Games,Rules, and Practices

We present and defend a view labeled “practiceism” which provides a solution to the incompatibility problems. The classic incompatibility problem is inconsistency of: 1. Someone who intentionally violates the rules of a game is not playing the game.

2. In many cases, players intentionally violate the rules as part of playing the game (e.g. fouling to stop the clock in basketball).

The problem has a normative counterpart: 1’. In normal cases, it is wrong for a player to intentionally violate the rules of the game.

2’. In many normal cases, it is not wrong for a player to intentionally violate the rules of the game (e.g. fouling to stop the clock in basketball).

According to both formalism and informalism, the rules of the game include the formal rules of the game. Both traditional positions avoid the incompatibility problems by rejecting 1 and 1'. Practiceism rejects 2 and 2’: it maintains that the rules are the rules manifested in playing the game, not the formal rules.

Practiceism presents two theses: (a) the real rules of the game are the rules players follow: the practice determines the rules, and not vice versa. (b) the (first order) rules of a game determine what is legitimate within the game.     

多词素词的通达表征:分解还是整体

有关通达表征的结构主要有三种观点词素、整词和混合的观点.分解存储的通达表征认为,在通达表征层次中只有不可再分的词素,而没有彼此独立的词条.也就是说,词语是以词素分解形式存储在通达表征中的.整词存储的通达表征认为,在通达表征中存储的都是整词,每一个词都有其独立的词条.混合的通达表征认为词素和整词都有可能是通达表征中的单元.它具有更大的灵活性.综合考虑已有的文献和进一步的理解思考,作者提出影响词语通达表征的两个因素语义透明度和词频.     

幼儿责任心维度构成的探索性与验证性因子分析

责任心维度构成的研究是幼儿责任心发展及其影响因素研究的基础.本研究依据国内外有关文献和已有的研究经验,编制了幼儿责任心问卷,对120名4-5岁中班幼儿的教师进行问卷词查,在此基础上采用探索性因素分析和验证性因素分析探讨幼儿责任心的维度构成.结果表明,幼儿责任心由自我责任心、他人责任心、集体责任心、任务责任心、承诺责任心和过失责任心六个维度所构成.     

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.     

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.     

Religious studies in Scotland: A persistent tension with divinity

This article treats the history of the study of religions in Scotland as a chapter in the history of the academic study of religions in the UK and Continental Europe. After sketching traditions of ‘Scottish comparative religion’ from the late nineteenth century to the interwar period, the authors map out an institutional history of ‘Religious Studies’ as a distinctive disciplinary formation in Scotland since 1970. The emergence, consolidation and in some cases decline of this relatively new academic field are charted at the five main contemporary university sites in Scotland where religion, as a distinct subject, is taught: Aberdeen, Glasgow, Edinburgh, Stirling and the Open University. In the cases of Aberdeen, Glasgow and Edinburgh, the authors argue that ‘Religious Studies’ has had to fashion its niche in the context of the ecclesiastical authority enjoyed by Scottish Divinity faculties, resulting in an ongoing ‘tension’ between Religious Studies and Theology. The development of the subject at Stirling and the Open University underscores the historical alignment of Religious Studies with non-Presbyterian educational values in Scotland, whereas the persistence of Religious Studies in Schools of Divinity at the other Scottish universities may veil the traditionally ‘religionist’ stance of most scholars of religion working in these institutions.