A Behavioral Foundation for Models of Evolutionary Drift

Binmore and Samuelson (1999) have shown that perturbations (drift) are crucial to study the stability properties of Nash equilibria. We contribute to this literature by providing a behavioural foundation for models of evolutionary drift. In particular, this article introduces a microeconomic model of drift based on the similarity theory developed by Tversky (1977), Kahneman and Tversky (1979) and Rubinstein (1988),(1998). An innovation with respect to those works is that we deal with similarity relations that are derived from the perception that each agent has about how well he is playing the game. In addition, the similarity relations are adapted to a dynamic setting. We obtain different models of drift depending on how we model the agent´s assessment of his behaviour in the game. The examples of the ultimatum game and the chain-store game are used to show the conditions for each model to stabilize elements in the component of Nash equilibria that are not subgame- perfect. It is also shown how some models approximate the laboratory data about those games while others match the data.

Terrorism and the World Economy

Published as an article in: European Economic Review, 2008, vol. 52, issue 1, pages 1-27.

La actividad del World Café, una herramienta para la evaluación y desarrollo de los valores en el deporte escolar

[ES] El presente trabajo presenta una experiencia aplicada que pretende conocer las opiniones, de los agentes sociales que rodean a los jóvenes deportistas, para la promoción de valores. A través de la actividad del World Café, los agentes sociales implicados en el deporte escolar aportaron orientaciones enfocadas a mejorar la calidad educativa del deporte. Un grupo de 56 participantes [padres/madres (8), árbitros (8), profesores de educación física (8), entrenadores (8), deportistas de élite (8), deportistas escolares (8) y representantes institucionales (8)] debatieron, desde su perspectiva, cómo consideraban que podían ayudar en la promoción de valores en los contextos deportivos escolares en los que participan. Entre los resultados más relevantes destacan, la necesidad de concretar desde el propio centro escolar los valores que se pretenden promocionar a través del deporte; en segundo lugar, la importancia de llevar a cabo una coordinación entre los agentes directos que rodean a los jóvenes deportistas; y finalmente, llevar a cabo una formación dirigida a monitores y padres/madres, que les permita adquirir herramientas adecuadas para la promoción de valores.

Ethnolinguistic democracy, translation policy and contemporary world order (dis)order

Eguíluz, Federico; Merino, Raquel; Olsen, Vickie; Pajares, Eterio; Santamaría, José Miguel (eds.)

Community structure in real-world networks from a non-parametrical synchronization-based dynamical approach

[EN]This work analyzes the problem of community structure in real-world networks based on the synchronization of nonidentical coupled chaotic Rössler oscillators each one characterized by a defined natural frequency, and coupled according to a predefined network topology. The interaction scheme contemplates an uniformly increasing coupling force to simulate a society in which the association between the agents grows in time. To enhance the stability of the correlated states that could emerge from the synchronization process, we propose a parameterless mechanism that adapts the characteristic frequencies of coupled oscillators according to a dynamic connectivity matrix deduced from correlated data. We show that the characteristic frequency vector that results from the adaptation mechanism reveals the underlying community structure present in the network.

Rule the World

Rule the World es una aplicación para móviles Android. Consiste en introducir al jugador en una realidad aumentada, mediante el uso de su localización, debe de recoger diferentes objetos para darles diferentes usos, como llevarlos equipados, usarlos para construir otros objetos o enviárselos a amigos. En el siguiente documento se muestra el completo desarrollo de este proyecto, como se ha realizado la gestión, en que partes se ha dividido, la planificación que se ha llevado para realizar el trabajo, el análisis que se hizo de la aplicación, junto con su diseño, como se ha realizado el desarrollo y las pruebas. Este proyecto ha servido para afianzar conocimientos adquiridos a lo largo del grado, como el desarrollo de bases de datos, seguridad y arquitecturas y algoritmos software. Pero también ha servido para aprender nuevas cosas, como programar para un sistema diferente, utilizar elementos poco vistos en el grado, como la geolocalización y los mapas.

The Uniform World Model: A Methodology for Predicting the Health Impacts of Air Pollution

47 p.

Shedding light on TQM: some research findings

Over the last decad , the paradigm of Total Quality Management (TQM) has been successfully forged in our business world. TQM may be defined as something that is both complex and ambiguous; nevertheless, some key elements or principles can be mentioned which are common to all of them: customer satisfaction, continuous improvement, commitment and leadership on the part of top management, involvement and support on the part of employees, teamwork, measurement via indicators and feedback. There are, in short, two main reasons for it having spread so widely: on the one hand, the successful diffusion of ISO 9000 standards for the implementation and certification of quality management systems, standards that have been associated to the TQM paradigm, and, on the other, the also successful diffusion of self evaluation models such as the EFQM promoted by the European Foundation for Quality Management and the Malcolm Baldrige National Quality Award in the USA, promoted by the Foundation for the Malcolm Baldrige National Quality Award. However, the quality movement is not without its problems as far as its mid and long term development is concerned. In this book some research findings related to these issues are presented.

