Industries are currently experiencing several kinds of disruptive changes, including digital transformation and environmental and health emergencies. Despite intense discussion about disruptive changes in companies, the impact of such changes on workplace learning is still underexplored. In this study, we investigated the impact of disruptive changes on informal learning practices according to the perspectives of employers, employees and adult educators. Informal learning was operationalised along a continuum between organised informal learning and everyday informal learning. Fifty-five companies’ representatives from three European (...) countries and four industrial fields were interviewed. The interviews were further triangulated with questionnaires collected by employees from the same companies. Questionnaire data were used to collect detailed information on individual informal workplace learning strategies and digital technologies adopted in organised informal learning. The interview data were analysed using qualitative content analysis. A coding scheme was developed with five macro-categories organised into 23 sub-categories. Occurrence and co-occurrence analysis were performed to identify which individual and organisational factors and approaches support most learning, according to interviewees. Interviewees reported the possibility of interacting with colleagues and being autonomous as the main sources of everyday informal learning processes. Employees from the same companies reported model learning, vicarious feedback, and applying someone’s own ideas as the most frequent IWL strategies. Organised informal learning was mainly based on knowledge transfer, which reflects passive cognitive engagement by employees. Specifically, digital technologies in organised informal learning were poorly used for supporting reflection, constructive processes, and collaborative knowledge construction. The results suggest that participants believed that higher forms of cognitive engagement are possible only within face-to-face organised informal training or in everyday informal learning. Possible explanations of the results and practical implications are discussed. (shrink)

ABSTRACT The article presents the federalist thought of Carlo Cattaneo, Giuseppe Ferrari and Alberto Mario and Gaetano Salvemini. Referring briefly to the recognised failures of the federal idea in Italy and the corresponding difficulties with its territorial puzzle’ as well, the author proposes to analyse their argumentation through the prism of their attempts to find a proper federal structure for this country. The article shows that despite their eagerness to make Italy perfectly compatible with its ‘natural’ diversity, they (...) gave different answers to the Italian federalist dilemma: whether to begin the whole process with the communes or with more subnational units or rather somewhat include both elements. As will be seen, it was perhaps Salvemini who outlined the most coherent and Cattanean conception that recognised again the necessity of local initiative. Yet, as will be also seen, his federalism, intertwine from the beginning with his concern about the Italian South, was not free from its own weaknesses. (shrink)

This major publication is a history of the semantic tradition in philosophy from the early nineteenth century through its incarnation in the work of the Vienna Circle, the group of logical positivists that emerged in the years 1925-1935 in Vienna who were characterised by a strong commitment to empiricism, a high regard for science, and a conviction that modern logic is the primary tool of analytic philosophy. In the first part of the book, Alberto Coffa traces the roots of (...) logical positivism in a semantic tradition that arose in opposition to Kant's theory that a priori knowledge is based on pure intuition and the constitutive powers of the mind. In Part II, Coffa chronicles the development of this tradition by members and associates of the Vienna Circle. Much of Coffa's analysis draws on the unpublished notes and correspondence of many philosophers. The book, however, is not merely a history of the semantic tradition from Kant 'to the Vienna Station'. Coffa also critically reassesses the role of semantic notions in understanding the ground of a priori knowledge and its relation to empirical knowledge and questions the turn the tradition has taken since Vienna. (shrink)

Abortion is largely accepted even for reasons that do not have anything to do with the fetus' health. By showing that (1) both fetuses and newborns do not have the same moral status as actual persons, (2) the fact that both are potential persons is morally irrelevant and (3) adoption is not always in the best interest of actual people, the authors argue that what we call ‘after-birth abortion’ (killing a newborn) should be permissible in all the cases where abortion (...) is, including cases where the newborn is not disabled. (shrink)

