Este artículo demuestra los resultados de la aplicación de La Filosofía para Niños (FpN) como propuesta didáctica para el fortalecimiento de actitudes críticas y reflexivas sobre el tema de la identidad cultural de manera dialógica en un contexto escolar de Educación General Básica Superior en Cuenca (Ecuador). Para el análisis se utilizó la metodología hermenéutica, a través de la interpretación de las transcripciones de las tres sesiones aplicadas con base a historias creadas con preguntas que generaban discusiones y a través (...) de las cuales se logró fortalecer las actitudes críticas y reflexivas de los estudiantes. (shrink)

The goal of the 2010 Ontology Summit was to address the current shortage of persons with ontology expertise by developing a strategy for the education of ontologists. To achieve this goal we studied how ontologists are currently trained, the requirements identified by organizations that hire ontologists, and developments that might impact the training of ontologists in the future. We developed recommendations for the body of knowledge that should be taught and the skills that should be developed by future ontologists; these (...) recommendations are intended as guidelines for institutions and organizations that may consider establishing a program for training ontologists. Further, we recommend a number of specific actions for the community to pursue. (shrink)

The article deals with the theories of the American philosopher John Searle concerning his embracement of a form of emergentism of the mind and his ideas about consciousness, intentionality with ‘C’, and language as a critique of traditional standpoints closer to positivist theses. Bearing this in mind, the general purpose is to reveal how the philosophy of Searle aims to recover the active role of the agent and, in consequence, the semantic and pragmatic dimensions of language are vindicated, dimensions in (...) which consciousness and intentionality are key to the construction and dynamism of social reality. (shrink)

Resumen. La educación en valores conservacionistas representa una vía para promover cambios permanentesde actitudes, formación de conciencia y sensibilidad hacia los problemas socioambientales, por lo que serequiere la cooperación y participación de las universidades para lograr la internalización de valores en lascomunidades. El presente estudio tiene como objetivo proponer un modelo de gestión ambiental basado envalores conservacionistas que contribuya a la integración de la Universidad Nacional Experimental delTáchira [UNET] con la comunidad Río Chiquito, Parroquia La Petrolea, Municipio Junín, Estado Táchira,Venezuela. (...) Metodológicamente se ubicó en una investigación de campo, descriptiva, bajo la modalidad deproyecto factible, con apoyo en el paradigma cuantitativo, adoptándose el diseño no experimentaltranseccional. La población estuvo conformada por cinco informantes claves encargados del desarrollo deprogramas ambientales y 137 familias del área en estudio; como muestra se seleccionó la totalidad de losinformantes y 102 familias, a quienes se les aplicó un guión de entrevista y un cuestionario, respectivamente,validados mediante la técnica juicios de expertos y obteniéndose un coeficiente Alfa de Cronbach de 0.97indicativo de una confiabilidad muy alta. Los resultados evidencian que en la comunidad poco se practicanvalores conservacionistas, como consecuencia a la no presencia de líderes vecinales que fomenten estosvalores, además, hay una exigua participación comunitaria y universitaria en materia ambiental. Por tanto, serecomienda la elaboración del modelo de gestión ambiental basado en valores conservacionistas paracontribuir en el proceso integración universidad comunidad y así consolidar la formación de un individuo conconciencia conservacionista.Palabras claves. liderazgo vecinal, participación comunitaria, participación universitaria, modelo de gestiónambiental, valores conservacionistas.. Conservation values education represents a way to promote permanent changes in attitudes, raisingawareness and sensitivity to environmental problems, so it requires the cooperation and participation ofuniversities to achieve the internalization of values in communities. This study aims to propose a model ofenvironmental management based on conservation values that contribute to the integration of the UniversidadNacional Experimental del Táchira [UNET] – Río Chiquito, Parroquia La Petrolea, Municipio Junín, EstadoTáchira, Venezuela. Methodologically was located in a field research, descriptive, in the form of feasibleproject, supported in the quantitative paradigm, adopting the experimental design is not transactional. Thepopulation consisted of five key informants responsible for the development of environmental programs and137 families in the study area, as the entire sample was selected informants and 102 families who wereadministered an interview guide and questionnaire, respectively, validated by technical experts and trialsyielding a Cronbach alpha coefficient of 0.97 indicating a very high reliability. The results show that inpractice little community conservation values, due to the non presence of neighborhood leaders to promotethese values, in addition, there is a low participation in community and university environment. Therefore, werecommend the development of environmental management model based on conservation values to contributeto the university community integration process and consolidate the formation of a conservation-consciousindividual.Keywords. conservation values, community involvement, university involvement, leadership, neighborhood,environmental management model. (shrink)

El objetivo es estudiar las relaciones jóvenes- política en el contexto actual de procesos sociales para comprender el sentido de las prácticas políticas de las y los jóvenes universitarios, concretando la indagación con estudiantes de la Fundación Universitaria Los Libertadores. Se problematizan la..

