A partir de dos poemas de Borges se emprende un análisis de la experiencia del instante, inicialmente al trasluz de la crítica hegeliana de la inmediatez sensible como decir inconsciente, para, después, trasponerla al vacío constitutivo de la identidad que destapa el deseo, empresa que conduce hasta un fenómeno del presente como diástasis que depara la presencia de la ausencia.

El sistema penitenciario de Ecuador enfrenta una crisis estructural de proporciones preocupantes. Esta investigación se centra en analizar las diversas causas que han precipitado esta situación, con el objetivo de determinar la responsabilidad del Estado ecuatoriano en esta crisis. Se examina específicamente si el Estado cumple adecuadamente con su obligación de rehabilitar a los condenados y reintegrarlos a la sociedad tras el cumplimiento de sus penas. Se evidencia una ausencia significativa de programas efectivos de reinserción para las Personas Privadas de (...) Libertad (PPL), lo que directamente contribuye a la crisis carcelaria actúa. El propósito de este estudio es analizar críticamente la situación del sistema penitenciario ecuatoriano, identificando las deficiencias en los programas de rehabilitación y reinserción social ofrecidos a las PPL. Se busca determinar si el Estado es el principal responsable de la crisis carcelaria mediante el análisis de diversas fuentes bibliográficas y la evaluación de su cumplimiento de las obligaciones legales y humanitarias hacia este grupo vulnerable. Se llevó a cabo una investigación cualitativa, donde se analizaron diversas fuentes bibliográficas especializadas para abordar el problema del sistema penitenciario en Ecuador. Se examinaron informes gubernamentales, estudios académicos y documentos legales pertinentes para comprender a fondo las causas subyacentes de la crisis carcelaria. Esta metodología permitió una evaluación exhaustiva de las deficiencias institucionales y la falta de programas de rehabilitación adecuados para las PPL en el país. Los resultados de la investigación revelan una serie de factores que contribuyen a la crisis carcelaria en Ecuador. Entre ellos se destacan el hacinamiento, la sobrepoblación, el debilitamiento institucional, el tráfico de drogas y armas, entre otros. Se evidencia que el Estado no cumple adecuadamente con su obligación de rehabilitar a los condenados y reintegrarlos a la sociedad, lo que agrava la situación y hace más miserable la vida de las PPL dentro de los centros de reclusión. Este estudio confirma que el Estado ecuatoriano es el principal responsable de la crisis carcelaria existente en el país. La falta de programas efectivos de rehabilitación y reinserción social para las PPL, junto con otras deficiencias institucionales, ha exacerbado la situación. Es imperativo que el Estado tome medidas urgentes y efectivas para abordar estas deficiencias y garantizar el respeto de los derechos humanos y la dignidad de las personas privadas de libertad en Ecuador. (shrink)

This article presents and reflects upon the results of a survey involving a sample of women who have experienced gender-based violence and who have turned to an institutional centre to tackle their situation. In aiming to move beyond a descriptive treatment, we consider the plurality of user types and their remote use patterns in relation to the resources offered by virtual feminist communities designed to promote increased sociopolitical mobilisation in the fight against violence against women. We will observe the progressive (...) emergence of protest actions organised by Spanish virtual feminist communities, which make use of new technologies to contribute productively to the debate and to political action in innovative organisations and formats. The article discusses how feminist virtual communities are using digital spaces for their work combatting violence against women, and whether this work is apparent to those who experience this violence. Finally, we tackle the implications of this work for online feminist activism in terms of a more interactive and social constructivist model of activism, as well as considering its relationship to institutional-legal discourse and public policies that require women to recognise themselves as victims. (shrink)

