Eighth annual meeting of the international society for the history of the neurosciences hosting the Ninth meeting of the european club for the history of neurology JULY 7–10, 2003

Damasio (1994) claims that Descartes imagined thinking as an activity separate from the body, and that the effort to understand the mind in general biological terms was retarded as a consequence of Descartes dualism. These claims do not hold; they are Damasios error. Descartes never considered what we today call thinking or cognition without taking the body into account. His new dualism required an embodied understanding of cognition. The article gives an historical overview of the development of Descartes radically new psychology from his account of algebraic reasoning in the early Regulae (1628) to his neurobiology of rationality in the late Passions of the soul (1649). The author argues that Descartes dualism opens the way for mechanistic and mathematical explanations of all kinds of physiological and psychological phenomena, including the kind of phenomena Damasio discusses in Descartes error. The models of understanding Damasio puts forward can be seen as advanced version of models which Descartes introduced in the 1640s. A far better title for his book would have been Descartes vision.     

‘Grace for the rebels’: the role of the royal pardon in the Peasants' Revolt of 1381

This article focuses on the Peasants' Revolt of 1381 as a means of examining some of the late medieval assumptions about the nature of royal mercy. Rather than adding to the weight of scholarship on the causes and characteristics of the Revolt, this article discusses the views on mercy (‘grace for the rebels’)1 1?The parliament rolls of medieval England [hereafter PROME], ed. C. Given-Wilson et al. (CD-ROM. Scholarly Digital Editions, Leicester, 2005), ‘Richard II: parliament of 1381, text and translation’, item 30. I would like to thank the audience of the Oxford Medieval History Seminar for their advice on an early version of this paper, and Mark Ormrod for his helpful comments on this essay in draft form. that were reportedly expressed by all parties during the course of the rebellion. The first section analyses the chronicles and their references to discussion of pardon and mercy during the revolt itself. The second section examines the role of the royal pardon in the subsequent judicial proceedings in the Home Counties — who were the first recipients of pardon, and how were they able to secure royal grace? The final section then discusses the formulation of the pardon in the autumn parliament, and the debate surrounding the course of government policy in the wake of revolt on an unprecedented scale. This article seeks to demonstrate that the Crown and commons shared a common language of pardon, and understood that by framing their discussion in terms of royal grace, they were alluding to a particular kind of idealised relationship between the king and his subjects.     

Criteria for Determining an Engineering—Geographic Boundary of the North of the USSR

Reductions of the cost increments of northern development depend to a large extent on the manufacture of machines and equipment with northern specifications designed for operation under low temperatures. Existing definitions of the northern regions of the USSR are not suitable for this purpose. An engineering-geographic regionalization of the USSR is therefore proposed, defining the area of application of specially designed northern machines on the basis of a harshness scale that relates climatic harshness to its effect on machines. The key threshold values on this harshness scale are 4.6, above which ordinary structural steel loses strength and is subject to harshness-related ruptures; 5.3, above which ordinary structural steel becomes brittle and is affected by a fifty-fold increase of ruptures; and 7.9, above which ordinary steel can no longer perform.     

What Sort of Geographical Education for the Anthropocene?

As the Anthropocene concept gains in prominence, there is opportunity to explore it as a social and cultural process, not merely as a matter of scientific definition and debate. This paper seeks to sketch some of the social dimensions of the Anthropocene, in terms of anxiety about the human future, about risk, and about environmental limits. It considers how the term encapsulates a prophetic sense of concern and unease about people's place in nature, the very thing that the embrace of industrial capitalism was supposed to remove. It then explores four open‐ended attributes of a geographical education for the Anthropocene. These are: first, engaging critically with digital technologies; second, countering grand narratives with local encounters; third, setting hope alongside gloom; and fourth, remembering the past as well as the future. The purpose of such attributes is to prepare students for creative encounters with the uncertainties of the Anthropocene. The implications for educational practice are then considered, including the role of active and community‐based learning strategies within a university conceived of as a place of classrooms without borders.     

