scholarly journals Virus Eradication and Synthetic Biology: Changes with SARS-CoV-2?

Viruses ◽  
2021 ◽  
Vol 13 (4) ◽  
pp. 569
Author(s):  
Jean-Nicolas Tournier ◽  
Joseph Kononchik
Keyword(s):  
Clinical Trials ◽  
Synthetic Biology ◽  
Viral Disease ◽  
Virus Eradication ◽  
Disease Eradication ◽  
The Public ◽  
The Past ◽  
The World ◽  
Significant Effort

The eradication of infectious diseases has been achieved only once in history, in 1980, with smallpox. Since 1988, significant effort has been made to eliminate poliomyelitis viruses, but eradication is still just out of reach. As the goal of viral disease eradication approaches, the ability to recreate historically eradicated viruses using synthetic biology has the potential to jeopardize the long-term sustainability of eradication. However, the emergence of the severe acute respiratory syndrome-coronavirus (SARS-CoV)-2 pandemic has highlighted our ability to swiftly and resolutely respond to a potential outbreak. This virus has been synthetized faster than any other in the past and is resulting in vaccines before most attenuated candidates reach clinical trials. Here, synthetic biology has the opportunity to demonstrate its truest potential to the public and solidify a footing in the world of vaccines.

Technical Fixes, Technological Solutions

1997 ◽  
Author(s):  
Robert Pool
Keyword(s):  
Water Pollution ◽  
Global Warming ◽  
Hazardous Wastes ◽  
Technological Disaster ◽  
The Public ◽  
The Past ◽  
The World ◽  
Underlying Theme

The past couple of decades have been a confusing, frustrating period for engineers. With their creations making the world an ever richer, healthier, more comfortable place, it should have been a time of triumph and congratulation for them. Instead, it has been an era of discontent. Even as people have come to rely on technology more and more, they have liked it less. They distrust the machines that are supposedly their servants. Sometimes they fear them. And they worry about the sort of world they are leaving to their children. Engineers, too, have begun to wonder if something is wrong. It is not simply that the public doesn’t love them. They can live with that. But some of the long-term costs of technology have been higher than anyone expected: air and water pollution, hazardous wastes, the threat to the Earth’s ozone layer, the possibility of global warming. And the drumbeat of sudden technological disaster over the past twenty years is enough to give anyone pause: Three Mile Island, Bhopal, the Challenger, Chernobyl, the Exxon Valdez, the downing of a commercial airliner by a missile from the U.S.S. Vincennes. Is it time to rethink our approach to technology? Some engineers believe that it is. In one specialty after another, a few prophets have emerged who argue for doing things in a fundamentally new way. And surprisingly, although these visionaries have focused on problems and concerns unique to their own particular areas of engineering, a single underlying theme appears in their messages again and again: Engineers should pay more attention to the larger world in which their devices will function, and they should consciously take that world into account in their designs. Although this may sound like a simple, even a self-evident, bit of advice, it is actually quite a revolutionary one for engineering. Traditionally, engineers have aimed at perfecting their machines as machines. This can be seen in the traditional measures of machines: how fast they are, how much they can produce, the quality of their output, how easy they are to use, how much they cost, how long they last.

scholarly journals Modern Scotland: Archaeology, the Modern past and the Modern present

2012 ◽  
Keyword(s):  
Modern World ◽  
Archaeological Research ◽  
Recent Past ◽  
Critical Perspective ◽  
The Public ◽  
World Archaeology ◽  
The Past ◽  
The World ◽  
Ways Of Life

