The role of science rhetoric in the global village -- Scientific English in the postmodern age -- Problematizing the rhetoric of contemporary science -- A contrastive rhetoric approach to science dissemination -- Disciplinary practices and procedures within research sites -- Triangulating procedures, practices and texts in scientific discourse -- ELF and a more complex sociolinguistic landscape -- Re-defining the rhetoric of science.

Thymidylate synthase plays a central role in the biosynthesis of thymidylate, an essential precursor for DNA biosynthesis. In addition to its role in catalysis and cellular metabolism, it is now appreciated that thymidylate synthase functons as an RNA binding protein. Specifically, thymidylate synthase binds with high affinity to its own mRNA, resulting in translational repression. An extensive series of experiments has been performed to elucidate the molecular elements underlying the interaction between thymidylate synthase and its own mRNA. In addition to (...) characterization of the underlying cis‐ and trans‐acting elements, recent studies have shown that thymidylate synthase has the capacity to bind specifically to other cellular RNA species. While the biological significance of these other RNA/thymidylate synthase interactions remains to be defined, this work suggests a potential role for TS in coordinately regulating several critical aspects of cellular metabolism. (shrink)

Europe has the most educated generation in its history, yet an alarming number of graduates are overqualified. This paper explores the intersection between education and work from the perspectives of those involved in a sector that is prone to overqualification: the call centres of Romania’s thriving business service sector. Based on over 100 in-depth interviews with young people, human resource personnel, and managerial staff at different levels of seniority, the paper maps subjective views about overqualification. Despite the objective classification of (...) employment in call centres in terms of national occupational codes, most interviewees, regardless of their role, were unlikely to read their employment through the lenses of overqualification. Young people internalised the gap between education and employment and learned not to attach strong employment-related expectations to degrees, especially those in the social sciences and humanities (non-STEM). Managers and HR staff highly regarded company-specific skills and had learned to tap into a group of graduates without clear labour market routes. The paper conceptualises the availability of jobs at the bottom of the ‘knowledge economy’ in connection with employment structures available in the economic semi-periphery and problematises politically the question of overqualification. (shrink)

Phenomenology and the Kyoto School implement an interaction among cultures1 that is not limited to illustrating Western philosophy wxith exotic similes. Insofar as my position is concerned, I will start out with phenomenology in order to study Nishida's work, trying on the one hand to understand the meaning that he gives to nothingness in relation to the Merleau-Pontian concept of creux in order, on the other hand, to enlarge reason and philosophy.To achieve this, I shall establish a comparison of the (...) two thinkers that will help to shed light on their conceptions, while at the same time demonstrating the efficacy of thinking the unthoughts or negativities indicating a... (shrink)

An intriguing question in the field of stress is what makes an individual more likely to be susceptible or resilient to stress‐induced depression. Predisposition to stress susceptibility is believed to be influenced by genetic factors and early adversity. However, beyond genetics and life experiences, recent evidence has highlighted social rank as a key determinant of susceptibility to stress, underscoring dominant individuals as the vulnerable ones. This evidence is in conflict with epidemiological, clinical, and animal work pointing at a link between (...) social subordination and depression. Here, we review and analyze rodent protocols addressing the relevance of social rank to predict vulnerability to chronic social stress. We also discuss whether a specific social status (i.e., dominance or subordination) is the appropriate predictor of vulnerability to develop stress‐induced depression or rather, the loss of social rank and resources. (shrink)

This paper aims at providing some insights into the philosophical tools that may help solve the huge problems of social justice. For that purpose, I focus on the concept of responsibility, since it could be a suitable catalyst for debate. This paper argues that we must necessarily develop an enhanced notion of responsibility and commit to it both at a social and institutional level. First, I will introduce the relation between ethics and politics—necessarily rather than contingently intertwined. I will elaborate (...) on the concept of poliethics coined by the Spanish philosopher Francisco Fernández Buey. Second, I will outline certain changes undergone in recent years to the understanding of the concept of responsibility in the field of ethics and politics. Finally, I will argue that a significant extension of the notion of responsibility is still necessary if it is to play a relevant role in the contemporary world. I will therefore contend that there are sufficient reasons why our societies should do the moral stretch exercises suggested by Günther Anders. For that purpose, I suggest ten tenets that could serve as a basis for this poliethics of enhanced responsibility and for a collective reflection on this issue. (shrink)

Este trabajo rastrea los pilares definitorios de la Estética Cotidiana a partir del análisis de dos nociones básicas: desinterés y Einfühlung. Se aborda primero la tradición estética occidental erigida sobre estos conceptos, y después el posicionamiento diferencial de la estética japonesa. El artículo contrasta ambas posturas y sitúa a la Estética Cotidiana entre una y otra, argumentando su conexión con la estética japonesa como alternativa a la estética desinteresada y empática de Occidente.

Books reviewed:Mark BevirThe Logic of the History of Ideas.

En este trabajo pretendemos comparar y contrastar las concepciones explícitas e implícitas de la historicidad de Merleau-Ponty y Arendt. Comenzaremos trazando su filiación fenomenológica, que tiene como hilo conductor su común búsqueda del sentido de la experiencia incluso en el sinsentido, abriéndose a él desde sus situaciones y compromisos, adentrándose con el pensamiento en la fragilidad y en la contingencia que jamás excluyeron del filosofar. Mostraremos que el desarrollo merleau-pontiano de la fenomenología genética, particularmente su interpretación del concepto husserliano de (...) la Stiftung, posibilita una concepción de la historia que podría ser aceptada por Arendt, de la misma manera que lo fue su ontología indirecta y su interrogación filosófica. Aunque su resistencia a la reversibilidad de la chair limitará la concepción arendtiana de la acción y del pensar, la interrelación de ambos pensamientos revelará la necesidad de una nueva filosofía de la historia. (shrink)

