Statements of Method and Teaching: The Case of Socrates

In this paper, I ponder the question of whether Socrates follows a method of investigation — the method of hypothesis — which he advocates in Plato's Phaedo. The evidence in the dialogue suggests that he does not follow the method, which raises additional questions: If he fails to do so, why does he articulate the method? Does his statement of method affect his actions or is it mainly forgotten? Although Socrates is a fictional character, his actions in the Phaedo suggests questions about the function of espoused methods in actual situations.     

Consumption-leisure tradeoffs in pigeons: Effects of changing marginal wage rates by varying amount of reinforcement

Pigeons' rates of responding and food reinforcement under simple random-ratio schedules were compared with those obtained under comparable ratio schedules in which free food deliveries were added, but the duration of each food delivery was halved. These ratio-with-free-food schedules were constructed so that, were the pigeon to maintain the same rate of responding as it had under the simple ratio schedule, total food obtained (earned plus free) would remain unchanged. However, any reduction in responding would reduce total food consumption below that under the simple ratio schedule. These “compensated wage decreases” led to decreases in responding and decreases in food consumption, as predicted by an economic model of labor supply. Moreover, the reductions in responding increased as the ratio value increased (i.e., as wage rates decreased). Pigeons, therefore, substituted leisure for consumption. The relationship between these procedures and negative-income-tax programs is noted.     

An improvement of the Harman-Fukuda-method for the minres solution in factor analysis

The method proposed by Harman and Fukuda to treat the so-called Heywood case in the minres method in factor analysis i.e., the case where the resulting communalities are greater than one, involves the frequent solution of eigenvalue problems. A simple method to treat this problem requiring less computing time and enjoying higher numerical stability is described in this paper.     

THE NEGATIVE SIDE EFFECTS OF REWARD

The negative side effects of aversive control have been extensively discussed in clinical literature and textbooks. The symmetry between aversive and appetitive control in basic experimental research implies that parallel negative side effects of reward exist. These negative side effects are described and their implications for clinical practice and research are discussed.     

Generalized bilinear models

Generalized bilinear models are presented for the statistical analysis of two-way arrays. These models combine bilinear models and generalized linear modeling, and yield a family of models that includes many existing models, as well as suggest other potentially useful ones. This approach both unifies and extends models for two-way arrays, including the ability to treat response and explanatory variables differently in the models, and the incorporation of external information about the variables directly into the analysis. A unifying framework for the generalized bilinear models is provided by considering four particular cases which have been proposed and used in the existing statistical literature. A three-step procedure is proposed to analyze data sets by generalized bilinear models. Two data sets of different nature are analyzed.     

A one-way random effects model for trimmed means

The random effects ANOVA model plays an important role in many psychological studies, but the usual model suffers from at least two serious problems. The first is that even under normality, violating the assumption of equal variances can have serious consequences in terms of Type I errors or significance levels, and it can affect power as well. The second and perhaps more serious concern is that even slight departures from normality can result in a substantial loss of power when testing hypotheses. Jeyaratnam and Othman (1985) proposed a method for handling unequal variances, under the assumption of normality, but no results were given on how their procedure performs when distributions are nonnormal. A secondary goal in this paper is to address this issue via simulations. As will be seen, problems arise with both Type I errors and power. Another secondary goal is to provide new simulation results on the Rust-Fligner modification of the Kruskal-Wallis test. The primary goal is to propose a generalization of the usual random effects model based on trimmed means. The resulting test of no differences among J randomly sampled groups has certain advantages in terms of Type I errors, and it can yield substantial gains in power when distributions have heavy tails and outliers. This last feature is very important in applied work because recent investigations indicate that heavy-tailed distributions are common. Included is a suggestion for a heteroscedastic Winsorized analog of the usual intraclass correlation coefficient.     

现代运动心理学研究综述

从宏观的角度描述了现代运动心理学的研究领域,分析了运动员个性、唤醒水平与运动成绩、焦虑与运动成绩、心理技能训练和运动动机等五个方面的研究倾向,指出：认知运动心理学仍是研究的主流,各类研究都在尽量追求更明确的理论导向和更好的生态学效度,试图综合性地探讨运动行为,并且更加注重在描述和预测的基础上解释和控制运动行为。     

THEOLOGY IN AN EVOLUTIONARY MODE

Abstract. Evolution has become the standard way of understanding the world process. Theology has to express traditional faith in the context of the contemporary world. Since the common world view has profoundly changed, from a static world of being into a dynamic world of becoming, theology needs to change its language and its understanding of the universe as God's creation. This understanding of an evolving world is to be used as a theological source. Such a change of perspective necessitates a fundamental reconstructing of theology; for theology, such reconstructing means a renewed understanding of the Creator and of the Incarnation.     

Rereading sophistical arguments: A political intervention

This essay argues that Aristotle's categories of oratory are not as useful in judging the methods of Sophistical rhetoric as his presentation of time. The Sophistical argumentative method of making the weaker the stronger case is re-evaluated as a political practice. After showing this argument's relation to power and ideology, Aristotle's philosophy, which privileges a procedure of argument consistent with the politics of a polis-ideal rhetoric, is offered as reason for objecting to Sophistical rhetoric. The essay concludes that Sophistical rhetoric prefers the concept of possibility over Aristotelian actuality, and offers a need for an ideological space of radical, generative possibility in rhetorical theory.     

论中医的科学精神和人文方法

近十几年来中医现代化研究成效不显,以及发生许许多多的争论和困惑的重要原因在于我们对中医的基本性质缺乏一种共识。说中医就是一门科学或者不是科学,是一门经验医学或者是哲学医都会使我们陷于一个难堪的困境。中医具有科学精神,但不具有西方意义上的科学方法,而是用具有中国特色的人文方法实现科学精神的经验知识体系。具有科学精神是一回事,怎样实现这种精神却是另一回事,前者是无国界的,后者却是可以文化多元的。