Antes da proibição

While there have always been norms and customs around the use of drugs, explicit public policies--regulations, taxes, and prohibitions--designed to control drug abuse are a more recent phenomenon. Those policies sometimes have terrible side-effects: most prominently the development of criminal enterprises dealing in forbidden (or untaxed) drugs and the use of the profits of drug-dealing to finance insurgency and terrorism. Neither a drug-free world nor a world of free drugs seems to be on offer, leaving citizens and officials to face the age-old problem: What are we going to do about drugs?While there have always been norms and customs around the use of drugs, explicit public policies--regulations, taxes, and prohibitions--designed to control drug abuse are a more recent phenomenon. Those policies sometimes have terrible side-effects: most prominently the development of criminal enterprises dealing in forbidden (or untaxed) drugs and the use of the profits of drug-dealing to finance insurgency and terrorism. Neither a drug-free world nor a world of free drugs seems to be on offer, leaving citizens and officials to face the age-old problem: What are we going to do about drugs?
Leia mais: Drugs and Drug Policy: What Everyone Needs to Know

A ascensão do capitalismo

The Rise of Capitalism

by Ludwig von Mises
The precapitalistic system of product was restrictive. Its historical basis was military conquest. The victorious kings had given the land to their paladins. These aristocrats were lords in the literal meaning of the word, as they did not depend on the patronage of consumers buying or abstaining from buying on a market.
On the other hand, they themselves were the main customers of the processing industries, which, under the guild system, were organized on a corporative scheme. This scheme was opposed to innovation. It forbade deviation from the traditional methods of production. The number of people for whom there were jobs even in agriculture or in the arts and crafts was limited. Under these conditions, many a man, to use the words of Malthus, had to discover that "at nature's mighty feast there is no vacant cover for him" and that "she tells him to be gone."[1] But some of these outcasts nevertheless managed to survive, begot children, and made the number of destitute grow hopelessly more and more...
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O lado escuro do progresso tecnologico

Novo estudo mostra que por causa dos modernos sistemas de automatização cada vez os pilotos estão menos capaz voar.
Veja:
Eine Studie der US-Flugsicherheitsbehörde kommt zu einem erschreckenden Ergebnis: Viele Piloten moderner Linienmaschinen sind derart an automatische Systeme gewöhnt, dass sie immer weniger von der klassischen Fliegerei verstehen. Das hat laut dem Bericht bereits mehrere Abstürze verursacht. mehr...

Raça, economia e emprego

Walter Williams explica:
"Overall U.S. unemployment is 9.1 percent. For white adults, it's 8 percent, and for white teens, 23 percent. Black adult unemployment stands at 17 percent, and for black teens, it's 40 percent, more than 50 percent in some cities, for example, Washington.
Chapter 3 of "Race and Economics," my most recent book, starts out, "Some might find it puzzling that during times of gross racial discrimination, black unemployment was lower and blacks were more active in the labor force than they are today." Up until the late 1950s, the labor force participation rate of black teens and adults was equal to or greater than their white counterparts. In fact, in 1910, 71 percent of black males older than 9 were employed, compared with 51 percent for whites. As early as 1890, the duration of unemployment among blacks was shorter than it was among whites, whereas today unemployment is both higher and longer-lasting among blacks than among whites...."
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Inovação

The Economist informa:

"INNOVATION is today’s equivalent of the Holy Grail. Rich-world governments see it as a way of staving off stagnation. Poor governments see it as a way of speeding up growth. And businesspeople everywhere see it as the key to survival.

Which makes Clay Christensen the closest thing we have to Sir Galahad. Fourteen years ago Mr Christensen, a knight of the Harvard Business School, revolutionised the study of the subject with “The Innovator’s Dilemma”, a book that popularised the term “disruptive innovation”. This month he publishes a new study, “The Innovator’s DNA”, co-written with Jeff Dyer and Hal Gregersen, which tries to take us inside the minds of successful innovators. How do they go about their business? How do they differ from regular suits? And what can companies learn from their mental habits? ---"

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O lado escuro da ciência medica

Panel reveals new details of 1940's experiment

By MIKE STOBBE - AP Medical Writer | AP – 9 hrs ago

ATLANTA (AP) — A presidential panel on Monday disclosed shocking new details of U.S. medical experiments done in Guatemala in the 1940s, including a decision to re-infect a dying woman in a syphilis study.

