Dusky groupers ( Epinephelus marginatus ) are characterized by a complex sex allocation strategies and overexploitation of bigger individuals. We developed an individual based model to investigate the long-term effects of density dependence on grouper population dynamics and to analyze the variabilities of extinction probabilities as a result of interacting mortalities at different life stages. We conduct several simulations with different forms of sex allocation functions and different combinations of mortality rates. The model was parametrized using data on dusky grouper (...) populations from the literature. The most important insights produced by this simulation study are that density dependence of sex allocation is an evolutionarily stable strategy, increases the population biomass, mitigates the effect of the removal of large male and indicates a need for protection of females and flexible stages. (shrink)

Proceeding of the Third International Conference of the French-Speaking Society for Theoretical Biology Content Type Journal Article Category Editorial Pages 1-2 DOI 10.1007/s10441-012-9156-2 Authors Slimane Ben Miled, ENIT-LAMSIN, Tunis el Manar University, 13, place Pasteur, Belvédère, B.P. 74, 1002 Tunis, Tunisia Journal Acta Biotheoretica Online ISSN 1572-8358 Print ISSN 0001-5342.

Dusky groupers (Epinephelus marginatus) are characterized by a complex sex allocation strategies and overexploitation of bigger individuals. We developed an individual based model to investigate the long-term effects of density dependence on grouper population dynamics and to analyze the variabilities of extinction probabilities as a result of interacting mortalities at different life stages. We conduct several simulations with different forms of sex allocation functions and different combinations of mortality rates. The model was parametrized using data on dusky grouper populations from (...) the literature. The most important insights produced by this simulation study are that density dependence of sex allocation is an evolutionarily stable strategy, increases the population biomass, mitigates the effect of the removal of large male and indicates a need for protection of females and flexible stages. (shrink)

This work presents a stock/effort model describing both harvested fish population and fishing effort dynamics. The fishing effort dynamic is controlled by investment which corresponds to the revenue proportion generated by the activity. The dynamics are subject to a set of economic and biological state constraints. The analytical study focuses on the compatibility between state constraints and controlled dynamics. By using the mathematical concept of viability kernel, we reveal situations and management options that guarantee a sustainable system.

Abstract This work is about the viability domain corresponding to a model of fisheries management. The dynamic is subject of two constraints. The biological constraint ensures the stock perennity where as the economic one ensures a minimum income for the fleets. Using the mathematical concept of viability kernel, we find out a viability domain which simultaneously enables the fleets to exploit the resource, to ensure a minimum income and stock perennity. Content Type Journal Article Category Regular Article Pages 1-19 DOI (...) 10.1007/s10441-012-9153-5 Authors C. Sanogo, LIRNE, Mathmatics Engineering Team, Ibn Tofail University, Kenitra, Morocco S. Ben Miled, ENIT-LAMSIN, Tunis el Manar University, Tunis, Tunisia N. Raissi, LAA, Mohamed V University, Rabat, Morocco Journal Acta Biotheoretica Online ISSN 1572-8358 Print ISSN 0001-5342. (shrink)

This paper presents the first edition, translation and analyse of al-Mns commentary of the Book X of Euclid one. For the first time, irrational numbers are defined and classified. The algebraisation of Elementsrizms Algebra, shows irrational numbers as solution to algebraic quadratic equations. The algebraic calculus makes here the first steps. On this occasion, negative numbers and their calculation rules appears. Simplifications imposed by the algebraic writings are sometimes in opposition with the conclusions of propositions conceived in a purely geometrical (...) framework, revealing a contradiction between geometrical and algebraic goals. It will be resolved by the independant way algebra will take with mathematicians belonging to the tradition of al-Karajal from the 11th-12th centuries on. (shrink)

Recently, management literature has sought to examine the role of institutional entrepreneurs in the emergence of commons logic and in building consensus around its meaning. While the focus has been on new commons, not all are created ex nihilo. Some types of preexisting commons, known as contested commons, often pose challenges that result in disagreements and conflicts with respect to their ownership, use, and management. These commons are a ubiquitous yet understudied phenomenon. In this paper, we use the case of (...) the Tunisian Oasis of Jemna, pictured against the historical backdrop of the Arab Spring, to look at the institutional struggles that involve institutional entrepreneurs and the opponents of a contested commons. We identify two main strategies used by institutional entrepreneurs to frame the commons as a superior alternative: idealizing the commons and coalescing the community to harness its potential. We also highlight the heretofore neglected role of opponents, who engage in demonizing the commons to restore the competing logics of state or market. Finally, we unravel some of the conditions that allow for a temporary settlement of the contest, leading to what we term de facto commons. (shrink)

