El artículo explica la configuración histórica del arte contemporáneo en Centroamérica a partir de los cambios y transformaciones institucionales emanadas en la última década del siglo XX. Señala las diferencias de la producción de la generación de los noventa con relación a las prácticas artísticas gestionadas durante la década de los ochenta y, posteriormente, se señala el desplazamiento de la tradición eminentemente pictórica a campos más próximos a la creación participativa en medio urbano.Se reflexiona sobre la influencia de la violencia (...) en la conformación de los imaginarios simbólicos y se alerta sobre el peligro de la excesiva proliferación de la imagen violenta en las representaciones artísticas, ante todo, si su abordaje se realiza como parte de una agenda que contribuye al espectáculo y a la excitación de la percepción mediante la representación directa de la violencia que despolitiza la imagen y fomenta muy poco la comprensión crítica del mundo. (shrink)

El artículo explica los efectos negativos que experimentan las obras de arte en el actual contexto de estetización. Desde el pensamiento estético de Benjamin, Adorno, Debord, Baudrillard, Welsh, Lipovetsky y Vilar se analiza la degradación y neutralización del arte ante la estetización. De manera paralela, se señala las propuestas de estos autores para sacar al arte de su actual atolladero y, con ello, contener lo superfluo y la degradación de la obra a objeto decorativo. Desde esta perspectiva, se resalta la (...) propuesta de Gerard Vilar como una alternativa de resistencia y superación ante la pérdida de la capacidad crítica y transformadora del arte en un contexto en el que para muchos el arte ha empezado a sucumbir y a disolverse en éter estético. (shrink)

This article sets forth a compositional model of ideology by drawing on the tradition of historical materialism and further developing its insights into the aesthetic composition of reality. It demonstrates how ideology is not simply a set of false beliefs but is rather the process by which social agents are composed over time in every dimension of their existence, including their thoughts, practices, perceptions, representations, values, affects, desires, and unconscious drives. By working through a number of diverse debates and authors—ranging (...) from Karl Marx and Friedrich Engels to Louis Althusser, Eduardo Galeano, Rosaura Sánchez, and Paulo Freire—it thereby elucidates how ideology is best understood as an aesthetic process that includes aspect of sense and sense-making, and that therefore requires a collective, cultural revolution as its antidote. (shrink)

Philosophers often explain what could be the case in terms of what is, in fact, the case at one possible world or another. They may differ in what they take possible worlds to be or in their gloss of what is for something to be the case at a possible world. Still, they stand united by the threat of paradox. A family of paradoxes akin to the set-theoretic antinomies seem to allow one to derive a contradiction from apparently plausible principles. (...) Some of them concern the interaction between propositions and worlds, and they appear to afford the means to map classes of propositions into propositions – or, likewise, classes of worlds into worlds – in a one-to-one fashion that leads to contradiction. Yet another family of paradoxes threaten the view that whatever could exist does, in fact, exist, which is in line with modal realism, for example. This article aims to survey and identify the source of each family of paradoxes as well as to outline some responses to them. (shrink)

Whether or not we achieve absolute generality in philosophical inquiry, most philosophers would agree that ordinary inquiry is rarely, if ever, absolutely general. Even if the quantifiers involved in an ordinary assertion are not explicitly restricted, we generally take the assertion’s domain of discourse to be implicitly restricted by context.1 Suppose someone asserts (2) while waiting for a plane to take off.

The study aims at expanding the idea of knowledge beyond the notion of descriptive knowledge. It examines a pluralism of scientific, philosophical, literary, and aesthetic forms of knowledge. This pluralism is not relativistic but complementary. Different ways of knowing enrich each other thus facilitating a more comprehensive and differentiated conception of the world.".

I present a puzzle for absolutely unrestricted quantification. One important advantage of absolutely unrestricted quantification is that it allows us to entertain perfectly general theories. Whereas most of our theories restrict attention to one or another parcel of reality, other theories are genuinely comprehensive taking absolutely all objects into their domain. The puzzle arises when we notice that absolutely unrestricted theories sometimes impose incompatible constraints on the size of the universe.

