Innerarity, Daniel (2019). Política para Perplexos. Lisboa: Porto Editora, ISBN 978-972-0-45-03232-4, 214 pp.

Daniel Innerarity in “Politics for the Perplexed” continues the reflection begun in the aftermath of the Great Recession (Innerarity, 2016) on the current challenges facing contemporary democracies, examining the ethical and cultural foundations for the possibility of a new social contract. This social contract is to be based on trust between citizens, but also between them and the various institutions that support liberal democracy. To this end, we are proposed to replace a majority democracy with a negotiation democracy, continuing an “old” theoretical opportunity of the author (Innerarity, 2012). As a desideratum of contemporary societies, negotiation democracy corresponds, in the first place, to an objective and correct diagnosis of the pathologies and dysfunctions of today's western democracies

Is the euro area M3 abandoning us?

This paper reassesses the role of the M3 aggregate for monetary policy purposes in the euro area. Using data until 2006Q4 it is shown that the M3 aggregate ceased to display the empirical properties that supported its prominent role in the ECB’s monetary policy strategy. On the one hand, when the most recent data are used in the analysis there is strong evidence of cointegration breakdown in the M3 money demand models as well as in the "two-pillar Phillips curves" with filtered data. On the other hand, the leading indicator properties of M3 for inflation in the area have also deteriorated markedly in the most recent years. This is supported by evidence both in the time and frequency domains.

Hipertensão arterial :|brelação com a progressão da doença renal crónica

Dissertação de mestrado em Medicina (Nefrologia), apresentado à Faculdade de Medicina da Universidade de CoimbraA insuficiência renal crónica é um problema de saúde pública com implicações económicas e sociais significativas. A prevalência desta afecção tem vindo a crescer nos últimos anos como consequência do aumento da esperança média de vida, aliada ao sedentarismo e à maior prevalência de outras doenças como a diabetes mellitus ou hipertensão arterial. A hipertensão e a insuficiência renal crónica têm uma relação muito particular, não só pela partilha de factores de risco mas também, por uma poder ser causa ou consequência da outra. A hipertensão e a proteinúria são as duas variáveis independentes mais importantes na progressão da doença renal crónica. A estratégia terapêutica nestes doentes passa, obrigatoriamente, pela redução da excreção urinária de proteínas e vigilância e controlo da pressão arterial, que apesar da sua reconhecida importância, é fracamente controlada em inúmeros casos. Nesse sentido, o recurso a fármacos com potencial nefroprotector, como os IECA e os ARA, tem-se revelado fundamental. Nesta revisão serão abordados a fisiopatologia da doença renal crónica, o papel da pressão arterial na sua evolução e o seu tratamento.Chronic kidney disease is a serious public health problem with substantial economic and social implications. Its prevalence has been rising throughout the years due to: increased lifetime expectation, sedentary lifestyle of modern societies and higher prevalence of other chronic conditions such as diabetes mellitus or arterial hypertension. Chronic kidney disease and hypertension have a curious relationship, not only they share common risk factors, they also seem to promote and maintain each other. Hypertension and proteinuria are the two most important variables in the progression of chronic kidney disease. The present therapeutic strategies aim to reduce the urinary protein loss and to tightly control the blood pressure, which, despite its known importance is barely achieved. In this revision it will be discussed the chronic renal failure’s physiopathology and the role of the blood pressure on its progression. The use of antihypertensive medicine, whose actions extend beyond the reduction of blood pressure, such as ECA inhibitors or AARs, is one of the measures which actually is responsible for the declined progression of the chronic kidney disease

