere formal science in physics and thus in the philosophical form of science as a whole. The article explores this tension—mathematics as a symbolic form—and shows that only indications within the framework of the historical-hermeneutical treatment would speak in favour of such an interpretation. Furthermore, the article argues that a specific, cultural-historical semiotics can be considered for mathematics in Cassirer’s work. (shrink)

Este articulo tiene el objetivo de cuestionar los sentidos del aula de filosofia, sobre todo en la educaciön secundaria. Para eso, parte de la definiciön de filosofia expuesta por Deleuze y Guattari en Qu'est-ce que la philosophie?, donde la senala como una actividad de creaciön de conceptos, hace critica a las concepciones del aula de filosofia como momentos de reflexion, de contemplaciön o incluso de diälogos, una vez que ninguna de estas tareas se hace especfficamente filosöfica. Para garantizar esa especificidad, (...) intenta caracterizar el aula de filosofia como un "taller de conceptos", un espacio donde el maestro y los alumnos se hacen creadores de conceptos, alrededor de problemas vividos, tomando como herramientas los conceptos histöricamente producidos. (shrink)

As a reply to the commentary (Humphreys in Found Sci, 2012), we explore the methodological implications of seeing artificial neural networks as generic classification tools, we show in which sense the use of descriptions and models in data analysis is not equivalent to the original empirical use of epicycles in describing planetary motion, and we argue that agnostic science is essentially related to the type of problems we ask about a phenomenon and to the processes used to find answers.

Este artículo busca presentar el legado teórico-político de Rousseau a través de la interpretación de su _Discurso sobre los orígenes y fundamentos de la desigualdad entre los hombres y el Contrato social_, entendidos como una unidad argumentativa y metodológica en la obra del ginebrino. Para esto se expondrán en un primer momento las consideraciones normativas y antropológicas que marcan el problema político de Rousseau. A partir de allí se presentarán las ideas principales de su noción de democracia, para finalmente concluir (...) que el legado democrático de Rousseau resulta particularmente útil como elemento crítico en el contexto de la hegemonía de las democracias representativas liberales actuales. (shrink)

A fascinating property of germ cells is their ability to maintain totipotency throughout development. At fertilization, this totipotency is unleashed and the egg generates all the cell types needed to make a brand new organism. Occasionally, germ cells differentiate precociously in the embryo or in the gonads and form teratomas, tumors containing many differentiated somatic cell types. Until recently, the genetic basis for teratoma formation was not known. The unexpected discovery of a teratoma in a C. elegans double mutant points (...) to translational control as a key mechanism to maintain totipotency in developing germ cells. BioEssays 28: 865–867, 2006. © 2006 Wiley periodicals, Inc. (shrink)

Il presente numero di “Rivista di estetica” raccoglie diversi contributi che intendono riflettere oggi sui limiti e sulle possibilità di un approccio estetico-filosofico alle nuove istanze (sia tecniche che narrative) che ci giungono da questo oggetto sempre da identificare chiamato film. Come si sa, il cinema, fin dalle sue origini, ha generato un complesso insieme di discorsi intorno a sé. Il cinema è stato cioè continuamente trattato, discusso, analizzato, fatto oggetto di studio, dalla st...

The energy-momentum tensor for a particular matter component summarises its local energy-momentum distribution in terms of densities and current densities. We re-investigate under what conditions these local distributions can be integrated to meaningful global quantities. This leads us directly to a classic theorem by Max von Laue concerning integrals of components of the energy-momentum tensor, whose statement and proof we recall. In the first half of this paper we do this within the realm of Special Relativity and in the traditional (...) mathematical language using components with respect to affine charts, thereby focusing on the intended physical content and interpretation. In the second half we show how to do all this in a proper differential-geometric fashion and on arbitrary space-time manifolds, this time focusing on the group-theoretic and geometric hypotheses underlying these results. Based on this we give a proper geometric statement and proof of Laue's theorem, which is shown to generalise from Minkowski space to space-times with significantly less symmetries. This result, which seems to be new, not only generalises but also clarifies the geometric content and hypotheses of Laue's theorem. A series of three appendices lists our conventions and notation and summarises some of the conceptual and mathematical background needed in the main text. (shrink)

General Relativity offers the possibility to model attributes of matter, like mass, momentum, angular momentum, spin, chirality etc. from pure space, endowed only with a single field that represents its Riemannian geometry. I review this picture of ‘Geometrodynamics’ and comment on various developments after Einstein.

Moving from Paris, Pisa, and Oxford to London, Amsterdam, and Cambridge, this essay documents extensive collaborations between anatomists and mathematicians. At a time when no standard way to acknowledge collaboration existed, it is remarkable that in all the cases I discuss anatomists expressed in print their debt to mathematicians. The cases I analyze document an extraordinarily fertile period in the history of anatomy and science and call into question historiographic divisions among historians of science and medicine. I focus on Steno's (...) Myology, showing how his collaboration with mathematician Viviani led to a geometrical treatment of muscular contraction and to an epistemology inspired by Galileo. The collaboration between Steno and Viviani enables us to interpret a major text in the history of anatomy, one whose implications had so far eluded historians. (shrink)

In this paper the affiliation of Lévi-Strauss with the functional structuralism of Trubetzkoy and Jakobson is defined as “explicit linguistics” and the consonance with the works of Franz Boas is also thrown into relief. As “implicit linguistics” is defined his accurate attention to lexical facts, in the case of questions of nomenclature and in particular of the terminology of kinship. As this regards, Lévi-Strauss perfectly captures not only the differences between linguistic systems and anthropological systems, but also their respective integration. (...) In this way he comes to surmount the model itself of the functional structuralism of a certain linguistics which is too predictive. Finally, in homage to the great scholar, two examples are proposed of the integration of linguistics “without adjectives” and anthropology “without adjectives” in relation to the etymology of gr. anthropos, seen from the point of view of a specific sociolinguistic hierarchy and within the frame of the Indo-Mediterranea area, and of the Indo-European name of the woman of marriageable age (gr. gyné) seen in the perspective of the innovative conditions of exogamous marriage. (shrink)

We show that every model of IΔ0 has an end extension to a model of a theory where log-space computable function are formalizable. We also show the existence of an isomorphism between models of IΔ0 and models of linear arithmetic LA.

