David Friedell has recently discussed the relationship between intrinsic and extrinsic properties of art, specifically in music. Friedell claims that normative social rules dictate who can change the intrinsic or extrinsic properties of a piece of music. I claim that in text-based theater—as a particular art form—the dividing line between intrinsic and extrinsic properties of a play is sometimes tenuous. This tenuousness is due to a play's bifurcated existence as a dramatic text and as many theatrical performances.

BackgroundBreast cancer patients are at elevated risk of depression during treatment, thus provoking the chance of poor clinical outcomes. This retrospective cohort study aimed to investigate whether integrating Chinese herbal medicines citation into conventional cancer therapy could decrease the risk of depression in the long-term breast cancer survivors.MethodsA cohort of patients aged 20–70 years and with newly diagnosed breast cancer during 2000–2008 was identified from a nationwide claims database. In this study, we focused solely on survivors of breast cancer at (...) least1 year after diagnosis. After one-to-one matching for age, sex, and baseline comorbidities, breast cancer patients who received and did not receive CHM treatment were enrolled. The incidence rate and hazard ratio citation for depression between the two groups was estimated at the end of 2012. A Cox proportional hazard model was constructed to examine the impact of the CHM use on the risk of depression.ResultsDuring the study period, the incidence rate of depression was significantly lower in the treated cohort than in the untreated cohort [8.57 compared with 11.01 per 1,000 person-years citation], and the adjusted HR remained significant at 0.74 in a Cox proportional hazards regression model. The corresponding risk further decreasing to 43% among those using CHM for more than 1 year.ConclusionFinding from this investigation indicated that the lower risk of depression observed in breast cancer patients treated with CHM, suggesting that CHM treatment should be considered for disease management toward breast cancer. Yet, the optimal administered dose should be determined in further clinical trials. (shrink)

Extensive research has demonstrated that rs1360780, a common single nucleotide polymorphism within the FKBP5 gene, interacts with early-life stress in predicting psychopathology. Previous results suggest that carriers of the TT genotype of rs1360780 who were exposed to child abuse show differences in structure and functional activation of emotion-processing brain areas belonging to the salience network. Extending these findings on intermediate phenotypes of psychopathology, we examined if the interaction between rs1360780 and child abuse predicts resting-state functional connectivity (rsFC) between the amygdala (...) and other areas of the salience network. We analyzed data of young European adults from the general population (N = 774; mean age = 18.76 years) who took part in the IMAGEN study. In the absence of main effects of genotype and abuse, a significant interaction effect was observed for rsFC between the right centromedial amygdala and right posterior insula (p <.025, FWE-corrected), which was driven by stronger rsFC in TT allele carriers with a history of abuse. Our results suggest that the TT genotype of rs1360780 may render individuals with a history of abuse more vulnerable to functional changes in communication between brain areas processing emotions and bodily sensations, which could underlie or increase the risk for psychopathology. (shrink)

Many believe that the ethical problems of donation after cardiocirculatory death (DCD) have been "worked out" and that it is unclear why DCD should be resisted. In this paper we will argue that DCD donors may not yet be dead, and therefore that organ donation during DCD may violate the dead donor rule. We first present a description of the process of DCD and the standard ethical rationale for the practice. We then present our concerns with DCD, including the following: (...) irreversibility of absent circulation has not occurred and the many attempts to claim it has have all failed; conflicts of interest at all steps in the DCD process, including the decision to withdraw life support before DCD, are simply unavoidable; potentially harmful premortem interventions to preserve organ utility are not justifiable, even with the help of the principle of double effect; claims that DCD conforms with the intent of the law and current accepted medical standards are misleading and inaccurate; and consensus statements by respected medical groups do not change these arguments due to their low quality including being plagued by conflict of interest. Moreover, some arguments in favor of DCD, while likely true, are "straw-man arguments," such as the great benefit of organ donation. The truth is that honesty and trustworthiness require that we face these problems instead of avoiding them. We believe that DCD is not ethically allowable because it abandons the dead donor rule, has unavoidable conflicts of interests, and implements premortem interventions which can hasten death. These important points have not been, but need to be fully disclosed to the public and incorporated into fully informed consent. These are tall orders, and require open public debate. Until this debate occurs, we call for a moratorium on the practice of DCD. (shrink)

In the 1960s and 1970s, Hilary Putnam articulated a notion of relativized apriority that was motivated to address the problem of scientific change. This paper examines Putnam’s account in its historical context and in relation to contemporary views. I begin by locating Putnam’s analysis in the historical context of Quine’s rejection of apriority, presenting Putnam as a sympathetic commentator on Quine. Subsequently, I explicate Putnam’s positive account of apriority, focusing on his analysis of the history of physics and geometry. In (...) the remainder of the paper, I explore connections between Putnam’s account of relativized a priori principles and contemporary views. In particular, I situate Putnam’s account in relation to analyses advanced by Michael Friedman, David Stump, and William Wimsatt. From this comparison, I address issues concerning whether a priori scientific principles are appropriately characterized as “constitutive” or “entrenched”. I argue that these two features need to be clearly distinguished, and that only the constitutive function is essential to apriority. By way of conclusion, I explore the relationship between the constitutive function of a priori principles and entrenchment. (shrink)

