© 2015 Elsevier Inc.Postnatal organogenesis occurs in an immune competent environment and is tightly controlled by interplay between positive and negative regulators. Innate immune cells have beneficial roles in postnatal tissue remodeling, but roles for the adaptive immune system are currently unexplored. Here we show that adaptive immune responses participate in the normal postnatal development of a non-lymphoid epithelial tissue. Since the mammary gland is the only organ developing predominantly after birth, we utilized it as a powerful system to study (...) adaptive immune regulation of organogenesis. We found that antigen-mediated interactions between mammary antigen-presenting cells and interferon-γ -producing CD4+ T helper 1 cells participate in MG postnatal organogenesis as negative regulators, locally orchestrating epithelial rearrangement. IFNγ then affects luminal lineage differentiation. This function of adaptive immune responses, regulating normal development, changes the paradigm for studying players of postnatal organogenesis and provides insights into immune surveillance and cancer transformation. Plaks et al. (shrink)

In this interview with Jan Hendrik van den Berg, the Dutch phenomenologist and psychiatrist addresses the origins of his work, his most significant influences, and the purpose of metabletic phenomenology in the modern age. In the course of the interview. Dr. Van den Berg provides a basic overview of his work, and highlights the central finding of his metabletic analyses: a loss of wonder before nature, which results from the more fundamental loss of genuine spirituality in the modern (...) world. (shrink)

untangled and ordered in a theoretical framework focusing on evaluations doing no harm, tackling bad and doing good. Divided into four parts a diverse group of subject experts present a practical look at ethics, utilizing practical experience to analyze how ethics have been applied in evaluations, and how new approaches can shape the future of ethics. The chapters collectively create a common understanding of the potential role of ethics to infuse policy decisions and stakeholder initiatives with evaluations that provide better (...) insight and potential solutions for problems, going beyond "what works" to what needs to be done and what would help. The methodological scope ranges from working in contexts of fragility, conflict and violence, to participatory and decolonised approaches, including the ethical imperatives posed by global crises such as climate change, inequity and exploitative international relations. Ethics for Evaluation presents evaluators, commissioners of evaluation, policy makers and practitioners with inspiration for an ethical perspective on how evaluation can contribute towards solving problems. It presents a solid foundation for inclusive terminology and ethics guidance that would be the heart of a global exercise in professionalization of ethical evaluation practice. (shrink)

Cet article examine les opinions des néoplatoniciens tardifs sur le phénomène social de la philotimia (« amours des honneurs » ; « ambition »). Sur la base du Commentaire de l’Alcibiade de Proclus, on montre que la philotimia est une émotion qui résulte d’une compréhension imparfaite de la vraie nature de l’honneur et du pouvoir. La mauvaise philotimia pousse les ambitieux à poursuivre une carrière politique en quête de pouvoir mondain et de prestige au prix de l’étude de la philosophie. (...) La bonne philotimia, au contraire, peut les pousser à rechercher ce qui est véritablement bien et donc les mettre sur la voie de la philosophie. L’histoire fournit maints exemples de bonne et de mauvaise philotimia. Damascius, dans sa Vie d’Isidore, mobilise des théories de la bonne et de la mauvaise philotimia pour éloigner ses lecteurs de l’arène politique et les conduire vers la poursuite de la philosophie. (shrink)

This thought-provoking book discusses the concept of progress in economics and investigates whether any advance has been made in its different spheres of research. The authors look back at the history, successes and failures of their respective fields and thoroughly examine the notion of progress from an epistemological and methodological perspective. The idea of progress is particularly significant as the authors regard it as an essentially contested concept which can be defined in many ways – theoretically or empirically; locally or (...) globally; or as encouraging or impeding the existence of other research traditions. The authors discuss the idea that for progress to make any sense there must be an accumulation of knowledge built up over time rather than the replacement of ideas by each successive generation. Accordingly, they are not concerned with estimating the price of progress, reminiscing in the past, or assessing what has been lost. Instead they apply the complex mechanisms and machinery of the discipline to sub-fields such as normative economics, monetary economics, trade and location theory, Austrian economics and classical economics to critically assess whether progress has been made in these areas of research. -/- Bringing together authoritative and wide-ranging contributions by leading scholars, this book will challenge and engage those interested in philosophy, economic methodology and the history of economic thought. It will also appeal to economists in general who are interested in the advancement of their profession. (shrink)

