Immigrant linguistic justice: The lay of the land

Linguistic justice is concerned with the just way of politically regulating linguistic diversity. Today, the linguistic-justice debate may be differentiated into three different domains: interlinguistic justice, intralinguistic justice, and global linguistic justice. Each of these domains has, to a significant extent, attracted different authors and debates, although the normative system underlying them is structurally similar. This introductory piece aims to provide context for our symposium dedicated to linguistic justice and migration by, first, giving an overview of linguistic justice, second, linking linguistic justice to migration, and, finally, providing an overview of the various papers in the symposium, situating them against the background developed in the first two sections.     

Evaluating the integration hypothesis: A meta-analysis of the ICSEY project data using two new methods

The Integration Hypothesis states that acculturating migrants who adopt the integration strategy (i.e. being doubly engaged, in both their heritage culture and in the larger national society) will have better psychological and socio-cultural adaptation than those who adopt any other strategy (Assimilation, Separation or Marginalization). This hypothesis was supported in the original evaluation of the ICSEY project data, using the mean adaptation scores for individuals in the four acculturation clusters. This conclusion was further supported by an analysis that used scores that were derived from the two underlying dimensions. This paper further evaluates this hypothesis meta-analytically using two new methods: Cultural Involvement and Cultural Preference; and Euclidean Distance. The results showed that these two methods provided support for the integration hypothesis, for both psychological adaptation and socio-cultural adaptation. The pattern of relationships was stronger for positive than for negative indicators of adaptation. Theoretical and practical implications of the results are discussed.     

Comparing language and religion in normative arguments about linguistic justice

Many of the most influential theorists of linguistic justice make arguments on the basis of comparisons between language and religion. They claim either that (1) language, by contrast with religion, cannot be separated from the state or that (2) unequal official linguistic recognition, just like unequal official religious recognition, is morally problematic. This article argues that careful attention to debates about liberalism and the place of religion in public life invites us to question the two above-mentioned liberal assumptions about religion underlying many arguments concerning linguistic justice based on (dis)analogies between language and religion. The hope is that such critical scrutiny is likely to shed some light on normative questions of linguistic justice, more precisely on questions about the legitimacy of granting more recognition to certain languages, usually those of national native groups (as opposed to groups resulting from more or less recent immigration).     

Enacting collective support for the European integration: Participation in pro‐integration action and preference for specific transnational acculturation strategies

We propose that collective support for European integration is mani‐fested in 2 distinct forms: first, as engagement in socio‐political action by citizens who seek to change their nation and its status in Europe. Second, it is manifested as a transnational acculturation process that impacts on both nations and their citizens. These processes potentially engage social identities at 3 levels: national, European and as supporters of the European integration. Here, we examine these different levels of identification as part of a model predicting collective support for the European integration. To capture the dimension of transnationality, we collected data from 2 Romanian samples, 1 of participants living in their country of origin (N = 203), and 1 of participants living as migrants outside Romania (N = 196). We found that identification as a pro‐integration supporter flows from European and Romanian national identifications and is an excellent predictor of collective support for European integration in both its forms. We conclude by discussing how our findings can be applied to the design of intervention strategies and policies to promote support for the European Union and the integration process in the current socio‐political climate (where the unity and the very existence of European Union are under threat).     

语言经验对概率词切分的影响

概率词切分指个体利用音节间的转换概率切分语流、发现词语边界的过程。经典的概率词切分研究多采用“学习-测试”范式, 首先要求被试切分一段无意义人工语言, 随后对切分效果进行测试。近年来, 研究者逐渐关注语言经验对概率词切分的影响, 具体包括语音经验和被试掌握的语言知识两方面。今后的研究, 一方面可以更多地关注普通话母语者的语言经验如何作用于概率词切分过程; 另一方面还可以在语言经验的分类上进行拓展, 细分群体语言经验和个体语言经验的影响。     

The casuistic method of practical ethics

This essay concerns itself with the methodology of practical ethics. There are a variety of methods employed in ethics. Although none have been firmly established as dominant, it is generally agreed that casuistry, or the case-based method, is one important strategy commonly used for resolving ethical issues. Casuists compare the case under consideration to a relevantly similar (analogous) precedent case in which judgements have already been made, and they use these earlier judgements to determine the proper resolution of the present case. In this article, I try to provide a better understanding of the nature of contemporary casuistry. To accomplish this, I explain (in the first section) the basic features of casuistic reasoning. The second section focuses on the logic of casuistry. By assessing casuistic reasoning from the logical viewpoint, casuistry can be reconstructed as a logically correct method of reasoning. The third section looks at casuistry from the epistemic point of view and investigates the justificatory force of casuistic reasoning. Finally, in the fourth section, I show the usefulness of formal casuistry.     