Introducción: El maltrato infantil se define como el abuso y la desatención de que son objeto los menores de 18 años; incluye el maltrato físico o psicológico, abuso sexual, desatención, negligencia y explotación comercial o de otro tipo que puedan causar un daño a la salud, al desarrollo o la dignidad del niño, y poner en peligro su supervivencia, en el contexto de una relación de responsabilidad, confianza o poder. Método: Se realizó un estudio prospectivo, con enfoque cuali-cuantitativo, modalidad de (...) campo, descriptivo, analítico y longitudinal en la escuela Manuela Espejo del cantón Ambato, provincia Tungurahua, Ecuador, durante el periodo 2013-2015 con el objetivo de determinar la incidencia de maltrato infantil y brindarle la atención o tratamiento adecuado. Resultados: El 7,67 % de los niños eran maltratados, predominó el sexo masculino con un 74 %, fundamentalmente en el medio familiar con un 52,17 % en la modalidad de maltrato psicológico en un 62,16 %. Conclusiones: La violencia infantil, continúa siendo un problema a nivel internacional. La asistencia continua a las víctimas del maltrato y a sus familias puede ayudar a reducirlo y a paliar sus consecuencias. Introduction: Child abuse is defined as mistreatment and neglect of children who are under 18. It includes physical or psychological abuse, sexual abuse, neglect, negligence and commercial exploitation or any other kind of exploitation that may cause damage to children´s health, physical development or dignity, and may endanger their survival in the context of a relationship of responsibility, trust or power. Method: A prospective, descriptive, analytical, longitudinal study was conducted using qualitative and quantitative approaches at Manuela Espejo School in Canton Ambato, Tungurahua province, Ecuador, during the period of 2013-2015 in order to determine the incidence of child abuse and provide adequate care or treatment. Results: 7.67% of children were abused; of those, males predominated at 74%. The abuse took place mainly in the family environment in the form of psychological maltreatment. Conclusions: Child abuse remains a problem internationally. Continuous assistance to victims of abuse and their families can help reduce and mitigate its consequences. (shrink)

This article examines whether people share the Gettier intuition (viz. that someone who has a true justified belief that p may nonetheless fail to know that p) in 24 sites, located in 23 countries (counting Hong Kong as a distinct country) and across 17 languages. We also consider the possible influence of gender and personality on this intuition with a very large sample size. Finally, we examine whether the Gettier intuition varies across people as a function of their disposition to (...) engage in “reflective” thinking. (shrink)

Philosophers have long debated whether, if determinism is true, we should hold people morally responsible for their actions since in a deterministic universe, people are arguably not the ultimate source of their actions nor could they have done otherwise if initial conditions and the laws of nature are held fixed. To reveal how non-philosophers ordinarily reason about the conditions for free will, we conducted a cross-cultural and cross-linguistic survey (N = 5,268) spanning twenty countries and sixteen languages. Overall, participants tended (...) to ascribe moral responsibility whether the perpetrator lacked sourcehood or alternate possibilities. However, for American, European, and Middle Eastern participants, being the ultimate source of one’s actions promoted perceptions of free will and control as well as ascriptions of blame and punishment. By contrast, being the source of one’s actions was not particularly salient to Asian participants. Finally, across cultures, participants exhibiting greater cognitive reflection were more likely to view free will as incompatible with causal determinism. We discuss these findings in light of documented cultural differences in the tendency toward dispositional versus situational attributions. (shrink)

In the remainder of this article, we will disarm an important motivation for epistemic contextualism and interest-relative invariantism. We will accomplish this by presenting a stringent test of whether there is a stakes effect on ordinary knowledge ascription. Having shown that, even on a stringent way of testing, stakes fail to impact ordinary knowledge ascription, we will conclude that we should take another look at classical invariantism. Here is how we will proceed. Section 1 lays out some limitations of previous (...) research on stakes. Section 2 presents our study and concludes that there is little evidence for a substantial stakes effect. Section 3 responds to objections. The conclusion clears the way for classical invariantism. (shrink)

This paper employs network theory, mining data and bibliometric analysis when mapping the scientific contribution of Nobel Prize candidate; Manuel Sandoval Vallarta, the first and most renowned Mexican physicist and important figure in Latin American science. Vallarta died in 1977, and the existing literature is about his life and contributions to science but not about how those are still valuable today. This paper is the first to highlight, with mapping tools, that his contributions are relevant to the international community of (...) cosmic rays, quantum mechanics and relativity. These tools delivered three findings: Identify how he built his own field of study, same as universal knowledge. Unveil that the backward and forward Vallarta citations follow a scale-free network distribution. Determine social factors that benefited or affected his scientific activities—such as World War II interrupting Vallarta’s successful productivity at Massachusetts Institute of Technology. Furthermore, this study confirmed the interdisciplinary nature of the mapping studies of the scientist's contributions using scientometric tools. As a result, several interesting questions arose throughout our research, some of which were answered from the history and philosophy of science. However, others need to be analyzed by experts in the fields of Vallarta. Mapping research sends an invitation to interdisciplinary dialogue/research between experts in different areas of study to better understand the process of knowledge production both, individual and collective. (shrink)