« Rites » sont d'abord de séquences d'actions corporelles définies socialement plus ou moins strictement. Très souvent, mais pas toujours les sociétés attendent qu'aux actes extérieurs correspondent des motivations, des croyances et des émotions intérieures ou « psychiques ». Il ya des sociétés où l'efficacité supposée des rites dépend de la correspondance entre mouvements corporels et «réalité » intérieure. Mais il y en a d'autres où ce qui compte c'est uniquement l'exécution minutieuse des gestes corporels en tant que tels. De (...) toute façon, des actions rituelles ne sauraient être interprétées comme suivant exclusivement un calcul rationnel, bien qu'un observateur sociologique pourrait constater une fonction objectivement positive d'un rite sur le plan social ou psychique sans qu'il y ait une relation causale sur le plan physique. C'est surtout dans le cas des rites de deuil où on observe que des actions objectivement ineffectives, donc symboliques, « répondent » à une situation qui ne peut être altérée sur le plan « réel », mais qui aident à supporter l'insupportable. On constate quand même la possibilité que ce qui n'était d'abord qu'un mouvement extérieur s'imprègne de valeurs symboliques, comme si par exemple une douleur rituellement infligée devient le symbôle de l'appartenance à un groupe social. Les rites sont donc l'incarnation du social dans les corps des sujets. Ils s'y inscrivent. Surtout dans les grandes civilisations les rites deviennent un système administré par des spécialistes, qui développent un « code élaboré » qui n'est déchiffrable que par les experts. L'article montre qu'il ya une certaine opposition entre contrôle rituel et moral de comportements humains."Rites" are first sequences bodily actions socially defined more or less strictly. Very often, but not always expect companies as external acts are the motivations, beliefs and inner emotions or "psychic". There are societies where the supposed efficacy of rites depends on the correspondence between body movements and "reality" inside. But there are others where what counts is only the meticulous execution of bodily gestures as such. Anyway, ritual actions can not be interpreted exclusively as following a rational calculation, although a sociological observer could see a positive function objectively a rite of social or psychic without a causal relationship to the physical plane. It is especially in the case of mourning rites which we observe that actions objectively ineffective, so symbolic, "respond" to a situation that can not be altered on the "real", but help to bear the unbearable. There is still the possibility that what was at first a movement outside soaks symbolic values, such as if ritually inflicted pain becomes the symbol of belonging to a social group. The rites are the incarnation of social issues in the body. They enroll. Especially in the great civilizations rituals are a system administered by specialists who develop "elaborated code" that is decipherable only by experts. The article shows that there is a tension between moral and ritual control of human behavior. (shrink)

While the word “democracy” has proliferated in social and political discourse in recent decades, I suggest that the liberal democracy of the past, connected as it is (especially in the West) to the market economy, is insufficient for the challenges facing the contemporary Latin American context. I assess and criticize democratic ideas in order to suggest that the way forward is radical democracy based on socio-economic and political justice. These, however, have to be articulated at a variety of levels, from (...) that of local and indigenous peoples to that of national and international relations. (shrink)

The so-called Trolley Problem was first discussed by Philippa Foot in 1967 as a way to test moral intuitions regarding the doctrine of double effect, Kantian principles and utilitarianism. Ever since, a great number of philosophers and psychologists have come up with alternative scenarios to further test intuitions and the relevance of conventional moral doctrines. Given that physicians routinely face moral decisions regarding life and death, the Trolley Problem should be considered of great importance in medical ethics. In this article, (...) five “classic” trolley scenarios are discussed: the driver diverting the trolley, a bystander pulling a lever to divert the trolley, a fat man being thrown from a bridge to stop the trolley, a bystander pulling a lever to divert a trolley so that a fat man may be run over, and a bystander pulling a lever so that a fat man falls off from a bridge to stop the trolley. As these scenarios are discussed, relevant moral differences amongst them are addressed, and some of the applications in medical ethics are discussed. The article concludes that Trolley scenarios are not the ultimate criterion to make ethical decisions in difficult ethical challenges in medicine cases but they do serve as an initial intuitive guide. (shrink)

Resumo: Lopes dos Santos, ao colocar o Tractatus Logico-Philosophicus no que denomina “tradição crítica”, mostra que Wittgenstein delimita o alcance da filosofia ao eliminar sua pretensão de ser um tipo de conhecimento que, como a ciência, possa formular proposições verificáveis sobre objetos. E Wittgenstein faz isso de modo distinto da crítica moderna à metafísica, pois elimina o sujeito do problema: não é preciso recorrer a faculdades subjetivas para fazer essa delimitação, mas apenas à linguagem na qual o pensamento se expressa. (...) Por outro lado, na perspectiva da “tradição lógica”, há na mesma obra uma identificação entre a essência do “logos” que pode enunciar algo verdadeiro sobre o ser e do próprio ser do qual se fala nesse discurso. Nosso objetivo é destacar este vínculo com a “tradição lógica” para defender que, para além de uma “virada linguística”, há no Tractatus uma espécie de “metafísica silenciosa” que coloca problemas tais como o do sujeito e o da “essência” do mundo em seu correto lugar após passá-los pelo crivo da crítica. (shrink)

