蒯因彻底翻译的不确定性论题

蒯因在《语词和对象》这部著作中第一次提出了翻译的不确定性论题,这一论题的提出,引起了广泛的论证与反驳。通过分析蒯因本人对此论题的分析与论证,可以看出：翻译的不确定性论题是蒯因哲学体系中不可分割的一个部分,是对“经验论的两个教条”在语言中的继续批判,是“整体论”的逻辑发展,以及“本体论相对性”的理论前提。通过分析戴维森、普特南对此论题的回应,可以使我们对“彻底翻译不确定性论题”有一个更好的把握。     

Indeterminacy,identity and counterparts: Evans reconsidered

In this paper I argue that Gareth Evans’ famous proof of the impossibility of de re indeterminate identity fails on a counterpart-theoretic interpretation of the determinacy operators. I attempt to motivate a counterpart-theoretic reading of the determinacy operators and then show that, understood counterpart-theoretically, Evans’ argument is straightforwardly invalid.     

The power of the past: Nostalgia as a meaning-making resource

In three experiments we tested whether nostalgia bolsters meaning in life relative to two other modes of autobiographical thought: imagining a desired future experience and recalling a positive past experience. In Experiment 1 participants thought about a nostalgic or desired future experience and then completed a presence of meaning scale. Thinking about a nostalgic (compared to desired future) experience increased perceived presence of meaning. In Experiment 2 we examined whether nostalgia can additionally reduce the search for meaning. Participants thought about a nostalgic, desired future or recent positive experience, and then completed a search for meaning scale. Nostalgia, relative to both comparison conditions, decreased the search for meaning. Finally we tested whether, by virtue of its capacity to increase meaning, nostalgia can mitigate threats to meaning. In Experiment 3 participants were exposed to either absurd or representational art, under the guise that they would later have to interpret its meaning, and then thought about either a nostalgic or a recent positive experience. Meaning was subsequently measured. The absurd art interpretation condition decreased the perceived presence of meaning but nostalgic reflection attenuated this effect.     

Meaning gained versus meaning lost: The effects of meaning salience on anxiety and depression during the coronavirus pandemic

People who have meaningful lives generally experience less anxiety and depression. Meaning salience, or the awareness of the meaning in one's life, is believed to partially explain this relationship. However, in times of isolation, what might be most salient to people are the meaningful aspects of their lives that have disappeared. This study seeks to understand how making gained versus lost meaning salient affects anxiety and depression. Participants either wrote for 5 minutes about how their life gained meaning (n = 29) or lost meaning (n = 30) due to the coronavirus restrictions, or about music (i.e., the control condition; n = 32). Those who wrote about gained meaning experienced less momentary anxiety than those who wrote about lost meaning. In addition, meaning salience moderated the relationship between meaning and both anxiety and depression. Those who wrote about gained meaning appeared to exhibit a positive relationship between meaning in life (MIL) and both anxiety and depression, while those who wrote about lost meaning exhibited negative relationships. In all, this suggests that meaning salience is not always positive and that researchers and practitioners should consider how making positive meaning salient may be more beneficial than a general focus on MIL.     

On Sellars' exam question trilemma: are Kant's premises analytic,or synthetic a priori,or a posteriori?

ABSTRACT

Wilfrid Sellars argued that Kant’s account of the conceptual structures involved in experience can be given a linguistic turn so as to provide an analytic account of the resources a language must have in order to be the bearer of empirical knowledge. In this paper I examine the methodological aspects of Kant’s transcendental philosophy that Sellars took to be fundamental to influential themes in his own philosophy. My first aim here is to clarify and argue for the plausibility of what I claim is Sellars’ interpretation of Kant’s ‘analytic’ transcendental method in the first Critique, based ultimately on non-trivial analytic truths concerning the concept of an object of our possible experience. Kant’s ‘transcendental proofs’ thereby avoid a certain methodological trilemma confronting the candidate premises of any such proof, taken from Sellars’ 1970s undergraduate exam question on Kant. In part II of the essay I conclude by highlighting in general terms how Kant’s method, as interpreted in the analytic manner explained in part I, was adapted by Sellars to produce some of the more influential aspects of his own philosophy, expressed in terms of what he contends is their sustainable reformulation in light of the so-called linguistic turn in twentieth-century philosophy.     

