8 March, now known as International Women’s Day, is a day for feminist claims where demonstrations are organized in over 150 countries, with the participation of millions of women all around the world. These demonstrations can be viewed as collective rituals and thus focus attention on the processes that facilitate different psychosocial effects. This work aims to explore the mechanisms involved in participation in the demonstrations of 8 March 2020, collective and ritualized feminist actions, and their correlates associated with personal (...) well-being and collective well-being, collective efficacy and collective growth, and behavioral intention to support the fight for women’s rights. To this end, a cross-cultural study was conducted with the participation of 2,854 people from countries in Latin America and Europe, with a retrospective correlational cross-sectional design and a convenience sample. Participants were divided between demonstration participants and non-demonstrators or followers who monitored participants through the media and social networks. Compared with non-demonstrators and with males, female and non-binary gender respondents had greater scores in mechanisms and criterion variables. Further random-effects model meta-analyses revealed that the perceived emotional synchrony was consistently associated with more proximal mechanisms, as well as with criterion variables. Finally, sequential moderation analyses showed that proposed mechanisms successfully mediated the effects of participation on every criterion variable. These results indicate that participation in 8M marches and demonstrations can be analyzed through the literature on collective rituals. As such, collective participation implies positive outcomes both individually and collectively, which are further reinforced through key psychological mechanisms, in line with a Durkheimian approach to collective rituals. (shrink)

IntroductionTranscranial magnetic stimulation is a consolidated procedure for the treatment of depression, with several meta-analyses demonstrating its efficacy. Theta-burst stimulation is a modification of TMS with similar efficacy and shorter session duration. The geriatric population has many comorbidities and a high prevalence of depression, but few clinical trials are conducted specifically for this age group. TBS could be an option in this population, offering the advantages of few side effects and no pharmacological interactions. Therefore, our aim is to investigate the (...) efficacy of TBS in geriatric depression.Clinical trial registration[https://clinicaltrials.gov/ct2/], identifier [NCT04842929]. (shrink)

The use of automation in cars is increasing. In future vehicles, drivers will no longer be in charge of the main driving task and may be allowed to perform a secondary task. However, they might be requested to regain control of the car if a hazardous situation occurs. Performing a secondary task might increase drivers' mental workload and consequently decrease the takeover performance if the workload level exceeds a certain threshold. Knowledge about the driver's mental state might hence be useful (...) for increasing safety in conditionally automated vehicles. Measuring drivers' workload continuously is essential to support the driver and hence limit the number of accidents in takeover situations. This goal can be achieved using machine learning techniques to evaluate and classify the drivers' workload in real-time. To evaluate the usefulness of physiological data as an indicator for workload in conditionally automated driving, three physiological signals from 90 subjects were collected during 25 min of automated driving in a fixed-base simulator. Half of the participants performed a verbal cognitive task to induce mental workload while the other half only had to monitor the environment of the car. Three classifiers, sensor fusion and levels of data segmentation were compared. Results show that the best model was able to successfully classify the condition of the driver with an accuracy of 95%. In some cases, the model benefited from sensors' fusion. Increasing the segmentation level increased the performance of the model for windows smaller than 4 min, but decreased for windows larger than 4 min. In conclusion, the study showed that a high level of drivers' mental workload can be accurately detected while driving in conditional automation based on 4-min recordings of respiration and skin conductance. (shrink)

The COVID-19 pandemic played as a booster to the cultural, social, and economic transformations triggered by the 4.0 Industrial Revolution, increasing the diffusion and employment of technological devices and requiring to reconsider the traditional approach to work and organization. Dealing with an emblematic organizational case, the article highlights the main key capabilities requested to face the current scenario, suggesting transformed attitudes needed to cope with the unfolding complex, uncertain, changing digital and blended world. The findings, gathered through an extensive survey (...) involving 500 people who started working at a distance during the 2020 lockdown period, underline the main actionable skills to be achieved for enhancing agile work, hybrid professional roles and new work, and organizational and managerial cultures. (shrink)

