Psychological flexibility is a key concept of acceptation and commitment therapy. This factor has been linked with psychological wellbeing and associated factors, such as quality of life, in cancer patients. These and other positive results of acceptation and commitment therapy in cancer patients found in previous research could be enhanced by using mhealth tools. A three-arm randomized superiority clinical trial, with a pre-post-follow-up repeated measures intergroup design with a 1:1:1 allocation ratio is proposed. A hundred and twenty cancer patients will (...) be randomly assigned to one of the following interventions: face-to-face ACT + mobile application, face-to-face ACT, and Waitlist control group. The primary expected outcome is to observe significant improvements in psychological flexibility acceptance and action questionnaire- II in the face-to-face ACT + app group, after comparing baseline and post-treatment scores, and the scores will remain stable in the two assessment points, 3 and 6 months after the intervention. Secondary expected outcomes are significant increasing scores in quality of life and post-traumatic-growth, and significant decreasing scores in anxiety and depression, insomnia and fatigue at the same assessment points. Also, it is expected that the scores of this group will be higher than the scores of the face-to-face ACT group and the waitlist control group. This study aims to assess the efficacy of a combined intervention for psychological flexibility and associated symptoms in cancer patients. The results of this protocol may help to consider the use of acceptation and commitment therapy and mhealth applications in cancer settings as a valid therapeutic choice.Clinical Trial Registration[www.ClinicalTrials.gov], identifier [NCT05126823]. (shrink)

BackgroundInformation and communication technology solutions have the potential to support active and healthy aging and improve monitoring and treatment outcomes. To make such solutions acceptable, all stakeholders must be involved in the requirements elicitation process. Due to the COVID-19 situation, alternative approaches to commonly used face-to-face methods must often be used. One aim of the current article is to share a unique experience from the Pharaon project where due to the COVID-19 outbreak alternative elicitation methods were used. In addition, an (...) overview of common functional, quality, and emotional goals identified by six pilot sites is presented to complement the knowledge about the needs of older adults.MethodsOriginally planned face-to-face co-creation seminars were impossible to carry out, and all pilot sites chose alternative requirements elicitation methods that were most suitable in their situation. The elicited requirements were presented in the form of goal models. In one summary goal model, we provide an overview of common functional, quality, and emotional goals.ResultsDifferent elicitation methods were combined based on the digital literacy of the target group and their access to digital tools. Methods applied without digital technologies were phone interviews, reviews of literature and previous projects, while by means of digital technologies online interviews, online questionnaires, and virtual co-creation seminars were conducted. The combination of the methods allowed to involve all planned stakeholders. Virtual and semi-virtual co-creation seminars created collaborative environment comparable to face-to-face situations, while online participation helped to save the time of the participants. The most prevalent functional goals elicited were “Monitor health,” “Receive advice,” “Receive information.” “Easy to use/comfortable,” “personalized/tailored,” “automatic/smart” were identified as most prevalent quality goals. Most frequently occurring emotional goals were “involved,” “empowered,” and “informed.”ConclusionThere are alternative methods to face-to-face co-creation seminars, which effectively involve older adults and other stakeholders in the requirements elicitation process. Despite the used elicitation method, the requirements can be easily transformed into goal models to present the results in a uniform way. The common requirements across different pilots provided a strong foundation for representing detailed requirements and input for further software development processes. (shrink)