Amid increasing demands from students and the public, universities have recently reinvigorated their efforts to increase the number of faculty from underrepresented populations. Although a myriad of piecemeal programs targeting individual recruitment and development have been piloted at several institutions, overall growth in faculty diversity remains almost negligible and highly localized. To bring about genuine change, we hypothesize a consortia approach that links individuals to hiring opportunities within a state university system might be more effective. Here we present a case (...) study describing the progress of the NSF-funded Alliances for Graduate Education and the Professoriate PROMISE Academy Alliance, a consortium within the University System of Maryland collaborating to develop, implement, self-study, evaluate, and disseminate a unique postdoc-to-faculty conversion model in the biomedical sciences. The initiative centers on diversifying faculty across five institutions in the USM, including teaching-focused institutions, comprehensive universities, research institutions, and professional schools. Components of this approach include enhanced recruiting and hiring practices to attract outstanding postdoctoral scholars from underrepresented backgrounds, multi-institutional networking and professional development, and facilitated processes to transition postdocs into tenure-track positions at their postdoctoral institution or another institution in the state system. This model is distinct from more deficit-based approaches because it goes beyond focusing on building the individual’s skills to enter the professoriate. This program restructures the traditionally short-term nature of postdoctoral employment and incorporates a pathway to a tenure-track professorship at the same institution or within the same statewide system where the postdoc is trained. This multi-institutional model leverages collaboration and distinct institutional strengths to create cross-institutional support, advocacy, and policy. Importantly, it uses a decentralized financial structure that makes this approach distinctly replicable. Recognizing the immediate need for more collaborative approaches to diversify faculty and a lack of literature about such approaches, this case study describes the development of, and potential benefits of, a state university system, as well as the qualitative lessons learned from self-study, internal evaluation, external evaluation, and NSF site visits. The AGEP PROMISE Academy can serve as a model for replication at other university systems hoping to diversify their faculty. (shrink)

Michael Friedman’s Dynamics of Reason is a welcome contribution to the ongoing articulation of philosophical perspectives for understanding the sciences in the context of post-positivist philosophy of science. Two perspectives that have gained advocacy since the demise of the “received view” are Quinean naturalism and Kuhnian relativism. In his 1999 Stanford lectures, Friedman articulates and defends a neo-Kantian perspective for philosophy of science that opposes both of these perspectives. His proffered neo-Kantian perspective is presented within the context of the (...) problem of theory change or “scientific revolutions,” and its main feature is a conception of scientific knowledge that requires “relativized constitutive a priori principles.” The lectures make up the first part of the book; the second part of the book, “Fruits of Discussion,” is a further elaboration and defence of the ideas advanced in the lectures. The resulting book serves as a useful sequel to Friedman’s impressive historical studies in Foundations of Space-Time Theories, Kant and the Exact Sciences, and Reconsidering Logical Positivism. In the preface, Friedman tells us that this book represents the philosophical viewpoint that he has arrived at as a result of completing these works. As such, it is not surprising that the prominent themes of the book are ones that have occupied Friedman’s attention in the past, viz., the importance of a priori principles in the exact sciences, the conventionalism of the logical positivists, and, more generally, an articulation of what remains defensible in neo-Kantian philosophy of science. (shrink)

