An historical preface to engineering ethics

This article attempts to distinguish between science and technology, on the one hand, and engineering, on the other, offering a brief introduction to engineering values and engineering ethics. The method is (roughly) a philosophical examination of history. Engineering turns out to be a relatively recent enterprise, barely three hundred years old, to have distinctive commitments both technical and moral, and to have changed a good deal both technically and morally during that period. What motivates the paper is the belief that a too-easy equation of engineering with technology tends to obscure the special contribution of engineers to technology and to their own professional standards and so, to obscure as well both the origin and content of engineering ethics.     

内隐记忆研究的实验方法探索：启动效应计量方法的改进思路及其实验研究

以实验鉴定了常规的启动效应计量方法的有效性程度,并为客观地计量启动效应,创用了“超意识广度法”、“二次比较法”等．结果发现：（１）如被试数量较少,以不同补笔率为“基线值”所求得的启动效应之间发生显著差异的可能性存在;（２）超意识广度法能克服“阈下呈现刺激法”“分散注意法”的不足,为内隐记忆提供有利的识记情境;（３）“二次比较法”能为正常人内隐记忆的存在提供更为直接、可靠的证据,并能客观、精确地计量启动效应。     

Rasch's multiplicative poisson model with covariates

As a multivariate model of the number of events, Rasch's multiplicative Poisson model is extended such that the parameters for individuals in the prior gamma distribution have continuous covariates. The parameters for individuals are integrated out and the hyperparameters in the prior distribution are estimated by a numerical method separately from difficulty parameters that are treated as fixed parameters or random variables. In addition, a method is presented for estimating parameters in Rasch's model with missing values. The author is now affiliated with the Otara University of Commerce. The author is grateful to Yoshio Takane, Haruo Yanai, Eiji Muraki, the editor and referees for their careful readings and helpful suggestions on earlier versions of this paper. Part of this work was presented at the third European Congress of Psychology at Tampere, Finland in 1993.     

Game logic and its applications I

This paper provides a logic framework for investigations of game theoretical problems. We adopt an infinitary extension of classical predicate logic as the base logic of the framework. The reason for an infinitary extension is to express the common knowledge concept explicitly. Depending upon the choice of axioms on the knowledge operators, there is a hierarchy of logics. The limit case is an infinitary predicate extension of modal propositional logic KD4, and is of special interest in applications. In Part I, we develop the basic framework, and show some applications: an epistemic axiomatization of Nash equilibrium and formal undecidability on the playability of a game. To show the formal undecidability, we use a term existence theorem, which will be proved in Part II.The authors thank Hiroakira Ono for helpful discussions and encouragements from the early stage of this research project, and Philippe Mongin, Mitio Takano and a referee of this journal for comments on earlier versions of this paper. The first and second authors are partially supported, respectively, by Tokyo Center of Economic Research and Grant-in-Aids for Scientific Research 04640215, Ministry of Education, Science and Culture.Presented by H. Ono     

General education,cultural diversity,and identity

The issue of this paper is cultural plurality as a problem for public, general education and for (personal) identity. In order to examine this question, one needs to be clear about the meaning of the concepts of general education, on the one hand, and cultural diversity on the other. In the first section, we will fix the meaning of these concepts. A conceptual distinction between cultural diversity and cultural pluralism will be introduced. In the second section, it will be argued that open pluralism can only be maintained if there is a basic common culture apart from the cultural diversity that pluralism affirms. Therefore, there is yet an indispensable role for general education in an open, pluralistic society. In the third section we will look at two metaphors that give an opposite significance to the relation between identity and diversity: the conversational metaphor and the food metaphor mishmash. The final section expands on the conversational metaphor by way of an exposition of Ricoeur's hermeneutics of the self. It supplies us with a promising concept of identity that is not in complete opposition to diversity.     

How much woe when we go: A quantitative method for predicting culture shock

Culture shock is defined as the confusion and discomfort caused by the conflict in perceived motives and expected behaviors between the home culture and the foreign culture. Several quantitative and graphical methods employing techniques of cluster analysis and similarity mapping are offered for predicting the magnitude of culture shock between pairs of countries using data extracted from Hofstede's 1980–83 studies of national cultural values. Implications for business, politics, and personal stress management are discussed.     

CATHOLIC ETHICS AS SEEN FROM PADUA

During the summer of 2006, over four hundred Catholic ethicists from around the world gathered for four days in Padua, Italy. About sixty of the conference papers have become available in two edited collections, Catholic Theological Ethics in the World Church: The Plenary Papers from the First Cross‐cultural Conference on Catholic Theological Ethics, and Applied Ethics in a World Church: The Padua Conference. As the conference was marked by a distinctive and creative tension—between the diversity which characterized the nationalities and cultural identities of the participants, on the one hand, and the commonness of their religious heritage, on the other—these essays can tell us much about contemporary Catholic ethics in its response to global pluralism. The following develops four reflections. First, the conference papers pursue a style of scholarship that is at once critically creative and ecclesially rooted. Second, the conference raises new concerns about the importance that Christian formation must have in a pluralist world. Third, the participants affirm and defend the ultimate universality of moral goods while also arguing that these goods are expressed and embodied in unavoidably particular ways. Finally, the most important contribution that Catholic ethics can make to public conversations about issues of common concern is through its articulation and defense of key human values.     

Analytic practice: Convergences and divergences1

The author discusses current convergences and divergences concerning analytic practice. After presenting a clinical vignette that can be understood differently according to different theoretical approaches, he discusses Wallerstein’s proposal of a common ground in psychoanalysis and suggests that the present state of the art indicates that psychoanalysis is a pluralistic discipline, with different ways of training and practising it, and that the main challenge is to improve our ability to listen to and to learn from different approaches.     

Caveats of non-ipsatization of basic values: A review of issues and a simulation study

Ipsatization, or a correction of variables by their common component, is routinely applied to measures of basic values. Although ipsatization has been criticized, the consequences of non-ipsatization are rarely discussed. We show that the ipsatization of values is intertwined with their definition. A common factor involved in ipsatization was suggested to represent a nuisance variable, a response style, social desirability, or other constructs. A simulation study illustrated that within-individual centering revealed more accurate value scores when the common factor was in the data, with exception of the situation when values were consistently and positively correlated with each other. We conclude that in different conditions both applying and failing to apply ipsatization can cause bias. Therefore, no general advice in regard to ipsatization can be provided.     

价值观的稳定性与可变性

价值观是人们区分好坏、善恶、美丑、损益、是非的信念系统,通常是充满情感的。价值观具有稳定性与可变性的特点。价值观的稳定性表现为:基本价值观具有跨时间的稳定性和跨情境的一致性; 特别是保护性价值观和人生价值观具有较强的稳定性。个人的发展、经历重大事件以及实验干预可导致价值观的改变,可变性主要表现为价值观的重要性发生变化。从我国的实际出发,探讨个人的核心价值观问题、以及价值观研究中国化、价值观研究对价值观教育的启示,乃是我们今后研究的关注点。