In lieu of an abstract, here is a brief excerpt of the content:Research Ethics after World War II: The Insular Culture of BiomedicineAllan M. Brandt (bio) and Lara Freidenfelds (bio)Human subjects research in the United States has only recently emerged as an important area of historical investigation. Over the last quarter century, scholars have begun the process of grounding within an historical context both the complex relationship between researchers and subjects and the processes by which biomedical knowledge is produced. (...) Their studies examine topics ranging from the impact of the anti-vivisectionist movement on human experimentation in the early twentieth century (Lederer 1995) to the development of the discipline of bioethics in the 1960s and 1970s (Rothman 1991) and the emergence of the legal concept of informed consent for human research (Katz, Glass, and Capron 1972). Many of the discussions focus on isolated incidents of scandal, such as the Tuskegee Syphilis Study (Jones 1993; Brandt 1978) and the Willowbrook School hepatitis study (Rothman and Rothman 1984). In doing so, they attempt to explain how such clearly unethical research could have been initiated and what consequences have resulted from public knowledge of such research.Nonetheless, the broader historical contexts and implications of human subjects research have yet to be fully delineated. This project will be of crucial importance, not only for historians, but also for those concerned with research policy and medical ethics. The historical examination of human subjects research will provide further insight into the details of research methods, the construction of protocols, and the historically specific interest in certain diseases. In addition, scholars will better understand the relationships of power and authority between researcher and subject, as well as the social and scientific mechanisms for the production of new biomedical knowledge. The process of enlisting research subjects illuminates the significance of class, gender, ethnicity, and race in science, in biomedicine, and in society. The fact that, historically, much research has employed research subjects from vulnerable populations, who participated in coercive contexts, has exposed powerful social assumptions embedded in the research enterprise. [End Page 239]The revelation of new documents indicating past abuses has sparked much of the investigation into human subjects research and the recent investigation of human radiation experiments during the Cold War era. One of the most important achievements of the Advisory Committee on Human Radiation Experiments was the uncovering of thousands of documents, a remarkable mine of archival data, that had been previously inaccessible to researchers. Jonathan Moreno and Susan Lederer’s article on the history of Cold War research ethics in this issue of the Kennedy Institute ofEthics Journal represents the first attempt since the publication of the Committee’s Final Report to analyze the Committee’s findings in a serious historical context.Historical accounts of the emergence of bioethics traditionally have left a great void in their discussions of human experimentation, generally ignoring the period between the writing of the Nuremberg Code in 1947 and the publication of Henry Beecher’s 1966 New England Journal ofMedicine article condemning systematic, unethical practices in human experimentation (Rothman 1991). The period from 1946 to 1966, however, was a time of vigorous research characterized by a fragmented community of medical researchers who applied inconsistent ethical standards and employed highly variable research practices. Both military and civilian medical researchers were intensely interested in radiation and thus conducted human subjects research along those lines, including examinations of the effects of plutonium injections and of total body irradiation, the use of trace radioisotopes to study various body processes, and observations of the effects of radiation intentionally released into the environment. The U.S. Government sponsored several thousand such studies (ACHRE 1995 [GPO, pp. 227–31; Oxford, pp. 135–38]), some of which were conducted on hospital patients, institutionalized children, military personnel, and prisoners. The Cold War scientific culture that produced this research must be examined from an historical ethical perspective.A central aspect of the culture of biomedical science after World War II was its insularity. Increasingly high standards of admission and challenging training had come to ensure that only a select group of individuals was admitted to the professions of medicine and research science. In this culture of experts, trustworthiness and ethical judgment were considered to be dependent upon expertise... (shrink)