Stylistic appearances and linguistic diversity

Philosophy is beginning to pay problems of linguistic justice the attention they deserve in today's heavily interconnected and migrant world. Contemporary philosophy itself, however, has a particular problem of linguistic justice that deserves metaphilosophical attention. At least in the philosophical tradition that is mainstream in much of the world today, viz., analytic philosophy, methodological and sociological mechanisms make it the case that the voices of non-(native) Anglophone philosophers are substantially less heard. Among the mechanisms responsible for this situation, argues this paper, is the emphasis given by influential philosophical institutions to linguistic style and appearances as signs of clarity, precision, and rigour in the treatment of philosophical problems. Such an emphasis is not justifiable, in part because it deprives philosophy of a wider variety of perspectives. The paper concludes by presenting and motivating a recent initiative that aims to foster greater linguistic and cultural diversity within the profession.     

Three challenges (and three replies) to the ethics of belief

In this paper I look at three challenges to the very possibility of an ethics of belief and then show how they can be met. The first challenge, from Thomas Kelly, says that epistemic rationality is not (merely) a form of instrumental rationality. If this claim is true, then it will be difficult to develop an ethics of belief that does not run afoul of naturalism. The second challenge is the Non-Voluntarism Argument, which holds that because we cannot believe at will and because ought implies can, there can be no ethics of belief. The third challenge comes from Richard Feldman, who claims that there is no such thing as ought all-things-considered. He says, for example, that moral oughts can be weighed against other moral oughts and that epistemic oughts can be compared to each other, but that there is no way to weigh moral oughts against epistemic oughts. If this is true, then norms about what one ought to believe are not nearly as important as one might have hoped or as philosophers have traditionally thought. In answering these three challenges, I try to show how and why the project of developing epistemic norms might be a promising avenue of research, despite claims to the contrary.     

Shared structuring resources across domains: double task effects from linguistic processing on the structural integration of pitch sequences

Many studies have reported evidence suggesting that resources involved in linguistic structural processing might be domain-general by demonstrating interference from simultaneously presented non-linguistic stimuli on the processing of sentences (Slevc, Rosenberg, & Patel, 2009 Slevc, L. R., Rosenberg, J. C., & Patel, A. D. (2009). Making psycholinguistics musical: Self-paced reading time evidence for shared processing of linguistic and musical syntax. Psychonomic Bulletin & Review, 16(2), 374–381. doi:10.3758/16.2.374[Crossref], [PubMed], [Web of Science ®] , [Google Scholar]). However, the complexity of the analysed linguistic processes often precludes the interpretation of such interference as being based on structural—rather than more general—processing resources (Perruchet & Poulin-Charronnat, 2013 Perruchet, P., & Poulin-Charronnat, B. (2013). Challenging prior evidence for a shared syntactic processor for language and music. Psychonomic Bulletin & Review, 20(2), 310–317. doi:10.3758/s13423-012-0344-5[Crossref], [PubMed], [Web of Science ®] , [Google Scholar]). We therefore used linguistic structure as a source of interference for another structural processing task, by asking participants to read sentences while processing experimentally manipulated pitch sequences. Half of the sentences contained a segment with either an “out-of-context” sentential violation or a “garden path” unexpectancy. Furthermore, the pitch sequences contained a cluster shift, which did or did not align with the sentential unexpectancies. A two-tone recognition task followed each pitch sequence, providing an index of the strength with which this structural boundary was processed. When a “garden path” unexpectancy (requiring structural reintegration) accompanied the cluster shift, the structural boundary induced by this shift was processed more shallowly. No such effect occurred with non-reintegratable “out-of-context” sentential violations. Furthermore, the discussed interference effect can be isolated from general pitch recognition performance, supporting the interpretation of such interference as being based on overlapping structural processing resources (Kljajevic, 2010 Kljajevic, V. (2010). Is syntactic working memory language specific? Psihologija, 43(1), 85–101. doi:10.2298/PSI1001085K[Crossref], [Web of Science ®] , [Google Scholar]; Patel, 2003 Patel, A. D. (2003). Language, music, syntax and the brain. Nature Neuroscience, 6(7), 674–681. doi: 10.1038/nn1082[Crossref], [PubMed], [Web of Science ®] , [Google Scholar]).     

The ethics of intergenerational relationships

Abstract

According to the relational approach we have obligations to members of future generations not because of their interests or properties but because, and only because, they are our descendants or successors. Common accounts of relational duties do not explain how we can have obligations to people who do not yet exist. In this defence of the relational approach I examine three sources of intergenerational obligations: the concern of parents for their children, including their future children; the desire of community members to pass on a heritage to their descendants; and the relationship of citizens in an intergenerational polity.     

