Explicación causal versus causación

En "Causiug and Nothingness", Helen Beebee [Beebee, 2004] aborda el problema de los eventos negativos que cumplen el rol de causas, El sentido común asigna en muchos casos un rol causal a aparentes eventos en los que, lo que se pone de manifiesto es la ausencia de algnna propiedad. Por ejemplo se sostiene que la falta de muros de contención fue causa de la inundación ocurrida en la ciudad de Santa Fe hace unos años

The challenge of making the idea of Sustainable Intensification operational

The intensification of agricultural production has become a topic of intense debate in academic and socio-political media worldwide. In southern South America agricultural intensification operates in two ways. On one hand, through the rThe intensification of agricultural production has become a topic of intense debate in academic and socio-political media worldwide. In southern South America agricultural intensification operates in two ways. On one hand, through the replacement of natural covers (forests and native grasslands dedicated, in general, to livestock) by annual or perennial crops (in general soybeans or pine and eucalyptus plantations). On the other hand, intensification is associated with the increasing input use and/or the implementation of management practices that increase production per area unit.eplacement of natural covers (forests and native grasslands dedicated, in general, to livestock) by annual or perennial crops (in general soybeans or pine and eucalyptus plantations). On the other hand, intensification is associated with the increasing input use and/or the implementation of management practices that increase production per area unit.Fil: Paruelo, José. Consejo Nacional de Investigaciones Científicas y Técnicas. Oficina de Coordinación Administrativa Parque Centenario. Instituto de Investigaciones Fisiológicas y Ecológicas Vinculadas a la Agricultura. Universidad de Buenos Aires. Facultad de Agronomía. Instituto de Investigaciones Fisiológicas y Ecológicas Vinculadas a la Agricultura; Argentina. Universidad de la República; Urugua

Modos de comprensión y modelos de explicación

En un interesante artículo de 1995, Wesley Salmon intenta, entre otras cosas, clarificar el significado de lo que habitualmente resulta un término sumamente vago, el de "comprensión científica". En ese trabajo, el autor distingue varias acepciones del término comprensión: a) comprensión de significados, donde incluye la comprensión de símbolos, obras artísticas o el lenguaje de alguna civilización pasada, b) comprensión como empatía, es decir compartir sentimientos o emociones, e) comprensión de propósitos, ya sean naturales como sobrenaturales y d) comprensión de fenómenos naturales

Enseñanza de las ciencias y filosofía

La epistemología es una de las herramientas necesarias para el desarrollo de nuevas estrategias para la enseñanza de las ciencias. Sin embargo, no está claro el rol que esta disciplina juega en este proceso. En este trabajo presento una serie de ejemplos extraídos de manuales de uso habitual en la enseñanza de las ciencias donde se detecta la falta de un correcto análisis epistemológico. Identifico dos roles para los filósofos de la ciencia: la tarea de formación epistemológica de los docentes de ciencia y la investigación acerca de los costos epistemológicos de la transposición didáctica y de los supuestos que tiene la ciencia enseñada.Epistemology is a valuable tool for the design of new strategies in science teaching. However, the role the discipline plays in this process is not generally clear. In this paper I present several examples taken from standard science books that show lack of a correct epistemological analysis. I identify two roles for philosophers of science: the task of epistemological training of science teachers and the research of the epistemological costs of didactic transposition and of the implicit assumptions of the theory being taught

Los sistemas agropecuarios : qué verde era mi valle

Fil: Paruelo, José. Universidad de Buenos Aires. Facultad de Agronomía; Argentina.La agricultura es una de las actividades humanas que contribuyen a\ngenerar cambios de escala global al modificar el tipo de cobertura y el\nuso del suelo. Al sustituir bosques por cultivos, por ejemplo, se ve\nafectada la diversidad biótica por pérdida de especies. Así se modifica\nla dinámica del carbono (C) de la porción deforestada, con un aumento\nen la cantidad de C atmosférico por mayores pérdidas y menor\nincorporación.\nLa agricultura no solamente contribuye a los cambios globales, también\nse ve afectada por éstos, al modificarse el régimen de lluvias y por el\naumento en la temperatura global

Superposición de interacciones causales en la teoría de Phil Dowe

La teoría de causación de Dowe (1992) de cantidades conservadas contenía las bases sobre las que intenta dar cuenta de la causación; reciéntemente en (2000) Dowe presenta la teoría en un estado de desarrollo que permite aplicarla con más detalle a los casos pretendidos. En este trabajo presentaremos algunos contraejemplos a la teoría inicial que no pueden ser resueltos tampoco por la teoría detallada, y mostraremos de qué manera puede obtenerse toda una serie de estos contraejemplos. Analizaremos qué tipo de entidades, procesos o interacciones son candidatos a jugar el papel de causas y efectos, mostrando cómo la línea de contraejemplos puede extenderse a otro tipo de casos que recientemente fueron abordados en la teoría detallada. Mostraremos además cómo la teoría de Dowe podría hacerse inmune a esta familia de contraejemplos y cuál sería el coste de esta posible solución.Dowe's theory of causation (1992) of conserved quantities contained the foundations on which he tries to account for causation. Recently in (2002), Dowe has presented the theory in a state of development that enables it to be applied in a more detailed fashion to would-be cases. In this study, we shall present some counterexamples to the initial theory that cannot be resolved by the detailed theory either, and we shall show how an entire series of counterexamples can be obtained. We shall analyse what type of entities, processes or interaction are candidates for playing the role of cause and effect, demonstrating how the line of counterexamples can be extended to other types of cases that were recently examined in the detailed theory. We shall also show how Dowe's theory might become immune to this family of counterexamples, and what the cost of this possible solution might be