In lieu of an abstract, here is a brief excerpt of the content:IntroductionAnna Mastroianni (bio) and Jeffrey Kahn (bio)In this issue of the Kennedy Institute of Ethics Journal, we subject the work of the Advisory Committee on Human Radiation Experiments to examination from many angles. Nearly one year has passed since the release of the Committee’s final report and recommendations, and it seems an appropriate time to invite discourse and reflection on the influence and impact of the Committee and its (...) efforts. Our intent is to advance understanding of the Committee and its work, its place in the evolution of bioethics and public policy, as well as the broader legacy of restoring trust in the conduct of human subjects research.In 1993, President Clinton and Secretary of Energy Hazel O’Leary initiated an investigation of America’s involvement in radiation experiments on its citizens during the Cold War. The investigation resulted in the appointment of the Committee in January 1994. Some issues raised by these radiation experiments were brought to the attention of the nation by revelations contained in a Pulitzer Prize-winning series of newspaper stories about plutonium injections carried out by the government on allegedly unsuspecting subjects during the Cold War. The Committee faced a broad mandate, which included piecing together the history of Cold War radiation experiments and human subjects research, as well as recommending remedies for past wrongs and mechanisms to ensure that such wrongs could not be repeated in the future.This issue of the Journal consists of articles and accompanying commentaries on historical, philosophical, policy, and political aspects of the Committee’s work that are important to bioethics. This collection of articles, authored by Committee members, staff, and leading scholars, is designed to paint a picture of the breadth and complexity of the Committee’s efforts and to provide context and to stimulate discussion of significant issues.In the first article, Ruth Faden provides her unique perspective as chair of the Committee. She goes beyond the necessary overview and background of the Committee to reflect on the impact and meaning of the Committee’s work to bioethics and public policy.Much of the Committee’s effort was directed at gathering and uncovering information about the history of Cold War radiation experiments, an endeavor fairly foreign to bioethics but critically important to understanding the context in which to make moral judgments about the past. Jonathan Moreno and Susan Lederer discuss how the Committee’s work changed some of the traditional views of the history of research ethics. The commentary by Allan Brandt and Lara Freidenfelds further illuminates the value of understanding this recovered history. [End Page ix]In making moral judgments about the past, the Committee confronted complex questions about how to assess wrongdoing and the culpability of the government and its agents. Allen Buchanan explains why this was such a difficult but crucial task and how the Committee worked through some of the answers to these questions. His discussion illustrates the challenges to consensus in the committee decision-making process described in Ruth Macklin’s article in this issue on committees and consensus. Tom Beauchamp analyzes the frameworks for making retrospective moral judgments developed by two committees, the Advisory Committee and the University of California at San Francisco Ad Hoc Fact Finding Committee on World War II Human Radiation Experiments, and critiques their applications of the frameworks in the case of the plutonium injection experiments.The Committee recognized that in order to prevent wrongs seen in the past from occurring in the future, it would be necessary to understand the human subjects protections now in place. Nancy Kass and Jeremy Sugarman discuss the results of the Committee’s attempts to measure the operation and effectiveness of the current system for protection of human subjects. Paul Appelbaum comments on the relevance and value of the Committee’s empirical projects to contemporary human subjects research.The Committee’s work, and the products of any commission’s work, must be viewed partly in light of the place of commissions in bioethics scholarship and policymaking. Appointed commissions can have significant impacts on scholarly and public thinking, policymaking, and future direction, and bring high visibility to issues. It is important to realize that the conclusions of the Committee... (shrink)

We begin with a theory of thought as a biocognition not precisely situated in the individual, and still less in the brain alone, but deriving from a shared field of bioinformation. The structure of associations among elements of speech may reflect the structure of this field. Then we demonstrate that the analysis of the structure of the scientific discourse applied within this logic shows the fractal structure of the field of bioinformation. We also show that scientific culture can be interpreted (...) as a cultural model. So, scientific culture would be the elaboration of a cultural scenario in which each human being is another "myself" according to circumstances, an identification making a relationship of aid possible. This aid relationship is governed by an energy equilibrium defined by the cultural scenario, and may be calculated according to fractal theory. The result is a fractal model of consciousness and of the energies at work, whose equilibrium is necessary for the correct functioning of the human being. The consequences are determined concerning the reinsertion of the logic of the culture within the purely objective logic of medicine, in particular that of "giving-receiving" inherent in all cultures, even at the levels of giving birth in the context of modern medicine. We thank R. Ruiz-Banos for a long-time fruitful collaboration in the field of scientometrics. (shrink)

Eusociality is broadly defined as: colonies consisting of overlapping generations, cooperative brood care, and a reproductive division of labour where sterile (or non-reproductive) workers help the reproductive members. Colonies of many complex eusocial insect species (e.g. ants, bees, termites) exhibit traits, at the collective level, that are more analogous to biological individuals rather than to groups. Indeed, due to this, colonies of the most complex species are typically a unit of selection, which has led many authors to once again apply (...) the concept of the superorganism to eusocial insects. However, unlike W. M. Wheeler, who originally employed the concept from a physiological and evolutionary perspective, today the superorganism is typically understood only from an evolutionary perspective, using group selection. This is because of the widely held view that eusocial colonies are self-organized systems. According to this view, even the most complex eusocial systems can be explained by appealing to a set of local interactions between parts of an initially disordered system (i.e. self-organization), without the need of any hierarchical control. In this paper we challenge the presupposition that hierarchical control and regulation is not possible in complex eusocial colonies. Using a case study of honey bees (Apis mellifera), we develop an alternative to the self-organization approach, that focuses on the hierarchical nature of the organization of complex eusocial systems—that we refer to as the hierarchical-organizational approach. In addition, we will analyse how colonies of eusocial insects show a complex set of interactions between the different organisms that bring forth a new cohesive collective organization, and how in turn the constitutive entities of this collective organization are transformed in this process. This paper argues that an inter-identity (namely the superorganism) emerges at the collective level in complex eusocial colonies, such as honey bees, due to the hierarchically-organized network of interactions within the colony. (shrink)