Fear to contamination is an easy-to-provoke, intense, hard-to-control, and extraordinarily persistent fear. A worsening of preexisting psychiatric disorders was observed during the COVID-19 outbreak, and several studies suggest that those with obsessive–compulsive disorder may be more affected than any other group of people. In the face of worsening OCD symptoms, there is a need for mental health professionals to provide the support needed not only to treat patients who still report symptoms, but also to improve relapse prevention. In this line, (...) it is recommended to improve alternative strategies such as online consultations and digital psychiatry. The aim of this study is to develop augmented reality stimuli that are clinically relevant for patients with cleaning OCD and assess their efficiency to obtain emotionally significant responses. Four AR stimuli were developed: a plastic bag full of garbage, a piece of bread with mold, a dirty sports shoe, and a piece of rotten meat. All stimuli were shown to a clinical group and a control group. Relevant results were the design of the AR stimuli. These stimuli were validated with the statistical difference in perceived anxiety in the meat stimuli between the clinical and control groups. Nevertheless, when looking at effect sizes, all stimuli present effect sizes from small to large, with both shoe and bread between small and medium effect sizes. These results are a valuable support for the clinical use of these AR stimuli in the treatment of cleaning OCD. (shrink)

Resumen Este artículo examina siete concepciones filosóficas acerca de la libertad -incluyendo la distinción entre libertad negativa y positiva, liberal y republicana-, ejemplificándolas con representantes de la historia de la filosofía. Por otra parte, para enriquecer la mirada desde un texto jurídico concreto, examinamos la Constitución ecuatoriana de 2008. El propósito principal que ha animado esta investigación es el de sondear las distintas visiones que se han propuesto sobre la libertad, en su triple relación con: 1) los valores, tales como (...) el bien común y la igualdad; 2) el tipo de deber correspondiente que tienen que cumplir los particulares y la sociedad con respecto al sujeto portador del derecho a la libertad; y 3) el Estado y las leyes. Aspiramos a que los resultados alcanzados aporten mayor claridad en aquellos debates de la filosofía normativa en los que está involucrada la libertad.The paper examines seven philosophical conceptions of freedom -including the distinctions between positive and negative liberty, and liberal and republican liberty-, exemplifying them with great authors in the history of philosophy. On the other hand, in order to enrich the vision with a concrete legal document, we examine the Ecuadorian Constitution of 2008. The central aim of the research is to probe the use made by those who participated in the drafting of that Constitution of philosophical ideas concerning liberty in its threefold relation to: 1) values, such as common good and equality; 2) the correlative duties imposed on individuals and the society at large with respect to the holder of the right to freedom; and 3) the state and its laws. We hope that the results provide greater clarity in those debates of normative philosophy in which freedom is involved. (shrink)

Background: Freezing of gait is a common symptom in Parkinson’s disease and can be difficult to treat with dopaminergic medications or with deep brain stimulation. Novel stimulation paradigms have been proposed to address suboptimal responses to conventional DBS programming methods. Burst-cycling deep brain stimulation delivers current in various frequencies of bursts, while maintaining an intra-burst frequency identical to conventional DBS.Objective: To evaluate the safety and tolerability of BCDBS in PD patients with FOG.Methods: Ten PD subjects with STN or GPi DBS (...) and complaints of FOG were recruited for this single center, single blinded within-subject crossover study. For each subject, we compared 4, 10, and 15 Hz BCDBS to conventional DBS during the PD medication-OFF state.Results: There were no serious adverse events with BCDBS. It was feasible and straightforward to program BCDBS in the clinic setting. The benefit was comparable to conventional DBS in measures of FOG, functional mobility and in PD motor symptoms. BCDBS had lower battery consumption when compared to conventional DBS.Conclusions: BCDBS was feasible, safe and well tolerated and it has potential to be a viable future DBS programming strategy. (shrink)