Libraries provide access to large amounts of library metadata. Unfortunately, many libraries only offer textual interfaces for searching and browsing their holdings. Visualizations provide simpler, faster, and more efficient ways to navigate, search and study large quantities of metadata. This paper presents GlamMap, a visualization tool that displays library metadata on an interactive, computer-generated geographic map. We provide detailed discussion of how GlamMap benefits the work of librarians and researchers. We show how geographic representations help librarians to perform tasks such (...) as collection assessment and how geographic information helps researchers to identify important scientific resources. (shrink)

In their introduction to the recent excellent volume Plato & Hesiod, the editors G.R. Boys-Stones and J.H. Haubold observe that when we think about the problematic relationship between Plato and the poets, we tend to narrow this down to that between Plato and Homer. Hesiod is practically ignored. Unjustly so, the editors argue. Hesiod provides a good opportunity to start thinking more broadly about Plato's interaction with poets and poetry, not in the least because the ‘second poet’ of Greece represents (...) a different type of poetry from Homer's heroic epics, that of didactic poetry. What goes for Plato and Hesiod goes for Proclus and Hesiod. Proclus , the productive head of the Neoplatonic school in Athens, took a great interest in poetry to which he was far more positively disposed than Plato had ever been. He wrote, for example, two lengthy treatises in reaction to Socrates' devastating criticism of poetry in the Republic as part of his commentary on that work in which he tries to keep the poets within the Platonic pale. This intriguing aspect of Proclus' thought has, as one might expect, not failed to attract scholarly attention. In Proclus' case too, however, discussions tend to concentrate on his attitude towards Homer . To some extent this is only to be expected, since much of the discussion in the Commentary on the Republic centres on passages from Homer. Proclus did not, however, disregard Hesiod: we still possess his scholia on the Works and Days, now available in a recent edition by Patrizia Marzillo. (shrink)

The South African government’s COVID-19 pandemic risk mitigation strategies significantly limited social contact, which necessitated a novel approach to existing face-to-face career guidance practices. The Grade 9 Career Guidance Project, originally developed as a group-based career development intervention, required radical adaptation into a self-directed, manualized format to offer career guidance to Grade 9 learners from low-income communities amid a global pandemic. The adaptation and continuation of the project was deemed essential as secondary school learners in low-income communities have limited career (...) guidance support. Furthermore, a close collaboration with the teachers at eight resource-constrained South African secondary schools was vital for successful implementation. To assess the success of the adaptation to a self-directed format, a mixed-methods design was employed, and Life Orientation teachers’ evaluative feedback was solicited. Favorable quantitative results were obtained; majority of teachers agreed that learners enjoyed the booklet and that it was deemed an adequate substitute to the previous contact-based format of the Career Guidance Project. This was also confirmed by the qualitative findings revealing teachers’ satisfaction with the booklet’s content, specifically that the booklet is complementary to the Life Orientation curriculum. Qualitative findings identified specific contextual barriers that contributed to some learners struggling to use the booklet optimally. The results suggest that it is feasible and acceptable to implement a self-directed career guidance intervention among secondary school learners amid a global pandemic. Teachers recommended ways to integrate the booklet, resources, and contact sessions as a preferred way forward. These findings have important implications for similar resource-constrained settings that may not have readily access to in-person career guidance and counseling human development. (shrink)

In this article, an ethical analysis of an educational programme on renal replacement therapy options for patients and their social network is presented. The two main spearheads of this approach are: (1) offering an educational programme on all renal replacement therapy options ahead of treatment requirement and (2) a home-based approach involving the family and friends of the patient. Arguments are offered for the ethical justification of this approach by considering the viewpoint of the various stakeholders involved. Finally, reflecting on (...) these ethical considerations, essential conditions for carrying out such a programme are outlined. The goal is to develop an ethically justified and responsible educational programme. (shrink)

We apply an online optimization process based on machine learning to the production of Bose-Einstein condensates. BEC is typically created with an exponential evaporation ramp that is optimal for ergodic dynamics with two-body s-wave interactions and no other loss rates, but likely sub-optimal for real experiments. Through repeated machine-controlled scientific experimentation and observations our ’learner’ discovers an optimal evaporation ramp for BEC production. In contrast to previous work, our learner uses a Gaussian process to develop a statistical model of the (...) relationship between the parameters it controls and the quality of the BEC produced. We demonstrate that the Gaussian process machine learner is able to discover a ramp that produces high quality BECs in 10 times fewer iterations than a previously used online optimization technique. Furthermore, we show the internal model developed can be used to determine which parameters are essential in BEC creation and which are unimportant, providing insight into the optimization process of the system. (shrink)

