An idealist critique of naturalism

ABSTRACT

According to many naturalists, our ordinary conception of the world is in tension with the scientific image: the conception of the world provided by the natural sciences. But in this paper, I present a critique of naturalism with precedents in the post-Kantian idealist tradition. I argue that, when we consider our actual linguistic behavior, there is no evidence that the truth of our ordinary judgments hinges on what the scientific image turns out to be like. I then argue that the best explanation of this result is that the norms and presuppositions operating in ordinary discourse are different from the norms and presuppositions operating in scientific discourse. So naturalistic attempts to undermine the manifest image are illegitimate attempts to critique a practice ‘from the outside’.     

Liberal naturalism,objectivity and the autonomy of the mental

ABSTRACT

The paper distinguishes between two different ways of cashing out the general insight that often goes by the name of ‘liberal naturalism’. The objective is to show how these two different argumentative strategies undergird two fundamentally different approaches to the project of elucidating the specificity of mental phenomena. On one approach, the central concern of such a project is the ontological status of subjective conscious phenomena; on the other, the central concern is the irreducibility of parochial capacities in the adoption of intentional stances. I begin by tracing out some of the origins of this important divergence and then focus on the motivations of the latter approach. I show that there is a tension between its motivations and the way that it has been used to rehabilitate idealist themes from the post-Kantian tradition.     

Linda问题的表象-命题双表征解释视角探究

本文首先提出了Linda问题的表象-命题双表征这一新的解释视角。该视角认为,Linda问题基于表象表征和命题表征可以有两种不同的解读与表征方式;而不同的被试在Linda问题上可能分别采取了上述表征方式之一;但由于Linda问题的特殊性,大多数被试采用了表象表征;大多数被试的这一表征取向则可能是所谓谬误判断出现的原因。本文通过4项研究,让被试在基于表象表征设计的转述版本与基于命题表征设计的转述版间选择接近自身理解的版本;并考察了将Linda问题修改成更符合命题表征的数学化表达形式能否降低所谓谬误水平;还考察了增加促使被试运用命题表征的排序项"Linda是全人类中的一员"能否降低所谓谬误水平。结果显示,在转述版本选择上,大多数被试选择了基于表象表征设计的版本;而上文所指的两个修正版Linda问题则都降低了被试的所谓谬误水平。这些结果支持了本文所提的视角。     

《周易》与中国象科学

本文通过对《周易》和古希腊哲学的比较,说明中西方在传统认识上,由于时空选择不同,从而形成了两种科学。西方的传统认识,以空间为主,时间为辅.空间统摄时间。中国的认识传统,以时间为主,空间为辅,时间统摄空间.因此,前者认识世界着重在“体”,后者则着重在“象”,对“象”层面的认识为“象科学”,主要采用自然整体方法和意象方法.象的实质是“气”.“气”是时间属性占优势的物质存在,与空间属性占优势的实物和物理场不同,构成世界的另一半,中医学是象科学的代表.中医学的突破,定将带来象科学的复兴,对人类的未来和健康发展具有关键意义。     

科学发明中原型启发的创造性思维成分及其脑机制

目前对创造性思维的测量及神经机制的研究, 国际上大多采用发散思维任务、远距离联想测验、顿悟问题解决等任务。但这些测量工具大多停留在对非科学类问题解决的研究上, 因此生态效度和预测效度都不高。本项目在前面研究的基础上, 探讨更符合现实生活的科学发明中原型启发的创造性思维成分及机制。研究一通过两个行为实验探索原型启发能力的创造性思维成分测试的结构效度; 研究二运用大样本磁共振数据, 从脑机制上进一步验证创造性思维成分的结构效度; 研究三通过3个核磁任务态探索原型启发能力的主要创造性思维成分的脑机制; 研究四试图在高校和企业研发机构进行跟踪研究, 检验创造性思维成分测试的预测效度。通过本项目的开展, 希望开发具有更高预测效度和生态效度的用于发明创造领域的创造性测量工具。     

Alchemy in the image of the analyst

The author aims to demonstrate the activation in the transference relationship of a figure representing 'sameness' in a number of forms. In the first clinical vignette, she shows how a child projects his own difficulty symmetrically on to the analyst, with the aim of creating the conjunction of opposites which the psyche needs for its growth.
During the archetypal reworking which adolescence provides we again find this figure of 'sameness' in the foreground, in the phase of homosexual object choice. A second clinical vignette shows how this figure of 'sameness' can be represented in the fantasy or the desire of becoming an analyst.
The author puts forward the hypothesis that this fantasy represents an imago whose characteristics include being a tool for linking feeling and thinking in the inner world; it is constituted in the entre deux , the space between self and other, and, like Winnicott's transitional object, it facilitates the capacity to symbolize. Being 'off centre' with regard to infantile positions in relation to the parental imagos, this imago offers a vantage point for 'evaluation' ( sich auseinandersetzen ) and 'consideration' ( betrachten ). Finally this imago is transistory, because its destiny is to be deconstructed (as shown in the third clinical vignette which concerns an adult patient), in order to be integrated through the work of analysis.     