Woods et al. (2015) claim that secular Simple Reaction Time (SRT) slowing (Woodley et al. 2013), disappears once modern studies are corrected for software and hardware lag, and once Galton’s data are corrected for fastest-response selection. Here, this is challenged with a reanalysis of the secular slowing of SRT in the UK amongst large (N>500), population-representative age-matched (≊18-30 years) studies. Starting with Galton’s sample, this is assigned the simulated value estimated by Dodonova and Dodonov (2013, who like Woods et al. (...) were critical of secular SRT slowing, owing to measurement issues) on the basis that he collected the fastest of three trials (207.5ms). The two sexes in Galton’s study are combined (as in Woods et al.), raising the weighted sample mean to 208.5ms. Next is the Wilkinson and Alison (1989) study, which attempted to replicate Galton’s study one century later, collecting SRTs as part of an exhibit in the London Science Museum. An electronic chronoscope recorded SRTs on magnetic tape, and sampled over eight trials with micro-processor-determined variable foreperiods. The mean SRT value for the 1,189 participants aged between 20 and 29 is 245ms. The presence of long and variable foreperiods necessitates a penalty of 10ms (Dodonova & Dodonov, 2013). Another 10ms should be deducted based on key-pressing time (Dodonova & Dodonov, 2013), reducing the mean to 225ms. The studies of Deary and Der (2005) and Der and Deary (2006) are also included. The first utilized the highly representative Scottish Twenty-07 cohort. Dodonova and Dodonov (2013) identified a 53ms lag stemming from liquid crystal stimulus onset delay. This is subtracted from the weighted average of the two sexes (300.8ms), along with another 10ms for key-pressing time. The resultant mean is 237.8ms.Dodonova and Dodonov (2013) cleaned the male data in the Der and Deary (2006) study, collected from the representative UK Health and Lifestyle Survey, by removing cases for which SRT standard deviations exceeded those for choice RT. This reduced the N from 834 to 661, and also reduced the mean from 300ms to 284ms. The estimate was also penalized for LCD onset delay and key-pressing time, reducing the mean to 221ms. When the SRT value for the female sample is penalized equivalently the resulting value is 239ms. In order to simulate the female N for the purposes of taking a weighted average of both sexes, the actual female N is reduced in proportion to the male N (79.3%=881), yielding a weighted mean of 230.9ms for a combined sample-size of 1,472. Table 1 presents the data used in the analysis.Table 1 SRT means, sample sizes and sampling years for four large, age-matched UK samples[Table 1 here]Consistent with Dodonova and Dodonov (2013), N-weighted regression is employed, as the only data on sample variability is sample size. Figure 1 illustrating the secular trend in UK SRT over 100 years.[Figure 1 here] Figure 1. Secular SRT slowing across four large, representative studies from the UK spanning a century. Bubble-size is proportional to sample size. Combined N=6,622. The secular slowing between UK studies is statistically significant (β=0.97; 95% CI=0.969 to 0.971, N=6,622), at –22.8ms a century. Additional evidence for generational SRT slowing comes from Verhaeghen (2014), who suggested that the ratio of longitudinal to cross-sectional age-related slowing might tentatively infer generational changes in processing speed. Verhaeghen reports ratios for two SRT studies (0.91 and 1.15), implying both secular losses and gains. For the study of Deary and Der (2005), the SRT ratios are “censored because they were excessively large” (p. 256). In this study, the ratio of the cross-sectional slowing trend (taking the weighted average of all paired between-cohort differences rescaled in terms of change per decade for males and females), to the weighted average decadal longitudinal slowing trend for both the males and females is 0.73, for an N of 1,926 (cf. Woodley et al., 2014b, for a detailed reanalysis of this dataset). The weighted average of the three SRT ‘Verhaeghen ratios’ is 0.9 (N=4,078) – tentatively consistent with generational declines (i.e. a ratio of <1). In conclusion Woods et al. (2015) have undoubtedly made an important contribution to the debate concerning the role of software and hardware lag in the inflation of contemporary estimates of SRT, however the evidence for generational SRT slowing remains quite compelling. ReferencesDeary, I.J., & Der, G. (2005). Reaction time, age, and cognitive ability: Longitudinal findings from age 16 to 63 years in representative population samples. Aging, Neuropsychology, and Cognition, 12, 187–213.Der, G., & Deary, I.J. (2006). Age and sex differences in reaction time in adulthood: Results from the United Kingdom Health Lifestyle Survey. Psychology and Aging, 21, 62–73.Dodonova, Y.A., & Dodonov, Y.S. (2013). Is there any evidence of historical slowing of reaction time? No, unless we compare apples and oranges. Intelligence, 41, 674–687.Galton, F. (1890). Exhibition of instruments (1) for testing the perception of differences of tint, and (2) for determining reaction-time. Journal of the Anthropological Institute, 19, 27–29.Verhaeghen, P. (2014). The elements of cognitive aging: Meta-analyses of age-related differences in processing speed and their consequences. Oxford: Oxford University Press.Wilkinson, R.T., & Allison, S. (1989). Age and simple reaction time: Decade differences for 5,324 subjects. Journal of Gerontology, 44, 29–35.Woodley, M.A., Madison, G., & Charlton, B.G. (2014b). Possible dysgenic trends insimple visual reaction time performance in the Scottish Twenty-07 cohort: Areanalysis of Deary & Der (2005). Mankind Quarterly, 55, 110-124.Woodley, M.A., te Nijenhuis, J., & Murphy, R. (2013). Were the Victorians cleverer than us? The decline in general intelligence estimated from a meta-analysis of the slowing of simple reaction time. Intelligence, 41, 843–850.Woods, D.L., Wyma, J.M., Yund, E.W., Herron, T.J., & Reed, B. (2015). Factors influencing the latency of simple reaction time. Frontiers in Human Neuroscience, 9:131. (shrink)

Spinoza’s philosophy is bold and rich in challenges to our “common-sense intuitions”, and insofar as it provides powerful arguments to motivate these challenges, I believe that we cannot ask for more. Bold and well-argued philosophy has the indispensable virtue of being able to unsettle and try us, to move us to reconsider what seems natural and obvious, and possibly even to change our most basic beliefs. Indeed, for those who seek to test – rather than confirm - their old and (...) well-fortified intuitions, Spinoza is nothing short of a living spring. My deep support for rigorous, counter-intuitive philosophy notwithstanding, a considerable part of the current paper will be dedicated to an examination and critique of one of the boldest and most fascinating readings of Spinoza of the past few years. In his recent piece, “Rationalism Run Amok: Representation and the Reality of Emotions in Spinoza,” and in his outstanding new book, Michael Della Rocca suggests a strict identification of the relations of inherence, causation, and conception in Spinoza (Della Rocca develops this view partly in response to a position recently articulated by Don Garret). In order to see the striking implications of this claim, one need only realize that, according to Della Rocca, Spinoza holds that insofar as the sun is the (partial) cause of some states of the sunflower, the sunflower (partly) inheres in the sun. Furthermore, insofar as my great-great-grandparents caused me, I inhere in them (though we never co-existed at the same time). The mere oddity of Della Rocca’s claim will play only a limited role, if any, in my discussion below. Della Rocca provides important and interesting arguments to the effect that if we are to accept Spinoza’s radical version of the Principle of Sufficient Reason (henceforth, PSR), we should bite the bullet and accept the odd implications of Spinoza’s alleged view. While I have nothing but admiration for this willingness to read Spinoza in an allegedly consistent and uncompromising manner, I do think that Della Rocca’s argument that a strict endorsement of the PSR leads necessarily to the identification of the relations of inherence, causation and conception is wrong. I will argue that (1) Spinoza never endorsed this identity, and (2) that Della Rocca’s suggestion could not be considered as a legitimate reconstruction or friendly amendment to Spinoza’s system because it creates several severe and irresolvable problems in the system, and for that reason (and not because the threefold identity contravenes common sense) it should be rejected. In the rest of the paper I rely on my analysis of the relations of inherence, causation, and conception, and suggest a new interpretation of core issues in Spinoza’s metaphysics, and particularly of the conceived through and in another relations and the nature of the substance/modes opposition. Against Della Rocca’s claim that the bifurcation of efficient causation (into causation which is, and is not, accompanied by inherence) constitutes an illegitimate brute fact, I will argue that the bifurcation of causation in Spinoza is paralleled by a bifurcation of conception and that the two relations are grounded in the foundational bifurcation of existence into substance and modes. If we are to recognize the reality of modes in Spinoza, we must also acknowledge the bifurcations that result from the bifurcation of existence into substance and modes. (shrink)