This study aimed to determine the predictive character of organizational socialization and occupational positive mental health on organizational commitment in higher education teachers. A sample of 279 teachers from higher education institutions who signed an informed consent form was used. Fifty-four point five percent of the participants were women, with a mean age of 44.05 years. The participants completed the Organizational Socialization Inventory, the Positive Occupational Mental Health Questionnaire and the Organizational Commitment Scale, and for data analysis descriptive statistics, correlation (...) analysis and multiple linear regression with stepwise method were applied, entering each dimension of organizational commitment separately as a dependent variable. As a result, moderate to weak correlations were identified between the study variables, and it was found that the final models indicate that the future perspectives and socio-affective dimensions predict affective commitment by 38%; that future perspectives, spirituality and age predict normative commitment by 22.8%; and that the future perspectives dimension predicts commitment of continuity by 9.2%. It is concluded that teachers’ expectations about their development in the institution, as well as their interactions at the socio-affective and spiritual level with the work context, are factors that partially influence their attachment to the educational organization. (shrink)

Does the Ship of Theseus present a genuine puzzle about persistence due to conflicting intuitions based on “continuity of form” and “continuity of matter” pulling in opposite directions? Philosophers are divided. Some claim that it presents a genuine puzzle but disagree over whether there is a solution. Others claim that there is no puzzle at all since the case has an obvious solution. To assess these proposals, we conducted a cross-cultural study involving nearly 3,000 people across twenty-two countries, speaking eighteen (...) different languages. Our results speak against the proposal that there is no puzzle at all and against the proposal that there is a puzzle but one that has no solution. Our results suggest that there are two criteria—“continuity of form” and “continuity of matter”— that constitute our concept of persistence and these two criteria receive different weightings in settling matters concerning persistence. (shrink)

In this paper we describe an experimental test of the validity of the Pauli Exclusion Principle (for electrons) which is based on a straightforward idea put forward a few years ago by Ramberg and Snow (Phys. Lett. B 238:438, 1990). We perform a very accurate search of X-rays from the Pauli-forbidden atomic transitions of electrons in the already filled 1S shells of copper atoms. Although the experiment has a very simple structure, it poses deep conceptual and interpretational problems. Here we (...) describe the experimental method and recent experimental results, which we interpret in the framework of quon theory. We also present future plans to upgrade the experimental apparatus using Silicon Drift Detectors. (shrink)

We present an experimental test of the validity of the Pauli Exclusion Principle for electrons based on the concept put forward a few years ago by Ramberg and Snow. In this experiment we perform a very accurate search of X-rays from the Pauli-forbidden atomic transitions of electrons in the already filled 1S shells of copper atoms. Although the experiment has a simple structure, it poses deep conceptual and interpretational problems. Here we describe the experimental method and recent experimental results, which (...) we interpret as an upper limit for the probability to violate the Pauli Exclusion Principle. We present also future plans to upgrade the experimental apparatus using Silicon Drift Detectors. (shrink)

Is behavioral integration a necessary feature of belief in folk psychology? Our data from over 5,000 people across 26 samples, spanning 22 countries suggests that it is not. Given the surprising cross-cultural robustness of our findings, we argue that the types of evidence for the ascription of a belief are, at least in some circumstances, lexicographically ordered: assertions are first taken into account, and when an agent sincerely asserts that p, nonlinguistic behavioral evidence is disregarded. In light of this, we (...) take ourselves to have discovered a universal principle governing the ascription of beliefs in folk psychology. (shrink)

There are multiple and diverse voices of jurists who have expressed their fear of the unrestricted power of law enforcement and have announced the crisis of the formalist sense of Law. The widespread reaction against the abstract and formalist character of the positivist theory of law manifested itself as the Krausist philosophy of law and was backed by the philosophy of Krause, Schelling, Hegel and the most recent Natural Law theories that seek to establish substantial criteria for moral action. This (...) distrust was caused by the heteronomy of modest and obedient civil servants of the judicial order that rely on political balance of power in which nothing depends on the human bottom of institutions. Let us consider briefly the impressive analyses performed by different thinkers on this issue, which they considered characteristic of their era, but that continues to constitute a difficulty that challenges contemporary society. (shrink)

Traducción del alemán de Irene Borges-Duarte.