Hegel has long been considered a major thinker of progress. This paper extends Hegel’s philosophy of progress into an outline of a philosophy of technology. It does this not by directly reading the little Hegel wrote on the subject, but by introducing six central Hegelian ideas that bear on the technological thought. It argues that, for Hegel, (1) mankind is destined to change its destiny; (2) that true change involved qualitative change; (3) that true change is conceptual, and not material, (...) change; (4) that history progresses immanently according to its own laws; (5) that history progresses towards ever greater artificiality; and that (6) artificiality is closely linked to freedom. These ideas cohere into a Hegelian metaphysics of technology, which is supportive of the technological enterprise. This paper is meant both to sketch a metaphysical understanding of the technological enterprise, and to trace the intellectual roots of contemporary technological utopianism. (shrink)

ABSTRACTThis paper attempts to shed light on Hegel’s recurring comment that Spinoza’s philosophy lacks the ‘principle of individuality’. It shows that this criticism can have three distinct meanings: that Spinozism cannot account for the multiplicity of finite individuals; that Spinozism leads to a moral devaluation of the finite individual; the form of substance is indifferent and lacks a differentiating principle. It is shown that Hegel argued, somewhat incoherently, for all three.

Urban Digital Twins (UDTs) have become the new buzzword for researchers, planners, policymakers, and industry experts when it comes to designing, planning, and managing sustainable and efficient cities. It encapsulates the last iteration of the technocratic and ultra-efficient, post-modernist vision of smart cities. However, while more applications branded as UDTs appear around the world, its conceptualization remains ambiguous. Beyond being technically prescriptive about what UDTs are, this article focuses on their aspects of interaction and operationalization in connection to people in (...) cities, and how enhanced by metaverse ideas they can deepen societal divides by offering divergent urban experiences based on different stakeholder preferences. Therefore, firstly this article repositions the term UDTs by comparing existing concrete and located applications that have a focus on interaction and participation, including some that may be closer to the concept of UDT than is commonly assumed. Based on the components found separately in the different studied cases, it is possible to hypothesize about possible future, more advanced realizations of UDTs. This enables us to contrast their positive and negative societal impacts. While the development of new immersive interactive digital worlds can improve planning using collective knowledge for more inclusive and diverse cities, they pose significant risks not only the common ones regarding privacy, transparency, or fairness, but also social fragmentation based on urban digital multiplicities. The potential benefits and challenges of integrating this multiplicity of UDTs into participatory urban governance emphasize the need for human-centric approaches to promote socio-technical frameworks able to mitigate risks as social division. (shrink)

This essay proposes a reductive account of robust macro-regularities. On the view proposed, regularities can earn their elite scientific status by featuring in good summaries of restricted regions in the space of physical possibilities: our “modal neighborhoods.” I argue that this view vindicates “nomic foundationalism”, while doing justice to the practice of invoking physically contingent generalizations in higher-level explanations. Moreover, the view suggests an explanation for the particular significance of robust macro-regularities: we rely on summaries of our modal neighborhoods when (...) reasoning hypothetically about “agentially accessible” possibilities. (shrink)

In recent years, character traits in general and virtue-related concepts in particular have been of considerable interest to philosophers, psychological researchers, and practitioners in the business ethics field. Three approaches to character traits can be used to incorporate ethics into organizations: virtues, character strengths, and competencies. The aim of this article is to clarify the concept of character traits, or virtues, and provide a unified operational version of it for incorporation into management. To this end, we first discuss the analogy (...) among virtues, character strengths, and competencies. Then, we propose a list of moral competencies that can be implemented in competency-based human resource management. (shrink)