We consider a situation where an individual is facing an uncertain situation, but may costly alter his knowledge of the uncertainties. We study in this context how risk aversion may modify the individual search behavior. We consider a one-armed bandit problem (where one arm is safe and the other is risky) and study how the agent risk aversion can change the sequence of arms selected. The main result is that when the utility function is more concave, the agent has more (...) chances to select the safe arm. We also discuss how search is affected by risk aversion. (shrink)

La modernidad es este espacio ofrecido para el desarrollo de las nuevas formas de comunidad, donde los conocimientos, costumbres y tradiciones se vuelven populares al encontrarse a disposición de todos los que conforman el grupo. Esto da espacio a un mestizaje de la cultura que, con el transcurrir de las generaciones, se hará más uniforme. El proceso de modernización se presentó de manera gradual donde, por medio de la expansión del conocimiento y los sentimientos comunes, se consiguió llegar a contagiar (...) a gran parte de la población. Es escrito busca mostrar, de forma sencilla pero crítica, el proceso de globalización y lo que ella trae consigo, a la identidad del ser humano. (shrink)

This paper aims to prepare a broad discussion with general linguistics that would be articulated in the form of a critique. The framework of this preparation will be the implicit dialogue that arguably took place between Heidegger and late modern linguistics. To carry out this preparation, I provide a brief definition of what is understood by late modern linguistics. I also present its constitutive features and what internal problems can be observed in it from Heidegger’s perspective. Finally, I deal with (...) one of its fundamental features, namely, the problem of the distinction between the linguistic and the extralinguistic, which is discussed from the perspective of an interpretation of the Heideggerian analysis of some verses by Hölderlin. (shrink)

In psychiatry there is no sharp boundary between the normal and the pathological. Although clear cases abound, it is often indeterminate whether a particular condition does or does not qualify as a mental disorder. For example, definitions of ‘subthreshold disorders’ and of the ‘prodromal stages’ of diseases are notoriously contentious. -/- Philosophers and linguists call concepts that lack sharp boundaries, and thus admit of borderline cases, ‘vague’. Although blurred boundaries between the normal and the pathological are a recurrent theme in (...) many publications concerned with the classification of mental disorders, systematic approaches that take into account philosophical reflections on vagueness are rare. This book provides interdisciplinary discussions about vagueness in psychiatry by bringing together scholars from psychiatry, psychology, philosophy, history, and law. It draws together various lines of inquiry into the nature of gradations between mental health and disease and discusses the individual and societal consequences of dealing with blurred boundaries in medical practice, forensic psychiatry, and beyond. -/- Part I starts with an overview chapter that helps readers to navigate through the philosophy of vagueness and through the various debates surrounding demarcation problems in the classification and diagnosis of mental illness. Part II encompasses historical and recent philosophical positions on gradualist approaches to health and disease. Part III approaches the vagueness of present psychiatric classification systems, and the debates concerning their revisions by scrutinizing controversial categories, such as posttraumatic stress disorder, and the difficulties of day-to-day diagnostic and therapeutic practice. Part IV finally focuses on social, moral, and legal implications that arise when being mentally ill is a matter of degree. (shrink)

The concept of corporate social responsibility (CSR) is not new. Many entrepreneurs created and developed companies along the time, with a strong sense of ethical and social responsibility. This article presents an example of how CSR was conceived and put into practice when Caja de Pensiones para la Vejez y de Ahorros was created in Barcelona in 1905, following the life and ideas of its founder, Francesc Moragas, a lawyer with a deep commitment for social action and a successful conception (...) of the technical and economic dimensions of a financial and social institution. (shrink)

By Olga Campos, Mª Ángeles Arráez, Miguel Moreno, Francisco Lara, Pedro Francés, and Javier Rodríguez Alcázar.