Ecclesiastical nationalism and primacy in world Orthodoxy: the case of the Serbian Church at the pan-Orthodox Council in Crete

ABSTRACT

The Holy and Great Council of the Orthodox Church (2016) was supposed to be, above all, a demonstration of Orthodox unity. However, four autocephalous Orthodox churches were absent and others were split internally over their stances towards the Council. Ethnophyletism (ecclesiastical nationalism) and disagreements between the Orthodox churches over universal primacy have often been emphasised as the factors which eventually prevented the display of full pan-Orthodox conciliarity. By analysing official documents of the Serbian Orthodox Church (SOC) and the statements of Serbian hierarchs, I assess the role of ethnophyletism and primacy in the SOC’s positioning regarding the Council. I conclude that ethnophyletism and a lack of consensus over primacy were overshadowed by the cleavage between progressive and conservative tendencies within the SOC as well as beyond autocephalous frontiers. The study may thus contribute to a better understanding of the current challenges to pan-Orthodox conciliarity in general.     

Pluralism, scientific knowledge, and the fallacy of overriding values

The paper examines one implication of pluralism, the view that all values are conditional and none are overriding. This implication is that since scientific knowledge is one of the conditional values, there are circumstances in which the pursuit of even the most basic scientific knowledge is legitimately curtailed. These circumstances occur when the pursuit of scientific knowledge conflicts with moral and political values which, in that context, are more important than it. The argument focuses on the case for and against space exploration in search of intelligent extraterrestrial life. The widely held supposition that search for pure scientific knowledge cannot be reasonably curtailed is identified as the fallacy of overriding values.     

The Non-Conceptual Dimension of Social Mediation: Toward a Materialist Aufhebung of Hegel

ABSTRACT

Sellars’s relationship with Hegel is complex and itself ‘dialectical‘ in interesting ways. Sellars follows Hegel in recognizing that the normativity essential to intentionality and conceptuality is a social phenomenon. But Sellars criticizes Hegel for his inability to independently explain the emergence and function of this essential group phenomenon. I shall argue that Sellars’s critique of Hegel on this count is part of a larger, metaphysically ambitious and rigorously realistic position, which, though turning Hegel’s ontology on its head, shares with Hegel the methodological ambition of arriving at a position which is globally explanatorily closed. Further, it will be suggested that although Sellars would surely have been critical of the ontological reification of Hegel’s dialectical method, he nonetheless reserves an important role for conceptual dialectical development right at the heart of his system, namely in his understanding of the conceptual evolution that leads from the manifest to the scientific image. Finally, I shall argue that Sellars thereby aspires to provide nothing less than a materialist aufhebung of idealist Hegelian dialectics.     

墨子的兼爱理想与世界和谐的构建

墨子提出的“天下之人皆相爱”理想,虽然没有实现,但一直是人类追求的目标。在全球一体化和现代化的今天,面对日益盛行的个人主义和民族利己主义或国家至上主义,面对一切湮没在利害关系之中的无情无爱世界,面对各种犯罪、恐怖活动和局部战争,以墨子的兼爱理想为旗帜,建立“强不执弱,众不动寡,富不侮贫,贵不敖(傲)贱,诈不欺愚”的制约机制,构建动态的世界和谐,已经成为当代人类和世界各国面临的重大而紧迫的任务。本文试图阐述墨子的兼爱思想对构建当代世界和谐的意义。     

Belief in a just world mediates the relationship between institutional trust and life satisfaction among the elderly in China

This study investigated the relationship between institutional trust and life satisfaction, and the mediating role of belief in a just world (BJW) among the elderly. The General Belief in a Just World Scale (GBJW) and Satisfaction with Life Scale (SWLS) were employed. A self-developed Institutional Trust questionnaire was used to measure participant’ levels of trust in eight institutions. The aggregate score for all eight items represented the level of institutional trust. The questionnaires were completed by 19,352 retirees ranging in age from 50 to 99 (M = 69.7, SD = 8.0). The results showed the following: (1) overall, the retirees tended to report high institutional trust and high life satisfaction; (2) institutional trust was positively associated with life satisfaction; and (3) more importantly, the relationships between institutional trust and life satisfaction were partially mediated by GBJW. This finding provides a new insight into the psychological mechanisms by which institutional trust relates to individual happiness. The theoretical and practical implications of these findings, as well as the study’s limitations, are discussed.     