The main recommendations of the panel report can be summarised under five key headings:  HUMANITY The Panel recommends recognition that research in this field should be geared towards the development of critical understandings of self and society in the modern world. Archaeological research into the modern past should be ambitious in seeking to contribute to understanding of the major social, economic and environmental developments through which the modern world came into being. Modern-world archaeology can add significantly to knowledge of Scotland’s historical relationships with the rest of the British Isles, Europe and the wider world. Archaeology offers a new perspective on what it has meant to be a modern person and a member of modern society, inhabiting a modern world.  MATERIALITY The Panel recommends approaches to research which focus on the materiality of the recent past (i.e. the character of relationships between people and their material world). Archaeology’s contribution to understandings of the modern world lies in its ability to situate, humanise and contextualise broader historical developments. Archaeological research can provide new insights into the modern past by investigating historical trends not as abstract phenomena but as changes to real lives, affecting different localities in different ways. Archaeology can take a long-term perspective on major modern developments, researching their ‘prehistory’ (which often extends back into the Middle Ages) and their material legacy in the present. Archaeology can humanise and contextualise long-term processes and global connections by working outwards from individual life stories, developing biographies of individual artefacts and buildings and evidencing the reciprocity of people, things, places and landscapes. The modern person and modern social relationships were formed in and through material environments and, to understand modern humanity, it is crucial that we understand humanity’s material relationships in the modern world.  PERSPECTIVE The Panel recommends the development, realisation and promotion of work which takes a critical perspective on the present from a deeper understanding of the recent past. Research into the modern past provides a critical perspective on the present, uncovering the origins of our current ways of life and of relating to each other and to the world around us. It is important that this relevance is acknowledged, understood, developed and mobilised to connect past, present and future. The material approach of archaeology can enhance understanding, challenge assumptions and develop new and alternative histories. Modern Scotland: Archaeology, the Modern past and the Modern present vi Archaeology can evidence varied experience of social, environmental and economic change in the past. It can consider questions of local distinctiveness and global homogeneity in complex and nuanced ways. It can reveal the hidden histories of those whose ways of life diverged from the historical mainstream. Archaeology can challenge simplistic, essentialist understandings of the recent Scottish past, providing insights into the historical character and interaction of Scottish, British and other identities and ideologies.  COLLABORATION The Panel recommends the development of integrated and collaborative research practices. Perhaps above all other periods of the past, the modern past is a field of enquiry where there is great potential benefit in collaboration between different specialist sectors within archaeology, between different disciplines, between Scottish-based researchers and researchers elsewhere in the world and between professionals and the public. The Panel advocates the development of new ways of working involving integrated and collaborative investigation of the modern past. Extending beyond previous modes of inter-disciplinary practice, these new approaches should involve active engagement between different interests developing collaborative responses to common questions and problems.  REFLECTION The Panel recommends that a reflexive approach is taken to the archaeology of the modern past, requiring research into the nature of academic, professional and public engagements with the modern past and the development of new reflexive modes of practice. Archaeology investigates the past but it does so from its position in the present. Research should develop a greater understanding of modern-period archaeology as a scholarly pursuit and social practice in the present. Research should provide insights into the ways in which the modern past is presented and represented in particular contexts. Work is required to better evidence popular understandings of and engagements with the modern past and to understand the politics of the recent past, particularly its material aspect. Research should seek to advance knowledge and understanding of the moral and ethical viewpoints held by professionals and members of the public in relation to the archaeology of the recent past. There is a need to critically review public engagement practices in modern-world archaeology and develop new modes of public-professional collaboration and to generate practices through which archaeology can make positive interventions in the world. And there is a need to embed processes of ethical reflection and beneficial action into archaeological practice relating to the modern past.

scholarly journals Where Does the World Historian Write From? Objectivity, Moral Conscience and the Past and Present of Imperialism

2011 ◽  
Vol 46 (3) ◽  
pp. 671-685 ◽  
Author(s):  
Richard Drayton
Keyword(s):  
Iraq War ◽  
Imperial History ◽  
The Public ◽  
The Past ◽  
Academic Subject ◽  
The World ◽  
The Future ◽  
Ethical Responsibilities

The contemporary historian, as she or he speaks to the public about the origins and meanings of the present, has important ethical responsibilities. ‘Imperial’ historians, in particular, shape how politicians and the public imagine the future of the world. This article examines how British imperial history, as it emerged as an academic subject since about 1900, often lent ideological support to imperialism, while more generally it suppressed or avoided the role of violence and terror in the making and keeping of the Empire. It suggests that after 2001, and during the Iraq War, in particular, a new Whig historiography sought to retail a flattering narrative of the British Empire’s past, and concludes with a call for a post-patriotic imperial history which is sceptical of power and speaks for those on the underside of global processes.

scholarly journals Understanding Urban Growth in Beijing-Tianjin-Hebei Region over the Past 100 Years Using Old Maps and Landsat Data

2021 ◽  
Vol 13 (16) ◽  
pp. 3264 ◽  
Author(s):  
Shuang Li ◽  
Zhongqiu Sun ◽  
Yafei Wang ◽  
Yuxia Wang
Keyword(s):  
Remote Sensing ◽  
Urban Area ◽  
Spatial Data ◽  
Urban Expansion ◽  
Remote Sensing Images ◽  
The Past ◽  
Old Maps ◽  
The World ◽  
The City

