The Failure of the Aetolian Deditio as a Didactic Cultural Clash in the Histories of Polybius (20.9-10)

This paper examines the Aetolian deditio in fidem of 191 as described by Polybius 20.9-10. Erich Gruen influentially interpreted Polybius’ description as inconsistent and exaggerated, on the grounds that Greeks and Romans from the 3rd and 2nd centuries BC had a common understanding of πίστις and fides and that Polybius’ own evidence on deditio was inconsistent. This paper reasserts the older view: that Greeks generally then had a hazy knowledge of Roman culture, including the practice of deditio, and that—even if weight be granted to factors such as the Roman commander’s personal character and ambitions or the historian’s supposed dislike of the Aetolians or his deployment of a degree of dramatic licence or a possible ‘hardening’ in the Romans’ general practice—this passage properly emphasises a genuine cultural clash, thereby promoting Polybius’ fundamental paideia-objective of teaching Greek readers, above all Greek politicians, how to respond competently to the realities of Roman power.Fil: Moreno Leoni, Álvaro Matías. Consejo Nacional de Investigaciones Científicas y Técnicas. Centro Científico Tecnológico Conicet - Córdoba. Centro de Investigaciones y Estudios sobre Cultura y Sociedad. Universidad Nacional de Córdoba. Centro de Investigaciones y Estudios sobre Cultura y Sociedad; Argentin

The Jackprot Simulation Couples Mutation Rate with Natural Selection to Illustrate How Protein Evolution Is Not Random

Protein evolution is not a random process. Views which attribute randomness to molecular change, deleterious nature to single-gene mutations, insufficient geological time, or population size for molecular improvements to occur, or invoke “design creationism” to account for complexity in molecular structures and biological processes, are unfounded. Scientific evidence suggests that natural selection tinkers with molecular improvements by retaining adaptive peptide sequence. We used slot-machine probabilities and ion channels to show biological directionality on molecular change. Because ion channels reside in the lipid bilayer of cell membranes, their residue location must be in balance with the membrane’s hydrophobic/philic nature; a selective “pore” for ion passage is located within the hydrophobic region. We contrasted the random generation of DNA sequence for KcsA, a bacterial two-transmembrane-domain (2TM) potassium channel, from Streptomyces lividans, with an under-selection scenario, the “jackprot,” which predicted much faster evolution than by chance. We wrote a computer program in JAVA APPLET version 1.0 and designed an online interface, The Jackprot Simulation http://faculty.rwu.edu/cbai/JackprotSimulation.htm, to model a numerical interaction between mutation rate and natural selection during a scenario of polypeptide evolution. Winning the “jackprot,” or highest-fitness complete-peptide sequence, required cumulative smaller “wins” (rewarded by selection) at the first, second, and third positions in each of the 161 KcsA codons (“jackdons” that led to “jackacids” that led to the “jackprot”). The “jackprot” is a didactic tool to demonstrate how mutation rate coupled with natural selection suffices to explain the evolution of specialized proteins, such as the complex six-transmembrane (6TM) domain potassium, sodium, or calcium channels. Ancestral DNA sequences coding for 2TM-like proteins underwent nucleotide “edition” and gene duplications to generate the 6TMs. Ion channels are essential to the physiology of neurons, ganglia, and brains, and were crucial to the evolutionary advent of consciousness. The Jackprot Simulation illustrates in a computer model that evolution is not and cannot be a random process as conceived by design creationists

História da Química na sala de Aula para Ensinar sobre a Natureza da Ciência: O Exemplo da Interdependência entre Ciência e Tecnologia

In the wake of the research that values Chemistry teaching and learning promoter of scientific literacy we developed under the EANCYT Project (Enseñanza y Aprendizaje sobre la Naturaleza de la Ciencia y Tecnología) a didactic sequence in order to improve students’ understanding of the interdependence between Science and Technology through explicit teaching about the nature of science. In the design of the didactic sequence were used materials framed in the sphere of the History of Science, linked to the name of Antoine Laurent Lavoisier, frequently considered as the father of Chemistry. These documents illustrate a remarkable episode in the evolution of this experimental science, in which the design and use of a complex technological device allowed the synthesis of water from hydrogen and oxygen reaching the proportions in which we now know that these gases combine. Are analyzed and presented some results obtained from the answers to some questions of COCTS (Cuestionario de Opiniones sobre Ciencia, Tecnologia y Sociedad), using a research methodology with pre-test/post-test and control group to evaluate both students and the didactic sequence

