We address current needs for neogenomics-based theoretical and computational approaches for several neuroscience research fields, from investigations of heritability properties, passing by investigations of spatiotemporal dynamics in the neuromodulatory microcircuits involved in perceptual learning and attentional shifts, to the application of genetic algorithms to create robots exhibiting ongoing emergence.

TEIXEIRA, C. M. Comunidade ética e religião: A estruturação da fé kantiana. Dissertação (Mestrado). 2013. 113f - Pontifícia Universidade Católica de Minas Gerais, Programa de Pós-graduação em Ciências da Religião, Belo Horizonte Palavras-chave Liberdade. Comunidade ética. Igreja. Religião moral. Fé racional.

Este artigo trata da perspectiva das duas espécies de justiça conforme esboçada por Martinho Lutero e evidencia sua pertinência como resposta crítica às crises contemporâneas. Para isso, retoma a leitura da exposição de Lutero em seu “Sermão Sobre as Duas Espécies de Justiça”, relembrando os contextos histórico e bíblico de sua abordagem. A partir daí, aponta a crise de justiça como causa central das demais crises, reconhecendo suas possíveis motivações e consequências como condicionantes dos conflitos de justiça ainda vivenciados pela (...) sociedade atualmente. Segue apresentando as noções de justiça exterior e justiça apropriada como resposta a esse caótico cenário e em protesto às formas insuficientes de justiça. Menciona os contornos e efeitos dessa proposta, notadamente seu potencial de interpelar a injustiça ao reascender na humanidade a chama da Justiça por meio da fé e da esperança. Conclui-se destacando a atualidade da perspectiva estudada e sua plausibilidade como opção para o pensar teologicamente a justiça em tempos sombrios. (shrink)

Background: The present study compared the effects of a traditional resistance training and resistance training combined with cognitive task on body composition, physical performance, cognitive function, and plasma brain-derived neurotrophic factor levels in older adults. Methods: Thirty community-dwelling older adults were randomized into TRT and RT+CT. Exercise groups performed a similar resistance training program, twice a week over 16 weeks. Cognitive Training involved performing verbal fluency simultaneously with RT. Exercise sessions were performed 2-3 sets, 8-15 repetitions at 60-70% of 1-repetition (...) maximum. Body composition, physical function, cognitive performance, and BDNF levels were assessed before and after intervention period. Results: The physical performance was similarly improved in response to both TRT and RT+CT. However, exclusive improvements on cognitive function and BDNF levels were observed only after RT+CT. Conclusion: The RT program associated with a cognitive task, improved physical and cognitive performance in healthy older adults. (shrink)

In this paper, I discuss the similarity between Wittgenstein’s use of thought experiments and Relativity Theory. I begin with introducing Wittgenstein’s idea of “thought experiments” and a tentative classification of different kinds of thought experiments in Wittgenstein’s work. Then, after presenting a short recap of some remarks on the analogy between Wittgenstein’s point of view and Einstein’s, I suggest three analogies between the status of Wittgenstein’s mental experiments and Relativity theory: the topics of time dilation, the search for invariants, and (...) the role of measuring tools in Special Relativity. This last point will help to better define Wittgenstein’s idea of description as the core of his philosophical enterprise. (shrink)

Mario Savio is widely known as the first spokesman for the Free Speech Movement. Having spent the summer of 1964 as a civil rights worker in segregationist Mississippi, Savio returned to the University of California at a time when students throughout the country were beginning to mobilize in support of racial justice and against the deepening American involvement in Vietnam. His moral clairty, his eloquence, and his democratic style of leadership inspired thousands of fellow Berkeley students to protest university regulations (...) that had severely limited political speech and activity on campus. The nonviolent campaign culminated in the largest mass arrest in American history, drew widespread faculty support, and resulted in a revision of university rules to permit political speech and organizing. This significant advance for student freedom rapidly spread to countless other colleges and universities across the country. Mario Savio went on to become a college teacher of physics, logic, and philosophy, to speak and organize in favor of immigrant rights and affirmative action and against U.S. intervention in Central America. He died on November 6, 1996, in the middle of a struggle against California State University fee hikes that hurt working-class students. Savio had submitted this article to the Notre Dame Journal of Formal Logic before he died. Final revisions were made by Philip Clayton with the assistance of Mario's colleagues at Sonoma State University. As reader for the Journal, George Englebretsen not only provided an extensive commentary on the article--much of which has been incorporated here--but also assisted in the difficult task of making revisions without changing the substance of Mario's style or thought. It is fitting that this, Savio's final publication, would be pedagogical in orientation. For him, moral considerations were no less pertinent in logic than in philosophy's less abstract fields. The usual student confusion with Venn diagrams led him to develop the new pictorial device presented in the following pages, which he believed was more sensitive to user psychology. It is hard to miss the political overtones in Savio's closing worry that in Venn diagrams "information of real significance may occasionally appear hidden and distorted." The decision by the Notre Dame Journal of Formal Logic to publish this piece posthumously is a testimony that logic, no less than other fields of philosophy, can be a tool of free speech and political change--as powerful in its way as the rhetorical brilliance of that young man standing on top of a police car who launched a worldwide movement with the words, "There is a time when the operation of the machine becomes so odious, makes you so sick at heart, you can't take part.". (shrink)