Living Being and Speaking Being: Toward a Dialogical Approach to Intentionality

One of the main goals of cognitive science is to shed light on human knowledge. This paper states that, if daily conversations, literature, and private thought, are proper expressions of human behavior, then cognitive sciences ought to elaborate a concept of knowledge suited to this kind of activities. I draw upon the notion of discourse in Bakhtin to specify the attributes of knowing needed to account for human behavior, whose manifestations in everyday life are not reduced to representing objects but essentially oriented toward responding to others. As a central aspect of knowledge, I focus on intentionality and offer a discussion about different aspects of it. Specifically, I examine the difference between intentionality as the faculty of representation (aboutness) and intentionality as the subjective positioning toward contextually relevant ideological perspectives (meaning).

Networks of meaning and the bicultural mind: A structural equation modeling approach

The paper examines cultural frame-switching among bicultural participants at the level of associated meanings. Bicultural participants of Greek descent who live in the Netherlands were randomly primed with either Greek or Dutch cultural symbols and language. A monocultural Dutch group in the Netherlands and a monocultural Greek group in Greece, were involved as control groups. Structural equation modeling indicated that the Greek participants in Greece and the bicultural participants primed with Greek culture had a similar pattern of associations. This pattern differed from that of the Dutch participants and the participants primed with Dutch culture. Thus, the two different monocultural association patterns were replicated among bicultural individuals. The findings show that meanings are affected by cultural frame-switching, and provide further support for the dynamic constructivist approach.     

Chronic fatigue syndrome/myalgicencephalomyelitis as a twentieth-century disease: analytic challenges

The challenges of chronic fatigue syndrome (often called myalgic encephalomyelitis, especially in the UK) (CFS/ME) to analytical and medical approaches are connected with our inability to understand its distressing somatic symptoms in terms of a single identifiable and understandable disease entity. The evidence for the roles of viral aetiologies remains inconclusive, as does our understanding of the involvement of the immune system. The history and social context of CFS/ME, and its relation to neurasthenia and psychasthenia are sketched. A symbolic attitude to the condition may need to be rooted in an awareness of psychoid levels of operation, and the expression and spread of CFS/ME may sometimes be aided by the ravages of projective identification. Psychic denial, sometimes violent, in sufferers (especially children and adolescents) and their families may be important in the aetiology of CFS/ME. We draw out common threads from psychodynamic work with five cases, four showing some symptomatic improvement, analytic discussions of three cases being presented elsewhere in this issue of JAP.     

Intersubjectivity and interaction in the analytic relationship: a mainstream view

The authors conceptualize intersubjectivity as a meta-theory that reflects the inherent nature of human relatedness and is conceptually independent of any particular theory of mind or school of psychoanalysis. Their view of intersubjectivity joins the emotional life of the analyst to that of the patient and places the analytic relationship at the center of the analytic process. They contrast intersubjectivity with traditional classical conflict theory so as to clarify the relevance of intersubjectivity for psychoanalytic clinical theory and therapeutic practice. In so doing, they hope to direct analysts more firmly toward the study of the unconscious dyadic contributions to the affective, inactive, and interactive dimensions of the analytic situation and their impact upon the patient's actions within and experience of the analytic relationship. To illustrate their thesis, two hours from an analysis are presented in detail.     

REM sleep and the analytic process: a psychophysiologic bridge.

Recent research on the physiology of REM sleep has supported the hypothesis that it serves processes of psychologic adaptation. This study examines the relationship between physiologic parameters of REM sleep and evidence in analytic material of the need for adaptation. Significant correlations were found between defensive strain before sleep and REM latency, and between change in defensive strain from evening to morning and total REM time.     

Exploring the place of financial status in the good life: Income and meaning in life

Abstract

Two studies examined the association between income and meaning in life (MIL). Study 1 (N = 781) demonstrated that income and other measures of financial status are positively associated with MIL and other aspects of well-being. The association between income and MIL was partially explained by autonomy, competence, and perceptions of control. Study 2 (N = 123) examined people’s forecasts of how financial status would affect their future well-being. Having a middle class or upper-middle class income in the future was expected to result in higher MIL, happiness, and need satisfaction than a life with a low income, showing that people perceive income as tied to meaning. These studies demonstrate how financial status can contribute to actual and expected MIL.     