The Guatemala experiments are already considered one of the darker episodes of medical research in U.S. history, but panel members say the new information indicates that the researchers were unusually unethical, even when placed into the historical context of a different era.

"The researchers put their own medical advancement first and human decency a far second," said Anita Allen, a member of the Presidential Commission for the Study of Bioethical Issues.

From 1946-48, the U.S. Public Health Service and the Pan American Sanitary Bureau worked with several Guatemalan government agencies to do medical research — paid for by the U.S. government — that involved deliberately exposing people to sexually transmitted diseases.

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Europa e o mundo de hoje

"Once, Europe happened to the world. Now, the world is happening to us."
John le Carré

Transformação social na América

34 fatos sobre o declínio da classe média nos Estado Unidos:
The following are 34 pieces of evidence that prove that the middle class in America is rapidly shrinking....
#1 In 1980, 52 percent of all jobs in the United States were middle income jobs. Today, only 42 percent of all jobs are middle income jobs.
#2 Back in 1980, less than 30% of all jobs in the United States were low income jobs. Today, more than 40% of all jobs in the United States are low income jobs.
#3 Only 63.5 percent of all men in the United States had a job last month. According to Bloomberg, that figure is "just slightly above the December 2009 nadir of 63.3%. These are the lowest numbers since 1948."
#4 In 1969, 95 percent of all men between the ages of 25 and 54 had a job. Last month, only 81.2 percent of men in that age group had a job.
#5 According to one recent survey, 64 percent of Americans would be forced to borrow money if they had an unexpected expense of $1000.
#6 The wealthiest 1% of all Americans now control 40 percent of all the wealth in this country.
#7 The poorest 50% of all Americans now control just 2.5% of all the wealth in this country.
#8 The wealthiest 1% of all Americans now own over 50% of all the stocks and bonds.
#9 According to the Washington Post, the average yearly income of the bottom 90 percent of all U.S. income earners is just $31,244.
#10 The average yearly income of the top 0.1% of all U.S. income earners is 5.6 million dollars.
#11 Between 1969 and 2009, the median wages earned by American men between the ages of 30 and 50 dropped by 27 percent after you account for inflation.
#12 Only the top 5 percent of all U.S. households have earned enough additional income to match the rise in housing costs since 1975.
#13 During this economic downturn, employee compensation in the United States has been the lowest that it has been relative to gross domestic product in over 50 years.
#14 According to the Bureau of Economic Analysis, health care costs accounted for just 9.5% of all personal consumption back in 1980. Today they account for approximately 16.3%.
#15 Total credit card debt in the United States is now more than 8 times larger than it was just 30 years ago.
#16 There are fewer payroll jobs in the United States today than there were back in 2000 even though we have added 30 million people to the population since then.
#17 Since the year 2000, we have lost approximately 10% of our middle class jobs. In the year 2000 there were about 72 million middle class jobs in the United States but today there are only about 65 million middle class jobs.
#18 The competition for even the most basic jobs has become absolutely brutal. Approximately 7 percent of all those that apply to get into Harvard are accepted. At a recent "National Hiring Day" held by McDonald's only about 6.2 percent of the one million Americans that applied for a job were hired.
#19 It now takes the average unemployed worker in America about 40 weeks to find a new job.
#20 According to a report released in February from the National Employment Law Project, higher wage industries are accounting for 40 percent of the job losses in America but only 14 percent of the job growth. Lower wage industries are accounting for just 23 percent of the job losses but 49 percent of the job growth.
#21 Half of all American workers now earn $505 or less per week.
#22 The cost of college tuition in the United States has gone up by over 900 percent since 1978.
#23 In the United States today, there are more than 100,000 janitors and more than 317,000 waiters and waitresses that have college degrees.
#24 17 million college graduates are doing jobs that do not even require a college degree.
#25 According to one recent survey, 36 percent of Americans say that they don't contribute anything at all to retirement savings.
#26 Back in 1965, only one out of every 50 Americans was on Medicaid. Today, one out of every 6 Americans is on Medicaid.
#27 As 2007 began, there were 26 million Americans on food stamps. Today, there are more than 45 million Americans on food stamps, which is a new all-time record.
#28 The number of Americans on food stamps has increased 74% since 2007.
#29 Today, one out of every four American children is on food stamps.
#30 In 1980, just 11.7% of all personal income came from government transfer payments. Today, 18.4% of all personal income comes from government transfer payments.
#31 The number of Americans that are going to food pantries and soup kitchens has increased by 46% since 2006.
#32 One out of every six elderly Americans now lives below the federal poverty line.
#33 In the United States, over 20 percent of all children are now living in poverty. In the UK and in France that figure is well under 10 percent.
#34 According to the Federal Reserve, the richest one percent of all Americans have a greater net worth than the bottom 90 percent combined.
As the middle class continues to shrivel up and die, the number of desperate people is going to continue to grow.
In the past, I have written extensively about how many Americans are already becoming so desperate that they will do just about anything for money
Fonte