Although stakeholder theory is widely accepted in environmental disclosure research, empirical evidence about the role of stakeholders in firms’ disclosure is still scarce. The authors address this issue for a setting of carbon disclosure. Our international sample comprises the Carbon Disclosure Project Global 500, S&P 500, and FTSE 350 reports from 2008 to 2011, resulting in a total of 1,120 firms with 3,631 firm-year observations. The authors apply Tobit regressions to analyze the relationship between carbon disclosure and the relevance of (...) the following stakeholder groups: government, general public, media, employees, and customers. Our results confirm that in addition to carbon performance, all stakeholders are associated with carbon disclosure. Only one stakeholder group acts as a moderator for the relationship between carbon performance and carbon disclosure. Furthermore, the authors find that carbon performance but not the affiliation to a carbon-intensive industry acts as a moderator between stakeholder relevance and carbon disclosure. (shrink)

We present two studies investigating the impact of causal perceptions and the moral emotions of anger, shame, and guilt on the justification of deviant workplace behavior. Study 1 tests our conceptual framework using a sample of undergraduate business students; Study 2 examines a population of practicing physicians. Results varied significantly between the two samples, suggesting that individual and contextual factors play an important role in shaping the perceptual and emotional processes by which individuals form reactions to undesirable affective workplace events. (...) Implications of these findings for the study of ethics, emotions, and attributions, as well as for promoting ethical behavior, are discussed. (shrink)

Employees play a critical role in materializing the company's purpose as they are the ones responsible for planning and executing all the organizational activities. Considering their vital role, we explored how employees, currently working full‐time from home, perceive their participation in the company's purpose. To do so, we performed online interviews with 23 employees from 14 companies. In addition to employees' perspectives, we collected textual data from the companies' websites where these employees were working, allowing us to compare both perspectives (...) and better understand employees' perspectives. Results revealed that employees do not directly recognize the organizational purpose concept and that the term purpose is barely found on the companies' websites. Therefore, we found that besides a problem of conceptual lack of clarity in the literature, organizational purpose is still on the way to being comprehended within companies. To help solve this problem, based on stakeholder theory, we discuss the meaning of organizational purpose and compare it to related concepts such as mission and vision. Finally, we offer managers orientation on how they should operationalize their companies' purpose and how they may externally communicate it online. (shrink)

Neste artigo buscamos investigar o papel da arte no pensamento e obra de Albert Camus. Para isso, avançamos em seus principais ensaios: O mito de Sísifo e O homem revoltado, na tentativa de sintetizar suas ideias acerca da criação absurda e da arte revoltada. Consideramos que a criação absurda, pensada n’O mito... sofrerá uma expansão explosiva no segundo ensaio do autor. Se, inicialmente, a arte para Camus devia expressar a fratura do homem e seu mundo, a consciência de nossa própria (...) absurdidade, a arte revoltada revela o movimento inicial de todas as subjetividades humanas: a estilização de um mundo sem sentido. Dessa forma, a criação artística deixa de ser unicamente uma escola de paciência, lucidez e multiplicação diante de uma experiência humana que carece de unidade e sentido, tornando-se a expressão mais proeminente dessa própria condição. O revoltado e o artista compartilham as mesmas exigências, éticas e estéticas, afinal, a própria revolta é, em parte, uma exigência estética. Desse modo, buscamos expor e elucidar os conceitos camusianos em torno da arte, absurda ou revoltada, e seus desdobramentos para uma ética estilizada. (shrink)

The history of the field of business ethics in the U.S. remains understudied and misunderstood. In this article I begin to remedy this oversight about the past, and I suggest how it can be beneficial in the present. Using both published and unpublished primary sources, I argue that the business ethics field emerged in the early twentieth century, against the backdrop of the establishment of business schools in major universities. I bring to light four important developments: business ethics lectures at (...) the University of California and Yale University, Leon Marshall’s curriculum at the College of Commerce of the University of Chicago, and the William A. Vawter Foundation on Business Ethics at Northwestern University. Then, I consider the payoffs of my historical account for business ethics theory, pedagogy, and practice. Specifically, I present four implications of my account under these headings: business ethics as a public problem; the place of ethics in business schools; historicizing business ethics; and historical self-knowledge. (shrink)

