El grado de Relaciones Internacionales de la Universidad Complutense de Madrid aplica en la parte práctica de algunas asignaturas el uso de herramientas innovadoras para lograr acercar algunos espacios laborales al alumnado.Este artículo analiza las herramientas que se articularon a través de dos proyectos de innovación docente aprobados en convocatorias competitivas: la realización de campañas de sensibilización a través de redes sociales y páginas web, la participación en el diseño y la ejecución de proyectos de cooperación para el desarrollo reales, (...) y la redacción de un libro publicado por una prestigiosa universidad. (shrink)

With the advent of the cloud computing model allowing a shared access to massive computing facilities, a surging demand emerges for the protection of the intellectual property tied to the programs executed on these uncontrolled systems. If novel paradigm as confidential computing aims at protecting the data manipulated during the execution, obfuscating techniques (in particular at the source code level) remain a popular solution to conceal the purpose of a program or its logic without altering its functionality, thus preventing reverse-engineering (...) on the program even with the help of computing resources. The many advantages of code obfuscation, together with its low cost, makes it a popular technique. This paper proposes a novel methodology for source code obfuscation that can be used together with other traditional obfuscation techniques, making the code more robust against reverse engineering attacks. Three program complexity metrics are used to define three different single-objective combinatorial optimization versions of the problem, which are solved and analysed. Additionally, three multi-objective problems are defined, those considering each of the selected metrics together with the program execution time, in order to avoid strong obfuscations penalizing the performance. The goal of the defined problems is to find sequences of LLVM optimizations that lead to highly obfuscated versions of the original code. These transformations are applied to the back-end pseudo-assembly code (i.e., LLVM Intermediate Representation), thus avoiding any further optimizations by the compiler. Classical genetic algorithms (GAs) are used to solve the studied problems, namely a basic cellular GA for the single-objective problems and the popular NSGA-II for the multi-objective ones. The promising results show the potential of the proposed technique. (shrink)

Este trabajo surge de un diálogo interdisciplinario entre dos tesis doctorales, una de educación y otra de filosofía, que comparten un interés sobre formas emancipadoras y democráticas de pensar con otros y otras en la escuela pública latinoamericana. Desde una perspectiva crítica propia de la filosofía de la educación latinoamericana realizamos un análisis epistemológico sobre las distintas formas de habitar la pregunta dentro de una práctica filosófica con niños y niñas. Tomamos como objeto de estudio una experiencia específica de comunidad (...) de indagación realizada en 2022 en el sur de Mendoza, Argentina. Entramamos herramientas teóricas de Walter Kohan, Paulo Freire y Jacques Rancière con la intención de visibilizar diversas formas de habitar la producción de saberes dentro de dicha comunidad. Proponemos dos nudos problemáticos: por un lado, el orden explicador/embrutecedor a partir de Rancière y, por el otro,la pregunta como afirmación vital a partir de Kohan y Freire. Trabajamos una serie de disonancias en torno a la circulación y a la potencia de la pregunta en la escuela y la educación pública. Finalmente proponemos una síntesis de estas problemáticas en la postulación de una “pregunta niña” como potencia epistémica emancipadora que supone una intimidad con los otros y otras, con las cosas y el mundo abierta desde una igualdad política e intelectual radical. (shrink)

El presente estudio trata de ser una aproximación histórica al posmodernismo en una de sus vertientes: el constructivismo, la teoría que defiende que el mundo es construcción social sin correlato objetivo alguno. A través del examen de la genealogía de este perfil, el artículo se propone mostrar que el constructivismo es deudor de diversas tradiciones de pensamiento irracionalista, subjetivista e idealista, y que por ello constituye una doctrina anti y pseudocientífica.

Este libro es un estudio sobre las teor as del desarrollo social y un an lisis de las estrategias, instituciones y pol ticas econ micas de los ltimos tiempos en varios pa ses.

