Economic reasoning and interaction in socially extended market institutions

An important part of what it means for agents to be situated in the everyday world of human affairs includes their engagement with economic practices. In this paper, we employ the concept of cognitive institutions in order to provide an enactive and interactive interpretation of market and economic reasoning. We challenge traditional views that understand markets in terms of market structures or as processors of distributed information. The alternative conception builds upon the notion of the market as a scaffolding institution. Introducing the concept of market as a socially extended cognitive institution we go beyond the notion of scaffolding to provide an enactive view of economic reasoning that understands the market participant in terms of social interactive processes and relational autonomy. Markets are more than inert devices for information processing; they can be viewed as highly scaffolded, where strong constraints and incentives predictably direct agents\u27 behavior. Building on this idea we argue that markets emerge from (a) the economic interaction of both supply and demand sides, in continual and mutual interplay, and (b) more basic social interactions. Consumer behavior in the marketplace is complex, not only contributing to determine the market price, but also extending the consumer\u27s cognitive processes to reliably attain a correct evaluation of the good. Moreover, this economic reasoning is socially situated and not something done in isolation from other consumers. From a socially situated, interactive point of view buying or not buying a good is something that enacts the market. This shifts the status of markets from external institutions that merely causally affect participants\u27 cognitive processes to social institutions that constitutively extend these cognitive processes. On this view the constraints imposed by social interactions, as well as the possibilities enabled by such interactions, are such that economic reasoning is never just an individual process carried out by an autonomous individual, classically understood. In this regard, understanding the concept of relational autonomy allows us to see how economic reasoning is always embodied, embedded in, and scaffolded by intersubjective interactions, and how such interactions make the market what it is

Effects of gonadotrophin-releasing hormone and bovine somatotrophin on hormone profiles and ovarian function in postpartum beef cows

Reproductive efficiency in beef cows is limited by the length of the postpartum anoestrous period which in turn is controlled by pituitary gonadotrophins and gonadal steroids and/or proteins. The first aim of this study was to elucidate the role of LH pulses in the development of ovarian activity in postpartum beef cows, specifically to determine whether or not the normal, relatively slow process of follicular development could be accelarated in cows in low body condition (BC) with pulses of gonadotrophin-releasing hormone (GnRH). The second aim was to determine the role of the metabolic hormones and in particular growth hormone (GH) in ovarian follicle development and function.Treatment of cows in low BC with pulsed intravenous infusions of 2 pg every 2 hours from 5 to 7 weeks postpartum induced ovulation in 10 out of 12 cows. Saline infusions resulted in ovulation in only 1 of 12 cows in high BC and 1 of 11 cows in low BC groups. Plasma concentrations of GH, IGF-I and insulin were not affected by GnRH treatment, but cows in high BC had higher IGF-I and lower GH levels than cows in low BC. Gonadotrophin profiles, luteinizing hormone (LH) pulse frequency and LH pulse amplitude were not affected by either GnRH treatment or BC. Numbers of small (3-7.9 mm diameter) and large (> 8 mm diameter) follicles present at week 7 postpartum and numbers of LH receptors in theca and granulosa tissue were not affected by GnRH treatment or BC. The number of granulosa cells present in large follicles at week 7 postpartum was also unaffected. Intrafollicular concentrations of oestradiol, testosterone and IGF-I in large follicles at 7 weeks postpartum were not significantly affected by GnRH treatment or BC but there was a marked trend towards higher concentrations of oestradiol in cows in high BC compared with cows in low BC.In Experiment 2, depot injections of 320 mg bovine somatotrophin (bST) (each designed to release 23 mg/day for 14 days) administered at weeks 2, 4, 6 and 8 postpartum induced ovulation in 4 out of 17 cows while 0 out of 15 ovulated in the control group (p= 0.10). While peripheral concentrations of GH and IGF-I were significantly increased throughout the postpartum period, there was no effect of bST on circulating concentrations of insulin, glucose, follicle-stimulating hormone (FSH), LH, LH pulse frequency or LH pulse amplitude. Numbers of small (3-7.9 mm diameter) and large (≥8 mm diameter) follicles and numbers of LH and FSH receptors in both theca and granulosa tissue at week 9 and numbers of granulosa cells present in large follicles was also unaffected. bST treatment significantly enhanced intrafollicular concentrations of oestradiol and IGF-I in large follicles (≥8 mm diameter) at 9 weeks postpartum but no difference in testosterone concentrations was observed.It is concluded that infusion of exogenous GnRH pulses enhanced the process of follicular development in cows in low BC. While it was not possible to identify causal relationships between BC, plasma GH and IGF-I concentrations and intrafollicular oestradiol concentrations, bST treatment was found to increase oestradiol production in large follicles. This effect was not mediated through changes in gonadotrophin profiles or receptors, indicating that GH has a more direct role in the control of ovarian function. It is suggested that this effect may be mediated through changes in intrafollicular IGF-I concentrations

FCC Physics Opportunities: Future Circular Collider Conceptual Design Report Volume 1

Overview of the FCC physics potential

FCC Physics Opportunities: Future Circular Collider Conceptual Design Report Volume 1

We review the physics opportunities of the Future Circular Collider, covering its e+e-, pp, ep and heavy ion programmes. We describe the measurement capabilities of each FCC component, addressing the study of electroweak, Higgs and strong interactions, the top quark and flavour, as well as phenomena beyond the Standard Model. We highlight the synergy and complementarity of the different colliders, which will contribute to a uniquely coherent and ambitious research programme, providing an unmatchable combination of precision and sensitivity to new physics

Future Circular Collider Conceptual Design Report Volume 1

This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License.We review the physics opportunities of the Future Circular Collider, covering its e+e-, pp, ep and heavy ion programmes. We describe the measurement capabilities of each FCC component, addressing the study of electroweak, Higgs and strong interactions, the top quark and flavour, as well as phenomena beyond the Standard Model. We highlight the synergy and complementarity of the different colliders, which will contribute to a uniquely coherent and ambitious research programme, providing an unmatchable combination of precision and sensitivity to new physics

FCC-ee: The Lepton Collider: Future Circular Collider Conceptual Design Report Volume 2

In response to the 2013 Update of the European Strategy for Particle Physics, the Future Circular Collider (FCC) study was launched, as an international collaboration hosted by CERN. This study covers a highest-luminosity high-energy lepton collider (FCC-ee) and an energy-frontier hadron collider (FCC-hh), which could, successively, be installed in the same 100 km tunnel. The scientific capabilities of the integrated FCC programme would serve the worldwide community throughout the 21st century. The FCC study also investigates an LHC energy upgrade, using FCC-hh technology. This document constitutes the second volume of the FCC Conceptual Design Report, devoted to the electron-positron collider FCC-ee. After summarizing the physics discovery opportunities, it presents the accelerator design, performance reach, a staged operation scenario, the underlying technologies, civil engineering, technical infrastructure, and an implementation plan. FCC-ee can be built with today’s technology. Most of the FCC-ee infrastructure could be reused for FCC-hh. Combining concepts from past and present lepton colliders and adding a few novel elements, the FCC-ee design promises outstandingly high luminosity. This will make the FCC-ee a unique precision instrument to study the heaviest known particles (Z, W and H bosons and the top quark), offering great direct and indirect sensitivity to new physics