William Thomson published between 1849 and 1852 three influential papers on the theory of heat. However, historians of science have already called attention to Thomson's difficulties in reconciling a principle formulated by James Prescott Joule with another principle formulated by Nicolas Leonard Sadi Carnot, and to errors Thomson made in his calculations. In the meantime, Rudolf Julius Emmanuel Clausius reconciled the two principles, and in 1854 he derived an expression for Carnot's principle. The author and collaborators have shown elsewhere that (...) it was fundamental to Clausius' reasoning that he took to its ultimate consequence the meaning of Carnot's principle as a ‘recovery’ condition. Thomson somehow let the meaning of ‘recovery’ escape him. Therefrom came his troubles. He seems to have been so obsessed by his initial difficulties that he put the emphasis on irreversibility and on conservation of energy, missing ‘all the rest’. (shrink)

This paper is concerned with the introduction of statistical concepts in the molecular theory of heat. In particular, we analyse the arguments invoked by Clausius between 1857 and 1862, and the motivation presented by Maxwell in 1860 to introduce his distribution of velocities. We first show that Maxwell's great insight seems to have been the recognition that the dynamical laws of molecular collision and thermal equilibrium could be made compatible only if the theory of heat became statistical. As for Clausius, (...) historians of science have observed that in 1857 he used probabilities to bring regularity to the theory, but have not satisfactorily analysed important features of his use of probabilities in the context of the theory of heat. We show that only in 1862, in order to answer a criticism to his paper of 1858, Clausius gave a meaning to random motion, along the lines proposed by Maxwell, in his paper of 1860. (shrink)

In 1751, LEONHARD EULER established “harmony” between two principles that had been stated by PIERRE-LOUIS-MOREAU DE MAUPERTUIS a few years earlier. These principles are intended to be the foundations of Mechanics; they are the principle of rest and the principle of least action.My claim is that the way in which “harmony” is achieved sets the foundations of so called Analytical Mechanics: it discloses the physical bases of the general ideas, concepts, and motivations of the formalism. My paper intends to show (...) what those physical bases are, and how a picture of the formalism issues from them. This picture is shown to be recast in JOSEPH-LOUIS LAGRANGES justification of the formalism, which strengthens my claim. (shrink)

RESUMO Este artigo se propõe discutir a constituição de comunidades de leitores, a partir de concepções advindas do Círculo de Bakhtin sobre linguagem, forças centrífugas e centrípetas; de Canclini sobre cultura/coleção; de reflexões de autores contemporâneos sobre juventudes e cultura juvenil e de Chartier sobre leitura. Interessa-nos problematizar como se constituem essas comunidades e como se dão as práticas leitoras em torno de obras que se colocam fora do cânone e da “boa leitura”. Investigamos, em uma pesquisamaior, como esses jovens (...) se organizam em comunidades de leitores para a produção e para o compartilhamento de saberes e de experiências. ABSTRACT This article aims to discuss the constitution of communities of readers based on the Bakhtin Circle’s conceptions of language, centrifugal and centripetal forces; Canclini’s understanding of culture/collection; contemporary authors’s reflections on youths and youth culture, and Chartier’s reflection on reading. It interests us to problematize how these communities are constituted and how the reading practices occur as they are related to works that are placed outside the canon and are not considered “good reading”. As part of a broader research study, we investigated how these youths are organized in communities of readers for the production and sharing of knowledge and experience. (shrink)

ROCHA, Maria da Penha Nunes da. As estratégias de comunicação da Igreja Universal do Reino de Deus. GOMES, Suzana dos Santos. Tessituras docentes de avaliação formativa.

ABSTRACT This article aims to analyze, from a Bakhtinian perspective, the grotesque construction of Mexican artist Frida Kahlo’s body through a religious worldview. Therefore, we analyze two of her self-portraits, taking into account the dialogic relations constructed between the grotesque representations and Catholic symbology. The analyzed utterances, in which the specificities of the creative competence of the author-creator in her aesthetic activity are inferred, showed that a dialogue is established between the painting El venado herido and Catholic Saint Sebastian and (...) between the painting Las dos fridas and the image of the Sacred Heart of Jesus. (shrink)

