El artículo intenta mostrar la unión entre el mundo civil y el mundo metafísico como un principio rector de la antropología, la gnoseología y la teoría política de Vico. La relación entre sentido común y libre albedrío es examinada en conexión con las modificaciones de la mente y con la Práctica de la Ciencia Nueva. This paper aims to show that the connection between the civil and the metaphysical world is a ruling principle in Vico’s anthropology, in his epistemology and (...) his political philosophy as well. The relationship holding between common sense and free will related with the modifications of mind and with the Practic of the New Science is finally assessed. (shrink)

Estudio bibliográfico y crítico de / A bibliographical and critical study of: Francesco Botturi, Tempo, linguagio e azione. Le strutture vichiane della "storia ideale eterna", Guida editori, Nápoles, 1996, pp. 194.

Este artículo explica la síntesis viquiana de filosofía y filología partiendo de la metaffsica de la mente y del concepto viquiamo de mente. El desarrollo histórico de la naturaleza humana yace en la base de la teoria del conocimiento de Vico. El axioma verum ipsum factum y la sabidurla poética son las claves hermenéuticas del mundo civil.This paper explains the Vichian synthesis of philosophy and philology starting from the metaphysics of mind and Vico’s concept of mind. The historical development of (...) the human nature lies on the bottom of Vico’s theory of knowledge. The axiom verum ipsum factum and the poetic wisdom are the hermeneutic keys of the civil world. (shrink)

Estudio bibliográfico y crítico de / A bibliographical and critical study of: Marcello Montanari, Vico e la politica dei Moderni, prefazione di Biagio De Giovanni, Palomar, Bari, 1995, pp. 266.

Closed-loop administration of propofol for the control of hypnosis in anesthesia has evidenced an outperformance when comparing it with manual administration in terms of drug consumption and post-operative recovery of patients. Unlike other systems, the success of this strategy lies on the availability of a feedback variable capable of quantifying the current hypnotic state of the patient. However, the appearance of anomalies during the anesthetic process may result in inaccurate actions of the automatic controller. These anomalies may come from the (...) monitors, the syringe pumps, the actions of the surgeon or even from alterations in patients. This could produce adverse side effects that can affect the patient postoperative and reduce the safety of the patient in the operating room. Then, the use of anomaly detection techniques plays a significant role to avoid this undesirable situations. This work assesses different one-class intelligent techniques to detect anomalies in patients undergoing general anesthesia. Due to the difficulty of obtaining real data from anomaly situations, artificial outliers are generated to check the performance of each classifier. The final model presents successful performance. (shrink)

Seven COVID-19 vaccines are now being distributed and administered around the world (figure correct at the time of submission), with more on the horizon. It is widely accepted that healthcare workers should have high priority. However, questions have been raised about what we ought to do if members of priority groups refuse vaccination. Using the case of influenza vaccination as a comparison, we know that coercive approaches to vaccination uptake effectively increase vaccination rates among healthcare workers and reduce patient morbidity (...) if properly implemented. Using the principle of least restrictive alternative, we have developed an intervention ladder for COVID-19 vaccination policies among healthcare workers. We argue that healthcare workers refusing vaccination without a medical reason should be temporarily redeployed and, if their refusal persists after the redeployment period, eventually suspended, in order to reduce the risk to their colleagues and patients. This ‘conditional’ policy is a compromise between entirely voluntary or entirely mandatory policies for healthcare workers, and is consistent with healthcare workers’ established professional, legal and ethical obligations to their patients and to society at large. (shrink)

Families play an essential role in deceased organ procurement. As the person cannot directly communicate his or her wishes regarding donation, the family is often the only source of information regarding consent or refusal. We provide a systematic description and analysis of the different roles the family can play, and actions the family can take, in the organ procurement process across different jurisdictions and consent systems. First, families can inform or update healthcare professionals about a person’s donation wishes. Second, families (...) can authorize organ procurement in the absence of deceased’s preferences and the default is not to remove organs, and oppose donation where there is no evidence of preference but the default is to presume consent; in both cases, the decision could be based on their own wishes or what they think the deceased would have wanted. Finally, families can overrule the known wishes of the deceased, which can mean preventing donation, or permitting donation when the deceased refused it. We propose a schema of 4 levels on which to map these possible family roles: no role, witness, surrogate, and full decisional authority. We conclude by mapping different jurisdictions onto this schema to provide a more comprehensive understanding of the consent system for organ donation and some important nuances about the role of families. This classificatory model aims to account for the majority of the world’s consent systems. It provides conceptual and methodological guidance that can be useful to researchers, professionals, and policymakers involved in organ procurement. (shrink)