RESUMEN El diálogo propuesto entre Heidegger y Adorno, especificamente en lo que concierne a las ideas de crítica y de resistencia, no desconoce la importancia que adquiere para el último la crítica extensa que él mismo dirige a la ontología de Heidegger, ni para este su cuestionamiento de la filosofia dialéctica. El artículo busca mostrar que, en ambos autores, la idea de crítica y de resistencia se resuelve como indagación del sentido negativo de la experiencia. Se concluye que, destacando semejanzas (...) y diferencias en sus planteamientos, la reivindicación del carácter negativo de la experiencia equivale reivindicar el poder crítico de la filosofia y del arte. ABSTRACT The dialogue between these two authors, concerning specifically the ideas of critique and resistance, does not ignore the importance attributed by Adorno to the extensive critique that himself addresses to Heidegger's ontology, nor the one attributed by the latter to his questioning of the dialectical philosophy. The paper shows that in both authors the ideas of critique and resistance can be settled as an inquiry into the negative sense of experience. It is concluded that, highlighting similarities and differences in their approaches, the recognition of the negative trait of experience equals to claiming the critical power of philosophy and art. (shrink)

Palabras de agradecimiento al promotor del Congreso Internacional y a los participantes en él. Asimismo, a la persona que ha trabajado en la labor de transcripción de mis escritos y a otros colaboradores míos. También a quienes han tomado en cuenta mis ideas para elaborar sus tesis doctorales, y a otros colegas cuyos planteamientos filosóficos distan de los míos. Como la filosofía es una actividad interminable, queda abierta la sucesiva investigación en mis propuestas.

Organization figures centrally in the understanding of biological systems advanced by both new mechanists and proponents of the autonomy framework. The new mechanists focus on how components of mechanisms are organized to produce a phenomenon and emphasize productive continuity between these components. The autonomy framework focuses on how the components of a biological system are organized in such a way that they contribute to the maintenance of the organisms that produce them. In this paper we analyze and compare these two (...) accounts of organization and argue that understanding biological organisms as cohesively integrated systems benefits from insights from both. To bring together the two accounts, we focus on the notions of control and regulation as bridge concepts. We start from a characterization of biological mechanisms in terms of constraints and focus on a specific type of mechanism, control mechanisms, that operate on other mechanisms on the basis of measurements of variables in the system and its environment. Control mechanisms are characterized by their own set of constraints that enable them to sense conditions, convey signals, and effect changes on constraints in the controlled mechanism. They thereby allow living organisms to adapt to internal and external variations and to coordinate their parts in such a manner as to maintain viability. Because living organisms contain a vast number of control mechanisms, a central challenge is to understand how they are themselves organized. With the support of examples from both unicellular and multicellular systems we argue that control mechanisms are organized heterarchically, and we discuss how this type of control architecture can, without invoking top-down and centralized forms of organizations, succeed in coordinating internal activities of organisms. (shrink)

Despite numerous and increasing attempts to define what life is, there is no consensus on necessary and sufficient conditions for life. Accordingly, some scholars have questioned the value of definitions of life and encouraged scientists and philosophers alike to discard the project. As an alternative to this pessimistic conclusion, we argue that critically rethinking the nature and uses of definitions can provide new insights into the epistemic roles of definitions of life for different research practices. This paper examines the possible (...) contributions of definitions of life in scientific domains where such definitions are used most. Rather than as classificatory tools for demarcation of natural kinds, we highlight the pragmatic utility of what we call operational definitions that serve as theoretical and epistemic tools in scientific practice. In particular, we examine contexts where definitions integrate criteria for life into theoretical models that involve or enable observable operations. We show how these definitions of life play important roles in influencing research agendas and evaluating results, and we argue that to discard the project of defining life is neither sufficiently motivated, nor possible without dismissing important theoretical and practical research. (shrink)

Living organisms act as integrated wholes to maintain themselves. Individual actions can each be explained by characterizing the mechanisms that perform the activity. But these alone do not explain how various activities are coordinated and performed versatilely. We argue that this depends on a specific type of mechanism, a control mechanism. We develop an account of control by examining several extensively studied control mechanisms operative in the bacterium E. coli. On our analysis, what distinguishes a control mechanism from other mechanisms (...) is that it relies on measuring one or more variables, which results in setting constraints in the control mechanism that determine its action on flexible constraints in other mechanisms. In the most basic arrangement, the measurement process directly determines the action of the control mechanism, but in more complex arrangements signals mediate between measurements and effectors. This opens the possibility of multiple responses to the same measurement and responses based on multiple measurements. It also allows crosstalk, resulting in networks of control mechanisms. Such networks integrate the behaviors of the organism but also present a challenge in tailoring responses to particular measurements. We discuss how integrated activity can still result in differential, versatile, responses. (shrink)