uBiome offers a gut bacteria sequencing service to consumers to entice data donation. It aims to establish a genomic repository for microbiomics. In 2013, some bloggers worried that uBiome operations had not received any Institutional Review Board ethics approval. uBiome co-founders Richman and Apte replied by effectively arguing that crony research agencies hamper innovation by requiring cumbersome for-fee IRBs to so-called “citizen science” projects. The debate soon ascended from ethics to appropriate institutional design for research and innovation. I reconstruct the (...) ethical issues underpinning the uBiome-IRB debate and situate them in the emerging context of entrepreneurial science relying on crowdsourcing. This paper contributes to the dialogue between social scientists and bioethicists promoted in this volume by offering an analysis of a case study that requires attention to the organizational and economic context and lends itself to collaboration across disciplines. (shrink)

O objetivo deste trabalho é examinar a crítica ao psicologismo de Edmund Husserl paraavaliar sua posição no que diz respeito à psicologia empírica. Procurarei mostrar, em primeirolugar, que Husserl, em Investigações lógicas, tem como alvo o psicologismo lógico e umadeterminada forma de psicologismo epistemológico. Em segundo lugar, buscarei mostrar quea fundamentação epistemológica da lógica pura, como ciência teórica, implica em uma teoriada subjetividade. Um dos objetivos de Husserl em Investigações lógicas é empregar afenomenologia, entendida como forma peculiar de psicologia descritiva, (...) para elaborar umanova teoria da subjetividade, por meio de uma análise descritiva das vivências envolvidas naobtenção do conhecimento teórico. Depois irei discutir o lugar que a psicologia empírica passaa ocupar depois da crítica ao psicologismo em Investigações lógicas. (shrink)

In recent times, in Asia and more specifically in South Asia the discourse on ethnic and religious nationalisms that attempt to redefine the identity of locals in an exclusive and adversarial manner has dominated political and mainstream exchanges. This emphasis on stringent and radical nationalism has serious ramifications for inclusive development. This article critically examines the findings of the Inclusive Development Index 2018 and link it with other reports and surveys like the Oxfam survey 2017 to find out the connections (...) between stringent forms of nationalism and development. Besides analyzing briefly the notions of nationalism as played out concretely in the South Asian nations, this article makes an in-depth analysis of the specific case of the right wing ‘Hindutva’ ideology in India. The processes, institutions and structures that lead to various forms of systemic bias and discrimination against the minorities will be identified, and the role of stringent nationalism in reinforcing these biases and thus impeding the project of inclusive development will be scrutinised. Keywords : inclusive development, radical nationalism, Hindutva, minorities, South Asia, inequality, post-colonial. (shrink)

It is well known that in the first edition of Logical Investigations , Husserl defines the research field of phenomenology as a psychological immanence. However, if we closely examine the criteria used for defining the psychological immanence, we find that they imply certain conception of transcendence of the intentional object. This conception of transcendence leads to epistemological problems concerning the relationship between the physical object and the object of perception. After all, it would be correct to say that the physical (...) object is transcendent in the same sense which it is stated that the perceived object is transcendent to the experience of perceiving? This article seeks to show how the transcendental turn of 1906/1907 and the consequent distinction between three concepts of immanence and transcendence in his work Idea of Phenomenology contributed to solving such problems. (shrink)