The role of some definite references in linguistic integration

Definite reference increases thematic integration for semantically related sentences (DeVilliers, 1974). Therefore, definite reference should increase linguistic integration in the Bransford-Franks integrated recognition paradigm. Two recognition and two recall studies demonstrated that, if anything, indefinite reference increases linguistic integration effects, as measured by existing measures of integration. However, definite reference increases topical clustering in recall. Results cast doubt on the validity of existing measures of linguistic integration and indicate that the tally model of performance in integrated recognition tasks (Reitman & Bower, 1973) is not totally adequate, either. Results are compatible with the associative model of Anderson and Bower (1973). Topical clustering appears to be a better measure of integrated memory than are existing measures of linguistic integration. Retention of information about the propositional form in which semantically related sentences are presented and integrated memory are not necessarily incompatible.     

The role of test procedure in linguistic integration studies

The effects of type of recognition test procedure were studied in a Bransford and Franks (1971) integration paradigm. Subjects received a two-alternative forced-choice recognition test or a modified “forced-choice” test in which all the sentences for each idea set were presented at once and the “old” sentences had to be identified. Contrary to the usual Bransford and Franks results, in which a yes-no, one-sentence-at-a-time recognition procedure is employed, the ability to discriminate “old” sentences from “new” sentences was clearly observed. A bias for selecting more complex sentences, however, was found for the modified “forced-choice” procedure. A prototype learning model is described to account for these results and previous data.     

Behavioral science integration: A practical framework of multi-level converging evidence for behavioral science theories

Several frameworks exist to help science in organizing known information, connecting previously disparate phenomena, promoting understanding, and identifying gaps in knowledge. This paper integrates previous frameworks that have been used in the behavioral sciences to produce a more comprehensive, specific, and complete framework, consonant with the process of scientific discovery as based on multiple, independent, and converging lines of evidence. This multi-level convergence framework is designed specifically for the analysis and understanding of human cognitive/behavioral traits, in contrast to more general frameworks that are designed to be applied relatively widely (such as across all information processing systems or across all biological organisms). This integrated framework overcomes gaps in prior frameworks, provides a more complete picture of the interrelationships between various aspects of the behavioral sciences, and can aid in evaluating theories, both for comparison and identifying gaps in evidentiary support.     

《易传》中的语言哲学思想探论--兼论儒、道、《易》的语言哲学思想之异同

本文试图对《易传》中的语言哲学思想,以及以孔子、孟子、荀子为代表的儒家和以老子、庄子为代表的道家的语育哲学思想进行初步分析,对先秦哲学中的语言哲学所关涉到的问题作一点探索性的研究,看先秦部分思想家考察了汉语言的哪些方面的特征,为我们反思现代汉语与现代中国哲学的关系提供某些启示。     

Global ethics: a short reflection on then and now

Ten years on from the first issue of the Journal of Global Ethics, Darrel Moellendorf and Heather Widdows reflect on the current state of research in global ethics. To do this, they summarise a recent comprehensive road map of the field and provide a map of research by delineating the topics and approaches of leading scholars of global ethics collected together in the recently published Routledge Handbook of Global Ethics which they have co-edited. Topics fall under issues of war, conflict and violence; poverty and development; economic justice; bioethics and health justice; and environmental and climate justice. In all these areas, ethicists are becoming ever more engaged in the details and mechanisms of actually delivering justice in the real world.     

The erosion of sexual dimorphism: challenges to religion and religious ethics

Late modernity has been witnessing the erosion of the dimorphic sexual paradigm that, in both strong and weak forms, has characterized human history as we know it. Recent discoveries in biology and the social sciences have combined with altered patterns in human sexual behavior to raise critical new questions about the inherited paradigm. Religions of the West whose sacred texts, mythologies, and codes of behavior assume that maleness and femaleness are exclusive and complementary types of sexuality-each of which determines sexual identity, reproductive role, social role, and the sex of one's partner-increasingly must grapple with both theoretical evidence for and experiential evidence of polymorphous human sexuality. Inherited categories of dimorphic sexuality not only are challenged but become less and less intelligible.     

经济正义:当代伦理学面临的重大课题

正义是一个历史范畴。人类对正义的追求经历了一个由个人正义到社会正义、由政治正义到经济正义的过程。随着经济关系成为支配社会发展的主要力量,经济发展的单向度价值取向的危害日益严重,社会不公正现象在经济领域中日益凸现,经济正义已成为当代社会正义理论中最重要、最具有社会意义的内容和形式。