The aim of this paper is to frame briefly Chateaubriand’s conception of logical forms in the distinction between logic and language as calculus and logic as universal language, devised by Jean van Heijenoort and later generalized by Jaakko Hintikka. The most important reasons to connect Chateaubriand’s conception with this distinction are perhaps Chateaubriand’s criticism of the linguistic approach to logical forms and the role Chateaubriand assigns to symbolism in his own account.O propósito deste artigo é localizar brevemente a concepção de (...) forma lógica de Chateaubriand com relação à distinção entre lógica e linguagem como cálculo e lógica como linguagem universal, introduzida por Jean van Heijenoort e depois generalizada por Jaako Hintikka. Talvez a razão mais importante para conectar a concepção de Chateaubriand com esta distinção sejam suas críticas ao tratamento linguístico das formas lógicas, e o papel que Chateaubriand atribui ao simbolismo em seu próprio tratamento. (shrink)

An understanding of the factors behind the evolution of multicellularity is one of today’s frontiers in evolutionary biology. This is because multicellular organisms are made of one subset of cells with the capacity to transmit genes to the next generation and another subset responsible for maintaining the functionality of the organism, but incapable of transmitting genes to the next generation. The question arises: why do somatic cells sacrifice their lives for the sake of germline cells? How is germ/soma separation maintained? (...) One conventional answer refers to inclusive fitness theory, according to which somatic cells sacrifice themselves altruistically, because in so doing they enhance the transmission of their genes by virtue of their genetic relatedness to germline cells. In the present article we will argue that this explanation ignores the key role of policing mechanisms in maintaining the germ/soma divide. Based on the pervasiveness of the latter, we argue that the role of altruistic mechanisms in the evolution of multicellularity is limited and that our understanding of this evolution must be enriched through the consideration of coercion mechanisms. (shrink)

¿Puede Tomás de Aquino, pensador del siglo XIII, decirnos algo a nuestra realidad política latinoamericana actual? Un texto entre dos contextos es el pretexto para generar una reflexión en torno al derecho a la rebelión, desde la perspectiva de la no-violencia y el derecho a la desobediencia civil. Un camino desde la justicia y el buen gobierno en el Aquinate, seguido del bien común político y las virtudes políticas en el Angélico para desembocar en el derecho a la rebelión, es (...) la ruta que se traza para esta exposición. Una lectura desde la propuesta exegética hermenéutica del Dr. René Padilla, es decir, una comprensión intuitiva, una comprensión gramático-histórica y una comprensión contextualizadora son el cómo y modo del presente trabajo. (shrink)

Plagiarism is a serious, yet widespread type of research misconduct, and is often neglected in developing countries. Despite its far-reaching implications, plagiarism is poorly acknowledged and discussed in the academic setting, and insufficient evidence exists in Latin America and developing countries to inform the development of preventive strategies. In this context, we present a longitudinal case study of seven instances of plagiarism and cheating arising in four consecutive classes of an Epidemiology Masters program in Lima, Peru, and describes the implementation (...) and outcomes of a multifaceted, “zero-tolerance” policy aimed at introducing research integrity. Two cases involved cheating in graded assignments, and five cases correspond to plagiarism in the thesis protocol. Cases revealed poor awareness of high tolerance to plagiarism, poor academic performance, and widespread writing deficiencies, compensated with patchwriting and copy-pasting. Depending on the events’ severity, penalties included course failure and separation from the program. Students at fault did not engage in further plagiarism. Between 2011 and 2013, the Masters program sequentially introduced a preventive policy consisting of: intensified research integrity and scientific writing education, a stepwise, cumulative writing process; honor codes; active search for plagiarism in all academic products; and a “zero-tolerance” policy in response to documented cases. No cases were detected in 2014. In conclusion, plagiarism seems to be widespread in resource-limited settings and a greater response with educational and zero-tolerance components is needed to prevent it. (shrink)