There are multiple and diverse voices of jurists who have expressed their fear of the unrestricted power of law enforcement and have announced the crisis of the formalist sense of Law. The widespread reaction against the abstract and formalist character of the positivist theory of law manifested itself as the Krausist philosophy of law and was backed by the philosophy of Krause, Schelling, Hegel and the most recent Natural Law theories that seek to establish substantial criteria for moral action. This (...) distrust was caused by the heteronomy of modest and obedient civil servants of the judicial order that rely on political balance of power in which nothing depends on the human bottom of institutions. Let us consider briefly the impressive analyses performed by different thinkers on this issue, which they considered characteristic of their era, but that continues to constitute a difficulty that challenges contemporary society. (shrink)

The commentaries on the Ethica nova and the Ethica vetus written by some masters of the arts – presumably operating in the Paris faculty – in the first half of the thirteenth century expound in an original way the doctrine of the virtutes consuetudinales which Aristotle, at the end of the first book of his Ethica (I 13), distinguishes into the two main classes of the “moral virtues” and the “intellectual virtues”. The present paper aims at highlighting the particularly important (...) task which is assigned to the intellectual virtues in these early commentaries: joining man to God directly, through a contemplation which becomes love. The masters of the arts maintain that the moral virtues, in spite of the definition given by Aristotle (habitus a quo quis bonus est et opus eius bene reddit), are not sufficient alone to bring man to perfection, but that other more perfect virtues, namely the intellectual ones, are needed in order to make him know and love the supreme good. Having no knowledge of the sixth book of the Ethica, in which Aristotle deals in particular with the intellectual virtues, our masters know only their general description and are concerned with clarifying their relationships with the moral virtues, compared to which they appear to be sometimes really distinct and sometimes united to them in sharing the recta ratio, so much that they may constitute a double virtue. Although the masters of the arts seem to be well-informed about the teaching of the theologians – which they often cite without opposing to it, albeit stressing their own philosophical point of view –, it is significant that no reference whatsoever is made by them to the theological virtues and that they have recourse to the themes of Avicennian mysticism such as the doctrine of the two faces of the soul. Besides presenting the commentaries on the Ethica vetus from a general point of view, I will focus on the Paris commentary in Ethicam veterem (Paris BN lat. 3804A, ff. 152ra-159vb, 241ra-247vb; Paris BN lat. 3572, ff. 226ra-235ra), of which I am preparing a critical edition. The Paris commentary contains in fact a special and original discussion of the doctrine of the virtutes intellectuales. (shrink)

Written by two of the leading figures in the field, this is a lucid and systematic introduction to semantics as applied to transformational grammars of the ...

Experiential imagination consists in an imaginative projection that aims at simulating the experiences one would undergo in different circumstances. It has been traditionally thought to play a role in how we build our lives, engage with other agents, and appreciate art. Although some philosophers have recently expressed doubts over the capacity of experiential imagination to offer insight into the perspective of someone other than our present-selves, experiential imagination remains a much sought-after tool. This paper substantiates pessimism about the epistemological value (...) of these uses of experiential imagination by developing an embodied approach. Our thesis is that experiential imagination is _robustly embodied_ because the _sociohistorically situated_ body makes an irreducible contribution to the imaginative project, and that, as such, it is constrained by who we are as _concrete_ agents. We argue that experiential imagination is an embodied, virtual exploration of imagined scenarios that depends on our situated history of sensorimotor and affective interactions. We conclude that experiential imagination is much more limited than commonly acknowledged, as it can hardly be divorced from who we are and where we have been. (shrink)

