In 1628, Harvey published his blood circulation theory, which triggered questionings by Riolan and Descartes at several levels: metaphysical, physiological, anatomical, institutional. The blood controversy tackles various conceptions of life that refer to various metaphysical backgrounds (Aristotelician, Cartesian or Neoplatonic), several kinds of relationships between natural philosophy and theology (compatibility, strict distinction, a balance between the two), distinct representations of the human body (dynamic, mechanic, aesthetic). It illustrates a point in time when medicine reforms and reorganizes its epistemic style (...) and its rationality in order to explain the complexity of the body’s fabric. (shrink)

1 Evidence-based policy requires researchers to provide the answers to ecological questions that are of interest to policy makers. To find out what those questions are in the UK, representatives from 28 organizations involved in policy, together with scientists from 10 academic institutions, were asked to generate a list of questions from their organizations. 2 During a 2-day workshop the initial list of 1003 questions generated from consulting at least 654 policy makers and academics was used as a basis for (...) generating a short list of 100 questions of significant policy relevance. Short-listing was decided on the basis of the preferences of the representatives from the policy-led organizations. 3 The areas covered included most major issues of environmental concern in the UK, including agriculture, marine fisheries, climate change, ecosystem function and land management. 4 The most striking outcome was the preference for general questions rather than narrow ones. The reason is that policy is driven by broad issues rather than specific ones. In contrast, scientists are frequently best equipped to answer specific questions. This means that it may be necessary to extract the underpinning specific question before researchers can proceed. 5 Synthesis and applications. Greater communication between policy makers and scientists is required in order to ensure that applied ecologists are dealing with issues in a way that can feed into policy. It is particularly important that applied ecologists emphasize the generic value of their work wherever possible. (shrink)

ABSTRACTIn 1651, Alexander Ross published an attack on Thomas Browne's Pseudodoxia Epidemica, Bacon's Natural History and William Harvey's De generatione. Ross's work, Arcana Microcosmi, defended Aristotelian natural philosophy against the ‘new philosophy’ that figures like Bacon, Harvey and Browne represented. Though Ross's attacks on these authors make up no more than half of the treatise’s contents, the book’s paratextual materials emphasise scientific debate. While Ross's authorial approach advocates reading exclusively ancient authorities for the sake of glossing and transmitting (...) their knowledge to a wider public, in order to argue against the new philosophy Ross must engage with its textual production. Furthermore, his works advertise their focus on Bacon, Harvey and Browne, which would have attracted a readership drawn to new scientific approaches to knowledge formation. Ross's polemic represents an effort to model his devotion to ancient authority while also generating a reading public that would resist the new approach to reading that the new philosophy proposed. (shrink)

The anti-patriarchy movement is going to undo ten thousand years of recorded history…. You watch. The time has come. Women are gonna take charge of society.I think [#MeToo] will have staying power because people, and not only women, men as well as women, realize how wrong the behavior was and how it subordinated women. So we shall see, but my prediction is that it is here to stay.As the story is told, #MeToo arrived in a kairotic moment. Jodi Kantor and (...) Megan Twohey's 5 October 2017 New York Times exposé of the methods Harvey Weinstein used to systematically harass and subsequently silence women in the entertainment industry opened the proverbial floodgates. Ten days later, actor Alyssa... (shrink)

In this new book, David Harvey seeks to determine what is meant by the term in its different contexts and to identify how accurate and useful it is as a description of contemporary experience.

In Pythagorean Women, classical scholar Sarah B. Pomeroy discusses the groundbreaking principles that Pythagoras established for family life in Archaic Greece, such as constituting a single standard of sexual conduct for women and men. Among the Pythagoreans, women played an important role and participated actively in the philosophical life. While Pythagoras encouraged women to be submissive to men, his reasoning was based on the desire to preserve harmony in the home. -/- Pythagorean Women provides English translations of all the (...) earliest extant examples of literary Greek prose by Neopythagorean women, shedding light on their attitudes about marriage, the home, music, and the cosmos. Pomeroy sets the Pythagorean and Neopythagorean women vividly in their historical, ecological, and intellectual contexts, illustrated with original photographs of sites and artifacts known to these women. (shrink)

We have been particularly interested in the demonstrable unremovability of machinery, which is a theme that can be pursued systematically starting at the most elementary level - the use of binary notation to represent integers; the use of rational numbers to solve linear equations; the use of real and complex numbers to solve polynomial equations; and the use of transcendental functions to solve differential equations.

Research on human causal learning has largely focused on strength learning, or on computational-level theories; there are few formal algorithmic models of how people learn causal structure from covariations. We introduce a model that learns causal structure in a local manner via prediction-error learning. This local learning is then integrated dynamically into a unified representation of causal structure. The model uses computationally plausible approximations of rational learning, and so represents a hybrid between the associationist and rational paradigms in causal learning (...) research. We conclude by showing that the model provides a good fit to data from a previous experiment. (shrink)

This book studies the phenomenon of freethinking in medieval Islam, as exemplified in the figures of Ibn al-Rāwandī and Abū Bakr al-Rāzī. It reconstructs their thought and analyzes the relations of the phenomenon to Islamic prophetology and its repercussions in Islamic thought.

Ethics is an increasingly important theme in social work practice. Worldwide, social workers experience common ethical challenges in very different contexts – from disaster relief in China to child protection work in Palestine. This book takes as its starting point real life cases featuring ethical problems in the areas of: negotiating roles and boundaries, respecting rights, being fair, challenging and developing organisations and working with policy and politics. Each case opens with a brief introduction, is followed by two commentaries and (...) ends with questions for reflection. The commentaries, written by authors from different countries, refer to relevant theories, concepts, practical matters, alternative courses of action and their implications. Features within the book include: An introductory chapter covering issues of global ethics Cases and commentaries drawn from across the world – from Peru to Finland Cases based on real life situations and chapter introductions from leading authorities in social work and ethical theory Questions and practical exercises to aid teaching and professional development This book is a unique and accessible resource for stimulating ethical reflection, expanding ethical horizons and developing ethical and intercultural sensitivity. It is designed for use by undergraduate and postgraduate students and professionals in the fields of social work, social education/pedagogy, social care work, international social work, community development, community organisation, youth work and related fields. (shrink)

Simulations, in which healthcare professionals are observed in dialogue with role-played patients, are widely used for assessing professional skills. Medical education research suggests simulations should be as authentic as possible, but there remains a lack of linguistic research into how far such settings authentically reproduce talk. This article presents an analysis of a corpus of general practice simulations in the United Kingdom, comparing this to a dataset of real-life general practitioner consultations. Combining corpus linguistic and conversation analytic methodologies, key interactional (...) features of the simulations are identified, particularly those associated with successful/unsuccessful performance in terms of the examiner’s grading. The corpus analysis identifies various forms of the phrase ‘tell me more about’ to occur significantly more frequently in the simulations compared to real GP consultations, typically in the opening sequences and most frequently in successful cases. It falls to a conversation analysis of the data, examining this phrase within the interactional context of these opening sequences, to better understand the actions it performs. Successful candidates in the simulations are found to perform a consistent sequential pattern, often incorporating this phrase. Although simulated, these interactions have real professional consequences for those being assessed. Linguistic findings about what constitutes successful interaction or differences to real-life practice therefore have important implications for professional education and assessment. (shrink)