The paper discusses how systems biology is working toward complex accounts that integrate explanation in terms of mechanisms and explanation by mathematical models—which some philosophers have viewed as rival models of explanation. Systems biology is an integrative approach, and it strongly relies on mathematical modeling. Philosophical accounts of mechanisms capture integrative in the sense of multilevel and multifield explanations, yet accounts of mechanistic explanation have failed to address how a mathematical model could contribute to such explanations. I discuss how mathematical (...) equations can be explanatorily relevant. Several cases from systems biology are discussed to illustrate the interplay between mechanistic research and mathematical modeling, and I point to questions about qualitative phenomena, where quantitative models are still indispensable to the explanation. Systems biology shows that a broader philosophical conception of mechanisms is needed, which takes into account functional-dynamical aspects, interaction in complex networks with feedback loops, system-wide functional properties such as distributed functionality and robustness, and a mechanism’s ability to respond to perturbations. I offer general conclusions for philosophical accounts of explanation. (shrink)

Systems biology is a vigorous and expanding discipline, in many ways a successor to genomics and perhaps unprecendented in its combination of biology with a ...

There is contrast to the belief that all energy and matter came into existence after the Big Bang. If we wish to understand the way the Greeks and other philosophers view our environment, we need to study the data that was collected by them. This book sees our portrayal of reality as having its departure point in concrete systems by which means of conceptual systems result in abstracted systems. This data must be sorted and information must now be surveyed, structured, (...) and analysed to find qualities and connections between the different aspects systems thinking. This has led to the theory for 'Living Systems'. It gives examples of applications which a basis for further studies of systems can be formed. The Internet now provides a major advantage to the retrieval of statistical information and opens a means for the future exploration and verification of how systems work. (shrink)

Ethologists and others studying animal behavior in a spirit are in need of a descriptive language and method that are neither anachronistically bound by behaviorist scruples nor prematurely committed to particular Just such an interim descriptive method can be found in intentional system theory. The use of intentional system theory is illustrated with the case of the apparently communicative behavior of vervet monkeys. A way of using the theory to generate data - including usable, testable data - is sketched. The (...) underlying assumptions of this approach can be seen to ally it directly with theorizing in evolutionary biology, which has recently come under attack from Stephen Gould and Richard Lewontin, who castigate it as the Their arguments, which are strongly analogous to B. F, Skinner's arguments against point to certain pitfalls that attend the careless exercise of such thinking (and rival varieties of thinking as well), but do not constitute a fundamental objection to either adaptationist theorizing or its cousin, intentional system theory. (shrink)

D'Holbach believed that the misery he saw in mankind around him was caused by religion and its superstitious beliefs - that there was a God who controlled destiny and would reward and punish individuals. The System of Nature was written to replace these delusions with a schema of understanding based solely on the physical workings of nature.

There is no doubt that custard apple diseases are among the important reasons that destroy the Custard Apple plant and its agricultural crops. This leads to obvious damage to these plants and they become inedible. Discovering these diseases is a good step to provide the appropriate and correct treatment. Determining the treatment with high accuracy depends on the method used to correctly diagnose the disease, expert systems can greatly help in avoiding damage to these plants. The expert system correctly diagnoses (...) Custard Apple disease to make it easier for farmers to find the right treatment based on the appropriate diagnosis. Objectives: A specialized syllable language system was established for the diagnosis of Custard Apple plant disease. (shrink)

In this chapter we explore basic mathematical and other constraints which limit the often novel uses of computation employed in modern computational system biology. These constraints generate substantial obstacles for one goal prominent in the field; namely, the goal of producing models valid for predictive uses in clinical and other contexts. However on closer examination many applications of computation and simulation in the field have more pragmatic or investigative goals in mind, suggesting an important role for rationalizing uses of computation (...) in systems biology and elsewhere as investigative tools. We discuss the concept of an “investigative tool”, and what insights it might offer our understanding of modern computational strategies and the bases for them. (shrink)

Here, for the first time, development studies encounters the set of ideas popularly known as 'Chaos Theory'. Samir Rihani applies to the processes of economic development, ideas from complex adaptive systems like uncertainty, complexity, and unpredictability. Rihani examines various aspects of the development process - including the World Bank, debt, and the struggle against poverty - and demonstrates the limitations of fundamentally linear thinking in an essentially non-linear world.