Publication date: 26 January 2017 Source: Author: Edward Echidime Eke, Michael A. Oyinloye, Isaac Oluwadare Olamiju - African cities are experiencing uncontrolled expansion. The focus of this paper is to evaluate the impact of urban expansion on landuse types of Akure for the period of 1972 to 2009. In analyzing the u rban expansion of the cit y, 1972 MSS, 1986 Landsat Thematic TM and Landsat Enhanced Thematic Mapper Plus images for 2002 and 2009 satellite image captured from googleearth (...) website were used in a post classification comparison analysis to map the spatial dynamics of landuse / land cover changes and identify the urban expansion of Akure. Questionnaire was also used to determine the factors responsible for the expansion of Akure. The findings showed a rapid expansion in the built-up are a of Akure from 1.00% in 1972 to 2.46% in 1986, 2.46% in1986 to 3.90% in 2002 with an annual growth rate of 10.63% and 3.66% due to increasing population of Akure within these periods respectively. Prediction made showed that the built-up of A kure would expand to 2.66 % in 2022. Th e study recommends review of the outdated 1980 master plan and development control mechanism that will guide the rapid expansion that had been accompanied by loss of vegetation in Akure. (shrink)

Theatrical characters’ dual existence on stage and in text presents a unique, challenging case for the analytical philosopher. -/- Analytic Philosophy and the World of the Play re-examines the ontological status of theatre and its fictional objects through the "possible worlds" thesis, arguing that theatre is not a mirror of our world, but a re-creation of it. Taking a fresh look at theatre’s key elements, including the hotly contested relationships between character and actor; onstage and offstage "worlds"; and the play-text (...) and performance, Michael Y. Bennett presents a radical new way of understanding the world of the play. (shrink)

Biopolitics and dystopia: genomics in Michael Crichton’s Next Resumen: En este artículo se busca demostrar que, mientras el desarrollo científico es propulsado por el pensamiento tecno-optimista, el discurso prevalente sobre genómica en la cultura de masas es pesimista y tiene potencial para impedir la construcción de respuestas adecuadas a los desafíos biopolíticos por parte de los sistemas políticos y jurídicos. Aquí se sostiene que la utopía genómica es la única propuesta optimista que estimula las investigaciones científicas y que permite (...) pensar en las posibles regulaciones y los cambios necesarios para la conceptualización de la idea de propiedad. Estos problemas son ilustrados con la ayuda del libro de Michael Crichton, Next, que proporciona numerosos ejemplos distópicos. Summary: The article seeks to demonstrate that while scientific development is pro- pelled by technooptimistic thought, the prevalent discourse about genomics is pessimistic, which has the potential to forestall the construction of an adequate answer on the part of political and legal systems. It is shown that genomic utopia is the only optimistic proposition which stimulates scientific research as well as enables thinking about regulations and the necessary changes in the conceptualization of the idea of property. These problems are illustrated with the help of Michael Crichton’s book Next, which provides numerous dystopian examples. Palabras clave: biopolítica, distopía, genómica, sociedad abierta, autopropiedad, Crichton. Keywords: biopolitics, dystopia, genomics, open society, self-ownership, Crichton. (shrink)

This “experimental” essay both investigates maps and functions as a map. Taking its cue from the Deleuzean rhizome, this essay proposes a new method of inquiry based upon the Scientific Method. This essay works as a series of displacements. Each piece of new evidence will take the paper in a different direction. After each piece of evidence is introduced, it will be my job to draw conclusions about the displacement. This inquiry works like a Deleuzean map.

