Recent developments in science and technology point to the need to unify, and extend, the definition of memory. On the one hand, molecular neurobiology has shown that memory is largely a chemical process, which includes conditioning and any form of stored experience. On the other hand, information technology has led many to claim that cognition is also extended, that is, memory may be stored outside of the brain. In this paper, we review these advances and describe the increasingly accepted extended (...) definition of memory. This definition is largely accepted in neuroscience but not explicitly stated. In the extended definition, memory is the capacity to store and/or retrieve information. Does this new definition of memory mean that everything is now a form of memory? We stress that memory still requires incorporation, that is, a corpore. It is a relationship -- where one biological or chemical process is incorporated into another, and changes both in a permanent way. Looking at natural and biological processes of incorporation can help us think of how incorporation of internal and external memory occurs in cognition. We further argue that, if we accept that there is such a thing as the storage of information outside the brain -- and that this organic, dynamic process can also be called “memory” -- then we open the door to a very different world. The mind is not static. The brain, and the memory it uses, is a work in progress; we are not now who we were then. (shrink)

How has the storage of information shaped human cognition? We bring together current advances in cognitive science, the neurobiology of memory, and archaeology to explore how storage of information affects consciousness. These fields strongly suggest that the increase in storage of information in the environment – which we call exosomatic storage of information – may have led to changes in human consciousness and human neurophysiology over time. To bring these findings together conceptually, we develop what we call a dialectical model (...) of the relationship between storage of information and the development of human consciousness. Using the system of dialectic philosophy, we put forward that (a) environmental changes, consciousness, and neurophysiology develop together, (b) these changes were irreversible, (c) quantitative increases in exosomatic storage of information may have led to qualitative changes in human consciousness and neurophysiology, (d) these changes in turn affected how we see ourselves. Indeed, our capacity to store information exosomatically distinguishes us from other animals, and may be a key attribute of our self-awareness and therefore self-consciousness. Because metaphors are central to human thought and can help structure scientific inquiry, we illustrate our model using a metaphor of drops of silver on the back of a glass, eventually making a mirror—where successive quantitative change leads to an irreversible qualitative development in human consciousness. The dialectic model can offer new insights into the co-evolution of material culture and human beings through its broader philosophical foundations and explanatory power. (shrink)

This article addresses the service of financial companies to society from the perspective of the Catholic Social Teaching (hereinafter CST), specifically regarding conflicts of interest between banks and their customers. The article begins with a case based on interviews with professionals in the financial sector, which provides the context for the CST’s contribution. The analysis of the aforementioned conflicts points to an apparent disconnect between service to society and service to customers. Thus, the bank would set aside the customer’s interests (...) in exchange for a better service to society through good results. This article presents the CST’s normative framework to analyze this matter through some of the CST’s principles: the centrality of the person, the respect for her dignity, and the orientation to the common good. These principles and the CST’s ethical concept of service provide guidance in assessing these conflicts of interest. From an ethical point of view and according to CST, there cannot be a true service to society if the dignity of the client is not respected. It is necessary to review the organization’s incentive policy and level of awareness about the importance of customer service. We end with recommendations related to conflicts of interest with clients. (shrink)

We explore offshore outsourcing through the lenses of Catholic Social Teaching (CST). First, we review the outcomes of the 30-year debate in business ethics on issues related to offshore outsourcing. We then cluster authors into two groups—the justice-centered approach and the welfare-centered approach—corresponding to different perspectives on the ethical challenges of offshoring. In the second part, we present and apply the four fundamental principles of the CST (human dignity, subsidiarity, solidarity and the common good) to offshoring, in dialogue with the (...) previous debate. The unity and interconnection among the CST’s fundamental tenets provide a cohesive framework that integrates the points made by the justice-centered and welfare-centered approaches, while introducing the principle of solidarity, more focused on the worker as a person and their flourishing. CST also stresses the need to initiate processes oriented toward structural changes for the sake of human dignity and the common good. (shrink)

What is the experience of creating a synergistic approach to arts and sciences practice in a learning community focused on the notion of sustainable development? In this article, I answer this question through an evolutionary approach to societal transformation. My social research inquiry integrates the arts and sciences, a learning and design community, sustainable development, and Internet networking. Codesigners created the conditions to explore in multimodal dialogue and engage, guide, and design the emergence of what I call evolutionary artscience through (...) portfolios and a new systems design space-the ArtSciLAB (an online artscience laboratory). Eighteen individuals working in nine countries participated in the Evolutionary Learning Community Network. Our learning and design experience, guided by Evolutionary Systems Design inquiry supports General Evolution Theory. We guided the Evolutionary Learning Community Network and designed the ArtSciLAB to incubate localized knowledge for development in learning regions worldwide. (shrink)