Biological regulation is what allows an organism to handle the effects of a perturbation, modulating its own constitutive dynamics in response to particular changes in internal and external conditions. With the central focus of analysis on the case of minimal living systems, we argue that regulation consists in a specific form of second-order control, exerted over the core regime of production and maintenance of the components that actually put together the organism. The main argument is that regulation requires a distinctive (...) architecture of functional relationships, and specifically the action of a dedicated subsystem whose activity is dynamically decoupled from that of the constitutive regime. We distinguish between two major ways in which control mechanisms contribute to the maintenance of a biological organisation in response to internal and external perturbations: dynamic stability and regulation. Based on this distinction an explicit definition and a set of organisational requirements for regulation are provided, and thoroughly illustrated through the examples of bacterial chemotaxis and the lac-operon. The analysis enables us to mark out the differences between regulation and closely related concepts such as feedback, robustness and homeostasis. (shrink)

Despite numerous and increasing attempts to define what life is, there is no consensus on necessary and sufficient conditions for life. Accordingly, some scholars have questioned the value of definitions of life and encouraged scientists and philosophers alike to discard the project. As an alternative to this pessimistic conclusion, we argue that critically rethinking the nature and uses of definitions can provide new insights into the epistemic roles of definitions of life for different research practices. This paper examines the possible (...) contributions of definitions of life in scientific domains where such definitions are used most (e.g., Synthetic Biology, Origins of Life, Alife, and Astrobiology). Rather than as classificatory tools for demarcation of natural kinds, we highlight the pragmatic utility of what we call operational definitions that serve as theoretical and epistemic tools in scientific practice. In particular, we examine contexts where definitions integrate criteria for life into theoretical models that involve or enable observable operations. We show how these definitions of life play important roles in influencing research agendas and evaluating results, and we argue that to discard the project of defining life is neither sufficiently motivated, nor possible without dismissing important theoretical and practical research. (shrink)

Endocrinologists apply the idea of feedback loops to explain how hormones regulate certain bodily functions such as glucose metabolism. In particular, feedback loops focus on the maintenance of the plasma concentrations of glucose within a narrow range. Here, we put forward a different, organicist perspective on the endocrine regulation of glycaemia, by relying on the pivotal concept of closure of constraints. From this perspective, biological systems are understood as organized ones, which means that they are constituted of a set of (...) mutually dependent functional structures acting as constraints, whose maintenance depends on their reciprocal interactions. Closure refers specifically to the mutual dependence among functional constraints in an organism. We show that, when compared to feedback loops, organizational closure can generate much richer descriptions of the processes and constraints at play in the metabolism and regulation of glycaemia, by making explicit the different hierarchical orders involved. We expect that the proposed theoretical framework will open the way to the construction of original mathematical models, which would provide a better understanding of endocrine regulation from an organicist perspective. (shrink)

The new mechanists and the autonomy approach both aim to account for how biological phenomena are explained. One identifies appeals to how components of a mechanism are organized so that their activities produce a phenomenon. The other directs attention towards the whole organism and focuses on how it achieves self-maintenance. This paper discusses challenges each confronts and how each could benefit from collaboration with the other: the new mechanistic framework can gain by taking into account what happens outside individual mechanisms, (...) while the autonomy approach can ground itself in biological research into how the actual components constituting an autonomous system interact and contribute in different ways to realize and maintain the system. To press the case that these two traditions should be constructively integrated we describe how three recent developments in the autonomy tradition together provide a bridge between the two traditions: (1) a framework of work and constraints, (2) a conception of function grounded in the organization of an autonomous system, and (3) a focus on control. (shrink)