Parallel run-time for CO-OPN

Dissertação para obtenção do Grau de Mestre em Engenharia InformáticaDomain Specific Modeling (DSM) is a methodology to provide programs or system’s specification at higher level of abstraction, making use of domain concepts instead of low level programming details. To support this approach, we need to have enough expressive power in terms of those domain concepts, which means that we need to develop new languages , usually termed Domain Specific Languages (DSLs). An approach to execute specifications developed using DSLs goes by applying a model transformation technique to produce a specification in another language. These transformation techniques are applied sucessively until the specification reaches a language with an implemented run-time. The language named Concurrent Object-Oriented Petri Nets (CO-OPN) is being used successfully as a target language for such model transformation techniques. CO-OPN is an object-oriented formal language for specifying concurrent systems, that separates coordination from computational tasks. CO-OPN offers mechanisms to define the system structure and behavior, and like DSLs, relieves the developer from stipulate how that structure and behavior are attained by the underlying system. The currently available code generator for CO-OPN only produces sequential code, despite of this language potential of expressing specifications rich in concurrent behavior. The generated sequential code can be executed either in a Sequential Run-Time or in the step simulator, which is part of CO-OPN Builder IDE. The generation of sequential code turns out to be an adversity to CO-OPN application since concurrent specifications cannot be executed in parallel and therefore this languages potential is not fully exploited. This dissertation aims at filling this CO-OPN’s execution gap, through the development of a Parallel Run-Time. The new Run-Time is achieved through the adaptation of the sequential code generator and actual execution support mechanisms. In this manner, all concurrent specifications that target CO-OPN benefit from thread safe code, ready for execution in parallel and distributed environments, relieving the developer from delving into parallel programming details.By guaranteeing a safe execution environment, CO-OPN becomes an alternative to the way parallel software is nowadays developed

Robust iris recognition under unconstrained settings

Tese de mestrado integrado. Bioengenharia. Faculdade de Engenharia. Universidade do Porto. 201

How can family businesses use their own tradition as a source of innovation

In order to survive in today’s fast paced and competition driven work environment it is inevitable for family owned business to ensure longevity through a proper innovation plan. The difficulty lies in how to come up with innovations. Thus, focusing on their own individual and collective capabilities and providing them with a new meaning seems an effective measure. One way of doing so is to search inside the company’s history and see how they can use this accumulation of know-how and transform it into an innovation strategy. Scholars have been studying family firms on how they are managed, what factors influence the strategic decisions and also how they ensure longevity. Nonetheless, there is a lack of research in how family-owned companies manage their relations and how they withstand more powerful and meaningful business relationships. With this in mind, the case of SousaTêxtil, a textile company that managed to innovate in their customer management by reapplying temporally distant knowledge and customs, is being examined. SousaTêxtil and its owner, Carlos Sousa, have been, throughout the years, improving their internal processes. The findings suggested that, although the company is largely affected by non-economic factors, the quality of interpersonal relationships and the usage of idiosyncratic knowledge are the main success factors.Para que uma empresa seja capaz de não só sobreviver nos dias de hoje, mas também garantir a sua longevidade, é necessário um plano de inovação adequado. A dificuldade está apenas em como inovar. Deste modo, focando nas suas próprias capacidades e atribuir-lhes um novo significado ou funcionalidades parece ser uma medida eficaz. Um método a usar é procurar na história da empresa e ver como se pode usar o conhecimento acumulado numa estratégia de inovação. Investigadores têm estudado empresas familiares sobre como são lideradas, quais os fatores que influenciam as decisões estratégicas e também a longevidade. No entanto, não há informação sobre como as empresas familiares lidam com as relações e como são capazes de ter relacionamentos comerciais mais poderosos e significativos. Sabendo isto, utilizei o caso da SousaTêxtil, uma empresa têxtil que conseguiu inovar na gestão de seus clientes, reaplicando conhecimentos e tradições temporariamente distantes. Esta empresa e o seu líder, Carlos Sousa, têm, ao longo dos anos, aperfeiçoado os seus processos. Os resultados sugerem que, embora a empresa seja amplamente afetada por fatores não-económicos, a qualidade das relações interpessoais e o uso do conhecimento são os principais fatores de sucesso

The Technological Diversity of Lithic Industries in Eastern South America during the Late Pleistocene-Holocene Transition

Brazilian archaeological literature has insisted for decades upon associating hunter-gatherer sites dated to the Pleistocene–Holocene transition either to the Itaparica tradition, if located in central or northeastern Brazil, or to the Umbu tradition and Humaitá tradition, if located in southern Brazil, Uruguay, or any other adjacent part of Paraguay and Argentina. These associations have been based almost entirely on the presence or absence of lesmas and “projectile points,” regardless of their morphological and technological features. In the Uruguayan archaeological literature, three other cultures are recognised: Fell industry, Catalanense industry, and Tigre tradition, all in the Uruguayan region. However, the last 10 years of systematic studies on the lithic assemblages from these sites have shown that Paleoindian societies from Eastern South America are more culturally diverse than expected and that previously defined archaeological cultures present several issues in their definition, suggesting that many of these “traditions” are not valid and should no longer be used. Instead, new lithic industries and archaeological cultures should be defined only when cultural patterns are observable through systematic analyses