La parábola de las minas (Lc 19,11-28), situada estratégicamente al final del camino a Jerusalén, es una perícopa de difícil interpretación. Por una parte, incorpora la parábola del pretendiente al trono en el relato de las minas/talentos, por otra, muestra la violencia de las duras palabras del rey. El presente artículo propone una nueva aproximación desde la pragmalingüística, analizando el contexto literario, la cohesión lingüística y la coherencia comunicativa. Así se evidencia la estrategia comunicativa lucana que propone la confianza, la (...) responsabilidad y la misión como claves de lectura. (shrink)

How do scientific explanations for beliefs affect people's confidence that those beliefs are true? For example, do people think neuroscience-based explanations for belief in God support or challenge God's existence? In five experiments, we find that people tend to think explanations for beliefs corroborate those beliefs if the explanations invoke normally-functioning mechanisms, but not if they invoke abnormal functioning (where “normality” is a matter of proper functioning). This emerges across a variety of kinds of scientific explanations and beliefs (religious, moral, (...) and scientific). We also find evidence that these effects can interact with people's prior beliefs to produce motivated judgments. (shrink)

There is consensus that children have questionable decisional capacity and, therefore, in general a parent or a guardian must give permission to enroll a child in a research study. Moreover, freedom from duress and coercion, the cardinal rule in research involving adults, is even more important for children. This principle is embodied prominently in the Nuremberg Code (1947) and is embodied in various federal human research protection regulations. In a program named "SATURN" (Student Athletic Testing Using Random Notification), each school (...) in the Oregon public-school system may implement a mandatory drug-testing program for high school student athletes. A prospective study to identify drug use among student-athletes, SATURN is designed both to evaluate the influence of random drug testing and to validate the survey data through identification of individuals who do not report drug use. The enrollment of students in the drug-testing study is a requirement for playing a school sport. In addition to the coercive nature of this study design, there were ethically questionable practices in recruitment, informed consent, and confidentiality. This article concerns the question of whether research can be conducted with high school students in conjunction with a mandatory drug-testing program, while adhering to prevailing ethical standards regarding human-subjects research and specifically the participation of children in research. (shrink)

Many have felt to be anachronistic the casting of proskynesis in the court of Alexander the Great as a matter of worship of the king. Taking this premise as its starting point, this article explores the possible origins of this presentation of Alexander's proskynesis, an understanding that is articulated most fully in the ' proskynesis debates' of Arrian and Curtius. It is argued that the misrepresentation was a deliberate strategy cultivated in the Peripatos, and that it was designed to deflect (...) opprobrium away from Callisthenes and, by extension, away from the Peripatos itself. (shrink)

The confinement that COVID-19 has brought about has had a negative influence on people’s psychological health. However, this impact is not widespread throughout the population, and men and women may be affected differently and it is not known what protective factors may exist. In this sense, physical activity has classically been shown to be a habit associated with psychological health. The study aimed to analyze the impact of confinement on psychological health, taking into account gender, and perceived changes in physical (...) activity. After the project was approved by the University’s Ethics Commission, the participants, after signing the informed consent, completed the online questionnaires during the days from 6 to 20 April, the time when, in Spain, confinement was in place and the highest peak of deaths and infections from COVID-19 occurred. A total of 457 Spanish participants were evaluated in psychological well-being, in its adaptation to Spanish, in coping, with the Spanish adaptation of the COPE Inventory, in daily habits and difficulties and the level of physical activity they had was recorded. Besides, the perceived change in physical activity due to confinement was recorded. The results showed that perceived emotions, difficulties for certain routines, psychological well-being, and coping differed according to sex. On the other hand, depending on the change in physical activity habits, it was observed that participants who increased their physical activity responded differently in the perception of emotions, and difficulties for routines and in psychological well-being. Finally, differences were also observed in most variables between sedentary, active, and federated participants. Results are discussed highlighting the importance of physical activity as a moderating factor of the impact of confinement. (shrink)

Este trabajo plantea el papel que juega la Providencia tanto en el curso de la historia como en el posible conocimiento de ésta. En ambos casos la Providencia es un factor 'ad extra' en los hechos históricos, que dependen del arbitrio del hombre .This paper questions the role of Providence, as much in the course of history as in the possible knowledge of it. In both cases Providence is an 'ad extra' factor in historical facts, that depend on the freedom (...) of man. (shrink)

