Litigation and new technologies in post-conventional societies

The increase in the volume of litigation verified since the 1990’s, having the Brazilian society as context, made the judiciary open itself to new technologies which facilitate the access to justice, as well as to a faster resolution of the demands. However, the intense insertion of technical rationalization in the process and decision operations by the judiciary, during the last years, led to a legalization supported by presuppositions of technical-instrumental regulation. According to the goal policy established by the CNJ, the annoyance of the instrumental rationality is present “with respect to purposes”, which demands, more and more, a mere fulfillment of previously instituted goals from the law operators. The matter is to know if the implementation of new technologies to solve the growing litigation coming from the complexity of societies is enough to adjust the Law to a post-conventional platform. If the social complexity implies resources coming from new technologies, it’s not certain that such technologies, on their own, satisfactorily answer a judicial model which, seen under the eyes of the post- conventional legitimacy and regulation, is adequate to complex societies. This illustrates that a judicial model, able to deal with the social plurality, must take into account not only the rules of instrumental rationality, but also the fundamental issues of communicative rationality. This current work intends to evaluate if the applicability of the instrumental rationality in the judiciary equally allows the law to extent the useful conditions of the communicative rationality to the consensual formation of will and opinion in the Democratic State of Law

Piracicaba river basin : mechanical and chemical erosion

It was carried out the characterization of the mechanical and chemical erosive processes in the Piracicaba River basin, for the period 1992-1996, in terms of the fluvial transport of dissolved and particulate materials. The mechanical erosion was calculated from the suspended sediment transport in the basin, considering the surface runoff discharge and the respective concentration calculated taking in account the statistical hydrogram separation method employed. The specific physical degradation calculated for the Piracicaba River basin was 90 t/km2.a, which correspond the velocity of the soil thickness reduction of about 64 m/Ma. The dissolved load of Piracicaba River was corrected due to the influence of the atmospheric inputs, mainly for SO4 2-, Ca2+ and Mg2+ (79.6; 63.8 and 41.8%, respectively). After the input corrections, it was estimated the total atmospheric/soil CO2 consumed during the silicate weathering (229 x 103 moles/km2.a) and the total chemical erosion (16.6 t/km2.a) expressed in terms of the total dissolved solids transported in the basin. The velocity of the silicate rock profile reduction (2.8 m/Ma) was calculated by the fluvial transport of dissolved silica knowing the mean silica concentrations in the parent rock and in the soil profile

Gift Young Engineers: An Extra-Curricular Initiative for Updating Computer and Electrical Engineering Courses

The curricula of engineering courses are well defined by the central government for all Brazilian universities. Indeed, there are some mandatory determinations that must be fulfilled prior to the accreditation of any engineering course in Brazil. Modifications must be submitted for evaluation beforehand, resulting in a process that sometimes takes years to be approved. That is a secure way to guarantee that the fundamentals of each engineering program will be part of the students’ carrier all over the country, and at the same time a problem when you need to introduce new technological subjects. That poses a problem when you have new demands for technological curricular components that could express the actual state of the art of modern subjects. Trying to solve these issues some professors from the Federal University of Amazonas developed a flexible extra-curricular program for electrical and computer engineering courses, named Gift Young Engineers. This paper describes the philosophy of these extra-curricular programs. Some examples of successful particular partnerships are also discussed. Indeed the proposed training programs for Digital TV Systems (hardware and software) will be presented and analyzed in details. The obtained results will also be discussed in order to contribute to similar experiences worldwide

Algumas considerações em torno do ser professor de filosofia no ensino médio / A few words around the philosophy of teacher be in school

As mudanças paradigmáticas ocorridas em nosso tempo interferem na condição do ser professor de Filosofia hoje. Historicamente, a interrelação entre educação e escola acena para o sistema econômico, que por sua vez estabelece uma intensa influência em suas práticas pedagógicas. Dessa forma, o referido artigo objetiva apresentar algumas discussões em torno da atuação profissional do professor de Filosofia do Ensino Médio e as conjunturas hodiernas. Quanto ao desenvolvimento do presente artigo, ele está assentado em dois tópicos. No primeiro momento, buscará apresentar uma relação entre escola e educação, destacando o contexto social em que nossa sociedade contemporânea está sustentada. No segundo, destacará algumas reflexões acerca do ser professor de Filosofia no hoje. Assim, tal artigo não visa esgotar a temática, mas constituir-se como uma possível contribuição nesse campo reflexivo.The paradigm shifts occurring in our time interfere in the condition of being a philosophy teacher. Historically, the relation between school and education waves to the economic system, which, in turn, establishes a strong influence on their teaching practices. Thus, this paper aims to present some discussion around the professional work of a high school philosophy teacher and today’s situations. As to the development of this article, he sits on two topics. At first, seeks to provide a link between school and education, highlighting the social context in which our contemporary society sits. In the second topic, highlights some reflections about being a teacher of Philosophy at today. Eventually, this article is not intended to exhaust the subject, but establish itself as a possible contribution to this field reflective