_In this symposium, Roberto A. Carleo III, Gregory Doukas and Imogen M. Sullivan think alongside Carlos Alberto Sánchez about the contingency of human existence as it is understood in Mexican existentialism. They ask: Should the notion of a metaphysical substance be discarded altogether due to its misuse in the history of European philosophy? Or are there philosophical reasons to avoid ontological uncertainty by, for example, postulating the notion of a non-discrete substance? And if attempts to define human substantiality merely (...) seek to defy this accidentality, should scholars with deviant identities deliberately engage in a wandering beyond dominant frameworks to evade the material and hermeneutical hostility of these frameworks? How should they work alongside others to best take up their responsibility? In his reply, Sánchez considers what the project of accidentalization would imply for each of these carefully-crafted interventions._. (shrink)

Digital media and technologies have significantly transformed the ways we relate to the world, in the triple sense of Selbstwelt, Mitwelt, and Umwelt. Think of the quantification of the self, the number of followers and likes on social media, or using Google maps and similar tools to orient ourselves in a city, to find and choose a good restaurant, and so on. One might say that digital media and technologies have actually transformed our interpretation, understanding, and access to the world. (...) Now, if hermeneutics is the philosophy of interpretation, then we might suppose that hermeneutics should pay attention to these transformations. For us, digital hermeneutics is the study of the ways digital media and technologies mediate between humans and the world. It is also the study of the ways digital media and technologies are embedded in non-technological relations between humans and the world – psychological, social, cultural, and so on. (shrink)

The association of resilience-related factors with frailty is a recent research topic. Dispositional optimism and context sensitivity are two psychological factors that differently contribute to individual resilience. This study aimed at investigating whether dispositional optimism and context sensitivity might contribute to a multifactorial model of frailty, together with established relevant factors such as cognitive and physical factors. This cross-sectional study involved 141 elderly outpatients aged ≥65 years, who were referred to the Geriatrics and Multidimensional Evaluation Clinic of the University Hospital (...) of Messina. We used the following measures: the Mini-Mental State Examination to screen for global cognitive functioning; 4-m gait speed and handgrip strength to measure physical performance; a 35-item Frailty Index to evaluate patients’ frailty status; the revised Life Orientation Test to gauge dispositional optimism; and the Context Sensitivity Index to measure context sensitivity. We found that LOT-R, CSI, and MMSE were all significantly associated with FI. Gait speed was only marginally associated with FI. The present study showed a novel association of dispositional optimism and context sensitivity with frailty among elderly outpatients. These preliminary findings support a multidimensional approach to frailty in which even peculiar psychological features might provide a significant contribution. (shrink)

Partiendo del cuestionamiento del propio Heidegger, se reconstruye la situación biográfica e histórico-cultural que posibilita tales alternativas a principios de siglo XX. Tras reconocer la validez de las críticas de Heidegger a las posiciones de Husserl y Dilthey, se detectan, sin embargo sus incongruencias respecto a la prioridad ontognoseológica que atribuye a la filosofía y a las Weltanschauungen respecto a las ciencias, mostrando las trampas, las ambigüedades y anfibologías en que incurre de forma premeditada para preservar el «halo de misterio» (...) que otorga a la pregunta por el sentido del Ser, en la que se demora. Desde el planteamiento «materialista» de los contextos determinantes, lo que se oculta tras el preguntar heideggeriano, más que la destrucción de la metafísica o del «pensar occidental», es un conservadurismo idealizado de la tradición, en el que sucumbe su «criticismo». Lejos de buscar una explicación ideológica al vínculo entre su filosofía y el nazismo, se sostiene aquí que es este idealismo gnoseológico (que no ontológico) acerca del papel de la filosofía, así como el descripcionismo gnoseológico el que nutre su elitismo conservador y su incapacidad de superar el privilegio óntico-ontológico de su Dasein singular como punto de partida de todo filosofar. (shrink)