Das System der Disponibilitätshierarchien versucht in der Rechtsphilosophie eine neue Perspektive zu eröffnen, indem speziell das Phänomen der Disponibilitätssetzung und seiner Auswirkungen auf die Umgangsmöglichkeiten und Urteilsmacht des Menschen in der Gesellschaft betrachtet wird. Die Disponibilitätshierarchie der Umgangsmöglichkeit und die Disponibilitätshierarchie der Urteilsmacht dienen dem Aufbau eines neuen Freiheitsbegriffes. Mit der Darstellung des Aufbaus der Statikexistenziale und der Dynamikexistenziale begründet das Werk einen neuen Freiheitsbegriff und überschreitet damit die Grenze der Rechtsphilosophie hin zur Allgemeinphilosophie. In der antiken und in der (...) klassischen Philosophie wurde Freiheit zumeist als Möglichkeit, in der absoluten Daseinsform aufzugehen, verstanden. Kant hat die Möglichkeit der absoluten Eigenursächlichkeit eines gedanklichen Ereignisses für den Folgegedankengang und Ereignisablauf als transzendentale Freiheit verstanden und als notwendige Bedingung der konkreten praktischen Freiheit, die er Selbstautonomie nannte, angesehen. Die moderne Philosophie sieht zumeist in der größtmöglichen materiellen und ideellen Ungebundenheit die Freiheit, die negative Freiheit als Freiheit von Zwängen ist. In diesem Buch wird herausgearbeitet, daß Freiheit ambivalent erstrebt wird durch den Aufbau von Statik- und Dynamikexistenzialen. Der Autor, geb. 1969, absolvierte ein Studium der Rechtswissenschaft an der Universität Freiburg im Breisgau und unternahm darüber hinaus Studien zur Allgemeinphilosophie. Er ist derzeit Rechtsreferendar am Landgericht Freiburg. (shrink)

1 Einleitung: Die konstruktivistische Herausforderung strukturgenetischer Subjekttheorien........................................................ 11 1. 1 Sozialisationstheorie - jenseits der groBen Entwiirfe......................................... 17 1. 2 Der genetische Strukturalismus im Kontext theoretischer Leitunterscheidungen................................................................................ ....... 20 1. 3 Konstitution als Problemstellung...................................................................... 27 2 Strukturgenetischer und radikaler Konstruktivismus........................... 33 2. 1 Die Erkenntnistheorie des Radikalen Konstruktivismus vor dem Hintergrund einer interaktionistischen strukturgenetischen Theoriestrategie.................................................................................... ........... 36 2. 1. 1 "Realitat" und "Wirklichkeit"........................................................................... 37 2. 1. 2 Konstruktivitat und AuBenwe1t: Piaget und von Glasersfeld............................. 41 2. 1. 3 Abgeschlossenheit, Rekursivitat und strukturelle Koppelung........................... 46 (...) 2. 2 Aquilibration und Adaption - Die differenztheoretische Ausgangslage des strukturgenetischen Konstruktivismus Piagets..................... 51 2. 3 Differenzerfahrung und die Entstehung des Neuen........................................... 54 2. 4 Der Status strukturgenetischer Fragestellungen vor dem Hintergrund des radikalen Konstruktivismus.................................................... 57 3 Soziale Konstitutions- und Systemtheorie.............................................. 62 3. 1 Die soziale Konstitutionshypothese.................................................................. 64 3. 2 Sprachzentrismus und Regelontologie.............................................................. 70 3. 3 Sinn als Grundbegriffund die Eigenstiindigkeit des Sozialen.......................... 72 3. 4 Das Problem der doppelten Kontingenz........................................................... 76 3. 5 Interpenetration und strukturelle Koppelung.................................................... 84 3. 6 Differenz und Identitat in der System- und sozialen Konstitutionstheorie......... 89 3. 7 Zwischenbilanz und Konsequenzen fur die Konzeption des Anfangsproblems 92 5 4 Die Konstitution der Subjekt-Objekt-Differenz: Das grundlegende Bezugsproblem des interaktionistischen Konstruktivismus...................................... 97 4. 1 Die Subjekt-Objekt-Differenzierung im genetischen Strukturalismus Piagets.................... 100 4. 1. 1 Die Ausgangskonstellation............................................ 102 4. 1. 2 1m Reich der Metaphem: Die Rolle der AuBenwelt und der Akkommodation........................................................................ 106 4. 1. 3 Die primaren und sekundaren Zirkularreaktionen im Blick des radikalen Konstruktivismus........................................................ III 4. 1. 4 Die Ausbildung der Subjekt-Objekt-Gegenlage.......................................... (shrink)

