The teaching of life sciences within the Islamic culture was observed in this investigation by instructors at the Association of Muslim Schools in the KZN region. The following question served as the basis for the investigation: Do Islamic schools teach life sciences from an Islamic perspective? The Association of Muslim Schools gave its approval after receiving ethical scrutiny. A questionnaire, interviews, and observations were used to gather data. The analysis of the data was conducted using an inductive methodology. The philosophy of Islam and its approaches to teaching the required Life Sciences curriculum served as the study's conceptual foundation. The results show that there is a problem with integrating religious knowledge into science teaching in Muslim ethos schools in South Africa. The Professional Teaching Model was an initiative to close the gap caused by educational dualism.
1. Intellectual property in the global economy : high stakes and propaganda warfare -- 2. Intellectual property and regulation theory -- 3. The emergence of modern patent law -- 4. Organic chemistry and the synthetic dyestuff industry -- 5. The pharmaceutical industry -- 6. Biotechnology, genomics and the new life science corporations -- 7. Plant breeding, the seed industry and plant breeders' rights -- 8. Towards a global IP regime : trade and diplomacy -- 9. Forums of resistance? -- 10. Epilogue : the life science industries in a patent-free world.
AbstractThe free-energy principle states that all systems that minimize their free energy resist a tendency to physical disintegration. Originally proposed to account for perception, learning, and action, the free-energy principle has been applied to the evolution, development, morphology, anatomy and function of the brain, and has been called apostulate, anunfalsifiable principle, anatural law, and animperative. While it might afford a theoretical foundation for understanding the relationship between environment, life, and mind, its epistemic status is unclear. Also unclear is how the free-energy principle relates to prominent theoretical approaches to life science phenomena, such as organicism and mechanism. This paper clarifies both issues, and identifies limits and prospects for the free-energy principle as a first principle in the life sciences.
The Greater Zurich Area has become a hub for the life sciences industry in recent years, with above-average numbers of medtech companies and brisk spin-off activities from the Zurich universities. The spin-offs have established themselves near their scientific origins, in incubators and parks where they have access to functional and affordable laboratory infrastructures. Numerous cluster initiatives and networks foster exchanges between start-ups, established companies and academia. An international regional comparison conducted within the framework of the EU HealthTIES project gave the region of Zurich a good score in the life sciences area. The detailed comparison shows that Zurich is strong in the academic field and the existing companies are well-positioned. However, weaknesses are evident in the field of clinical research and in the interface between academia and industry. The infrastructure offerings in the Greater Zurich Area for life sciences companies and for exchanges between academia and industry will be further expanded in the coming years. Whether the high growth rate of the industry in the Greater Zurich Area can be maintained or even increased depends on the economy and other factors, but also on the political environment.
At the start of the twenty-first century, warnings have been raised in some quarters about how – by intent or by mishap – advances in biotechnology and related fields could aid the spread of disease. Science academics, medical organisations, governments, security analysts, and others are among those that have sought to raise concern. Education and Ethics in the Life Sciences examines a variety of attempts to bring greater awareness to security concerns associated with the life sciences. It identifies lessons from practical initiatives across a wide range of national contexts as well as more general reflections about education and ethics. The eighteen contributors bring together perspectives from a diverse range of fields – including politics, virology, sociology, ethics, security studies, microbiology, and medicine – as well as their experiences in universities, think tanks and government.
In offering their assessment about what must be done and by whom, each chapter addresses a host of challenging practical and conceptual questions. Education and Ethics in the Life Sciences will be of interest to those planning and undertaking training activities in other areas. In asking how education and ethics are being made to matter in an emerging area of social unease, it will also be of interest to those with more general concerns about professional conduct.
