语言理解中的预设加工

预设是指以交际双方的共同背景(共享的知识或信念)为前提的、听话者根据特定语言标记(触发标记)及其限定的对象(计算内容)而推理出的非外显意义。例如,“张明又触发标记发表了论文计算内容”引发了“张明之前发表过论文”的预设推论。理解者依赖触发标记通达交际双方的共同背景,并在计算内容上生成完整的预设;随后,理解者连接生成的预设和共同背景,更新两者之间的关系。触发标记范畴、共同背景与预设的关联度、共同背景类型,以及理解者的参与动机会影响不同阶段的预设加工。未来研究可以从三个角度进一步探讨预设加工的认知基础：(1)采用计算建模的方法,量化交际互动中听话者理解预设的过程(如观点采择);(2)采用脑成像技术,揭示预设加工过程的神经基础;(3)以特殊人群为研究对象,检验和修正预设加工的认知模型。     

The Correspondence between Human Intelligibility and Physical Intelligibility: The View of Jean Ladrière

This article seeks to explain the correspondence between human intelligibility and that of the physical world by synthesizing the contributions of Jean Ladrière. Ladrière shows that the objectification function of formal symbolism in mathematics as an artificial language has operative power acquired through algorithm to represent physical reality. In physical theories, mathematics relates to observations through theoretic and empirical languages mutually interacting in a methodological circle, and nonmathematical anticipatory intention guides mathematical algorithmic exploration. Ladrière reasons that mathematics can make the physical world comprehensible because of the presence of a rational principle in both kinds of intelligibility.     

Negotiating the Boundaries of Science and Religion: The Case of Henry Margenau

The life of Henry Margenau (1901–1997) offers a case study in the complexity of the science-religion relation. As a physicist-philosopher at Yale University, he pursued a public program of "amalgamating religion with science." He drew upon his authority as a physicist and a tradition of philosophical idealism to advocate a "reciprocity" between the two spheres. He argued that a "new modesty" and "metaphysical attitude" among scientists created new opportunities for collaboration. At the same time, his view of faith and his sense of the religiousness of science created troubling ambiguities. In the end, Margenau embodied the ambivalent relation between science and religion while revealing the limits of renegotiating the boundaries.     

Giving Science a Bad Name: Politically and Commercially Motivated Fallacies in BSE Inquiry

It is a feature of scientific inquiry that it proceeds alongside a multitude of non-scientific interests. This statement is as true of the scientific inquiries of previous centuries, many of which brought scientists into conflict with institutionalised religious thinking, as it is true of the scientific inquiries of today, which are conducted increasingly within commercial and political contexts. However, while the fact of the coexistence of scientific and non-scientific interests has changed little over time, what has changed with time is the effect of this coexistence on scientific inquiry itself. While scientists may no longer construct their theories with various religious dictates in mind, growing commercial and political interests in science have served to distort the interpretation of science. Using the U.K.’s recent crisis with bovine spongiform encephalopathy (BSE) as my context, I examine two ways in which this distortion has occurred – the interpretation of the science of BSE by politicians and by commercial parties for the purposes of justifying policy decisions and informing the public of risk, respectively. Fallacious reasoning, I contend, is the manifestation of this distortion in these contexts. In demonstration of this claim, I examine how politicians and commercial parties alike have employed two fallacies in their assessments of the science of BSE. These fallacies extend in novel ways the set of so-called traditional informal fallacies. The interpretation of science, I conclude, is a rich context in which to conduct a study of fallacious reasoning; moreover, such a study can contribute in significant ways, I argue, to the public understanding of science.     

There is no moral authority in medicine: response to Cowdin and Tuohey.

Central to the Cowdin-Tuohey paper is the concept of a moral authority proper to medical practitioners. Much as I agree with the authors in refusing to degrade doctors to the status of mere technicians, I argue that one does not succeed in retrieving the moral dimension of medical practice by investing doctors with moral authority. I show that none of the cases brought forth by Cowdin-Tuohey really amounts to a case of moral authority. Then I try to explain why no such cases can be found. Developing an insight that is common to all the major moral thinkers in the philosophia perennis, I show that doctors are professionally competent with respect only to a part of the human good; morally wise persons are competent with respect to that which makes man good as man. I try to show why it follows that a) professional expertise has no natural tendency to pass over into moral understanding, and that b) doctor and non-doctor alike start from the same point in developing their understanding of medical morality. It follows that the authors fail in their attempt to de-center the moral magisterium of the Church by setting up centers of moral authority outside of the Church.     

The Role of Rhetoric in Rational Argumentation

The structure of this discussion will be tripartite. First it will set out a way of distinguishing between rhetoric and strictly rational argumentation. Next it will consider some of the ramifications of this proposed way of looking at the matter – in particular what its implications are for rationality and for rhetoric, respectively. Finally it examines how this perspective bears on the project of philosophizing. The paper's ultimate aim, accordingly, is to consider what light such an analysis can shed upon philosophy and philosophizing.     

5－13岁儿童父母权威认知的发展研究

利用假设的问题情景和两难故事,对我国儿童对父母权威的认知特点进行了初步探讨。结果发现儿童服从父母的主要因素随年龄增长有所变化,在不同的生活领域,儿童对父母权威的评价及服从强制性有所不同;而在公正－父母权威冲突判断中,年幼儿童不能分辨公平与权威,随着年龄的增长,逐渐发展为追求公平和考虑其它因素的服从。     

Mathematical progress: Between reason and society

It is shown how the historiographic purport of Lakatosian methodology of mathematics is structured on the theme of analysis and synthesis. This theme is explored and extended to the revolutionary phase around 1800. On the basis of this historical investigation it is argued that major innovations, crucial to the appraisal of mathematical progress, defy reconstruction as irreducibly rational processes and should instead essentially be understood as processes of social-cognitive interaction. A model of conceptual change is developed whose essential ingredients are the variability of rational responses to new intellectual and practical challenges arising in the cultural environment of mathematics, and the shifting selective pressure of society. The resulting view of mathematical development is compared with Kuhn's theory of scientific paradigms in the light of some personal communications.     

Deliberating Just War

This essay responds to James Turner Johnson's critiques of my argument in “‘Never Again War’: Recent Shifts in the Roman Catholic Just War Tradition and the Question of ‘Functional Pacifism.’” (2014). It attends specifically to three of Johnson's objections and offers accounts of the meaning and use of the term “functional pacifism,” an understanding of classic just war thought as a tradition, and the concepts of peace and authority within just war and pacifist thought. It argues that my analysis of the Catholic Church's movement toward pacifism but ultimate theological inability to embrace a functional pacifism still stands in spite of Johnson's critiques. In addition, it suggests that Johnson offers a thin pacifistic conception of peace and promotes a restricted notion of ecclesial authority and democratic government.     

Critical Thinking is Epistemically Responsible

Michael Huemer ( 2005 ) argues that following the epistemic strategy of Critical Thinking—that is, thinking things through for oneself—leaves the agent epistemically either worse off or no better off than an alternative strategy of Credulity—that is, trusting the authorities. Therefore, Critical Thinking is not epistemically responsible. This article argues that Reasonable Credulity entails Critical Thinking, and since Reasonable Credulity is epistemically responsible, the Critical Thinking that it entails is epistemically responsible too.