Advocates of interactionism in the ethical criticism of art argue that ethical value impacts aesthetic value. The debate is concerned with “the intrinsic question”: the question of whether ethical flaws/merits in artworks’ manifested attitudes affect their aesthetic value (Gaut 2007: 9). This paper argues that the assumption that artworks have intrinsic ethical value is problematic at least in regards to a significant subset of works: fictional artworks. I argue that, insofar as their ethical value emerges only from attitudes attributable to (...) actual agents, fictional artworks only have extrinsic ethical value. I show that what is at stake for interactionism is whether ethical judgements concerning artists’ attitudes in a context, rather than manifested attitudes, are ever aesthetically relevant. I conclude that, without buying into extreme actual intentionalism, a still controversial theory of interpretation that ties artworks’ meaning to actual artists, interactionism fails to show that ethical flaws/merits are aesthetic flaws/merits. (shrink)

Advocates of the ethical criticism of art claim that works' ethical defects or merits have an impact on their aesthetic value. Against ethical critics, autonomists claim that moral criteria should not be part of the considerations when evaluating works of art as art. Autonomism refers to the view that an artwork's aesthetic value is independent from its ethical value. The purpose of this paper is to examine how autonomism has been defended in the contemporary discussion in analytic aesthetics. I present (...) three versions of autonomism: Richard Posner's radical autonomism, James C. Anderson and Jeffrey T. Dean, and James Harold's moderate autonomism, and Francisca Pérez Carreño's robust autonomism. I argue that robust autonomism offers a stronger argument against the ethical critic. However, I point to some difficulties for Pérez Carreño's account and conclude by suggesting how further work in autonomism might go around them. (shrink)

Background: Eye movement desensitization and reprocessing [EMDR] is an innovative, evidence-based and effective psychotherapy for post-traumatic stress disorder [PTSD]. As with other psychotherapies, the effectiveness of EMDR contrasts with a limited knowledge of its underlying mechanism of action. In its relatively short life as a therapeutic option, EMDR has not been without controversy, in particular regarding the role of the bilateral stimulation as an active component of the therapy. The high prevalence of EMDR in clinical practice and the dramatic increase (...) in EMDR research in recent years, with more than 26 randomized controlled trials published to date, highlight the need for a better understanding of its mechanism of action. Methods: We conducted a thorough systematic search of studies published until October 2017, using PubMed, ScienceDirect, Web of Knowledge and Scopus databases that examined the mechanism of action of EMDR or provided conclusions within the framework of current theoretical models of EMDR functioning. Results: Seventy-five studies were selected for review and classified into three overarching models; (i) psychological models (ii) psychophysiological models and (iii) neurobiological models. The evidence available from each study was analysed and discussed. Results demonstrated a reasonable empirical support for the working memory hypothesis and for the physiological changes associated with successful EMDR therapy. Recently, more sophisticated structural and functional neuroimaging studies using high resolution structural and temporal techniques are starting to provide preliminary evidence into the neuronal correlates before, during and after EMDR therapy. Discussion: Despite the increasing number of studies that published in recent years, the research into the mechanisms underlying EDMR therapy are still in its infancy. Studies in well-defined clinical and non-clinical populations, larger sample sizes and tighter methodological control are further needed in order to establish firm conclusions. (shrink)

This book provides an up-to-date revision of materialism’s central tenets, its main varieties, and the place of materialistic philosophy vis a vis scientific knowledge. Materialism has been the subject of extensive and rich controversies since Robert Boyle introduced the term for the first time in the 17th century. But what is materialism and what can it offer today? The term is usually defined as the worldview according to which everything real is material. Nevertheless, there is no philosophical consensus about whether (...) the meaning of matter can be enlarged beyond the physical. As a consequence, materialism is often defined in stark exclusive and reductionist terms: whatever exists is either physical or ontologically reducible to it. This conception, if consistent, mutilates reality, excluding the ontological significance of political, economic, sociocultural, anthropological and psychological realities. Starting from a new history of materialism, the present book focuses on the central ontological and epistemological debates aroused by today’s leading materialist approaches, including some little known to an anglophone readership. The key concepts of matter, system, emergence, space and time, life, mind, and software are checked over and updated. Controversial issues such as the nature of mathematics and the place of reductionism are also discussed from different materialist approaches. As a result, materialism emerges as a powerful, indispensable scientifically-supported worldview with a surprising wealth of nuances and possibilities. (shrink)

Scientists are becoming increasingly aware of a “replicability crisis” in the behavioral, social, and biomedical sciences. Researchers have made progress identifying statistical and methodological...

