The views on the acceptability of physician-assisted suicide of lay people in a Latin American country, Colombia, have been examined. In July 2019–January 2020, 134 lay people in Bogota judged the acceptability of physician-assisted suicide in 48 realistic scenarios composed of all combinations of four factors: the patient's age, the level of incurability of the illness, the type of suffering, and the patient's request for physician-assisted suicide. In all scenarios, the patients were women receiving the best possible care. The ratings (...) were subjected to cluster analysis and analyses of variance. Three qualitatively different positions were found: Never Acceptable, Depends on the Patient's Request, and Always Acceptable. The only important factor in increasing acceptability among people not systematically opposed was the patient's request to have her life ended. The young age of some patients did not affect participants’ positions. These empirical findings suggest that most Colombian lay people are not categorically for or against physician-assisted suicide, but judge its degree of acceptability as a function of patients’ requests and other circumstances. (shrink)

Valeroso ha sido el esfuerzo de Arno Münster, filósofo franco-alemán, profesor de la Universidad de Amiens, por hacer conocer la obra de Ernst Bloch. Esta lucha, larga de muchos años de enseñanza e investigación, a veces solitaria, a veces a contracorriente de ciertas tendencias dominantes en la filosofía universitaria continental europea, se materializa una vez más con ocasión de la publicación de su último libro que reagrupa de una serie de conferencias de diverso contenido temático sobre el pensamiento de (...) Bloch, pronunciadas en distintos escenarios a lo largo de los últimos cinco años. La primera, establece una especie de cuadro comparativo entre la idea de “comprenderse a sí mismo en la existencia” de Kierkegaard, el concepto de angustia en Heidegger y la ontología del todavía-no de Bloch. (shrink)

Nursing research using concept analysis plays a critical role for knowledge development, particularly when concerning to broad and foundational concepts for nursing practice, such as dignity. This study aimed to synthesize research concerning concept analysis of dignity in nursing care. Based on a literature review, electronic databases were searched using the terms “dignity,” “human dignity,” “concept analysis,” and nurs*. Papers in Portuguese or English were included. The research synthesis was conducted independently by two reviewers. A total of 35 citations were (...) identified and seven papers were included. Six studies were elected using Walker and Avant concept analysis methodology while one applied the Beth Rodgers evolutionary model. The concept of dignity has been studied by nurses, and its attributes, antecedents, consequences, and similar concepts were synthesized into a definition. Dignity emerged as a fundamental concept in nursing ethics and the main attributes synthesized were personhood, sociability, respect, and autonomy. The antecedents identified were: facilitators—patient focus care, recognition, education, and ethical competence; threats—vulnerability and organizational environment. The consequences were positive coping, empowerment, and dignity preservation. The synthesis of these seven studies using concept analysis provided a clear definition of dignity. These findings challenge future research and education, particularly for the study of undergraduate and postgraduate nursing education programs to enhance skills for preserving patient dignity in clinical practice. (shrink)

Lombardo and Bell have translated this important early dialogue on virtue, wisdom, and the nature of Sophistic teaching into an idiom remarkable for its liveliness and subtlety.

This article motivates a shift in certain strands of the debate over legitimate roles for nonepistemic values in scientific practice from investigating what is involved in taking cognitive attitudes like acceptance toward an empirical hypothesis to looking at a social understanding of assertion, the act of communicating that hypothesis. I argue that speech act theory’s account of assertion as a type of doing makes salient legitimate roles nonepistemic values can play in scientific practice. The article also shows how speech act (...) theory might provide a framework for fruitfully extending aspects of the social and pragmatic turns in the philosophy of science. (shrink)

Any living organism interacts with and responds specifically to environmental molecules by expressing specific olfactory receptors. In this paper, this specificity will be first examined in causal terms with particular emphasis on the mechanisms controlling olfactory gene expression, cell-to-cell interactions and odor-decoding processes. However, this type of explanation does not entirely justify the role olfactory receptors have played during evolution, since they are also expressed ectopically in different organs and/or tissues. Homologous olfactory genes have in fact been found in such (...) diverse cells and/or organs as spermatozoa, testis and kidney where they are assumed to act as chemotactic sensors or renin modulators. To justify their functional diversity, homologous olfactory receptors are assumed to share the same basic role: that of conferring a self-identity to cells or tissues under varying environmental conditions. By adopting this standpoint, the functional attribution as olfactory or chemotactic sensors to these receptors should not be seen either as a cause conditioning receptor gene expression, or as a final effect resulting from genetically predetermined programs, but as a direct consequence of the environmental conditions olfactory receptor genes have explored during evolution. The association of odorant patterns with specific environmental or contextual situations makes their relationship semiotically triadic, due to the emergence of an interpretant capable of perceiving odorants as meaningful signs out of a noisy background. This perspective highlights the importance of odorant-receptor relationships as respect to the properties of the interacting partners. It is our contention that only when taken together can these different explanatory strategies provide a realistic account of how olfactory receptor genes have been structurally and functionally modified during evolution. (shrink)