Ciencia e ideología: reportaje a Gregorio Klimovsky.--Grupo de Estudio sobre Ciencia y Subdesarrollo. Ciencia dependiente en la Argentina.--Varsavsky, O. Ideología y verdad. Ciencia y estilos de desarrollo.--Simpson, T.M. Irracionalidad, ideología y objetividad.--García, R.V. Ciencia política y concepcíon del mundo.--Schvarzer, J. La ideología de un científico puro.

"Gregorio Piaia si è formato presso l'Università di Padova, dove si laureò il 17 febbraio 1968 con una tesi coordinata da Carlo Giacon sul tema dell'averroismo politico nel pensiero di Marsilio da Padova. Tra i suoi maestri è da ricordare ancora Giovanni Santinello, del quale fu il principale collaboratore nel guidare il gruppo di lavoro formato da giovani studiosi impegnati nel progetto di una grande Storia delle storie generali della filosofia, uscita in prima edizione in lingua italiana tra il (...) 1979 e il 2004 ed ora in corso di traduzione e aggiornamento in lingua inglese. La vita "pubblica" di Piaia si è svolta essenzialmente nella sua funzione di professore universitario, all'inizio come docente in formazione presso l'Università di Padova, poi quale professore associato presso l'Università di Verona, infine dal 1987 di nuovo a Padova, dove in qualità di professore ordinario tenne per quasi trent'anni la cattedra di storia della filosofia. Padova, Verona, il Veneto: certamente questi sono stati i riferimenti territoriali entro i quali si è compiuta la carriera accademica del bellunese Piaia. Ma egli estese ben presto l'ambito della sua attività di docente oltre questi limiti geografici, in Europa e nelle Americhe. Lo stesso spirito di apertura ha animato l'attività scientifica di Gregorio Piaia, che non si è svolta in limiti territoriali o di scuola precisi ma all'interno di una vasta "repubblica delle lettere" dai contorni più internazionali che nazionali: ne è testimonianza il suo ruolo di direttore o redattore di importanti riviste e la sua presenza nelle più rilevanti società di promozione degli studi filosofici e storico-filosofici. Non meno degna di nota, infine, è la sua costante attenzione e disponibilità nei confronti dei giovani studiosi. Il presente volume intende essere modesto segno della stima di cui gode e dell'ampiezza dei suoi interessi di ricerca." --Contratapa. (shrink)

Business Ethics: A European Review, EarlyView.

When organized into functional categories, the set of texts found in the Ugaritic archive in the “Maison du prêtre-magicien” manifests a clear raison d’être as a collection. Of the twelve main categories of texts from this deposit, the most significant serve to justify various forms of magical praxis and detail how to carry them out. Almost the entire collection of Ugaritic offering texts is found here, since all include a purification rite of the king, the responsibility of the magician priest (...) as mḥll, whose function is stated in KTU 1.119. This fact had been ignored up to now. In addition, the main texts setting out the royal ideology were entrusted to this magician priest, thus reflecting their magical-cultic nature. Additional texts belong to the realm of scribal training, another responsibility of this public official. The adjacent library with a wide variety of Akkadian texts was of fundamental value in this latter connection. (shrink)

SÍNTESE - No Discurso sobre o método e em outros textos Descartes vê uma oposição entre verdade e história e, por isso, recusa metodologicamente qualquer relação com o passado filosófico. Nisto é seguido por muitos de sua época, sendo que Malebranche o supera nesta reivindicação. Entretanto, a "astúcia da razão" mostra que coube exatamente à filosofia anti-histórica de Descartes o mérito de haver dado uma nova fisionomia à história filosófica que se desenvolveu no século XVI como gênero literário, e que (...) se encontra na raiz da transformação da "história dos filósofos" em "história da filosofia". (shrink)

To overcome the art-craft dualism, a root and branch reform of a traditionally hegemonic view on human activities is needed. By focusing on Gilbert Simondon’s fundamental claims, the article aims to display the most important consequences of a more in-depth understanding of poiesis, especially in relation to its reintegration with the sphere of praxis and collective ethos and to its connections with the idea of creativity. The field of production will lastly be associated with the concept of “living practice”, regarded (...) as important for the definition of a contemporary poietics. (shrink)