Studying urban expansion from a longer-term perspective is of great significance to obtain an in-depth understanding of the process of urbanization. Remote sensing data are mostly selected to investigate the long-term expansion of cities. In this study, we selected the world-class urban agglomeration of Beijing-Tianjin-Hebei (BTH) as the study area, and then discussed how to make full use of multi-source, multi-category, and multi-temporal spatial data (old maps and remote sensing images) to study long-term urbanization. Through this study, we addressed three questions: (1) How much has the urban area in BTH expanded in the past 100 years? (2) How did the urban area expand in the past century? (3) What factors or important historical events have changed the development of cities with different functions? By comprehensively using urban spatial data, such as old maps and remote sensing images, geo-referencing them, and extracting built-up area information, a long-term series of urban built-up areas in the BTH region can be obtained. Results show the following: (1) There was clear evidence of dramatic urban expansion in this area, and the total built-up area had increased by 55.585 times, from 126.181 km2 to 7013.832 km2. (2) Continuous outward expansion has always been the main trend, while the compactness of the built-up land within the city is constantly decreasing and the complexity of the city boundary is increasing. (3) Cities in BTH were mostly formed through the construction of city walls during the Ming and Qing dynasties, and the expansion process was mostly highly related to important political events, traffic development, and other factors. In summary, the BTH area, similarly to China and most regions of the world, has experienced rapid urbanization and the history of such ancient cities should be further preserved with the combined use of old maps.

Passports for Sale: How (Un)Meritocratic Are Citizenship by Investment Programmes?

2020 ◽  
Vol 22 (3) ◽  
pp. 309-337
Author(s):  
Odile Ammann
Keyword(s):  
Public Discourse ◽  
Immigration Law ◽  
The Public ◽  
The Past ◽  
The World

Abstract In recent years, citizenship by investment (CBI) and residency by investment (RBI) programmes have been burgeoning throughout the world, including in a range of European States. At first sight, such programmes are blatantly anti-meritocratic: they hinge on a person’s wealth, and not on her skills, potential, and intrinsic qualities. Yet upon a closer look, the public discourse that surrounds CBI and RBI is influenced by the same meritocratic conceptions as those that have been driving domestic citizenship and immigration law in the past decades. In this article, I take a step back from existing debates about CBI to argue that the concept of meritocracy is key to understanding, supporting, but also challenging contemporary immigration and citizenship law, including CBI. First, I analyse the merits—if I may say so—of the concept of meritocracy. I then show the limitations of using meritocratic arguments to justify the existence of CBI schemes.

Opioid Therapy for Chronic Nonmalignant Pain: Clinicians' Perspective

1996 ◽  
Vol 24 (4) ◽  
pp. 296-309 ◽  
Author(s):  
Russell K. Portenoy
Keyword(s):  
Psychosocial Functioning ◽  
Cumulative Risk ◽  
Opioid Therapy ◽  
Adverse Outcomes ◽  
The Public ◽  
The Past ◽  
Nonmalignant Pain ◽  
Chronic Nonmalignant Pain

During the past decade, debate has intensified about the role of long-term opioid therapy in the management of chronic nonmalignant pain. Specialists in pain management have discussed the issues extensively and now generally agree that a selected population of patients with chronic pain can attain sustained analgesia without significant adverse consequences. This perspective, however, is not uniformly accepted by pain specialists and has not been widely disseminated to other disciplines or the public. Rather, the more traditional perspective, which ascribes both transitory benefit and substantial cumulative risk to long-term opioid therapy, continues to predominate. According to this perspective, the inevitability of tolerance limits the possibility of sustained efficacy, and other pharmacological properties increase the likelihood of adverse outcomes, including persistent side-effects, impairment in physical and psychosocial functioning, and addiction. If accurate, these outcomes would indeed justify the withholding of opioid therapy for all but the most extreme cases of chronic nonmalignant pain.

scholarly journals Addressing inequality in Malaysia through corporate social intrapreneurship

2018 ◽  
Vol 53 ◽  
pp. 01001
Author(s):  
Asrif Omar Che Yusoff
Keyword(s):  
Corporate Social Responsibility ◽  
The Public ◽  
Global Context ◽  
The Past ◽  
The Subject ◽  
The Government ◽  
Corporate Social ◽  
Coordination And Collaboration ◽  
Social Sectors

Inequality has been a long standing issue in Malaysia, although the situation has been statistically improving over the past 40 years. From a Gini coefficient of 0.51 in 1970, the government has done considerably well to bring the figure down to 0.39 in 2016. Efforts toward improving the situation are aplenty, but there is room for improvement in terms of the coordination and collaboration of initiatives that are carried out within the public, private, and social sectors. This paper explores the idea of corporate social intrapreneurship as a potential vehicle to mitigate inequality in the country for the long term. Through the analysis of existing literatures and data on the subject, the aim is to first of all, provide a historical and global context on how the roles of corporation have evolved over the years, discuss the transformative views on social intrapreneurship against traditional corporate social responsibility, and offer considerations to further corporate social intrapreneurship initiatives through public-private partnerships in Malaysia.