The heristic argument with which Meno questions the possibility of inquiry and knowledge is tackled by Socrates through the reference to an archaic and religious doctrine, according to which the soul is immortal and has seen all things. Through this reference Socrates actually wants to affirm the affinity between the soul and the world of forms. So behind the myth of the prenatal vision of forms by the soul Plato intends to assert the ontological condition of the soul, that is, (...) its affinity to forms. (shrink)

In the present paper we show that any at most countable linearly-ordered commutative residuated lattice can be embedded into a commutative residuated lattice on the real unit interval [0, 1]. We use this result to show that Esteva and Godo''s logic MTL is complete with respect to interpretations into commutative residuated lattices on [0, 1]. This solves an open problem raised in.

I explore three points about the relationship between C.I. Lewis’s conceptual pragmatism and W.V. Quine’s naturalized epistemology inspired by Robert Sinclair’s Quine, Conceptual Pragmatism, and the Analytic-Synthetic Distinction. First, I highlight Lewis’s long-standing commitment to Platonism about meaning and its connection to his reflective philosophical method and rejection of a linguistic account of analyticity. Second, I consider Sinclair’s claim that “Lewis’s epistemology provides no indication concerning how, despite different sensory experiences, we still come to agree on what we are talking (...) about and what counts as evidence” (2022, 113). I find more hints, especially in Lewis’s account of how we verify that two people share meaning in common. However, some of the pragmatic and broadly empirical factors Lewis appeals to are not part of Quine’s naturalized epistemology. Finally, I relate these points to Quine’s (1953/1980) claim to advance a more “thorough pragmatism” than Lewis. Quine does not say much about action, value, and ethics, but these are central parts of Lewis’s conceptual pragmatism and a source of his reluctance to abandon those parts of his epistemology that Sinclair argues Quine found dispensable. (shrink)

In this paper, I look at Susan Stebbing’s articles and reviews that critically engage logical positivism. These appeared before the publication of A.J. Ayer’s Language, Truth and Logic and helped shape the early British reception of logical positivism. I highlight Stebbing’s adoption of G.E. Moore’s tripartite distinction between knowing a proposition, understanding it, and giving an analysis of it and, in light of this distinction, her focus on whether the principle of verifiability can ground a plausible account of communication. Stebbing (...) thinks not, and I reconstruct her reasons, as well as her own account of communication. In doing this, I relate her criticisms to her rejection of methodological solipsism and her dissatisfaction with the logical positivist treatment of statements about other minds and the past. I also argue that Stebbing’s work provides a bridge to later criticisms of logical positivism from ordinary language philosophers. Foregrounding Stebbing’s engagement with logical positivism, especially her focus on communication, paints a fuller picture of how the logical positivists came to be part of analytic philosophy despite having different concerns than many of the British philosophers engaging their work. (shrink)

Receptor oligomerization plays a key role in maintaining genome stability and restricting protein mutagenesis. When properly folded, protein monomers assemble as oligomeric receptors and interact with environmental ligands. In a gene-centered view, the ligand specificity expressed by these receptors is assumed to be causally predetermined by the cell genome. However, this mechanism does not fully explain how differentiated cells have come to express specific receptor repertoires and which combinatorial codes have been explored to activate their associated signaling pathways. It is (...) our contention that the plasma membrane acts as the locus where several contextual cues may be integrated. As such it allows the semiotic selection of those receptor configurations that provide cells with the minimum essential requirements for agency. The occurrence of protein misfolding makes it impossible for receptor monomers to assemble along the membrane and to sustain meaningful relationships with environmental ligands. How could a cell lineage deal with these loss-of-function mutations during evolution and restrain gene redundancy accordingly? In this paper, we will be arguing that the easiest way for bacteria clones to accomplish this goal is by getting rid of cells expressing mutated receptor proteins. The mechanism sustaining this cell selection is also occurring in many somatic tissues and its function is currently believed to counteract in vivo protein mutagenesis. Our discussion will be mainly focused on the significance and semiotic nature of the interplay between membrane receptors and the epigenetic control of gene expression, as mediated by the control of mismatched repairing and protein folding mechanisms. (shrink)

