This book shows how the current reform in investment regulation is part of a broader attempt to transform the international economic order. Countries in the North and South are currently rethinking how economic order should be constituted in order to advance their national interests and preferred economic orientation. While some countries in the North seek to create alternative institutional spaces in order to promote neoliberal policies more effectively, some countries in the South are increasingly skeptical of this version of economic (...) order and are experimenting with alternative versions of legal ordering that do not always sit well with mainstream versions promoted by the North. While we recognize that there are differences in approaches to the investment regimes proposed by countries in the South, we identify commonalities that could function as the founding pillars of an alternative economic order. (shrink)

Open peer commentary on the article “Constructing Constructivism” by Hugh Gash. Upshot: The concept of “constructivist teaching” seems unattainable for two reasons: a philosophical and an empirical one. Also, Hugh Gash’s survey is not so much about radical constructivism in education, but a review of different connected ideas labeled “constructivism” that have dominated the educational field.

We show that as a system which can be characterized by a finite-dimensional Hilbert space is observed more and more frequently, the probability that it will always be found in its initial state tends to one.

The work _De spiritu_ is an important but neglected work by Aristotle. It clearly shows for the first time that Aristotle assumed a special body as the ‘instrument’ of the soul. By means of this soul/body the soul forms the visible body of plants, animals and human beings.

In this paper we examine the functional anatomy of volition, as revealed by modern brain imaging techniques, in conjunction with neuropsychological data derived from human and non-human primates using other methodologies. A number of brain regions contribute to the performance of consciously chosen, or ‘willed', actions. Of particular importance is dorsolateral prefrontal cortex , together with those brain regions with which it is connected, via cortico-subcortical and cortico-cortical circuits. That aspect of free will which is concerned with the voluntary selection (...) of one action rather than another critically depends upon the normal functioning of DLPFC and associated brain regions. Disease, or dysfunction, of these circuits may be associated with a variety of disorders of volition: Parkinson's disease, ‘utilization’ behaviour, ‘alien’ and ‘phantom’ limbs, and delusions of ‘alien control’ . Brain imaging has allowed us to gain some access to the pathophysiology of these conditions in living patients. At a philosophical level, the distinction between ‘intentions to act', and ‘intentions in action’ may prove particularly helpful when addressing these complex disturbances of human cognition and conscious experience. The exercise and experience of free will depends upon neural mechanisms located in prefrontal cortex and associated brain systems. (shrink)

One of Sallust's main points in this preface is that individuals should strive to attaingloria, i.e. should be spoken highly of by others. With this in mind, the commentators seem agreed thatsilentioin the opening sentence must be taken in a passive sense: ‘silentioexpresses not a state in which one says nothing, but a state in which nothing is said about one, i.e. “obscurity”’. The sequence of ideas in the first chapter makes this interpretation seem certain.

The issue of democracy is alive once more. There is a growing number of works debating the current state of democracy both in theory and practice.1 In particular a pragmatist conception of democracy has also been revived. Not only has a Deweyan version of a participatory democracy become the focus but the intricacies of a Rortian version have also come to the forefront, from both sympathetic as well as critical viewpoints.2 Thus the impression that the contemporary world is in quite (...) an exigent need of reconsidering—and perhaps even forming a novel conception of—democracy seems to be obvious, at least from a global point of view.3 Moreover, the fact that the idea or ideal of democracy still seems to be .. (shrink)

This article focuses on the legal and organisational regulation of human cells in the United Kingdom and France. French Bioethics Law regulates human cells for health according to European Union law where it is enforceable. But products unregulated by EU law and based on human cells are never considered as medicinal products, given the strict implementation of the principle of “nonpatrimonialité” of the human body and its elements. By comparison, in the UK such products can be qualified as medicinal products. (...) Moreover, the setting up of the UK stem cell bank gives rise to the development of policies which expand the stem cell as a legal object. The paper discusses how these societies’ ethical and legal commitments underlie organisational practices in order to analyse the relationship between the existence (or not) of a national stem cell bank and the broader regulation of human cells. (shrink)

Panentheism has become a familiar term in contemporary Christian systematic theology and philosophy, for it is widely believed to be an appropriate way to overcome the alleged dualism found in the classical God-world relationship. But what is meant by the term panentheism, and how does it work so as to avoid becoming still another form of pantheism or cosmic monism? In 2004 Philip Clayton and the late Arthur Peacocke published a set of papers on the topic of panentheism that came (...) from a conference in England on that topic in 2001.1 Yet, while there were certain broad affinities in approach and content among many of the papers, none of them used precisely the same conceptual model for analysis of the concept. As.. (shrink)