This article provides ethical guidance on using race in health research as a variable or in defining the study population. To this end, a plain, non-exhaustive checklist is provided for researchers and research ethics committees, preceded by a brief introduction on the need for justification when using race as a variable or in defining a study population, the problem of exoticism, that distinctions pertain between race, ethnicity and ancestry, the problematic naming of races, and that race does not serve well (...) as a presumed biological construct in genetic research. (shrink)

Let T be a complete o-minimal extension of the theory of real closed fields. We characterize the convex hulls of elementary substructures of models of T and show that the residue field of such a convex hull has a natural expansion to a model of T. We give a quantifier elimination relative to T for the theory of pairs (R, V) where $\mathscr{R} \models T$ and V ≠ R is the convex hull of an elementary substructure of R. We deduce (...) that the theory of such pairs is complete and weakly o-minimal. We also give a quantifier elimination relative to T for the theory of pairs (R, N) with R a model of T and N a proper elementary substructure that is Dedekind complete in R. We deduce that the theory of such "tame" pairs is complete. (shrink)

Information technology is widely used to fulfill societal goals such as safety and security. These application areas put ever changing demands on the functionality of the technology. Designing technological appliances to be reconfigurable, thereby keeping them open to functionalities yet to be determined, will possibly allow the technology to fulfill these changing demands in an efficient way. In this paper we present a first exploration of potential societal and moral issues of reconfigurable sensors developed for application in the safety and (...) security domain, in the context of a large scale R&D-project in the Netherlands. We discuss the subtle distinction between the relevant notions of reconfigurability, function creep, and unrestricted or unforeseen technological affordances. We argue that the feature of reconfigurability makes context of use the central issue in the assessment of the societal and moral impact of the technology. It follows that the design of good policies for new application contexts has to be central in a value sensitive design approach to reconfigurable technology. (shrink)

Background: The Declaration of Helsinki, the World Medical Association’s statement of ethical guidelines regarding medical research, is published in the three official languages of the WMA: English, French and Spanish.Methods: A detailed comparison of the three official language versions was carried out to determine ways in which they differed and ways in which the wording of the three versions might illuminate the interpretation of the document.Results: There were many minor linguistic differences between the three versions. However, in paragraphs 1, 6, (...) 29, 30 and in the note of clarification to paragraph 29, there were differences that could be considered potentially significant in their ethical relevance.Interpretation: Given the global status of the Declaration of Helsinki and the fact that it is translated from its official versions into many other languages for application to the ethical conduct of research, the differences identified are of concern. It would be best if such differences could be eliminated but, at the very least, a commentary to explain any differences that are unavoidable on the basis of language or culture should accompany the Declaration of Helsinki. This evidence further strengthens the case for international surveillance of medical research ethics as has been proposed by the WMA. (shrink)

Background: Issues concerning legislation and regulation with respect to the role of nurses in euthanasia and physician-assisted suicide gave the Minister for Health reason to commission a study of the role of nurses in medical end-of-life decisions in hospitals, home care and nursing homes.Aim: This paper reports the findings of a study of the role of nurses in euthanasia and physician-assisted suicide, conducted as part of a study of the role of nurses in medical end-of-life decisions. The findings for hospitals, (...) home care and nursing homes are described and compared.Method: A questionnaire was sent to 1509 nurses, employed in 73 hospitals, 55 home care organisations and 63 nursing homes. 1179 responses were suitable for analysis. The questionnaire was pilot-tested among 106 nurses, with a response rate of 85%.Results: In 37.0% of cases, the nurse was the first person with whom patients discussed their request for euthanasia or physician-assisted suicide. Consultation between physicians and nurses during the decision-making process took place quite often in hospitals and nursing homes and less frequently in home care situations . In some cases , nurses administered the euthanatics.Conclusions: The results show substantial differences between the intramural sector and the extramural sector , which are probably linked to the organisational structure of the institutions. Consultation between physicians and nurses during the decision-making process needs improvement, particularly in home care. Some nurses had administered euthanatics, although this task is by law exclusively reserved to physicians. (shrink)