Since the publication of Universals and Scientific Realism (Armstrong 1978a, b) until Sketch for a Systematic Metaphysics (Armstrong 2010), via Universals: An Opinionated Introduction (Armstrong 1989), a World of States of Affairs (Armstrong 1997), and Truth and Truthmakers (Armstrong 2004), David Armstrong has developed one of the most influential theories of instantiation in contemporary analytic metaphysics (see, for example, Lewis, in Aust J Phil 61(4), 343–377, 1983; Baxter in Aust J Phil, 79, 449–464, 2001; Forrest, in Aust J Phil, 83, (...) 213–228, 2006). Instantiation has been advocated by Armstrong to give a solution to what he has called the “pressing problem” of “the multiple location of property universals” (Armstrong, in Universals: An opinionated introduction. University Press, Cambridge, 1989, pp. 89–90). Here I argue that Armstrong’s theory of instantiation fails to solve the problem because it involves two kinds of instantiation to account for particulars “having” and “sharing” universals. As a viable alternative to Armstrong’s theory, I propose a theory of instantiation capable of accounting for both phenomena in a univocal way. (shrink)

The systematic importance of the eidetic account of phantasy for Husserlian phenomenology in general is undisputed, but whether this account can be relevant for Aesthetics has often been put into question. In this paper I argue that Husserl’s rich phenomenology of phantasy, and in particular his account of perceptual phantasy, can nevertheless significantly enhance our understanding of how we recognize and imaginatively participate in artistic fictions. Moreover, I show how Husserl’s peculiar formulation of a non-intuitive phantasy at stake in artistic (...) representation anticipates some uses of the imagination in Aesthetics suggested by Ernst Gombrich and Kendall Walton. (shrink)

In this article we present symmetric diffusion networks, a family of networks that instantiate the principles of continuous, stochastic, adaptive and interactive propagation of information. Using methods of Markovion diffusion theory, we formalize the activation dynamics of these networks and then show that they can be trained to reproduce entire multivariate probability distributions on their outputs using the contrastive Hebbion learning rule (CHL). We show that CHL performs gradient descent on an error function that captures differences between desired and obtained (...) continuous multivariate probability distributions. This allows the learning algorithm to go beyond expected values of output units and to approximate complete probability distributions on continuous multivariate activation spaces. We argue that learning continuous distributions is an important task underlying a variety of real‐life situations that were beyond the scope of previous connectionist networks. Deterministic networks, like back propagation, cannot learn this task because they are limited to learning average values of independent output units. Previous stochastic connectionist networks could learn probability distributions but they were limited to discrete variables. Simulations show that symmetric diffusion networks can be trained with the CHL rule to approximate discrete and continuous probability distributions of various types. (shrink)

In einem Brief an Christiaan Huygens aus dem Jahre 1679 schlägt Leibniz eine neue von der Cartesischen Algebra verschiedene Characteristica geometrica vor. Dieser Entwurf wurde von einigen Wissenschaftshistorikern als ein Vorläufer der Analysis situs oder Topologie betrachtet. Im Jahre 1846 erhielt Graßmann einen Preis, der ausgesetzt worden war für die Konstruktion eines geometrischen Kalküls, der dem Leibnizschen ähnlich sein sollte. Im folgenden kritisierte ich die heute gemeinhin vertretene Auffassung, die Geometnsche Analyse von Graßmann sei die legitime mathematische Weiterentwicklung der geometrischen (...) Konzeptionen von Leibniz. Zunächst breite ich einige wenig bekannte historische Fakten bezüglich Leibniz und Graßmann aus und dann gehe ich dazu über, Kritik an Graßmanns Lektüre des Leibnizschen Textes zu üben. Die Frage nach dem wissenschaftlichen Wert der Gedanken, die Leibniz Huygens gegenüber äußert, möchte ich jedoch bis zur bald zu erwartenden Publikation zahlreicher Leibniz-Texte zu diesem Thema offen lassen. (shrink)

Ortega y Gasset pidió al filósofo la cortesía de la claridad. Las circunstancias del momento presente, en continua transformación, añaden al requerimiento orteguiano otro segundo no menos acuciante: la brevedad. Quien auténticamente sabe algo, acierta a decirlo de forma luminosa y en breve espacio, por ejemplo mil palabras. Y este es el espíritu que anima a Javier Gomá en esta colección de ensayos, o microensayos, que se resume así en su título: Todo a mil. El objetivo es, en un (...) millar de palabras, introducir al lector en la almendra de la reflexión filosófica. Así, por ejemplo, alguno de estos microensayos se arriesgan a definir con precisión cuestiones normalmente difusas como la sabiduría frente a la inteligencia o la dignidad humana; hay unos que abogan por actitudes contracorriente, como los beneficios de estar sentado, el desdén hacia las novedades, las ventajas del chisme o la afirmación gozosa de nuestro tiempo; otros critican ideas recibidas tan asentadas como el prestigio de la transgresión, la noción tradicional de 'vida privada', o la molesta tendencia a la sinceridad excesiva; otros más toman posición respecto a la responsabilidad de la crisis o el significado profundo de la paz social conquistada por el Estado de derecho; mientras otros, en fin, expresan la voz más personal del autor. Con este libro, Javier Gomá da un paso más en su decidida voluntad de hacer una filosofía mundana, abierta a todos, y ofrece así la mejor introducción posible, en mil palabras, a los más serios y perennes problemas filosóficos. (shrink)