A nova universidade

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August 28, 2011

Online Venture Energizes Vulnerable College

But some faculty at Southern N.H. fear for future of bricks-and-mortar campus

M. Scott Brauer for The Chronicle

Paul LeBlanc, president of Southern New Hampshire U.: "The traditional campus ... now has the resources to be even more traditional."

Enlarge Image

By Marc Parry

Manchester, N.H.

If you sketched a portrait of a college in a dicey economic spot, it might look like Southern New Hampshire University.

The private nonprofit university is little known nationally, not selective, and depends on tuition. It sits in a state whose population of public high-school graduates is projected to decline for years.

But rather than limping along, this obscure institution is becoming a regional powerhouse—online.

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Invenções brasileiras

As dez invenções brasileiras 

Nem só de inventar samba, bossa-nova e caipirinha vivem as mentes nacionais. Em terras brasileiras também foram criados inventos inovadores, que muitos usam e poucos conhecem a origem tupiniquim. Conheça algumas das invenções ‘Made in Brazil. Fonte: Associação Nacional dos Inventores.

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John Stuart Mill

The Basic Writings of John Stuart Mill which includes On Liberty, the Subjection of Women and Utilitarianism written by legendary English philosopher and political theorist John Stuart Mill is widely considered to be three of the greatest books of all time. These great classics will surely attract a whole new generation of John Stuart Mill readers. For many, On Liberty, the Subjection of Women and Utilitarianism is required reading for various courses and curriculums. And for others who simply enjoy reading timeless pieces of classic literature, the combination of these three gems by John Stuart Mill is highly recommended. Published by Classic Books America and beautifully produced, The Basic Writings of John Stuart Mill: On Liberty, the Subjection of Women and Utilitarianism would make an ideal gift and it should be a part of everyone's personal library.

Crise das universidades (americanas)

What's gone wrong at our colleges and universities—and how to get American higher education back on track 
A quarter of a million dollars. It's the going tab for four years at most top-tier universities. Why does it cost so much and is it worth it?
Renowned sociologist Andrew Hacker and New York Times writer Claudia Dreifus make an incisive case that the American way of higher education, now a $420 billion-per-year business, has lost sight of its primary mission: the education of young adults. Going behind the myths and mantras, they probe the true performance of the Ivy League, the baleful influence of tenure, an unhealthy reliance on part-time teachers, and the supersized bureaucracies which now have a life of their own.
As Hacker and Dreifus call for a thorough overhaul of a self-indulgent system, they take readers on a road trip from Princeton to Evergreen State to Florida Gulf Coast University, revealing those faculties and institutions that are getting it right and proving that teaching and learning can be achieved—and at a much more reasonable price.

Classificação de universidades

Manipulação das cifras segundo os critérios:
"... The U.S. News and World Report “Best Colleges” rankings, which will be published next month, are viewed as a Baedeker and Bible by more than 5 million American parents considering colleges and universities for their high-school juniors and seniors.

