scholarly journals Peto's paradox and the promise of comparative oncology

2015 ◽  
Vol 370 (1673) ◽  
pp. 20140177 ◽  
Author(s):  
Leonard Nunney ◽  
Carlo C. Maley ◽  
Matthew Breen ◽  
Michael E. Hochberg ◽  
Joshua D. Schiffman

The past several decades have seen a paradigm shift with the integration of evolutionary thinking into studying cancer. The evolutionary lens is most commonly employed in understanding cancer emergence, tumour growth and metastasis, but there is an increasing realization that cancer defences both between tissues within the individual and between species have been influenced by natural selection. This special issue focuses on discoveries of these deeper evolutionary phenomena in the emerging area of ‘comparative oncology’. Comparing cancer dynamics in different tissues or species can lead to insights into how biology and ecology have led to differences in carcinogenesis, and the diversity, incidence and lethality of cancers. In this introduction to the special issue, we review the history of the field and outline how the contributions use empirical, comparative and theoretical approaches to address the processes and patterns associated with ‘Peto's paradox’, the lack of a statistical relationship of cancer incidence with body size and longevity. This burgeoning area of research can help us understand that cancer is not only a disease but is also a driving force in biological systems and species life histories. Comparative oncology will be key to understanding globally important health issues, including cancer epidemiology, prevention and improved therapies.

2021 ◽  
Vol 26 (2) ◽  
pp. 69-81
Author(s):  
Vladimir V. Starovoitov ◽  

The article deals with the psychodynamic theory of the development of the individual in his personal relationships created by the English psychoanalyst and psychiatrist D. Winnicott. Winnicott created a special model of the intersubjective approach in clinical psychoanalysis. According to this approach, the studied subject, considered in the context of its culture, is largely determined by the past history of its development. Winnicott believed that a third area, the cultural experience of mankind, should be added to the other two areas explored in psychoanalytic theory: the inner psychic reality of the individual and the real world and the people living in it. His studies of childhood, in which he studied the relationship of the infant with the mother, the phenomenon of the transitional object, the role and influence of play in therapeutic work, etc., are particularly well known. According to the author of the article, Winnicott's study of the earliest experiences of the infant, due to the primary connection “mother-baby”, gave rise to the ideas that have become key to understanding these deepest levels of mental life.


2020 ◽  
Vol 50 (1-2) ◽  
pp. 58-66
Author(s):  
Giuliano Pancaldi

Here I survey a sample of the essays and reviews on the sciences of the long eighteenth century published in this journal since it was founded in 1969. The connecting thread is some historiographic reflections on the role that disciplines—in both the sciences we study and the fields we practice—have played in the development of the history of science over the past half century. I argue that, as far as disciplines are concerned, we now find ourselves a bit closer to a situation described in our studies of the long eighteenth century than we were fifty years ago. This should both favor our understanding of that period and, hopefully, make the historical studies that explore it more relevant to present-day developments and science policy. This essay is part of a special issue entitled “Looking Backward, Looking Forward: HSNS at 50,” edited by Erika Lorraine Milam.


2019 ◽  
Vol 12 (2) ◽  
pp. 99-114
Author(s):  
Maren Freudenberg ◽  
Tim Weitzel

The introduction to the special issue on ‘charisma’ offers a very brief overview of the development of the concept in the social sciences and various critiques and intersecting debates. It casts a close look at Max Weber’s sometimes contradictory use of the concept and the different ways he conceptualized it in his sociology of religion and his sociology of domination. It then examines alternative theoretical approaches to ‘charisma’ that emerge in the course of the twentieth century before outlining this special issue’s contribution to the conceptual debate and the individual articles’ operationalization of the term by viewing charisma as relational, communicative, procedural, as well as related to ideas, practices, and objects.


1966 ◽  
Vol 98 (2) ◽  
pp. 123-140 ◽  
Author(s):  
F. R. Allchin

To the outside observer the history of Hindu sectarianism often appears as a disorganized tangle, lacking clarity and precision. The whole process is made if anything more complex by the ill-defined relationship of sect and non-sect. As Renou remarks: Though no statistics are available, even for the present day, we have grounds for supposing that the most active sects were themselves only isolated groups within the great body of believers. From another point of view, however, the history is more understandable. A considerable part of sectarian activity during the past 1,500 years has been concerned with the spread and regional development of a single great devotional movement. Seen from this position, the uniformity and theological coherence of the sects, whether they be called Vaiṣṇavite, Śaivite, or by some other name, is remarkable and often overrides the no less real disparities of doctrine or detail at another level. Again, in this process regional variations have arisen in no small measure as a result of the popular character of the writings of particular saints. Thus, for example, Basava or Purandara Dāsa hold pride of place in the Karnāṭka, the one Vīra Śaiva, the other Vaiṣṇava; in Mahārāṣṇra devotion has in no small part been moulded by the thought of Jāân Dev or Tukā Rām; in the Pañjāb by Nānak; and in the Hindī region by Kabīr Dās, Tulsī Dās, and Sūr Dās. Throughout north India the influences which lay behind the movement were largely, but by no means exclusively, Vaiṣṇavite; yet other streams contributed, Śaivite, Buddhist, Tāntrika, Yogī, etc.


