[LENARDUZZI, Víctor. (2012). Placeres en movimiento. Cuerpo, música y baile en la “escena electrónica”. Buenos Aires: Aidos editores].

The concept of vulnerability is widely used in bioethics, particularly in research ethics and public health ethics. The traditional approach construes vulnerability as inherent in individuals or the groups to which they belong and views vulnerability as requiring special protections. Florencia Luna and other bioethicists continue to challenge traditional ways of conceptualizing and applying the term. Luna began proposing a layered approach to this concept and recently extended this proposal to offer two new concepts to analyze the concept of vulnerability, (...) namely understanding external conditions that trigger vulnerability and layers of vulnerability with cascading effects. Luna's conception of vulnerability is useful, which we demonstrate by applying her layered view and the new analyses in multiple contexts. We begin by outlining Luna's view and we use vignettes from healthcare involving transgender patients, the care of patients in psychiatric contexts, and research involving prisoners to illustrate how each part of Luna's concept elucidates important moral issues. (shrink)

This paper provides a philosophical analysis of the Price equation and its role in evolutionary theory. Traditional models in population genetics postulate simplifying assumptions in order to make the models mathematically tractable. On the contrary, the Price equation implies a very specific way of theorizing, starting with assumptions that we think are true and then deriving from them the mathematical rules of the system. I argue that the Price equation is a generalization-sketch, whose main purpose is to provide a unifying (...) framework for researchers, helping them to develop specific models. The Price equation plays this role because, like other scientific principles, shows features as abstractness, unification and invariance. By underwriting this special role for the Price equation some recent disputes about it could be diverted. (shrink)

We provide a quantifier-free axiom system for plane hyperbolic geometry in a language containing only absolute geometrically meaningful ternary operations (in the sense that they have the same interpretation in Euclidean geometry as well). Each axiom contains at most 4 variables. It is known that there is no axiom system for plane hyperbolic consisting of only prenex 3-variable axioms. Changing one of the axioms, one obtains an axiom system for plane Euclidean geometry, expressed in the same language, all of whose (...) axioms are also at most 4-variable universal sentences. We also provide an axiom system for plane hyperbolic geometry in Tarski's language L B which might be the simplest possible one in that language. (shrink)

Marr’s celebrated contribution to cognitive science (Marr 1982, chap. 1) was the introduction of (at least) three levels of description/explanation. However, most contemporary research has relegated the distinction between levels to a rather dispensable remark. Ignoring such an important contribution comes at a price, or so we shall argue. In the present paper, first we review Marr’s main points and motivations regarding levels of explanation. Second, we examine two cases in which the distinction between levels has been neglected when considering (...) the structure of mental representations: Cummins et al.’s distinction between structural representation and encodings (Cummins in Journal of Philosophy, 93(12):591–614, 1996; Cummins et al. in Journal of Philosophical Research, 30:405–408, 2001) and Fodor’s account of iconic representation (Fodor 2008). These two cases illustrate the kind of problems in which researchers can find themselves if they overlook distinctions between levels and how easily these problems can be solved when levels are carefully examined. The analysis of these cases allows us to conclude that researchers in the cognitive sciences are well advised to avoid risks of confusion by respecting Marr’s old lesson. (shrink)

Reverse analyses of three proofs of the Sylvester-Gallai theorem lead to three different and incompatible axiom systems. In particular, we show that proofs respecting the purity of the method, using only notions considered to be part of the statement of the theorem to be proved, are not always the simplest, as they may require axioms which proofs using extraneous predicates do not rely upon.

This article is about reductionism; as a tendency of thought, reductionism tells us that the hole can be explained as the sum of its parts. From this principle, one can deduce that the properties and laws of complex systems can be explained by the laws and properties of simple systems. On the other ..

Since the beginning of the scientific revolution, believers have had to reconcile their beliefs with science. This has always proved difficult. If an all-perfect God created the universe and its physical laws, why would he have to step in to perform miracles and answer prayers? If, as all the evidence indicates, the universe, including humans and their brains, is matter and nothing more, how can we possibly live forever? Theologians try hard, but never come up with satisfactory answers.

Using the axiom system provided by Carsten Augat in [1], it is shown that the only 6-variable statement among the axioms of the axiom system for plane hyperbolic geometry (in Tarski's language L B =), we had provided in [3], is superfluous. The resulting axiom system is the simplest possible one, in the sense that each axiom is a statement in prenex form about at most 5 points, and there is no axiom system consisting entirely of at most 4-variable statements.

An approach to music as an instrument of philosophical inquiry, seeking not so much a philosophy of music as a philosophy through music.

Los autores presentan el nuevo enfoque que busca la integración de las ciencias de la naturaleza con las ciencias sociales y humanas. Destacan el surgimiento de las disciplinas híbridas y las nuevas propuestas epistemológicas y metodológicas, exponiendo en particular el surgimiento de la sociología ambiental y el tema de lo rural como referente empírico. Analizan el metabolismo entre la sociedad y la naturaleza, relevando la apropiación de la naturaleza como eje de lo rural mostrando su carácter multidimensional. Concluyen en la (...) necesidad de estudiar lo rural desde una perspectiva multidisciplinaria señalando que la crisis del mundo moderno que se experimenta dice relación con la transgresión de los límites biofísicos del planeta. (shrink)

Violence is somehow equivalent to Be Right? How can I be fair and non-violent? It depends on the receptor, in terms of social comunication.

This book explores three worlds shared by the humans in their collective experiences. It identifies and explores the world of commonsense, the world of religion, and the world of science as three essential dimensions of human experience. The book helps understand that humans can gain comfort and pleasure in commonsense, achieve meaning and purpose from religion, and attain truth and rationality through science. It actively applies theories to and develops theoretical explanations from different domains or situations of human existence. This (...) book is of interest to theorists, researchers, instructors, and students across major academic disciplines in the humanities and social sciences. (shrink)

Over-flexibility in the definition of Friston blankets obscures a key distinction between observational and interventional inference. The latter requires cognizers form not just a causal representation of the world but also of their own boundary and relationship with it, in order to diagnose the consequences of their actions. We suggest this locates the blanket in the eye of the beholder.