Dass Edmund Husserl am Problem der Intersubjektivität gescheitert ist, gilt als ausgemacht - und ebenso, welche Konsequenzen daraus zu ziehen sind. Entgegen dem allenthalben pauschal erklärten `Abschied vom Subjekt' spricht aber vieles dafür, dass es in der gegenwärtigen Sozialtheorie eher um eine Reformulierung transzendentaler Subjektivität geht. Diese Interpretationsthese wirft ein neues Licht auf den sozialtheoretischen Diskurs, der im deutschen Sprachraum in den vergangenen dreissig Jahren vom Gegensatz von Jürgen Habermas' und Niklas Luhmanns Theorien bestimmt war: `Diskurs' und `System' erscheinen als (...) gegensätzliche Versuche, `Subjektivität' und `Interität' in ein theoretisch befriedigendes Verhältnis zu setzen. Wenn aber - so die kritische These dieses Buches - weder die Reformulierung von Subjektivität als `Interität' noch die Reformulierung von Subjektivität ohne `Interität' das Problem der Intersubjektivität überzeugend löst, ist dies ein Grund, neuerlich in eine direkte Auseinandersetzung mit Husserls Theorie transzendentaler Subjektivität einzutreten. Dabei stellt sich heraus, dass Husserls vielkritisierter und -skandalisierter Versuch, den Sinn `Anderer' im `Eigenen' zu fundieren, in der transzendentalphänomenologischen Subjekttheorie durch ein umgekehrtes Begründungsverhältnis konterkariert wird. Bei aller Problematik dieser Theorieanlage - welche nur in Gegenwendung zu den Gewohnheiten der Husserl-Interpretation, vor allem aber auch zu Husserls Selbstinterpretation in den Blick kommt - zeigt sich, dass der phänomenologische Begriff des transzendentalen Subjekts seinen Reformulierungen als Diskurs und als System in mancher Hinsicht überlegen ist. (shrink)

The relationship between abstract formal procedures and the activities of actual physical systems has proved to be surprisingly subtle and controversial, and there are a number of competing accounts of when a physical system can be properly said to implement a mathematical formalism and hence perform a computation. I defend an account wherein computational descriptions of physical systems are high-level normative interpretations motivated by our pragmatic concerns. Furthermore, the criteria of utility and success vary according to our diverse purposes and (...) pragmatic goals. Hence there is no independent or uniform fact to the matter, and I advance the ‘anti-realist’ conclusion that computational descriptions of physical systems are not founded upon deep ontological distinctions, but rather upon interest-relative human conventions. Hence physical computation is a ‘conventional’ rather than a ‘natural’ kind. (shrink)

Background: The castor bean is a large grassy or semi-wooden shrub or small tree. Any part of the castor plant parts can suffering from a disease that weakens the ability to grow and eliminates its production. Therefore, in this paper will identify the pests and diseases present in castor culture and detect the symptoms in each disease. Also images is showing the symptom form in this disease. Objectives: The main objective of this expert system is to obtain appropriate diagnosis of (...) the disease. Methods: In this paper, the expert system is designed for the ability of agricultural engineers to detect and diagnose disease of castor like as: seeding blight, alternaria blight, cercospora leaf spot, powdery mildew and wilt. This system presents the disease symptoms, survival and spread, favorable conditions and image for each disease. Clips and Delphi expert system languages are used for designing and implementing the proposed expert system. Results: The expert system in the diagnosis of castor diseases was assessed by farmers and agricultural engineers and they were satisfied and accepted with its quality of performance. Conclusions: The expert system is easy for farmers and people have experience in the plant of castor to detect and diagnosis the symptoms that may face this plant from several disease. (shrink)