In Between the Lines: A Philosophy of Theatre, theatre theorist, Michael Y. Bennett offers a systematic account of theatre--thinking about theatre metaphysically, epistemologically, and ethically. To investigate theatre and its in-between spaces, Bennett introduces some basic ideas about coherence and correspondence and, much more prominently, conversations surrounding subsumption and distinctness in order to better describe theatre as a form of art. Instead of limiting the concept and use of subsumption to suggest that constituent parts are subsumed within a distinct (...) whole, Bennett broadens the concept to claim that many of the properties of a theatrical character and/or a theatrical world are subsumed within the text. -/- Unlike some forms of literary fiction in which a narrator describes the properties of characters in general terms, theatre (particularly for the theatregoer) is largely devoid of distinct properties attributed to theatrical characters. Outside of the fact that theatrical characters speak and perform actions during the time of the play, there are little-to-no specified properties regarding theatrical characters and/or theatrical worlds. In thinking about the conceptual empty spaces of theatre, Bennett investigates three main topics: theatre as an art form, the properties of theatrical characters and theatrical worlds, and the difference between truth and truthfulness in the theatre. (shrink)

Using William Shakespeare’s Hamlet and the play-within-the play, The Murder of Gonzago, as a case study, this essay argues that theatrical utterances constitute a special case of language usage not previously elucidated: the utterance of a statement with propositional content in theatre functions as an event. In short, the propositional content of a particular p (e.g. p1, p2, p3 …), whether or not it is true, is only understood—and understood to be true—if p1 is uttered in a particular time, place, (...) and situation (i.e. during a theatrical event); otherwise, the propositional content in those theatrical utterances can either be false or contingently true. (shrink)

now, there is a debate about the “nature” of the Renaissance French writer Michel de Montaigne’s skepticism that could be similar, in some way, to the Quarrel between the Ancient and the Modern. some authors believe that Montaigne was a completely innovative author, who would have broken completely with the ancient skeptical tradition. others, however, feel that he has made little changes in the skeptical arguments and that his role would be reduced to a mere transmitter of the ancient forgotten (...) thought. Faced with both interpretations, it would be our intention, first of all, to explain the relevance of the montanian skepticism, its importance in the work of the author, and second exposing traditional and innovative positions, make clear their limits. This try to conclude the “truly” skeptical nature the of montanian skepticism, innovative and traditional at the same time. In addition, it attempts to resist the classification of dogmatic theories, traditional or renewal, which would seek to impose their own systems rather than read the author in his own terms. (shrink)

v. 1. East & west philosophy of religion.

Some interesting exceptions notwithstanding, the traditional logic of economic efficiency has long favored hierarchical forms of organization and disfavored democracy in business. What does the balance of arguments look like, however, when values besides efficient revenue production are brought into the picture? The question is not hypothetical: In recent years, an ever increasing number of corporations have developed and adopted socially responsible behaviors, thereby hybridizing aspects of corporate businesses and social organizations. We argue that the joint pursuit of financial and (...) social objectives warrants significant rethinking of organizational democracy’s merits compared both to hierarchy and to non-democratic alternatives to hierarchy. In making this argument, we draw on an extensive literature review to document the relative lack of substantive discussion of organizational democracy since 1960. And we draw lessons from political theory, suggesting that the success of political democracy in integrating diverse values offers some grounds for asserting parallel virtues in the business case. (shrink)

Resumen: Esta nota crítica analiza la perspectiva que Martha Nussbaum presenta sobre la emoción de la ira en su último libro Anger and Forgiveness. Resentment, Generosity, Justice. Para ello sitúo esta obra en el contexto del proyecto filosófico de la autora y señalo algunos cambios y continuidades en su análisis de la ira; después reviso a la luz de este nuevo libro algunas de las críticas que, centradas en la reivindicación de la ira, ha recibido su propuesta de una cultura (...) política centrada en las emociones “humanizadoras”.: This critical note examines Martha Nussbaum’s perspective on anger presented in her last book Anger and Forgiveness. Resentment, Generosity, Justice. I place this book in the context of Nussbaum’s philosophical project in order to trace changes and continuities in her views on anger, and then I examine some criticisms that have been held against her proposal of a political culture based on humanizing emotions based on the vindication of anger. (shrink)

Planctomycetes, Verrucomicrobia and Chlamydia are prokaryotic phyla, sometimes grouped together as the PVC superphylum of eubacteria. Some PVC species possess interesting attributes, in particular, internal membranes that superficially resemble eukaryotic endomembranes. Some biologists now claim that PVC bacteria are nucleus‐bearing prokaryotes and are considered evolutionary intermediates in the transition from prokaryote to eukaryote. PVC prokaryotes do not possess a nucleus and are not intermediates in the prokaryote‐to‐eukaryote transition. Here we summarise the evidence that shows why all of the PVC traits (...) that are currently cited as evidence for aspiring eukaryoticity are either analogous (the result of convergent evolution), not homologous, to eukaryotic traits; or else they are the result of horizontal gene transfers. (shrink)

Humans can learn complex functional relationships between variables from small amounts of data. In doing so, they draw on prior expectations about the form of these relationships. In three experiments, we show that people learn to adjust these expectations through experience, learning about the likely forms of the functions they will encounter. Previous work has used Gaussian processes—a statistical framework that extends Bayesian nonparametric approaches to regression—to model human function learning. We build on this work, modeling the process of learning (...) to learn functions as a form of hierarchical Bayesian inference about the Gaussian process hyperparameters. (shrink)