In order to find positive solutions for third-degree equations, which he did not know how to solve for roots, m proceeds by the intersections of conic sections. The representation of an algebraic equation by a geometrical curve is made possible by the choices of units of measure for lengths, surfaces, and volumes. These units allow a numerical quantity to be associated with a geometrical magnitude. Is there a trace of this unit in the mathematicians to whom al-Khayyām refers directly in (...) his Algebra? How does this unit enable the measurement of quantities and rational and irrational relations? We find answers to these questions in the commentaries to Books V and X of the Elements. (shrink)

We study the viability domains of bio-economic constraints for fishing model of hermaphrodite population, displaying three stages, juvenile, female and male. The dynamic of this model is subject to two constraints: an ecological constraint ensuring the stock perennity, and an economic constraint ensuring a minimum revenue for fishermen. Using viability kernel, we find out a viability domain which simultaneously guarantees a minimum stock level and a minimum income for fleets.

pereḳ 1. ʻOśeh fele -- pereḳ 2. Ḥidud be-divre Torah -- pereḳ 3. Ḥidud be-mile de-ʻalma -- pereḳ 4. Ḳetsat shut śikhliyot ṿe-ʻimahem shene derushim le-midrash Talmud Torah.

This book highlights the emergence of a new mathematical rationality and the beginning of the mathematisation of physics in Classical Islam. Exchanges between mathematics, physics, linguistics, arts and music were a factor of creativity and progress in the mathematical, the physical and the social sciences. Goods and ideas travelled on a world-scale, mainly through the trade routes connecting East and Southern Asia with the Near East, allowing the transmission of Greek-Arabic medicine to Yuan Muslim China. The development of science, first (...) centred in the Near East, would gradually move to the Western side of the Mediterranean, as a result of Europe's appropriation of the Arab and Hellenistic heritage. Contributors are Paul Buell, Anas Ghrab, Hossein Masoumi Hamedani, Zeinab Karimian, Giovanna Lelli, Marouane ben Miled, Patricia Radelet-de Grave, and Roshdi Rashed. (shrink)

Existing regulation of end-of-life care is flawed. Problems include poorly-designed laws, policies, ethical codes, training, and funding programs, which often are neither effective nor helpful in guiding decision-making. This leads to adverse outcomes for patients, families, health professionals, and the health system as a whole. A key factor contributing to the harms of current regulation is a siloed approach to regulating end-of-life care. Existing approaches to regulation, and research into how that regulation could be improved, have tended to focus on (...) a single regulatory instrument (e.g., just law or just ethical codes). As a result, there has been a failure to capture holistically the various forces that guide end-of-life care. This article proposes a response to address this, identifying “regulatory space” theory as a candidate to provide the much-needed holistic insight into improving regulation of end-of-life care. The article concludes with practical implications of this approach for regulators and researchers. (shrink)

In this paper, I consider intellectualist and anti-intellectualist approaches to knowledge-how and propose a third solution: a virtue-based account of knowledge-how. I sketch the advantages of a virtue-based account of knowledge-how and consider whether we should prefer a reliabilist or a responsibilist virtue-account of knowledge-how. I argue that only a responsibilist account will maintain the crucial distinction between knowing how to do something and merely being able to do it. Such an account, I hold, must incorporate ‘learning how to do (...) something’ as an essential part. Drawing on an argument by Craig, I hold that the function of the concept of knowing how is to mark out practical experts whom one can trust either to perform an action on one's behalf, or to teach one how to perform that action oneself. The best way to identify practical experts, I hold, is to discover what they have learned about performing the action in question. In arguing for the importance of the concept ‘learning’ to the field of knowledge-how, I argue for a new connection between the philosophy of education and virtue epistemology. (shrink)

This article assesses the quality of Integrative Social Contracts Theory (ISCT) as a social contract argument. For this purpose, it embarks on a comparative analysis of the use of the social contract model as a theory of political authority and as a theory of social justice. Building on this comparison, it then develops four criteria for any future contractarian theory of business ethics (CBE). To apply the social contract model properly to the domain of business ethics, it should be: (1) (...) self-disciplined, i.e., not aspire results beyond what the contract model can realistically establish; (2) argumentative, i.e., it should seek to provide principles that are demonstrative results of the contractarian method; (3) task-directed, i.e., it should be clear what the social contract thought-experiment is intended to model; and (4) domain-specific, i.e., the contractarian choice situation should be tailored to the defining problems of business ethics. (shrink)