We think that parents should use this guide with caution.
Our problem with the rankings begins with how they are produced. An unspecified number of academic leaders -- presidents, chancellors, provosts -- are sent questionnaires and asked to rate their peers. Though few of those surveyed have sat in on freshman lectures at Harvard or Yale (where students famously complain about the quality of undergraduate instruction), they invariably give the brand-name schools their highest endorsements.
Interestingly, when another college guide, the Princeton Review, surveyed students, half of the top 10 schools that U.S. News lauded for having “a strong commitment to undergraduate teaching” received a “C” grade or less.
More disturbing is that many of the measurements “Best Colleges” uses are subject to manipulation. As the survey has grown in importance, some school administrators have found ways to game the ratings race. One example: U.S. News ranks a school, in part, by the number of applications it receives compared with the number of students it accepts. Schools with higher rejection rates do better than those that admit a greater percentage of their applicants. We know of a young woman who was hired by the admissions office of a highly rated liberal-arts college to increase application numbers. The school wasn’t increasing its freshman slots, but was encouraging more teenagers to apply so that its rejection figures would be boosted..."
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Filsosofia e psicologia da inovação - discurso de Steve Jobs (de Apple) em Stanford

Veja Vídeo legendada:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yplX3pYWlPo&feature=youtu.be

Corrupção nas ciências econômicas

Charles Ferguson explica:"... Are these professors simply being paid to say what they would otherwise say anyway? Unlikely. Mishkin and Portes showed no interest whatever in Iceland until they were paid to do so, and they got it totally wrong. Nor do all these professors seem to make policy statements contrary to the financial interests of their clients. Even more telling, they uniformly oppose disclosure of their financial relationships.The universities avert their eyes and deliberately don't require faculty members either to disclose their conflicts of interest or to report their outside income. As you can imagine, when Larry Summers was president of Harvard, he didn't work too hard to change this.
Now, however, as the national recovery is faltering, Summers is being eased out while Harvard is welcoming him back. How will the academic world receive him? The simple answer: Better than he deserves.
Mais
Veja o documentario: Inside job

Inovação sem mercado

More on the Electric Edsel

August 20, 2011

By eric

Well, here’s a surprise – the Chevy Volt electric car isn’t selling.
Only 3,200 of these $41,000 “economy” cars have found buyers so far – most of them probably in the Hollywood hills, where it is trendy for the rich to show green (Leonardo DiCaprio owns a $100k Tesla electric roadster).
But out in the real world, the idea of a $41k “economy” car doesn’t parse. Yes, the Volt is a brilliant piece of engineering. But that’s neither here nor there if it costs more to operate than a standard economy car, which is ultimately the only criteria that matters as far as the marketplace viability of electric cars.
Leia mais para entender que passou e porque o carro não vende bem.

Como a dívida e a política do desenvolvimento destroem a África

  'Africa's Odious Debts is a path-breaking book that should be read by every student, professional and policymaker concerned with the causes of the region's underdevelopment. In a masterful, easily comprehendible and professionally thorough manner, the authors demolish the myth that African countries have received large net capital flows. In a detailed empirical presentation, they show quite the contrary: capital outflow from the poorest countries in the world, to the richest. This book should radically alter thinking and policy.' - John Weeks, Professor Emeritus, School of Oriental and African Studies, University of London 'Ndikumana and Boyce present a coruscating analysis of the deleterious impact of crushing debt and capital flight on poor African countries that are ironically among the largest recipients of foreign aid. Eminently readable, it is a fascinating study on how absolute power corrupts absolutely beyond the tethers of human conscience.' - Dev Kar, Lead Economist, Global Financial Integrity 'This is probably the most important book on Africa in recent years; it is vital reading for everyone with an interest in African affairs. The story of Africa's revolving door of inflowing debts and outflowing capital is one with catastrophic consequences for the ordinary people of Africa. Leonce Ndikumana and James Boyce have put in many years of legwork to explore the dimensions of this scandal, and the data they marshal shows, conclusively, how Africa has become a net creditor to the rest of the world, while remaining shackled to poverty by outstanding odious debts. Much can be done to free African countries from this appalling burden, and the authors are right to identify strengthening transparency, curtailing money laundering, repudiating odious debt and recovering stolen wealth as top priorities. Enraging, enlightening and encouraging in equal measure, this book combines passion and research excellence: a genuine tour de force." - John Christensen, Director, Tax Justice Network

A falâcia da janela quebra

Vídeo educacional sobre o erro mais comum na debate econômica:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DWJpaEokAI0

Governo aberto (open-source)

The case for open-source government

Maybe we are all thinking too much like Bolsheviks and not enough like Googlers. For Lenin and the Russian revolutionaries, the big question was “Kto kogo?” — essentially, “Who has the upper hand?”

