Podríamos calificar a Nietzsche de un profeta heroico e innovador, que hace un oráculo de la decadencia, denunciando el triunfo de lo suprasensible, de lo ideal, la imposición de otro mundo como la historia de un error, de una ilusión, fuente común de todas las ficciones, prejuicios y dogmatismos de la tradición cultural occidental. Sin embargo, el pensamiento que Nietzsche expresa con la muerte de dios, y que conlleva el fin del cristianismo y de la metafísica, tiene un origen metafísico (...) y un origen genuinamente cristiano. (shrink)

En este artículo tratamos eun tema de moda, la Big History, haciendo una descripción sintética de la evolución: desde la evolución cósmica a la evolución biológica. Presentamos aquí una síntesis de la evolución cósmica y la evolución biológica, así como la descripción científica y la reflexión filosófica de diversas teorías que intentan explicarlas, subrayando el carácter emergente y complejo, que creemos es efecto estructural del proceso evolutivo. A esta evolución global la denominamos cosmo-bio-antropo-evolución. Cabe destacar también la exposición que hacemos (...) de los recientes descubrimientos científicos que corroboran experimentalmente la Teoría del Big Bang, y, por tanto, afirman el inicio temporal del universo. (shrink)

En este artículo exponemos las intuiciones del teólogo y biólogo alemán Karl Schmitz-Moormann sobre la evolución. Como leitmotiv subyacente en toda su obra, Schmitz-Moormann tiene a Teilhard de Chardin. Inspirado por Teilhard y su metafísica de la unión, introduce un nuevo concepto, a saber, la uni-totalidad. Veremos aquí cómo Schmitz-Moormann observa diversas uni-totalidades a lo largo del progreso evolutivo, desde las partículas subatómicas hasta las agrupaciones humanas. Esas diversas uni-totalidades implican, a la vez, diversidad de unión, que puede ser explicada (...) por causas que van desde la interacción nuclear hasta el amor interpersonal. Análogamente, Schmitz-Moormann ve nuestro Dios tri-uno como la Uni-totalidad suprema unida por amor, a la que se acercan las uni-totalidades creadas. (shrink)

Genomic instability is a hallmark of cancer. Cancer cells that exhibit abnormal chromosomes are characteristic of most advanced tumours, despite the potential threat represented by accumulated genetic damage. Carcinogenesis involves a loss of key components of the genetic and signalling molecular networks; hence some authors have suggested that this is part of a trend of cancer cells to behave as simple, minimal replicators. In this study, we explore this conjecture and suggest that, in the case of cancer, genomic instability has (...) an upper limit that is associated with a minimal cancer cell network. Such a network would include (for a given microenvironment) the basic molecular components that allow cells to replicate and respond to selective pressures. However, it would also exhibit internal fragilities that could be exploited by appropriate therapies targeting the DNA repair machinery. The implications of this hypothesis are discussed. (shrink)

Written at an undergraduate mathematical level, this book provides the essential theoretical tools and foundations required to develop basic models to explain collective phase transitions for a wide variety of ecosystems.

RESUMEN En el presente artículo se reconoce la significación de la estimulación prenatal de la comunicación y la necesidad de brindar una orientación familiar oportuna y certera tanto a la embarazada como a sus familiares y su objetivo está encaminadoa contribuir a la capacitación del personal de salud dirigida a la orientación a la familia para la estimulación prenatal de la comunicación. En él se tiene en cuenta la influencia de los médicos y enfermeras, en dicha labor, además, se encuentran (...) reflexiones, comentarios, acciones y técnicas, con el propósito de elevar la calidad de la orientación para que la familia potencie la estimulación de la comunicación desde la gestación. ABSTRACT In this paper, it is recognized the significance of prenatal communication stimulation and the need to give timely and appropriate family guidance to pregnant women and their families in order to contribute to health staff training towards family guidance on prenatal communication stimulation. It is taken into account the influence of doctors and nurses on this work. Thoughts, comments, actions and techniques can be found in order to improve guidance quality so that families encourage communication stimulation from gestation. (shrink)