This article replies to the critical note by Trabattoni («Elenchos», xxxiii (2012) pp. 69-107). The author defends his interpretation of Plato's Theaetetus against Trabattoni's objections, arguing that the maieutic and peirastic character of the dialogue explains its negative or aporetic conclusion. For the failure of all the attempts to define knowledge in the dialogue doesn't mean that, according to Plato, knowledge is not possible for men or that it can be identified with doxa; on the contrary, Plato clearly states that (...) the philosopher, i.e. the dialectician, is absolutely able to attain the perfect knowledge of the forms. The subsequent failures in the Theaetetus, particularly the last two, depend on the admission of an "additive model'' according to which knowledge is "doxa plus something'', an epistemological attitude that is explicitly rejected in the Meno. (shrink)

In the proem that precedes the account of the generation of the world, Timaeus provides very important elements for understanding the discourse he is about to delivery. It is a complex text that displays at least three different levels: dialectical, analogical (or metaphorical) and epistemological. In the dialectical section, Timaeus establishes that the sensible universe is a generated reality and as such has a cause; in the metaphorical section, he indicates the analogical schemes he will use to explain the genesis (...) of the cosmos (technical and biological) and the causes on which it depends. Finally, in the epistemological section he explains the reason why this exposition cannot achieve truth but must be content with likeness. (shrink)

A central aim of cognitive science is to understand the fundamental mechanisms that enable humans to navigate and make sense of complex environments. In this letter, we argue that computational complexity theory, a foundational framework for evaluating computational resource requirements, holds significant potential in addressing this challenge. As humans possess limited cognitive resources for processing vast amounts of information, understanding how humans perform complex cognitive tasks requires comprehending the underlying factors that drive information processing demands. Computational complexity theory provides a (...) comprehensive theoretical framework to achieve this goal. By adopting this framework, we can gain new insights into how cognitive systems work and develop a more nuanced understanding of the relation between task complexity and human behavior. We provide empirical evidence supporting our argument and identify several open research questions and challenges in applying computational complexity theory to human decision‐making and cognitive science at large. (shrink)

Germ cells are cross-roads of development and evolution. They define the origin of every new generation and, at the same time, represent the biological end-product of any mature organism. Germ cells are endowed with the following capacities: to store a self-descriptive program, to accumulate a protein-synthesizing machinery, and to incorporate enough nourishment to sustain embryonic development. To accomplish this goal, germ cells do not simply unfold a pre-determined program or realize a sole instructive role. On the contrary, due to the (...) complexity of their cytoarchitecture and the nature of the soma-to-germ interactions, they are heavily involved in processes of sign recognition and meaningful tissue exploration. At each stage of their inward migration, germ plasma membranes act as semiotic interfaces allowing cells to interact with the surrounding extracellular milieu and experience the compatibility of selected developmental sequences. The question of which signaling pathways are activated at each developmental stage does not result from a strictly predetermined program instructing germ cell stemness. Rather, each developmental sequence is an open-ended semiotic relationship explored and gradually defined during evolution by the context-dependency of specific cell-to-cell interactions. In this way, any structural and functional novelty that has emerged in the course of germ cell interactions may be interpreted as an exaptation fixed in the species genome in response to specific environmental constraints. (shrink)

The egg behaves as a prospective cell sustaining the developmental processes of the future embryo. In biosemiotic terms, this apparent teleonomic behaviour can be accounted for without referring to the exclusive causal role played by its genetic makeup. We envision two different processes that are uniquely found in the oocyte: (1) the first involves the mechanisms by which large amounts of mRNA accumulate in the ooplasm to establish the embryo axes prior to fertilization; (2) the second involves transfer of an (...) excess of maternally supplied ribosomes to the oocyte to provide the future embryo with newly synthesized proteins. In this paper, we argue that the information required to sustain embryonic development is not due to any physical properties of the zygotic DNA and the maternal mRNAs, but to their spatially and temporally ordered relationship in the zygote’s internal space. (shrink)

Este artículo analiza tres cuentos de Edgar Allan Poe (El demonio de la perversidad, El gato negro y El corazón delator). Estos cuentos tienen en común el tema de la perversidad hacia cuya elucidación pretendemos avanzar desde la premisa deleuziana según la cual es preciso volver al espacio literario donde fueron nombradas las perversidades, con el fin de obtener algunas claves de comprensión sobre las causas y consecuencias de la perversidad, así como sobre la naturaleza de estos personajes literarios que, (...) en los tres cuentos citados, se autodefinen como víctimas de esta condición que se encarna en los seres humanos bajo la forma de un demonio. Nos acompañarán en este recorrido los aportes teóricos de Julia Kristeva, Gilles Deleuze, Michel Foucault, François Delaporte y Claude-Olivier Doron. (shrink)