Kto kogo remains the paradigm at the center of the fiscal battles roiling the Western world: young vs. old; rich taxpayers vs. poor welfare beneficiaries; public sector workers vs. private sector ones; wealthy Northern Europe vs. bankrupt Southern Europe; small government conservatives vs. big government liberals.
But a few people — writers, activists, even politicians — are examining the current woes of the Western state through a very different prism. You could call it the Government 2.0 approach, and its fundamental thesis is that the biggest question is not how much to spend and how much to tax, it is how to adapt the state to the information age.
One of the first thinkers to articulate this view was the best-selling author Don Tapscott. Tapscott, who has been arguing for decades that the knowledge economy requires a new style of government, thinks the time for his idea may have finally come.
“If you look at the current crisis, we have the irresistible force for reducing the cost of government meeting up with the immovable rock of public expectation that government should be better, not worse,” Tapscott told me. “Tinkering with this will not work. When you are talking about cutting trillions of dollars, that’s not trimming fat, that is tearing out organs, and we don’t need to do that, and we don’t want to do that.”
“We need to fundamentally rethink how we orchestrate and create government value,” he said. “And now we have a burning platform, which could help us do it.”
Tapscott’s latest book, Macrowikinomics co-written with Anthony D. Williams, suggests some ways to do that. One of his favorites is releasing government data. That information, he said, can then “become a platform on which private companies, civil society, other government organizations and, crucially, individuals, can self-organize to create value.”
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O renascimento do vinil

The revival of vinyl

Back to black

Oddly, the hunger for records is widespread

ONE common trend in many Western countries, regardless of the health of their recorded-music markets, is clear: vinyl is back. Sales of LPs were up in both Britain and Germany last year.  

The Economist

Inovação

The Economist diz:
"INNOVATION is today’s equivalent of the Holy Grail. Rich-world governments see it as a way of staving off stagnation. Poor governments see it as a way of speeding up growth. And businesspeople everywhere see it as the key to survival..."
Mais 
Veja também: 
http://www.economist.com/blogs/schumpeter/2011/06/fast-food-and-cultural-sensitivityhttp://www.economist.com/blogs/freeexchange/2011/06/innovation
http://www.economist.com/node/18958643

Crise das leis dos patentes nos EUA

The Economist: 

Intellectual property 

Patent medicine 

Why America’s patent system needs to be reformed, and how to do it Aug 20th 2011

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Política social americana

This classic book serves as a starting point for any serious discussion of welfare reform. Losing Ground argues that the ambitious social programs of the1960s and 1970s actually made matters worse for its supposed beneficiaries, the poor and minorities. Charles Murray startled readers by recommending that we abolish welfare reform, but his position launched a debate culminating in President Clinton’s proposal “to end welfare as we know it.”

O mito dos mercados racionais

At the core of the current financial crisis has been the widely held assumption that markets behave rationally. Fox, Time magazine editor-at-large, isn't the first to bring scrutiny—or censure—to the conceit, but his analysis is singularly compelling, and the rare business history that reads like a thriller. Fox leads us on a chronological journey of modern economic theory, featuring the cast of scholars who constructed the 20th- and 21st-century financial landscape, from Irving Fisher to such post-WWII figures as Milton Friedman, Harry Markowitz, Franco Modigliani and Merton Miller, Jack Treynor and William Sharpe. Fox offers a behind-the-scenes glimpse at academia's finest, complete with amusing anecdotes about the players and their theories, and illustrates how our economic behaviors and markets have been shaped by a gradually refined theory holding that the stock market prices are both random and perfectly rational. A must-read for anyone interested in the markets, our economy or government, this dense but spellbinding work brings modern finance and economics to life. 

Caminho para prosperidade

Demitir maus professors e reformar as leis de patentes, diz economista Tyler Cowan.

Vídeo do The Economist

Cultura no chão

 Life at the Bottom: The Worldview That Makes the Underclass is a collection of essays written by British writer, doctor, and psychiatrist Theodore Dalrymple and published in book form by Ivan R. Dee in 2001. In 1994, the Manhattan Institute started publishing the contents of these essays in the City Journal magazine. They are about personal responsibility, the mentality of society as a whole, and the troubles of the lower class, which Dalrymple commonly calls the "underclass". Dalrymple had problems in finding a British publisher to help him turn his individual essays into a collection, so he eventually turned to American companies for publication. The main themes expressed in the collection include how an individual's worldview (Weltanschauung) affects their actions and the attitudes of those around them, the philosophy of social determinism, and why a lack of personal responsibility for one's actions results from an individual's beliefs in determinism.