Trolley dilemmas have been tested cross-culturally, but only recently have researchers begun to assess the effect of responding to such dilemmas in a foreign language. Previous studies have found a Moral Foreign Language Effect in trolley dilemmas, whereby subjects who respond to these dilemmas in a foreign language, tend to offer more utilitarian responses. The present study seeks to test whether the MFLE holds amongst native speakers of Arabic. Additionally, the present study seeks to test whether the use of visual (...) images has any effect on responses. For such purposes, four groups were compared: 1) participants responding to trolley dilemmas in English without visual images; 2) participants responding to trolley dilemmas in Arabic without visual images; 3) participants responding to trolley dilemmas in English with visual images; 4) participants responding to trolley dilemmas in Arabic with visual images. (shrink)

Education is a field that evolves constantly in relation to the changes in the society and the needs of its beneficiaries, taking over and adapting functional models from other fields. The quality of education of today’s generations has a direct impact on the future, as tomorrow's adults need to have strong key competences, but also transversal competences needed in a dynamic and competitive labour market. Thus, the knowledge society implies opening up the education system to other social sectors, exploiting the (...) paradigm of student-centred education, harnessing technology and virtual environments to create authentic learning and training contexts. Within this framework, educational coaching can be a means through which the individual potential of the learner can be discovered and optimised, with multiple benefits in personal, academic and professional terms. In order to achieve academic success, students need to know themselves, set short-, medium- and long-term goals and objectives, develop skills and competences in autonomous learning, communication, self-motivation, creative and critical thinking, emotion management etc. Through coaching activities, students can benefit from academic support and help in the process of self-discovery and personal development, optimising personal potential, collaborating and creating educational communities that share common goals and values. Placing the teacher in the position of a coach, this can contribute to the development of a multifaceted perspective related to the role of the teacher in the contemporary school, as a student’s partner in the process of his or her education. The present paper aims to explore students’ perceptions concerning the need for coaching activities in their academic life and to identify the students’ main needs and directions for optimizing actions and interventions. (shrink)

Based on an analysis of a landmark case Lim Mey Lee Susan v Singapore Medical Council in Singapore where a doctor was professionally disciplined for over-charging a wealthy patient, a judgement upheld by the Singapore High Court, this paper will discuss the notion of an ‘ethical price’ (EP) and its determination with respect to the provision of healthcare services. It will first examine the limitations of a legal approach for setting an ethical limit to pricing. From there, it will argue (...) that Confucian philosophy provides a useful ethical framework to explore EP, with focus on the context of Singapore. The following question is addressed: What is an ethical pricing standard for medical practice from a Confucian perspective? The strengths and limitations of a Confucian value base as regards the determination of an objective EP will be analysed through an examination of the shortcomings of the doctor’s behaviour in the Susan Lim case as well as other case scenarios. The paper will conclude with some practical suggestions on how Confucian-based ideas can be applied to decision-making on pricing and the importance of this for medical professionalism and ethics teaching. (shrink)

This paper presents a variable neighborhood descent algorithm for the service restoration problem (SRP) in electrical distribution systems. The restoration problem appears when a permanent fault occurs in the system. The fault must be localized and isolated from the rest of the system. As a consequence of the isolation, the downstream area is de-energized and requires restoration. The variable neighborhood descent algorithm features its ability to solve the SRP for radial distribution systems and introduces a strategy that helps to deal (...) with the system’s radiality. Tests are performed using a 53-node test system. The results show that the proposed algorithm can efficiently solve the SRP in a distribution system, and as a deterministic algorithm, the results can be used to help nondeterministic algorithms. (shrink)

El problema de la intencionalidad ha sido el foco de discusiones losó cas desde sus inicios hasta el día de hoy y las diferentes explicaciones que se han dado al respecto han dado pie a la construcción de sistemas losó cos de todo tipo. Lo común a estos sistemas ha sido el uso del término intencionalidad, en sentido losó co, separado del de intención, en el sentido vulgar, pese a que ambos son actos voluntarios dirigidos hacia objetos. Dicho uso da (...) lugar a confusiones que evitan la producción de nuevo conocimiento y que, para ser aclaradas, implican un nuevo tratamiento de la intencionalidad, para la cual es útil la losofía del lenguaje y de la mente de John Searle. Mediante la lectura crítica de algunos de sus textos más representativos al respecto y de algunos autores que han hecho un análisis de ellos, este artículo comienza clari cando el concepto de intencionalidad, entendiéndolo como una característica, tanto de la conciencia, como de la voluntad. Luego, expone a grandes rasgos la teoría de la intencionalidad en John Searle, pasando de los actos de habla a los estados mentales. Por último, describe los rasgos constitutivos del lenguaje humano y lo compara con el lenguaje computacional. Se concluye que la intencionalidad es una característica hasta ahora exclusiva de los seres humanos y que está en directa relación con el lenguaje y el seguimiento de reglas. (shrink)