SECULARIZING DEMONS: FUNDAMENTALIST NAVIGATIONS IN RELIGION AND SECULARITY

Since the turn of the millennium, theologians and secular scholars of religion have increasingly begun exploring the relationship between transhumanism and religion. However, analyses of anti‐transhumanist apocalypticisms are still rare, and those that exist are situated mainly among broader explorations of religious and secular bioconservatism. This article addresses this lack of specificity by drawing analyses of transhumanism and religion into dialogue with explorations of contemporary demonology through a close study of the beliefs of the evangelical conspiracist Thomas Horn and the anti‐transhumanist milieu around him. Exploring the milieu's multifaceted demonology of the secular world in light of genealogies of religion and secularity, the article situates Horn's demonology as one attempt to negotiate these genealogies, using what Sean McCloud terms a “‘supernatural’ hermeneutics of suspicion” that sees spiritual forces as the structural base of reality. It argues that, while fringe, milieus like Horn's illuminate broader cultural tensions and genealogical relations surrounding the place of religion in a secular(izing) world.     

Interaction,information and meaning

The possibility of a “unified theory of information” which avoids reifying information or attributing agency to it is explored using the patterned processes characteristic of self‐organization. Interactions are shown to create information from the level of quantum physics to human societies. The difference between meaningless and meaningful information is explained through the contextualizing role of systems.     

聋人与听力正常人拓扑性质差异知觉的比较实验研究

分别选取15名聋人与15名听力正常人被试,在两种刺激图对呈现时间条件下,通过考察其对拓扑性质等价和拓扑性质差异图对的反应,本研究对聋人与听力正常人的拓扑性质差异知觉进行了比较研究。研究结果表明:(1)两种呈现时间条件下,被试对拓扑性质等价图对的反应均优于拓扑性质差异图对。(2)对于拓扑性质等价图对,被试在两种呈现时间条件下的反应不存在显著差异;而对于拓扑性质差异图对,被试则对长时间呈现的反应优于短时间呈现。(3)聋人与听力正常人在两种呈现时间条件下对两类刺激图对的反应均不存在显著差异。(4)对于聋人来说,刺激图对长时间呈现和短时间呈现的反应不存在显著差异;而对于听力正常人来说,刺激图对长时间呈现的反应则优于短时间呈现。     

论天人合德与道德价值的定位

中国传统伦理道德的天人合德为伦理道德价值提供了本体上的根据,这是道德价值的根本定位。其把道德价值定位于整体利益,就是定位于超越的绝对本位。这与现代伦理道德价值定位于人类个体利益一样,都存在理论和实践上的失误。伦理道德的逻辑发展,必将从此引申出集体利益与个体利益和谐一致的集体主义原则。     

“生生”、“感通”、“偕行”——《易传》的天人共生哲学

天人问题是中国哲学的基本问题,天人的基本含义之一相当于我们现在通常说的自然与人;基本含义之二是视天人为有德性(道德)的、有能动性的动态的、协调的存在。中国哲学中的这种天人观在《易传》中表现为"生生"——"感通"——"偕行"的天人共生态。《易传》既将天人视为一个"生生不息"的自然的生命有机体,又充分发掘天人的德性,并使二者相资相长,"日新之谓盛德,生生之谓易",天地人各有其位,各尽其能,各循其道,"各正性命",一体偕行,共生共存共荣。     

Spatial learning and goldfish telencephalon NMDA receptors

Recent results have demonstrated that the mammalian hippocampus and the dorso-lateral telencephalon of ray-finned fishes share functional similarities in relation to spatial memory systems. In the present study, we investigated whether the physiological mechanisms of this hippocampus-dependent spatial memory system were also similar in mammals and ray-finned fishes, and therefore possibly conserved through evolution in vertebrates. In Experiment 1, we studied the effects of the intracranial administration of the noncompetitive NMDA receptor antagonist MK-801 during the acquisition of a spatial task. The results indicated dose-dependent drug-induced impairment of spatial memory. Experiment 2 evaluated if the MK-801 produced disruption of retrieval of a learned spatial response. Data showed that the administration of MK-801 did not impair the retrieval of the information previously stored. The last experiment analyzed the involvement of the telencephalic NMDA receptors in a spatial and in a cue task. Results showed a clear impairment in spatial learning but not in cue learning when NMDA receptors were blocked. As a whole, these results indicate that physiological mechanisms of this hippocampus-dependent system could be a general feature in vertebrate, and therefore phylogenetically conserved.     

Patenting humans: Clones,chimeras, and biological artifacts

The momentum of advances in biology is evident in the history of patents on life forms. As we proceed forward with greater understanding and technological control of developmental biology there will be many new and challenging dilemmas related to patenting of human parts and partial trajectories of human development. These dilemmas are already evident in the current conflict over the moral status of the early human embryo. In this essay, recent evidence from embryological studies is considered and the unbroken continuity of organismal development initiated at fertilization is asserted as clear and reasonable grounds for moral standing. Within this frame of analysis, it is proposed that through a technique of Altered Nuclear Transfer, non-organismal entities might be created from which embryonic stem cells could be morally procured. Criteria for patenting of such non-organismal entities are considered. An earlier version of this paper was presented at an international conference, “The Ethics of Intellectual Property Rights and Patents,” held in Warsaw, Poland on 23–24 April, 2004.     

Real World Justice

Despite a high and growing global average income, billions of human beings are still condemned to lifelong severe poverty with all its attendant evils of low life expectancy, social exclusion, ill health, illiteracy, dependency, and effective enslavement. We citizens of the rich countries are conditioned to think of this problem as an occasion for assistance. Thanks in part to the rationalizations dispensed by our economists, most of us do not realize how deeply we are implicated, through the new global economic order our states have imposed, in this ongoing catastrophe. My sketch of how we are so implicated follows the argument of my book, World Poverty and Human Rights, but takes the form of a response to the books critics.     

The Relationship of Developmental Tasks to Life Satisfaction, Moral Reasoning, and Occupational Attainment at Age 28

This study was conducted to empirically investigate the relationship of several developmental tasks to the developmental outcomes of Life Satisfaction, Moral Reasoning, and Occupational Attainment at age 28. Structured retrospective interviews of 62 Midwestern men and women in their late twenties were converted to variable scores and submitted to quantitative analyses. The results indicated differing patterns of influence on each of the outcomes, clarifying the relative importance of each developmental task, and also highlighting the multi-faceted nature of human development.