Este ensaio tem como objetivo examinar a relação entre Spinoza e Goethe no contexto das implicações do conceito de infinito na cultura moderna. Como ele vai da metafísica especulativa mais radical para o reino da poesia dramática? Enquanto para o filósofo o conceito de infinito é a pedra angular da construção da “definição real de Deus”, para o poeta é uma das portas da experiência, da vida, do poder e da recuperação da juventude. Este ensaio tem como objetivo expor os (...) acordos e discordâncias entre uma filosofia que define o diabo entre seres imaginários e uma poesia que coloca o ser demoníaco no centro da mitologia moderna. Fausto é um mito da razão instrumental, da vontade de Domínio, uma visão do mal e também da salvação ativa da humanidade. (shrink)

_ Source: _Volume 29, Issue 1, pp 86 - 102 The aim of this paper is to give an overview of the place that Hobbes assigns to optics in the context of his classification of sciences and disciplinary boundaries. To do this, I will begin with an account of Hobbes’s conception of philosophy or science, and particularly his distinction between true and hypothetical knowledge. I will also show that in his demarcation between mathematics or geometry and natural philosophy Hobbes was (...) influenced by Galileo’s _Dialogue_. I then analyse the consequences of this distinction for optics, and conclude by clarifying its status among the scientific disciplines. (shrink)

Cell communication plays a key role in multicellular organisms. In developing embryos as in adult organisms, cells communicate by coordinating their differentiation through the establishment and/or renewal of a variety of cell communication channels. Under both these conditions, cells interact by either receptor signalling, surface recognition of specific cell adhesion molecules or transfer of cytoplasmic components through junctional coupling. In recent years, it has become apparent that cells may also communicate through the extracellular release of microvesicles. They may originate as (...) either exosomes from the endosomal compartment upon fusion of multivesicular bodies with the plasma membrane or be shed directly from the plasma membrane via extensions of the cell surface. Microvesicles may disperse over long distances through body fluids and deliver their molecular cargo onto a variety of target cells. As a general rule, the metabolic fate of these cells is determined by the molecular nature of the vesicular cargo, while targeting itself depends on the affinity of the molecules expressed on the enclosing membrane. In this paper, we will be arguing that intercellular vesicular transfer is substantially different from other types of cell communication, allowing cells and molecules to interact on varying levels. Cells interacting via ligand signalling owe their specificity to the steric coupling with cognate receptor molecules. As such, it is a pure molecular process that affects target cells only upon integration into their responding repertoire. In this relationship, coupled cells are reciprocally adapted to each other through the selection of their respective signalling capacities, following exploration of their receptor specificity. Interaction by intercellular vesicles realizes a substantially different type of cell communication. Vesicular traffic allows donor cells to carry out a horizontal type of gene transfer and target this information over long distances via independently controlled mechanisms. Because of this independence, cells interacting via vesicular traffic are not expected to adapt their signalling correspondences, but to control instead the efficiency of their cargo delivery irrespective of the receptor repertoire expressed by the target tissue. In this paper, the multifaceted functions of the intercellular vesicular traffic will be discussed in a multilevel biosemiotic perspective with the aim of unravelling the cellular mechanisms devised by nature to accomplish communication. (shrink)

Book review of Marie Boas Hall, Henry Oldenburg: Shaping the Royal Society (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2002), pp. xii + 369.

Infants initiate joint attentional exchanges by pointing relevant referents out to addressees. Over the second year of life, the functional meaning of the pointing gesture develops from declarative (sharing a referent) to informational (giving some information that is new to the addressee). This chapter analyzes this transition in the development of pointing based on experimental evidence about its production contexts and, in particular, of variables concerning the visibility of referents for infant and addressee. Further evidence is reported concerning the association (...) of pointing with vocalizations and visual checking towards the addressee in different temporal sequencing. It is argued that shared attention initiated by pointing plays a pivotal role in the intersection between social cognition and language development. (shrink)