This work aims to present the meaning of the distributions of the sensible in Jacques Rancière's theory. In order to understand the genesis of the distributions of the sensible – especially at this particular moment –, we will start from Rancier's definition of political subjectivization, which is inherent to the contribution of the distribution of places promoted by instances of domination. After all, for the author, politics is not the distribution of power. The distribution of the sensible would be a (...) political and policy process that is sometimes mediated by instances of conflict, and sometimes interceded by instances of power, and this tends to affect the way in which subjects occupy the sensible community by verifying the ways in which reality is taken and ordered following the order of domination. (shrink)

Recent evidence of intergenerational epigenetic programming of disease risk broadens the scope of public health preventive interventions to future generations, i.e. non existing people. Due to the transmission of epigenetic predispositions, lifestyles such as smoking or unhealthy diet might affect the health of populations across several generations. While public policy for the health of future generations can be justified through impersonal considerations, such as maximizing aggregate well-being, in this article we explore whether there are rights-based obligations supervening on intergenerational epigenetic (...) programming despite the non-identity argument, which challenges this rationale in case of policies that affect the number and identity of future people. We propose that rights based obligations grounded in the interests of non-existing people might fall upon existing people when generations overlap. In particular, if environmental exposure in F0 will affect the health of F2 through epigenetic programming, then F1 might face increased costs to address F2's condition in the future: this might generate obligations upon F0 from various distributive principles, such as the principle of equal opportunity for well being. (shrink)

Crowdfunding is increasingly common in medical research. Some critics are concerned that by adopting crowdfunding, some researchers may sidestep the established systems of review of the social and scientific value of studies, especially mechanisms of expert-based review. I argue firstly that such concerns are based on a misleading picture of how research value is assessed and secondly that crowdfunding may turn out to be an useful complement of extant funding systems. I start with the idea that medical knowledge is a (...) structured and intermediate public good and explain from this perspective that funding systems as a whole, rather than any of their parts ought to be considered devices for the discovery of the social and scientific value of research. If so, we should not be concerned with whether crowdfunding bypasses expert reviews, but with whether it may constitute an improvement of extant funding systems. In the second part, I speculate that crowdfunding may ameliorate, albeit limitedly, some recalcitrant failures of funding systems, such as the sponsorship of research on neglected diseases, and smooth funding adaptations for scientific transitions. If, after trial, such hypotheses turn out to be true, crowdfunding ought to be promoted. (shrink)

A proper understanding of the moral and political significance of migration requires a focus on global inequalities. More specifically, it requires a focus on those global inequalities that affect people’s ability to participate in the production of economic goods and non-economic goods. We call cooperative infrastructures the complex material and immaterial technologies that allow human beings to cooperate in order to generate human goods. By enabling migrants to access high-quality cooperative infrastructures, migration contributes to the diffusion of technical and socio-political (...) innovations. In this way, it positively affects the ability of individuals from poorer countries to participate in the production of human goods, to benefit from such production, and to contribute to human development. Migration can also damage the material and immateri al components of the cooperative infrastructures accessible in both the host and sending countries; these potential downsides of migration should not be ignored, although arguably they can often be neutralized, alleviated, or compensated. (shrink)

Chaque fois que nous "donnons forme" à quelque chose, cette représentation nous figure, par signes, l'objet évoqué, mais nous confirme également qu'il ne s'agit que d'un simulacre. D'où le besoin, à chaque époque, de créer du vivant pour pallier cette déception : tel est le sens du mythe de Pygmalion. Ce livre s'organise donc autour de deux pôles : d'un côté la nécessité de figurer, et de figurer l'acte même de la perception (voir le chapitre "Un oeil immense artificiel") ; (...) de l'autre, l'impératif de dépasser le signe. Il s'agit d'un défi radical, qui concerne l'avenir même des arts. C'est la raison de ce titre, A vif, qui témoigne d'un "coup d'oeil" : un regard et une incision pratiquée à vif dans l'objet, un désir de définitif qui ne caresse plus la forme, mais qui pénètre, met à nu, éviscère dans les paroles et dans les actes. Dedans et derrière l'oeil, comme dans l'un des plus impassibles traités d'anatomie du Cinquecento. Aujourd'hui, est-il encore vif notre oeil qui cherche le vivant? N'est-il pas lui-même défiguré par l'informe qui s'est logé en nous? Où est la pupilla viva qui illumine le Paradis et qui, de Dante à Baudelaire, a animé, de longs siècles durant, tant de quête mentale? Il faut remonter à ces origines, parcourir les espaces séculaires et sidéraux dans lesquels le cosmos était ordre, beauté, compréhension ; où, justement, il était nécessaire de "captiver les yeux pour avoir l'âme". Cet essai se voudrait une parabole déployée au fil de l'ardente soif humaine d'"exorbiter", de brûler la distance du point de vue, pour accéder, maintenant et à jamais, au vivant. (shrink)