Abstract: Background: In spite of the fact that computers continue to improve in speed and functions operation, they remain complex to use. Problems frequently happen, and it is hard to resolve or find solutions for them. This paper outlines the significance and feasibility of building a desktop PC problems diagnosis system. The system gathers problem symptoms from users’ desktops, rather than the user describes his/her problems to primary search engines. It automatically searches global databases of problem symptoms and solutions, and (...) also allows ordinary users to contribute exact problem reports in a structured manner. Objectives: The main goal of this Knowledge Based System is to get the suitable problem desktop PC symptoms and the correct way to solve the errors. Methods: In this paper the design of the proposed Knowledge Based System which was produced to help users of desktop PC in knowing many of the problems and error such as : Power supply problems, CPU errors, RAM dumping error, hard disk errors and bad sectors and suddenly restarting PC. The proposed Knowledge Based System presents an overview about desktop PC hardware errors are given, the cause of fault are outlined and the solution to the problems whenever possible is given out. CLIPS Knowledge Based System language was used for designing and implementing the proposed expert system. Results: The proposed PC desktop troubleshooting Knowledge Based System was evaluated by IT students and they were satisfied with its performance. (shrink)

The logic $G3^{<}_{{{}^{\scriptsize{-}}}\!\!\textrm{L}}$ was introduced in Robles and Mendéz as a paraconsistent logic which is based on Gödel’s 3-valued matrix, except that Kleene–Łukasiewicz’s negation is added to the language and is used as the main negation connective. We show that $G3^{<}_{{{}^{\scriptsize{-}}}\!\!\textrm{L}}$ is exactly the intersection of $G3^{\{1\}}_{{{}^{\scriptsize{-}}}\!\!\textrm{L}}$ and $G3^{\{1,0.5\}}_{{{}^{\scriptsize{-}}}\!\!\textrm{L}}$, the two truth-preserving 3-valued logics which are based on the same truth tables. We then construct a Hilbert-type system which has for $\to $ as its sole rule of inference, and is (...) strongly sound and complete for $G3^{<}_{{{}^{\scriptsize{-}}}\!\!\textrm{L}}$. Then we show how, by adding one axiom or one new rule of inference, we get strongly sound and complete systems for $G3^{\{1\}}_{{{}^{\scriptsize{-}}}\!\!\textrm{L}}$ and $G3^{\{1,0.5\}}_{{{}^{\scriptsize{-}}}\!\!\textrm{L}}$. Finally, we provide quasi-canonical Gentzen-type systems which are sound and complete for those logics and show that they are all analytic, by proving the cut-elimination theorem for them. (shrink)

This article presents the first, systematic analysis of the ethical challenges posed by recommender systems through a literature review. The article identifies six areas of concern, and maps them onto a proposed taxonomy of different kinds of ethical impact. The analysis uncovers a gap in the literature: currently user-centred approaches do not consider the interests of a variety of other stakeholders—as opposed to just the receivers of a recommendation—in assessing the ethical impacts of a recommender system.

In recent years, an active research program has emerged that aims to develop a Humean best-system account (BSA) of laws of nature that improves on Lewis’s canonical articulation of the view. Its guiding idea is that the laws are cognitive tools tailored to the specific needs and limitations of creatures like us. While current versions of this “pragmatic Humean” research program fare much better than Lewis’s account along many dimensions, I will argue that they have trouble making sense of certain (...) key features of the practice of fundamental physics. Indeed, these features seem to go against the very idea that laws are useful for agents like us. In my view, Humeans can address these issues by paying more attention to the explanatory role of laws. Following this idea, I will propose an account on which what makes a systematization the best is a kind of explanatory power, understood along the lines of the unificationist theory of explanation. The resulting view, I will argue, can make sense of those features of laws that other pragmatic accounts of laws have trouble explaining. (shrink)