A data-driven approach to road accidents in the municipality of Lisbon

Traffic accidents in urban areas lead to reduced quality of life and social inequality in cities, specially in third world countries. The growth of the urban mesh and the population density is seldom accompanied by the development or sizing of the road infrastructure. It is a fact that the number and severity of road accidents in Portugal have been decreasing over the last thirty years, bringing us closer to the European average. However, despite these facts, the situation remains worrying. Despite the adoption of programs such as the European Commission Road Safety Program and the recent EU Road Safety Policy Framework 2021-2030 or, on a national basis, the PENSE 2020 - National Strategic Plan for Road Safety the number of road accidents with victims in the district of Lisbon is still higher than the European average. Thus, and for this dissertation, we conducted an exploratory data analysis (EDA) on the combined data of traffic incidents recorded in the occurrence management system of the Lisbon Fire Brigade Regiment (RSB) and the road accidents reported to ANSR by the security forces (GNR and PSP) through the Statistical Bulletin of Traffic Accidents (BEAV). Furthermore, with data from occurrences in the Municipality of Lisbon between 2010 and 2020, to identify the existence of Black Spots in Lisbon's roads and which are the most significant and contributing factors to explain their existence. The data on road accidents were also georeferenced to capitalize their spatial existence and, consequently, better understand the existing spatial patterns and risk factors. Subsequently, through the use of the ArcGIS Pro we apply the algorithms of the Kernel Density and Hot Spot Analysis (Getis-Ord Gi*) tools, identifying the existence of the black spots, and that human, environmental and circumstantial factors have an influence on the severity of accidents, being the content validity guaranteed through an expert committee. This way, our research goal is to contribute to identify accident concentration areas in the city of Lisbon (hotspots), considering their influencing conditions.Os acidentes de trânsito em áreas urbanas conduzem à redução da qualidade de vida e à desigualdade social nas cidades, especialmente nos países em desenvolvimento. O crescimento da malha urbana, assim como, a densidade populacional raramente é acompanhada pelo desenvolvimento ou dimensionamento da infraestrutura rodoviária. É um facto que o número e a gravidade dos acidentes rodoviários em Portugal têm vindo a diminuir ao longo dos últimos trinta anos, o que permitiu aproximarmos da média Europeia, apesar destes factos a situação continua a ser preocupante. Apesar da adoção de programas como o Programa de Segurança Rodoviária da Comissão Europeia ou, numa base nacional, o PENSE 2020 - Plano Estratégico Nacional para a Segurança Rodoviária os números de acidentes de viação com vítimas no distrito de Lisboa continuam a ser mais elevados do que a média europeia. Desta forma e para efeitos deste trabalho realizamos uma análise de dados exploratória (AED) aos dados dos incidentes de transito registados no sistema de gestão de ocorrências do Regimento de Sapadores Bombeiros de Lisboa e a os dados de acidentes rodoviários reportados à ANSR pelas forças de segurança (GNR e PSP) através do Boletim Estatístico de Acidentes de Viação (BEAV) e ocorridos no concelho de Lisboa entre 2010 e 2020 por forma a identificar a existência de Pontos Negros nas vias de Lisboa e quais os fatores mais significantes e contribuintes que permitam explicar a sua existência. Os dados relativos aos acidentes rodoviários foram também georreferenciados para capitalizar a sua existência espacial e, consequentemente, compreender melhor os padrões espaciais existentes e os fatores de risco. Posteriormente através do recurso ArcGIS Pro aplicaram-se os algoritmos das ferramentas Densidade de Kernel e Hot Spot Analysis (Getis-Ord Gi*), identificando a existência dos pontos negros, e que fatores humanos, ambientais e circunstanciais têm influência na gravidade dos acidentes e que algumas variáveis de exposição foram consideradas importantes na explicação da ocorrência dos mesmos, sendo a validade do conteúdo garantida através de uma comissão de especialistas. Pretende-se, assim, contribuir para a identificação das zonas de concentração de acidentes da cidade de Lisboa (hotspots), tendo em conta as suas condições influenciadoras. Potenciando a segurança rodoviária no município