There has been some concern m recent years that economic interests in the biotechnology area could, particularly through patenting, have a constricting influence on scientific research. Despite this concern, there have been no studies of this phenomenon beyond isolated cases. In this article we examine the evolution of the biomedical field of hybridoma/monoclonal antibody research with detailed examples of the three types of patent claims that have emerged there—basic claims, claims on application techniques, and claims on specific antibodies. We analyze (...) the impact of these claims and their legal histories on the free flow of scientific information and, the activity of scientific researchers. We conclude that such patent claims present severe restrictions for both, not only in the monoclonal area but in general, amounting to a subtle but significant shift in the political economy of science and technology. (shrink)

At several places in this paper we have made use of a well-known rhetorical device: an argument was made; a character —dubbed “fictional reader” — was then evoked who voiced some objections against that particular argument; and finally, we answered those objections, thus bringing to a close, at least temporarily, our argument. The use of this device raises a question: “How is the presence of the ‘fictional reader” to be understood?” Is it a “mere” rhetorical tool, or does this character (...) designate some particular target? For instance, depending on the context, it could be seen as aimed at different straw men: traditionally minded sociologists, Whiggish historians, well-intentioned philosophers of science. Actually, none of these characters is behind the “fictional reader”. Rather, it refers, potentially, to any of the scientific actors (Milstein, Schwaber, Koprowski, Cohn, and so on) who inhabit our set of narratives. In other words, the “fictional reader” is an icon for the “native” reader/writer who simultaneously produces and questions the products of that particular literary activity known as scientific texts, by explicitly and implicitly raising the issue of the distinction between fact and technique.By following actors in their disputes about the novelty of K & M's contribution, it became apparent that it is not exactly clear which of the different elements of “hybridoma technology” should be regarded as “novel.” Was it the use of the P3 myeloma line? Was it the theoretical framework related to the notion of allelic exclusion? Was it ...? In each and every case, arguments can be made for or against the existence of a certain continuity or discontinuity with previous work. And in each case, the determination of novelty, as translated through the continuity/discontinuity issue, appeared to be hanging on the previous attribution of an epistemological status to the object that had allegedly been discovered: was it a fact or a technique?If one focuses on the relatively narrow network of immunogenetics, it could be argued that within that particular evidential context a series of “facts” had been established which, when transferred to other fields, such as the virological research being pursued in Koprowski's institute, were translated into a technique. However, as we have seen, even from an immunogenetic point of view the production of monoclonal antibodies can be viewed as being simultaneously a fact and a technique to establish that fact. Not only, as he himself noted,139 was Milstein not seeking to develop a technique for the production of monoclonal antibodies when the original experiments were carried out, but the significance later imputed to those experiments was not immediately attributed to them. The paper was seen as one among other papers that used cell fusion techniques to dissect the genetic control of antibody diversity. Distinctions that now appear crucial (e.g.: were the fusion partners two myelomas or a myeloma and a spleen cell?) were easily overlooked. At some point, around 1977, the production of monoclonal antibodies became a goal in itself, no longer linked to the initial immunogenetic network. The transformation of [MILSTEIN 75] into the foundational event of “hybridoma technology” was thus achieved. This transformation did not flow naturally from the original experiments. Rather, it involved specific investments which mobilized the activity of a large number of other scientific and industrial actors.140A tentative generalization can be deduced from our case study. The dichotomy between fact and technique that underlines much of contemporary science studies seem to be fundamentally misconceived, insofar as the determination of what counts as a fact and what counts as a technique is not possible on a priori grounds. Historians and sociologists of science are confronted with a field of heterogeneous interventions where particular pieces of work are constituted as discrete entities and simultaneously attributed a technical or a factual identity. “Novelty” and “innovation” are precisely the result of such polymorphic attributional processes. (shrink)