Purpose The purpose of this paper is to lay out an approach to addressing the problem of privacy protection in the global digital environment based on the importance that information has to improve users’ informational self-determination. Following this reasoning, this paper focuses on the suitable way to provide user with the correct amount of information they may need to maintain a desirable grade of autonomy as far as their privacy protection is concerned and decide whether or not to put their (...) personal data on the internet. Design/methodology/approach The authors arrive at this point in their analysis by qualitative discourse analysis of the most relevant scientific papers and dossiers relating to privacy protection. Findings The goal of this paper is twofold. The first is to illustrate the importance of privacy by default and informed consent working together to protect information and communication technology users’ privacy. The second goal is to develop a suitable way to administrate the mentioned “informed consent” to users. Originality/value To fulfil this purpose, the authors present a new concept of informed consent: active “informed consent” or “Opt-in” model by layers. “Opt-in” regimens have already been used with cookies but never with 2.0 applications, as, for instance, social network sites. (shrink)

Las batallas de gallos en el estilo libre son competiciones que estimulan la creatividad lingüística de los participantes y los elementos y recursos poéticos son ampliamente utilizados para mejorar sus puntuaciones en la competición.Metodológicamente, esta investigación muestra qué son las figuras retóricas fonológicas, cómo se emplean estos recursos en la elaboración de los mensajes realizados por los raperos y se explica cómo el uso de licencias y recurrencias fonológicas y licencias métricas son integradas con el fin de crear un discurso (...) persuasivo y ornamentado, complementando la base musical sobre la que han de crear el discurso. (shrink)

las severas criticas a la iglesia expresadas en el Speculum uite humane por Rodrigo Sanchez de arevalo, encaminadas quizas a una reforma interna de la institucion, fueron interpretadas, sin duda contra la voluntad del autor, como precedentes del luteranismo en Europa.

In British Hegelianism we find, forgotten, a weighty theory of individuality. This theory remains one of the most sustained attempts in the history of philosophy to analyze the individual, not in the social or psychological sense, but as a logical-metaphysical category. The Idealist conceptualization of the individual is bound with their unconventional theory of universals, for they argued that any individual is a “concrete universal,” and vice versa. This article reconstructs the British Idealist theory of individuality, highlighting its key insights: (...) (a) the individual is not a simple unit, but a small system with interrelated parts; (b) the individual is not simply given, but is mediated by thought; (c) the individual is the conceptual glue holding the parts together and assigning them their respective places; (d) the conceptualization of the individual lies at the intersection of logic, aesthetics and systems theory. (shrink)

Development and homeostasis of the haematopoietic system is dependent upon stem cells that have the unique ability to both self‐renew and to differentiate in all cell lineages of the blood. The crucial decision between haematopoietic stem cell (HSC) self‐renewal and differentiation must be tightly controlled. Ultimately, this choice is regulated by the integration of intrinsic signals together with extrinsic cues provided by an exclusive microenvironment, the so‐called haematopoietic niche. Although the haematopoietic system of vertebrates has been studied extensively for many (...) decades, the specification of the HSC niche and its signals involved are poorly understood. Much of our current knowledge of how niches regulate long‐term maintenance of stem cells is derived from studies on Drosophila germ cells. Now, two recently published studies by Mandal et al.1 and Krezmien et al.2 describe the Drosophila haematopoietic niche and signal transduction pathways that are involved in the maintenance of haematopoietic precursors. Both reports emphasize several features that are important for controlling stem cell behavior and show parallels to both the vertebrate haematopoietic niche as well as the Drosophila germline stem cell niches in ovary and testis. The findings of both papers shed new light on the specific interactions between haematopoietic progenitors and their microenvironment. BioEssays 29:713–716, 2007. © 2007 Wiley Periodicals, Inc. (shrink)

El presente trabajo tiene como objetivo conocer las características sociodemográficas y laborales de las mujeres indígenas migrantes hidalguenses que se dedican al trabajo doméstico en el estado de Nuevo León, México. Para alcanzar este objetivo se explorarán la encuesta intercensal del 2015. En comparación con otros movimientos migratorios, la migración interna de mujeres en México ha sido poco estudiada, en particular la protagonizada por población indígena. Entre los principales resultados encontramos que las mujeres migrantes hidalguenses que se dedican al trabajo (...) doméstico remunerado en Nuevo León tienen condiciones de precariedad laboral como producto de la institucionalización social, cultural y jurídica de la desigualdad y la injusticia estructural. Es un trabajo desvalorizado socialmente, ya que se considera propio de la construcción social de los roles de género femenino, como consecuencia encontramos que se legitima la discriminación en términos jurídicos, ante la falta del reconocimiento económico y de sus derechos laborales. (shrink)

Business Ethics, the Environment & Responsibility, EarlyView.

