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The recognition that geo-technologies are playing an increasingly important role in historical research led to a meeting in Barcelona in December 2007, attended by fifty leading academics and GIS practitioners from Europe, with additional representation from leading North American experts. The conference benefited from previous meetings in Florence (2000), Ghent (2002), Amsterdam (2004), Belfast (2005), Berlin (2006), and Mainz (2007). The three-day Barcelona conference had three key aims: (1) to survey the use and maturity of historical GIS; (2) to hold an inclusive, facilitated discussion on the feasibility and requirements for a European historical GIS; and (3) to develop a white paper on how to advance historical GIS within Europe. A network of networks was a major proposal to come from the Barcelona meeting, and its outlines and rationale are advanced in this white paper. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The application of e-Science technologies to disciplines in the arts and humanities raises major questions as to how those technologies can be most usefully exploited, what tools and infrastructures are needed for that exploitation, and what new research approaches can be generated. This paper reviews a number of activities in the UK and Europe in the last 5 years which have sought to address these questions through processes of experimentation and targeted infrastructure development. In the UK, the AHeSSC (Arts and Humanities e-Science Support Centre) has played a coordinating role for seven projects funded by the Arts and Humanities e-Science Initiative. In Europe, DARIAH (Digital Research Infrastructure for the Arts and Humanities) has sought to develop a deeper understanding of research information and communication in the arts and humanities, and to inform the development of e-infrastructures accordingly. Both sets of activity have indicated a common requirement: to construct a framework which consistently describes the methods and functions of scholarly activity which underlie digital arts and humanities research, and the relationships between them. Such a ‘methodological commons’ has been formulated in the field of the digital humanities. This paper describes the application of this approach to arts and humanities e-Science, with reference to the early work of DARIAH and AHeSSC. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In the last twenty years the educational policy of the European Union has sought two objectives: on the one hand, to make the citizens aware of the common European identity and on the other hand, to enable them to make Europe the most dynamic and competitive knowledge-based economy in the world. Education is seen as the most effective tool to face the current challenges in Europe in the context of globalization and economic crisis. It is therefore essential to raise the proper orientation to the present European Education crossroads. The hypothesis of this paper is that the education policy raised at European level does not respond with rigor and depth to the current challenges in Europe since it is predominantly subject to a target of economic progress and growth and to a professional training. Neither does it propose a comprehensive education within a code of ethics that achieves to alleviate the profound moral failings of the current crisis, their breeding ground consisting of nihilism and moral relativism. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The article offers the author's insights on the journal "Theoria." He states that from 2003 to 2009 the journal established itself as a global resource of philosophical papers in Europe and Spanish-speaking countries. The author says that "Theoria" has been acknowledged by the European Reference Index for the Humanities (ERIH) list of the European Science Foundation and the ISIS Arts and Humanities Citation Index. He mentions the journal's members of the board from that time on, including Fernando Broncano, Josep Corbí, and José Ferreirós, whom he considers responsible for the achievements of "Theoria." He adds that the journal is expecting submissions for its 2010 chapter.