Background Voluntary assisted dying became lawful in Victoria, the first Australian state to permit this practice, in 2019 via the Voluntary Assisted Dying Act 2017 (Vic). While conscientious objection by individual health professionals is protected by the Victorian legislation, objections by institutions are governed by policy. No research has been conducted in Victoria, and very little research conducted internationally, on how institutional objection is experienced by patients seeking assisted dying. Methods 28 semi-structured interviews were conducted with 32 family caregivers and (...) one patient about the experience of 28 patients who sought assisted dying. Participants were interviewed during August-November 2021. Data from the 17 interviews (all with family caregivers) which reported institutional objection were analysed thematically. Results Participants reported institutional objection affecting eligibility assessments, medication access, and taking the medication or having it administered. Institutional objection occurred across health settings and was sometimes communicated obliquely. These objections resulted in delays, transfers, and choices between progressing an assisted dying application and receiving palliative or other care. Participants also reported objections causing adverse emotional experiences and distrust of objecting institutions. Six mediating influences on institutional objections were identified: staff views within objecting institutions; support of external medical practitioners and pharmacists providing assisted dying services; nature of a patient’s illness; progression or state of a patient’s illness; patient’s geographical location; and the capability and assertiveness of a patient and/or caregiver. Conclusions Institutional objection to assisted dying is much-debated yet empirically understudied. This research found that in Victoria, objections were regularly reported by participants and adversely affected access to assisted dying and the wider end-of-life experience for patients and caregivers. This barrier arises in an assisted dying system that is already procedurally challenging, particularly given the limited window patients have to apply. Better regulation may be needed as Victoria’s existing policy approach appears to preference institutional positions over patient’s choice given existing power dynamics. (shrink)

The historical sciences, such as geology, evolutionary biology, and archaeology, appear to have no means to test hypotheses. However, on closer examination, reasoning in the historical sciences relies upon regularities, regularities that can be tested. I outline the role of regularities in the historical sciences, and in the process, blur the distinction between the historical sciences and the experimental sciences: all sciences deploy theories about the world in their investigations.

Queer objects are crucial to the narrative strategies of Dennis Cooper’s George Miles cycle where they support his exhaustive inventory of what it means to have a sexual type. In Frisk, Cooper transforms some objects into media to blur the boundaries between the writing subject and the objects he desires. The snuff photos, seen at too young an age, form the point of reference for Dennis the narrator’s erotic life but they acquire their force in a looping narrative structure that (...) calls into question their status as representation as well as their capacity to communicate. The novel thus elicits a new theorization of the relation between objects and media that discloses the stakes for fiction in a queer subjectivity that takes the self as another object at the same time as it probes the limits of realism. I situate Cooper in a genealogy of autofiction that extends back to Marcel Proust and Jean Genet and forward to J.T. LeRoy, Ben Lerner, Maggie Nelson, and Sheila Heti. The essay concludes by contrasting Cooper’s narrative achievements to the collapse of the writing subject into the autobiographical self in the more recent examples. (shrink)

From classical, Fraïissé-homogeneous, ($\leq \omega$)-categorical theories over finite relational languages, we construct intuitionistic theories that are complete, prove negations of classical tautologies, and admit quantifier elimination. We also determine the intuitionistic universal fragments of these theories.

This book presents an original comprehensive approach to some of the most difficult problems concerning sense-perception and other mental states. After rejecting prevailing approaches, the author presents his own viewpoint which may be characterized as direct, critical realism. Basing his conclusions on conceptual analysis, psychological evidence and historical considerations, the author is able to offer new insights into traditionally unsolved problems concerning the nature of perceptual states, the ontological status of perceptual environment, the cognitive mechanism in perception and the explanation (...) of perceptual mistakes. The book also discusses the implications of this approach for other mental states such as memory and consciousness. (shrink)

In my time at The Hastings Center, the projects I've worked on have intersected in fascinating ways, but one through line has impressed me as especially important: centering the experiences and needs of people and communities most affected by the issue at hand.