En el marco de los 800 años de la celebración del encuentro de San Francisco y el Sultán, convocado por la Orden Franciscana, el presente artículo pretende indagar sobre la concepción de la imagen del moro en la sociedad colonial y, particularmente reflejados en la serie de 54 cuadros de la vida de san Francisco del Museo de Arte Colonial de San Francisco, Santiago de Chile, confeccionada en el siglo XVII en un taller del Cuzco y cuyo destino fue el (...) Convento homónimo para la formación y contemplación de los religiosos, que nos permite descubrir su representación. El moro representa el signo del individuo o del territorio pagano, en acción o contexto de violencia, pero capaz de la conversión. Estos aspectos son comunes a los prejuicios traídos por los colonizadores, marcados por la larga lucha en la península contra ellos y las políticas de expulsión de esta comunidad desde España. El arte colonial, a su vez, fue un ejercicio de diálogo cultural que adaptó la cultura hispánica a la realidad del nuevo mundo, y, por tanto, permitió la lectura del moro trasladada a las dificultades y éxitos de la evangelización y a la violencia ejercida por los conquistadores. (shrink)

The skills of thinking, reading conceptions and reading practice (literacy levels) found in textbook activities for the sixth year of Primary Education in Social Sciences and Spanish Language in Spain are analyzed in this paper. A mixed methodology is used to triangulate the data, integrating the critical analysis of discourse and two types of statistical analysis: descriptive (frequencies and percentages) and inferential (χ 2, ANOVA, and the Mann-Whitney U Test). The results inform us of both the permanence and the strengthening (...) of the design of an activity oriented toward the development of traditional conceptions of linguistic-cognitive reading. In the framework of education for global citizenship, the conclusion is the need for student reading practices that begin with the principles of critical literacy directed at the acquisition of social, critical, and creative thinking skills. (shrink)

Virtuosity in music performance is often associated with fast, precise, and efficient sound-producing movements. The generation of such highly skilled movements involves complex joint and muscle control by the central nervous system, and depends on the ability to anticipate, segment, and coarticulate motor elements, all within the biomechanical constraints of the human body. When successful, such motor skill should lead to what we characterize as fluency in musical performance. Detecting typical features of fluency could be very useful for technology-enhanced learning (...) systems, assisting and supporting students during their individual practice sessions by giving feedback and helping them to adopt sustainable movement patterns. In this study, we propose to assess fluency in musical performance as the ability to smoothly and efficiently coordinate while accurately performing slow, transitionary, and rapid movements. To this end, the movements of three cello players and three drummers at different levels of skill were recorded with an optical motion capture system, while a wireless electromyogrphy (EMG) system recorded the corresponding muscle activity from relevant landmarks. We analyze the kinematic and coarticulation characteristics of these recordings separately and then propose a combined model of fluency in musical performance predicting music sophistication. Results suggest movements from expert performers' are characterized by consistently smooth strokes and scaling of muscle phasic coactivation. The explored model of fluency as function of movement smoothness and coarticulation patterns was shown to be limited by the sample size but serves as a proof of concept. Results from this study show the potential of a technology-enhanced objective measure of fluency in musical performance, which could lead to improved practices for aspiring musicians, instructors, and researchers. (shrink)

The Shroud of Turin is an old linen fabric imprinted with the image of a tortured man who lies prone with his hands crossed before him. Since for many it is related to Jesus of Nazareth, this cloth is among the most studied, controversial and enigmatic of all archaeological and religious objects. Since its radiocarbon dating at the end of the eighties of the last century, it is considered by many to be an object made in the Middle Ages. The (...) controversy is due to the fact that there are other scientific and artistic evidences that place this object outside the medieval sphere. An argument map is a critical thinking way of representing the relationships between evidences and arguments, and is used here to represent the sequences of argumentation that defend that the Shroud of Turin is not a medieval object. (shrink)

In this paper we study the interaction between symmetric logic and probability. In particular, we axiomatize the convex hull of the set of evaluations of symmetric logic, yielding the notion of probability in symmetric logic. This answers an open problem of Williams ( 2016 ) and Paris ( 2001 ).