生命意义感对大学新生日常烦心事和心理适应的影响

为验证日常烦心事对个体心理适应的作用过程,并探讨生命意义感是否在烦心事知觉与心理适应之间起调节作用。研究采用纵向追踪方式对153名大学新生进行新近生活经历问卷、压力知觉量表、生命意义感量表和心理适应的测量。结果显示压力知觉在日常烦心事与心理适应之间起完全中介作用;拥有意义在烦心事知觉与心理适应之间起调节作用,但追求意义的调节作用不显著。这说明日常烦心事会通过压力知觉影响个体心理适应,拥有意义对个体心理适应具有调节作用。     

Meta-analytic connections between forgiveness and health: the moderating effects of forgiveness-related distinctions

Objective: We explore meta-analytic associations between health and forgiveness, testing a number of potential theoretical and methodological factors that could alter that association, including the type of forgiveness measure (e.g. state vs. trait), the type of health measure (i.e. physical vs. psychological) and the target of forgiveness (e.g. self- vs. other-forgiveness).

Design: Our findings below reflect the meta-analysis of 103 independent samples consisting of 606 correlations with a total sample of 26,043 participants. The final sample included papers from 17 countries. The included samples were diverse including students, older adults, divorced mothers, combat veterans and others.

Main Outcome Measures: Various health measures, including physical health outcomes (e.g., blood pressure, cortisol levels, bodily pain) and psychological health outcomes (e.g., depression, anxiety, PTSD).

Results: We found a reliable overall association between forgiveness and health outcomes. The association was stronger for psychological health than for physical health, though associations with cardiovascular health indicators (i.e. heart-rate and blood pressure) were robust.

Conclusion: The findings provided considerable support to current theorizing about the health benefits of forgiveness. It is plausible that forgiveness might improve psychological health and reduce cardiovascular stress.     

The functional nature of conspiracy beliefs: Examining the underpinnings of belief in the Da Vinci Code conspiracy

Focusing on a contemporary conspiracy theory popularized in the novel The Da Vinci Code (Brown, 2002), we examined the underlying psychological factors and individual differences that may predict belief in conspiracy theories, and assessed such beliefs’ resistance to counterevidence. Our results suggest that belief in the Da Vinci Code conspiracy may be associated with coping with existential threat and death-related anxiety. In addition, the extent to which participants believed in the conspiracy was associated with the endorsement of congruent (New Age spiritual) and competing (Christian religious) beliefs, in opposite directions. Finally, exposure to counterevidence resulted in belief reduction, specifically among more religious participants (i.e. among those endorsing a competing belief system). We suggest that belief in modern conspiracy theories may help individuals attain or maintain a sense of meaning, control, and security.     

Communication and Content: Circumstances and Consequences of the Habermas-Brandom Debate

The recent exchange between Robert Brandom and Jürgen Habermas provides an opportunity to compare and contrast some aspects of their systems. Both present broadly inferential accounts of meaning, according to which the content of an expression is determined by its role in an inferential network. Several problems confront such theories of meaning - one of which threatens the possibility of communication because content is relative to an individual's set of beliefs. Brandom acknowledges this problem and provides a solution to it. The point of this paper is to argue that it arises for Habermas's theory as well. I then present several solutions Habermas could adopt and evaluate their feasibility. The result is that Habermas must alter his theory of communicative action by contextualizing the standards for successful communication.     

Uses and abuses of theory: a group analytic perspective

Group therapy occupies a curious and ambiguous status in the overall mental health field: groups are recognized and marginalized, sought after and avoided, respected and dismissed as second best to individual therapy. Groups are now practised widely in many services, probably because of the pressure of referrals and increased concern about funding, but even then have a secondary status. The under-recognition of both the value and complexity of groups seems to parallel the problems of theory which are part of the group psychotherapeutic culture. Rather than attempt a comprehensive theory of groups in this article, I intend to present some of the problems about theory and its link to practice, focusing particularly on the ambivalence about groups that I see as a continuing concern. I do so from a position which values theory, seeing in theory the container of understanding which guides psychotherapeutic practice. I do not identify with a critical position which rejects theory. This position recognizes fully the risks and dangers of over-theorizing, the potential to distort human contact through a rigid adherence to theory; however, I write in the spirit of appreciating theory thoughtfully applied as without theory, our work might be impoverished and even impeded.