The development of technologies for gene editing in the wild has the potential to generate tremendous benefit, but also raises important concerns. Using some form of public deliberation to inform decisions about the use of these technologies is appealing, but public deliberation about them will tend to fall back on various forms of heuristics to account for limited personal experience with these technologies. Deliberations are likely to involve narrative reasoning—or reasoning embedded within stories. These are used to help people discuss (...) risks, processes, and fears that are otherwise difficult to convey. In this article, we identify three forms of collective narrative that are particularly relevant to debates about modifying genes in the wild. Our purpose is not to privilege any particular narrative, but to encourage people involved in deliberations to make these narratives transparent. Doing so can help guard against the way some narratives—referred to here as “crafted narratives”—may be manipulated by powerful elites and concentrated economic interests for their own strategic ends. (shrink)

Is business intimately related to ethics or can the two be separated? I argue that examining this question by focusing on how the two areas might be separated is logically flawed. Examining how business and ethics are connected, however, can bear fruit. This examination shows that business is a proper subset of ethics. Understanding this intimate connection has two practical benefits. It removes the seemingly incommensurable conflict between financial and ethical responsibilities of managers and it gives us new and positive (...) insights into Milton Friedman’s view that the social responsibility of business is to increase its profits. (shrink)

Emer de Vattel was the first writer systematically to combine three arguments in a single work, namely: that states have a fundamental duty of self-interestedness; that they nonetheless have reason to see themselves as inhabiting a kind of society; and that this society is held together by positive agreements between its members on rules that shall regulate their interactions. This article explores how Vattel arrived at his vision of international order. It points to the significance of his understanding of the (...) state as being a ?moral person?. This was a description of the state introduced by Samuel von Pufendorf, who argued that the state was a moral person because it possessed the moral faculties of intellect and will. This helped to ground a constitutionalist theory of the state, for intellect and will, being represented by separate institutions of the state, in effect balanced each other. But the notion of the state as a moral person was later taken up in a rival intellectual tradition that allotted no independence to the will. This was the philosophical tradition to which Vattel belonged. In this altered context, the notion of moral personality was transformed. I argue that this was critical to the formulation of Vattel's theory. (shrink)

Marxism, Cultural Studies and Sport assesses the contemporary relevance of Marxist approaches and offers a unique and diverse examination of modern sports ...

This article explores the expanding dimensions of Internet-based communication in connection with the potential up flowing of super-consciousness within virtual worlds. The presence of an Enlightened Master is highlighted as a necessary catalyst precipitating Internet mediated super-consciousness. The virtual world Second Life is cited as a model for addressing present day potentials for such a transformative process. A proposal is outlined for experimenting with the communicative potentials of virtual worlds. The Internet is illustrated as an emerging nervous system of collective (...) consciousness ready to undergo a cleansing process similar to that of an individual nervous system. A vision of future potentials is also considered. (shrink)

However, the barriers and facilitators of such changes - law reform perspectives - have been virtually ignored. Why do so many attempts to change the law fail but others are successful? International Perspectives on End-of-Life Law Reform aims to address this question by drawing on ten case studies of end-of-life law reform from the United Kingdom, the United States, Canada, the Netherlands, Belgium and Australia. Written by leading end-of-life scholars, the book's chapters blend perspectives from law, medicine, bioethics and sociology (...) to examine sustained reform efforts to permit assisted dying and change the law about withholding and withdrawing life-sustaining treatment. Findings from this book not only shed light on changing end-of-life law but also provide insight more generally into how and why law reform succeeds in complex and controversial social policy areas. (shrink)

_Foucault’s Law_ is the first book in almost fifteen years to address the question of Foucault’s position on law. Many readings of Foucault’s conception of law start from the proposition that he failed to consider the role of law in modernity, or indeed that he deliberately marginalized it. In canvassing a wealth of primary and secondary sources, Ben Golder and Peter Fitzpatrick rebut this argument. They argue that rather than marginalize law, Foucault develops a much more radical, nuanced and coherent (...) theory of law than his critics have acknowledged. For Golder and Fitzpatrick, Foucault’s law is not the contained creature of conventional accounts, but is uncontainable and illimitable. In their radical re-reading of Foucault, they show how Foucault outlines a concept of law which is not tied to any given form or subordinated to a particular source of power, but is critically oriented towards alterity, new possibilities and different ways of being. _Foucault’s Law_ is an important and original contribution to the ongoing debate on Foucault and law, engaging not only with Foucault’s diverse writings on law and legal theory, but also with the extensive interpretive literature on the topic. It will thus be of interest to students and scholars working in the fields of law and social theory, legal theory and law and philosophy, as well as to students of Foucault’s work generally. (shrink)