Continuous sedation until death is an increasingly common practice in end-of-life care. However, it raises numerous medical, ethical, emotional and legal concerns, such as the reducing or removing of consciousness, the withholding of artificial nutrition and hydration, the proportionality of the sedation to the symptoms, its adequacy in actually relieving symptoms rather than simply giving onlookers the impression that the patient is undergoing a painless 'natural' death, and the perception that it may be functionally equivalent to euthanasia. This book brings (...) together contributions from clinicians, ethicists, lawyers and social scientists, and discusses guidelines as well as clinical, emotional and legal aspects of the practice. The chapters shine a critical spotlight on areas of concern and on the validity of the justifications given for the practice, including in particular the doctrine of double effect. (shrink)

Las reflexiones académicas sobre la educación se han nutrido en múltiples ocasiones de conceptos de otras disciplinas o campos, de esta manera, el presente artículo explora el potencial simbiótico de los laboratorios remotos con la educación inclusiva a través de un rastreo de la literatura latinoamericana alrededor de estas categorías, así como de sus posibles usos didácticos, ya que, gracias a sus características interactivas y culturalmente flexibles, este encuentro conceptual se hace con el objetivo de fortalecer los procesos de emancipación (...) y empoderamiento social desde los grupos históricamente excluidos. (shrink)

First in-depth analysis of this important Mexican philosopher’s work.

This essay introduces and defends Emilio Uranga's philosophical intervention in his 1952 text, Análisis del ser del mexicano. Here, to begin with, a case is made that the Análisis can be read as an effort at decolonizing philosophy. This is followed by a consideration of recent criticisms of “la filosofía de lo mexicano,” which naturally extend to Uranga's text, since this is the philosophical tradition in which we find it. Finally, a defense is given against these critiques and a suggestion (...) is made that in order to properly understand the Análisis it is crucial that one understand both its liberatory impulse and its method. (shrink)

In this work, the evolution of demographic and health patterns in a Basque rural population from Spain is analysed, as they relate to progress in demographic and epidemiological transition. For this purpose, parochial record data on 13,298 births and 9215 deaths, registered during the 19th and 20th centuries (180090) resulting from cardiovascular diseases and malignant neoplasms (post-transition causes). This last point is in contrast with observations from the first four decades of the 20th century, when infectious diseases and respiratory ailments (...) were determining factors in mortality among this population. The data provided by the study of the variation over time in demographic and health patterns indicate that reducing the risk of mortality is one of the most important preconditions for fertility decline. (shrink)

The focus of this work is the analysis of changes in completed family size and possible determinants of that size over time, in an attempt to characterize the evolution of reproductive patterns during the demographic transition. With this purpose in mind, time trends are studied in relation to the mean number of live births per family (as an indirect measure of fertility), using family reconstitution techniques to trace the reproductive history of each married woman. The population surveyed is a Spanish (...) rural community called Lanciego, located at the southern end of the province of Alava (Basque Country). A total of 24,510 parish records of baptisms, marriages and burials made between 1800 and 1969 were examined to obtain the demographic data set. For each reconstituted family, the variables included in the study were the number of live births per family or family size (FAMS), year of marriage (YEAR), age at marriage of both partners (AMAN, AWOM), wife’s age at the end of marriage (WEND), duration of marriage (MARD), age at first maternity (A1CH), length of reproductive span (REPS) and number of children dying before their first anniversary (MINF). Through a principal component analysis, three factors were found that explained more than 75% of the total variance. Association of variables in factors I and III was particularly useful in characterizing the variability of mean family size in pre-transitional, transitional and post-transitional cohorts. During demographic transition, a decreasing trend is observed in the variables FAMS, REPS and MINF, while variables AWOM, AMAN, WEND and A1CH show a tendency to increase over the 20th century. Results obtained by multiple regression analysis confirm that the best predictors of family size (dependent variable) were REPS and MINF, which between them explained over 85% of the total variation in FAMS (R2=0·853). In Lanciego, birth control seems to be present on the evidence of an increase in age at first maternity and a decrease in age at last parturition, indicating that the beginning of the reproductive span is delayed and its end is brought forward. Interaction between family size and infant mortality is discussed in the light of various hypotheses, including replacement of descendants, the so-called biological effect and the theory of r and k selection. (shrink)

