THE LANGUAGE OF RIGHTS AND CONCEPTUAL HISTORY

The historical problem about the origins of the language of rights derives its importance from the conceptual problem: of “two fundamentally different ways of thinking about justice,” which is basic? Is justice unitary or plural? This in turn opens up a problem about the moral status of human nature. A narrative of the origins of “rights” is an account of how and when a plural concept of justice comes to the fore, and will be based on the occurrence of definite speech‐forms—the occurrence of the plural noun in the sense of “legal properties.” The history of this development is currently held to begin with the twelfth‐century canonists. Later significant thresholds may be found in the fourteenth, sixteenth, and eighteenth centuries. Wolterstorff's attempt to find the implicit recognition of rights in the Scriptures depends very heavily on what he takes to be implied rather than on what is stated, and at best can establish a pre‐history of rights‐language.     

REVIEW OF SCHREIBMAN'S: THE SCIENCE AND FICTION OF AUTISM

Although the awareness of autism in the general public has increased significantly over the past 20 years, much of the widely disseminated information is not fully grounded in scientific fact. In The Science and Fiction of Autism (2005), Laura Schreibman addresses a series of debates and controversies in areas ranging from diagnostic practices and etiological theories to effective clinical practices. This book provides an overview of the field of autism that is suitable for well‐educated parents and new professionals in the field.     

SELF‐DECEPTION AND THE EXPERIENCE OF FICTION

Sartre's commentary on bad faith is the starting‐point for an exploration of self‐deception: what it is not, what it is, and whether it's always wrong. The proffered analysis of self‐deception parallels a certain theory of our experience of fiction. In essence, it is argued that the self‐deceiver creates a kind of fiction in which he is a character, a fiction that he nonetheless believes to be real.     

SCIENCE AND SEMANTICS: THE CASE OF VAGUENESS AND SUPERVALUATION*

Abstract: It is widely assumed that the methods and results of science have no place among the data to which our semantics of vague predicates must answer. This despite the fact that it is well known that such prototypical vague predicates as ‘is bald’ play a central role in scientific research (e.g. the research that established Rogaine as a treatment for baldness). I argue here that the assumption is false and costly: in particular, I argue one cannot accept either supervaluationist semantics, or the criticism of that semantics offered by Fodor and Lepore, without having to abandon accepted, and unexceptionable, scientific methodology.     

THE SEMANTICS OF FACIAL EXPRESSIONS AND THE PREDICTION OF THE MEANINGS OF STEREOSCOPICALLY FUSED FACIAL EXPRESSIONS

Two experiments were concerned with scaling affective meanings of posed facial expressions using a specially devised form of semantic differential and with determining the extent to which the meaning of stereoscopically fused facial expressions could be predicted. Both experiments provided evidence for at least three dimensions. High reliability for scaling the affective meanings of facial expressions was demonstrated. Two methods were employed for predicting the meaning of a composite expression. The results indicated that the predictions based on the congruity principle do no better than those based on a simple algebraic mean of the two components.     

汉语词汇产生中语义、语音层次之间的交互作用

采用3种方法考察汉语词汇产生中语义激活（词条选择）和音位编码这两个阶段之间的关系。实验一、二分别采用图片命名法和干扰字命名法,发现目标图片（“牛”）的语义相关词（“羊”）的语音信息得到了激活,说明汉语词汇产生中存在多重语音激活,音位编码在词条选择完成之前既已开始。实验三采用语义范畴判断法,考察语音信息的激活是否会向上反馈到词条和语义层次,发现目标图片（“羊”）的同音字（“阳”）不会促进对图片的语义判断。研究表明,多重语音激活与语音激活向词条和语义层次反馈是两个独立的,可以分割的问题。虽然实验一和二的结果符合相互作用理论,实验三的结果符合模块化观点,但就总体而言,本研究更加支持词汇产生中的模块化观点     

ON DAVIDSON'S REFUTATION OF CONCEPTUAL SCHEMES AND CONCEPTUAL RELATIVISM

Despite Donald Davidson's influential criticism of the very notion of conceptual schemes, the notion continues enjoying its popularity in contemporary philosophy and, accordingly, conceptual relativism is still very much alive. There is one major reason responsible for Davidson's failure which has not been widely recognized: What Davidson attacks fiercely is not the very notion , but a notion of conceptual schemes, namely, the Quinean notion of conceptual schemes and its underlying Kantian scheme-content dualism. However, such a notion simply cannot carry the weight of conceptual relativism for it does not catch the essences of conceptual relativism. Consequently, I argue that the very notion of conceptual schemes and conceptual relativism have survived Davidson's attack. Therefore, the failure of the Quinean notion of conceptual schemes and Kantian scheme-content dualism, even if Davidson can claim victory, does not mark the end of the very notion of conceptual schemes.     

THE UNDERDETERMINATION/INDETERMINACY DISTINCTION AND THE ANALYTIC/SYNTHETIC DISTINCTION

Two of W. V. Quine's most familiar doctrines are his endorsement of the distinction between underdetermination and indeterminacy, and his rejection of the distinction between analytic and synthetic truths. The author argues that these two doctrines are incompatible. In terms wholly acceptable to Quine, and based on the underdetermination/indeterminacy distinction, the author draws an exhaustive and exclusive distinction between two kinds of true sentences, and then argues that this corresponds to the traditional analytic/synthetic distinction. In an appendix the author expands on one aspect of the underdetermination/indeterminacy distinction, as construed here, and discusses, in passing, some of Quine's more general views on truth.