Recent epidemiological reports of associations between socioeconomic status and epigenetic markers that predict vulnerability to diseases are bringing to light substantial biological effects of social inequalities. Here, we start the discussion of the moral consequences of these findings. We firstly highlight their explanatory importance in the context of the research program on the Developmental Origins of Health and Disease (DOHaD) and the social determinants of health. In the second section, we review some theories of the moral status of health inequalities. (...) Rather than a complete outline of the debate, we single out those theories that rest on the principle of equality of opportunity and analyze the consequences of DOHaD and epigenetics for these particular conceptions of justice. We argue that DOHaD and epigenetics reshape the conceptual distinction between natural and acquired traits on which these theories rely and might provide important policy tools to tackle unjust distributions of health. (shrink)

Multiple authorship is the universal solution to multi-tasking in the sciences. Without a team, each with their own set of expertise, and each involved mostly in complementary ways, a research project will likely not advance quickly, or effectively. Consequently, there is a risk that research goals will not be met within a desired timeframe. Research teams that strictly scrutinize their modus operandi select and include a set of authors that have participated substantially in the physical undertaking of the research, in (...) its planning, or who have contributed intellectually to the ideas or the development of the manuscript. Authorship is not an issue that is taken lightly, and save for dishonest authors, it is an issue that is decided collectively by the authors, usually in sync with codes of conduct established by their research institutes or national ministries of education. Science, technology and medicine publishers have, through independent, or sometimes coordinated efforts, also established their own sets of guidelines regarding what constitutes valid authorship. However, these are, for the greater part, merely guidelines. A previous and recent analysis of authorship definitions indicates that the definitions in place regarding authorship and its validity by many leading STM publishers is neither uniform, nor standard, despite several of them claiming to follow the guidelines as set forward by the International Committee of Medical Journal Editors or ICMJE. This disparity extends itself to ghost and guest authorship, two key authorship-related issues that are examined in this paper to assess the extent of discrepancies among the same set of STM publishers and what possible influence they might have on publishing ethics. (shrink)

La question de l’autorité illégitime et a fortiori de la résistance à cette autorité est toujours délicate à manier, à la fois en termes de définition de l’autorité, d’appréciation du critère d’illégitimité et de mise en œuvre d’un éventuel droit de résistance. Les difficultés d’approche sont encore plus grandes s’agissant d’une période comme le Moyen-Âge, au cours de laquelle la conception, la structuration et les effets de l’autorité ont considérablement évolué. En se centrant sur les xiii e - xv e (...) siècles, l’article se propose d’examiner d’une part les critères de qualification de l’autorité publique comme illégitime et d’autre part les voies ouvertes pour lui résister, en fait comme en droit. (shrink)

The natural instinct for members of the Committee on Publication Ethics, which now number almost 12,200, as well as academia, is to assume that this organization works under strict and clearly defined ethical parameters, with a solid vision, and an independent mandate that is not influenced by power, think tanks, or partisan interests. Naturally, whistle-blowing and science shaming are not practices that one would usually associate with an ethics organization like COPE, because they involve ethically and morally questionable practices. Despite (...) this, ethical borders have become blurred between the objectives of Retraction Watch and PubPeer, two self-moderated science watchdogs that rely heavily on these questionable practices, in their efforts to grow and survive, and the values espoused by COPE. A Retraction Watch post, in which the former COPE Chair, Virginia Barbour, made a claim of apparent harassment, is the most striking example of the dangers when collaboration may take place between science-shaming websites, and an ethics organization, COPE. These bonds appear to have been in development for a number of years already, with the inclusion of Elizabeth Wager, the former COPE Chair, as a director of The Center for Science Integrity Inc., Retraction Watch’s parent organization. Retraction Watch was financed by, among other groups, the Laura and John Arnold Foundation, whose leader, John Arnold, an ex-Enron trader, declared a “war on bad science”, which may naturally include the destruction of aspects of science as well. Retraction Watch embraces several infamous pseudonymous personas under the broad umbrella of freedom of speech, liaising thereby with PubPeer. There is no doubt that errors in the literature need correcting, but this apparent connection with COPE raises questions about the basic ethical foundation of this relationship. Are scientists to embrace this bond between COPE and science watchdogs and pseudonymous whistle-blowers as the new normal in the correction of the scientific literature? This opinion piece puts forward arguments why the author believes that the ethical compass of COPE has become skewed. (shrink)

En este trabajo, el autor describe el Programa de sistemas de ayuda centrado en la persona que fue desarrollado para responder las demandas de las personas de la ciudad de Oporto, socialmente excluidas. Se describe el principio fundamental y los componentes del programa, junto con su proceso de realización. Finalmente, se ofrece una reflexión crítica de todo el programa y las expectativas de los futuros desarrollos.