Se abordan las nociones de “pueblo” y de “populismo” desarrolladas por Laclau y se presenta la crítica de Zizek a la noción de “pueblo”, desde su defensa de la categoría de “clase social”. Posteriormente se exponen los vínculos entre la teoría queer de Butler, la ciudadanía democrática radical de Mouffe y el populismo de Laclau y se presentan las críticas feministas dirigidas contra el desplazamiento de la categoría “mujeres” efectuado por dichas filosofías. Finalmente se abordan, desde la obra de Millett, (...) MacKinnon y Firestone, las discrepancias entre el marxismo y el feminismo entorno al antagonismo principal de la sociedad (clase social/clase sexual). Así el trabajo aborda las tensiones y desplazamientos entre las categorías “pueblo”, “clase social” y “clase sexual” y la capacidad de cada una de ellas para desencadenar la transformación de la sociedad. (shrink)

El libro “El presente de la filosofía del derecho” de Milagros Otero Parga, catedrática de la Universidad de Santiago de Compostela, es una de las principales novedades bibliográficas del año en el ámbito jurídico. El título da cuenta del carácter comprehensivo de su contenido, pues el ensayo realiza un recorrido por el pasado y el presente de la filosofía del derecho en toda su amplitud. En ese camino, Otero se adentra en las grandes discusiones doctrinales de la disciplina y dialoga (...) con las más autorizadas voces del pasado y el presente, formulando en todo momento una tesis propia que vertebra todo el trabajo. (shrink)

A través de un repaso a las teorías científicas más ortodoxas (a fines del siglo XIX) acerca de la diversidad biológica en nuestra especie —tal y como aparecen en la obra de autores como Darwin, Broca, Huxley, Haeckel, Vogt, etc.— el presente artículo propone la existencia de una conexión ideológica entre las teorías evolutivas sobre las así llamadas "razas humanas" (especialmente los modelos darwinistas sobre evolución humana), y las jerarquías raciales que, a su vez, establecía la lógica económica del imperialismo (...) occidental. (shrink)

Altruism (a costly action that benefits others) and reciprocity (the repayment of acts in kind) differ in that the former expresses preferences about the outcome of a social interaction, whereas the latter requires, in addition, ascribing intentions to others. Interestingly, an individual’s behavior and neurophysiological activity under outcome- versus intention-based interactions has not been compared directly using different endowments in the same subject and during the same session. Here, we used a mixed version of the Dictator and the Investment games, (...) together with electroencephalography, to uncover a subject’s behavior and brain activity when challenged with endowments of different sizes in contexts that call for an altruistic (outcome-based) versus a reciprocal (intention-based) response. We found that subjects displayed positive or negative reciprocity (reciprocal responses greater or smaller than that for altruism, respectively) depending on the amount of trust they received. Furthermore, a subject’s late frontal negativity differed between conditions, predicting responses to trust in intentions-based trials. Finally, brain regions related with mentalizing and cognitive control were the cortical sources of this activity. Thus, our work disentangles the behavioral components present in the repayment of trust, and sheds light on the neural activity underlying the integration of outcomes and perceived intentions in human economic interactions. (shrink)

María Zambrano aproached to the problem of identity in an intenseway in the context of the spanish civil war, the exile and, even more, thecrisis of occidental reason. This problem is enunciated, first, as a debatebetween present and past, meaning, between the way of recover and assumethe tradition;..

Este trabajo tiene por objeto el estudio del bien jurídico de la libre competencia en el mercado como posible bien jurídico digno de tutela penal. Al respecto se plantean dos problemas esenciales: el propio concepto de competencia y el respeto a los principios legitimadores del Derecho penal. Para no argumentar en abstracto, se analiza un problema político-criminal concreto: el delito de corrupción entre particulares como delito contra la competencia en el mercado. El trabajo concluye que el legislador ha ignorado parcialmente (...) el principio de intervención mínima en este ámbito. (shrink)

With Rawls’ project of a theory of justice summarized in two basic principles and the priority of freedom, moral philosophy reemerged as a subject matter worthy of rigorous reflection and able to contribute to the public debate. Rawls presented a rational defence of normative principle of justic..