Guidelines for the “Perfect Inner City”. Discussing the Appropriateness of Monitoring Approaches for Reurbanization

In this paper, we analyse the appropriateness of monitoring approaches for the observation of inner-city reurbanization processes. Reurbanization is conceptualized here as a process of long-term stabilization of inner-city areas by both a readiness of present residents to stay and an influx of new residents. It has been recently re-set on the top of the European urban research agenda since non-growth has proved to be a major path of future development for many European cities. Recent research evidence across Europe underscores the fact that reurbanization depends much on local settings of institutional, socio-economic and infrastructural factors. To foster a clearer understanding of the nature and dynamics of local reurbanization, to assess its extent and progress and, what is more, to help practitioners to shape sustainable policy initiatives appropriate to the respective context, reurbanization needs to be observed over the long term. The complex character of reurbanization sets new challenges for monitoring approaches and indicator-based tools. Due to the genuine relation of the present debate on reurbanization to the phenomenon of non-growth or the return of the compact city, the focus in this paper is set on demographic development trends and their impact on inner-city change. In this vein, our paper presents a monitoring design and a respective newly developed indicator set for reurbanization which focuses more on the initial recognition of reurbanization than on its long-term stability. Methodically, chances and limits of the integration of household-related indicators and qualitative knowledge on reurbanization into monitoring tools are highlighted. Empirical and statistical evidence is taken from a recently completed EU FP 5 research project and from municipal surveys.     

The Effects of the Scientific Survey On the Tibetan Plateau for 50 Years

TheauthorisanAcademicianofCAS.HonoraryPresidentofChina'sSocietyontheTbetanPlaleau.ThefiftyyearsforscientificsurveyontheTibetanPlateauisthataccompaniedwiththefoundationandgroWthofthePeople'sRepublicofChina,andthatrepresentedscientificproaresses,nationalunityandeconomicdeveIopmentin1ibetanareas.ItisthemostpraiseworthyscientificpracticeinChina'sscienceresearchduringthefiftyyears.Manyofus,fromyouthtooldage,havebeenworkingforitfornearlyfiftyyears.WenotonIycontributedOuryouthstagebutalsoallt…     

Following the Living Buddha Xaricang Into Tibet for the Peaceful Liberation of Tibet

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Breaking the Bad News: Plans for the Announcement to the Empire of the Death of Elizabeth II and the Proclamation of Her Successor, 1952–67

This article uses recently released official papers to examine British planning for the announcement of the death of Elizabeth II to the Empire/Commonwealth, and for the involvement of Commonwealth representatives in the proclamation of her successor. The planning process was complicated by the complex and varied nature of the relationship between the Crown and different parts of both the colonial Empire and the independent Commonwealth. While the debates generated by this process tended to revolve around relatively minor issues of protocol, they were informed by a much more serious concern: the extent to which the institution of the British monarchy should adapt to meet the needs of the ‘new’ Commonwealth. Those advocating flexibility saw this as essential if the Crown was to continue to have a unifying role within the Commonwealth. Traditionalists, however, feared that reform would weaken the value of the monarchy as the focus of a specifically British national identity.     

Explanations for the Outbreak of Cattle Plague in Cheshire in 1865–1866: 'Fear the Wrath of the Lord'

Abstract

'Explanations for the Outbreak of Cattle Plague in Cheshire in 1865–66: "Fear the Wrath of the Lord"'. This article examines the explanations advanced for the outbreak of rinderpest in 1865–66, which bore disproportionately upon Cheshire. Although there was some criticism of unsatisfactory farming practices and their role in spreading disease, most people were prepared to accept that the epidemic was God's punishment for sin — either sin by the population or by the government on their behalf. This explanation was made all the more acceptable by the failure of veterinary surgeons and other parties to produce an effective cure. The views expressed were those of an age where atonement for sin was a dominant element in religious thought.     

Was James Madison Ever for the Bill of Rights?

Abstract

This article revisits the question whether James Madison believed the Bill of Rights improved the Constitution. In particular, it asks whether the evidence supports the argument that Madison was persuaded that bills of rights serve an important educative function in constitutional government. It concludes that the evidence does not support this argument and suggests that Madison did not believe that the Bill of Rights improved the Constitution.     

