IntroductionThis study aimed to evaluate, in adults with mild cognitive impairment, the brain atrophy that may distinguish between three AT biomarker-based profiles, and to determine its clinical value.MethodsStructural MRI was employed to evaluate the volume and cortical thickness differences in MCI patients with different AT profiles, namely, A−T−−: normal AD biomarkers; A+T−−: AD pathologic change; and A+T++: prodromal AD. Sensitivity and specificity of these changes were also estimated.ResultsAn initial atrophy in medial temporal lobe areas was found in the A+T−− and (...) A+T++ groups, spreading toward the parietal and frontal regions in A+T++ patients. These structural changes allowed distinguishing AT profiles within the AD continuum; however, the profiles and their pattern of neurodegeneration were unsuccessful to determine the current clinical status.ConclusionsMRI is useful in the determination of the specific brain structural changes of AT profiles along the AD continuum, allowing differentiation between MCI adults with or without pathological AD biomarkers. (shrink)

According to a growing body of studies, people’s ability to forecast future emotional experiences is generally biased. Nonetheless, the existing literature has mainly explored affective forecasting in relation to specific events, whereas little is still known about the ability to make general estimations of future emotional states. Based on existing evidence suggesting future-oriented disposition as a key factor for mental health, the aims of the current study were (1) to investigate the relationship between negative (NA) and positive (PA) affective forecasting (...) biases and perceived psychological well-being, and (2) to explore whether positively biased predictions are associated with resilience and foster one’s skills to cope with stressful events. To do so, we asked 85 undergraduate students to forecast PA and NA over two weeks, as well as to report their daily affect through a web-based Ecological Momentary Assessment. According to the results, positively biased PA forecasting (i.e., overestimating positive emotional states) was associated with greater perceived psychological well-being and higher resilience. When high levels of stress were experienced, participants holding an optimistic, yet biased, estimation of future PA were more likely to successfully manage stressors, thus maintaining lower levels of NA and higher levels of positive emotions. We suggest that positively biased PA forecasting is an adaptive cognitive distortion that boosts people’s resilience and mental health, thus opening new avenues for the promotion of psychological well-being. (shrink)

"El repertorio bibliográfico no presenta resumen".

: La obra de Andrés Pérez de Rivas considera la pobreza desde cuatro perspectivas: la pobreza económica, el aislamiento y la barbarie, la ignorancia de la fe cristina y la santa pobreza. Tratándose de los indígenas americanos, en ningún caso aparece la pobreza como injusticia o como el resultado de la injusticia. No hay una denuncia o crítica de contenido social. Pérez de Rivas está hablando de un ser vulnerable, desprotegido y, por lo tanto, de un menor, un necesitado (...) de ayuda, un dependiente. Lo que sí hay es un proyecto para superar esta situación de precariedad, barbarie y paganismo; proyecto que se constituye en un discurso de legitimación del hecho colonial. Este discurso, contenido principalmente en Historia de los triunfos de nuestra santa fe, es el objeto de estudio del presente artículo. (shrink)

Although in Italy there is currently no effective law on physician-assisted suicide or euthanasia, Decision No. 242 issued by the Italian Constitutional Court on September 25, 2019 established that an individual who, under specific circumstances, has facilitated the implementation of an independent and freely-formed resolve to commit suicide by another individual is exempt from criminal liability. Following this ruling, some citizens have submitted requests for assisted suicide to the public health system, generating a situation of great uncertainty in the application (...) processes. As a matter of fact, shared and defined procedures are lacking as Decision 242/2019 merely added some principles on which the legislature will have to base its future intervention. This paper analyses the advisory role that the Decision attributes to territorial ethics committees with the aim of stimulating discussions on their role in oversight mechanisms. The proposed conclusion is that the envisaged role does not appear consistent with the functions of these bodies and is ultimately substantially undefined and unjustified. (shrink)