Living systems employ several mechanisms and behaviors to achieve robustness and maintain themselves under changing internal and external conditions. Regulation stands out from them as a specific form of higher-order control, exerted over the basic regime responsible for the production and maintenance of the organism, and provides the system with the capacity to act on its own constitutive dynamics. It consists in the capability to selectively shift between different available regimes of self-production and self-maintenance in response to specific signals and (...) perturbations, due to the action of a dedicated subsystem which is operationally distinct from the regulated ones. The role of regulation, however, is not exhausted by its contribution to maintain a living system’s viability. While enhancing robustness, regulatory mechanisms play a fundamental role in the realization of an autonomous biological organization. Specifically, they are at the basis of the remarkable integration of biological systems, insofar as they coordinate and modulate the activity of distinct functional subsystems. Moreover, by implementing complex and hierarchically organized control architectures, they allow for an increase in structural and organizational complexity while minimizing fragility. Finally, they endow living systems, from their most basic unicellular instances, with the capability to control their own internal dynamics to adaptively respond to specific features of their interaction with the environment, thus providing the basis for the emergence of minimal forms of cognition. (shrink)

The Right has a long history of questioning the importance of race analysis. Recently, the conceptual and political status of race has come under increased scrutiny from the Left. Bracketing the language of ‘race’ has meant that the discourse of skin groups remains at the level of abstraction and does not speak to real groups as such. As a descriptor, race essentializes identity as if skin color were a reliable way to perceive one's self and group as well as others, (...) and questions the viability of a social struggle based on race. In other words, race is not real and discourses that insist on its objective status are ensnared in reification. The response—equally from the Left—has been to reassert the centrality and changing dynamics of race in education and society. They argue that we need to develop more, rather than less, complex discourses on race. Orientations that attempt to discredit race analysis are therefore unable to dismantle the racial system because they refuse its significance as an autonomous system of interpellations. In other words, race is real. This essay appraises the debate within the Left about the status of race, their projections about the future of race, and the kind of struggle they promote in order to realize a society freed from the chains of racism. (shrink)

Resumo Este artigo procura apresentar e discutir tentativas recentes em filosofia social de analisar e interpretar o capitalismo, a partir de uma perspectiva praxeológica. O practice turn em teoria social procurou superar o dualismo entre agência e estrutura, ou entre ação e sistema, por meio da noção de prática social. Seria possível então interpretar o capitalismo como um tipo especifico de prática social? Para tentar encaminhar essa questão, explicita-se brevemente, em um primeiro momento, em que consiste o practice turn em (...) teoria social. Num segundo momento, analisa-se e se discute a proposta de Rahel Jaeggi de conceber a economia como uma rede de práticas sociais. Em seguida, expõe-se e se avalia a tentativa de Christian Lotz em ver, no dinheiro, a chave para compreender aquilo que ele chama de esquema capitalista. Por fim, conclui-se, chamando a atenção para os potenciais e desafios ligados ao empreendimento de interpretar o capitalismo em função de uma teoria da prática, sugerindo que um aprofundamento na análise da imaginação especificamente capitalista, vinculando-a com a típica plasticidade e diversidade do capitalismo, possa ajudar a avançar nesse campo.This paper aims to present and discuss recent attempts in social philosophy to analyze and interpret capitalism from a praxeological perspective. The practice turn in social theory sought to overcome the dualism between agency and structure, or between action and system, through the notion of social practice. Is it then possible to interpret capitalism as a specific type of social practice? To try to address this question, I briefly introduce, in a first moment, the practice turn in social theory. In a second moment, I analyze and discuss Rahel Jaeggi’s proposal to conceive the economy as a network of social practices. I then explain and evaluate Christian Lotz’s attempt to see money as the key to understanding what he names as “the capitalist schema”. Finally, I conclude by drawing attention to the potentials and challenges of interpreting capitalism as a social practice, suggesting that a deeper analysis of specifically capitalist imagination, linking it with the typical plasticity and diversity of capitalism, may help to move forward in this field. (shrink)