Searching for certainty in an uncertain world: the difficulty of giving up the experiential for the rational mode of thinking

Our research explores predictions that people make in a simple environment consisting of sequences of a binary signal followed by two possible outcomes. In order to optimize their prediction success, respondents should use a very simple decision rule, called maximization, whereby they consistently predict according to the signal. In line with past research, our findings show that even respondents who realized after the experiment that maximization is optimal failed to use it during the experiment itself. We discuss conditions that weaken or reinforce behaving according to the optimal rule in a repeated choice situation. Experiment 1 shows that individuals who are forced to plan their strategy and justify their actions are more likely to discover and use the optimal rule than those not forced to do so. Thinking about the appropriateness of one's performance can be done in two different orientations: focusing on the past (justifying past actions) or on the future (planning future action). Experiment 2 shows that planning induces rule‐base thinking, while justifying fails to do so. These findings are discussed within a theoretical framework which suggest an interplay between the experiential and the rational modes of processing. Copyright © 2003 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

The inclosure scheme and the solution to the paradoxes of self-reference

Proponents of the explanatory gap claim that consciousness is a mystery. No one has ever given an account of how a physical thing could be identical to a phenomenal one. We fully understand the identity between water and H₂O but the identity between pain and the firing of C-fibers is inconceivable. Mark Johnston [Journal of philosophy (1997), 564–583] suggests that if water is constituted by H₂O, not identical to it, then the explanatory gap becomes a pseudo-problem. This is because all “manifest kinds”—those identified in experience—are on a par in not being identical to their physical bases, so that the special problem of the inconceivability of ‘pain = the firing of C-fibers’ vanishes. Moreover, the substitute relation, constitution, raises no explanatory difficulties: pain can be constituted by its physical base, as can water. The thesis of this paper is that the EG does not disappear when we substitute constitution for identity. I examine four arguments for the EG, and show that none of them is undermined by the move from constitution to identity.     

入世出世心理对压力和心理健康的中介作用

以319名大一学生为被试研究入世出世心理对压力和心理健康的中介作用,结果发现：（1）平常心对压力和生活满意度起部分中介作用,拼搏精神对压力和自尊起部分中介作用。（2）平常心对压力和心理症状总分、自卑、网络成瘾、敌对起部分中介作用,拼搏精神对压力和人际过敏、抑郁起部分中介作用。说明拼搏精神与平常心能缓减压力对心理健康的消极影响,培养拼搏精神和平常心是应对压力的有效途径。     

Narrative rationality and the logic of scientific discourse

This essay argues that scientific discourse is amenable to interpretation and assessment from the perspective of the narrative paradigm and its attendant logic, narrative rationality. It also contends that this logic entails a revised conception of knowledge, one that permits the possibility of wisdom. The text analyzed is James D. Watson and Francis H. Crick's proposal of the double helix model of DNA.     

Sociology and psychology within the scope of scientific dishonesty

A survey is undertaken based on qualitative analyses of the cases of scientific misconduct from the Danish Committee on Scientific Dishonesty’s first five years of collecting data, with additional information from selected international sources, in which underlying psychological motivations can be judged. An carlier version of this paper was presented at a symposium, Scientific Misconduct. An International Perspective, organised by The Medical University of Warsay, 16 November, 1998.     

Mathematical progress: Between reason and society

It is shown how the historiographic purport of Lakatosian methodology of mathematics is structured on the theme of analysis and synthesis. This theme is explored and extended to the revolutionary phase around 1800. On the basis of this historical investigation it is argued that major innovations, crucial to the appraisal of mathematical progress, defy reconstruction as irreducibly rational processes and should instead essentially be understood as processes of social-cognitive interaction. A model of conceptual change is developed whose essential ingredients are the variability of rational responses to new intellectual and practical challenges arising in the cultural environment of mathematics, and the shifting selective pressure of society. The resulting view of mathematical development is compared with Kuhn's theory of scientific paradigms in the light of some personal communications.     

The norms and stability of new measures of the multidimensional body image construct

The measurement of the body image construct has become increasingly multidimensional. New assessments are available to measure various facets of body image functioning: The Body Image Disturbance Questionnaire, Appearance Schemas Inventory-Revised, Body Image Coping Strategies Inventory, and Body Image Quality of Life Inventory. The present article reports normative data and acceptable internal reliabilities across seven completed investigations using these measures with female and male college students. Sex differences were examined and found, as expected, for most of the measures. In addition, a study evaluated an undetermined but essential psychometric property of these facets of the construct—their test–retest reliability. In a sample of 107 college students, the 2-week stability of these measures was found to be acceptable. Several directions for future research with these assessments are identified.     

大学生世界观、人生观、价值观形成中的接受机制

大学生三观形成过程是与接受对象和接受环境互动的过程。大学生的知识结构、价值取向、意志品格决定着其三观接受倾向及信念内化的过程。三观信息反映现实的深度 ,与接受者内在认知结构和观念的契合程度 ,影响着其被接受的程度。而接受环境具有验证、巩固或修正、改变原有的三观观念的作用。应赋予三观以更深厚的文化基础和精神内涵 ,增强其理论创新和与现实的贯通性。