Cultural evolution studies are characterized by the notion that culture evolves accordingly to broadly Darwinian principles. Yet how far the analogy between cultural and genetic evolution should be pushed is open to debate. Here, we examine a recent disagreement that concerns the extent to which cultural transmission should be considered a preservative mechanism allowing selection among different variants, or a transformative process in which individuals recreate variants each time they are transmitted. The latter is associated with the notion of “cultural (...) attraction”. This issue has generated much misunderstanding and confusion. We first clarify the respective positions, noting that there is in fact no substantive incompatibility between cultural attraction and standard cultural evolution approaches, beyond a difference in focus. Whether cultural transmission should be considered a preservative or reconstructive process is ultimately an empirical question, and we examine how both preservative and reconstructive cultural transmission has been studied in recent experimental research in cultural evolution. Finally, we discuss how the relative importance of preservative and reconstructive processes may depend on the granularity of analysis and the domain being studied. (shrink)

This article builds on the hypothesis that theoretical approaches to philosophy of technology are currently stuck in a false alternative: either embrace the “empirical turn” or jump back into the determinism, pessimism, and general ignorance towards specific technologies that characterized the “humanities philosophy of technology.” A third path is however possible, which consists of articulating an empirical point of view with an interest in the symbolic dimension in which technologies and technological mediations are always already embedded. Bourdieu’s sociology of the (...) symbolic forms represents an important and mostly unexplored resource in this respect. In this article, we introduce the notion of technological capital and its tree states—objectified, institutionalized, and embodied. In the first section, we briefly account of the empirical turn in philosophy of technology. Specific attention is then devoted to postphenomenology. We depict three perspectives in postphenomenology: standard postphenomenology, in which one single human-technology-world relation at a time is considered; the attempt of some technological mediation theorists to articulate postphenomenology and actor-network theory ; the original effort in Ihde, which is currently practiced by a minority of postphenomenologists, to combine an interest for the empirical dimension of technological mediations with an attention to the social and cultural conditions of possibility in which these mediations are embedded. In the second section, we consider some recent critiques of the limits of the empirical turn in philosophy of technology, especially related to postphenomenology. Furthermore, we argue that Pierre Bourdieu’s sociology may benefit the philosophy of technology. One might say that according to a Bourdieusian perspective, technologies are, in their invention, implementation, and use, embedded in symbolically organized interactions among social actors or groups. The notion of technological capital is introduced. A specific attention is given to its embodied state, which is related to the habitus. Such concept suggests that, to rephrase the famous sentence by Heidegger, “the essence of technology is not totally technological.” In the conclusion, we consider three risks related to a Bourdieusian approach to technology: transparency, determinism, and absolutism. (shrink)

The ethics of deceased organ procurement (OP) is supposedly based on individual consent to donate, either explicit (opt-in) or presumed (opt-out). However, in many cases, individuals fail to express any preference regarding donation after death. When this happens, the decision to remove or not to remove their organs depends on the policy’s default option or on family preferences. Several studies show that in most countries the family plays a significant and often decisive role in the process of decision-making for OP. (...) Depending on the country, the family may be allowed to take different kinds of actions in different situations, and this may be granted either by law or by clinical practice only. This adds much complexity to the usual classification of consent policies in two categories: opt-in and opt-out. Here we propose a novel and comprehensive taxonomy of the models of consent for OP according to three variables: (1) the deceased’s wishes, if any, (2) family wishes, if any, and (3) default policies. By analysing these models of consent, we show that they rely on at least three different concepts of autonomy: individual autonomy, relational autonomy, and family autonomy. In light of this analysis, we discuss the ethical debates surrounding two policy approaches: presumed consent and family veto. (shrink)

Many theories of racism presuppose that ordinary usage of the term “racism” should be preserved. Rarely is this presupposition—the presumption of conservatism—defended. This paper discusses the work of Lawrence Blum, Joshua Glasgow, Jorge Garcia, Tommie Shelby, and others, in order to develop a critique of the presumption of conservatism. Against this presumption, I defend the following desideratum: If ordinary usage of “racism” prompts significant practical difficulties that can be averted by revising ordinary usage, then this counts as a mark against (...) the normative status of ordinary usage and so counts as a reason for revising it. The significance of this argument is that it clears the way for a rigorous defense of revisionism. My paper provides a prima facie case for revisionism, built on two practical criticisms of the ordinary usage of “racism.” First, ordinary usage reflects incompatible norms that promote conceptual confusion and misunderstanding, among other problems. Second, ordinary usage reflects an individualistic conception of racism that serves the interests of whites. By championing ordinary usage in our philosophical theories, we (unwittingly) promote the interests of whites over nonwhites. (shrink)