There has been much debate recently on the question whether essence can explain modality. Here, I examine two routes to an essentialist account of modality. The first is Hale's argument for the necessity of essence, which I will argue is — notwithstanding recent attempted defences of it — invalid by its very structure. The second is the proposal that it is essential to essential truth that it is necessary. After offering three possible versions of the view, I will argue that (...) each fails to provide a metaphysical explanation of necessity in terms of essence. (shrink)

Transformar el modo de vida individual es necesario para abordar la crisis ecosocial, y resulta perentorio que las políticas comprometidas con su resolución promocionen una capacidad individual de acción ecosocial. Sin embargo, parece que cierta brecha motivacional está obstaculizando la transformación del modo de vida individual. A fin de dar respuesta a esta brecha, ensayamos una mixtura del enfoque de las capacidades con las teorías de Hartmut Rosa. Argumentamos que la resonancia natural funge de factor personal de conversión necesario, si (...) bien no suficiente, para la capacidad de acción ecosocial; y que una política que promocione la resonancia natural se adecuaría también a los requisitos impuestos al desarrollo humano tanto por el enfoque de las capacidades como por la sostenibilidad. (shrink)

The foundation of the Australian colonial project lies within an ‘originary violence’, in which the state retains a vested interest in maintaining the founding order of things. Inequalities and iniquities are maintained for the purpose of sustaining the life and continuity of the state. The Australian state, founder of a violent order is called upon by the international community to conform and uphold ‘human rights’, but what does this call to conformity require, particularly when the call comes from states which (...) are also founded upon colonial violence? This article argumes that very little is required beyond the masquerade that ‘equality’ for Aboriginal peoples is an on-going project of the state. So for what purpose does the masquerade continue? (shrink)

Aesthetic evaluations of human bodies have important implications for moral recognition and for individuals’ access to social and material goods. Unfortunately, there is a widespread aesthetic disregard for non-white bodies. Aesthetic evaluations depend on the aesthetic properties we regard objects as having. And it is widely agreed that aesthetic properties are directly accessed in our experience of aesthetic objects. How, then, might we explain aesthetic evaluations that systematically favour features associated with white identity? Critical race philosophers, like Alia Al-Saji, Mariana (...) Ortega, Paul C. Taylor, and George Yancy, argue that this is because the perception of racialized bodies is affected by the social structures in which they are appreciated. The aim of this paper is to propose how social structures can affect aesthetic perception. I argue that mental imagery acquired through the interaction with aesthetic phenomena structures the perception of non-aesthetic properties of bodies, so that aesthetic properties consistent with racist stereotypes are attributed to individuals. (shrink)

The foundation of the Australian colonial project lies within an ‘originary violence’, in which the state retains a vested interest in maintaining the founding order of things. Inequalities and iniquities are maintained for the purpose of sustaining the life and continuity of the state. The Australian state, founder of a violent order is called upon by the international community to conform and uphold ‘human rights’, but what does this call to conformity require, particularly when the call comes from states which (...) are also founded upon colonial violence? This article argumes that very little is required beyond the masquerade that ‘equality’ for Aboriginal peoples is an on-going project of the state. So for what purpose does the masquerade continue? (shrink)

This essay is a critical review of two recent collections, Feminism and Foucault: Reflections on Resistance, edited by Irene Diamond and Lee Quinby and Feminism as Critique: On the Politics of Gender, edited by Seyla Benhabib and Drucilla Cornell. While the collections differ in their manner of addressing the critical sources that have inspired them-the former relying upon a single theorist, the latter attempting to move through some of the philosophical history that constitutes our present theoretical terrain-both attempt to (...) think through and thus revisualize some of the categories of difference which we have inherited. Though the best essays from these collections are celebrated for demonstrating how "feminism as critique" can work to move us toward a clearer and more inclusive feminist theory, questions are raised about what the inattention to race in these volumes suggests about our own role in the construction of power and knowledge, and the erasures that help to secure them both. (shrink)

Introduction: Time and the shared world -- The "subject" of inquiry -- Mineness and the practical first-person -- Being and otherness: Sartre's critique -- Heideggerian aprioricity and the categories of being -- The temporality of care -- Fursorge: acknowledging the other Dasein -- Authenticity, inauthenticity, and the extremes of Fursorge -- Conclusion.