The body social: an enactive approach to the self

This paper takes a new look at an old question: what is the human self? It offers a proposal for theorizing the self from an enactive perspective as an autonomous system that is constituted through interpersonal relations. It addresses a prevalent issue in the philosophy of cognitive science: the body-social problem. Embodied and social approaches to cognitive identity are in mutual tension. On the one hand, embodied cognitive science risks a new form of methodological individualism, implying a dichotomy not between the outside world of objects and the brain-bound individual but rather between body-bound individuals and the outside social world. On the other hand, approaches that emphasize the constitutive relevance of social interaction processes for cognitive identity run the risk of losing the individual in the interaction dynamics and of downplaying the role of embodiment. This paper adopts a middle way and outlines an enactive approach to individuation that is neither individualistic nor disembodied but integrates both approaches. Elaborating on Jonas' notion of needful freedom it outlines an enactive proposal to understanding the self as co-generated in interactions and relations with others. I argue that the human self is a social existence that is organized in terms of a back and forth between social distinction and participation processes. On this view, the body, rather than being identical with the social self, becomes its mediator

Learning to perceive in the sensor motor approach: Piaget's theory of equilibration interpreted dynamically

Learning to perceive is faced with a classical paradox: if understanding is required for perception, how can we learn to perceive something new, something we do not yet understand? According to the sensorimotor approach, perception involves mastery of regular sensorimotor co-variations that depend on the agent and the environment, also known as the "laws" of sensorimotor contingencies (SMCs). In this sense, perception involves enacting relevant sensorimotor skills in each situation. It is important for this proposal that such skills can be learned and refined with experience and yet up to this date, the sensorimotor approach has had no explicit theory of perceptual learning. The situation is made more complex if we acknowledge the open-ended nature of human learning. In this paper we propose Piaget's theory of equilibration as a potential candidate to fulfill this role. This theory highlights the importance of intrinsic sensorimotor norms, in terms of the closure of sensorimotor schemes. It also explains how the equilibration of a sensorimotor organization faced with novelty or breakdowns proceeds by re-shaping pre-existing structures in coupling with dynamical regularities of the world. This way learning to perceive is guided by the equilibration of emerging forms of skillful coping with the world. We demonstrate the compatibility between Piaget's theory and the sensorimotor approach by providing a dynamical formalization of equilibration to give an explicit micro-genetic account of sensorimotor learning and, by extension, of how we learn to perceive. This allows us to draw important lessons in the form of general principles for open-ended sensorimotor learning, including the need for an intrinsic normative evaluation by the agent itself. We also explore implications of our micro-genetic account at the personal level.

Incidental Memory of Younger and Older Adults for Objects Encountered in a Real World Context

Effects of context on the perception of, and incidental memory for, real-world objects have predominantly been investigated in younger individuals, under conditions involving a single static viewpoint. We examined the effects of prior object context and object familiarity on both older and younger adults' incidental memory for real objects encountered while they traversed a conference room. Recognition memory for context-typical and context-atypical objects was compared with a third group of unfamiliar objects that were not readily named and that had no strongly associated context. Both older and younger adults demonstrated a typicality effect, showing significantly lower 2-alternative-forced-choice recognition of context-typical than context-atypical objects; for these objects, the recognition of older adults either significantly exceeded, or numerically surpassed, that of younger adults. Testing-awareness elevated recognition but did not interact with age or with object type. Older adults showed significantly higher recognition for context-atypical objects than for unfamiliar objects that had no prior strongly associated context. The observation of a typicality effect in both age groups is consistent with preserved semantic schemata processing in aging. The incidental recognition advantage of older over younger adults for the context-typical and context-atypical objects may reflect aging-related differences in goal-related processing, with older adults under comparatively more novel circumstances being more likely to direct their attention to the external environment, or age-related differences in top-down effortful distraction regulation, with older individuals' attention more readily captured by salient objects in the environment. Older adults' reduced recognition of unfamiliar objects compared to context-atypical objects may reflect possible age differences in contextually driven expectancy violations. The latter finding underscores the theoretical and methodological value of including a third type of objects-that are comparatively neutral with respect to their contextual associations-to help differentiate between contextual integration effects (for schema-consistent objects) and expectancy violations (for schema-inconsistent objects).

El proceso de deshumanización del morir en la literatura hispánica medieval

354 p.

Basque legacy in the New World: on the surnames of Latin American presidents

[EN] In this article we explain the etymology of the surnames of Basque origin that some presidents of Latin American countries have or have had in the past. These family names were created in the language called Euskara, in the Basque Country (Europe), and then, when some of the people who bore them emigrated to America, they brought their surnames with them. Most of the family names studied here are either oiconymic or toponymic, but it must be kept in mind that the oiconymic ones are, very often, based on house-nicknames, that is, they are anthroponymic in the first place. As far as possible, we have related the surname, when its origin is oiconymic or toponymic, to its source, i.e. to the house or place where it was created.

"Heroes" and "Villains" of World History across Cultures

Emergent properties of global political culture were examined using data from the World History Survey (WHS) involving 6,902 university students in 37 countries evaluating 40 figures from world history. Multidimensional scaling and factor analysis techniques found only limited forms of universality in evaluations across Western, Catholic/Orthodox, Muslim, and Asian country clusters. The highest consensus across cultures involved scientific innovators, with Einstein having the most positive evaluation overall. Peaceful humanitarians like Mother Theresa and Gandhi followed. There was much less cross-cultural consistency in the evaluation of negative figures, led by Hitler, Osama bin Laden, and Saddam Hussein. After more traditional empirical methods (e.g., factor analysis) failed to identify meaningful cross-cultural patterns, Latent Profile Analysis (LPA) was used to identify four global representational profiles: Secular and Religious Idealists were overwhelmingly prevalent in Christian countries, and Political Realists were common in Muslim and Asian countries. We discuss possible consequences and interpretations of these different representational profiles.