A implementação de tecnologias móveis de informação e comunicação no suporte à Saúde Mental tem atraído a atenção das autoridades. Com a ascensão das Inteligências Artificiais, esse movimento pode ser impulsionado de maneira exponencial. Nesse cenário, esta revisão tem como objetivos verificar a aplicabilidade das Inteligências Artificiais (IAs) na Saúde Mental e analisar os aspectos que favorecem a relação entre IAs e usuários. Para tanto, realizou-se uma revisão sistemática nas bases de dados PubMed e Biblioteca Virtual em Saúde, no período (...) de 25 de maio a 23 de junho de 2023. Selecionamos os 100 primeiros artigos mais relevantes com as palavras-chave: “Inteligência Artificial”, “Saúde Mental”, “Chatbots”, “Psicoterapia”, “Psicologia” e suas equivalentes em inglês. Os critérios de inclusão foram: acesso aberto, publicação a partir de 2018, em português ou inglês e menção à atuação de IAs no âmbito da Saúde Mental. Para reduzir o risco de viés, excluímos os estudos que não mensuraram o impacto das intervenções por meio de métodos experimentais ou quase-experimentais. Para a síntese dos dados, delimitaram-se alguns pontos específicos de análise, como “Resultado da intervenção”, “Aspectos que favorecem a relação”, entre outros. Atenderam aos critérios de inclusão 24 estudos, dos quais 17 apresentaram resultados positivos em suas intervenções. O uso de IAs na Saúde Mental possui grande potencial de expansão e os resultados obtidos neste trabalho podem guiar a implementação dessas práticas e futuras pesquisas na área. (shrink)

In Leibniz’s New Essays stands out, within many important topics, his doctrine of innate ideas, which supposes the division between sense knowledge and innate knowledge and implies the distinction between truths of reason and truths of fact. That doctrine is particularly relevant for Leibniz’s philosophy, but implicitly entails the epistemological difference between belief, on one hand, and certainty, on the other. In this paper I outline, according to my interpretation, how Leibniz explains that humans can have certainty about innate ideas. (...) This topic is important because if Leibniz demonstrates the possibility of having certainty of those ideas, then, it is feasible to believe in its existence. However, if his explanation is unsatisfactory his metaphysical doctrine would be seriously weakened and, at the same time, both skepticism and Locke’s empiricist doctrine would be reinforced. (shrink)

The classification of preserved hypothalamic activity in brain death and brainstem death as functional or non-functional has become a subject of debate. While proponents of the neurological criterion claim that these activities lack functional significance (Shemie et al. 2014), Nair-Collins and Joffe (2023) argue for their functional physiological role. However, the interpretation of the term "function" within the medico-legal framework, where death is characterized by the irreversible cessation of all brain functions, remains unclear. -/- My intention here is not to (...) engage in a debate over the validity of different viewpoints regarding the functional significance of preserved activities in the hypothalamus or the heart. Rather, I aim to highlight the critical importance of exploring and defining the concept of function in medicine, which currently lacks clarity. My point is that, whatever our position in the brain death debate, reaching a consensus on this conceptual matter would minimize misunderstandings and establish a robust foundation for further insightful analysis. (shrink)

Es una obra colegiada en homenaje al doctor Jorge Alberto Silva que reúne los trabajos de juristas que cultivan diversas ramas de la ciencia jurídica. Este libro, además de numeroso artículos dedicados al análisis y exposición de casos sobre derecho internacional, el lector encontrará que la filosofía del derecho, la teoría general del derecho, la teoría de la argumentación, así como la teoría de la constitución, convergen en los trabajos que componen este extenso volumen y dan como resultado un (...) texto transdisciplinario, complejo e integral de gran valor académico. (shrink)