Neste artigo, usamos a Análise de Discurso Crítica como abordagem teórico-metodológica para analisar argumentos de ministros e ministras do Superior Tribunal de Justiça em um acórdão que afetou o entendimento jurisprudencial brasileiro sobre a Lei Maria da Penha. O principal objetivo neste trabalho é analisar como a Justiça constrói argumentos relativos à violência contra as mulheres em um órgão público notório, como o STJ, que é popularmente conhecido como "Tribunal da Cidadania" por, supostamente, garantir o exercício de vários (...) direitos para a população brasileira. Também buscamos trazer a público diálogos conflitantes, ideologias e jogos de poder inerentes à decisão em análise.This study employs Critical Discourse Analysis as thetheoretical framework to analyze the arguments used by the Superior Court of Justice in decisions related to the Maria da Penha Act, which had significant impact on Brazilian case law. The author's main objective is to discuss how Brazilian Justices construct legal arguments about violence against women in such an important public institution as the Superior Court, popularly known as the "Citizenship Court." The paper also aims to expose conflicting dialogues, ideologies, and power games that are inherent in these decisions. (shrink)

Law No. 11,340/2006, also known as the "Maria da Penha" Law, was created after the condemnation to exclusively protect women victims of violence. In Article 9, § 2, item II, there is a specific rule on the employment contract, which allows the judge to ensure that women in situations of domestic and family violence maintain the employment relationship for up to six months. During this period, women have the right to be absent from work, thus contributing to the (...) preservation of their physical and psychological integrity. The objective of this paper is to better analyze how the international system may further contribute to increasing the labor legal protection of women victims of domestic violence. A prospective-documentary technique was employed to analyze the Brazilian domestic legislation and the international system, including norms of the International Labor Organization (ILO) and the jurisprudence of the Inter-American Commission on Human Rights of the Organization of American States (OAS). These analyses reveal that despite the separation of social phenomena – domestic violence occurring in the private sphere, and work belonging to the public sphere of the victim's life – international principles, so-called soft law rules, can be used to further enhance the protection of women victims of domestic violence in Brazil. These women require a whole set of mechanisms that protect their physical, psychological, and emotional integrity, but also guarantee financial and professional support. This multidimensional response to domestic violence is central to a country that ranks 5th in the world for femicide. (shrink)

María Lugones, one of the premiere figures in feminist philosophy, has at last collected some of her most famous essays, as well as some lesser-known gems, into her first book.

We argue that philosophers are competent to facilitate public discussion concerning restrictions on human migration across political borders. We also argue that presenting public audiences with a prima facie case for open borders offers a unique opportunity to elucidate important aspects of philosophical reasoning. Finally, we share resources and a lesson plan for those keen to examine the case for open borders with students, or to facilitate public discussion on these issues.

Creativity has often been declared, especially by philosophers, as the last frontier of science. The assumption is that it will defy explanation forever. I will defend two claims in order to oppose this assumption and to demystify creativity: (1) the perspective that creativity cannot be explained wrongly identifies creativity with what I shall call metaphysical freedom; (2) the Darwinian approach to creativity, a prominent naturalistic account of creativity, fails to give an explanation of creativity, because it confuses conceptual issues with (...) explanation. I will close with some remarks on the status and differences in some explanations available in contemporary cognitive science. (shrink)

I argue that creativity is compatible with determinism and therefore with naturalistic explanation. I explore different kinds of novelty, corresponding with four distinct concepts of creativity – anthropological, historical, psychological and metaphysical. Psychological creativity incorporates originality and spontaneity. Taken together, these point to the independence of the creative mind from social learning, experience and previously acquired knowledge. This independence is nevertheless compatible with determinism. Creativity is opposed to specific causal factors, but it does not exclude causal determination as such. So (...) creativity can be naturalized. (shrink)

This paper argues that the so-called ‘paradox’ of dehumanization is a mirage arising from misplaced abstraction. The alleged ‘paradox’ is taken as challenge that arises from a skeptical stance. After reviewing the history of that skeptical stance, it is reconstructed as an argument with two premises. With the help of an epistemologically structured but pluralistic frame it is then shown how the two premises of the Skeptic’s argument can both be debunked. As part of that it emerges that there are (...) a couple of ways how dehumanization can be realized, and one such realization can be sufficient for affirming the reality of dehumanization for a specific case. (shrink)

In the face of causal complexity, scientists reconstitute phenomena in order to arrive at a more simplified and partial picture that ignores most of the 'bigger picture.' This paper will distinguish between two modes of reconstituting phenomena: one moving down to a level of greater decomposition (toward organizational parts of the original phenomenon), and one moving up to a level of greater abstraction (toward different differences regarding the phenomenon). The first aim of the paper is to illustrate that phenomena are (...) moving targets, i.e., they are not fixed once and for all, but are adapted, if necessary, on the basis of the preferred perspective adopted for pragmatic reasons. The second aim is to analyze in detail the second mode of reconstituting phenomena. This includes an exposition of the kind of pragmatic-pluralistic picture resulting from the fact that phenomena are reconstituted by a move up to a level of greater abstraction. (shrink)