Prácticamente casi todos los temas básicos que conforman la agenda política y social de esta década están relacionados con dos categorías básicas: la ciudadanía y la multiculturalidad. La forma en cómo se gestiona el vínculo de estos dos pilares básicos constituye el principal factor de transformación social, política y cultural de nuestra época. El objetivo de este capítulo es doble: por un lado, y en relación al tema general de este monográfico, argumentar que el tema de la inmigración forma parte (...) de una dinámica más amplia de discusiones sobre los fundamentos básicos de nuestra época moderna, resultado del doble proceso de State-Building y de Nation-building; por otro lado, subrayar que la primera "víctima" de este proceso de cambio contextual es precisamente el producto de este doble movimiento histórico: la noción tradicional de ciudadanía, que tiene dificultades de encontrar recursos para gestionar los nuevos fenómenos ligados con la multiculturalidad. En este marco, nos plantearemos como pregunta básica: ¿en qué sentido el multiculturalismo plantea problemas a la tradición de la ciudadanía? Partiremos de la situación siguiente: ¿qué ocurre cuando se usa la noción tradicional de la ciudadanía en contextos de multiculturalidad?. Estructuré mi argumentación en cinco secciones. En la primera sección, introduciré el marco conceptual dentro del cual se ubican las discusiones actuales, compuesto de tres elementos básicos: el Estado, la Nación y la Ciudadanía. En la segunda sección, entraremos en la discusión sobre el concepto tradicional de la ciudadanía, centrándonos en su base normativa y empírica desde una perspectiva comparativa. En la tercera sección, nos ocuparemos del concepto de multiculturalismo. En la cuarta sección me ocuparé de lo que he titulado como los "contextos de la multiculturalidad", esto es, las diferentes dimensiones que ponen en entredicho el carácter indivisible (y sagrado) del Estado, la Nación y la Ciudadanía. Introduciremos, sucesivamente, el pluralismo de identidades culturales, el pluralismo de identidades nacionales, la inmigración, la construcción política de la Unión Europea y, por último, la globalización. Finalmente, en una quinta y última sección, haremos un balance final dando un sentido histórico a nuestros razonamientos. (shrink)

El presente artículo recoge los resultados de una investigación basada en el análisis comparado de la estética de los museos creados en ciudades que forman parte de la denominada Ruta de la Seda. La aproximación a estos museos se basa principalmente en la observación de los aspectos educativos y patrimoniales, elementos que caracterizan la esencia de dichas instituciones. UNESCO impulsa desde 1988 acciones vinculadas a la Ruta de la Seda, ruta comercial ahora reconvertida en ruta de diálogo entre culturas. Observamos (...) que cada museo estudiado ha insistido en aquellas cuestiones de rango local y nacional que caracterizan su idiosincrasia, potenciando las facetas educativas desde la tradición de la producción de seda, y también las cuestiones patrimoniales para afianzar los rasgos característicos de cada comunidad. Hemos entrevistado a sus responsables y observado en directo sus instalaciones y colecciones. Detectamos que, a pesar de la influencia internacional de la iniciativa, o bien precisamente por ello, en cada caso se ha optado por incidir en los factores diferenciales locales, primando los argumentos estéticos de identidad cultural. Examinamos el caso concreto del Museo de la Seda de Valencia, el de creación más reciente, pero que aloja la institución más antigua. (shrink)

Leigh Van Valen was an American evolutionary biologist who made major contributions to evolutionary theory. He is particularly remembered for his groundbreaking paper “A New Evolutionary Law” (1973) where he provided evidence from fossil record data that the probability of extinction within any group remains essentially constant through time. In order to explain such an unexpected result, Van Valen formulated a very influential idea that he dubbed the “Red Queen hypothesis.” It states that the constant decay must be a consequence (...) of evolutionary interactions among connected species within ecological networks. In Van Valen’s picture, species do not merely evolve: they also coevolve with other species. As a consequence, when thinking about adaptation to an external environment, the other species must be considered as part (maybe a major part) of such an external world. Van Valen’s law provided the first complex systems theory of coevolutionary dynamics and inspired a whole range of theoretical and experimental developments from very diverse fields, percolating far beyond its original formulation. Red Queen arms races are nowadays considered a widespread feature of complex adaptive systems. (shrink)

Fluid neural networks can be used as a theoretical framework for a wide range of complex systems as social insects. In this article we show that collective logical gates can be built in such a way that complex computation can be possible by means of the interplay between local interactions and the collective creation of a global field. This is exemplified by a NOR gate. Some general implications for ant societies are outlined. ©.