Iterative restricted space search : a solving approach based on hybridization

Face à la complexité qui caractérise les problèmes d'optimisation de grande taille l'exploration complète de l'espace des solutions devient rapidement un objectif inaccessible. En effet, à mesure que la taille des problèmes augmente, des méthodes de solution de plus en plus sophistiquées sont exigées afin d'assurer un certain niveau d 'efficacité. Ceci a amené une grande partie de la communauté scientifique vers le développement d'outils spécifiques pour la résolution de problèmes de grande taille tels que les méthodes hybrides. Cependant, malgré les efforts consentis dans le développement d'approches hybrides, la majorité des travaux se sont concentrés sur l'adaptation de deux ou plusieurs méthodes spécifiques, en compensant les points faibles des unes par les points forts des autres ou bien en les adaptant afin de collaborer ensemble. Au meilleur de notre connaissance, aucun travail à date n'à été effectué pour développer un cadre conceptuel pour la résolution efficace de problèmes d'optimisation de grande taille, qui soit à la fois flexible, basé sur l'échange d'information et indépendant des méthodes qui le composent. L'objectif de cette thèse est d'explorer cette avenue de recherche en proposant un cadre conceptuel pour les méthodes hybrides, intitulé la recherche itérative de l'espace restreint, ±Iterative Restricted Space Search (IRSS)>>, dont, la principale idée est la définition et l'exploration successives de régions restreintes de l'espace de solutions. Ces régions, qui contiennent de bonnes solutions et qui sont assez petites pour être complètement explorées, sont appelées espaces restreints "Restricted Spaces (RS)". Ainsi, l'IRSS est une approche de solution générique, basée sur l'interaction de deux phases algorithmiques ayant des objectifs complémentaires. La première phase consiste à identifier une région restreinte intéressante et la deuxième phase consiste à l'explorer. Le schéma hybride de l'approche de solution permet d'alterner entre les deux phases pour un nombre fixe d'itérations ou jusqu'à l'atteinte d'une certaine limite de temps. Les concepts clés associées au développement de ce cadre conceptuel et leur validation seront introduits et validés graduellement dans cette thèse. Ils sont présentés de manière à permettre au lecteur de comprendre les problèmes que nous avons rencontrés en cours de développement et comment les solutions ont été conçues et implémentées. À cette fin, la thèse a été divisée en quatre parties. La première est consacrée à la synthèse de l'état de l'art dans le domaine de recherche sur les méthodes hybrides. Elle présente les principales approches hybrides développées et leurs applications. Une brève description des approches utilisant le concept de restriction d'espace est aussi présentée dans cette partie. La deuxième partie présente les concepts clés de ce cadre conceptuel. Il s'agit du processus d'identification des régions restreintes et des deux phases de recherche. Ces concepts sont mis en oeuvre dans un schéma hybride heuristique et méthode exacte. L'approche a été appliquée à un problème d'ordonnancement avec deux niveaux de décision, relié au contexte des pâtes et papier: "Pulp Production Scheduling Problem". La troisième partie a permit d'approfondir les concepts développés et ajuster les limitations identifiées dans la deuxième partie, en proposant une recherche itérative appliquée pour l'exploration de RS de grande taille et une structure en arbre binaire pour l'exploration de plusieurs RS. Cette structure a l'avantage d'éviter l'exploration d 'un espace déjà exploré précédemment tout en assurant une diversification naturelle à la méthode. Cette extension de la méthode a été testée sur un problème de localisation et d'allocation en utilisant un schéma d'hybridation heuristique-exact de manière itérative. La quatrième partie généralise les concepts préalablement développés et conçoit un cadre général qui est flexible, indépendant des méthodes utilisées et basé sur un échange d'informations entre les phases. Ce cadre a l'avantage d'être général et pourrait être appliqué à une large gamme de problèmes

Estimation of the remaining useful life of hydro generators

O monitoramento da condição dos geradores é muito desejável para uma operação confiável de uma usina hidrelétrica. As atividades de manutenção podem ser programadas para evitar falhas inesperadas que podem levar a meses ou anos de máquinas paradas sem geração. Estudos indicam que o isolamento do estator é a principal causa de falha do gerador. Nesse sentido, a base da metodologia proposta é o monitoramento do estado atual do sistema de isolamento do estator de hidrogeradores. Testes de descarga parcial nos enrolamentos do estator são aplicados para acessar a condição de isolamento. Um algoritmo para estimar a vida útil remanescente é a principal contribuição deste trabalho. Esta estimativa é baseada em avaliações estatísticas de hidro-geradores e na condição real do sistema de isolamento do estator. Testes de envelhecimento acelerado em amostras de estator com ampla aquisição de variáveis são realizados para entender o processo de envelhecimento. O algoritmo proposto é testado em casos simulados e em dados reais de um ensaio de ciclo térmico, no qual foi observado a ruptura do isolamento.Agência 1The monitoring of generators’ condition is very desirable for a reliable operation of a hydropower plant. Maintenance activities can be scheduled to avoid unexpected failures that can lead to months or years of machines stopped without generation. Studies indicate that stator insulation is the leading cause of generator failure. In this sense, the proposal methodology’s base is the monitorization of the actual health stage of the stator insulation system of hydro generators. Partial discharge tests in stator windings are applied to access the insulation condition. An algorithm to estimate the remaining useful life is the main contribution of this work. This estimation is based on both statistical evaluations of hydro generators and the stator insulation system’s actual condition. Accelerated aging tests in stator specimens with wide variables acquisition are performed to understand the aging process. The proposed algorithm is tested in simulated cases and real data from a thermal cycle test, which observed an insulation breakdown