RESCUE AND RECOVERY AS A THEOLOGICAL PRINCIPLE,AND A KEY TO MORALITY IN EXTRATERRESTRIAL SPECIES

New theological understanding can emerge with the advancement of scientific knowledge and the use of new concepts, or older concepts in new ways. Here, the authors present a proposal to extend the concept of “rescue and recovery” found in the United Nations Law of the High Seas, off-world and within a broader purview of other intelligent and self-aware species that humans may someday encounter. The notion of a morality that extends to off-world species is not new, but in this analysis, rescue and recovery become an imperative when any intelligent and self-aware species is in harm's way. Rescue and recovery encompass a necessary action component except perhaps in those cases where rescuers are in danger. The authors explore three biblical examples of rescue and recovery to derive a fundamental meaning of the concept.     

RELATIVE EFFECTIVENESS OF TEACHER ATTENTION AND THE “GOOD BEHAVIOR GAME” IN MODIFYING DISRUPTIVE CLASSROOM BEHAVIOR1

A variety of behavioral procedures have been employed in recent years to modify disruptive classroom behavior. Such methods have been developed with the belief that curtailing disruptive behavior would strengthen positive classroom performance. In this study, two procedures, the good behavior game and the teacher-attention method, were compared to determine short-run effectiveness. Four teachers (two fourth-grade and two fifth-grade) implemented both methods in their classrooms over a five-week period. Presentation of methods was alternated in a counterbalanced design to control for order effects. Each of the four classrooms consisted of 25 students. A time-sampling procedure was used to record the presence or absence of disruptive behavior within 15-second intervals. Disruptive behavior was defined as any talking-out or out-of-seat behavior without permission. The results indicated that both procedures were effective in modifying disruptive classroom behavior, but that the good behavior game reduced disruptive behavior significantly better than the teacher-attention method. In addition, all teachers preferred the game to the teacher-attention procedure. This reaction seemed related to the effort involved in initiating the two activities. The good behavior game required less effort on the teacher's part. However, use of the game alone raises certain ethical considerations. One such issue involves abuse of peer pressure. Also, there is a possibility that negative rules may tend to promote resentment. Positively stated rules would ameliorate that problem. Another relates to the possibility that some teachers might be carried away by the ease of the game's implementation to the extent that behavior control becomes the primary objective in the classroom. As a result, one might consider use of the game to maximize short-term change, but then phase out this procedure in favor of another method (e.g., teacher attention) for long-run effects.     

中医药治理演进历程、特点与能力提升

中医药治理是国家治理现代化的重要环节,以中医药政策发展为主线,对建国以来中医药治理演进历程进行梳理,划分为计划和运动式、效率和市场化、标准和法制化以及法治和现代化四个治理阶段,分别从治理理念变化、治理政策执行、治理方式选择和治理策略重点等方面深入剖析其演进特点,提出构建公平、信任和法治多维度的治理新格局,突出中医药的特色优势及建设高效的信息化治理平台,以基层为重点融入乡村振兴和健康中国战略,从而促进中医药治理现代化,实现“善治”目标。

     

临床工作者面对肿瘤患者照护需求的压力分析

在以实务为基础的研究上进行灵性多元观点的内容分析。对临床工作者进行焦点访谈,研究显示面对患者的死亡与未知的恐惧、患者的身心灵整合与情绪变化、家属的心理支持与情绪处理等,都会无意间增加临床工作者的压力困境。而当前存在的主要问题包括临床工作者认为灵性需求应该具备有意义的信念;临床工作者面对正负向情绪,透过修复自我的价值观与经验复制的分享,来协助家属适应与度过哀伤期;临床工作者并非仅是让患者得以善终,还必须着重改善照护质量。

     

Can Robert Adams Survive Moral Twin Earth?

Richard Boyd and Robert Adams have both developed semantic accounts of moral terms based on Hilary Putnam's causal regulation theory for natural kind terms, according to which the terms in question refer to the properties which predominantly causally regulated the terms. However, Terence Horgan and Mark Timmons have mounted an objection to Boyd's semantics—their Moral Twin Earth argument. If this argument is successful against Boyd then it might be thought that it should also be successful against Adams, given the similarity between their semantic accounts. I will argue in this essay that Adams's semantics is sufficiently different from Boyd's to enable him to survive Moral Twin Earth, but that he is vulnerable to a modified version of Moral Twin Earth that I describe.     