The book examines how Darwinism has been used to explain novelty and change in culture through the Darwinian approach to creativity and the theory of memes. The first claims that creativity is based on a Darwinian process of blind variation and selection, while the latter claims that culture is based on and explained by units - memes - that are similar to genes. Both theories try to describe and explain mind and culture by applying Darwinism by way of analogies. Kronfeldner (...) shows that the analogies involved in these theories lead to claims that give either wrong or at least no new descriptions or explanations of the phenomena at issue. Whereas the two approaches are usually defended or criticized on the basis that they are dangerous for our vision of ourselves, this book takes a different perspective: it questions the acuteness of these approaches. Darwinian theory is not like a dangerous wolf, hunting for our self image. Far from it, in the case of the two analogical applications addressed in this book, Darwinian theory is shown to behave more like a disoriented sheep in wolf's clothing. - A revised and much shortened version of a dissertation (2007, Darwinism, Memes and Creativity: A Critique of Analogical Reasoning from Nature to Culture). (shrink)

Os registros históricos humanos sofreram transformações à medida em que evoluíam as tecnologias. Quanto maior a evolução tecnológica, mais informações puderam ser disseminadas. O objetivo desta pesquisa é discutir as possíveis similaridades entre a Ciência da Informação e as nuances pós-modernas. Como procedimentos metodológicos apresenta uma pesquisa de natureza qualitativa e exploratória baseada em uma revisão bibliográfica. O estudo possibilitou a confirmação dos elementos relacionais para uma compreensão dialógica entre a pós-modernidade, a complexidade e a Ciência da Informação. O pensamento (...) pós-moderno questiona paradigmas consolidados na Ciência Moderna, contrapondo-se às ideias e práticas inerentes ao pensamento científico baseado no paradigma dominante, mais especificamente nos preceitos provenientes do racionalismo científico, da visão reducionista e da discrepante realidade de grupos sociais. (shrink)

Over the last four decades arguments for and against the claim that creative hypothesis formation is based on Darwinian ‘blind’ variation have been put forward. This paper offers a new and systematic route through this long-lasting debate. It distinguishes between undirected, random, and unjustified variation, to prevent widespread confusions regarding the meaning of undirected variation. These misunderstandings concern Lamarckism, equiprobability, developmental constraints, and creative hypothesis formation. The paper then introduces and develops the standard critique that creative hypothesis formation is guided (...) rather than blind, integrating developments from contemporary research on creativity. On that basis, I discuss three compatibility arguments that have been used to answer the critique. These arguments do not deny guided variation but insist that an important analogy exists nonetheless. These compatibility arguments all fail, even though they do so for different reasons: trivialisation, conceptual confusion, and lack of evidence respectively. Revisiting the debate in this manner not only allows us to see where exactly a ‘Darwinian’ account of creative hypothesis formation goes wrong, but also to see that the debate is not about factual issues, but about the interpretation of these factual issues in Darwinian terms. (shrink)

Human nature is a concept that transgresses the boundary between science and society and between fact and value. It is as much a political concept as it is a scientific one. This chapter will cover the politics of human nature by using evidence from history, anthropology and social psychology. The aim is to show that an important political function of the vernacular concept of human nature is social demarcation (inclusion/exclusion): it is involved in regulating who is ‘us’ and who is (...) ‘them.’ It is a folk concept that is used for dehumanization, for denying (a) membership in humankind or (b) full humanness to certain people in order to include or exclude them from various forms of politically relevant aspects of human life, such as rights, power, etc. (shrink)

In this paper I want to leave behind the failed attempts to think about populism as ideology, strategy, style, or even discourse. I will focus on the ‘conceptual battles of politics’ and their potential to influence actors to pursue and effect specific ends. Reinhart Koselleck and his ideas about conceptual history will figure prominently in my discussion, as will his concept of asymmetrical combat-concept as a means of unleashing a theoretical and political war. The goal is to demonstrate that concepts (...) have taken the place of weapons of war among political actors. (shrink)

