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...

A brief history of the relations between humans and animals -- Out of sight, out of mind -- Everybody loses: the effects of industrial breeding and meat eating on poverty, the environment and health -- The real face of industrial animal breeding -- Sorry excuses -- The continuum of life -- The mass killing of animals--genocide versus zoocide -- A little side trip into the realm of moral judgment -- The dilemma of animal experimentation -- Illegal trade in wildlife -- (...) Animals as objects of entertainment -- Animal rights, human obligations -- An appeal to reason and to human kindness. (shrink)

La 4e de couverture indique : "Les thèses de Lacan viennent de sa pratique, mais il avait articulé celles-ci dans un cadre théorique très élaboré. De Platon et Descartes jusqu'à Heidegger ou Wittgenstein, en passant par Kant et Hegel, Lacan a lu avec attention les grands philosophes. Le refondateur de la psychanalyse, à l'encontre des scolastiques de la psyché qu'il a sans cesse combattues, avait à faire à la vérité, à la vérité freudienne, celle des sujets qui s'analysent, mais aussi (...) aux articulations de savoir qui prennent une place primordiale dans l'élaboration de son immense séminaire qui constitue une des créations les plus puissantes de notre temps. Les grands philosophes y sont fréquemment interrogés dans leur pensée fondamentale et jusqu'à leur point de butée que Lacan nommait l'impossible et qu'il tentait de déborder à partir des (quatre) concepts fondamentaux de Freud et en posant avec l'objet a le registre du Réel et le primat de l'écriture.". (shrink)

Winner of the Moonbeam Children's Animals/Pets Non-Fiction Gold Medal! A story about the fundamental connection between animals and people and how we can treat all of Earth's creatures with compassion and empathy. Furry polar bears, playful sea otters, slow sloths, prickly porcupines, and slimy snakes are just a few of the many animals we share our world with. And even though we might not look the same or have the same needs as our animal neighbors, we have more in common (...) with them than we might think. Our Animal Neighbors introduces children to the importance of treating all animals with the care and compassion they deserve. We all want to experience love, safety, and respect and this book is the first step to instilling those values at an early age. This planet is our home, and we should all be free to live a prosperous life regardless of whether we have hands, hooves, scales, or fur. “A serious message delivered with humor, simplicity, and charm makes this book an excellent purchase for families that value open-ended discussions. Also a good resource for classrooms and libraries that welcome diverse opinions and points of view.”—School Library Journal. (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)

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.

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)

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)

The central theme of this important book is that we are paying the price of an arrogance that refuses to recognize mystery. The author invites the reader to enter into the argument that he holds with himself on a great number of problems. Written in the early 1950s, Marcel's discussion of these topics are remarkably contemporary, e.g.: * Our crisis is a metaphysical, not merely social, one. * What a man is depends partly on what he thinks he is, and (...) a materialistic philosophy turns men into things. * Can a man be free except in a free country? * Stoicism is no longer a workable philosophy because today pressure can be put on the mind as well as on the body. * Technical progress is not evil in itself, but a technique is a means that, regarded as an end, can become either an idol or an excuse for self-idolatry. State control of scientific research, leading to a concentration on new means of destruction, is a calamity. * Fanaticism is an opinion that refuses to argue, and so the fanatic is an enemy of truth. * The kind of unification that science is bringing about today is really an ironing out of differences, but the only valuable kind of unity is one that implies a respect for differences. * We must beware of thinking in terms of great numbers and so blinding ourselves to the reality of individual suffering. Our philosophical approach to being is made possible only by our practical approach to our neighbor. * We must encourage the spirit of fraternity and distrust the kind of egalitarianism that is based on envy and resentment. * No man however humble should feel that he cannot spread the light among his friends. No easy solution is offered, but the author conveys his own faith that ultimately love and intelligence will triumph. (shrink)

In this chapter, we discuss a specific kind of progress in economics, namely, progress that is pushed by the repeated use of mathematical models in most sub-branches of economics today. We adopt a functional account of progress to argue that progress in economics occurs via the use of what we call ‘common recipes’ and the use of model templates to define and solve problems of relevance for economists. We support our argument by discussing the case of twentieth-century business cycle research. (...) By presenting this case study in detail, we show how model templates are not only re-applied to different phenomena. We also show how scientists come up with them in the first place and how – once they are considered less useful – they are replaced with new ones. Finally, our case also illustrates that it is not only the mathematical structure that is re-used but that such a re-use also requires a shared conceptual vision of core properties of the phenomenon. If that vision is not shared anymore among economists, a model template can become useless and has to be replaced – sometimes through overcoming resistance – with a different one. (shrink)

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)

Essays in this volume honor Marcel Senn on the occasion of his retirement from the law department of Universität Zürich. The contributors of the essays are colleagues and friends.

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)

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)

Peut-on dire qu'une philosophie est vraie?" [et la réponse négative de Canguilhem], "La réalité des philosophies" [et l'idéalisme radical de Gueroult], "Les deux systèmes de métaphysique" [et la place de Spinoza], "Comment je vois la Nature", "Les points cardinaux de ma philosophie", "Comment philosopher", "Faire son devoir" [ce qui compte est 1'k-te] sont parmi les chapitres principaux de cet ouvrage. Ceux-ci sont secondaires : "Bergson et Eucken", "Palmyre", "Kant contre Spinoza" [sur la place des définitions]."--Page 4 of cover.

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)

La 4ème de couv. indique : "À quatre-vingt-quatorze ans, Marcel Conche a encore quelque chose à dire sur la nature, l'infini, la vérité, la tradition, la création, le moi, le silence, le tragique, l’amour, la mort ou les mathématiques, mais aussi sur Héraclite, Descartes, Kant, Leibniz et, principalement, sur Spinoza.".

Decision outcomes sometimes result in negative emotions. This can occur when a decision appears to be wrong in retrospect, and/or when the obtained decision outcome does not live up to expectations. Regret and disappointment are the two emotions that are of central interest in the present article. Although these emotions have a lot in common, they also differ in ways that are relevant to decision making. In this article we review theories and empirical findings concerning regret and disappointment. We first (...) discuss how regret and disappointment differ with respect to their antecedent conditions, appraisals, and phenomenology. We also discuss possible behavioural consequences of experiencing these emotions. Next, we consider how the anticipation of regret and disappointment may influence decision making. We use regret and disappointment theory, developed by the economists Bell (1982, 1985), and Loomes and Sugden (1982, 1986, 1987), as a framework for our discussion. Finally, we argue that combining the theoretical approaches and research paradigms of behavioural decision theory with emotion theories will significantly increase our knowledge of antecedents and consequences of emotions. (shrink)