Los derechos humanos sólo adquieren sentido, para Julián Marías, en torno a la persona, una de las claves de su pensamiento. El ser humano es radicalmente diferente a cualquier otro ser, con su doble estructura analítica y empírica, permanente y cambiante al mismo tiempo, y se caracteriza por su existencia argumentativa, proyectiva y futuriza. Javier Pérez Duarte es doctor en Derecho, licenciado en Derecho y en Filosofía y Letras por la Universidad de Deusto, en cuya Facultad de Derecho imparte (...) clases de Filosofía del Derecho y de Ética de las profesiones jurídicas. Entre sus publicaciones cabe destacar Claves del pensamiento político de Julián Marías, El proyecto vital en la ancianidad, en torno a la figura de Norberto Bobbio, Personificación de las cosas y cosificación de la persona, un análisis sobre Georg Simmel en los inicios de la gran revolución industrial, El burgués emprendedor y el capitalista del éxito, un acercamiento al estudio de Werner Sombart de estas dos figuras representativas de la modernidad y Responsabilidad y arte médico en la «Ciudad Universal» de Hans Jonas, acerca de los nuevos peligros del desarrollo científico. (shrink)

International research enrolling human subjects has raised an ethical concern regarding the just distribution of benefits between the countries that design the research and the host communities. Although several universal declarations have expressed this concern, a gap between theory and practice continues to exist, as well as a significant divergence between the design of the research protocol and the social context where it will be implemented. Although institutional review boards have made a valuable effort to evaluate international research, their sensitivity (...) to the just sharing of research benefits as well as their attention to the social context must be evaluated. This article analyzes the distribution of benefits in a review of international research in Mexico and produces an ethical reflection based on the results. (shrink)

Los trabajos que aquí se presentan ofrecen una gran panorámica sobre la reflexión en torno a la vida humana y vienen a continuación de los expuestos en el libro Dimensiones de la vida humana tal como las ofrece la antropología española. Ahora se abordan esas dimensiones desde tres vertientes diferenciadas, la historia, la literatura y la hermenéutica. La vida humana es plural y así son también las vistas sobre ella. Un primer conjunto de textos trata de la imagen del ser (...) humano en diversos momentos de la historia de la filosofía. Un segundo grupo nos acerca a la reflexión filosófica que se da en la literatura, ya que los escritores exploran las posibilidades de la vida humana, con lo que sus creaciones son un excelente mirador que el antropólogo filósofo no puede ignorar. Por último aparece un bloque de investigaciones que se centran en la hermenéutica -con una importante presencia de Paul Ricoeur- y en M. Merleau-Ponty, con motivo de su centenario en 2008. La cantidad de trabajos aquí recogidos es una buena muestra de los estudios que sobre antropología filosófica se están realizando en nuestro país. Cada texto es una ventana abierta que permite una mirada sobre el ser humano, sobre su imagen o sus imágenes. Sobre los autores: Javier San Martín, catedrático de Filosofía en la UNED, ha centrado su investigación en la fenomenología, antropología filosófica y filosofía de Ortega y Gasset. Tomás Domingo Moratalla, profesor de Ética en la Universidad Complutense de Madrid, se ha centrado en la filosofía de Paul Ricoeur, la antropología filosófica y la filosofía práctica en clave hermenéutica. (shrink)