Pediatric Resuscitation: Evaluation of a Clinical Curriculum

Objective: To assess the impact of a 6-hour pediatric resuscitation curriculum on the comfort levels of resident physicians’ evaluation and treatment of critically ill pediatric patients. Methods: An evaluation instrument assessed resident comfort levels, measured on a seven digit Likert scale ranging from significantly uncomfortable to significantly comfortable, in 13 areas of pediatric resuscitation. To complete the curriculum, residents had to demonstrate proficiency in knowledge and procedural skills during mock resuscitation scenarios and on both written and oral examinations. Results: Thirty-one residents participated in the study: 51.6% were pediatric, 12.9% were medicine/pediatric and 35.5% were emergency medicine residents. Participants in the curriculum had little previous experience with pediatric resuscitation (83% had been involved in five or fewer pediatric resuscitations). In all 13 areas of pediatric resuscitation tested, residents reported improvement in comfort levels following the course (p<0.002; Wilcoxon Signed Rank Tests). The most significant changes were observed for the following items: resuscitation of pulseless arrest, performance of cardioversion and defibrillation, performance of intraosseous needle insertion, and drug selection and dosing for rapid sequence intubation. Fewer than 48% of learners rated themselves as comfortable in these areas prior to training, but after completion, more than 80% rated themselves in the comfortable range. All residents but one received passing scores on their written examinations (97%). During the mock resuscitation scenarios and oral examination, 100% of the residents were assessed to have ‘completely’ met the learning objectives and critical actions Conclusion: Implementation of a pediatric resuscitation curriculum improves pediatric and emergency medicine residents’ comfort with the evaluation and treatment of critically ill pediatric patients. This curriculum can be used in residency training to document the acquisition of core competencies, knowledge and procedural skills needed for the evaluation and treatment of the critically ill child. The results reported in this study support using this model of instructional design to implement educational strategies, which will meet the requirements of graduate education

Specification of a multilevel model for an individualized didactic planning: case of learning to read

Abstract: The basic idea of this paper is to follow a modeling by level, which has a progressive degree of smoothness, according to three approaches (Macroscopic, Mesoscopic and microscopic), to arrive at an individualized didactic planning. We follow in the first level a macroscopic approach. It is related to the individualization of the goal of working session; the second level is concerned by the calculation of sequence of didactic situations types. We will base our selves on an approach called mesoscopic; the third level requires a microscopic approach, which is related to each didactic situation. This level has the highest degree of smoothness, it covers all aspects of didactic situations: the contents, the interface and the scenario of unfolding

‘Turning many to righteousness’ : Religious didacticism in the ›Speculum humanae salvationis‹ and the similitude of the oak tree

In this contribution I shall be interested, among other things, in finding a place for the European phenomenon of the ›Speculum humanae salvationis‹ within German literary history, which will inescapably involve revisiting the unfashionable discussion of date and origins. I also intend to ask about the place of this text in the ‘didactic’ literature of the Middle Ages. Is a religious text structured according to sacred history didactic? Much didactic poetry is in the vernacular: What does it mean that the ›Speculum‹ was composed in Latin? And what place should be accorded to its vernacular reception? The ›Speculum‹ is inscribed within a set of oppositions that would appear to be recurrent in the didactic literature of the later Middle Ages: Latin and vernacular, verse and prose, words and pictures, religious and profane, moral teaching and devotion, clerical and lay. In view of its exceptionally broad transmission in the German lands, both in Latin and in vernacular reworkings, is it possible to describe this text so that it takes a place within a larger picture? In some respects it may stand at a threshold in the history of European didacticism