This paper revisits Donnellan’s distinction between referential and attributive uses of definite descriptions and argues that it is not exhaustive. Donnellan characterizes the distinction in terms of two criteria: the speaker’s intentions and the type of content the speaker aims to express. I argue that contrary to the common view, these two criteria are independent and that the distinctive features may be coinstantiated in more than two ways. This leaves room for nonattributive and nonreferential uses of definite descriptions. Kripke’s notions (...) of general and specific intentions provide a framework that accommodates such cases. Additionally, it proves useful for the analysis of the use of proper names with specific nonsingular intentions. The paper also discusses how the interpretation of the use of definite descriptions as attributive or referential (or neither) is sensitive to which theory of singular thoughts one adopts. (shrink)

Continuing Franz Boas' work to establish anthropology as an academic discipline in the US at the turn of the twentieth century, Alfred L. Kroeber re-defined culture as a phenomenon sui generis. To achieve this he asked geneticists to enter into a coalition against hereditarian thoughts prevalent at that time in the US. The goal was to create space for anthropology as a separate discipline within academia, distinct from other disciplines. To this end he crossed the boundary separating anthropology from biology (...) in order to secure the boundary. His notion of culture, closely bound to the concept of heredity, saw it as independent of biological heredity (culture as superorganic) but at the same time as a heredity of another sort. The paper intends to summarise the shifting boundaries of anthropology at the beginning of the twentieth century, and to present Kroeber?s ideas on culture, with a focus on how the changing landscape of concepts of heredity influenced his views. The historical case serves to illustrate two general conclusions: that the concept of culture played and plays different roles in explaining human existence; that genetics and the concept of Weismannian hard inheritance did not have an unambiguous unidirectional historical effect on the vogue for hereditarianism at that time; on the contrary, it helped to establish culture in Kroeber's sense, culture as independent of heredity. (shrink)

This paper spells out the ways in which we need to be pluralists about “human nature”. It discusses a conceptual pluralism about the concept of “human nature”, stemming from post-essentialist ontology and the semantic complexity of the term “nature”; a descriptive pluralism about the “descriptive nature” of human beings, which is a pluralism regarding our self-understanding as human beings that stems from the long list of typical features of, and relations between, human beings; a natural kind term pluralism, which is (...) a pluralism that concerns the choices we have in deciding how to apply the kind term “human”; and an explanatory pluralism that results from the causal complexity of life. Because of the complexity of being human, which gives rise to these pluralisms, being human is, the paper claims, a kaleidoscopic affair, and one far from concerning the life sciences only. (shrink)

This paper addresses whether the often-bemoaned loss of unity of knowledge about humans, which results from the disciplinary fragmentation of science, is something to be overcome. The fragmentation of being human rests on a couple of distinctions, such as the nature-culture divide. Since antiquity the distinction between nature (roughly, what we inherit biologically) and culture (roughly, what is acquired by social interaction) has been a commonplace in science and society. Recently, the nature/culture divide has come under attack in various ways, (...) in philosophy as well as in cultural anthropology. Regarding the latter, for instance, the divide was quintessential in its beginnings as an academic dis-cipline, when Alfred L. Kroeber, one of the first professional anthropologists in the US, rallied for (what I call) the right to ignore—in his case, human nature—by adopting a separationist epistemic stance. A separationist stance will be understood as an epistemic research heuristic that defends the right to ignore a specif-ic phenomenon (e.g., human nature) or a specific causal factor in an explanation typical for a disciplinary field. I will use Kroeber’s case as an example for making a general point against a bias towards integration (synthesis bias, as I call it) that is exemplified, for instance, by defenders of evolutionary psychology. I will claim that, in principle, a separationist stance is as good as an integrationist stance since both can be equally fruitful. With this argument from fruitful sepa-ration in place, not just the separationist stance but also the nature/culture di-vide can be defended against its critics. (shrink)

The article addresses the question whether culture evolves in a Lamarckian manner. I highlight three central aspects of a Lamarckian concept of evolution: the inheritance of acquired characteristics, the transformational pattern of evolution, and the concept of directed changes. A clear exposition of these aspects shows that a system can be a Darwinian variational system instead of a Lamarckian transformational one, even if it is based on inheritance of acquired characteristics and/or on Lamarckian directed changes. On this basis, I apply (...) the three aspects to culture. Taking for granted that culture is a variational system, based on selection processes, I discuss in detail the senses in which cultural inheritance can be said to be Lamarckian and in which sense problem solving, a major factor in cultural change, leads to directed variation. (shrink)

