"Moral Agent"是""道德代理人"吗?——一个伦理学概念辨析

道德代理人一词是国内环境伦理学界对西方伦理学概念moral agent的翻译,但此译法不妥之处有三:(1)moral agent是西方伦理学的基本术语,是指具有自我意识,能够进行道德认识、道德判断、道德选择和道德行为并承担道德责任的道德行为体,无代理之意;(2)西方非人类中心主义环境伦理学家主张moral agent包括人和部分高等动物,故moral agent不能译为道德代理人;(3)道德行为体(moral agent)与道德关怀对象之间的关系不是代理关系。     

Brain activation detection by neighborhood one-class SVM

Brain activation detection is an important problem in fMRI data analysis. In this paper, we propose a data-driven activation detection method called neighborhood one-class SVM (NOC-SVM). Based on the probability distribution assumption of the one-class SVM algorithm and the neighborhood consistency hypothesis, NOC-SVM identifies a voxel as either an activated or non-activated voxel by a weighted distance between its near neighbors and a hyperplane in a high-dimensional kernel space. The proposed NOC-SVM are evaluated by using both synthetic and real datasets. On two synthetic datasets with different SNRs, NOC-SVM performs better than K-means and fuzzy K-means clustering and is comparable to POM. On a real fMRI dataset, NOC-SVM can discover activated regions similar to K-means and fuzzy K-means. These results show that the proposed algorithm is an effective activation detection method for fMRI data analysis. Furthermore, it is stabler than K-means and fuzzy K-means clustering.     

The history of religions and francophone research in Europe: Main disciplinary trends in Switzerland, France, Belgium and Luxemburg

This article provides an overview (as of September, 2008) of the state of the field of l’histoire des religions in the four french-speaking countries of Europe. It discusses the pioneers, along with their followers and influence, the position of principle institutions regarding teaching in the field, and the general orientations of each university, along with distinct emphases that reflect recent socio-political and cultural developments. This detailed panorama brings to light the relative weakness of french-speaking research in the field of l’histoire générale des religions. It calls attention to tensions between the former high status of this academic area, more than half of a century ago, and the disrepute into which its comparativist project has fallen over the last decades. It asks how French secularism – and the growing secularization of western societies more generally – may have influenced perceptions of the discipline, its orientations, and its position in today's academic market academic market. It also considers the impact of declining comprehension of religious phenomena among younger generations and correlated concerns with popularisation.     

Charting the map metaphor in theories of religion

The idea that scholars of religion produce ‘maps’ that represent the ‘territories’ of religion(s) is common and influential. This paper first discusses the role of the metaphor, with special reference to the work of J.Z. Smith, and some of the problems raised by the map metaphor (above all, its implicit reliance on a naive correspondence view of truth). It then draws two important distinctions: between different levels of representation; and between the representing and guiding function of maps (truth and use). It ends by comparing issues in the philosophy of science and the theory of religion in order to highlight some promising directions for more defensible semantic and epistemological groundwork in theory of religion.     

Anthropology of religion: Disasters and the representations of tradition and modernity

Based on ethnographic research, this article explores local explanations for and interpretations of the earthquake which occurred on the island of Java, Indonesia in May 2006, costing 6000 lives and leaving about 1 million people homeless. Although everybody knows that the disaster was the result of tectonic activity, this knowledge co-exists with religious beliefs in manifold ways. The most widespread accounts of the earthquake referred to local myths connected to the landscape. The spirits are said to have sent the disaster in order to remind the Javanese - and most importantly the Sultan and other people in power - of their traditions. Several rituals were invented to prevent more misery, and certain experts thereby gained considerable importance. The various ways in which people shaped, interpreted and negotiated the meaning of the disaster are interconnected with their understanding of tradition and modernity. This article argues that - whereas Javanese culture was based on an image of the reconciliation of these spheres before - the discourse on the earthquake reveals a new tendency to polarise: on the one hand modernity is associated with secularisation, materialism, moral decay and ecological exploitation, while on the other hand tradition is idealised according to a global model of spirituality and harmony. Thus, the main argument of this paper is that the culturalisation of a natural event brings both cultural and transcultural dynamics to light.     

Orientalism, representation and religion: the reality behind the myth

Said's Orientalism has been called an ‘epoch-making’ and ‘paradigm constitutive’ book. While it undoubtedly caused a stir on its appearance and proved an important influence upon post-colonial studies and other developments in literary and cultural theory, a careful re-reading of it reveals a deeply flawed work that offers a confused analysis of human representations and realities, a highly selective and partial engagement with Western and Middle Eastern history and scholarship, and a particularly unhelpful approach to religion. The argument offered here is that Said's claims about ‘Orientalism’ are actually incoherent, veering between Foucauldian social constructionism and references to trans-cultural human realities; that the theoretical approaches to religion are inconsistent and highly selective; that the account of human agency is entirely inadequate; and that, although Said condemns entire generations of Orientalist scholars as racist, imperialist and ethnocentric, he is insufficiently reflective about his own scholarly position and the implications of its inconsistencies. Although Orientalism has been hailed as a book that ‘breathed insurgency’, it actually offers a vision of human beings as remarkably powerless in the face of arbitrary and abstract discourses that define their lives as oppressors or oppressed. Said sought to demonstrate that the reality behind the myth of scholarly impartiality was a racist and ethnocentric exercise of control and authority over the Orient, but the reality behind the myth of Orientalism is a theoretically flawed work offering a reductive account of religion and an impoverished view of human beings.     

Marketing the goods of salvation: Bourdieu on religion

Pierre Bourdieu's work has had a resounding impact on disciplines ranging from linguistics to anthropology to art history to literary criticism. Scholars of religion have, however, been relatively slow to catch on to the theoretical gold mine that academics in other fields have discovered in Bourdieu's work, doubtless in part because Bourdieu himself pays only limited attention to religion. The present article is intended to serve as an introduction to Bourdieu's theory of practice as it applies to his sociological theory of religion, which is especially serviceable for the analysis of the relationship among religion, class and power. Haitian religion and culture are used as a case study in the spirit of Bourdieu's own insistence that theory always be confronted with the substantive and never be exercised in a vacuum.     

193例戒毒者人格类型及其与自尊、社会支持和应对策略的关系

以193名戒毒者为被试,运用问卷法和对数线性模型调查和分析了戒毒者个人背景及其与戒毒行为的关系,通过聚类分析概括出戒毒者的三种人格类型,并探讨了不同人格类型戒毒者在自尊、社会支持、应对策略上的特点及其关系。结果表明：(1)中低教育程度与中低经济收入显著正相关;男性所估计的戒毒时间远远少于女性;吸毒时间越长,复吸的可能性越大。(2)外向冲动型戒毒者的自尊水平最高,其次是内向顺从者,身心障碍者的自尊水平显著低于外向冲动者。(3)身心障碍者对支持的主观体验和利用程度越高,所采取的面对策略越多;所获得的支持越多,越少采取屈服策略。而内向顺从者和外向冲动者对所获支持的满意程度越高,越少采取面对策略;对支持的利用程度越高,所采取的屈服策略越多。