In this essay, I focus on two questions. First, what is Kant's understanding of the sense in which our faculties form a unified system? And, second, what are the implications of this for the metaphysical relationships between the faculties within this system? To consider these questions, I begin with a brief discussion of Longuenesse's groundbreaking work on the teleological unity of the understanding as the faculty for judgment. In doing so, I argue for a generalization of Longuenesse's account along two (...) dimensions. The result is a picture of our faculties as forming a teleological system—unified under the overarching aims of reason as the highest rational faculty. Then I discuss the recent debate between “additive” and “transformative” interpretations of the relationship between sensibility and the understand- ing, before proposing that we should interpret Kant as endorsing a moderate form of the “transformative” reading, which captures important elements of both the “additive” and the “transformative” account. (shrink)

In this reply to James H. Fetzer’s “Minds and Machines: Limits to Simulations of Thought and Action”, I argue that computationalism should not be the view that (human) cognition is computation, but that it should be the view that cognition (simpliciter) is computable. It follows that computationalism can be true even if (human) cognition is not the result of computations in the brain. I also argue that, if semiotic systems are systems that interpret signs, then both humans and computers are (...) semiotic systems. Finally, I suggest that minds can be considered as virtual machines implemented in certain semiotic systems, primarily the brain, but also AI computers. In doing so, I take issue with Fetzer’s arguments to the contrary. (shrink)

The notion of cognitive system is widely used in explanations in cognitive psychology and neuroscience. Traditional approaches define cognitive systems in an agent-relative way, that is, via top-down functional decomposition that assumes a cognitive agent as starting point. The extended cognition movement challenged that approach by questioning the primacy of the notion of cognitive agent. In response, [Adams, F., and K. Aizawa. 2001. The Bounds of Cognition. Oxford, UK: Wiley-Blackwell.] suggested that to have a clear understanding of what a cognitive (...) system is we may need to solve “the demarcation challenge”: the problem of identifying a reliable way to determine which mechanisms that are causally responsible for the production of a certain cognitive process constitute a cognitive system responsible for such process and which ones do not. Recently, [Rupert, R. 2009. Cognitive Systems and the Extended Mind. Oxford: Oxford University Press.] offered a solution based on the idea that the mechanisms that constitute a cognitive system are integrated in a particular sense. In this paper I critically review Rupert’s solution and argue against it. Additionally, I argue that a successful account of cognitive system must accommodate the fact that the neural mechanisms causally responsible for the production of a cognitive process are diachronically dynamic and yet functionally stable. At the end, I offer a suggestion as to how to accommodate this diachronic dynamicity without losing functional stability. I conclude by drawing some implications for the discussion on cognitive ontologies. (shrink)

Chest pain is the pain felt in the chest by infants, children and adolescents. In most cases the pain is not associated with the heart. It is mainly recognized by the observance or report of pain by the infant, child or adolescent by reports of distress by parents or care givers. Chest pain is not unusual in children. Lots of children are seen in ambulatory clinics, emergency rooms and hospitals and cardiology clinics. Usually there is a benign cause for the (...) pain for utmost children. Certain patients have conditions that are serious and perhaps life-threatening. Chest pain in pediatric patients needs careful physical examination and a detailed history that would point to the possibility of a serious cause. Researches of pediatric chest pain are scarce. It has been difficult to create evidence-based guidelines for evaluation. In this paper we propose an expert system to help doctors and parents, and care giver in diagnosing chest pain in infants and children. This expert System is design and implemented in SL5 Object language. (shrink)

Robert Rupert argues against the view that human cognitive processes comprise elements beyond the boundary of the organism, developing a systems-based conception in place of this extended view. He also argues for a conciliatory understanding of the relation between the computational approach to cognition and the embedded and embodied views.

Considerations arising in the context of burgeoning concerns about the environment can provoke an exploration of issues that have significance both for environmental education in particular and education more generally. Notions of the ‘greater whole’ and ‘systemic wisdom’ that feature in some strands of environmental discourse are a case in point. It is argued that interpretations of these notions arising in currently influential scientific and systems thinking understandings of nature that attempt to overcome a corrosive separation of humankind and nature (...) through a dilution or dismissal of the distinction between the human and non-human, self and other, require critical evaluation if they are not to bring their own dangers. Merleau-Pontian understandings of object constitution in a subjectively informed life-world and ideas of the ‘selving’ of natural things are drawn upon in developing a non-discursively grounded interpretation of systemic wisdom. The latter is taken to raise questions that have considerable transformative potential for conventional views of knowledge and its curriculum organisation. (shrink)

