PROTECTING BIOS IN THE NEXT MILLENNIUM: WHAT DOES IT MEAN?

The new millennium will begin in less than 2,000 days. The period of the post-industrial society in the Euro-American region will soon be over and a new era, perhaps that of the ethics of bios will start. With the beginning of the next millennium, a whole list of questions emerge, related to the future and the further existence of bios on this planet. Marx once said that, "Philosophers have only explained the world until now, but now it is necessary to change it." Our world has changed significantly in the last hundred and fifty years. Philosophers should now think more about the problem of how not to go on changing the world, but rather how to maintain bios and the environment in optimal condition, within the limits of sustainable existence and, in line with, the principles of intrinsic ethical values and the essence of life. Since the present existence of bios is based on specific philosophies and styles of thinking, it is philosophers who are responsible for the triumphs and pitfalls of our society. A New Order of Bios How do we answer the question in this the title? To think seriously about the question of protecting bios in the next millennium, from the point of view of philosophy, is to come up with the very provocative answer that, it makes no sense to answer it at all. If the catastrophic scenarios are fulfilled, it would no longer be within human capabilities to protect bios. These scenarios, for the development of the world and the existence of bios, were reached not only by fundamentalists, ecological organisations and movements, but also by groups of scientists from different fields, including ecologists. Ecology also, paradoxically, agrees with this provocative answer to the given question but, it is necessary to bear in mind that both ecology and philosophy have different reasons and different points of view, which can lead to the same answer. F. Fukuyama (1992) published a very interesting study, The End of History and the Last Man. This book summarises current opinions on the sense and aims of the history of human beings. As the title already suggests, the author comes to the conclusion that the culminating phase of fulfilment, according to teleology, has already started and that the next millennium will complete it definitively. This example can be used to show that, from this point of view, further discussion on the protection of bios in the next millennium has lost any meaning. In terms of both ecology and history, the same problem has to be solved, a problem that can be understood from different professional points of view. The existence of bios and its surrounding environment in the next millennium is not predictable on the basis of the latest developments of knowledge in ecology. This brings us back to teleology: for the first time the final aim is understood as the goal of the history of mankind, for the second time, as the final stage of the development of bio-systems. The answer, according to philosophy, is known in the first case, and all the symptoms document the final goal, but in the second case, the real forms of bios and environmental development, according to ecology, cannot be predicted for the future and the answer is unknown. From the strictly logical point of view of the concept of the goal, the answers are given a priori to the unprecedented eco-biological questions. This paper presents the stage when, while looking for the answer to the question of the protection of bios in the future, the merely traditional concept of the problem -reality and the objective truth equal objectivity -is no longer sufficient. In our opinion the problem of the protection of bios in the future, from the point of view of ecology, is a trans-disciplinary problem. This means transferring from a formulation in one field of discipline to a formulation in another. The concept of trans-disciplinarity does not end solely with scientific disciplines but continues, by the formulating of bios protection in symbols, i.e. as language, institutions, or cultural and social milieu. This concept of trans-disciplinarity differs from interdisciplinarity in that the problem to be solved is not understood as a focus of various scientific disciplines, as a limited area between different scientific subjects but, as an idea which penetrates these subjects in the form of a certain basis of ideas, which helps to formulate these subjects. The difference between a similar concept of a paradigm and the transdisciplinary approach is based on the hypothesis that this formulated basis of ideas is not the result of scientific knowledge but only an idea, more or less, anticipated and expressed by the majority of the population. A trans-disciplinary approach to the solving of the problem of protecting bios is not created automatically, only on the basis of empirical facts, and it is not possible to reveal it with the help of classical rational scientific methods. The solution to this problem is not given subjectively, on the basis of the endeavour and the wish to solve it. A reasonable solution lies in the contact of two approaches, two worlds, the sensuous and the rational. In this connection, Patocka's phenomenology leads to a similar model of the natural world (Patocka, 1992). There are three possible basic steps for a trans-disciplinar

The design and conduct of clinical trials to limit missing data

Peer Reviewedhttp://deepblue.lib.umich.edu/bitstream/2027.42/94446/1/sim5519.pd

Assessing and augmenting SCADA cyber security: a survey of techniques

SCADA systems monitor and control critical infrastructures of national importance such as power generation and distribution, water supply, transportation networks, and manufacturing facilities. The pervasiveness, miniaturisations and declining costs of internet connectivity have transformed these systems from strictly isolated to highly interconnected networks. The connectivity provides immense benefits such as reliability, scalability and remote connectivity, but at the same time exposes an otherwise isolated and secure system, to global cyber security threats. This inevitable transformation to highly connected systems thus necessitates effective security safeguards to be in place as any compromise or downtime of SCADA systems can have severe economic, safety and security ramifications. One way to ensure vital asset protection is to adopt a viewpoint similar to an attacker to determine weaknesses and loopholes in defences. Such mind sets help to identify and fix potential breaches before their exploitation. This paper surveys tools and techniques to uncover SCADA system vulnerabilities. A comprehensive review of the selected approaches is provided along with their applicability

Investigator experiences with financial conflicts of interest in clinical trials

<p>Abstract</p> <p>Background</p> <p>Financial conflicts of interest (fCOI) can introduce actions that bias clinical trial results and reduce their objectivity. We obtained information from investigators about adherence to practices that minimize the introduction of such bias in their clinical trials experience.</p> <p>Methods</p> <p>Email survey of clinical trial investigators from Canadian sites to learn about adherence to practices that help maintain research independence across all stages of trial preparation, conduct, and dissemination. The main outcome was the proportion of investigators that reported full adherence to preferred trial practices for all of their trials conducted from 2001-2006, stratified by funding source.</p> <p>Results</p> <p>844 investigators responded (76%) and 732 (66%) provided useful information. Full adherence to preferred clinical trial practices was highest for institutional review of signed contracts and budgets (82% and 75% of investigators respectively). Lower rates of full adherence were reported for the other two practices in the trial preparation stage (avoidance of confidentiality clauses, 12%; trial registration after 2005, 39%). Lower rates of full adherence were reported for 7 practices in the trial conduct (35% to 43%) and dissemination (53% to 64%) stages, particularly in industry funded trials. 269 investigators personally experienced (n = 85) or witnessed (n = 236) a fCOI; over 70% of these situations related to industry trials.</p> <p>Conclusion</p> <p>Full adherence to practices designed to promote the objectivity of research varied across trial stages and was low overall, particularly for industry funded trials.</p

Tamper-Evident Digital Signatures:

We introduce the notion of tamper-evidence for digital signature generation in order to defend against attacks aimed at covertly leaking secret information held by corrupted signing nodes. This is achieved by letting observers (which need not be trusted) verify the absence of covert channels by means of techniques we introduce herein. We call our signature schemes tamper-evident since any deviation from the protocol is immediately detectable. We demonstrate our technique for the RSA-PSS (known as RSA&apos;s Probabilistic Signature Scheme) and DSA signature schemes and show how the same technique can be applied to the Schnorr and Feige-Fiat-Shamir (FFS) signature schemes. Our technique does not modify the distribution of the generated signature transcripts, and has only a minimal overhead in terms of computation, communication, and storage