Theoretical accounts of development exhibit several internal tensions and face multiple challenges. They span from the problem of the identification of the temporal boundaries of development (beginning and end) to the characterization of the distinctive type of change involved compared to other biological processes. They include questions such as the role to ascribe to the environment or what types of biological systems can undergo development and whether they should include colonies or even ecosystems. In this chapter we discuss these conceptual (...) issues, and we argue that adopting an organizational approach may help solve or clarify them. -/- While development is usually identified with the achievement of an adult form with the capability to reproduce and therefore maintain a lineage, adopting the organizational approach may provide a different strategy, which focuses also on the maintenance of the current organization of the organism. By doing so an organizational approach favors a switch in perspective which consists in analyzing how organisms maintain their viability at each moment of development rather than considering them as going through intermediate stages of a process directed toward a specific goal state. This developmental dimension of biological organization has yet to be given a general and detailed analysis within the organizational theoretical perspective, apart from some preliminary attempts. How a biological organization is maintained through a series of radical organizational changes and what these changes are issues that still require clarification. In this chapter we offer the beginnings of such an analysis of developmental transitions, understood as changes in functionality brought forth by regulatory mechanisms in the context of the continued maintenance of organizational viability at every step. (shrink)

At first glance, relating philosophy and design does not seem trivial, but there are several elements that make it possible to develop such a hypothesis beyond the context of the philosophy of technology. In this article, the main objective is to explore some aspects of design in the world and in Brazil, emphasizing how much its bases dialogue with the principles of Gadamer’s philosophical hermeneutics. To do so, in the first section, I develop a bibliographical analysis of the history of (...) design, exposing its roots in art and architecture, as well as the passage from affirmative design to the philosophy of design. In the second section, I discuss some studies on design and philosophy in order to support the formation of critical-speculative design from contemporary art, and later, to address the main hypothesis of the study, that is, that there is a very interesting gain in relating studies of Gadamerian hermeneutics in what I call philosophical-hermeneutical design, which allows thinking about the history, identity and ontological preconceptions of design and expand horizons of philosophical hermeneutics. (shrink)

In this paper we criticize the “Ashbyan interpretation” (Froese & Stewart, 2010) of autopoietic theory by showing that Ashby’s framework and the autopoietic one are based on distinct, often incompatible, assumptions and that they aim at addressing different issues. We also suggest that in order to better understand autopoiesis and its implications, a different and wider set of theoretical contributions, developed previously or at the time autopoiesis was formulated, needs to be taken into consideration: among the others, the works of (...) Rosen, Weiss and Piaget. By analyzing the concepts of organization and closure, the idea of components, and the role of materiality in the theory proposed by Maturana and Varela, we advocate the view that autopoiesis necessarily entails self-production and intrinsic instability and can be realized only in domains characterized by the same transformative and processual properties exhibited by the molecular domain. From this theoretical standpoint it can be demonstrated that autopoietic theory neither commits to a sharp dualism between organization and structure nor to a reflexive view of downward causation, thus avoiding the respective strong criticisms. (shrink)

The paper considers two main cases of how the creative arts can inform a greater appreciation of human dignity. The first case explores a form of theater, Commedia dell’Arte that has deep roots in Italian culture. The second recounts a set of theater exercises done with very minimal direction or self-direction in executive education and MBA courses at the Darden School, University of Virginia, in the United States. In both cases we highlight how the creative arts can be important for (...) promoting human dignity in organizations, and how they can lead to a more authentic conversation about values, ethics, and meaning. (shrink)

BackgroundMinorities are an underrepresented population in clinical trials. A potential explanation for this underrepresentation could be lack of willingness to participate. The aim of our study was to evaluate willingness to participate in different hypothetical clinical research scenarios and to evaluate the role that predictors could have on the willingness of minorities to participate in clinical research studies.MethodsWe conducted a mixed-methods study at the Miami VA Healthcare system and included primary care patients with hypertension. We measured willingness to participate as (...) a survey of four clinical research scenarios that evaluated common study designs encountered in clinical research and that differed in degree of complexity. Our qualitative portion included comments about the scenarios.ResultsWe included 123 patients with hypertension in our study. Of the entire sample, ninety-three patients were minorities. Seventy per cent of the minorities were willing to participate, compared to 60 per cent of the non-minorities. The odds ratio of willingness to participate in simple studies was 0.58; 95 per cent CI 0.18–1.88 p=0.37 and the OR of willingness to participate in complex studies was 5.8; 95 per cent CI 1.10–1.31 p=0.03. In complex studies, minorities with low health literacy cited obtaining benefits as the most common reason to be willing to participate. Minorities who were not willing to participate, cited fear of unintended outcomes as the main reason.ConclusionsMinorities were more likely to be willing to participate in complex studies compared to non-minorities. Low health literacy and therapeutic misconception are important mediators when considering willingness to participate in clinical research. (shrink)