PurposeThe purpose of this paper is to explore a particular philosophical underpinning for Information Systems (IS) research – critical systemic thinking (CST). Drawing upon previous work, the authors highlight the principal features of CST within the tradition of critical research and attempt to relate it to trends in the Italian school of IS research in recent years, as exemplified by the work of Claudio Ciborra but also evident in work by, e.g. Resca, Jacucci and D'Atri.Design/methodology/approachThis is a conceptual paper which (...) explores CST, characterised by a focus on individual uniqueness, and socially‐constructed, individual worldviews as generators of human knowing.FindingsThe paper draws on work by Heinz Klein in which he elaborated three constitutive stages in critical research: interpretive, genealogical and constructive. The authors introduce a fourth, reflective stage and discuss five categories of critical research, reflecting different perspectives on emancipation, culminating in emergent expressionism, associated with Ciborra and the Italian school more generally.Research limitations/implicationsThis paper discusses approaches to CST and how they might have practical implications in IS development. The distinction between approaches founded in logical empiricism and those founded in hermeneutic dialectics are considered and the development of critical and systems strands are discussed.Practical implicationsThe paper addresses CST as an approach to development of information systems. Such approaches enable users to explore their individually unique understandings and create a constructive dialogue with one another, which emancipates and empowers users to own and control their own development processes and hence build more productive and usable systems.Social implicationsA focus on research which is oriented towards emancipation in the tradition of critical social theory.Originality/valueThe paper draws on extensive theoretical research carried out by the authors over a period of more than ten years in CST and synthesises the practical implications. (shrink)

We address the question of whether and to what extent explanatory and modelling strategies in systems biology are mechanistic. After showing how dynamic mathematical models are actually required for mechanistic explanations of complex systems, we caution readers against expecting all systems biology to be about mechanistic explanations. Instead, the aim may be to generate topological explanations that are not standardly mechanistic, or to arrive at design principles that explain system organization and behaviour in general, but not specific mechanisms. These abstraction (...) strategies serve various aims, including prediction and control, that are central to understanding the epistemic diversity of systems biology. (shrink)

Griffiths and Russell D. Gray (1994, 1997, 2001) have argued that the fundamental unit of analysis in developmental systems theory should be a process – the life cycle – and not a set of developmental resources and interactions between those resources. The key concepts of developmental systems theory, epigenesis and developmental dynamics, both also suggest a process view of the units of development. This chapter explores in more depth the features of developmental systems theory that favour treating processes as fundamental (...) in biology and examines the continuity between developmental systems theory and ideas about process in the work of several major figures in early 20th century biology, most notable C.H Waddington. (shrink)

Prior to the twentieth century, theories of knowledge were inherently perceptual. Since then, developments in logic, statis- tics, and programming languages have inspired amodal theories that rest on principles fundamentally different from those underlying perception. In addition, perceptual approaches have become widely viewed as untenable because they are assumed to implement record- ing systems, not conceptual systems. A perceptual theory of knowledge is developed here in the context of current cognitive science and neuroscience. During perceptual experience, association areas in the (...) brain capture bottom-up patterns of activation in sensory-motor areas. Later, in a top-down manner, association areas partially reactivate sensory-motor areas to implement perceptual symbols. The stor- age and reactivation of perceptual symbols operates at the level of perceptual components – not at the level of holistic perceptual expe- riences. Through the use of selective attention, schematic representations of perceptual components are extracted from experience and stored in memory (e.g., individual memories of green, purr, hot). As memories of the same component become organized around a com- mon frame, they implement a simulator that produces limitless simulations of the component (e.g., simulations of purr). Not only do such simulators develop for aspects of sensory experience, they also develop for aspects of proprioception (e.g., lift, run) and introspec- tion (e.g., compare, memory, happy, hungry). Once established, these simulators implement a basic conceptual system that represents types, supports categorization, and produces categorical inferences. These simulators further support productivity, propositions, and ab- stract concepts, thereby implementing a fully functional conceptual system. Productivity results from integrating simulators combinato- rially and recursively to produce complex simulations. Propositions result from binding simulators to perceived individuals to represent type-token relations. Abstract concepts are grounded in complex simulations of combined physical and introspective events. Thus, a per- ceptual theory of knowledge can implement a fully functional conceptual system while avoiding problems associated with amodal sym- bol systems. Implications for cognition, neuroscience, evolution, development, and artificial intelligence are explored. (shrink)