Pressing problems of the euro zone — And beyond (OR: What may break the camel’s back)

2012 ◽  
Vol 62 (4) ◽  
pp. 423-434
Author(s):  
Jan Winiecki
Keyword(s):  
Monetary Union ◽  
Present Writer ◽  
Large Majority ◽  
Short Term ◽  
Large Measure ◽  
Euro Zone ◽  
The Past ◽  
The World ◽  
Simple Question

A look at the Western debate about West’s problems reveals what the present writer regards in a large measure as an irritating superficiality. Nowhere is it better visible than in the mainstream discussions about the euro zone and its problems, where most debaters glide over the fundamentals of Europe’s long-term problems and concentrate on the superficial and short-term issues. The discussions on how to “save” the euro zone strangely forget the defects in its creation, glide over the lessons to be drawn from policies pursued during the past decade, and defend the virtue of maintaining its present membership. But the problems of Europe run much deeper than the survival or collapse of the monetary union. Even if we assume that the problems of confidence the member states have in each other’s behaviour are restored and the rest of the world regains confidence in the institutions of the monetary union, the fundamental problems will remain unsolved. A clue to the real long-term problems may be found in the answer to a rather simple question. It runs as follows: “Why is the large majority of European countries indebted to such an extent that any further increase in debt to GDP ratio generates panic reactions among potential lenders?”

Hospitable universities and integration of refugees: First responses from Austria and Poland

2017 ◽  
Vol 17 (2) ◽  
pp. 248-270 ◽  
Author(s):  
Daniel Kontowski ◽  
Madelaine Leitsberger
Keyword(s):  
Social Inclusion ◽  
Human Right ◽  
The Public ◽  
The Past ◽  
European Universities ◽  
Public Role ◽  
The Social ◽  
Academic Year

European universities responded in different ways to the ‘refugee crisis’ of 2015. Some subscribed to the agenda of higher education (HE) as a universal human right, while others stressed different long-term benefits of offering access to it. Yet, the unprecedented sense of moral urgency that guided immediate declarations of support and subsequent actions has largely remained unaddressed. With the crisis becoming a new reality for many countries, HE has a role to play in the social inclusion of refugees, even in countries that were not attractive destinations for refugees in the past. In this article, we provide an overview of the reasons why HE institutions supported refugees, and present the results of an empirical study of Poland and Austria during the 2015–2016 academic year. We then evaluate those first responses utilizing parts of Ager and Strang’s framework of integration, and discuss issues of institutional readiness, capabilities and the public role of HE stemming from this comparison. Our findings suggest that reasons such as acknowledgement of basic rights, or utilizing social capital are insufficient to explain and understand strong integrative support measures. We propose that refugee support by HE institutions is both better understood and promoted through the language of hospitality.

scholarly journals The World Trade Organization's legitimacy crisis

2002 ◽  
Vol 1 (1) ◽  
pp. 7-22 ◽  
Author(s):  
DANIEL C. ESTY
Keyword(s):  
Global Governance ◽  
World Trade ◽  
Checks And Balances ◽  
Trade Regime ◽  
The Public ◽  
The World ◽  
Successful Launch ◽  
National Governments ◽  
Legitimacy Crisis

Despite the successful launch of a new round of multilateral trade negotiations at Doha, the World Trade Organization faces a legitimacy crisis. Protests continue to rock major international economic meetings, and the WTO's role in globalization is being questioned by many observers. This paper examines the contours of this crisis and explores the possibility that the WTO's indirect ties to popular sovereignty – through national governments – provide an insufficient foundation for the trade regime's authority and central role in the emerging structure of global governance. Arguing that the WTO needs to re-establish its legitimacy based on wider links to the public around the world in whose name freer trade is pursued, the paper suggests that the WTO must also re-build its reputation for efficacy in a context where success is no longer measured exclusively in narrow economic terms. To be seen as serving the interests of the world community broadly, the trade regime needs to pursue its economic goals in a fashion that shows sensitivity to other important goals and values, such as poverty alleviation, environmental protection, and the promotion of public health. Long-term success further depends on the trade regime becoming embedded within a broader structure of global governance that provides ‘checks and balances’ and reinforces the legitimacy of international trade policy making.

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