Časopis Teorie vědy 1/2004

OBSAH

 

 

 

 

Adolf Filáček:

Social Sciences and Humanities in the Czech Republic                                   5

(Focus on Academy of Sciences)

 

Costas P. Constantinou:

The Use of Concept   Mapping as an Assessment Tool in Science                 35

 

Franc Mali:

The new Challenges of University System in the Recent Processes

  of Commodification of Scientific Knowledge                                       67
 
Ladislav Tondl:
Alternatives and Creative Activity as   a   Search                                           79

 

Oleg Suša:

Risks-learning  in a  Global Cosmopolis:

                                     103

 

Wendy Drozenová, Monika Bartíková:

Ethics of Science in the Czech Republic                                                    111

 

Izabela Kijenska,   Krzysztof Jan Kurzydłowski:

Innovation strategy in Poland under the central planning

and during the transition to market ekonomy                                           127

 

 

Reviews

Monika Bartíková:   

  Christine Wächter . Technik-Bildung und Geschlecht                            141

 

 

---

 

 

 

Teorie vědy 1/2004

 

Social Sciences and Humanities in the Czech Republic [1]

(Focus on Academy of Sciences)

 

Adolf Filáček

 

Abstract

This paper discusses key transformation problems and changes in the humanities and the social sciences after 1989. These changes are also a part of the approximation of the Czech Republic to the developed countries of the European Union. Attention is also paid to the role of the humanities and the social sciences in the European Research area. The research in the area of the humanities and the social sciences in the Academy of Sciences of the Czech Republic is described in detail here.

 

 

 

THE USE OF   CONCEPT   MAPPING

AS   AN   ASSESSMENT   TOOL   IN   SCIENCE

 

Costas P. Constantinou

 

Abstract

  The paper discusses the role of concept mapping as a tool of performance assessment. A concept map is a graphical representation consisting of nodes representing concepts and labeled lines denoting the relationship between a pair of concepts. A concept map is interpreted as representing important aspects of the student’s organization of concepts and, indirectly, the student’s construction of meaning. Therefore, concept mapping has the potential to provide direct measures of students’ knowledge structures. The paper discusses the following characteristics of a concept map used as an assessment tool:

1 It can be presented as an activity that invites a student to provide evidence bearing on his or her knowledge structure in a domain.

2. It provides a format for the student’s response.

3. It can be accompanied by a scoring system with which the students’ performance can be evaluated accurately and consistently.

Various concept mapping techniques are reviewed based on these three characteristics. The issues of validity and reliability are then addressed in detail. The need for concept mapping techniques to be used in conjunction with an operational description of cognition is also identified and analyzed. Finally, the educational implications of adopting concept mapping performance assessment strategies are discussed along with directions of future research.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

THE NEW CHALLENGES OF UNIVERSITY SYSTEM

IN THE RECENT PROCESSES

OF COMMODIFICATION OF SCIENTIFIC KNOWLEDGE

 

Franc Mali

 

Abstract

 

The article deals with the role of university research in the recent processes of globalisation and the new mode of knowledge production. The central processes characterising the modern world are the changes of social production of knowledge. Universities as a basic academic research institutions have to accommodate to these changing trends. Therefore, it is very important to promote the new political culture of hybrid communities and entrepreneurial values among academic staff at universities. Hybridisation reflects the need of different communities (academics, industrials, politics, etc.) to speak in more than one language in order to communicate at the (social) boundaries .

 
ALTERNATIVES AND CREATIVE ACTIVITY AS A SEARCH
Ladislav Tondl

 

Abstract

     The paper develops the author´s reflections on the role of „thinkings and reasonings in alternatives“. The concept „alternative“ is conceived as „alternative of anything“, as alternative for a competent subject in the framework of a specified situation, as alternative for entities or processes being able to secure a specified function. Some types of rational action are analysed as a goal-oriented search for alternatives with a better competence in the given problem-solving situation. This concerns, e.g.: research activities or cognitive actions, technological creative actions, creations in the sphere of art and culture.