2015 ◽  
Vol 58 (1-2) ◽  
pp. 21-55
Author(s):  
Astrid Meier ◽  
Tariq Tell

Environmental history provides a perspective from which we can deepen our understanding of the past because it examines the relationships of people with their material surroundings and the effects of those relationships on the individual as well as the societal level. It is a perspective that holds particular promise for the social and political history of arid and marginal zones, as it contributes to our understanding of the reason some groups are more successful than others in coping with the same environmental stresses. Historians working on the early modern Arab East have only recently engaged with the lively field of global environmental history. After presenting a brief overview of some strands of this research, this article illustrates the potential of this approach by looking closely at a series of conflicts involving Bedouin and other power groups in the southern parts of Bilād al-Shām around the middle of the eighteenth century.


The relationship between humans and dogs has garnered considerable attention within archaeological research around the world. Investigations into the lived experiences of domestic dogs have proven to be an intellectually productive avenue for better understanding humanity in the past. This book examines the human-canine connection by moving beyond asking when, why, or how the dog was domesticated. While these questions are fundamental, beyond them lies a rich and textured history of humans maintaining a bond with another species through cooperation and companionship over thousands of years. Diverse techniques and theoretical approaches are used by authors in this volume to investigate the many ways dogs were conceptualized by their human counterparts in terms of both their value and social standing within a variety of human cultures across space and time. In this way, this book contributes a better understanding of the human-canine bond while also participating in broader anthropological discussions about how human interactions with domesticated animals shape their practices and worldviews.


1988 ◽  
Vol 66 (3) ◽  
pp. 903-921
Author(s):  
Rosemary A. Robbins

This paper is an account of studies of the linguistic transformation that took place in ancient Greece between the eighth and fourth centuries B.C., searching for factors which contribute to the shift in how humans perceived themselves. The group or force-field consciousness of the men of the Iliad and the linguistic factors which allowed “individuality” to emerge by the time of Plato is explored. The account relates the emergence of the notion of “madness” to the development of the individual and asks whether madness is an artifact of individuality and explores the relationship of these developments to our present underlying assumption of a duality in human nature composed of the rational and the irrational.


2010 ◽  
Vol 46 (1) ◽  
pp. 103-119 ◽  
Author(s):  
ANDREA GUSTAVSON

Over several decades of interviewing people and crafting their words into published works, Studs Terkel defined, expanded, and challenged the field of oral history. Terkel often described his methods as similar to those of a “prospector for gold” sifting through the statements of his subjects to create essays that reveal each person's “essence.” Drawing on his planning documents, interview transcripts, manuscripts and published texts, I trace Terkel's approach to oral history through two of his best-known works – Hard Times and “The Good War” – and through three stages: his planning and performance of interviews, his editing of the individual transcripts, and his construction of the completed text. I conclude by considering the implications of Terkel's unconventional approach to oral history and the ways in which his methodology may reflect his long history of involvement with progressive political movements. Terkel crafted his subject's narratives into texts I term “documentary memory”; he insisted that his works are subjective “memory books” but also employed a documentary rhetoric of objectivity. Terkel believed telling stories of the past to be a form of social action and he used his texts about the past to comment politically on his present – his “memory books” document earlier periods in American history relevant to the cultural moment in which he published.


Author(s):  
Евгения Викторовна Алёхина

В статье рассмотрены возникновение и развитие противоборствующих в философской мысли креационного и эволюционного объяснений происхождения Вселенной, жизни и разума. Обращаясь к анализу двух парадигм, автор показала, что они имеют длительную историю противостояния. В наше время, как и в прошлом, эта проблема сводится к альтернативе - либо эволюция как продукт слепой случайности, либо целенаправленное творчество Высшего Разума. В последнем случае есть два варианта: ортодоксальный и модернистский - «телеологический эволюционизм». Обосновывается, что современная постнеклассическая наука все больше определяется социальными, культурными и мировоззренческими основаниями. Одной из точек пересечения трех уровней научного знания является проблема происхождения мира. Противоположные варианты её решения имеют различное соотношение собственно научного (экспериментального) и мировоззренческого аспектов. Эволюционная гипотеза с позиции диалектического материализма не смогла преодолеть редукционизм и наивный реализм механистического подхода. Наличие в указанных парадигмах аксиологического компонента в той или иной степени утверждает или отрицает смысл жизни и достоинство личности. The article examines the emergence and development of the opposing creation and evolutionary explanations of the origin of the universe, life and mind in philosophical thought. Turning to the analysis of the two paradigms, the author showed that they have a long history of opposition. In our time, as in the past, this problem boils down to an alternative - either evolution as a product of blind chance, or purposeful creativity of the Higher Reason. In the latter case, there are two options: orthodox and modernist - «teleological evolutionism». It is substantiated that modern post-non-classical science is increasingly determined by social, cultural and ideological foundations. One of the intersection points of the three levels of scientific knowledge is the problem of the Origin of the World. Opposite solutions to its solution have a different ratio of the scientific (experimental) and worldview aspects. The evolutionary hypothesis could not overcome the reductionism and naive realism of the mechanistic approach from the standpoint of dialectical materialism. The presence of an axiological component in these paradigms, to one degree or another, affirms or denies the meaning of life and the dignity of the individual.


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