Economica

ABSTRACT Georges Bataille is remarkably absent from Gilles Deleuze’s oeuvre, even though early commentators like Michel Foucault, in his ‘Theatrum Philosophicum’, recognised an obvious affinity between the two thinkers. Direct references to Bataille in Deleuze’s published works are few and far between, and most of them are barely more than offhand remarks. In these few comments, Deleuze’s treatment of Bataille seems to oscillate between contempt and admiration. In an astonishing footnote within the Anti-Oedipus, Bataille’s concept of ‘sumptuary, non-productive expenditure’ is equated with Deleuze’s and Guattari’s concept of the ‘production of consumption’. Taking this passing remark seriously would mean finding Bataille at the very heart of Deleuze’s thought. This paper, therefore, seeks to investigate the traces of Bataille in Deleuze’s work, in order to evaluate the footnote in question. I will show that the equivocation of ‘sumptuary, non-productive expenditure’ and ‘production of consumption’ is indeed warranted and that Deleuze’s thought is far closer to Bataille’s than Deleuze ever cared to admit. Bataille emerges as a great precursor to the thought of immanence, difference, and the event.

Despite global efforts to harmonize international trade statistics, our understanding of digital trade and its implications remains limited. Here, we introduce a method to estimate bilateral exports and imports for dozens of sectors starting from the corporate revenue data of large digital firms. This method allows us to provide estimates for digitally ordered and delivered trade involving digital goods (e.g. video games), productized services (e.g. digital advertising), and digital intermediation fees (e.g. hotel rental), which together we call digital products. We use these estimates to study five key aspects of digital trade. We find that, compared to trade in physical goods, digital product exports are more spatially concentrated, have been growing faster, and can offset trade balance estimates, like the United States trade deficit on physical goods. We also find that countries that have decoupled economic growth from greenhouse gas emissions tend to have larger digital exports and that digital products exports contribute positively to the complexity of economies. This method, dataset, and findings provide a new lens to understand the impact of international trade in digital products.

Objetivo: Comparar e analisar as rentabilidades das empresas elétricas sustentáveis com as empresas sustentáveis brasileiras do Índice de Sustentabilidade Empresarial da B3. Referencial teórico: Abordou-se o importante conceito de Triple Bottom Line nas empresas e na sociedade, atrelado às empresas sustentáveis do setor elétrico. Método: Utilizou-se de estatística descritiva e aplicada com testes estatísticos não paramétricos para uma distribuição de não normalidade para análise dos dados coletados. Resultados e conclusão: A pesquisa apresenta que, ao que tudo indica, há conexão entre as rentabilidades das empresas sustentáveis do setor elétrico com a totalidade de empresas que compõe o índice de sustentabilidade empresarial da B3 e que, portanto, estar relacionada no rol de empresas sustentáveis é agregar valores de boa imagem e de sustentabilidade para a empresa do setor elétrico. Implicações da pesquisa: A pesquisa detalha, empiricamente, que ser sustentável é rentável para as empresas do setor elétrico a longo prazo, pois suas rentabilidades podem ser atreladas ao grupo de empresas sustentáveis da B3. Esse fato contribui para que outras empresas do setor elétrico possam fazer parte do índice de sustentabilidade empresarial e, por conseguinte, tenham boas práticas de sustentabilidade ambiental, social e econômica. Originalidade/valor: Este estudo é vanguardista em comparar sustentabilidade no setor elétrico, amplifica o discurso de sustentabilidade empresarial e incentiva que o máximo de empresas, principalmente do setor elétrico, possam ter cultura sustentável em seus negócios.

Em 1859, uma nuvem massiva de gás eletrificado e partículas subatômicas altamente carregadas atingiram a magnetosfera terrestre, causando danos nas redes telegráficas mundiais. Causado por uma violenta ejeção de massa coronal (CME), o Evento de Carrington foi a maior tempestade geomagnética já registrada. Se um evento semelhante ocorresse nos dias atuais, as consequências seriam, no entanto, econômica e socialmente devastadoras, tendo em vista a alta dependência da sociedade na eletricidade e em linhas de energia quando comparada à época do ocorrido. Assim sendo, a fim de criar uma ferramenta auxiliadora na antevisão de tempestades solares parecidas, desenvolveu-se neste trabalho um algoritmo de inteligência artificial capaz de prever eventos do tipo Carrington com base na velocidade de prótons não-lineares originados por fenômenos relativos à atividade magnética do Sol. O Sun Tracker, nome dado ao algoritmo pelos autores, foi desenvolvido por meio de um modelo de machine learning do tipo Árvore de Decisão, o qual utilizou bases de dados das missões espaciais DSCOVR e WIND para os conjuntos de treino e teste. Sun Tracker obteve 79,5% de precisão, evidenciando a eficácia do modelo na previsão de eventos solares de risco à infraestrutura elétrica e eletrônica terrestre.

Negative feedback in academic settings is often unavoidable, although it may directly interfere with the ultimate goal of education, as setbacks can diminish motivation, and may even lead to dropping out of school. Previous research suggests that certain predispositions, inductions, and interventions might mitigate the harmful effects of negative feedback. Among others, growth mindset beliefs and mindfulness meditation were proposed as the most promising candidates that may help students to retain motivation. In a pre-registered, randomized experiment, we gave a disappointing evaluation to 383 university students in a bogus laboratory IQ test situation. Half of the participants previously received a growth mindset induction referring to intelligence as a malleable characteristic, while the other half received a fixed mindset induction referring to intelligence as a stable characteristic that cannot be changed. Then participants had a brief mindfulness meditation session or a control condition. Subsequently, they could choose to complete practice tasks before the final IQ assessment. The number of completed optional tasks was used as a behavioral proxy for task persistence. The results showed no difference in task persistence for the growth mindset or the mindfulness induction groups, compared to the other conditions. However, those who reported having higher pre-induction growth mindset beliefs or dispositional mindfulness completed more optional tasks after the mindset or mindfulness induction, respectively. We concluded that our brief inductions may not be adequate for everyone to rectify the demotivating effects of negative feedback, but can enhance task persistence for people with a stronger disposition towards a growth mindset or mindfulness.

The notion of junior scientists’ independence has increasingly become relevant in the evaluation of scientific excellence. In this paper, we deconstruct independence—as an element of excellence—in the context of reviewing a prestigious European Research Grant. Conducting qualitative interviews with this grant’s reviewers, we reveal five different dimensions of how reviewers construct the notion of independence: two dimensions are directly linked to the applicants’ relationship to their supervisors: reviewers were talking about independence as a result of emancipation from the applicants’ (former) supervisor and as a concept that researchers need to negotiate with them. Beyond, three topical dimensions of independence could be identified, referring to originality, networks and mobility. We further show that gender is deeply inscribed into these dimensions, especially when reviewers use their own biographical background for assessing the independence of an early career researcher. These experiences are subject to gender bias through (i) individual stereotypical pictures of masculinity and femininity and (ii) the specific norms of scientific disciplines and structures. These individual gendered constructions of independence might give space to gender bias in the assessment of independence and thus of excellence.