A WAY FORWARD FOR SOCIOLOGICAL RESEARCH ON SCIENCE AND RELIGION: A REVIEW AND A RIFF

John Evans’s new book Morals Not Knowledge pushes scholars to rethink contemporary debates about religion and science by moving past the rhetoric of societal elites to examine the perspectives of everyday Americans, identifying the moral conflicts at the heart of debates. We review Evans’s key contributions while also extending and challenging his arguments, urging consideration of how renewed moral debates might be informed by a broader set of U.S. “publics.” Drawing on empirical research, we highlight four sets of voices that are missing from Evans’s analysis. Specifically, we highlight the voices of racial and ethnic minorities, religious communities (as opposed to individuals), members of minority religious traditions, and everyday religious scientists. Through doing so we offer avenues for future research on these diverse publics that will help facilitate a broader set of better and more informed debates about moral conflict between religious and scientific communities.     

Regularized Partial and/or Constrained Redundancy Analysis

Methods of incorporating a ridge type of regularization into partial redundancy analysis (PRA), constrained redundancy analysis (CRA), and partial and constrained redundancy analysis (PCRA) were discussed. The usefulness of ridge estimation in reducing mean square error (MSE) has been recognized in multiple regression analysis for some time, especially when predictor variables are nearly collinear, and the ordinary least squares estimator is poorly determined. The ridge estimation method was extended to PRA, CRA, and PCRA, where the reduced rank ridge estimates of regression coefficients were obtained by minimizing the ridge least squares criterion. It was shown that in all cases they could be obtained in closed form for a fixed value of ridge parameter. An optimal value of the ridge parameter is found by G-fold cross validation. Illustrative examples were given to demonstrate the usefulness of the method in practical data analysis situations. We thank Jim Ramsay for his insightful comments on an earlier draft of this paper. The work reported in this paper is supported by Grants 10630 from the Natural Sciences and Engineering Research Council of Canada to the first author.     

A Theology of the Cross for South Africa

This article seeks to investigate in what ways the Lutheran theologia crucis - when brought into dialogue with the South African historical-political context - can be of epistemological as well as pastoral significance for the people of South Africa. South Africa is a nation in the process of coming to terms with a traumatic past of violence, oppression, suffering and injustice. In order for healing and reconciliation to occur, people must find some kind of meaning in the story of the past, and indeed must find the seeds of hope and new beginnings in this story. This article argues that the story of South Africa can be likened to a story of the cross, and that the God of South Africans can be identified as the God of the cross, the Deus absconditus who is mysteriously and paradoxically revealed in suffering and injustice. In identifying the God of the cross as their God, and seeing their story as a story of the cross, South Africans may also anticipate theirs to be(come) a story of the resurrection and of new life.     

The Way of Salvation in Luther's Theology: A Feminist Evaluation

Abstract : Luther's understanding of salvation can be summed up with the phrase “justification by grace through faith.” The doctrine of justification is the focal point for all theological categories in Luther's theology, including salvation. That said, this article examines various ways grace or salvation is understood to be conveyed in Luther's theology through: the cross, the resurrection or through God's election and covenant with humankind. Throughout the article, it evaluates these foci for salvation in terms of their ability to speak gospel to women's lives today. In particular, it evaluates the appropriate usage of Luther's epistemology of the cross.     

医学伦理学——欧洲与中国的桥

跨文化医学伦理学研究,要求我们以理智的方式去应对全球化。既要维护多样性,又要明确共同利益、亦要追求共同目标。任何文化都不能强行提出一些标准去规范国际间的生物医学。自主权应坚持义务论的解释,否则一个强势风气将会支配利益的选择解释,将文化多样性在伦理学中铸成一个统一的模式,形成自主权的“通货膨胀倾向”。     

Contextuality in the Theology of Douglas John Hall

The theology of Douglas John Hall has much to offer us in a time of wanton warfare and social injustices. Hall contends that the modern paradigm, supported by an "eternal, universal theology of glory" proves inadequate for addressing the problems of the world in which we live, and offers us a "contextual theology of the cross." This theology, unlike theologies of glory, is not afraid to "walk" into the darkness; in fact, Hall contends that is the only place where the light of God is revealed.     

Personality traits of Russians from the observer's perspective

Data were collected by the members of the Russian character and personality survey from 39 samples in 33 administrative areas of the Russian Federation. Respondents (N = 7065) identified an ethnically Russian adult or college‐aged man or woman whom they knew well and rated the target using the Russian observer rating version of the Revised NEO Personality Inventory, which measures neuroticism, extraversion, openness to experience, agreeableness and conscientiousness. Factor analyses within samples showed that the factor structure of an international sample combining data from 50 different cultures was well replicated in all 39 Russian samples. Sex differences replicated the known pattern in all samples, demonstrating that women scored higher than men on most of the neuroticism, openness, agreeableness and conscientiousness facet scales. Cross‐sectional analyses demonstrated consistent age differences for four factors: Older individuals compared to younger ones were less extraverted and open but more agreeable and conscientious. The mean levels of traits were similar in all 39 samples. Although in general personality traits in Russians closely followed the universal pattern, some reliable culture‐specific effects were also found that future studies can help interpret. Copyright © 2009 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

A postcolonial Pannenberg? Mimicry,the law,and the cross of love

This paper employs the postcolonial concepts of mimicry and hybridity to interpret Wolfhart Pannenberg's understanding of the violence done to Jesus on the cross and the subversive reconciliatory love that it engenders. According to Pannenberg, although the man Jesus was crucified as blasphemer of the Jewish law, the resurrection vindicated Jesus so that the ones accusing Jesus were retroactively deemed to be the actual blasphemers. As a result, Jesus ended up dying not for his own alleged breaking of the law, but as an inclusive substitute for all blasphemers of God (through amour propre) deserving death. Thus, the resurrection confirmed Jesus’ divine identity and his earthly teaching that love supersedes and transforms the law. Applying the concept of mimicry to Pannenberg, on the cross the symbolic and semiotic are held together in tension for in mimicry the “not-quite sameness” menaces the colonizer. The cross, ostensibly a symbolic sign of abjection, is mimicked by the suffering of Jesus and subverted through a practice of inclusive semiotic love which recapitulates sinful human life toward a life of transformed autonomy. Pannenberg displays a pseudo postcolonial understanding of subverting oppressive law into love. However, on account of his futurist ontology, the eschatological totality is underscored relative to formative experiences, leaving him vulnerable to postcolonial critiques of essentialism, which can reinscribe colonialism. I contend that Pannenberg employs a strategy of “strategic particularism” in which concepts such as mimicry and hybridity are helpful as hermeneutical tools but ultimately provisional and temporary relative to the whole.     

In the last analysis: archetypal themes in the analysis of an elderly patient with early disintegrative trauma

Aspects of the analysis of an elderly patient with early disintegrative experiences are described: separation anxiety, an internalized attack upon vitality, and the fear of dependency were prominent features of the transference/countertransference relationship, while the search for meaning as death drew nearer continued to be the central theme. The patient's many dreams reveal a wealth of images whose complex interlinkings provided evidence of a heightened and energized individuation process aiming at the integrity of personality.     

群体任务中合作行为的跨阶段演变

合作是电子商务时代群体工作的重要基础。本实验通过资源两难任务研究群体工作中的合作行为的演变。111名被试参加了实验。研究发现,在动态博弈过程中,群体其他成员行为的多个阶段反馈将成为决策者合作机制形成的主要基础,与决策者价值等内部因素和环境不确定性等外部因素,共同影响合作行为的演变