This article illustrates in which sense genetic determinism is still part of the contemporary interactionist consensus in medicine. Three dimensions of this consensus are discussed: kinds of causes, a continuum of traits ranging from monogenetic diseases to car accidents, and different kinds of determination due to different norms of reaction. On this basis, this article explicates in which sense the interactionist consensus presupposes the innate?acquired distinction. After a descriptive Part 1, Part 2 reviews why the innate?acquired distinction is under attack (...) in contemporary philosophy of biology. Three arguments are then presented to provide a limited and pragmatic defense of the distinction: an epistemic, a conceptual, and a historical argument. If interpreted in a certain manner, and if the pragmatic goals of prevention and treatment are taken into account, then the innate?acquired distinction can be a useful epistemic tool. It can help, first, to understand that genetic determination does not mean fatalism, and, second, to maintain a system of checks and balances in the continuing nature?nurture debates. (shrink)

This paper has two aims. First, to bring together the models of temporal phenomenology on offer and to present these using a consistent set of distinctions and terminologies. Second, to examine the methodologies currently practiced in the development of these models. To that end we present an abstract characterisation in which we catalogue all extant models. We then argue that neither of the two extreme methodologies currently discussed is suitable to the task of developing a model of temporal phenomenology. An (...) entirely top-down methodology is largely insensitive to empirical findings, while one that is entirely bottom-up is insensitive to both introspective evidence and more general philosophical considerations. We recommend a methodology that falls between these two extremes. (shrink)

Leibniz's metaphysics appears to go a long way towards monism: it supports a strong dependence of limited things on the absolute or God and understands this dependence not only as causal dependence but also as a pervasive ontological dependence which involves the communality of nature between absolute and limited. Yet, Leibniz stops short of affirming monism. Why? This paper takes a fresh look at Leibniz's reasons for opposing monism through the lens of a virtually unknown text of 1698 on the (...) metaphysical foundations of the infinite. Against the backdrop of the present-day monistic proposals of Jonathan Schaffer and Michael Della Rocca, the paper identifies and evaluates four different types of monism: 1. Whole-Part Monism; 2. World-Animal Monism; 3. God-Nature Monism and 4. Eleatic Monism. It argues that Leibniz's opposition to Whole-Part Monism, World-Animal Monism, and God-Nature Monism, is due to his conceptions of the infinite and of what it is to be “an absolutely absolute Being”. Furthermore, it argues that the only type of monism which could preserve Leibniz's demanding notions of real infinite and absolute is Eleatic Monism. The latter, however, is also rejected by Leibniz due to our first-hand experience of what it is to be a substance. (shrink)

This research aims to identify the ethical issues perceived by intensive care nurses in their everyday practice. It also aims to understand why these situations were considered an ethical issue and what interventions/strategies have been or are expected to be developed so as to minimize them. Data were collected using a semi-structured interview with 15 nurses working at polyvalent intensive care units in 4 Portuguese hospitals, who were selected by the homogenization of multiple samples. The qualitative content analysis identified end-of-life (...) decisions, privacy, interaction, team work, and health-care access as emerging ethical issues. Personal, team, and institutional aspects emerge as reasons behind the experience of these issues. Personal and team resources are used in and for solving these issues. Moral development and training are the most significant strategies. (shrink)

The term ‘human nature’ can refer to different things in the world and fulfil different epistemic roles. Human nature can refer to a classificatory nature (classificatory criteria that determine the boundaries of, and membership in, a biological or social group called ‘human’), a descriptive nature (a bundle of properties describing the respective group’s life form), or an explanatory nature (a set of factors explaining that life form). This chapter will first introduce these three kinds of ‘human nature’, together with seven (...) reasons why we disagree about human nature. In the main, this chapter focuses on the explanatory concept of human nature, which is related to one of the seven reasons for disagreement, namely, the scientific authority inherent in the term ‘nature’. I will examine why, in a number of historical contexts, it was attractive to refer to ‘nature’ as an explanatory category, and why this usage has led to the continual contestation of the term within the sciences. The claim is that even if the contents of talk about ‘nature’ varied historically, the term’s pragmatic function of demarcation stayed the same. The term ‘nature’ conveys scientific authority over a territory; ‘human nature’ is a concept used to divide causes, as well as experts, and thereby conquer others who threaten to invade one’s epistemic territory. Analysing this demarcation, which has social as well as epistemic aspects, will help us to understand why the explanatory role has been important and why it is unlikely that people will ever agree on either the meaning or the importance of ‘human nature’ as an explanatory category. (shrink)