In his new book, Carlos Alberto Torres, an internationally renowned critical theorist of education, explores the early writings of Paulo Freire whose ideas have had a tremendous and long-lasting impact on the world of pedagogy and politics. Torres analyzes Freire's works, from the 1960s and 1970s, before Freire gained worldwide recognition for his Pedagogy of the Oppressed. Offering an in-depth look into the formative thinking of Freire, Torres identifies how his ideas produced frameworks for educating global citizens, building community (...) and mutual respect, creating social responsibility, instilling an appreciation for diversity, promoting multiple literacies, and social justice education. This volume is the result of more than 3 decades of research with access to Freire's personal library and the archives of the Paulo Freire Institute, as well as the author's extensive conversations with Paulo Freire over two decades--Dr. Torres was Freire's adviser during his tenure as Secretary of Education in the Municipality of São Paulo, Brazil, 1989-1991. (shrink)

Husserl places “around 1898” the introduction of the notion of ‘ phenomenon’ in his philosophy. If one of the tasks of the history of philosophy is to circumscribe the problems which originated the creation of a new concept in some doctrine, the purpose of this paper is to investigate what difficulties had roused the invention of the idea of ‘phenomenon” in the husserlian philosophy.

Husserlian phenomenology has been interpreted as a method of knowledge that can be applied to different domains and which would compete with other methods to give us a better understanding of the “real”, the “man” or “society”. Moreover, “phenomenological idealism” has been presented as an “ontological” or “metaphysical” thesis, in the pre-critical sense of the term. The goal of this study is to suggest that these two theses imply the tacit identification of the natural attitude and the phenomenological one, avoiding (...) the difference between the objects to which these attitudes relate. Therefore, a phenomenological truth does not anticipate any opinion about the “world”. (shrink)

Na atualidade estamos enfrentando uma forte onda de intolerância e tolerância, potencializando e valorizando a Tolerância como sendo um modelo a seguir, e seria a solução para as fortes condutas violentas, discriminatórias e criminosas que estamos sendo vítimas nas relações interpessoais e nas relações entre culturas e países. Tolerar o desigual, o assimétrico é uma luta desigual, do mais forte contra aquele que pela sua realidade social, tem sido enfraquecido. Como formar uma consciência e uma cultura, não do tolerar-aguentar a (...) partir de minhas condições impostas; mas uma cultura de hospitalidade, de acolhida, de abertura ao distante, ao assimétrico e estranho. A hospitalidade incondicional, ou seja, não coloco nenhuma condição, a única condição para acolher ao estrangeiro que chega do além do horizonte, é não ter condições. Desse modo não acolho uma categoria estrangeiro, mas uma pessoa que tem sua individualidade e sua unicidade. Para uma acolhida com hospitalidade é necessário criar um deslocamento na minha interioridade, me acomodar diferente, o outro que chega sempre provoca um movimento interior e exterior no meu eu; quando não acolho ao assimétrico, colocando condições na sua chegada, nada de novo acontece no eu. Acolher com hospitalidade é a possibilidade de nos experimentar diferente e de inaugurar algo novo em nós, na construção de sermos cada vez melhores, mais humanos, solidários e hospitaleiros. Palavras-chave: Tolerância, Intolerância, Hospitalidade condicional, Hospitalidade incondicional, Estrangeiro. (shrink)

This volume offers an updated analysis of the use, meaning, and scope of the classical notion of aitía. It clarifies philosophical and philological questions about aitia and offers bold and innovative interpretations of this key concept of ancient philosophy. The numerous meanings and nuances of aitia remain difficult to grasp. Ancient philosophers use aitia to explain the existence and activity of substances, bodies, souls, or gods, Paradoxically, its own definition remains difficult to establish. This book reconstructs some of the most (...) important uses, variants, and scopes of the term aitia within different philosophical perspectives in antiquity, including early Greek philosophy, Plato, Aristotle, Stoicism, and Islamic philosophy. The chapters analyze metaphysical aspects, epistemological issues, and logical implications of aitia. They engage with the most relevant critical literature generated in several modern languages. In doing so, they offer an inclusive and overarching re-evaluation of our assumptions about causation and explanation in ancient philosophy. Cause and Explanation in Ancient Philosophy will be of interest to scholars and advanced students working on pre-Socratic philosophy, Plato, Aristotle, Hellenistic philosophy, late antiquity, and medieval philosophy. (shrink)