Este artículo estudia los números de la Revista de Psicoanálisis publicados entre 1946 y 1955 en Argentina. En particular, analiza los artículos escritos por los psicoanalistas argentinos que allí aparecen y las notas e informaciones que se incluyen en las últimas páginas de la revista. Se propone, por un lado, rastrear qué es el psicoanálisis en esos años, pensando este saber como un objeto discursivo, y, por el otro, indagar sobre el modo en que se construye la comunidad discursiva psicoanalítica (...) de la APA. Este recorrido ha evidenciado, por un lado, que el psicoanálisis es entendido, en ese entonces, como una teoría científica y una práctica contigua a la práctica médica, limitado al tratamiento individual. Por el otro, ha identificado que la revista, además de constituir un medio de comunicación privilegiado para la institución, contribuye a la consolidación de la comunidad discursiva psicoanalítica. (shrink)

Are humans a domesticated species? How is this issue related to debates on the roles of human agency in human evolution? This article discusses four views on human domestication: Darwin’s view; the view of those who link human domestication to anthropogenic niche construction and, more specifically, to sedentism; the view of those who link human domestication to selection against aggression and the domestication syndrome; and a novel view according to which human domestication can be conceived of in terms of a (...) process of political selection. The article examines and compares these views to illustrate how discussions of human domestication can contribute to debates about how, and to what extent, human agency has affected human evolution. (shrink)

O tema sobre a cultura da mesa de refeição quer refletir o aspecto teológico-religioso da cultura do antigo Israel e apontar a relação entre cultura e teologia, costumes e valores espirituais, como experiências que apontam para o Transcendente e para a unidade de um grupo. Com isso, o texto quer resgatar tal reflexão para o mundo pós-moderno, no qual a cultura sustenta-se por uma dimensão que transcende a vida prática dos homens, assinala valores impregnados de religiosidade e espiritualidade e, consequentemente, (...) de crenças instaladas no mais íntimo de um corpo social. O fim último é o respeito e o reconhecimento da vida que vem de Deus. (shrink)

This work highlights the faith of Jesus as a response to the affiliate relationship between the Father and the Son. This intimate union, characterized by the word Abba, reveals that the very existence of Jesus took place in the bosom of the Father and it was developed in the intimacy with Him. It is in thi.s loving bosom of the Father that, from the beginning, Jesus constitutes the consciousness of a God who is close, loving and able to hear the (...) cries of his people. The Lordship of God is crystallized in the actions of Jesus through the proclamation of the Kingdom. The force that makes Jesus embrace the plan of God is the Spirit, making Jesus desirous and able to carry out the will of the Father. (shrink)

A pesquisa acadêmica exige uma gama de procedimentos. Cada área desenvolve seus métodos, que são avaliados pelos resultados da qualidade das pesquisas. Para quem se inicia nesse processo, conhecer esses passos e procedimentos é muito significativo e definidor da formação do pesquisador. O presente texto, nascido na área de Ciências da Religião e Teologia, tem por objetivo a apresentação do método que foi desenvolvido pelo autor, professor convidado do Programa de Pós-graduação em Ciência da Religião da UFJF – PPCIR-UFJF, em (...) mais de três décadas de orientação, pesquisa e aprendizado. O artigo foi produzido a partir da experiência adquirida das orientações e mostra as condições fundamentais para o trabalho acadêmico, especialmente indicadas por João Batista Libanio, mas também por outros pesquisadores. A parte central do texto é a sistematização do método de orientação acadêmica denominado “método eletrônico”, termo criado por Libanio, e assumido pelo autor em suas mais de cinquenta orientações. Além de indicar os passos desse método, com observações importantes e práticas, há um exemplo de aplicação sobre como elaborar um artigo. (shrink)