The relations between the Iranian, in particular Zoroastrian, and Jewish apocalyptic literature as well as their mutual influences have, since the beginning of the twentieth century, constituted a rich and exciting battlefield for the scholars of these respective traditions. This article aims to present some topics concerning the definition of Iranian apocalyptics and its relation with its Jewish counterpart, as well as to establish an updated starting point for a new scholarly debate.

O presente texto relata a experiência da produção de dois vídeos: Rotas da Marrabenta - Música Moçambicana em Movimento e “Esta cultura que te conduz a saber ser”: Um olhar sobre o fortalecimento das capacidades nacionais para a salvaguarda do patrimônio imaterial nos países africanos de língua oficial portuguesa.. Discutindo a categoria de Patrimônio Cultural Imaterial o texto aponta as possibilidades de se pensar e mostrar a diversidade cultural e social do continente africano por meio de uma linguagem audiovisual em (...) diálogo com a antropologia. Palavras Chave: Patrimônio Cultural Imaterial, audiovisual, Moçambique, Cabo Verde. (shrink)

*Doutor pela Universidade Estadual de Campinas. Professor da Universidade Estadual de Campinas. ** Docteur à la Université de Paris 8. Professeur de philosophie de l'éducation, Université de Rouen. Apoio: CAPES-COFECUB. A noção de diferença ganhou o mundo, no final do século vinte, e chegou ao campo teórico da educação e às escolas. Educar a diferença; educar na diferença; educar para a diferença passaram a ser palavras de ordem em planos de educação de órgãos governamentais, em projetos políticos pedagógicos de escolas, (...) em projetos de organizações não governamentais. Projetos multiculturais proliferam, culturas de paz, tolerância e convivência consensual são afirmadas nos mais diversos âmbitos. No caso específico do Brasil, a diferença passou a ser palavra-chave das políticas públicas, seja para embasar a pluralidade, seja para embasar a educação inclusiva. Mas uma pergunta se impõe: compreendemos, de fato, a diferença? Vivemos a diferença, ou ela está apenas em nossos discursos? Enfim: como nos relacionamos com as diferenças? A problemática tem ganhado diferentes contornos nos dois países nos últimos anos. No Brasil, as últimas duas décadas foram momento de desenvolvimento de políticas públicas de cunho afirmativo, centrados na perspectiva de uma educação inclusiva. Partia-se do princípio de que uma educação democrática deve estar aberta para todos, sem exceção, de modo que a escola deve ser o lugar da manifestação das diferenças, mas tratadas todas de modo igualitário. Diferenças sociais, de gênero, de cor, de cultura, de níveis e condições de aprendizagem devem conviver, num ato solidário de construção de uma cultura democrática comum. Mais recentemente, a emergência de uma onda neoconservadora tem colocado em questão alguns destes princípios e práticas, em reação contrária àquilo que vinha sendo produzido. Um exemplo são os esforços em diversas regiões do País para impedir que questões relativas ao gênero sejam trabalhadas nas escolas; e mesmo os debates colocados em pauta pelo movimento que se autodenomina “Escola sem partido”, que defende a prática de uma suposta “neutralidade” que, sabemos, é impossível no ato educativo. No contexto francês, a problemática assume outros contornos, mas também se reveste de especial importância. País com larga tradição republicana, que se traduz também no campo da educação, vive-se ali de forma intensa a problemática do convívio com imigrantes de diferentes culturas. Lembremos, por exemplo, da proibição do uso de véu islâmico pelas meninas nas escolas públicas, alguns anos atrás, sob a alegação de que a escola é laica e não pode admitir a ostentação de símbolos religiosos. É uma questão de desrespeito ao outro? De desrespeito à liberdade de crença? De desrespeito a uma cultura? Ou afirmação de uma pluralidade em que condições singulares não podem prevalecer sobre o global? Questões certamente polêmicas. E hoje, com a intensificação do movimento de refugiados pela Europa, a questão se vê acirrada. Forças nacionalistas defendem que se limite o acesso ao estrangeiro, ou que este se submeta aos princípios da cultura francesa; mas, anos atrás, filósofos como René Schérer e Jacques Derrida defendiam o princípio da hospitalidade, do acolhimento do outro como sendo um dos mais fundamentais de uma política republicana. Enfim, com histórias diferentes e com contextos muito diferenciados entre si, os dois países se veem confrontados com o dilema de como lidar com as diferenças, de como tratá-las no contexto escolar. O propósito deste dossiê é o de oferecer distintas abordagens conceituais do tema, evidenciando as contribuições que a Filosofia da Educação pode oferecer para pensar os problemas contemporâneos. Ele é fruto das ações de um projeto de cooperação internacional entre universidades brasileiras e universidades francesas financiado pelo acordo CAPES-COFECUB. O projeto se intitula Diferença, Pluralismo e Confiança em Educação e Formação, com vigência entre janeiro de 2015 e dezembro de 2018, e tem como objetivo central pensar conceitualmente estes temas, como forma de oferecer subsídios teóricos para o campo educativo, na interface Brasil-França. Data de registro: 17/05/2017 Data de aceite: 04/12/2016. (shrink)