Do politicamente correto ao incorretamente polido

The text argues that a linguistic analysis paired with the appreciation of the context of current social stands is highly legitimate, observing, however, that, in different situations, this so-called investigative-appreciative attitude has been transformed in actions and reactions that might become vulgarized in common place, or might even become disfigured in stupidity. The distortions in the assessment of the discourse of the other are now a widespread, the hunt for what is now conventionalized as the politically incorrect in language is just a sample of such a distortion. In this presentation, a number of cases of such a nature is analyzed against cases in which, inversely, the use of language is markedly polite, but the deviation of conduct is made more evident. The objective is to evaluate both cases via the role of intersubjectivity in the construal of discourse, aiming at verifying its conceptual counterpart, with special attention to evidence on the mutual conceptual engagement between interlocutors.

Iowa State Daily (February 24, 2012)

ContentsMoving beyond coalProvost leaves 'passion'Program named 'Top 10' in nationSwim team debuts Olympic-style suitsShould stupidity be saved as free speech?

The idiot: his place in creation, and his claims on society.

Mode of access: Internet.

Mental efficiency, and other hints to men and women,

Mental efficiency.--Expressing one's individuality.--Breaking with the past.--Settling down in life.--Marriage.--Books.--Success.--The petty artificialities.--The secret of content.

A pathology of the animal spirits – the clinical neurology of Thomas Willis (1621–1675) Part II – Disorders of intrinsically abnormal animal spirits

Thomas Willis (1621-1675), author of the classical work Cerebri Anatome (1664), was arguably the father of the modern era of neurology. His clinical neurology, as described in his Pathologiae Cerebri (1667) and De Anima Brutorum (1672), was largely derived from personal observations and not from traditional authorities and was based around his concept of the animal spirits, a fictitious entity in many ways analogous to the present day idea of the nerve impulse. This concept allowed him to develop a pathology of the animal spirits which embraced the whole content of the clinical neurology and psychiatry of his times. The anatomical and physiological background to Willis' concepts of animal spirit dysfunction, and those disorders he regarded as due to disturbed function of intrinsically normal animal spirits, have been dealt with in the previous part of this paper. The disorders he attributed to intrinsically abnormal animal spirits, dealt with in this part of the paper, comprised two categories. In one, the animal spirits possessed explosive properties, whilst in the other the abnormalities were non-explosive in their nature. The former category included epilepsy, hysteria and hypochondriasis, whilst the latter included mainly disorders now considered psychiatric e.g. delirium, melancholy, madness and stupidity. Willis' ideas about the pathogenesis of nervous system disorder seem never to have been generally accepted, partly because they appeared at a time when others were increasingly calling into question the existence of the animal spirits. Nevertheless, Willis' attempt to record and interpret all nervous system disease on the basis of disorder of function of a single underlying mechanism represents a formidable synthetic intellectual endeavour on the part of a very busy physician. (C) 2002 Elsevier Science Ltd. All rights reserved.