This article examines what constitutes an ethical flaw in artworks and asks which ethical flaws are relevant in determining works. ethical and aesthetic values. I argue that while most of the discussion has simply taken for granted that it is intrinsic ethical flaws that should be taken into account, there are further important differences in the type of intrinsic ethical flaws that artworks display. I identify two different types of ethical defects in artworks, fictional and actual, and argue that this (...) distinction has important consequences for debates surrounding the ethical value of works of fiction. (shrink)

It has been pointed out that Sensorimotor Enactivism, a theory that claims that perception is enacted and brought about by movement, says very little about the neural mechanisms that enable perception. For the proponents of the predictive approach to Sensorimotor Enactivism, this is a challenge that can be met by introducing predictive processing into the picture. However, the compatibility between these theories is not straightforward. Firstly, because they seem to differ in their stand towards representations: while Sensorimotor Enactivism is said (...) to belong to the non-representational wing of cognitive science, predictive processing has a representational profile. And secondly, because they exhibit different explanatory strategies: while Sensorimotor Enactivism prioritizes the interactions of the embodied agent, predictive processing has internalist commitments. The aim of this paper is to address these concerns and show that a predictive approach to Sensorimotor Enactivism is viable. More specifically, I focus on the Free-Energy approach, a theory that falls within the ballpark of predictive processing. In this paper I argue for the following claims. I argue that both Sensorimotor Enactivism and the Free-Energy approach may be understood for some systems in representational terms. The non-representational reading of Sensorimotor Enactivism is not mandatory and neither is the representational reading of the Free-Energy approach. Sensorimotor Enactivism is, in this respect, compatible with both representational and non-representational interpretations of the FEA. So, the position towards representations of these frameworks should not stand in the way of a predictive approach to Sensorimotor Enactivism. I also show that the Free-Energy approach allows for an account that prioritizes the interaction of the embodied agent with the environment. This is the explanatory strategy followed by Sensorimotor Enactivism. To justify this strategy and following other proponents of Sensorimotor Enactivism, I argue that by referring to the interactions of the embodied agent a better account of the phenomena in question is provided. On this basis, I claim that Sensorimotor Enactivism and the Free-Energy approach are compatible in what concerns their explanatory strategy as well. Thus, making the case for the viability of the predictive approach to Sensorimotor Enactivism. (shrink)

This article examines the role of the Spanish Atomic Forum as the representative of the nuclear sector in the public arena during the golden years of the nuclear power industry from the 1960s to 1970s. It focuses on the public image concerns of the Spanish nuclear lobby and the subsequent information campaigns launched during the late 1970s to counteract demonstrations by the growing and heterogeneous anti-nuclear movement. The role of advocacy of nuclear energy by the Atomic Forum was similar to (...) that in other countries, but the situation in Spain had some distinguishing features. Anti-nuclear protest in Spain peaked in 1978 paralleling the debates of a new National Energy Plan in Congress, whose first draft had envisaged a massive nuclearization of the country. We show how the approval of the Plan in July 1979, with a significant reduction in the nuclear energy component, was influenced by the anti-nuclear protest movements in Spain. Despite the efforts of the Spanish Atomic Forum to counter its message, the anti-nuclear movement was strengthened by reactions to the Three Mile Island accident in March 1979. (shrink)

‘‘Post-normal science’’ has received much attention in recent years, but like many iconic concepts, it has attracted differing conceptualizations, applications, and implications, ranging from being a ‘‘cure-all’’ for democratic deficit to the key to achieving more sustainable futures. This editorial article introduces a Special Issue that takes stock of research on PNS and critically explores how such research may develop. Through reviewing the history and evolution of PNS, the authors seek to clarify the extant definitions, conceptualizations, and uses of PNS. (...) The authors identify five broad areas of research on, or using, PNS which have developed over four decades. Their analysis suggests that the 1990s represent a symbolic watershed in the use of PNS terminology, when the concept was further developed and applied to highly complicated issues such as climate change. The authors particularly distinguish between uses of PNS as a normative prescription and as a practical method. Through this classification, they set out gaps and research questions arising. They then briefly summarize the Special Issue articles and consider their relationship to each other and the research questions raised by their analysis. They conclude by considering what the articles in this issue suggest for future theory building in PNS and related scholarship. (shrink)