As a discourse genre, statements of purpose are characterized by their occluded status in the academy and by their hybrid nature. Statements of purpose are required in applications for a place in a postgraduate course, and they are requested to obtain information about the academic and professional background and skills of each applicant. A study of the genre’s linguistic and textual features is needed in Spanish to discover and understand writers’ and readers’ perception of this genre. A corpus of 50 (...) motivation letters in Spanish is analyzed here. We study the distinguishing macro- and microtextual features of this particular genre and co-occurrences between both kinds of features. At the macrotextual level, statements of purpose display prototypical rhetorical moves, which can be classified as writers’ moves and readers’ moves. On the microtextual level, modalization resources and discourse markers are discussed. This multiple perspectives analysis of the corpus shows evidence of significant co-occurrences among modalization, discourse markers, and rhetorical moves. Writers’ ideal representations of this discourse genre, which spans the academic and professional fields, can also be deduced. (shrink)

Sustainable investment, which integrates social, environmental and ethical issues, has grown from a niche market of individual ethical investors to embrace institutional investors resulting in £764 billion in assets under management in the UK alone [Eurosif, 2008: ‘European SRI Study 2008’ ]. Explaining this growth is complex, involving shifts in personal and collective values, reactions to corporate scandals, scientific and media pronouncements about climate change, Government initiatives, responses from financial markets and the influence of SI innovators in The City of (...) London. The article examines the influence of human agency through interviews with 14 SI champions who have variously been responsible for launching SI funds and changing investment processes and organisational structures in order to enhance SI. Interviewees were asked about their motivations and persuasive strategies, the obstacles they faced and how they overcame them as well as broader implications of SI for financial markets. The following key categories inform the results and the discussion: Values; Conservatism, Antipathy and Incredulity; Optimism and Sympathy from Insiders; The Social and Political Context; The Business Case; Organisational Constraints; Inappropriate forms of Remuneration; Short-termism; The Nature of Capitalism. Three discourses were also identified. The first is the necessity to make a business case for SI; the second is the benefits that SI can bring to the quest of overcoming short-termism; the third is a belief that for SI to have a significant influence, greater government intervention is required. (shrink)

The aim of this article is to analyse Spanish conversational structure, more concretely, to investigate in depth the role of the third move, or follow-up, outside classroom discourse. Since first introduced by Sinclair and Coulthard, the follow-up move has attracted a great deal of attention, as proved by numerous studies. However, these studies have mostly focused on English while Spanish has been neglected. The present study intends to fill in this gap by analysing a corpus of 50 conversational exchanges in (...) Peninsular Spanish. The analysis is qualitative and based on Tsui’s conversational framework, which has proved methodologically useful. As results will show, the presence or absence of the third move in Spanish conversations seems to rely heavily on a gender-based distinction. (shrink)

En este artículo procederemos, en primer lugar, a clarificar las características de la razón poética de M. Zambrano en relación con la vida, la historia y, por ende, con la razón vital-histórica de Ortega y Gasset. A continuación, mostraremos de qué modo la primera incluye la poiésis de la pintura. Veremos entonces la relación que la “razón poética-pictórica” guarda con la memoria, así como el tipo de memoria que la filósofa reivindica en comparación con uno de los filósofos a los (...) que leyó desde su juventud: Henri Bergson. Al hilo de esta exposición analizaremos el sentido que la pensadora le otorga al “lugar”, con el objeto de descifrar el título de su obra “Algunos lugares de la pintura”. Solo así lograremos entender la preocupación zambraniana por abrir lugares espaciotemporales habitables en los que detenerse a contemplar. Nos preguntaremos en nuestra conclusión si esto es todavía posible en la era de la información. (shrink)

Given the negative costs of exclusion and the relevance of belongingness for humans, the experience of exclusion influences social affiliation motivation, which in turn is a relevant predictor of prosocial behavior. Skin conductance is a typical measure of the arousal elicited by emotions. Hence, we argued that both inclusion and exclusion will increase skin conductance level due to the increase of either positive affect or anger affects, respectively. Moreover, we argued that emotional arousal is also related to social affiliation motivation (...) and prosocial behavior. A total of 48 students were randomly allocated to either an inclusionary or exclusionary condition and their skin conductance levels were recorded during an experiment in which they completed an online questionnaire and played the game “Cyberball.” Results indicated that (a) individuals who perceived high exclusion felt angrier than individuals perceiving high inclusion, who feel positive affect; (b) no differences were evidenced in terms of skin conductance between exclusion and inclusion situations; (c) over-aroused individuals were less motivated to affiliate; and (d) individuals with lower affiliation motivation behaved in a less prosocial way. The results were congruent to the argument that behaving prosocially may be a way to gain the desired affiliation. (shrink)

The purpose of this article is to present a business ethics case from the viewpoint of discursive ethics. Dialogue and subsequent agreement constitute two key ideas of European identity and are two basic concepts of discursive ethics thinking. Our choice for this type of approach was determined by several reasons, of which there are three that should be pointed out, as they can be considered an heritage of the European way of thinking:1) the need for a rational dialogue, in which (...) all those affected -- or, failing that, the people acting in their name -- are represented, as a way to find solutions to conflicts;2) the importance of respecting a set of conditions ensuring equal opportunities and total symmetry among the participants; and3) obliged respect for the universalization principle, which establishes that a decision is morally correct when it can or could be accepted by all those whom it affects, present or future.In order to present this case, the following steps are taken. Firstly, a brief summary of the case will be provided, defining the different ways of approaching the problem and the resulting map of interests. Secondly, the different interests and values, which came into play, are analysed. Finally, we go over the different approaches that were made to reach a solution before considering dialogue, which turned out to be the most decisive. (shrink)