In this paper we address the question of minimal cognition by investigating the origin of some crucial cognitive properties from the very basic organisation of biological systems. More specifically, we propose a theoretical model of how a system can distinguish between specific features of its interaction with the environment, which is a fundamental requirement for the emergence of minimal forms of cognition. We argue that the appearance of this capacity is grounded in the molecular domain, and originates from basic mechanisms (...) of biological regulation. In doing so, our aim is to provide a theoretical account that can also work as a possible conceptual bridge between Synthetic Biology and Artificial Intelligence. In fact, we argue, Synthetic Biology can contribute to the study of minimal cognition, by providing a privileged approach to the study of these mechanisms by means of artificial systems. (shrink)

In this paper a critique to philosophical approaches that presuppose invariant knowledge for policy purposes is carried out. It is shown that socioeconomic processes do not fit to the logic of stable causal factors, but they are more suited to the logic of "open-ended results". On the basis of this ontological variation it is argued that ex-ante interventions are not appropriate in the socioeconomic realm. On the contrary, they must be understood in a “dynamic” sense. Finally, derivational robustness analysis is (...) proposed as a useful tool for overcoming the problem of “overconstraint”, a typical problem of economic models. (shrink)

O tema da política sobre a vida é marcado por uma mudança na forma de governo exercida na institucionalização do biopoder, especialmente a partir da entrada do capitalismo como elemento balizador da governamentalidade. No presente artigo, o objetivo principal é mostrar como a biopolítica governamental, notadamente proposta pelos estudos de Michel Foucault, nos anos 70, desdobra-se e lastreia a tese da necropolítica de Achille Mbembe e suas implicações práticas na contemporaneidade. Para isso, comparo alguns excertos de textos de Foucault, Fanon, (...) Mbembe, Deleuze, Agamben, entre outros, no intuito de explorar como a biopolítica está presente na lógica de controle social, implementada e refinada tecnologicamente por governos, o que pode levar a diversos movimentos persecutórios e preconceituosos com determinados grupos sociais. Por fim, aponto como tais necropolíticas podem ser identificadas no Brasil atual, especialmente com base em relatórios de violência aqui analisados, estudos sobre desigualdade étnico-racial-social e combate socialmente seletivo no enfrentamento da pandemia da Covid-19, destacando a relevância e a atualidade de se discutir tais conceitos sob perspectiva descolonial. (shrink)

In this article an epistemological framework is proposed in order to integrate the emergentist thought with systemic studies on biological autonomy, which are focused on the role of organization. Particular attention will be paid to the role of the observer’s activity, especially: (a) the different operations he performs in order to identify the pertinent elements at each descriptive level, and (b) the relationships between the different models he builds from them. According to the approach sustained here, organization will be considered (...) as the result of a specific operation of identification of the relational properties of the functional components of a system, which do not necessarily coincide with the intrinsic properties of its structural constituents. Also, an epistemological notion of emergence—that of “complex emergence”—will be introduced, which can be defined as the insufficiency, even in principle, of a single descriptive modality to provide a complete description of certain classes of systems. This integrative framework will allow us to deal with two issues in biological and emergentist studies: (1) distinguishing the autonomy proper of living systems from some physical processes like those of structural stability and pattern generation, and (2) reconsidering the notion of downward causation not as a direct or indirect influence of the whole on its parts, but instead as an epistemological problem of interaction between descriptive domains in which the concept of organization proposed and the observational operations related to it play a crucial role. (shrink)

This paper criticises the ideological dimension of the AI narrative. It does so by questioning the implicit assumptions behind its vision, which promises a world that automatically adapts to our desires before we even know them. These assumptions hinge on a misconception of the value of desire as residing exclusively with its fulfilment, warranting human manipulation for increased predictability. This social trajectory towards algorithmic governance, rather than delivering on the promised fulfilment, undermines our capacity to sustain the same desire that (...) it uses to justify its enterprise. (shrink)