Many of the computing systems programmed using Machine Learning are opaque: it is difficult to know why they do what they do or how they work. Explainable Artificial Intelligence aims to develop analytic techniques that render opaque computing systems transparent, but lacks a normative framework with which to evaluate these techniques’ explanatory successes. The aim of the present discussion is to develop such a framework, paying particular attention to different stakeholders’ distinct explanatory requirements. Building on an analysis of “opacity” from (...) philosophy of science, this framework is modeled after accounts of explanation in cognitive science. The framework distinguishes between the explanation-seeking questions that are likely to be asked by different stakeholders, and specifies the general ways in which these questions should be answered so as to allow these stakeholders to perform their roles in the Machine Learning ecosystem. By applying the normative framework to recently developed techniques such as input heatmapping, feature-detector visualization, and diagnostic classification, it is possible to determine whether and to what extent techniques from Explainable Artificial Intelligence can be used to render opaque computing systems transparent and, thus, whether they can be used to solve the Black Box Problem. (shrink)

This book is a multi-faceted attempt to understand the psychological mysteries of land, space, native cultures, changing eras, and geographical dislocation. It shows us that many remote and seemingly peaceful areas of the world have their own dark and silent pasts in which their original inhabitants were often brutally wiped out. Weaving history, geography, myth, philosophy, and psychoanalysis together, this book tries to understand why such atrocities were committed, how those subjected to these 'crimes' might have perceived them, and what (...) are the long-term, trans-generational consequences of these historical events. (shrink)

The received view of dynamical explanation is that dynamical cognitive science seeks to provide covering law explanations of cognitive phenomena. By analyzing three prominent examples of dynamicist research, I show that the received view is misleading: some dynamical explanations are mechanistic explanations, and in this way resemble computational and connectionist explanations. Interestingly, these dynamical explanations invoke the mathematical framework of dynamical systems theory to describe mechanisms far more complex and distributed than the ones typically considered by philosophers. Therefore, contemporary dynamicist (...) research reveals the need for a more sophisticated account of mechanistic explanation. (shrink)

Models developed using machine learning are increasingly prevalent in scientific research. At the same time, these models are notoriously opaque. Explainable AI aims to mitigate the impact of opacity by rendering opaque models transparent. More than being just the solution to a problem, however, Explainable AI can also play an invaluable role in scientific exploration. This paper describes how post-hoc analytic techniques from Explainable AI can be used to refine target phenomena in medical science, to identify starting points for future (...) investigations of causal relationships, and to generate possible explanations of target phenomena in cognitive science. In this way, this paper describes how Explainable AI—over and above machine learning itself—contributes to the efficiency and scope of data-driven scientific research. (shrink)

O referente trabalho tem por objetivo descrever parte das experiências obtidas mediante a participação na extensão em “Educação e Cultura Afro” desenvolvida pelo Órgão de Educação e Relações Étnicas – ODEERE. Na oportunidade, refletimos sobre as discussões obtidas nos dez módulos do curso e como essas pautas influíram diretamente nas concepções pressupostas acera da cultura afro. Em vista de se perceber o legado africano assumindo metodologias de resistência na contemporaneidade, a formação docente e discente deve procurar reaver e fortalecer de (...) forma diversificada sua identidade e seu território para combater a discriminação racial. Dessa forma, o presente trabalho discorre sobre a importância do curso para alunos, professores e a comunidade em busca de melhor formação e rompimento do status quo étnico. Entretanto, aprendendo a respeitar e valorizar a cultura, o legado africano, a educação étnico-racial, por meio de práxis realmente efetivas em seus respectivos territórios de identidade. Palavras-chave: Educação; Cultura; Afro; Saberes. (shrink)

Migration often causes what I refer to in this paper as ‘anti-immigration backlashes’ in receiving countries. Such reactions have substantial costs in terms of the undermining of national solidarity and the diffusion of political distrust. In short, anti-immigration backlashes can threaten the social and political stability of receiving countries. Do such risks constitute a reason against permissive immigration policies which are otherwise desirable? I argue that a positive answer may depend on a skeptical view based on the alleged constraints that (...) certain political facts - especially facts about human nature - pose on political intervention. This view does not stand conceptual and empirical scrutiny in the case of anti-immigration backlashes, where feasibility comes in degree. Yet focusing on the recalcitrance to change of these facts is practically important when devising action plans. This pragmatic core of the skeptical view yields a gradualist and naturalistic way of thinking about constraints in political theorising about migration, and elsewhere. (shrink)