Fin troppo abituati a leggere il 1927 di Heidegger (Sein und Zeit) e di Marcel (JournalMéthaphysique) con gli occhi del dopo e delle filosofie dell’esistenza, non ci si accorgesempre di una lettura diversa già in corso con gli occhi del prima e di Io e Tu (1923) diBuber. Il comune racconto polemico e antisartriano rivendica l’Essere più che l’esistere,ma rischia di fermarsi alla vicinanza, dentro cui si prepara invece un racconto alternativoche imparenta Marcel più con il principio dialogico (Buber, 1954) (...) e il pensiero dell’altro(Lévinas,1975). «Accordo fondamentale» con Heidegger per lo Zuspruch des Seins e laVerità come apertura, «prossimità metafisica», sensibilità comune, influenze. Fanno peròda netto contrasto l’«accordo disaccordo» e le «differenze essenziali» di Marcel per leaperture bloccate, il filosofare astratto, il «disconoscimento dell’altro» (Ma relation avecHeidegger, 1957, 1979). E quel «credere di stare davanti al mistero» di Heidegger (Letterasull’umanismo, 1947) sembra una svista. (shrink)

While Marx’s critique of David Ricardo is frequently debated, Marx’s critique of Samuel Bailey has, for far too long, remained in the shade. I try to show that Ricardo and Bailey represent two fundamental “moments” of Marx’s Darstellung. The word “moment” is here used in a non-generic sense: Ricardo’s and Bailey’s theories of value represent two opposite and contradictory sides of value’s category as presented in Marx’s critique of political economy. Building on the work of Hans Georg Backhaus, who claims (...) that the first chapter of Volume one of the Capital can be understood only as a metacritique of Bailey’s critique of Ricardo, this topic is developed in order to further clarify the connection of critique and presentation in Marx’s theory. (shrink)

This section presents a selection from the proceedings of a colloquium held at Brown University in the spring of 2015. The event was hosted by the Virtual Humanities Lab in the Department of Italian Studies, in collaboration with the Center for Digital Scholarship in the Brown University Library, and DARIAH-Italy. Its aim was to explore the new types of scholarly output produced when scholars use digital methods to collaborate on, annotate and visualize traditional materials.

In this commentary on Bastin et al., we suggest that spatial context plays a critical role in the encoding and retrieval of events. Specifically, the translation process between the viewpoint-independent content of a memory and the viewpoint-dependent stimuli activating the retrieval plays a critical role in spatial memory recollection. This perspective also provides an explanatory model for pathological disturbances such as Alzheimer's disease.

Psychopathy is among the more widely discussed personality disorders. Psychopathy is intriguing for many reasons, one of which is that many of the most famous and heinous villains, real or imagined, are psychopathic. Understanding how a person could be so evil is clearly a very important, fundamental social concern. Yet, there remains no consensus as to even an authoritative description of the disorder. It is our impression, perhaps incorrectly, that Justman is arguing for a central importance of lack of guilt.We (...) begin by noting that it is only the rare person who has all of the features of a respective personality disorder (Widiger &... (shrink)

What type of speech act is a norm of action, when the norm is agreed upon as the conclusion of an argumentative dialogue? My hypothesis is that, whenever a norm of action is the conclusion of an argument, it should be analyzed as the statement of a norm and thus as a verdictive speech act. If the context is appropriate, and the interlocutors are sincerely (or institutionally) committed to their argumentative exchange and its conclusion, then this verdictive motivates and institutes (...) a new one with the force of an exercitive. The interlocutors’ recognition and acceptance that the new illocution has been performed lends the norm its exercitive force. (shrink)

In this article, I examine the historiographical ideas of the historian of chemistry Hélène Metzger against the background of the ideas of the members of the groups and institutions in which she worked, including Alexandre Koyré, Gaston Bachelard, Abel Rey, Henri Berr and Lucien Febrve. This article is on two interdependent levels: that of particular institutions and groups in which she worked and the École Pratique des Hautes Études) and that of historiographical ideas. I individuate two particular theoretical aspirations pursued (...) by the historians in Metzger's milieu: the ideal of total history and the study of the human mind. These two objectives were seen by Metzger and many others as implicating each other. Moreover, Metzger and other historians wanted to integrate the practice of commentary of texts in the realisations of those ideals. I argue, however, that these objectives proved very difficult to realise at the same time. One tradition which stemmed out of these discussions, exemplified by Bachelard, Canguilhem and Foucault, focused on the mind and knowledge, and renounced commentary of texts and total history as it was understood by the historians of the Centre de Synthèse. The latter, however, did not really pursue the study of the mind. Moreover, historians like Metzger and Koyré who practised an attentive analysis of texts could not realise total history. (shrink)