Hybrid philosophy and rational vitalism in Canguilhem and Ortega y Gasset

This paper explores the problem of the synthesis between vitalism and rationalism, in contemporary philosophy. With this aim, we compare the intellectual careers of Georges Canguilhem (1904-1995) and José Ortega y Gasset (1883-1955). We contrast their conceptions of philosophy as “hybrid” knowledge, closely related to science, as well as their points of view on Vitalism, anthropology, the technique and the perspectivism. To avoid that comparison is purely abstract and ahistorical, we use the method of the sociology of philosophy. This forces us to locate both paths in their respective philosophical fields and generational units, also according to his social background and professional career.

Hybrid LMS-LMF algorithm for adaptive echo cancellation

The coefficients of an echo canceller with a near-end section and a far-end section are usually updated with the same updating scheme, such as the LMS algorithm. A novel scheme is proposed for echo cancellation that is based on the minimisation of two different cost functions, i.e. one for the near-end section and a different one for the far-end section. The approach considered leads to a substantial improvement in performance over the LMS algorithm when it is applied to both sections of the echo canceller. The convergence properties of the algorithm are derived. The proposed scheme is also shown to be robust to noise variations. Simulation results confirm the superior performance of the new algorithm.