In lieu of an abstract, here is a brief excerpt of the content:Images >> Quan Zhou Wu and Linaje’s GenealogyJulia Haeyoon Chang (bio) Click for larger view View full resolutionQuan Zhou WuENJOY (Linaje 2024)Art and design by Quan Zhou WuDigital infrastructure by Marco Fratini[End Page 5] Click for larger view View full resolutionQuan Zhou WuUNA DE ELLAS (Linaje 2024)Art and design by Quan ZhouWu Digital infrastructure by Marco Fratini[End Page 6] Click for larger view View full resolutionQuan Zhou WuMEMORIAS (...) RETORCIDAS(Linaje 2024)Art and design by Quan Zhou WuDigital infrastructure by Marco Fratini[End Page 30] Click for larger view View full resolutionQuan Zhou Wu,NEGATIVOS (Linaje 2024)Art and design by Quan Zhou WuDigital infrastructure by Marco Fratini[End Page 31] Click for larger view View full resolutionQuan Zhou WuELLAS Y YO (Linaje 2024)Art and design by Quan Zhou WuDigital infrastructure by Marco Fratini[End Page 49] Click for larger view View full resolutionQuan Zhou Wu,STATEMENT (Linaje 2024)Art and design by Quan Zhou WuDigital infrastructure by Marco Fratini[End Page 74] Click for larger view View full resolutionQuan Zhou WuLAS ARTISTAS QUE NO FUIMOS (Linaje 2024)Art and design by Quan Zhou WuDigital infrastructure by Marco Fratini[End Page 75]Quan Zhou Wu’s followers will surely be struck—as I was—by the multisensory digital exhibit “Linaje” (“Lineage”), which was published in 2024 and departs, perhaps unexpectedly, from the artist’s previous well-established oeuvre. Before delving into the work in question, it may be fruitful first to have a glimpse at the artist’s iconic aesthetic. In 2015, and at the age of twenty-seven, Wu, a self-taught artist, debuted her first graphic memoir, Gazpacho Agridulce. The book commences with her parents’ newfound life in Spain after leaving Qingtian, a province of Zhejiang, China, to run a restaurant in Algeciras, a municipality of Cadiz. The opening pages of Gazpacho pack a punch, depicting Wu’s dramatic and untimely birth in a taxicab en route to the hospital.Gazpacho’s publication initiated a crucial sea change in the predominantly white Spanish publishing world, which would soon after be rocked by a boom of racialized1 authors penning anti-racist memoirs and other works of non-fiction.2 Gazpacho would also eventually become the first of the author’s trilogy of graphic memoirs, which was completed by the sequels Andaluchinas por el mundo (2017) and the most recent La agridolce vita (2023).Wu’s narratives capture the familial, identarian, and social conflicts that erupt from cultural disloyalties and racism—direct consequences of migration. She and her sisters, for example, loathe their family’s rigid Chinese and Christian mores and long for the cultural markers of an ordinary Spanish childhood, structured of course by U.S. global consumer culture, e.g. Barbie, Pizza Hut, and McDonald’s.An illustrator, cartoonist, and podcaster, Wu’s talent as a storyteller lies in her complex use of humor. With great care for her subject and her reader, Wu deploys humor to tend to the uncouth, raw, and ugly parts of life. In so doing, the author invites us to laugh and ultimately reckon with our own discomfort as we with sit with the heaviness of racism, sexism, and post-migration melancholy—using humor as a salve.At her best, Wu serves irreverence, rawness, and wit. To be immersed in her books is to rub up against the rough-hewn emotions that bring her characters to life. The vibrancy of her palette and the whimsy of her pen strokes are inviting, animated, and deceptively light-hearted. In an instant, lines and pigment rearrange into abstractions dense with affect. Fiery hollowed eyes, a gaping mouth, and flushed skin burn through the frame—making the volcanic rage of a migrant mother immediately palpable. It’s so emotive, it practically singes your skin. Click for larger view View full resolutionFigure 1.Cover of Wu’s first graphic memoir Gazpacho agridulce: Una autobiografía china-andaluza[End Page 102] Click for larger view View full resolutionFigure 2.Excerpt from Gazpacho agridulce (courtesy of the artist)[End Page 103]While... (shrink)

This paper aims at explicating a theory of hope that is also suitable for gravely ill people and based on virtue ethics, research in the psychology of “well-being,” and the philosophy of palliative care. The working hypotheses of the theory are that hope is conditioned neither by past events nor by present needs, but is not necessarily oriented toward the future, especially the distant future; that hope is related to personal agency and to freedom; and that hope is deliberative, hence (...) evaluative, motivatory, and rationally critical. Following Higgins’ distinction between “prevention-focus” and “promotion-focus” strategies of coping, and Rawls’ notion of the “Aristotelian principle,” it is argued that hope is the valuation of and personal identification with “promotion-focus” goals with an attitude of nonattachment to any one goal. (shrink)

Text classification involves deciding whether or not a document is about a given topic. It is an important problem in machine learning, because automated text classifiers have enormous potential for application in information retrieval systems. It is also an interesting problem for cognitive science, because it involves real world human decision making with complicated stimuli. This paper develops two models of human text document classification based on random walk and accumulator sequential sampling processes. The models are evaluated using data from (...) an experiment where participants classify text documents presented one word at a time under task instructions that emphasize either speed or accuracy, and rate their confidence in their decisions. Fitting the random walk and accumulator models to these data shows that the accumulator provides a better account of the decisions made, and a “balance of evidence” measure provides the best account of confidence. Both models are also evaluated in the applied information retrieval context, by comparing their performance to established machine learning techniques on the standard Reuters‐21578 corpus. It is found that they are almost as accurate as the benchmarks, and make decisions much more quickly because they only need to examine a small proportion of the words in the document. In addition, the ability of the accumulator model to produce useful confidence measures is shown to have application in prioritizing the results of classification decisions. (shrink)