The Style of Blugzeimat and the “Masks” of the Prehistoric Rock Art of the Western Sahara: New Evidence for Long-Distance Contacts

Blugzeimat is a prehistoric rock-art site in the Tiris region (southern Western Sahara), with more than 100 engraved slabs. The major portion of these engravings represents zoomorphs, anthropomorphs and non-figurative signs. Based on the absence of protohistoric texts, chariots or horse riders, and the probable depiction of a halberd, the age of these engravings may correspond to the first half of the second millennium BCE. The stylistic attributes of the engraved bovines, which are the most commonly represented subject, allow us to relate Blugzeimat to several sites with pecked engravings located in the Tiris (Western Sahara) and Adrar (north-western Mauritania) regions. In addition to this first stylistic and geographic delimitation, we have also been able to identify signs, traditionally designated as “masks” in the literature, which relate Blugzeimat to several sites with incised engravings located in the northern Saguia el Hamra basin. As incised and pecked engraving techniques have been regularly considered examples of unrelated rupestrian traditions in the Western Sahara, the engraving of these highly specific signs using both techniques allows us to question that paradigm. Finally, the long-distance thematic coincidence represented by the presence of such signs, in regions far from one another, provides additional evidence to refute the common idea of an absence or scarcity of cultural contacts between the north and south of the Western Sahara before the adoption of the horse and camel.     

In the shadow of Franz Boas: the Italian Committee for the Study of Population Problems and the physical assimilation of immigrants (1938–1955)

ABSTRACT

Between 1938 and 1955, the Italian Committee for the Study of Population Problems (C.I.S.P.), headed by the world-renowned statistician and demographer Corrado Gini, organized a number of field expeditions in order to empirically verify the influence of the environment on the bodily changes of immigrants (Albanian and Ligurian ‘colonies’ in Italy, and Italians in the U.S.). Based on original archival sources, this article analyses, first, how the C.I.S.P. organized the demographic, anthropological and medical investigations on the physical assimilation of immigrants, by adopting a specific research model inaugurated in 1911 by American anthropologist Franz Boas; secondly, it shows how C.I.S.P. research was conceived, from the very beginning, as a fundamental contribution to the elaboration of an alternative, ‘Latin’ eugenic agenda as well as a form of critical distancing from the launch of the ‘Race Manifesto’, in July 1938.     

Governing Civil Society in Cambodia: Implications of the NGO Law for the “Rule of Law”

Abstract

This article reviews the introduction of the 2015 Law on Associations and Non-governmental Organisations in Cambodia (“NGO Law”) from 2011–17 and explores its connection to the rule of law. After outlining the content, definitions and regulatory environment related to the NGO Law, it provides a commentary on its initial application, and examines its potential articulation with other legislation (such as defamation and libel, telecommunications law and land law). I argue that the NGO Law should be characterised as a carefully crafted piece of legislation, developed and defended over time by the ruling political party to increase control and intimidation by invoking adherence to the “rule of law”. Narratives of national security, terrorism, neutrality and cultural cohesion have been interwoven with new regulatory requirements to obfuscate overt political interference. The article argues that the NGO Law intersects with, and consolidates, the recent trend of the government’s use of legislation as a political tool to control and manipulate political opponents and government critics. This is not to deny that there are areas of civil society action and service provision that require greater government control via regulatory compliance. Nevertheless, the state’s attempts to tighten civil space are being met with resistance and “work around” strategies from the plethora of diverse organisations functioning in Cambodia.     

A Review of “Fighting for the Speakership: The House and the Rise of Party Government”

We explore the sensitivity of Congress to statements of administration policy (SAPs) and signing statements in the struggle with the executive over policy. We hypothesize that the nature and use of objections contained in these presidential communications generates additional congressional oversight. To test whether this happens, we developed a dataset with all SAPs, signing statements, and congressional oversight hearings from 1997 through 2007. The results indicate that the type and number of objections raised in presidential communications affects congressional oversight activity.