Commentary on Corradi et al.’s (2019) new conception of aesthetic sensitivity: Is the ability conception dead?

Corradi et al. (British Journal of Psychology, 2019) argue that their new conception of visual aesthetic sensitivity (as responsiveness to aesthetic features in one’s preferences) presents several advantages in comparison with the current ability view of aesthetic sensitivity, usually defined as the ability to judge aesthetic stimuli in accordance with standards (The Journal of Psychology, 1964, 57 and 49). Although the measure they propose is interesting and presents advances to the field, we point to important issues. Notably, the authors conveniently base their comparison between the two conceptions on psychometric double standards, discard a century of research on aesthetic sensitivity by focusing on Eysenck’s speculations, and disguise an extension of already existing aesthetic preference tests (e.g., The Journal of Psychology, 1952, 33 and 199; Empirical Studies of the Arts, 2005, 23 and 165) as a redefinition of aesthetic sensitivity. We conclude that both aesthetic preference and aesthetic sensitivity research are legitimate objects of study, that the authors present interesting ideas to further the study of aesthetic preferences, but that their approach is not new and that its proposed renaming only adds confusion to the field.     

Evaluating adult interaction during the Step It UP! game to increase physical activity in children

A recent intervention, the Step it UP! game (Galbraith & Normand, 2017), consists of an interdependent group contingency to increase student physical activity. In addition, previous research demonstrated that adult interaction may reinforce physical activity (Larson et al., 2014). We extended research on the Step it UP! game by comparing the effects of no game, Step it UP! game, and Step it UP! game plus adult interaction on the number of steps taken by participants in a third-grade classroom during recess. Overall, 19 of the 25 participants took more steps during the Step it UP! game plus adult interaction compared to the Step it UP! game and no-game recesses. Furthermore, 20 participants preferred the Step it UP! game plus adult interaction. Results suggest that adult interaction can enhance the effects of the Step it UP! game to increase physical activity.     

Marriage and the Public Good

In this article I seek to address some misunderstandings inarguments about same sex-marriage. I do this by evaluating severalviews on homosexuality and marriage. My central aim is to showthat a rejection of same-sex marriage does not depend upon theview that homosexual acts are immoral or disordered. Rather,one must examine sexual acts in light of public goods that areat stake. I also argue that the Christian understanding of marriageand sexuality offers more than a set of prohibitions againstcertain sexual acts. Rather, it offers reasonable principlesby which to evaluate the relationship between sexual acts andthe public good.     

Moral Philosophers as Ethical Engineers: Limits of Moral Philosophy and a Pragmatist Alternative

Ever since Kant, moral philosophers have been more or less animated by the mission of discovering inescapable law‐like rules that would provide a binding justification for morality. Recently, however, many have started to question (a) whether this is possible and (b) what, after all, this project could achieve. An alternative vision of the task of moral philosophy starts from the pragmatist idea that philosophizing begins and ends in human experiencing. It leads to a view where morality is seen as a “social technology” that aims to make living together possible, and strengthens people's capability to live a good life within a society. The role of moral philosophy is, accordingly, to develop our moral tools further. Moral philosophers become ethical engineers who use their expertise in ethical topics to criticize existing “moral technology” and construct new concepts, tools, and theories that better answer the current challenges for living a good life.     

孟子对传统天命报应论的创造性转化--兼论性善论的价值合理性

在建立以性善论为核心的道德天命观过程中,文化根基的问题观照和传统文化的资源借续是孟子的理论立足点。通过以性善言天善、以心性的价值合理性印证天命的价值理性和“德福合一”的新解释,孟子重建了人的道德信仰,完成了对天命报应论的全新构想。心性的价值合理性与天命的价值理性之间的相互印证,是孟子性善论及其天命观中最有创意的理论运思。