En la actividad científica se pueden distinguir tres tipos principales de representación científica: proyectiva, subsuntiva y reductiva. Tras unas breves considcraciones introductorias, se presentan las características más destacadas de cada uno de estos tres tipos principales de representación científica y se abstrae a partir de ellas el esquema al que toda Teoría General de la Representación Científica (TGRC) se debe adecuar. A continuación se exponen las lineas generales de la principal propuesta presente en la literatura para desarrollar TGRC y se (...) hacen algunas consideraciones criticas. La conclusión provisional es que esta propuesta tiene, al menos por el momento, el problema de ser, o bien demasiado liberal, o bien demasiado conservadora. Por último, se propone un enfoque alternativo a explorar que pretende estar libre de los problemas deI anterior.We can distinguish three main types of representation in scientific practice: projective, subsuntive and reductive. After some brief introductory remarks, we present the more salient characteristics of these three main types of scientific representation and we abstract from them a scheme that any General Theory for Scientific Representation (GTSR) must fit. Then we offer the general traits of the main existing proposal for a GTSR and we make some criticisms. The provisional conclusion is that this proposal is, as it stands, either too liberal or too conservative. Finally, we propose to explore an alternative approach which intends to solve these difficulties. (shrink)

This is the introduction to the special issue of the Spanish journal Ágora-Papeles de Filosofía (31/2, 2012) devoted to new Ibero-American contributions to metatheoretical structuralism.

Can we dispense with mimesis in representation? Content Type Journal Article Category Essay Review Pages 1-6 DOI 10.1007/s11016-011-9529-1 Authors José A. Díez, Department of Logic, History and Philosophy of Science/LOGOS Research Group, University of Barcelona, C/Montalegre, 6-8, 08001 Barcelona, Spain Journal Metascience Online ISSN 1467-9981 Print ISSN 0815-0796.

Siebel's exposition of the Principle of Compositionality, the main argument against it and Fodor's reply and its virtues, is extremely clear, so I go direct to the problem. I'll make, first, some comments on ambiguity for I think that some aspects of the problem, and the persuasive part of Lahav's objections, have to do with it; then I'll focus on Siebel's worries about Fodor's reply, and I'll defend that an improved version of the Fodorian approach shows that such worries are (...) unsound. (shrink)

Social suffering commands increasing public attention in the wake of several historical processes that have changed the ways victims are perceived. In making suffering eloquent by rendering it in conceptual form, philosophy runs the risk of muting suffering, thereby neutralizing its ability to mobilize responses. In the experience of suffering philosophy finds a limit it must recognize as its own. Yet only by fulfilling its duty towards suffering - only by having the abolition of suffering as its ultimate goal - (...) can philosophical thinking withstand a tacit complicity with injustice. (shrink)

En la búsqueda de una ética para nuestro tiempo, el autor acude a la obra de Adorno para examinar la relación dialéctica entre praxis y teoría, y afirma que el nuevo concepto de praxis que emerge de esta relación podría guiarnos en la construcción de una ética más crítica que la mayoría de morales, constituidas únicamente por un sistema de normas. El autor defiende la concepción adorniana sobre el lugar del sujeto en la sociedad, que pretende despertar en este sujeto (...) la conciencia de sus capacidades, pero también de sus límites y sobre todo de su falta de libertad; lo que permite a Adorno conceder validez al intento de vida justa del sujeto moderno sólo en su problematicidad y fragilidad. (shrink)

Summary From the following discussion, we conclude that: (a) the homogeneity of space implies (in special relativity) the homogeneity of time, and vice versa; (b) the assumption of homogeneity of space (or time) implies that the transformation formulae must be linear (see Equations (10) and (17)).

En este trabajo se asume: que una teoría factual es un sistema conceptual para representar parcelas deI mundo; que la principal manera de expresar tales sistemas es mediante el lenguaje; y que, consecuentemente, en la comparación de teorías rivales tienen importancia los factores de índole ontosemántica. Desde esa perspectiva se analizan dos problemas que surgen de la aceptación de la tesis de la inconmensurabilidad, a saber: a) el de establecer las condiciones ontosemánticas que dan sentido a la comparabilidad de teorías (...) inconmensurables; y b) el de la consideración de un enfoque ontosemántico compatible con el hecho de que algunas modificaciones en una teoría no conlleven variación de significado y referencia, mientras otras sí.In this work it is assumed: that a factual theory is a conceptual system for representing patches of the world; that the principal way of expressing a system of that sort is by means of language; and that, consequently, factors of ontosemantic kind are important for the comparison between rival theories. Given this perspective, two problems, whieh come up from the acceptance of the incommensurability thesis are analyzed: a) to establish the ontosemantic conditions that give sense to the comparability of incommensurable theories; and b) to consider an ontosemantic picture compatible with the fact that some modifications in a theory are not followd by variance of meaning and reference, while other modifications are. (shrink)

Thomas Aquinas, in his commentary on the Metaphysics, offers a faithful rendering of the argument in the course of his almost literal paraphrase; but in the Summa Contra Gentiles, when he undertakes to give "the arguments by which Aristotle sets out to prove the existence of God," the argument from time is strangely omitted. Thomas is not peculiar in this omission. Maimonides before him evinces no recognition of the argument from time, and I am aware of no modern discussion of (...) it. The one directly relevant passage in Book Lambda is certainly exiguous enough, and it might perhaps be suggested that Aristotle himself failed to grasp the argument as independent of the argument from motion. The argument from time is indeed absent from the Physics in anything like its full force, though an abbreviated version of it is peripherally anticipated in chapter 1 of Bk. 8. There being such a meagreness of supporting documentation in the Aristotelian corpus itself, it is not altogether surprising that the key passage--Met. 1071b3-10--should be passed over as merely a highly condensed synopsis of the argument from motion. I am confident, however, that, elliptical as the passage is, it actually uncovers an argument for the prime mover quite distinct from the main argument of the Physics. (shrink)

This chapter contains sections titled: Sher's Weak Logicism Finiteness, an Infinite Sentence and Skolem Back to Strong Logicism? Benacerraf's Challenge An Anti‐realist Frege? Second‐order Logic and Sets Skolem (Again) and Megethology.

