Chapter 21 examines Goethe’s relationship to German Idealism. Although the speculative nature of the Idealist method appears alien to Goethe’s own thought, and he himself expressed reservations about it, his poetic and scientific works display a significant degree of sympathy with the concerns that motivated his contemporaries. The chapter highlights the importance of Spinoza in the alignment between Goethe and Idealist thought, before considering in detail the significance of Kant, Fichte, Hegel and above all Schelling, whose philosophy of nature and art is particularly resonant with Goethe’s own.

Chapter 4 introduces the official duties that Goethe carried out in Weimar, from his membership of the Privy Council, to the various commissions (such as mining) for which he was responsible, to his leadership of the Weimar court theatre. It also explains the significance of civil service for middle-class men in Goethe’s time. Finally, the chapter reflects on the connections between Goethe’s work as a civil servant and his pursuits in the areas of literature and science, emphasising, at the same time, that these connections are often far from straightforward.

It is common for income tax systems around the world to contain a broad range of exemptions. From a policy perspective, there are many reasons why governments provide exemptions. The most obvious is to grant concessional treatment to certain ‘deserving’ entities. Tax exemptions may be total or partial and are usually provided because the relevant entities serve some social, community or philanthropic purpose that the government wishes to support. By providing particular entities with tax exemptions, the government delivers support to them indirectly (ie via tax expenditures) rather than directly (ie via grants or subsidies). Clearly, providing tax exemptions comes at a cost, since governments do not collect revenue from the benefiting entities. However, this needs to be balanced against the fact that many of these entities provide important services to the community, which governments might otherwise feel they would have to provide themselves. By supporting such entities under their tax systems, governments can relieve themselves (either wholly or partly) from having to directly provide certain services that may, in any case, be best delivered through the private sector.

The development of a research culture in higher education institutions is a significant issue, but with little empirical evidence in the Mexican context, especially at the undergraduate level. The objective of this chapter nonetheless is to analyze the theoretical and practical dimensions of undergraduate research undertaken by different Mexican institutions. The chapter is structured in four parts, beginning with a description of the Mexican educational system and the objectives that higher education has in order to develop professional research, continuing with a description of the role that the National Council of Science and Technology has developed in the development and infrastructure of research in the country. Subsequently, best practice and results are addressed where undergraduate research and development has been enhanced, and the chapter ends with the future developments that are envisioned in higher education institutions in Mexico.

This introductory chapter discusses what a river is; why rivers are important, both as natural features that shape the Earth’s surface and as resources for society; the science of fluvial geomorphology, including a brief history of this field; the process-oriented perspective of the book; rivers as dynamic natural systems; general concepts, such as dynamic equilibrium, thresholds, and nonlinear system dynamics, that have been employed to describe the dynamics of river systems; and the importance of both physical processes and environmental/historical contingency as factors influencing the dynamics of river systems. It presents a conceptual model defining rivers as dynamic systems characterized by interaction among flow, sediment transport, and channel form. It defines a hierarchy of spatial and temporal scales relevant to the characterization of river systems.

Certain key themes, subjects and texts were considered to constitute a crucial educational foundation for an individual aspiring to achieve success in the court societies of the Persian Cosmopolis. This chapter argues that the character of this general education was deliberately ‘cosmopolitan’: based on a widely agreed canon of texts, both literary and scientific, whose importance was recognised across the Persian Cosmopolis. Rather than mere knowledge acquisition, the aim of this education was the formation of a specific type of disposition: a particular orientation towards the court society and towards the self. Underlying the external traits of this courtly disposition was a widely shared medico-philosophical understanding of the connections between mind, body and soul and the way in which the perfection of one, presupposed the engagement of the others. The implication of the body in the acquisition of knowledge and the perfection of the soul provides the rationale for directing attention to bodily practices and the influences of objects on bodies, a theme that recurs throughout this book.

Certain key themes, subjects and texts were considered to constitute a crucial educational foundation for an individual aspiring to achieve success in the court societies of the Persian Cosmopolis. This chapter argues that the character of this general education was deliberately ‘cosmopolitan’: based on a widely agreed canon of texts, both literary and scientific, whose importance was recognised across the Persian Cosmopolis. Rather than mere knowledge acquisition, the aim of this education was the formation of a specific type of disposition: a particular orientation towards the court society and towards the self. Underlying the external traits of this courtly disposition was a widely shared medico-philosophical understanding of the connections between mind, body and soul and the way in which the perfection of one, presupposed the engagement of the others. The implication of the body in the acquisition of knowledge and the perfection of the soul provides the rationale for directing attention to bodily practices and the influences of objects on bodies, a theme that recurs throughout this book.