Virtue-approaches to medical ethics are becoming ever more influential. Virtue theorists advocate redefining right or good action in medicine in terms of the character of the doctor performing the action. In medical education, too, calls are growing to reconceive medical education as a form of character formation. Empirical studies of doctors’ ethics from a virtue-perspective, however, are few and far between. In this respect, theoretical and empirical study of medical ethics are out of alignment. In this paper, we survey the (...) empirical study of medical ethics and find that most studies of doctors’ ethics are rules- or principles-based and not virtue-based. We outline the challenges that exist for studying medical ethics empirically from a virtue-based perspective and canvas the runners and riders in the effort to find virtue-based assessments of medical ethics. (shrink)

Citizenship under Fire examines the relationship among civic education, the culture of war, and the quest for peace. Drawing on examples from Israel and the United States, Sigal Ben-Porath seeks to understand how ideas about citizenship change when a country is at war, and what educators can do to prevent some of the most harmful of these changes.Perhaps the most worrisome one, Ben-Porath contends, is a growing emphasis in schools and elsewhere on social conformity, on tendentious teaching of history, and (...) on drawing stark distinctions between them and us. As she writes, "The varying characteristics of citizenship in times of war and peace add up to a distinction between belligerent citizenship, which is typical of democracies in wartime, and the liberal democratic citizenship that is characteristic of more peaceful democracies."Ben-Porath examines how various theories of education--principally peace education, feminist education, and multicultural education--speak to the distinctive challenges of wartime. She argues that none of these theories are satisfactory on their own theoretical terms or would translate easily into practice. In the final chapter, she lays out her own alternative theory--"expansive education"--which she believes holds out more promise of widening the circles of participation in schools, extending the scope of permissible debate, and diversifying the questions asked about the opinions voiced. (shrink)

This long-standing series provides the guild of religion scholars a venue for publishing aimed primarily at colleagues. It includes scholarly monographs, revised dissertations, Festschriften, conference papers, and translations of ancient and medieval documents. Works cover the sub-disciplines of biblical studies, history of Christianity, history of religion, theology, and ethics. Festschriften for Karl Barth, Donald W. Dayton, James Luther Mays, Margaret R. Miles, and Walter Wink are among the seventy-five volumes that have been published. Contributors include: C. K. Barrett, Francois Bovon, (...) Paul S. Chung, Marie-Helene Davies, Frederick Herzog, Ben F. Meyer, Pamela Ann Moeller, Rudolf Pesch, D. Z. Phillips, Rudolf Schnackenburgm Eduard Schweizer, John Vissers. (shrink)

Harry Brighouse and Adam Swift argue that education is a positional good; this, they hold, implies that there is a qualified case for leveling down educational provision. In this essay, Ben Kotzee discusses Brighouse and Swift's argument for leveling down. He holds that the argument fails in its own terms and that, in presenting the problem of educational justice as one of balancing education's positional and nonpositional benefits, Brighouse and Swift lose sight of what a consideration of the nonpositional benefits (...) by itself can reveal. Instead of focusing on education's positional benefits, Kotzee investigates what emphasizing education's nonpositional benefits would imply for educational justice. Drawing on recent work in social epistemology, Kotzee holds that theories of educational justice would benefit from a consideration of the virtue of epistemic justice, and he outlines solutions to a number of problems in the area from this perspective. (shrink)

In The Dilemma of Context, Scharfstein contends that the problems encountered with context are insoluble. He explains why this problem lays an intellectual burden on us that, while remaining inescapable,can become so heavy it destroys the understandingit was created to further.

This article expounds Samuel von Pufendorf’s evolving theory of multiple monarchy, from the publication of his early work on the form of the Holy Roman Empire, through his natural jurisprudence, to his historical accounts of European statesmanship. Although his comments on the irregularity—indeed, the monstrosity—of composite kingdoms are well known, it is less often appreciated that Pufendorf came to be able to accommodate them within a typology of constitutional systems developed against the background of his theory of the moral personality (...) of the state. Pufendorf’s political thought after his early book on the Holy Roman Empire is the record of a consistent attempt to confront the complexities of multiple monarchy rather than capitulate in the face of them. (shrink)