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Human post‐Human. Towards homo technologicus? The fifth edition of TriesteNext, European Exhibition of scientific research has gathered students and young graduates, scientists and philosophers, businessmen and men of the institutions in order to discuss the latest achievements and future developments of scientific research, from biotechnology to logistics, from robotics to astrophysics, from informatics to marketing. The dialogue between science and philosophy, hosted by TriesteNext, analyzed the specific characteristics of the human being, the only being in the world able to produce language, to get in a cognitive relationship with the world and to undertake a recognition process with other men, a relationship that affects his very being and his way of acting in the world.

Cassirer and Einstein’s Physics. The epistemological Advantage of the Theory of Relativity The vast universe, which exists independently of us human beings and which stands before us as an eternal enigma, accessible only in part to our attention and our thinking, has never ceased to exercise his attraction on Einstein. The contemplation of universe led him to venture into the most mysterious sides of theoretical physics and to solve the most complex problems of classical physics. The paradox of theory of relativity consists precisely in the introduction of new absolute, which create a considerable epistemological advantage compared to the newtonian physics. The constancy of the speed of light becomes for Cassirer an ideal apriori, or rather a transcendental form of scientific thought, that revolutionizes the concepts of nature, measure, space and time and responds to the fundamental synthetic requirement of intellect, to his inevitable process of gathering and unifying the multiplicity of experience within the unity of the universal laws of science.

The conference has brought to light the relevance of Gabriel Tarde, sociologist, psychologist and philosopher, considered one of the founders of criminology. His work, long neglected by the academic debate, is fundamental to understanding social dynamics and the forces that govern human action. Invention, imitation, belief and desire: these are the basic categories of Tarde’s thought, which enable us to appreciate his modernity, his sensitivity to the phenomenon of social deviance, his confidence in the human will, the true cause which conducts the process of historical change.

The paper intends to investigate the deconstruction of the kantian ethical formalism by Max Scheler, who, adopting the phenomenological method, establishes an order of a priori knowledge absolutely distinct from natural and the scientific knowledge. Phenomenological knowledge leads to intuition of essences, that, according to their degree of generality, can be formal or material. Identifying a form of knowledge different from intellectual synthesis and the sensitive perception, namely fühlen or axiological feeling, Scheler releases the a priori from legislator mechanism of intellect and also from characteristics of objects. The a priori is rather a plainness that appears immediately in eidetic intuition, such as hierarchical structure of meanings and values, which constitutes the logos that permeates the universe.

An interesting debate on the issue of personal identity and its ethical implications has animated the days of the XIII International Congress of Max Scheler‐Gesellschaft. A large program of work has garnered numerous perspectives on the philosophy of person and the phenomenology of otherness, investigating in particular the role of emotions in the formation of person process. The main topic of conference was the Max Scheler’s phenomenology of emotions, which is an important turning point in the philosophy of twentieth century. The formation of ordo amoris, or rather order of feeling, generates the self‐ transcendence of the immediate feeling in virtue, in which the person realizes her singularity. The emotion, therefore, doesn’t remain confined in a state of mind and inner private but acts in the world, creating the emotional breakthrough (emotioneller Durchbruch) that makes me exist in a new way in the world, which allows me to act according to my ordo amoris.

The different images of the human being that have occurred in the history of thought are based on the Cartesian dichotomy between res cogitans and res extensa. The philosophical anthropology of the twentieth century seeks to overcome the mind‐body dualism, building a unified image of the human being. However, the comparison between the main anthropological theories and analysis of the controversies that have animated the debate about the definition of human nature reveal that the overcoming of Cartesian dualism leads to the formation of a new conflict, the conflict of the human being with himself.

Background: The GL261 and CT2A syngeneic tumor lines are frequently used as immunocompetent orthotopic mouse models of human glioblastoma (huGBM) but demonstrate distinct differences in their responses to immunotherapy. Methods: To decipher the cell-intrinsic mechanisms that drive immunotherapy resistance in CT2A-luc and to define the aspects of human cancer biology that these lines can best model, we systematically compared their characteristics using whole exome and transcriptome sequencing, and protein analysis through immunohistochemistry, Western blot, flow cytometry, immunopeptidomics, and phosphopeptidomics. Results: The transcriptional profiles of GL261-luc2 and CT2A-luc tumors resembled those of some huGBMs, despite neither line sharing the essential genetic or histologic features of huGBM. Both models exhibited striking hypermutation, with clonal hotspot mutations in RAS genes (Kras p.G12C in GL261-luc2 and Nras p.Q61L in CT2A-luc). CT2A-luc distinctly displayed mesenchymal differentiation, upregulated angiogenesis, and multiple defects in antigen presentation machinery (e.g. Tap1 p.Y488C and Psmb8 p.A275P mutations) and interferon response pathways (e.g. copy number losses of loci including IFN genes and reduced phosphorylation of JAK/STAT pathway members). The defect in MHC class I expression could be overcome in CT2Aluc by interferon-g treatment, which may underlie the modest efficacy of some immunotherapy combinations. Additionally, CT2A-luc demonstrated substantial baseline secretion of the CCL-2, CCL-5, and CCL-22 chemokines, which play important roles as myeloid chemoattractants. Conclusion: Although the clinical contexts that can be modeled by GL261 and CT2A for huGBM are limited, CT2A may be an informative model of immunotherapy resistance due to its deficits in antigen presentation machinery and interferon response pathways. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Introduction Malignant gliomas (such as glioblastoma [GBM]) remain formidable cancers based on their poor prognosis, with a median survivorship of 15 months or less, extensive neurologic morbidity, and cost of [...], Oncolytic viral (OV) therapy, which uses genetically engineered tumor-targeting viruses, is being increasingly used in cancer clinical trials due to the direct cytolytic effects of this treatment that appear to provoke a robust immune response against the tumor. As OVs enter tumor cells, intrinsic host defenses have the potential to hinder viral replication and spread within the tumor mass. In this report, we show that histone deacetylase 6 (HDAC6) in tumor cells appears to alter the trafficking of postentry OVs from the nucleus toward lysosomes. In glioma cell lines and glioma-stem-like cells, HDAC6 inhibition (HDAC6i) by either pharmacologic or genetic means substantially increased replication of oncolytic herpes simplex virus type 1 (oHSV). Moreover, HDAC6i increased shuttling of post-entry oHSV to the nucleus. In addition, electron microscopic analysis revealed that post-entry oHSVs are preferentially taken up into glioma cells through the endosomal pathway rather than via fusion at the cell surface. Together, these findings illustrate a mechanism of glioma cell defense against an incoming infection by oHSV and identify possible approaches to enhance oHSV replication and subsequent lysis of tumor cells.