▪ Abstract Well-being is a complex construct that concerns optimal experience and functioning. Current research on well-being has been derived from two general perspectives: the hedonic approach, which focuses on happiness and defines well-being in terms of pleasure attainment and pain avoidance; and the eudaimonic approach, which focuses on meaning and self-realization and defines well-being in terms of the degree to which a person is fully functioning. These two views have given rise to different research foci and a body of knowledge that is in some areas divergent and in others complementary. New methodological developments concerning multilevel modeling and construct comparisons are also allowing researchers to formulate new questions for the field. This review considers research from both perspectives concerning the nature of well-being, its antecedents, and its stability across time and culture.

/pdf/on-happiness-and-human-potentials-a-review-of-research-on-1t2vu3ifq9.pdf

On Happiness and Human Potentials: A Review of Research on Hedonic and Eudaimonic Well-Being

https://www.thelancet.com/pdfs/journals/lancet/PIIS0140-6736(08)61690-6.pdf

Closing the gap in a generation: health equity through action on the social determinants of health

https://link.springer.com/content/pdf/10.2307%2F3343168.pdf

Development as Freedom

A doubling in global food demand projected for the next 50 years poses huge challenges for the sustainability both of food production and of terrestrial and aquatic ecosystems and the services they provide to society. Agriculturalists are the principal managers of global useable lands and will shape, perhaps irreversibly, the surface of the Earth in the coming decades. New incentives and policies for ensuring the sustainability of agriculture and ecosystem services will be crucial if we are to meet the demands of improving yields without compromising environmental integrity or public health.

/pdf/agricultural-sustainability-and-intensive-production-1h98l920tu.pdf

Agricultural sustainability and intensive production practices

We review in detail a number of approaches that have been adopted to try and explain the remarkable observation of our accelerating universe. In particular we discuss the arguments for and recent progress made towards understanding the nature of dark energy. We review the observational evidence for the current accelerated expansion of the universe and present a number of dark energy models in addition to the conventional cosmological constant, paying particular attention to scalar field models such as quintessence, K-essence, tachyon, phantom and dilatonic models. The importance of cosmological scaling solutions is emphasized when studying the dynamical system of scalar fields including coupled dark energy. We study the evolution of cosmological perturbations allowing us to confront them with the observation of the Cosmic Microwave Background and Large Scale Structure and demonstrate how it is possible in principle to reconstruct the equation of state of dark energy by also using Supernovae Ia observational data. We also discuss in detail the nature of tracking solutions in cosmology, particle physics and braneworld models of dark energy, the nature of possible future singularities, the effect of higher order curvature terms to avoid a Big Rip singularity, and approaches to modifying gravity which leads to a late-time accelerated expansion without recourse to a new form of dark energy.

Dynamics of dark energy

Amiya Kumar Dasgupta (1903-1992)

On a dit qu’un « chameau » etait « un cheval concu par un comite ». Cela pourrait ressembler a une image pertinente des enormes faiblesses des decisions prises par des comites, mais cette accusation est en fait beaucoup trop faible. Il se peut qu’un chameau n’ait pas la vitesse d’un cheval, mais c’est un animal harmonieux et tres utile, bien concu pour parcourir de longues distances sans eau ni nourriture. Un comite qui, en dessinant un cheval, essaierait de tenir compte de tous les souhaits de ses differents membres finirait aisement par concevoir quelque chose de beaucoup moins convenable : peut-etre un centaure de la mythologie grecque, moitie cheval et moitie autre chose — une creation ingenieuse alliant la brutalite a la confusion.

/pdf/la-possibilite-du-choix-social-2ubf3zyyrm.pdf

La possibilité du choix social

Hume's Law and Hare's Rule

India is home to almost three million HIV cases. But AIDS is still a disease stigmatized and shrouded in denial. It is stigma that prevents people from openly discussing the facts around HIV, and keeps them from getting treatment. Stigma leads to discrimination against HIV positive people in hospitals, schools and even among families. In this ground-breaking anthology, sixteen of India's well-known writers go on the road to tell the human story behind the epidemic.William Dalrymple meets the devadasis ('temple women'), many of whom have become victims of HIV; Kiran Desai travels to the coast of Andhra where the sex workers are considered the most desirable and Salman Rushdie spends a day with Mumbai's transgenders. These writers travel the country to talk to housewives, vigilantes, homosexuals, police and sex-workers and together they create a complex and gripping picture of AIDS in India: who it is affecting, how and why. Eye-opening, hard-hitting and moving, "AIDS Sutra" will show you a side to India rarely seen before. This anthology was produced in collaboration with Avahan, the India AIDS Initiative of the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation.

Amartya Sen

Papers

Amiya Kumar Dasgupta (1903-1992)

La possibilité du choix social

Hume's Law and Hare's Rule

AIDS Sutra : untold stories from India

Status, education, and problems of Indian women