This new collection of essays in Our Culture by the author of Life at the Bottom bears the unmistakable stamp of Theodore Dalrymple's bracingly clearsighted view of the human condition. It suggests comparison with the work of George Orwell. In these twenty-six pieces, Dr. Dalrymple ranges over literature and ideas, from Shakespeare to Marx, from the breakdown of Islam to the legalization of drugs. Informed by years of medical practice in a wide variety of settings, his acquaintance with the outer limits of human experience allows him to discover the universal in the local and the particular, and makes him impatient with the humbug and obscurantism that have too long marred our social and political life. As in Life at the Bottom, his essays are incisive yet undogmatic, beautifully composed and devoid of disfiguring jargon. Our Culture, What's Left of It is a book that restores our faith in the central importance of literature and criticism to our civilization.

História escondida - Lincoln

I will say then that I am not, nor ever have been in favor of bringing about in any way the social and political equality of the white and black races, that I am not nor ever have been in favor of making voters or jurors of negroes, nor of qualifying them to hold office, nor to intermarry with white people; and I will say in addition to this that there is a physical difference between the white and black races which I believe will forever forbid the two races living together on terms of social and political equality. And inasmuch as they cannot so live, while they do remain together there must be the position of superior and inferior, and I as much as any other man am in favor of having the superior position assigned to the white race.
~ Abraham Lincoln, Debate with Stephen Douglas, Sept. 18, 1858, in Abraham Lincoln: Speeches and Writings, 1832-1858 (New York: Library of America, 1989), pp. 636-637.

A orígem do estado

e Franz Oppenheimer Vindicated: War and the Origins of the State

Posted by Charles Burris on August 16, 2011 10:45 AM

A new wave of archaeological research on the origins of the state is vindicating the pioneer socioeconomic theories of the great libertarian sociologist Franz Oppenheimer, author of the masterwork, The State. Oppenheimer’s book was a decisive influence upon modern libertarian thought, especially in the works of Albert Jay Nock, Frank Chodorov, and Murray N. Rothbard. It set the stage for libertarian class theory or power elite analysis in the 20^th Century.

Parem a ajuda

"For God's Sake, Please Stop the Aid!"

The Kenyan economics expert James Shikwati, 35, says that aid to Africa does more harm than good. The avid proponent of globalization spoke with SPIEGEL about the disastrous effects of Western development policy in Africa, corrupt rulers, and the tendency to overstate the AIDS problem.

SPIEGEL:

Mr. Shikwati, the G8 summit at Gleneagles is about to beef up the development aid for Africa...

Shikwati: ... for God's sake, please just stop.

SPIEGEL: Stop? The industrialized nations of the West want to eliminate hunger and poverty.

Shikwati: Such intentions have been damaging our continent for the past 40 years. If the industrial nations really want to help the Africans, they should finally terminate this awful aid. The countries that have collected the most development aid are also the ones that are in the worst shape. Despite the billions that have poured in to Africa, the continent remains poor.

SPIEGEL: Do you have an explanation for this paradox?

Shikwati: Huge bureaucracies are financed (with the aid money), corruption and complacency are promoted, Africans are taught to be beggars and not to be independent. In addition, development aid weakens the local markets everywhere and dampens the spirit of entrepreneurship that we so desperately need. As absurd as it may sound: Development aid is one of the reasons for Africa's problems. If the West were to cancel these payments, normal Africans wouldn't even notice. Only the functionaries would be hard hit. Which is why they maintain that the world would stop turning without this development aid.

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Censura não!

Congresso sergipano sobre ciência, tecnologia e inovação

A Associação Sergipana de Ciência, ASCi, convida a todos para participarem do Congresso Sergipano de Ciência. A promoção desta primeira edição do Congresso Sergipano de Ciência tem como motivação congregar pesquisadores sergipanos de diferentes áreas de conhecimento que desenvolvem pesquisas no campo das Ciências e Inovação Tecnológica, bem como estudantes de graduação e pós-graduação. A realização do Congresso durante a Semana Nacional de Ciência e Tecnologia representará um espaço para divulgação nacional das pesquisas realizadas em Sergipe.