Human Resources Practices and unions coexist in some organisations to manage the employment relationships of the workers. In this study, we analyse how the presence/absence of unions and HRPs are combined in private European organisations, and which of these combinations are related to higher levels of wellbeing and the quality of labor relations. Data come from 24,503 workers of private organisations, obtained from the Sixth European Working Conditions Survey. Latent profiles analysis and different analyses of the variance suggested four different (...) profiles. The profile with the greatest presence of HRPs and union presence is related to the highest levels of employees' wellbeing and quality of labor relations in organisations, whereas those organisations with a low level of union presence or HRPs reached the worst levels in employees' wellbeing and quality of labor relations indicators. The results and their practical implications are discussed. (shrink)

Purpose Given the considerable challenges posed by disinformation to both society and journalism, how do news media outlets in Hispanic America and Spain address this pervasive global phenomenon? The purpose of this study is to evaluate the extent to which these outlets embrace recommendations from academic, professional and institutional spheres for countering false contents. Design/methodology/approach A qualitative content analysis was used using variables linked to transparency, verification and potential errors incurred. This study comprehensively analyses the ethical codes of 34 digital (...) native outlets spanning 12 Hispanic American countries (Bolivia, Chile, Colombia, Cuba, Ecuador, Guatemala, Honduras, Mexico, Paraguay, Peru, Uruguay and Venezuela), as well as Spain. Findings The key findings reveal significant variations in adherence to the recommended guidelines. Particularly striking is the disparity between compliance with transparency and verification compared to notably higher adherence to measure aimed at rectifying errors. This exploratory study paves the way for further research on additional countries. Originality/value Ethical codes are a fundamental instrument of media accountability. Nevertheless, their utility in the fight against misinformation has barely been addressed. This study is pioneering in the field of disinformation and ethical codes within digital native media outlets in Hispanic America and Spain. (shrink)

En este trabajo se discute la fundamentación de la posibilidad de una crítica de la lingüística general o lingüística teórica a partir de la interpretación de un pasaje de Carta sobre el “humanismo” de Heidegger. Nuestra interpretación es que la concepción metafísica del lenguaje genera una obliteración para comprender el fenómeno del lenguaje o las lenguas, pero esa misma concepción y, por tanto, esa misma obliteración pertenecen al fenómeno del lenguaje, y no son algo externo que pudiera evitarse. Por tanto, (...) nos preguntamos si acaso la lingüística sustenta esa concepción y se defiende que la obliteración que Heidegger diagnóstica exige un discernimiento de los conceptos fundamentales de la lingüística y de sus presupuestos. Planteamos como hipótesis de trabajo para el ejercicio crítico que no es la lingüística misma la que sustenta la concepción tal y como se puede observar siguiendo el discernimiento de sus conceptos fundamentales, sino sus presupuestos. Esto nos llevará a sostener que los conceptos fundamentales de la lingüística críticamente considerados deconstruyen los presupuestos desde donde la teoría lingüística concibe el lenguaje y su propia fundamentación teórica. (shrink)