Platón y Kant plantean un modelo “constitucional” del alma, en el que la razón y el apetito o la pasión tienen diferentes roles estructurales y funcionales en la generación de la motivación, en contraposición al común “modelo combativo,” en el que son mostrados como fuentes de motivación independientes que luchan por el control. Desde el punto de vista del modelo constitucional, podemos explicar qué hace que una acción sea diferente de un evento. Lo que hace que una acción sea atribuible (...) a una persona y, por lo tanto, lo que la hace una acción, es que surge desde la constitución de la persona y, por lo tanto, desde la persona como un todo, y no desde una fuerza que actúa sobre o en ella. Esto, a su vez, implica una explicación de lo que hace buena a una acción: lo que hace que una acción sea buena es que se delibere sobre ella y se la elija de una manera que unifique a la persona en un sistema constitucional. A través de la acción deliberativa nos constituimos como agentes unificados. La justicia platónica y el imperativo categórico de Kant se muestran como estándares normativos para la acción porque son principios de autoconstitución. (shrink)

La psicología clásica griega se sirvió de la acotación filosófica de expresiones del lenguaje ordinario para desarrollar su teoría de las facultades del alma. Tal fue el caso de la facultad sensible. El artículo muestra cómo en la República de Platón convive la documentación de la amplitud de significados del uso ordinario de aisthanesthai y aisthesis con una aproximación a la acuñación filosófica del término aisthesis, a través del concepto de dynamis que, como muestra la frecuente indistinción entre aisthesis y (...) doxa, no alcanza los rasgos definitorios presentes en diálogos posteriores. Palabras clave: Platón; Psicología; Teoría de la PercepciónClassical Greek psychology made use of the philosophical marking off of everyday language expressions to develop its theory of soul faculties. So it was with the sensitive faculty. The paper shows how in Plato’s Republic there coexist the documenting of the many meanings of aisthanesthai and aisthesis in their ordinary usage, together with an approach to the philosophical coining of the term aisthesis, by means of the concept of dynamis. As the frequent lack of distinction between aisthesis and doxa shows, the former does not reach the definiteness of later dialogues. Keywords : Plato; Psychology; Theory of Perception. (shrink)

This paper revisits the charges of fideism and irrationalism oftentimes leveled against Kierkegaard's consideration of the relation of ratio to fides. To this avail the author engages one of the key texts in this polemic, namely the first three chapters of Philosophical Fragments. His reading centers on the rather subtle suggestion that eroticlove, as a surrendering of oneself to another, plays the role of a metaphor or image for the downfall of the understanding characteristic of religious conversion. By considering the (...) possibilities and limitations of this metaphoric relation, he suggests that thedownfall of the understanding required in religious conversion occurs, surprisingly, not without an understanding, however limited, of the downfall. Because the experience oferotic love reveals where our true passion lies, we gain access to an alternative account of religious conversion according to Kierkegaard, one where ratio is not necessarilyput on the verge of disappearing by fides. Moreover, thanks to this metaphoric relation, not only does erotic love itself acquire a novel meaning—under the religious command of loving one's neighbor — but also one grasps in advance the risk of becoming dispassionate in a religious sense. (shrink)

El correcto mantenimiento de las zonas donde se alojan los perros y el uso de repelentes es fundamental para la prevención de la transmisión de esta enfermedad.

La investigación realizada consistió en un estudio llevado a cabo en la población de las Regiones de Bío Bío y Valparaíso, con intención de conocer la actitud que tienen frente a la donación de órganos. En Chile la tasa de donaciones en muy baja, y nos gustaría conocer la motivación que lleva ante la negativa a donar los órganos, o tratar de conocer cuáles son las circunstancias que llevan a que Chile se encuentre con esta baja tasa de donantes de (...) órganos. Los resultados obtenidos, mostraron que ambas regiones tienen una actitud positiva ante la donación de órganos, pero ésta baja cuando se pide donar sus propios órganos, y baja aún más, cuando se les pide donar los órganos de sus familiares. En este estudio analizamos variables sociopersonales, variables de interacción social, creencias religiosas, etc. Consideramos que este estudio es de gran relevancia para la sociedad, puesto que es una forma de conocer la opinión de la población, y pueda realizarse una implementación donde sea posible, con la finalidad de incrementar la tasa de donantes y con ello, aumentar la tasa de trasplantes realizados, de tal forma que estaríamos regalando vida a más personas. (shrink)