Público Alvo Pesquisadores, estudantes de graduação e pós-graduação e professores do ensino básico e universitário sergipanos.

Quem é a ASCI? A Associação Sergipana de Ciência (ASCi), fundada em 10 de setembro de 2004, é uma entidade civil, sem fins lucrativos, que tem por objetivos:

• contribuir para o desenvolvimento científico e tecnológico;
• promover e facilitar a cooperação entre os pesquisadores;
• incentivar e estimular o interesse do público com relação à ciência.

A ASCi busca alcançar esses objetivos por meio da:

• publicação de revistas, livros, jornais e boletins de caráter científico ou de divulgação científica;
• promoção de eventos científicos;
• colaboração e intercâmbio com associações congêneres.

Nesses anos de existência, a ASCi tem sido responsável pela edição da revista Scientia Plena. A qualidade desta revista já é reconhecida em diversos ambientes acadêmicos, inclusive pelo mais importante indicador de qualidade de revistas científicas do Brasil, o Qualis da CAPES.

Inscrição

A solução é crescimento econômico

The Real Solution Is Growth

4:30 PM Monday August 8, 2011
by Daron Acemoglu | Comments ( 15)

Recent headlines have focused on the debt ceiling, the recent credit rating downgrade, unemployment, and the other thorny fiscal challenges facing the United States. But consider this: increasing the country's average growth rate by one percentage point over the next 20 years would not only result in much higher incomes and more jobs for all Americans but would also obviate the need for drastic spending cuts today to reign in the government deficit. With a 2% increase per year, average incomes in the United States, and to a first approximation government tax revenues, would be 49% higher in 20 years than they are today; with a 3% increase per year, they would be 81% higher.
The underlying message? We should not take our eye off the really important ball: economic growth and the innovation process that underpins it.
Leia mais

Pouco estudado e menos ainda aprendido

As enrollment rates in colleges have continued to increase, a new book questions whether the historic number of young people attending college will actually learn all that much once they get to campus. In Academically Adrift: Limited Learning on College Campuses, two authors present a study that followed 2,300 students at 24 universities over the course of four years. The study measured both the amount that students improved in terms of critical thinking and writing skills, in addition to how much they studied and how many papers they wrote for their courses.
Richard Arum, a co-author of the book and a professor of sociology at New York University, tells that the fact that more than a third of students showed no improvement in critical thinking skills after four years at a university was cause for concern...
Overall, though, the study found that there has been a 50 percent decline in the number of hours a student spends studying and preparing for classes from several decades ago...Fonte

América (EUA)

Se quer entender os Estados Unidos, começa com este livro.

Porque a educação está num estado de desastre - não só no Brasil

  Harry Browne explica: "... A primeira coisa que precisa ser entendida a respeito das escolas públicas é que elas não são instituições educacionais. Elas são agências políticas — logo, são controladas pelo grupo que tenha mais influência política. E isto exclui você e eu...
O problema não são professores despreparados. O problema não é a falta de recursos ou a falta de participação dos pais.
O problema é que as escolas são administradas pelo governo...


Suponhamos que o governo tenha estatizado a indústria de computadores tão logo ela surgiu (tudo para o "bem do povo", claro). Não é difícil imaginarmos como ela seria hoje:

— Um computador pessoal custaria alguns milhões de reais e seria maior que uma casa;
— Ele provavelmente seria capaz de realizar operações de soma e subtração, porém os funcionários públicos iriam nos explicar por que é cientificamente impossível uma máquina destas realizar multiplicações e divisões;
— O custo de um computador subiria continuamente, e cada modelo novo seria pior e mais caro que o do ano anterior;
— Haveira grupos de interesse organizados tentando fazer com que o governo produzisse computadores com DOS, e outros grupos exigindo interface gráfica. Haveria intensos debates sobre se os computadores fornecidos pelo governo deveriam poder acessar sites religiosos ou não.

O lado positivo seria que todos os computadores viriam com um software que ensinaria às crianças como manusear uma camisinha..."
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