The Discriptio Hispaniae is a passage from the Geometry of Gisemundus, also entitled Ars Gromatica Gisemundi, a medieval treatise of agrimensura written by an unknown author, probably a monk known as Gisemundus who had some agrimensorial experience. The work was compiled around AD 800 by collecting passages of a range of sizes, from just a few words to several pages, extracted from ancient and medieval sources. Although modern research into Roman agrimensorial texts has admitted the importance of the AGG, its (...) corrupt condition has not invited sustained analysis. The passage now known as the Discriptio Hispaniae, a short section from chapter three of the second book of the AGG entitled III De segregatione provinciarum ab Augustalibus terminis, is particularly interesting for the information that it provides concerning the territorial division of Hispania in Late Antiquity. This article presents an edition and English translation of the Discriptio Hispaniae and argues that the most likely point of origin for the Discriptio Hispaniae is during the Byzantine occupation of parts of southern Spain during the second half of the sixth century and the first quarter of the seventh century. We suggest that the Discriptio Hispaniae was preserved because the Byzantine authorities were keen to keep on record information about the borders of the province of Carthaginensis, perhaps the main theme in the text. (shrink)

Whenever the state of a biological system is not determined solely by present conditions but depends on its past history, we can say that the system has memory. Bacteria and bacteriophage use a variety of memory mechanisms, some of which seem to convey adaptive value. A genetic type of heritable memory is the programmed inversion of specific DNA sequences, which causes switching between alternative patterns of gene expression. Heritable memory can also be based on epigenetic circuits, in which a system (...) with two possible steady states is locked in one or the other state by a positive feedback loop. Epigenetic states have been observed in a variety of cellular processes, and are maintained by diverse mechanisms. Some of these involve alternative DNA methylation patterns that are stably transmitted to daughter molecules and can affect DNA–protein interactions (e.g., gene transcription). Other mechanisms exploit autocatalytic loops whereby proteins establish the proper conditions for their continued synthesis. Template polymers other than nucleic acids (e.g., components of the cell wall) may also propagate epigenetic states. Non‐heritable memory is exemplified by parasitic organisms that bear a signature of their previous host, such as host‐controlled modification of phage DNA or porin hitchhiking in predatory bacteria. The heterogeneous nature of the examples known may be indicative of widespread occurrence of memory mechanisms in bacteria and phage. However, the actual extent, variety and potential selective value of prokaryotic memory devices remain open questions, still to be addressed experimentally. BioEssays 24:512–518, 2002. © 2002 Wiley Periodicals, Inc. (shrink)

El tema predilecto en la filosofía moderna ha sido desde sus comienzos el de la subjetividad. Una subjetividad que ha permitido grandes avances pero también peligros para el ser humano, y es que al centrarse demasiado en la conciencia de sí mismo, el hombre y su filosofía han perdido la conexión con la realidad racional con la que conviven. El idealismo hegeliano, entendido como filosofía del espíritu, pretende ser a la vez una superación de este distanciamiento mutuo y una nueva (...) forma de comprender la filosofía, el hombre, la realidad y la articulación racional que todos ellos encuentran en lo absoluto. (shrink)

Cell‐wall‐less bacterial variants, or L‐forms, have been described in many bacterial species under laboratory conditions, in infected eukaryotic cell cultures and inside animals. Of special interest for human health is the formation of L‐forms as a consequence of specific antibiotic treatments, and the potential involvement of L‐forms in persistent and relapsing infections. An old enigma about L‐forms is how they can divide in the absence of cell wall synthesis, since septum formation is an essential requisite for cell division. However, the (...) classical definition of L‐forms as cell‐wall‐less bacterial variants may need a revision to accomodate recent observations by Richard d'Ari and coworkers:1 genetic and biochemical evidence indicates that E. coli L‐forms induced by β‐lactam antibiotics do contain small amounts of peptidoglycan, essential for their growth and probably required for septum formation. If these observations are extrapolated to all known L‐forms, the very concept of cell‐wall‐less bacteria may need revision, and be restricted to mycoplasmas and their relatives. BioEssays 29:1189–1191, 2007. © 2007 Wiley Periodicals, Inc. (shrink)

In the Statesman Plato resourced to the paradigm of the art of weaving to define the technique that the good governor must possess. However, with this analogy Plato equated political activity with the most characteristic of women’s activities in Ancient Greece. In such a way, Plato recognized that the philosopher-king, as he had put forward in the Republic , should give way to an expert that, like women weaving, knows the technique to weave the social fabric well. However, Plato did (...) nothing more than propose a model that had already been put in Lysistrata’s mouth by Aristophanes, when ironically postulating a government headed by women, who had no match in the art of weaving. (shrink)

Children's understanding of the human mind has been found to be related to many social and experiential factors such as interactions with peers (Astington & Jenkins, 1995), parental socioeconomic a...