We experimentally investigated the influence of context-based biases, such as prestige and popularity, on the preferences for quotations. Participants were presented with random quotes associated to famous or unknown authors, or with random quotes presented as popular, i.e. chosen by many previous participants, or unpopular. To exclude effects related to the content of the quotations, all participants were subsequently presented with the same quotations, again associated to famous and unknown authors, or presented as popular or unpopular. Overall, our results showed (...) that context-based biases had no, or limited, effect in determining participants’ choices. Quotations preferred for their content were preferred in general, despite the contextual cues to which they were associated. We conclude discussing how our results fit with the well-known phenomenon of the spread and success of misattributed quotations, and we draw some more general implications for cultural evolution research. (shrink)

The Australian Federal Government has announced a two-year trial scheme to compensate living organ donors. The compensation will be the equivalent of six weeks paid leave at the rate of the national minimum wage. In this article I analyse the ethics of compensating living organ donors taking the Australian scheme as a reference point. Considering the long waiting lists for organ transplantations and the related costs on the healthcare system of treating patients waiting for an organ, the 1.3 million AUD (...) the Australian Government has committed might represent a very worthwhile investment. I argue that a scheme like the Australian one is sufficiently well designed to avoid all the ethical problems traditionally associated with attaching a monetary value to the human body or to parts of it, namely commodification, inducement, exploitation, and equality issues. Therefore, I suggest that the Australian scheme, if cost-effective, should represent a model for other countries to follow. Nonetheless, although I endorse this scheme, I will also argue that this kind of scheme raises issues of justice in regard to the distribution of organs. Thus, I propose that other policies would be needed to supplement the scheme in order to guarantee not only a higher number of organs available, but also a fair distribution. (shrink)

This chapter contains sections titled: Sexual Selection, Women's Preferences, and Mating Intelligence The Seduction Community: Human Excellence and Empowering Social Art in a Post‐Scarcity Era Is It Wrong to Try to Raise Your Mating Intelligence? Is Raising Your Mate Value a Good Thing? A Deflationist Solution to the Problem Conclusion: What About Women?

In this paper we clarify some issues related to our previous article ‘After-birth abortion: why should the baby live?’.

Sanchez and Sanchez have selected, edited, translated, and introduced some of the most influential texts in Mexican philosophy, which constitute a unique and robust tradition that will challenge and complicate traditional conceptions of philosophy. The texts collected here are organized chronologically and represent a period of Mexican thought and culture that emerged from the Mexican Revolution of 1910 and which culminated in la filosofia de lo mexicano (the philosophy of Mexicanness). Though the selections reflect on a variety of philosophical questions, (...) collectively they represent a growing tendency to take seriously the question of Mexican national identity as a philosophical question--especially given the complexities of Mexico's indigenous and European ancestries, a history of colonialism, and a growing dependency on foreign money and culture. More than an attempt to describe the national character, however, the texts gathered here represent an optimistic period in Mexican philosophy that aimed to affirm Mexican culture and philosophy as a valuable, if not urgent, contribution to universal culture. (shrink)

Change blindness, the surprising inability of people to detect significant changes between consecutively-presented visual displays, has recently been shown to affect tactile perception as well. Visual change blindness has been observed during saccades and eye blinks, conditions under which people’s awareness of visual information is temporarily suppressed. In the present study, we demonstrate change blindness for suprathreshold tactile stimuli resulting from the execution of a secondary task requiring bodily movement. In Experiment 1, the ability of participants to detect changes between (...) two sequentially-presented vibrotactile patterns delivered on their arms and legs was compared while they performed a secondary task consisting of either the execution of a movement with the right arm toward a visual target or the verbal identification of the target side. The results demonstrated that a motor response gave rise to the largest drop in perceptual sensitivity in detecting changes to the tactile display. In Experiment 2, we replicated these results under conditions in which the participants had to detect tactile changes while turning a steering wheel instead. These findings are discussed in terms of the role played by bodily movements, sensory suppression, and higher order information processing in modulating people’s awareness of tactile information across the body surface. (shrink)