Theoria, Volume 88, Issue 4, Page 782-798, August 2022.

The occurrence of oscillatory behaviours in living cells can be viewed as a visible consequence of stable, regulatory homeostatic cycles. Therefore, they may be used as experimental windows on the underlying physiological mechanisms. Recent studies show that growing pollen tubes are an excellent biological model for these purposes. They unite experimental simplicity with clear oscillatory patterns of both structural and temporal features, most being measurable during real‐time in live cells. There is evidence that these cellular oscillators involve an integrated input (...) of plasma membrane ion fluxes, and a cytosolic choreography of protons, calcium and, most likely, potassium and chloride. In turn, these can create positive feedback regulation loops that are able to generate and self‐sustain a number of spatial and temporal patterns. Other features, including cell wall assembly and rheology, turgor, and the cytoskeleton, play important roles and are targets or modulators of ion dynamics. Many of these features have similarities with other cell types, notably with apical‐growing cells. Pollen tubes may thus serve as a powerful model for exploring the basis of cell growth and morphogenesis. BioEssays 23:86–94, 2001. © 2001 John Wiley & Sons, Inc. (shrink)

The aim of this paper is to give one kind of internal proportional systems with general representation and without closure and finiteness assumptions. First, we introduce the notions of internal proportional system and of general representation. Second, we briefly review the existing results which motivate our generalization. Third, we present the new systems, characterized by the fact that the linear order induced by the comparison weak order ≥ at the level of equivalence classes is also a weIl order. We prove (...) the corresponding representation theorem and make some comments on strong limitations of uniqueness; we present in an informal way a positive result, restricted uniqueness for what we call connected objects. We conclude with some final remarks on the property that characterizes these systems and on three possible empirical applications. (shrink)

In this book, two philosophers use their training in arguments and reasoning to uncover the role of ungrounded beliefs when we fall in love. They illustrate the fallacies of love by drawing on personal experiences, literary characters and two imaginary individuals, providing examples of ungrounded beliefs in Aesop's Fables, Cinderella and Don Giovanni amongst others to illustrate love as an inexhaustible source of misperceptions, misunderstandings and misconceptions.

Within post - Kuhnian, philosophy of science, much effort has been devoted to issues related to conceptual change, such as incommensurability, scientific progress and realism, but mostly in terms of reference, without a fine - grained theory of scientific concepts/senses. Within the philosophy of language and of mind tradition, there is a large body of work on concepts, but the application to scientific concepts has been very tentative. The aim of this paper is to propose a general framework for a (...) theory for the individuation of scientific concepts. The general view about the individuation of concepts favored here is the possession - condition approach: to individuate a concept is to identify its possession conditions. The general metascientific tools for the analysis of scientific theories are model - theoretic, more specifically, structuralist: scientific theories, the entities to which scientifc concepts belong, are model - theoretic theory - nets. The general idea about the content of scientific concepts that inspires this proposal comes from: (i) our grandfathers’ "laws - plus - correspondence rules", (ii) Kuhns "laws applied to exemplars" views and (iii) moderate operationalism. The aim is to show that some clarification can be gained applying the possesion condition appproach to (an expansion of) these three elements using structuralist metascientific tools. First, I briefly present the two main structuralist ideas I shall use: the difference between observability and non - theoreticity, and the notion of theory - net. Second, I informally introduce the five components that come from my reading of the three traditional elements; these components are, or are not, plausible independently of how they will be integrated within a theory of concept - identity. Third, I present the kore of the theory of possession conditions for concept - identity that we shall use for the integration of such components. Finally, I propose the general traits of the possession condition that corresponds to each of these five components, I present some problems and point out some possible ways of dealing with them. (shrink)

José A. Díez examines the reasons for claiming that models involve fictions. He opposes the claim that, in order to account for some key features of the practice of modeling in science, such as the existence of unsuccessful representations and also of successful yet inaccurate or idealized ones, it is necessary to accept fictional entities. In resisting such a view, he sketches an account of scientific modeling and argue that according to such account there is no need for strong (...) factionalism, only a weak, unproblematic fictionalist component is needed. (shrink)

En esta contribución ensayaremos una reflexión, desde las coordenadas de los estudios sobre ciencia, tecnología y sociedad (CTS), sobre el impacto de la pandemia del coronavirus en España. Estudiaremos la evolución de la percepción social en España sobre la vacunación contra la COVID-19 a la luz de los avances científicos e industriales en el desarrollo de las vacunas, las decisiones y debates políticos que acompañaron a la gestión de la crisis sanitaria y la cobertura mediática del proceso por parte de (...) los medios de comunicación. Para ello utilizaremos fundamentalmente los datos proporcionados por el Centro de Investigaciones Sociológicas (CIS) complementados, puntualmente, con datos ofrecidos por otras encuestas nacionales e internacionales, así como una amplia selección de noticias aparecidas en medios de comunicación que contribuyeron a configurar el imaginario público sobre la pandemia durante los meses previos y posteriores al inicio de la vacunación en España, que comenzó en nuestro país a finales de diciembre de 2020. Aunque este estudio exploratorio se basa en datos de encuestas y de medios, no pretende ofrecer un análisis descriptivo detallado, sino que su alcance se limita a una reflexión que pueda contribuir a comprender mejor el significado de la pandemia para las cambiantes relaciones C-T-S. (shrink)