Innovation in the life sciences depends on how much information is produced as well as how widely and easily it is shared. Policies governing the science commons – or alternative, more restricted informational spaces – determine how widely and quickly information is distributed. The purpose of this paper is to highlight why the science commons matters and to analyse its structure and function. The main lesson from our analysis is that both the characteristics of the physical resources (from genes to microbes, plants and animals) and the norms and beliefs of the different research communities – think of the Bermuda rules in the human genome case or the Belem declaration for bioprospecting – matter in the institutional choices made when organising the science commons. We also show that the science commons contributes to solving some of the collective action dilemmas that arise in the production of knowledge in Pasteur's Quadrant, when information is both scientifically important and practically applicable. We show the importance of two of these dilemmas for the life sciences, which we call respectively the diffusion–innovation dilemma (how readily innovation diffuses) and the exploration–exploitation dilemma (when application requires collective action).
Scholars, scientists, and policymakers converged last fall at the annual meeting of the Association for Politics and the Life Sciences (APLS) held on the Indiana University campus in Bloomington from October 14–16, 2010. Founded in 1980, the association uniquely merges evolutionary, genetic, and ecological knowledge with the study of political behavior, public policy, and ethics. This year's annual meeting celebrated the diversity of scholarship embodied by the association with the theme, "Toward Consilience: Thirty Years of the Association for Politics and the Life Sciences."
AbstractWe introduce the Special Issue on Life Science in Politics: Methodological Innovations and Political Issues. This issue of Politics and the Life Sciences is focused on the use of life science theory and methods to study political phenomena and the exploration of the intersection of science and political attitudes. This issue is the third in a series of special issues funded by the Association for Politics and the Life Sciences that adheres to the Open Science Framework for registered reports. Pre-analysis plans are peer reviewed and given in-principle acceptance before data are collected and/or analyzed, and the articles are published contingent upon the preregistration of the study being followed as proposed. We note various interpretations and challenges associated with studying the science of politics and discuss the contributions.
Dr. Sherman P. Vinograd fulfilled the roles of Chief of Medical Science and Technology and Director of Biomedical Research at the National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA) from the fall of 1961 until the spring of 1979. In this role he shaped, organized, and directed NASA's program of medical research as a funded program of studies, which was carried out in not only NASA Center laboratories, but also in university, industry, and other government laboratories and hospitals all over the country. It produced a large substrate of information through its bed rest studies, vestibular, bone, neuromuscular, hematology, and cardiovascular researches. It also produced valuable fall-out, such as an accurate bone density measurement technique which is now in common clinical use. ; His major activities during this career were conceptualizing, establishing, and chairing the Space Medicine Advisory Group (SPAMAG) charged with defining the earth-based and space-based research and life-support requirements for a manned orbiting research laboratory. This group designed a carefully planned study utilizing highly qualified, specialized members of the scientific community. They postulated a non-existent orbiting laboratory to be designed according to the needs of future human flight crews and requirements for human spaceflight information. This would result in the creation of Skylab. ; He was also responsible for establishing the In-flight Medical Experiments Program in preparation for the Apollo series of manned space flights. This program was a series of carefully designed flight crew studies derived from proposals by qualified scientists both from within and outside NASA to evaluate human responses to spaceflight. ; In addition, Dr. Vinograd developed a supportive Research and Development Program necessary to provide pertinent ground-based data and to advance state-of-the-art medical measurement technology, a major development of which was the Integrated Medical and Behavioral Laboratory Measurement System (IMBLMS). This consisted of medical experiments and accompanying equipment necessary to perform them that was used from the Gemini through the Skylab manned space flight programs. Carried aboard virtually any post-Apollo space vehicle by virtue of its rack and module design, these designs were used well into the future. He also fostered the continuing ground-based medical research program sponsored and/or conducted by NASA. ; The Dr. Sherman P. Vinograd Aerospace Exploration collection consists of artifacts, books, correspondence, financial materials, newspapers, photographs, plaques, printed materials, and reports relating to Dr. Vinograd's early life, his career as an M. D. prior to joining NASA, his years as a physician and researcher at NASA, and the other professional organizations and projects in which he was involved both during and after these periods. ; Box 8, Folder 14