In lieu of an abstract, here is a brief excerpt of the content:IRBs Under the MicroscopeJonathan D. Moreno (bio)The spring and summer of 1998 were seasons in the sun for institutional review board (IRB) aficionados. Rarely have the arcana of the local human subjects review panels been treated to so much attention in both the executive and the legislative branches of government, not only at the federal but also at the state level. And it looks as if the attention (...) will continue for some time. The spate of interest is due to a series of coincidences: a powerful House of Representatives subcommittee held hearings after its chairman learned about the IRB system during a previous session on research in underdeveloped communities; the Department of Health and Human Services’s Inspector General (DHHS-IG) released a report on IRBs; the National Institutes of Health (NIH) Office of Extramural Research completed a report on clinical trial monitoring; the National Bioethics Advisory Commission (NBAC) readied a report on research involving persons with mental disorders; the states of Maryland and New York completed studies of research with subjects who lack decision-making capacity; and advocacy groups protested a psychiatric research project involving inner city children.Underlying these proximate causes for the IRB blitz is a growing realization that the already considerable clinical trial enterprise will expand significantly over the next few years. Congress is talking about giving the politically popular NIH half again the budget it currently receives, which in turn will stimulate more commercially supported research. The director of the National Cancer Institute is considering a five-fold increase in the number of subjects enrolled in oncology studies over the next several years. Phase I cancer studies are among the most ethically sensitive, so IRBs will have more work cut out for them if this goal is reached. Adding to the rush of interest in IRBs are the government’s recent apology to the survivors of the syphilis study in Tuskegee, continuing congressional dissatisfaction with the way the Pentagon handled its vaccine distribution during the Gulf War, and the controversy about AZT trials in developing countries.On the HillCongressman Christopher Shays, the moderate Connecticut Republican who has developed an interest in human research issues, convened hearings on human [End Page 329] subjects research and the IRB system on 11 June 1998. Shays chairs the House Government Reform/Human Resources Subcommittee. The committee’s ranking minority member is Edolphus Towns of Brooklyn, NY, who shares Shays’s interest in this area.The immediate rationale for the hearings was the release that day of the DHHS-IG report, Institutional Review Boards: A Time for Reform. The subtitle was changed from A System in Jeopardy apparently after some people in DHHS expressed reservations about its seemingly alarmist tone, but the IG staffers who testified before Shays’s subcommittee insisted that they stood behind the message that the IRB system is in trouble if considerable reforms are not undertaken. Among the factors in the research environment cited as support for the bleak forecast: managed care, commercialization, multi-site trials, high IRB workloads, minimal IRB oversight of approved studies, conflicts of interest, insufficient training of IRB members and investigators, and lack of IRB self-studies (DHHS-IG 1998).As is normally the case for congressional oversight hearings, the first panel of witnesses consisted of executive branch officials, including Eric Meslin, Executive Director of the National Bioethics Advisory Commission, and Gary Ellis, Director of the Office for Protection from Research Risks (OPRR). Shays pressed Ellis on the extent to which OPRR conducts on-site investigations of complaints about abuse of human subjects. Admitting that on-site investigations are rare, Ellis suggested that the agency is inadequately staffed to follow up on complaints as quickly as it might wish. The members of Congress who were present at the hearings generally expressed concern about the DHHS-IG’s findings.The second panel that day, which Shays was unable to attend, set a different tone. Four of the panelists—Paul Appelbaum of the University of Massachusetts at Worcester, Robert Levine of Yale University, Angela Bowen of the Western IRB (a private clinical trials review firm), and I—were invited as authorities on the current condition of the IRB system. Bert Spilker... (shrink)

A partir del análisis de algunas cuestiones hermenéuticas en la película Edipo rey, se defiende que uno de los aspectos centrales de la crítica a la sociedad de Pasolini es el allanamiento de la propiedad simbólica. Con ello, en este trabajo nos referiremos a la homologación consecuente de la sociedad de consumo que se manifiesta como una pérdida de lo sagrado. En esta línea, se analizan algunas cuestiones teóricas a propósito del pensamiento de Pasolini sobre el cine y se sostiene (...) que ese allanamiento de la propiedad simbólica es una condición de la posibilidad de “lo político” en nuestro tiempo. (shrink)

This chapter examines Bunge’s distinction between the logical concept of existence and the ontological one. We introduce a new conceptual existence predicate in an intensional environment that depends on the evaluation world. So that we can investigate restricted areas where the different kinds of concepts might exist. We hope this new predicate would encompass Bunge’s philosophical position which he designates as conceptualist and fictional materialism. The basic hybridization acts as a bridge between intensions and extensions because @ works as a (...) useful rigidifier. In hybrid logic, the accessibility relation and many properties this relation might have can be easily expressed in the formal language. The initial hypothesis is that hybridization and intensionality can serve as unifying tools in the areas involved in this research; namely, Logic, Philosophy of Science and Linguistics. (shrink)

Is ethics a computable function? Can machines learn ethics like humans do? If teaching consists in no more than programming, training, indoctrinating… and if ethics is merely following a code of conduct, then yes, we can teach ethics to algorithmic machines. But if ethics is not merely about following a code of conduct or about imitating the behavior of others, then an approach based on computing outcomes, and on the reduction of ethics to the compilation and application of a set (...) of rules, either a priori or learned, misses the point. Our intention is not to solve the technical problem of machine ethics, but to learn something about human ethics, and its rationality, by reflecting on the ethics that can and should be implemented in machines. Any machine ethics implementation will have to face a number of fundamental or conceptual problems, which in the end refer to philosophical questions, such as: what is a human being (or more generally, what is a worthy being); what is human intentional acting; and how are intentional actions and their consequences morally evaluated. We are convinced that a proper understanding of ethical issues in AI can teach us something valuable about ourselves, and what it means to lead a free and responsible ethical life, that is, being good people beyond merely “following a moral code”. In the end we believe that rationality must be seen to involve more than just computing, and that value rationality is beyond numbers. Such an understanding is a required step to recovering a renewed rationality of ethics, one that is urgently needed in our highly technified society. (shrink)