The conventional portrait of Thomas Hobbes that emerged in twentieth century histories of philosophy is that of the quintessential mechanical philosopher, who openly broke with philosophical tradition (together with René Descartes). Hobbes’s scholars depicted a more correct and detailed panorama, by analyzing Hobbes’s debt towards Aristotelian and Renaissance traditions, as well as the problematic nature of the epistemological status that Hobbes attributes to natural philosophy. However, Hobbes’s connection to modern Galilean science remains problematic. How and in what way did Hobbes (...) take inspiration from Galileo? In this article, I analyze Hobbes’s natural philosophy by addressing three topics: (1) his connection with some aspects of seventeenth-century Aristotelianism; (2) differences and analogies between Hobbes’s and Galileo’s epistemological approaches; and (3) the Galilean foundation of Hobbes’s philosophy. Through this analysis I want to show in which sense Hobbes can be properly defined a “Galilean philosopher”. (shrink)

Volume I. Interpellazioni e surdeterminazioni.

Preface R. Baine Harris Most Western scholars are not aware of the complexity, richness, and antiquity of Indian Philosophy. It is one of the oldest, ...

Lire les �uvres de philosophie grecque revient la plupart du temps à lire un corpus limité de textes érigés en «classiques» déconnectés de leurs sites. Pour désenclaver cette sélection, on propose ici d�ouvrir le canon des textes philosophiques grecs moyennant une prise en compte des voyages de ces textes en Occident, de leur forme ainsi que de leur lieu de production. L�article décrit d�une part deux formes de transit des textes philosophiques grecs?: le transit homogène philologico-humaniste, le transit hétérogène des (...) médiations entre nous et l�antiquité. D�autre part, on présente trois formes situées dans l�espace grec?: le logos du temple de Parménide, le dialogos du théâtre de Platon et la dialogê du Lycée d�Aristote. (shrink)

_The Dead Mother_ brings together original essays in honour of André Green. Written by distinguished psychoanalysts, the collection develops the theme of his most famous paper of the same title, and describes the value of the dead mother to other areas of clinical interest: psychic reality, borderline phenomena, passions and identification. The concept of the 'dead mother' describes a clinical phenomenon, sometimes difficult to identify, but always present in a substantial number of patients. It describes a process by which the (...) image of a living and loving mother is transformed into a distant figure; a toneless, practically inanimate, dead parent. In reality, the mother remains alive, but she has psychically 'died' for the child. This produces a depression in the child, who carries these feelings within him into adult life, as the experience of the loss of the mother's love is followed by the loss of meaning in life. Nothing makes sense any more for the child, but life seems to continue under the appearance of normality. _The Dead Mother_ is a valuable contribution to literature on psychoanalytic and psychotheraputic approaches to grief, loss and depression. (shrink)

In 1870, the most important journal of Allan Kardec's spiritist school, the "Revue Spirite", ascribes a superlative role to France in the intellectual world and encourages soldiers to defend their fatherland. The defeat against Prussia is interpreted as a punishment for crimes of the Premier Empire. The journal recognizes the necessity of reforms, but it does not support the Commune in 1871.

SummaryThis article examines the relationship of Jeremy Bentham and some of his disciples within Romantic Liberalism in the Mediterranean in the early 1820s. By studying the content of Bentham's correspondence with his collaborators and some Spanish political leaders, the text sheds light on Bentham's ideas on constitutional rule, the independence of Latin America and religious tolerance.

Teoría del derecho / G.R.Morchon. - v.1.

This research paper is a reflective exercise concerning a philosophy of difference. As a pre-text, the narrative by Joao Anzanello Carrascoza, Sign of the Times (Señal de los tiempos) has been selected. Based on this narrative text, a manner of text will be propitiated in which two words will be in..

Although work–family conflict is highly relevant for both families and businesses, scarce attention has received from business ethics perspective. This article focuses on the latter, presenting a set of relevant insights from Catholic Social Teaching (CST). After reviewing the foundations and principles presented by CST regarding work–family relationships, a set of normative propositions are presented to develop work–family policies and for a correct personal work–family balance. It is argued that business responsibility with employees’ family should be considered as a part (...) of Corporate Social Responsibility. In addition, the applications of these principles and propositions can lead to a mutual enrichment of both business and family. (shrink)