O presente artigo apresenta como intuito primordial uma exposição acerca da temática da desumanização presente na literatura de testemunho de Primo Levi (1919-1987) e nas reflexões de Hannah Arendt (1906-1975), sobretudo em sua obra Eichmann em Jerusalém. A investigação acerca do fenômeno da desumanização no universo concentracionário nazista será realizada, primordialmente, a partir de sua relação com a tese da banalidade do mal, que aborda a impessoalização e a perda da consciência moral como integrantes do projeto totalitário de supressão da (...) individualidade e da banalização da barbárie. Numa primeira análise, foi estabelecida uma breve ponderação sobre os principais aspectos do “mal banal” na perspectiva da narrativa histórica de Arendt e de que forma tais elementos dialogam com a despersonalização. Em seguida, a temática da desumanização foi analisada propriamente na literatura primoleviana. Por fim, foi traçado um paralelo entre os dois autores, atestando, de forma categórica, um vínculo direto entre o totalitarismo, a proliferação da banalidade do mal e a desumanização. Fundamentado sob a metodologia de abordagem dedutiva, o presente trabalho foi construído com a utilização de fontes bibliográficas. (shrink)

The aim of this paper is to present some system-theoretical notions ─ such as constraint, closure, integration, coordination, etc. ─ which have recently raised a renovated interest and have undergone a deep development, especially in those branches of philosophy of biology characterized by a systemic approach. The im- plications of these notions for the analysis and characterization of self-maintaining organizations will be discussed with the aid of examples taken from models of minimal living systems, and some conceptual distinctions will be (...) provided. In the last part of the paper the epistemic implications of these ideas will be presented. (shrink)

The aim of this paper is to provide a theoretical framework to understand how multicellular systems realize functionally integrated physiological entities by organizing their intercellular space. From a perspective centered on physiology and integration, biological systems are often characterized as organized in such a way that they realize metabolic self-production and self-maintenance. The existence and activity of their components rely on the network they realize and on the continuous management of the exchange of matter and energy with their environment. One (...) of the virtues of the organismic approach focused on organization is that it can provide an understanding of how biological systems are functionally integrated into coherent wholes. Organismic frameworks have been primarily developed by focusing on unicellular life. Multicellularity, however, presents additional challenges to our understanding of biological systems, related to how cells are capable to live together in higher-order entities, in such a way that some of their features and behaviors are constrained and controlled by the system they realize. Whereas most accounts of multicellularity focus on cell differentiation and increase in size as the main elements to understand biological systems at this level of organization, we argue that these factors are insufficient to provide an understanding of how cells are physically and functionally integrated in a coherent system. In this paper, we provide a new theoretical framework to understand multicellularity, capable to overcome these issues. Our thesis is that one of the fundamental theoretical principles to understand multicellularity, which is missing or underdeveloped in current accounts, is the functional organization of the intercellular space. In our view, the capability to be organized in space plays a central role in this context, as it enables (and allows to exploit all the implications of) cell differentiation and increase in size, and even specialized functions such as immunity. We argue that the extracellular matrix plays a crucial active role in this respect, as an evolutionary ancient and specific (non-cellular) control subsystem that contributes as a key actor to the functional specification of the multicellular space and to modulate cell fate and behavior. We also analyze how multicellular systems exert control upon internal movement and communication. Finally, we show how the organization of space is involved in some of the failures of multicellular organization, such as aging and cancer. (shrink)

Hermeneutics, or the science of interpretation,is well accepted in the humanities. In thefield of education, hermeneutics has played arelatively marginal role in research. It isthe task of this essay to introduce thegeneral methods and findings of Paul Ricoeur'shermeneutics. Specifically, the essayinterprets the usefulness of Ricoeur'sphilosophy in the study of domination. Theproblem of domination has been a target ofanalysis for critical pedagogy since itsinception. However, the role of interpretationas a constitutive part of ideology critique isrelatively understudied and it is here thatRicoeur's (...) ideas are instructive. Last, theessay radicalizes Ricoeur's insights in orderto realize their potential to disruptasymmetrical relations of power in education. To this extent, the author contributes to thebuilding of a critical brand of hermeneutics,or the interpretation of domination. (shrink)