En este trabajo intento articular y desarrollar la defensa que Roberto Torretti hace del realismo pragmático. En el núcleo de la visión de Torretti existe un rechazo a la idea de que la verdad de las teorías científicas consista en su correspondencia con el mundo. Propongo entonces entender la correspondencia como una noción metafórica. Articularé una noción de coherencia pragmática sobre la cual establezco una nueva teoría de la coherencia entre verdad y realidad. En consecuencia, resultará posible afirmar que el (...) realismo pragmático consiste en la búsqueda del verdadero conocimiento de la realidad, de un modo que también concuerda con el pragamatismo defendido por Torretti. (shrink)

El sistema penitenciario de Ecuador enfrenta una crisis estructural de proporciones preocupantes. Esta investigación se centra en analizar las diversas causas que han precipitado esta situación, con el objetivo de determinar la responsabilidad del Estado ecuatoriano en esta crisis. Se examina específicamente si el Estado cumple adecuadamente con su obligación de rehabilitar a los condenados y reintegrarlos a la sociedad tras el cumplimiento de sus penas. Se evidencia una ausencia significativa de programas efectivos de reinserción para las Personas Privadas de (...) Libertad (PPL), lo que directamente contribuye a la crisis carcelaria actúa. El propósito de este estudio es analizar críticamente la situación del sistema penitenciario ecuatoriano, identificando las deficiencias en los programas de rehabilitación y reinserción social ofrecidos a las PPL. Se busca determinar si el Estado es el principal responsable de la crisis carcelaria mediante el análisis de diversas fuentes bibliográficas y la evaluación de su cumplimiento de las obligaciones legales y humanitarias hacia este grupo vulnerable. Se llevó a cabo una investigación cualitativa, donde se analizaron diversas fuentes bibliográficas especializadas para abordar el problema del sistema penitenciario en Ecuador. Se examinaron informes gubernamentales, estudios académicos y documentos legales pertinentes para comprender a fondo las causas subyacentes de la crisis carcelaria. Esta metodología permitió una evaluación exhaustiva de las deficiencias institucionales y la falta de programas de rehabilitación adecuados para las PPL en el país. Los resultados de la investigación revelan una serie de factores que contribuyen a la crisis carcelaria en Ecuador. Entre ellos se destacan el hacinamiento, la sobrepoblación, el debilitamiento institucional, el tráfico de drogas y armas, entre otros. Se evidencia que el Estado no cumple adecuadamente con su obligación de rehabilitar a los condenados y reintegrarlos a la sociedad, lo que agrava la situación y hace más miserable la vida de las PPL dentro de los centros de reclusión. Este estudio confirma que el Estado ecuatoriano es el principal responsable de la crisis carcelaria existente en el país. La falta de programas efectivos de rehabilitación y reinserción social para las PPL, junto con otras deficiencias institucionales, ha exacerbado la situación. Es imperativo que el Estado tome medidas urgentes y efectivas para abordar estas deficiencias y garantizar el respeto de los derechos humanos y la dignidad de las personas privadas de libertad en Ecuador. (shrink)

The American Journal of Bioethics, Volume 12, Issue 2, Page 40-42, February 2012.

Utilitarianism focuses on the optimization of personal well being in ways that seems to make the practice of medicine irrelevant to the well being of the practitioners, unless given external incentives such as money or honor. Care based on indirect incentives is considered inferior to care motivated internally. This leads to the paradox of utilitarian care. Following Nozick's conceptual Pleasure Machine it is argued that in addition to the promotion of personal well being, people care about fulfilling their well being (...) in a world which is real, just, good, and beautiful. Complete mechanization of social and personal life in accordance with a strict utilitarian regime is also incompatible with the kind of world people desire, even if it promises more fulfillments in terms of personal well being. This explains the so-called Taurek-Parfit paradox, according to which sometimes ethics seems “to count the numbers” and sometimes not. The very pursuit of utilitarianism does not contribute to any personal life plan. The helping professions make the world a better place for us to live in, even though they do not necessarily bear directly on the well being of any individual other than the recipients of care. This resolves the paradox of utilitarian care. (shrink)

This article isolates ten prepositions, which constitute the undercurrent paradigm of contemporary discourse of health disease and medicine. Discussion of the interrelationship between those prepositions leads to a systematic refutation of this paradigm. An alternative set is being forwarded. The key notions of the existing paradigm are that health is the natural condition of humankind and that disease is a deviance from that nature. Natural things are harmonious and healthy while human made artifacts are coercive interference with natural balance. It (...) is suggested that the current paradigm is influenced by the world of finances and by instrumental reason. The alternative model suggests that human nature cannot be delineated. Humans fashion their own selves and nature by artificial means, medicine among them. The article discusses the implications of the paradigm adapted in various scholarly and popular debates such as the use of sex hormones for contraception, the care of the elderly, holistic medicine and distributive justice in health care. Medicine is not an isolated or a privileged realm. There is no unique entitlement to health care. It is always part of a broader agenda of social values and institutions. A open view of human societies, values and practices as they are situated within concrete material conditions is the platform required for an integrative and creative discourse of health care. (shrink)