Coexistencia pacífica de explicaciones y reducción

The present paper deals with the notion of complementarity associated with Salmon’s proposal of peaceful coexistence between scientific explanation models. The relation between the coexistence of such models and theoretical reduction is studied. Finally a way of understanding peaceful coexistence is proposed which does not rely on pragmatic factors and also allows us to return to the use of the explanatory capacity of theories as a value of relevance in the rational choice between scientific theories

Land use / land cover change (2000 – 2014) in the Rio de la Plata grasslands : an analysis based on MODIS NDVI time series

Baeza, Santiago. Universidad de la República. Facultad de Agronomía. Departamento de Sistemas Ambientales. Montevideo, Uruguay.Paruelo, José María. Universidad de Buenos Aires. Facultad de Agronomía. Instituto de Investigaciones Fisiológicas y Ecológicas Vinculadas a la Agricultura (IFEVA). Laboratorio de Análisis Regional y Teledetección (LART) Buenos Aires, Argentina.22Latin America in general and the Rio de la Plata Grasslands (RPG) in particular, are one of the regions in the world with the highest rates of change in land use/land cover (LULC) in recent times. Despite the magnitude of this change process, LULC descriptions in the RPG are far from being complete, even more those that evaluate LULC change through time. In this work we described LULC and its changes over time for the first 14 years of the 21st century and for the entire grassland biome of the Rio de la Plata, one of the most extensive grassland regions in the world. We performed simple but exhaustive classifications at regional level based on vegetation phenology, using extensive LULC field database, time series of MODIS NDVI satellite images and decision trees classifiers, generating an annual map for all RPG. The used technique achieved very good levels of accuracy at the regional (94.3%–95.5%) and sub-regional (78.2%–97.6%) scales, with commission and omission errors generally low (Min = 0.6, Max = 10.3, Median = 5.7, and Min = 0, Max = 41.8, Median = 6.8 for regional and sub regional classification respectively) and evenly distributed, but fails when LULC classifications are generated in years when the climate is very dierent from those used to generate spectral signatures and train decision trees, or when the NDVI time series accumulates large volumes of lost data. Our results show that the RPG are immersed in a strong process of land use change, mainly due to the advance of the agricultural frontier and at the expense of loss of grassland areas. The agricultural area increased 23% in the analyzed period, adding over than 50,000 Km2 of new crops. Most agricultural expansion, and therefore the greatest losses of grassland, concentrates on both sides of Uruguay river (Mesopotamic Pampa and the western portion of Southern and Northern Campos) and the western portion of Inland Pampa. The generated maps open the door for more detailed and spatially explicit modeling of many important aspects of ecosystem functioning, for quantification in the provision of ecosystem services and for more efficient management of natural resources

Disentangling the signal of climatic fluctuations from land use : changes in ecosystem functioning in South American protected areas (1982-2012)

177-189Global environmental change is characterized by changing climate, atmospheric composition and land use. Its impact on ecosystem structure and functioning has been detected throughout the world. While every ecosystem is vulnerable to climate change, the degree of the impact and the magnitude of the ecosystem response are likely to vary. Protected areas of South America provide a ‘laboratory’ to test expectations of climate change effects on ecosystems at a regional scale. By using protected areas we minimized the effects of land use/land cover changes over ecosystem functioning. We analyzed the temporal trends, that is, directional changes, and spatial heterogeneity of both climatic variables and attributes of the seasonal dynamics of the normalized difference vegetation index, that is, a surrogate of vegetation carbon gains derived from satellite information, on 201 protected areas of South America. Increased productivity and higher seasonality, frequently climate driven, is the most common signal across South American biomes but concentrated on those areas located in the tropics and subtropics. In general, arid and semiarid sites responded positively to increases in precipitation and negatively to increases in temperature, while humid ecosystems responded in the opposite way. Our results provide a preliminary basis for predicting which ecosystems will respond more rapidly and strongly to climate change. We also provide support to the fact that protected areas are not static systems as their functioning is changing with different magnitude and in contrasting directions

Environmental and Human Controls of Ecosystem Functional Diversity in Temperate South America

The regional controls of biodiversity patterns have been traditionally evaluated using structural and compositional components at the species level, but evaluation of the functional component at the ecosystem level is still scarce. During the last decades, the role of ecosystem functioning in management and conservation has increased. Our aim was to use satellite-derived Ecosystem Functional Types (EFTs, patches of the land-surface with similar carbon gain dynamics) to characterize the regional patterns of ecosystem functional diversity and to evaluate the environmental and human controls that determine EFT richness across natural and human-modified systems in temperate South America. The EFT identification was based on three descriptors of carbon gain dynamics derived from seasonal curves of the MODIS Enhanced Vegetation Index (EVI): annual mean (surrogate of primary production), seasonal coefficient of variation (indicator of seasonality) and date of maximum EVI (descriptor of phenology). As observed for species richness in the southern hemisphere, water availability, not energy, emerged as the main climatic driver of EFT richness in natural areas of temperate South America. In anthropogenic areas, the role of both water and energy decreased and increasing human intervention increased richness at low levels of human influence, but decreased richness at high levels of human influence