Developmental systems theory (DST) is a wholeheartedly epigenetic approach to development, inheritance and evolution. The developmental system of an organism is the entire matrix of resources that are needed to reproduce the life cycle. The range of developmental resources that are properly described as being inherited, and which are subject to natural selection, is far wider than has traditionally been allowed. Evolution acts on this extended set of developmental resources. From a developmental systems perspective, development does not proceed according to (...) a preformed plan; what is inherited is much more than DNA; and evolution is change not only in gene frequencies, but in entire developmental systems. (shrink)

Abstract. Intelligent Tutoring System Builder (ITSB) is an authoring tool designed and developed to aid teachers in constructing intelligent tutoring systems in a multidisciplinary fields. The teacher is needed to create a set of pedagogical fundamentals, which, in line, are inured to automatically build up a broad tutor framework and construct an intelligent tutoring system. In this paper an explanation of the theory and the architecture of the tool is outlined. A presentation of several system components, the requirements of the (...) different components, integration of these components in ITSB tool are shown. Furthermore, implanting of requirements, cognitive principle, and common design fundamentals in the tool to ease the use of teachers. A variety of design matters, an example of building an intelligent tutoring system for teaching Java language using ITSB tool and an evaluation are presented. (shrink)

Food retailers are powerful actors of the agro-industrial food system. They exert strong lock-in effects that hinder transitions towards more sustainable agri-food systems. Indeed, their marketing practices generally result in excluding the most sustainable food products, such as local, low-input, small-scale farmers’ products. Recently in Belgium, several initiatives have been created to enable the introduction of local products on supermarket shelves. In this article, we study three of those initiatives to analyse if the development of local sourcing in supermarkets opens (...) up an opportunity for a transition towards more sustainable agri-food systems. We conceptualise transitions as a shift in governance and ethical values and adopt a pragmatist approach of ethics combined with the systemic perspective of transition studies, to evaluate the impact of these initiatives. Our analysis shows that they mainly contribute to the reproduction of the incumbent agri-food system. It also highlights that first, to be a driver for sustainability transitions, food ethics need to be systemic i.e. relate to a systemic understanding of problems and perspective of sustainability, including social justice. And second, it highlights that governance arrangements involving not only representative organisations of the various agri-food and non-agricultural actors, but also actors upholding ethical values that are currently missing in conventional supply chains and representing excluded and marginalised interests, favour the uptake of such systemic ethics by incumbent actors. Hence, systemic ethics and inclusive governance are key features for initiatives to contribute to a sustainability transition. (shrink)

The evolution of Intelligent Tutoring System (ITS) is the result of the amount of research in the field of education and artificial intelligence in recent years. English is the third most common languages in the world and also is the internationally dominant in the telecommunications, science and trade, aviation, entertainment, radio and diplomatic language as most of the areas of work now taught in English. Therefore, the demand for learning English has increased. In this paper, we describe the design of (...) an Intelligent Tutoring System for teaching English language grammar to help students learn English grammar easily and smoothly. The system provides all topics of English grammar and generates a series of questions automatically for each topic for the students to solve. The system adapts with all the individual differences of students and begins gradually with students from easier to harder level. The intelligent tutoring system was given to a group of students of all age groups to try it and to see the impact of the system on students. The results showed a good satisfaction of the students toward the system. (shrink)

One important role of belief systems is to allow us to represent information about a certain domain of inquiry. This paper presents a formal framework to accommodate such information representation. Three cognitive models to represent information are discussed: conceptual spaces, state-spaces, and the problem spaces familiar from artificial intelligence. After indicating their weakness to deal with partial information, it is argued that an alternative, formulated in terms of partial structures, can be provided which not only captures the positive features of (...) these models, but also accommodates the partiality of information ubiquitous in science and mathematics. (shrink)