The aim of this paper is to examine the idea of metamathematical deduction in Hilbert’s program showing its dependence of epistemological notions, specially the notion of intuitive knowledge. It will be argued that two levels of foundations of deduction can be found in the last stages (in the 1920s) of Hilbert’s Program. The first level is related to the reduction – in a particular sense – of mathematics to formal systems, which are ‘metamathematically’ justified in terms of symbolic manipulation. The (...) second level of foundation consists in warranting epistemologically the validity of the combinatory processes underlying the symbolic manipulation in metamathematics. In this level the justification was carried out with the aid of notions from modern epistemology, particularly the notion of intuition. Finally, some problems concerning Hilbert’s use of this notion will be shown and it will be compared with Brouwer’s. (shrink)

El presente trabajo constará de tres partes. En la primera, trataré de ver qué es lo que significó para nuestro autor el asombrarse (staunen, wonder) ante el mundo considerado como un todo. En la segunda, intentaré relacionar ese pasmo o extrañeza con el sentido de la vida de cada uno de nosotros. Y es que la segunda parte es una explicitación de la primera. En la tercera, contextualizaré lo dicho en la cotidianidad de los humanos. Como creo, al igual que (...) Epicuro, que la filosofia que no cura las heridas del alma es vana, acabaré aterrizando, en lo posible, en el buen vivir que a todos, al menos como ideal, nos pertenece. (shrink)

Horkheimerian’s critique of the Enlightenment, shows the process whereby the demystification of the world is triggered by way of an “an act of sovereignty” of reason. There the man lost for reason his possibility of self-criticism, causing it to be in instrumental reason. Since its inception, the Enlightenment, as myth, mutilated reason, over the pursuit of truth –theoretical truth and moral truth–, there was a renounce to sense. The dream of Enlightenment rationality was reduced to the 'instrumentalization'. This dialectic not (...) only reveals the irreversible crisis of reason, but leaves in place, in the discussion of critical theory, the idea of the 'social pathology of reason', from which a “normative horizon” can be proposed, hinting at the scene of the ethical discussion the lack of rationality of societies. (shrink)