Resumen: El corpus, siendo una herramienta eficaz, se está empleando en múltiples ámbitos, entre los que se encuentran los estudios de traducción. Sin embargo, dicho recurso no se utiliza con mucha frecuencia en las investigaciones traductológicas cuando una de las lenguas en cuestión es chino clásico (la lengua escrita empleada antiguamente en China), y autores que sí hacen estas investigaciones suelen no mencionar los pasos a seguir cuando se trata un corpus paralelo ad hoc. El objetivo del presente artículo es (...) presentar cómo se elabora un corpus paralelo chino clásico-español tomando como ejemplo la novela histórica Romance de los Tres Reinos y sus traducciones al español. Para ello, hemos descrito la problemática de creación y explotación de este tipo de corpus, siguiendo el orden de las fases del proceso. Resulta que algunas fases del proceso son universales, mientras que otras son propias de lenguas clásicas y de la combinación lingüística chino-otra lengua, en cuyo caso sí faltan aplicaciones eficaces. Con el trabajo, esperamos deparar información a los estudiosos que quieran realizar y profundizar las investigaciones basadas en corpus paralelo y en las obras clásicas de China. Abstract: The corpus, being an effective tool, is utilized in multiple fields. One of them is the Translation. However, this resource isn´t used frequently in translation studies when one of the languages in question is classical chinese (written language used anciently in China). And when it comes to an ad hoc parallel corpus, the steps of how to create it are usually omitted by researchers who make such investigations. The objective of this article is to present how to elaborate a classic Chinese-Spanish parallel corpus taking as example the historic novel Romance of the Three Kingdoms and its two translations into Spanish. To reach the objective, we have described the problem of creation and exploitation of this type of corpus, following the order of the phases of the process. We’ve found that some of the phases are universal while other phases are unique for old languages and for the linguistic combination Chinese-other language. And in this latter case, there’s a lack of effective applications. With the current work, we hope to offer useful information to those scholars who are willing to carry out their own investigations based on self-built parallel corpus and at the same time related to the classic Chinese works. (shrink)

En diciembre del 2019, en la provincia de Wuhan, China, se describió una nueva enfermedad respiratoria, aguda y potencialmente letal, causada por un coronavirus. A esta enfermedad se le denominó Covid-19. En México, la mortalidad por esta enfermedad es elevada y un porcentaje importante de los enfemos muere en los hospitales. Por ahora no existe en México un protocolo específico en el sistema de salud tanto público como privado, para que las familias puedan decirle adiós a los enfermos con Covid-19. (...) Un panel de expertos en cuidados paliativos y bioética proponen uno, para que pueda servir como referencia en cada unidad de salud de nuestro país. (shrink)

Recently, several articles in the scholarly literature on medical ethics proclaim the need for “responsible scholarship” in the debate over the proper criteria for death, in which “responsible scholarship” is defined in terms of support for current neurological criteria for death. In a recent article, James M. DuBois is concerned that academic critiques of current death criteria create unnecessary doubt about the moral acceptability of organ donation, which may affect the public’s willingness to donate. Thus he calls for a closing (...) of the debate on current death criteria and for journal editors to publish only critiques that “substantially engage and advance the debate.” We argue that such positions as DuBois’ are a threat to responsible scholarship in medical ethics, especially scholarship that opposes popular stances, because it erodes academic freedom and the necessity of debate on an issue that is literally a matter of life and death, no matter what side a person defends. (shrink)

We have lost one of the giants of the twentieth century physics when Yoichiro Nambu passed away in July, 2015, at the age of 94. Today's Standard Model, though still incomplete in many respects, is the culmination of the most successful theory of the Universe to date, and it is built upon foundations provided by discoveries made by Nambu in the 1960s: the mechanism of spontaneously broken symmetry in Nature (with G Jona-Lasinio) and the hidden new SU(3) symmetry of quarks (...) and gluons (with M-Y Han). In this volume honoring Nambu's memory, World Scientific Publishing presents a unique collection of papers written by his former colleagues, collaborating researchers and former students and associates, not only citing Nambu's great contributions in physics but also many personal and private reminiscences, some never told before. This book is a volume for all who benefited not only from Nambu's contributions toward understanding the Universe but also his warm and kind persona. It is a great addition to the history of contemporary physics. (shrink)

In “A new proof of the completeness of the Lukasiewicz axioms” Chang proved that any totally ordered MV-algebra A was isomorphic to the segment \}\) of a totally ordered l-group with strong unit A *. This was done by the simple intuitive idea of putting denumerable copies of A on top of each other. Moreover, he also show that any such group G can be recovered from its segment since \^*}\), establishing an equivalence of categories. In “Interpretation of AF (...) C *-algebras in Lukasiewicz sentential calculus” Mundici extended this result to arbitrary MV-algebras and l-groups with strong unit. He takes the representation of A as a sub-direct product of chains A i, and observes that \ where \. Then he let A * be the l-subgroup generated by A inside \. He proves that this idea works, and establish an equivalence of categories in a rather elaborate way by means of his concept of good sequences and its complicated arithmetics. In this note, essentially self-contained except for Chang’s result, we give a simple proof of this equivalence taking advantage directly of the arithmetics of the the product l-group \, avoiding entirely the notion of good sequence. (shrink)