Concessive and semifactual interpretations during reasoning with multiple conditionals

The present research evaluates how people integrate factual ‘if then’ and semifactual ‘even if’ conditional premises in an inference task. The theory of mental models establishes that semifactual statements are represented by two mental models with different epistemic status: ‘A & B’ is conjectured and ‘not-A & B’ is presupposed. However, following the principle of cognitive economy in tasks with a high working memory load such as reasoning with multiple conditionals, people could simplify the deduction process in two ways, by discarding: (a) the presupposed case and/or (b) the epistemic status information. In Experiment 1 and Experiment 2, we evaluated each of these hypotheses. In Experiment 1, participants make inferences from two conditionals: two factual conditionals or one factual and one semifactual, with different representations. In Experiment 2, participants make inferences with a factual conditional followed by two different semifactual conditionals that share the same representations but differ in their epistemic status. Accuracy and latency data suggest that people think of both the conjectured and the presupposed situations, but do not codify the epistemic status of either when the task does not require it. The results are discussed through theoretical predictions about how people make inferences from different connected conditionals.     

Can We Consume Our Way Out of Climate Change? A Call for Analysis

The problem of climate change is analyzed as a manifestation of economic growth, and the steady-state economy of ecological economics is proposed as a system-wide solution. Four classes of more specific solutions are described. In the absence of analysis, cultural inertia will bias solutions in favor of green consumption as a generalized solution strategy. By itself, green consumption is a flawed solution to climate change because it perpetuates or even accelerates economic growth that is incompatible with a sustainable culture. Addressing climate change requires an integration of regulatory, energy efficiency, skill-based, and dissemination solutions. Behavioral scientists are encouraged to work with others in ecological economics and other social sciences who recognize cultural reinvention as a means of achieving sustainability.     

Religion,Altruism, and Helping Strangers: A Multilevel Analysis of 126 Countries

This article tests how religion relates to helping strangers, an important but rarely studied measure of social solidarity and informal social capital. It uses the Gallup World Poll, a survey with nationally representative samples of 179,961 respondents from 126 countries. It finds that religious people, members of minority religions, and people in religiously diverse countries were more likely to help a stranger. Individuals living in devout countries were more likely to help strangers even if they themselves were not religious. The results suggest that religion plays a particularly important role in promoting the prosocial norms and values that motivate helping strangers.     

从哲学眼界论医学、健康安全与卫生经济

从哲学眼界看,医学与健康都是多元的概念,是许多相互交叉、渗透、影响、制约的因素互相作用的结果。医学、健康保健应适应经济水平,即我们应向患者及社会提供一个安全的、科学的、用的起的、可持续的医疗与健康保健服务。较多贪婪的、不安全的医学时代,最好的计划是不断进行几元钱的预防医学投入和适当的姑息医学。     

A Normative Pragmatic Perspective on Appealing to Emotions in Argumentation

Is appealing to emotions in argumentation ever legitimate and, if so, what is the best way to analyze and evaluate such appeals? After overviewing a normative pragmatic perspective on appealing to emotions in argumentation, I present answers to these questions from pragma-dialectical, informal logical, and rhetorical perspectives, and note positions shared and supplemented by a normative pragmatic perspective. A normative pragmatic perspective holds that appealing to emotions in argumentation may be relevant and non-manipulative; and that emotional appeals may be analyzed as strategies that create pragmatic reasons and assessed by the standard of formal propriety or reasonability under the circumstances. I illustrate the explanatory power of the perspective by analyzing and evaluating some argumentation from Frederick Douglass’s “What to the Slave is the Fourth of July.” I conclude that a normative pragmatic perspective offers a more complete account of appealing to emotions in argumentation than a pragma-dialectial, informal logical, or rhetorical perspective alone, identifies a range of norms available to arguers, and explains why appealing to emotions may be legitimate in particular cases of argumentation.     

Socializing Retail Employees in Ethical Values: The Effectiveness of the Formal versus Informal Methods

The purpose of this study was to test the effectiveness of an informal socialization process for reported employee attitudes towards unethical behavior within a large retail organization. This study compares the reported ethical attitudes of full-time employees (N = 203) who were socialized using an informal approach, to the reported ethical attitudes of their managers (N = 274) who were socialized using a formal approach. The results indicate that the informal approach to ethical socialization was not as effective as the formal approach to ethical socialization. Employees were more accepting of unethical behavior than were their managers. Implications are discussed and recommendations for ethical socialization techniques are provided.     

Fresh Expressions of Church and the Mixed Economy

The term “fresh expressions of church” has been used since 2004 in the Church of England to refer to small contextual churches that start alongside but aim to be different to parish churches. What is characteristic of a fresh expression of church is not its newness, but its ability to pass on and contextualize inherited theology, ecclesiology, tradition, and spiritual experience. The ecclesiology of fresh expressions of church can be summarized as a dialogical‐relational ecclesiology that is focused on a theological centre. There may be around 2,100 of them in the Church of England, both urban and rural. During the past 15 years, the self‐understanding of the Church of England, a traditional state church with its parish structure, has changed. The mother church of the Anglican World Communion claims since 2008 to be a mixed‐economy church: one that supports and recognizes innovative ecclesial spaces (fresh expressions of church) as church, as well as parish churches. It is the goal to have an innovative diversity of churches in a pluralistic society. At the same time, these churches should be recognizable and contextual. It is the concept of the mixed economy that manages a fair cooperation between parochial and fresh expressions of church. In the meantime, the concept of mixed economy is received not only in the UK, but in different national and free churches in continental Europe, the US, South Africa, Canada, and Australia. Lately, the concept has been taken up by the Community of Protestant Churches in Europe (CPCE).     

未雨绸缪：变革前非正式信息对员工变革抵制意愿的影响

组织变革前总会有小道消息等非正式信息传播, 这些信息是员工提前了解变革的重要来源。研究探索变革前非正式信息对员工变革前抵制意愿的影响, 以及员工变革抵制意愿随时间推移的变化。基于255位样本数据的结构方程模型及多层次线性增长模型分析表明：(1)变革前非正式信息的消极性及不完整性, 显著负向影响员工变革认知, 进而使员工变革抵制意愿上升; (2)随着时间推移, 员工变革抵制意愿显著衰减, 即从变革前到变革发生时抵制意愿显著降低。研究揭示了变革前非正式信息对员工有“热身准备”的作用, 能够帮助员工提前适应, 从而更好地应对变革。研究结果有助于变革的顺利实施。     

马克思政治经济学语境中的价值哲学

马克思通过政治经济学批判完成了他的重建形而上学工作。由此,他把政治经济学当作一种价值哲学来研究,他的政治经济学中的每一个范畴都体现着他的价值哲学思想。本文着重以其中的货币、价值属性和商品拜物教三个范畴分析马克思有关价值存在、价值主体性和价值意识的原理。     

How Gender Counts When Couples Count Their Money

In this study we explored the ways in which men's and women's personal incomes are treated and experienced differently in the family. Two hundred and fourteen participants (102 men and 112 women) in dual-earner couples were recruited in a random sample telephone survey. Participants reported a double standard in which women receive more praise than men for their incomes. Men reported stronger negative and positive feelings about their incomes than women. Regardless of gender, the higher the participants' income category the more gratitude they received from spouses and the more appreciated they felt. Wives' absolute incomes elicited husbands' gratitude, whereas husbands' relative incomes influenced wives' gratitude. Women who outearned their husbands reported no negative consequences. Although money still carries gendered meaning, women's incomes may earn increasing clout in the family. The ways in which praise, criticism, and gratitude for earnings provide a window on how gender is done and undone in the family are discussed.