El trabajo desarrollado en este artículo muestra una experiencia docente basada en la Metodología Activa del Aprendizaje Basado en Proyectos en la asignatura de Instalaciones II de la titulación del Grado en Arquitectura Técnica de la Universidad de Burgos. Para alcanzar la excelencia del proceso de enseñanza y aprendizaje, se ha diseñado una metodología de trabajo basada en el desarrollo progresivo de un Proyecto de Ejecución mediante subproyectos, con el objetivo de conseguir mejores resultados en el proceso de aprendizaje mediante (...) el desempeño personal, la retroalimentación de procesos y el trabajo cooperativo, todo ello orientado a la excelencia académica y profesional de los estudiantes. Los resultados obtenidos muestran que el ABP es una excelente metodología para el proceso de enseñanza-aprendizaje de la asignatura de Instalaciones II y para el futuro desempeño profesional de los estudiantes. (shrink)

BackgroundStudies and meta-analyses found individual, meso and micro-social factors that are associated with individual well-being, as well as a positive socio-emotional climate or collective well-being.AimThis article simultaneously studies and examines these factors of well-being.MethodWell-Being is measured as a dependent variable at the individual and collective level, as well as the predictors, in three cross-sectional and one longitudinal studies. Education and social intervention workers from Chile, Spain and Uruguay participate; a subsample of educators from the south central Chile and from Chile, (...) Uruguay and Spain ; workers from organizations in Latin America and Southern Europe, military cadets from Argentina ; and teams from Spanish companies.ResultsIndividual and collective well-being indicators were related, suggesting that the emotional climate as a context improves personal well-being. Individual factors, psychosocial factors were positively associated with personal well-being in education and social intervention context. Organizational dynamic or transformational culture is directly and indirectly associated with individual well-being through previously described psychosocial factors. Group processes such as internal communication and safe participation, task orientation or climate of excellence as well as leadership style that reinforces participation and belonging, were positively associated with collective well-being in labor and military context and predict team work socio-emotional climate in a longitudinal study- but were unrelated to individual well-being. Transformational leadership plays a mediating role between functional factors and social-emotional climate in work teams. Organizational role autonomy, functional organizational leadership, integration and resources were associated with collective well-being in organizations. Organizational leadership moderates the relationship between task orientation and collective well-being in military context.ConclusionIndividual and microsocial factors influence personal well-being. Meso level factors favorable to well-being through processes which reinforce social belonging, influence directly collective well-being and indirectly personal well-being. Leadership that reinforces participation and belonging play a central role for emotional climate. Stress and emotional climate playing an important pivotal role for psychological well-being. (shrink)

Luis Jiménez Moreno murió en octubre de 2007 a los 77 años de edad. Durante los últimos 30 años perteneció a la Universidad Complutense, de la que llegó a ser catedrático. Había estudiado en Salamanca, Roma, Valencia y Munich. Su tesis doctoral sobre el pensamiento antropológico de Nietzsche fue dirigida por Aranguren. Fue catedrático de instituto en Andújar, Ávila y Badalona, y profesor de universidad en Barcelona y Madrid. El presente artículo recoge los datos fundamentales de su vida, así (...) como toda su obra dividida en libros, artículos, ensayos, conferencias, ponencias y comunicaciones en congresos, seminarios, simposios, reuniones científicas, etc. (shrink)

Homo academicus propone una reflexión epistemológica de interés para investigaciones similares y para la práctica sociológica en general. En segundo lugar, propone un mapa del mundo universitario francés, de las diferentes formas de capital que lo configuran y de los diversos tipos de carrera académica. Más allá del origen nacional de su análisis, Bourdieu insiste en el valor del modelo. En tercer lugar, Bourdieu ofrece una explicación de un acontecimiento histórico que trasciende la universidad, pero en el que ésta jugó (...) un papel de primer orden. Mayo del 68 muestra cómo un acontecimiento histórico desestabiliza parcialmente el orden social existente. Este artículo interroga Homo academicus desde un punto de vista epistemológico, estructural e histórico. (shrink)