 

Risks-learning  in a  Global COsmopolis: Information,

Citizenship and Global Cosmopolitanism

 

Oleg Suša

 

Abstract

Alternative futures oriented to contemporary global problems solutions and risk management are related to citizens ability to learn how to become global (cosmopolitan) citizens. Important conditions for that should be analysed within the information society, globalization of media and communication. This learning has not been not institutionalized so far (as in the education), and it is a result of rather indirect social interaction. Individuals are embedded into complex network of the global information flows and, at the same time, they are members of their national and local communities. Cosmopolitan individual is a virtual member of a global community. Social analysis should study with more attention global media as the key globalizing actor shaping the public space of communication with the power to shape cosmopolitan participation.

Ethics   of   Science   in   the Czech   Republic

 

Wendy Drozenová, Monika Bartíková *

 

Abstract

Ethics of science is a concept with no clear borders. At the first place, it concerns the problems issuing from the developments in science itself, the new possibilities of action brought about by them and their moral implications. On the other hand, it includes also the problems connected with science as an institution, its social structure, and its impacts on the broader social context of the society. During the course of history, there have been important changes in the view of ethics of science. Since the 20th century, common general values have been accepted, issuing from human rights and basic values of democracy. With the progress in science, new problems and questions have arisen at the same time. In the Czech Republic, ethics of science has not been studied in general, the main issues resulting from some special and specific problems. For some branches of science, especially medicine or genetic engineering, new institutions have appeared to solve them. Ethical regulations are usually realised through multidisciplinary ethics committees, belonging partly to the sphere of medicine (ethics committees of teaching hospitals, Ethics Committee of the General Medical Council of CR), partly to the government (Bioethics Committee of the Council for R & D), partly to both (Ethics Committee of the Ministry of Health of CR), without any clear division of competencies. Theoretical reflection of ethics of science in the Czech Republic has become recently a subject of research in the Centre for Science, Technology and Society Studies of the Academy of Science. The science and technology development pick up speed and brings new problems, which refer to ethical side of life. First of all there are the problems joined the biomedical area. Cloning, genetic manipulation of stem cells, forensic genetic, xenotransplantation or nanotechnology – all these new technologies are attended by specific moral issues, which implicate wide debates to this problems. In February 2004 has been started in Madrid an international project called “Institutionalisation of Ethics in Science Policy; practices and impact (INES)”, which tries to answer some questions related to the ethical problems of science and technology. The project is focusing the problems concerned with the incorporation of ethics in science policy and its impact on practice in science and technology. The area of the science and technology ethics is very extensive and it was necessary to concentrate the attention on the limited area of science and technology – the biomedical issues like medical genetics, genetic modified food and forensic genetics .

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Innovation   strategy   in   Poland  

under   the   central   planning

  and   during   the   transition   to   market   economy

 

Izabela Kijenska,   Krzysztof Jan Kurzydłowski

 

 

Abstract

Transition to market economy has been initiated in Poland with a strong focus on fiscal policy and on financial aspects of business activity. The passive policy in technology and innovation area has been based on the paradigm that the State should not intervene in the innovations domain which must be shaped by market forces. The paper examines how the market forces influenced innovation processes in Poland during the transition period and what innovation strategy emerged in such conditions. It refers to the technological gap in 1990 and to the governmental policy overcome it. The paper also shows the structure of Polish R&D units and describes current demand for contract research for Polish industry

 

 

 

REVIEWS

 

  Christine Wächter: Technik-Bildung und Geschlecht

München, Wien: Profil Verlag, 2003

 

Monika Bartiková

 

Abstract

 

Our society conception about the relationship between technology and women, comes out from the prejudice that women have an unfriendly attitude to technology and the fine woman cannot understand how technology works. But in real life there are more women, who do not correspond with this image. These women graduated in technical subjects and despite this they must incessantly persuade people about their abilities. The book “Technik-Bildung und Geschlecht” engages in the theme of women education at the technical schools. This book is a result of research, which tries to insert the women-technology-programs in the praxis in the South-Austrian region Villach and so awake the women interest for technical study .

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

[1] The paper is based on the contribution presented at the ESRC Accession Countries Conference, Ascot, Surrey, UK, February 12-13, 2004

* W. Drozenová is the author of the parts: Introduction, Development of Ethics of Science in History, State of the Art in the Czech Republic

M. Bartíková is the author of the parts: International project “INES”, Used Methods,   Conclusion

The part Institutions were prepared together.