In lieu of an abstract, here is a brief excerpt of the content:Reviewed by:Becoming Human: Matter and Meaning in an Antiblack World by Zakiyyah Iman JacksonBernabé S. Mendoza (bio)Zakiyyah Iman Jackson, Becoming Human: Matter and Meaning in an Antiblack World New York: By New York University Press, 2020, 320 pp. ISBN 978-1-4798-9004-0the radical work of black feminism is to upend Western dualistic ways of thinking that structure our understanding of what it means to be human. In Becoming Human: Matter and (...) Meaning in an Antiblack World, Zakiyyah Iman Jackson troubles the dominant dualistic distinction of the human and the animal. Jackson argues that antiblackness undergirds Enlightenment discourses on the human-animal divide such that blackness cannot be extricated from the very concept of the animal because both “are not only interdependent representations but also entangled concepts” (28). Central to Jackson’s argument on the animalization of blackness is the notion of “ontologized plasticity,” which posits the being of black(ened) people as infinitely malleable and mutable matter and further points to the fluidification of form and “fleshly existence.” Far from seeing the human as a category that has “ontological integrity,” as scholars in the fields of animal studies, new materialisms, and posthumanism presuppose, Jackson instead seeks to redefine the concept of the human through the theorization of blackness (16). She points out that such theorization has been, for such scholars, a lacuna and the “space of the unthought,” which thus marks her intervention in these fields. [End Page 211]The author offers a sustained engagement with the knowledge claims of science and philosophy, reading them through and against the intellectual contributions of black feminist writers and artists. She draws from such luminaries as Toni Morrison, Nalo Hopkinson, Octavia Butler, Audre Lorde, and the artist Wangechi Mutu to show the ways in which they reject an enclosed notion of the human that is defined only by keeping the racialized other at bay and in a degraded animalized and liquified state. As such, she showcases how black feminist visual and literary culture “theorizes and philosophizes” and reveals the faulty, antiblack premises upon which science and philosophy establish their claims of knowledge on the human.Offering a materialist theory of black ontology and temporality, Jackson poses three main arguments on the racialization of the human-animal distinction. The first is the aforementioned notion of ontologized and black(ened) plasticity that speaks to the constant modulation and manipulation of black matter as it relates to gender, sexuality, and sexual reproduction. Reading US slavery as an experimental playground for testing the limits of the human, Jackson argues that “black female f lesh... functions as the limit case of ‘the human’ and is its matrix-figure” (4). She defines plasticity as a “praxis that seeks to define the essence of a black(ened) thing as infinitely mutable in antiblack, often paradoxical sexuating terms as a means of hierarchically delineating sex/gender, reproduction, and states of being more generally” (11). There is, in other words, an inversion that takes place in that it is only through opposition and the imposed instability and illegibility of blackness—of black matter and the black mater(nal) situated as “chaos by design”—that such categories as “woman,” “mother,” and “female body” can themselves take hold and become intelligible forms (11). Jackson engages with the work of Hortense Spillers and Sylvia Wynter in order to argue that “Man,” as the object of analysis within liberal humanism, “produces an untenable dichotomy—‘the human’ versus ‘the animal,’ whereby the black(ened) female is posited as the abyss dividing organic life into ‘human’ or ‘animal’ based on wholly unsound metaphysical premises” (12). This claim on the centrality of the black female in the plasticization of blackness is given support in chapter 2, which focuses on Nalo Hopkinson’s speculative novel Brown Girl in the Ring, where plasticity gives way to opacity.In this chapter, Jackson explores the ways in which the black female body, as that which is opaque and nonrepresentable within the “dominant grammar of representation,” shatters what she argues is Heidegger’s metaphysical and hierarchical ordering of human, animal, and world. In exploring “how our received conceptions of being hinges on our im/perception of black mater... (shrink)

BackgroundIn this manuscript, we argue that within the context of phase IV, physician-researchers retain their fiduciary obligation to treat the patient-participants.DiscussionWe first clarify why the perspective that research ethics ought to be differentiated from clinical ethics is not applicable in phase IV, and therefore, why therapeutic orientation is most convivial in this phase. Next, assuming that ethics guidelines may be representative of common morality, we show that ethics guidelines see physician-researchers primarily as physicians and only secondarily as researchers. We then (...) elaborate on what a fiduciary obligation is and how some of the obligations are default duties. Lastly, we look at the fiduciary obligation of the physician-researcher in phase IV interventional trials.ConclusionThe fiduciary obligation to treat is not as easily waived as in earlier trials. Assuming the entwinement of research and practice in phase IV, physician-researchers, in collaboration with other researchers, investigators, and research ethics committees, should ensure that in terms of study design, methodology, and research practice, the therapeutic value of the research to the patient-participants is not diminished. (shrink)

This article is the result of a theoretical analysis of a consultation family therapy interview conducted by the well-known family therapist, Dr. S. Minuchin. In the interview, Minuchin effectively challenges the family's structure and the individual members' presenting identities and social roles. Through his successful use of metaphor and techniques like confrontation, enactment and confirmation, he leads the family members out of their confinement toward interaction. Based on a phenomenologically oriented analysis, the authors propose a theoretical formulation to account for (...) the interpersonal space created during the therapeutic process. The directing question they address is: if every member of the family is confined to and legitimates his own conception of himself and his circumstances, how can mutually influencing relations be evoked? A main hypothesis is posed: the therapist faced with conflictual relationships effects consecutive synthesis which allow movement toward desired and alternative behaviors and toward the integration of each member into the family. Initially, the presenting behaviors are of a repetitive and unidimensional nature. The therapist proceeds to unlock these states mainly by using metaphors which point towards actual behaviors and desired alternatives. He thus opens a second dimension by presenting means which make reflection possible and heightens differentiation of self. Subsequently, the family members are led toward the formation of a positive and shared identity confirmed and affectively supported by the therapist. This process results in a third dimension where family members manifest personal reflective awareness of different ways of relating to each other. Integration of the individuals into a new family matrix becomes possible. (shrink)