In Re-Thinking Science. Knowledge and the Public in an Age of Uncertainty H. Nowotny, P. Scott, e M. Gibbons vindicate a “socially robust” scientific knowledge in accordance with the social needs of our time. Such a knowledge would not be just epistemically reliable; in addition, it would also fit the situations to which will be put to use, and take into account the consequences of its utilization. In the authors’ view, this new kind of science, which they call “Mode 2 (...) knowledge” in another book, would do justice to a society that is not restrained to receive or ask for scientific information, but also requires sharing in its production. Nowotny and her colleagues mention several epistemological changes which a “robust” knowledge would involve. In this paper I analyze some of those alleged changes. (shrink)

En este artículo de investigación se muestra, que durante la fabricación de hierro, las escorias han sido una fuente información del producto obtenido. Esto aplica a toda la historia de la fabricación de este metal desde el inicio de la edad del hierro. Los estudios en este campo se conocen como arqueo de metalurgia y se inicia desde la paleo metalurgia hasta el presente. Las escorias primitivas obtenidas a partir de su separación de la masa de hierro sólida obtenidas en (...) procesos muy primitivos y más modernas como la forja catalana. Estudios petrográficos, de difracción de rayos X y de fluorescencia de rayos x, han revelado la existencia fayalita, en escorias siderometalúrgicas antigüas a temperaturas por debajo del punto eutéctico,deducidas como entre 1150°C y 1200°C. Más recientemente, la presencia de fayalita ha sido revelada en procesos de reducción operando con temperaturas menores a los 900°C. En este documento se presenta una explicación para tal hecho mediante un análisis de las energías asociadas a los sistemas. Cerámicos compuestos de FeO- SiO2-MgO- P2O5 presentes en dichos procesos. Palabras Clave: Hornos de fundición, hierro, experimentos, escorias, análisis, fayalita. Referencias [1]S.Rovira., “Museo Arqueológico Nacional/Univ. Autónoma de Madrid”, Francisco Burillo. Experimentos de Fundición de Minerales de Hierro en la Ciudad-Estado Celtibérica de Segeda, 2004. [2]F.Gómez., “Minería y metalurgia en la antigüedad”. Trabajo Titular de Ciencia dos Materiais e Ingeniería Metalúrgica. Ferrol, Universidad de Coruña, 2006. [3]E.Ringdalen. “Parámetros de reacción del cuarzo en la producción del óxido de los materiales” Rev. The Minerals, Metals & Materials Society, 2016, pp. 43-49. [4]M.Meyer. “Caracterización de fase y micro estructural de pellet de mineral de hierro y su relación con prueba de fuerza de trituración en frío”. Mineral Processing and Extractive Metallurgy Review An International Journal, 2016. [5]Z.Sheng. “Relación entre el óxido Férrico y el sistema Fe2O3-SiO2 Al2O3”, 2015. [6]D.Fuller. “Fenómenos de Sinterización de finos en proceso de reducción directa”. Puerto Ordaz,1965. [7]O.Dam. “Microfotografías de muestras de minerales Australiano y Venezolano procesados en el reactor wustitico, mostrando la presencia de fase Fayalita”, 1993. [8]Q.Odeta. “Study on Formation Mechanism of Fayalite by Solid State Reaction in Sintering Process”, 2017. (shrink)

A proliferation of tests exists for the assessment of auditory-verbal memory processes. However, from a clinical practice perspective, the situation is less clear when it comes to the ready availability of reliable and valid tests for the evaluation of visual/visuo-spatial memory processes. While, at face value, there appear to be a wide range of available tests of visual/visuo-spatial memory, utilizing different types of materials and assessment strategies, a number of criticisms have been, and arguably should be, leveled at the majority (...) of these tests. The criticisms that have been directed toward what are typically considered to be visual/visuo-spatial memory tests, such as the potential for verbal mediation, over-abstraction of stimuli, the requirement of a drawing response, and the lack of sensitivity to unilateral brain lesions, mean that, in reality, the number of readily available valid tests of visual/visuo-spatial memory is, at best, limited. This article offers a critical, historical review on the existing measures and resources for the neuropsychological assessment of visual/visuo-spatial memory, and it showcases some examples of newer tests that have aimed to overcome the challenges of assessing these important aspects of memory. The article also identifies new trends and examples of how technological advances such as virtual reality may add value to overcome previous obstacles to assessment, thereby offering professionals more reliable, accurate means to evaluate visual/visuo-spatial memory in clinical practice. (shrink)