The functional capabilities that consciousness seems to provide to biological systems can supply valuable principles in the design of more autonomous and robust technical systems. These functional concepts keep a notable similarity to those underlying the notion of operating system in software engineering, which allows us to specialize the computer metaphor for the mind into that of the operating system metaphor for consciousness. In this article, departing from these ideas and a model-based theoretical framework for cognition, we present an architectural (...) proposal for machine consciousness, called the Operative Mind. According to it, machine consciousness could be implemented as a set of services, in an operative system fashion, based on modeling of the own control architecture, that supervise the adequacy of the system architectural structure to the current objectives, triggering and managing adaptativity mechanisms. (shrink)

In this article we will argue that given certain conditions for the evolution of bi- ological controllers, these will necessarily evolve in the direction of incorporating consciousness capabilities. We will also see what are the necessary mechanics for the provision of these capabilities and extrapolate this vision to the world of artifi- cial systems postulating seven design principles for conscious systems. This article was published in the journal Neural Networks special issue on brain and conscious- ness.

Abstract Nowadays, there is a deep and widespread feeling of discomfort among academics due to the psychological and labor pressures that universities exert upon their researchers by demanding endless publications. In this paper, I offer numerous pieces of evidence of this crisis, which affects primarily those who inhabit academic ecologies. First, I argue that it is convenient to understand the current situation as an expression of technologies and individual apparatuses shaped by subjectivizing ideologies, and mechanisms of exclusion, stigmatization, and replacement. (...) Second, I examine two proposals against the crisis produced by the pace of academic production framed by the Slow movement. Lastly, after making explicit some of the assumptions that undergird the university’s epistemological machine, I propose to complement Ulmer and Mountz’s project with two suggestions. On the one hand, I extend an invitation to reflect on and with students as a means to redirect the university’s teleology. On the other hand, I suggest incorporating an ontogogic approach as a resistance apparatus against the pressure from the university’s production machine. The article’s point of departure is anti-dicotonegative because it is based on a summative approach rather than in an agonistic procedure. In other words, I propose two additional tools that can be put to the test to contribute to solving the university publication crisis. (shrink)

Este artículo propone una lectura retrospectiva y crítica de la visita del Papa Francisco a Colombia, realizada en septiembre de 2017, y se apoya en algunas nociones provenientes del pensamiento de Bernard Lonergan S.J. No pretende analizar o recordar su coyuntura, sino captar y exponer los desafíos generados en aquella visita, que se vislumbran como posibilidad de sanación en nuestra historia. Son asuntos estructurales que apelan tanto la vida creyente como la vida social y política, y no meras declaraciones de (...) referencia de un líder religioso. (shrink)

Karl Marx’s writings about Spain have been published and studied on several occasions. Among the sources listed by Pedro Ribas, William Walton and his work The Revolutions of Spain, from 1808 to the End of 1836 figures among those mentioned most. Rather surprising, given that Walton sympathised with both Spanish Carlism and Portuguese Miguelism. Though he was born and died in England, Walton lived in the Spanish and Portuguese empires, in America and in the French colony of Santo Domingo at (...) various stages in the course of his career. A Catholic in an Anglican country, he translated Puigblanch’s The Inquisition Unmasked. Neither did his political ideas remain unchanged throughout his life. This paper looks at the influence thatWalton had on Marx’s ideas about Spain, particularly as regards the Carlist political movement. Marx read Walton in the British Library and took detailed notes from his book. He used these notes in his articles regarding the events that occurred in the country. We will also reflect on the place that Walton begins to occupy in Peninsular historiography, through the bibliographical information on his changing political viewpoints and his proximity to contemporary events.For this article we started with the study of the biography and the work of William Walton, which led us to discover a possible connection with the thinking of Karl Marx. Our investigations have led us to consider that Walton’s writings on Spain helped to form the opinions expressed by Marx in his press articles. (shrink)

This report analyses the aplicability of the principles of consciousness developed in the ASys project to three of the most relevant cognitive architectures. This is done in relation to their aplicability to build integrated control systems and studying their support for general mechanisms of real-time consciousness. To analyse these architectures the ASys Framework is employed. This is a conceptual framework based on an extension for cognitive autonomous systems of the General Systems Theory (GST). A general qualitative evaluation criteria for cognitive (...) architectures is established based upon: a) requirements for a cognitive architecture, b) the theoretical framework based on the GST and c) core design principles for integrated cognitive conscious control systems. (shrink)

Night: The presence of the absence, the dissolution of the person in the night, the horror of being, the reality of the unreal, it takes us more to the absence of God than to God, to the absence of every entity. Dawn: Not being conscious of the existence of that unchangeable supposed centre of the person within time does not mean that we cannot be able to explain the not static changeable and relational personal identity in other ways. Day: It (...) is me who flows, but I am not in the flow like a support from where life flows, I am flowing in my own reality. This is not similar to an egology, it does not mean that everything exists and is loved to me, but it does mean that everything is seen and loved for me. (shrink)

Noche: La presencia de la ausencia, la disolución de la persona en la noche, el horror de ser, la realidad de lo irreal hacen que la noción de il y a �más que a Dios nos lleve a la ausencia de Dios, a la ausencia de todo ente�. Amanecer: No ser consciente de la existencia de ese supuesto centro inalterable de la persona dentro del tiempo no quiere decir que no seamos capaces de explicar la alterable y relativa identidad personal (...) de otras maneras. Día: Soy yo quién fluye, pero yo no estoy en el flujo como un apoyo de donde la vida fluya; yo estoy fluyendo en mi propia realidad. Esto no es similar a una egología, no significa que todo exista y sea amado por mí, sino que quiere decir que todo es visto y amado por mí. (shrink)

Night: The presence of the absence, the dissolution of the person in the night, the horror of being, the reality of the unreal, it takes us more to the absence of God than to God, to the absence of every entity. Dawn: Not being conscious of the existence of that unchangeable supposed centre of the person within time does not mean that we cannot be able to explain the not static changeable and relational personal identity in other ways. Day: It (...) is me who flows, but I am not in the flow like a support from where life flows, I am flowing in my own reality. This is not similar to an egology, it does not mean that everything exists and is loved to me, but it does mean that everything is seen and loved for me. (shrink)

Night: The presence of the absence, the dissolution of the person in the night, the horror of being, the reality of the unreal, it takes us more to the absence of God than to God, to the absence of every entity. Dawn: Not being conscious of the existence of that unchangeable supposed centre of the person within time does not mean that we cannot be able to explain the not static changeable and relational personal identity in other ways. Day: It (...) is me who flows, but I am not in the flow like a support from where life flows, I am flowing in my own reality. This is not similar to an egology, it does not mean that everything exists and is loved to me, but it does mean that everything is seen and loved for me. (shrink)