This study investigates contemporary Mayan oral stories through the lens of Julian Jaynes's theory on the origin of consciousness, aiming to identify a potential connection between the literary elements of these narratives and traits of pre‐consciousness outlined by Jaynes. Jaynes's neuropsychological thesis argues that human consciousness emerged around 3000 years ago after a period of “bicameral mind,” characterized by auditory “hallucinations” that guided non‐habitual behavior. He claims that remnants of bicameral mentality linger to this day in all cultures. While his (...) theoretical framework has been applied to cultures in Europe, the Middle East, and Asia, this research uniquely surveys early Mayan texts and focuses on 78 oral narratives from Lake Atitlán, Guatemala. Our findings reveal traces of bicamerality, evident in the gradual fading of inner voices replaced by divination, anomalous mental states, encounters with the supernatural, and spiritual possession. Contrary to pathologizing these phenomena, the narratives often present them as abilities the Maya may not have felt culturally compelled to suppress to the extent presumed in other societies. (shrink)

I explore one distinctive aspect of our relation to spaces which is particularly significant in our everyday aesthetic evaluations of cities (urban spaces): the frequent use of linguistic expressions referring to the sense of touch. We say that a space is oppressive or expansive, or warm or cold, or (more indirectly) cozy or desolate. Touching, as involved in these expressions, seems to refer, rather than to the contact of a physical object with our skin, to a sort of touching with (...) our life. To understand this, I try to make explicit both (a) what is being touched, i.e., the view of space behind these expressions; and (b) how and in which sense our life touches it. I propose to think about space as a plenum made of qualities (e.g., colors, smells, sounds, textures), some of which are penetrable and some of which are not. And as to how we touch spaces, I defend that we do so as we immerse ourselves in them. Once immersed in them, we are constantly both evaluating how well we fit in them as well as looking for a better-quality fitting. This is how we evaluate spaces aesthetically. Our embodied life fits better in a space when (a) we can realize more significant (for us, according to our ideal of life) possibilities in it, and (b) the felt quality of realizing those possibilities is enhanced by that space (“it feels better to read in this café”). (shrink)

The aim of this review is to identify and provide a structured overview of quantitative models in the pharmaceutical supply chain, a subject not exhaustively studied in the previous reviews on healthcare logistics related mostly to quantitative models in healthcare or logistics studies in hospitals. The models are classified into three categories of classification: network design, inventory models, and optimization of a pharmaceutical supply chain. A taxonomy for each category is shown describing the principal features of each echelon included in (...) the review; this taxonomy allows the readers to identify easily a paper based on the actors of the pharmaceutical supply chain. The search process included research articles published in the databases between 1984 and November 2016. In total 46 studies were included. In the review process we found that in the three fields the most common source of uncertainty used is the demand in the 56% of the cases. Within the review process we can conclude that most of the articles in the literature are focused on the optimization of the pharmaceutical supply chain and inventory models but the field on supply chain network design is not deeply studied. (shrink)

I defend that Cartesian passions are a function—in fact, the only function—of the mind-body union responsible for guiding us in the pursuit of our (natural) perfection, a perfection that we increase by joining goods that our nature deems to be so. This view is in conflict, on one hand, with those (a majority) who have emphasized either the epistemic or survival role of our passions and, on the other and more precisely, with a recent proposal according to which Cartesian passions (...) should not be even seen as guides for happiness. Against the latter, I will attempt to show that passions perform a guiding function (1) by discriminating what is “important” for us regarding the increase of our natural perfection (which includes informing the soul about the current state of perfection both of the body and of the mind-body union); and (2) by disposing us to act (which includes proposing to the will possible ways of action to increase or maintain our perfection). Our passions are, thus, both informative and motivational. Making explicit their informative role will require, negatively, showing that this does not mean they are reliable and, positively, undertaking a study—largely absent among commentaries—of their specific intentionality. (shrink)

La primera parte del artículo presenta un raro texto titulado "Avertissements aux Confesseurs", que se completa con otros dos fragmentos y las "Ordenances synodales" para los confesores. Se muestra como ejemplo de los efectos prácticos del Concilio de Trento en la diócesis de Ginebra, como había hecho San Carlos Borromeo en Milán. La segunda parte del artículo se refiere a los penitentes, y aunque se basa principalmente en "Introducción a la vida devota" y "Conversaciones espirituales", también tiene en cuenta algunos (...) extractos de sus cartas, traducidas ahora por primera vez al español, así como algunos de sus sermones. La tercera parte trata de tres de los capítulos del "Tratado del amor de Dios", en el que San Francisco de Sales presenta su hermosa doctrina de la contrición, rechazada por la Reforma, pero confirmada por el Concilio de Trento. (shrink)