Practically almost all the basic matters that make up the political and social agenda of this decade are related to two basic categories: citizenship and multiculturalism. The way in which the connection between these two basic pillars is managed constitutes the principal factor in the social, political and cultural transformation of our epoch. This work has two aims: on one hand, and in relation to the general subject of this monograph it is argued that the question of immigration is part (...) of a wider dynamic of discussions on the basic foundations of our modern era, resulting from the double process of State-building and Nation-building; on the other hand it underlines that the first victim of this process of contextual change is precisly the product of this double historical movement: the traditional notion of citizenship, which has difficulties in finding resources to administer the new phenomena tied to multiculturalism. In this framework, we propose the basic question: in what sense does multiculturalism pose problems to the tradition of citizenship? We start from the following situation: what happens when the traditional notion of citizenship is used in multicultural contexts? I structure my argumentation in five sections. In the first section, I set out the conceptual framework within which present-day arguments are situated, composed of three basic elements: the State, the Nation and Citizenship. In the second section, we enter into the discussion on the traditional concept of citizenship, focusing on its normative and empirical basis from a comparative perspective. In the third section, we are concerned with the concept of multiculturalism. In the fourth section I deal with what I have called the contexts of multiculturalism., that is, the different dimensions that call into question the indivisible (and sacred) character of the State, the Nation and Citizenship. We introduce, in succesion, the pluralism of cultural identities, the pluralism of national identities, immigration, the political construction of the European Union and, finally globalisation. In the fifth and last section we draw up a final balance giving a historical sense to our arguments. (shrink)

We are really just at the beginning of analysing the connection between ethics, border management and migration policies. In this framework of the debate, I would like to propose a line of analysis centred, not so much what States do in the area of migration policies but rather theorize about the behaviour toward the demand for entry by people from other States. That is, how the States behave rather than what the States do in migration policies. This analysis implies entering (...) into the field of applied ethics and taking a contextual approach. The construction of an ethical framework for the evaluation of decision-making represents a justified task in the current context of migration policies in Europe, and can contribute to the incipient debate on the Ethics of migration.This article follows five sections. In the first section the debate on the Ethics of Migration especially that concerned with the normative debate on the control of borders is introduced. In the second section, the need for using an applied ethic for analysing migration policies is justified, and, in the third section, an "evaluative ethical framework" is finally proposed. In section four, this framework and the policy-maker's information resources are presented, and in section five, the resulting ethical approaches and orientations that follows are defended. Finally, in the concluding section, the article shows the different applications of the proposed framework, viable in both the area of public policy analysis and for empirical research. (shrink)

Laurence Ricard | : La notion d’autonomie personnelle joue un rôle central dans les théories politiques contemporaines et, plus spécifiquement, dans les théories de la justice. Or, dans le paradigme libéral dominant, elle est définie par une compréhension rationaliste de l’agent individuel. La présente étude défend la nécessité de redéfinir ce concept d’autonomie à la lumière des développements philosophiques et psychologiques qui ont complexifié notre compréhension de la subjectivité. L’emploi du concept d’autonomie relationnelle développé par certains auteurs féministes et (...) par certains théoriciens de la reconnaissance semble pour ce faire prometteur. Cet article cherche à montrer qu’une compréhension relationnelle de l’autonomie est nécessaire pour expliquer la motivation à la coopération sociale et pour redéfinir la justice et l’injustice de façon à ce qu’elles correspondent à l’expérience sociale vécue. | : The notion of personal autonomy plays a central role in contemporary political theories and especially in theories of justice. Generally speaking, the dominant liberal paradigm defines individual agency in a purely rationalistic manner. Against this tradition, the present study argues for the necessity of rethinking and redefining this rationalistic concept of autonomy in light of psychological and philosophical developments that have complicated our understanding of subjectivity. For this purpose, the concept of relational autonomy, developed by feminist authors and some theorists of recognition, is most promising. This article aims to show that a relational understanding of autonomy is necessary to explain motivations for social cooperation and to understand justice and injustice in a way that corresponds to lived social experience. (shrink)

The aim of this book is to show how supramolecular complexity of cell organization can dramatically alter the functions of individual macromolecules within a cell. The emergence of new functions which appear as a consequence of supramolecular complexity, is explained in terms of physical chemistry. The book is interdisciplinary, at the border between cell biochemistry, physics and physical chemistry. This interdisciplinarity does not result in the use of physical techniques but from the use of physical concepts to study biological problems. (...) In the domain of complexity studies, most works are purely theoretical or based on computer simulation. The present book is partly theoretical, partly experimental and theory is always based on experimental results. Moreover, the book encompasses in a unified manner the dynamic aspects of many different biological fields ranging from dynamics to pattern emergence in a young embryo. The volume puts emphasis on dynamic physical studies of biological events. It also develops, in a unified perspective, this new interdisciplinary approach of various important problems of cell biology and chemistry, ranging from enzyme dynamics to pattern formation during embryo development, thus paving the way to what may become a central issue of future biology. (shrink)