SummaryThis paper analyses the development of three methods for detecting bloodstains during the first half of the nineteenth-century in France. After dealing with the main problems in detecting bloodstains, the paper describes the chemical tests introduced in the mid-1820s. Then the first uses of the microscope in the detection of bloodstains around 1827 are discussed. The most controversial method is then examined, the smell test introduced by Jean-Pierre Barruel in 1829, and the debates which took place in French academies and (...) learned societies during ensuing years are surveyed. Moving to the courtrooms a review is conducted of how the different methods were employed in criminal trials. By reviewing these cases, the main arguments against Barruel's test during the 1830s are explored as well as the changes making possible the return of the microscope to legal medicine around 1840. By reconstructing the history of these three methods, the paper reveals how the senses of smell and vision were employed in order to produce convincing evidence in both academies and courts. The paper questions two linear master narratives that are organized in terms of progress and decline: the development of forensic science as a result of continued technological progress; and the supposed decline of smell in the history of the senses, particularly in the realm of chemistry and medicine. (shrink)

This essay explores how the enhanced sensitivity of chemical tests sometimes produced unforeseen and puzzling problems in nineteenth-century toxicology. It focuses on the earliest uses of the Marsh test for arsenic and the controversy surrounding “normal arsenic”—that is, the existence of traces of arsenic in healthy human bodies. The essay follows the circulation of the Marsh test in French toxicology and its appearance in the academy, the laboratory, and the courtroom. The new chemical tests could detect very small quantities of (...) poison, but their high sensitivity also offered new opportunities for imaginative defense attorneys to undermine the credibility of expert witnesses. In this context, toxicologists had to dispel the uncertainty associated with the new method and come up with arguments to refute the many possible criticisms of their findings, among them the appeal to normal arsenic. Meanwhile, new descriptions of animal experiments, autopsies, and cases of poisoning produced a steady flow of empirical data, sometimes supporting but in many cases questioning previous conclusions about the reliability of the chemical tests. This challenging scenario provides many clues about the complex interaction between science and the law in the nineteenth century, particularly how expert authority, credibility, and trustworthiness were constructed, and frequently challenged, in the courtroom. (shrink)

Summary The paper follows the lives of Mateu Orfila and François Magendie in early nineteenth-century Paris, focusing on their common interest in poisons. The first part deals with the striking similarities of their early careers: their medical training, their popular private lectures, and their first publications. The next section explores their experimental work on poisons by analyzing their views on physical and vital forces in living organisms and their ideas about the significance of animal experiments in medicine. The last part (...) describes their contrasting research on the absorption of poisons and the divergences in their approaches, methods, aims, standards of proof, and intended audiences. The analysis highlights the connections between nineteenth-century courtrooms and experimental laboratories, and shows how forensic practice not only prompted animal experimentation but also provided a substantial body of information and new research methods for dealing with major theoretical issues like the absorption of poisons. (shrink)

Tras un breve recuerdo del debate centenario sobre la filosofía cristiana, el autor discute la nueva propuesta de Alasdair MacIntyre de mejorar una «filosofía católica» en el contexto de nuestra moderna crisis en la relación entre fe y razón. El autor comparte el diagnóstico sobre nuestra situación presente en las universidades de investigación y sobre su exclusión pragmática de la filosofía y la teología, las cuales, en el mejor caso, son reducidas a disciplinas especializadas sin relevancia para otras disciplinas, y, (...) en la mayoría de los casos, son simplemente expulsadas del ámbito de la investigación científica. La propuesta dialéctica de MacIntyre en Tres versiones rivales de la ética y en Dios, Filosofía, Universidades, aparte de otras obras menores, se examina críticamente y se presenta como una forma nueva de comprometer a los pensadores católicos y no católicos en una confrontación abierta y fructífera, en lugar de nuestro confinamiento actual en mundos cerrados de investigación falsamente científica. After a brief recollection of the century long debate about Christian philosophy, the author discusses Alasdair Maclntyre’s new proposal to enhance a «Catholic philosophy» in the context of our modern crisis of the relationship between faith and reason. The author shares the diagnosis about our present daj situation of research universities and their pragmatic exclusion of philosophy and theology, which, in the best case, are reduced to specialized disciplines with no import for other disciplines, and, in most cases, are just expelled from the realm of scientfic research. Maclntyre’s dialectical proposal in «Three Rival Versions of Moral Enquiry» and in «God, Philosophy Universities», and in some other minor works, is critically examined and presented as a new way to engage Catholic and non Catholic thinkers in an open and fruitful confrontation, in stead of our present confinement in closed worlds of falsely scientific research. (shrink)