On the Attributes of Berkeley’s God · It is clear among Berkeley’s scholars that God plays an essential role in his immaterialist proposal ; however, it is not so clear how we know Him and, in particular, what are His own attributes. In this paper I first review the characteristics of finite spirits and through them I analyze the Infinite Spirit or God with the aim of showing that His main attributes are four, namely, i) being volitional, ii) being creator-upholder, (...) iii) being perceptive, and iv) being a permanent interlocutor. These attributes, which are coherent and consistent with immaterialism, allow us to better understand the epistemic and ontological role that God plays in Berkeley’s philosophy. (shrink)

Ortega y Gasset afirmó “[...] la fenomenología no fue una filosofía para nosotros: fue... una buena suerte”. Esto se debió a que, a través de ella, pudo encontrar una salida del neokantismo. En consecuencia, Ortega entenderá que la fenomenología busca salvar la racionalidad sin ignorar la experiencia, es decir, sin olvidar, que todo sucede en la vida de cada individuo. Sin embargo, desde el principio se da cuenta de que este individuo no es algo aislado, sino que se forma en (...) relación con el mundo, la circunstancia (“Yo soy yo y mi circunstancia y si no la salvo a ella, no me salvo yo”, dirá hacia 1914) y que la fenomenología debe recuperar el carácter ejecutivo de la vida. El presente ensayo recorrerá desde el encuentro de Ortega con la fenomenología hasta sus intuiciones acerca de la vida como realidad radical. Palabras clave: Ortega y Gasset, Fenomenología, Circunstancias, Vida, Vivencias. (shrink)

The Handbook of Bioethical Decisions Volume II addresses and analyzes the most important ethical concerns and moral quandaries related to scientific integrity and institutional ethics. It counts on two parts, Part One: Research Ethics, which addresses issues related to Scientific Integrity, Research Misconduct and Conducting Ethical Research, and Part Two: Institutional Ethics and Bioethics Committees, which explores Institutional Ethics issues, Ethics and Bioethics Committees’ roles and scopes, and Bioethical Issues in Institutional Ethics. Consequently, the Handbook, Vol. II, offers a remarkable (...) collection of works by outstanding international experts on institutional and research ethics, in order for bioethics practitioners to obtain better elements to address key issues related to integrity in research as well as to decision-making processes. In this fashion, this volume is a valuable resource for professionals working on different bioethical and biomedical fields, such as, ethics and bioethics committees, health care institutions, biomedical and pharmacological companies, and academic settings, among others. Chapter 26 is available open access under a Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License via link.springer.com. (shrink)

José de Sousa Pereira, membro do Conselho da Fazenda de D. Pedro II, foi enviado a Roma com a embaixada do Bispo de Lamego entre 1676 a 1682. Consignou as impressões da viagem A politica dos princepes de Itália em 1680, decerto com a finalidade de fornecer modelos críti­cos aos governantes portugueses. Da apreciação da política italiana ressaltam simpatias pela república veneziana, pelo Ducado de Saboia, mas também um conhecimento deficiente das políti­cas de Génova, Modena, Mântua, Parma e Lucca, tão (...) reduzida é a informação que sobre elas aduz. Fez ressaltar o peso da falta de unidade territorial da Itália, os inconvenientes do regime electivo e as vantagens do absolutismo, este através do modelo da corte papal e na participação da nobreza, ao nível dos outros Estados. Mas a sugestão utópica vai para a república, através duma idealização do regime veneziano. Diplomata como era, Pereira não enjeitou também in­teressantes observações sobre política internacional. (shrink)

Las revoluciones han constituido un fenómeno central en la caracterización de la historia moderna; sus consecuencias se evidencian desde fines del siglo XVIII para las Trece Colonias de Norteamérica y Francia hasta los múltiples ejemplos aportados por el siglo XX. Tal apreciación ha sido sometida a estudios de diversa índole; sin embargo, no todos han sido capaces de explicar de forma ordenada la relación que se implica en sus decursos con la ciencia del derecho. De acuerdo con este criterio, el (...) presente estudio está orientado a caracterizar las manifestaciones y contenidos inherentes a la revolución como forma trascendente de resistencia política. Ello será posible a través de la valoración de sus elementos justificantes y constitutivos de acuerdo con diversos órdenes teóricos y doctrinales, la dimensión de sus alcances para las ciencias política y jurídica y su capacidad de transformación e implicación con el factor de la evolución histórica. (shrink)