Search results for "Philosophy of Science"
showing 10 items of 808 documents
Spain and the international scientific conferences on polio, 1940s-1960s
2010
The development of international health from a historical point of view has undergone major advances in recent times and constitutes a substantial part of the current agenda for historians of medicine. Within this framework, and focussing on a specific case study (international responses to poliomyelitis outbreaks in the 20th century), we explore the main actions and achievements of agencies such as the WHO and other private and international scientific organizations. Furthermore, this paper seeks to identify the Spanish presence and absence in these activities, their causes and consequences.
The medicalization of suicide in 19th century Spain: theoretical, professional and cultural aspects
2012
This paper analyzes the medicalization process of suicide in Spain during the 19th century. It describes the transition of suicide seen as an act of free will to a model, developed by mental doctors, which considered it a pathological behavior. Against this model, other conservative positions from the fields of Law and Medicine continued to defend the traditional view. The initial interest of mental medicine regarding the social aspects of suicide was developed during this period. The social factor that authors considered to be the most influential to suicide was the loss of religious ideas, which was understandable considering that religion was very present in Spanish science and society t…
[Los laboratorios de la Junta para Ampliación de Estudios e Investigaciones Científicas (J.A.E.) y la Residencia de Estudiantes (1912-1939)].
2007
La política de jóvenes pensionados científicos en el extranjero desarrollada por la JAE tuvo un complemento importante en la puesta en marcha de una serie de pequeños laboratorios científicos y centros de investigación agrupados principalmente en el Instituto Nacional de Ciencias y la Residencia de Estudiantes. El presente artículo aporta una perspectiva general de la labor realizada por algunos de esos laboratorios, sus principales protagonistas y grupos de investigación, particularmente los relacionados con las investigaciones biomédicas. No se analiza la labor del Instituto Cajal o el Museo de Ciencias Naturales, que son objeto de otras contribuciones en este mismo número monográfico. Se…
On Heidegger’s Sofa: Some Remarks on Psychotherapy from Historical and Philosophical Points of View
2019
AbstractOur starting point in this article is that the question of the essence of psychotherapy has to some extent been neglected. Its medical context has strengthened the tendency to interpret psychotherapy in general from a technical and overtly rationalistic standpoint. Instead, we would underline the importance of the philosophical and historical roots of all psychotherapies. In our view, it is imperative to acknowledge the antirationalistic underpinnings that have always informed the discipline. We show how speculative mysticism and the late philosophy of Martin Heidegger have proved to be indispensable tools in setting psychotherapies in their philosophical and historical context. Rob…
Science and law in the time of cholera: the mystery of the biscuits in Torroja (1865)
2018
By focussing on a case of collective poisoning in 1865, four features of forensic cultures are analysed: technologies for detection, authorized voices, regulations in action and the predominant social anxieties. Local newspapers and archival documents kept in the medical academies of Barcelona and Madrid are analysed. The analysis shows the tensions between various types of proof employed in legal medicine and the ambiguities between epidemic diseases and poisoning accidents. In the first section, I review the fears caused by the cholera epidemic in 1865, which was the first explanation of the accident. The changes of popular perception are also discussed by analysing contemporary newspaper…
Regulatory cytokine gene polymorphisms and risk of colorectal carcinoma.
2006
It is well established that cancer arises in chronically inflamed tissue, and this is particularly notable in the gastrointestinal tract. Classic examples include Helicobacter pylori-associated gastric cancer, hepatocellular carcinoma, and inflammatory bowel disease-associated colorectal cancer. Growing evidence suggests that these associations might be not casual findings. Focusing on individual cytokines has generated evidence that anti-inflammatory cytokine interleukin (IL)-10 and transforming growth factor-beta1 (TGF-beta1) may have a complex role in gastrointestinal carcinogenesis. As an example, IL-10-deficient mice develop severe atrophic gastritis and a chronic enterocolitis, develo…
Nonlinear nystagmus processing causes torsional VOR nonlinearity.
2003
The eye movement component that rotates around the line of sight, i.e., the ocular torsion, is in many aspects different from horizontal and vertical eye movements. While ocular torsion is mediated only by reflexive pathways like the torsional vestibulo-ocular and optokinetic reflexes (TVOR and OKN, respectively), horizontal and vertical components are also subject to intentional control mechanisms that are mediated by the saccadic and the pursuit systems. Dynamic properties of torsional eye movements are also very distinct. While horizontal and vertical VOR components show a gain close to unity and a small neural integration leakage with a time constant around pi=30 s, the TVOR shows a sma…
Botànica per a després d’una guerra: el viatge de Joan Salvador i Antoine de Jussieu per Espanya i Portugal
2013
Entre 1716 i 1717 l’apotecari barceloni Joan Salvador i Riera i Antoine de Jussieu, professor de botanica del Jardin du Roi de Paris van recorrer els camins d’Espanya i Portugal, ades en calessa, ades a lloms de mula per fer «observacions botaniques» . Aquest article presenta una breu ressenya de la nissaga dels Salvador i descriu sumariament el viatge dels dos naturalistes.
Viatgers romàntics. Els viatges d’Alexander von Humboldt i de Charles Darwin
2013
Tot i pertànyer a generacions diferents i representar formes diferents d’aproximació a l’estudi de la natura, Humboldt i Darwin comparteixen el fet de tenir en l’aventura individual d’un gran viatge iniciàtic la fita determinant de la seva fructífera carrera científica.
Las TIC (Tecnologías de la Información y la Comunicación) y los estudios biográficos
2005
Final version of the paper at: http://asclepio.revistas.csic.es/index.php/asclepio/article/view/37/36