Postmodernism: What One Needs to Know

This essay is an introduction to postmodernism and deconstruction as they relate to the special challenges of scholarship and teaching in the science and religion multidiscipline.     

DIE MARXISMUS – DEBATTE IM “SILBERNEN ZEITALTER”

Im Anfang des 20.Jahrhunderts unterzog eine Reihe von jungen, später berühmt gewordenen Philosophen den Marxismus einer tiefen Kritik. Ihnen ist es gelungen, wichtige Defekte der revolutionären Doktrinen aufzudecken und ihre verhängnivsollen Konsequenzen vorwegzunehmen. Diese Kritik ist auch für die gegenwärtige geistig-politische Situation aktuell.     

Relative sensitivity of the mutual exclusivity and novel-name-nameless category assumptions

The mutual exclusivity (ME) assumption states that children affix a novel label to only one unfamiliar object, while the novel-name-nameless category (N3C) assumption states that children affix a novel label to multiple unfamiliar objects. To compare the relative sensitivity of the two assumptions, two types of tasks, with two trials in each, were given to 5-year-olds. In the first trial of each task, all children selected only the unfamiliar object for a novel label, which was consistent with the ME assumption. For the task which did not have the same unfamiliar object in the two trials, 94% of the children selected the object with the same shape but black-white reversed image in the second trial, which was consistent with the N3C assumption. For the task which had the same unfamiliar object in the two trials, 43% of the children selected the same object in the second trial, which was consistent with the ME assumption, and 48% of them selected the object with the same shape but reversed image, which was consistent with the N3C assumption. The findings suggest that the ME and N3C assumptions can be flexibly applied to children's word learning.     

Effects of a variable-ratio conditioning history on sensitivity to fixed-interval contingencies in rats.

We investigated the possibility that human-like fixed-interval performances would appear in rats given a variable-ratio history (Wanchisen, Tatham, & Mooney, 1989). Nine rats were trained under single or compound variable-ratio schedules and then under a fixed-interval 30-s schedule. The histories produced high fixed-interval rates that declined slowly over 90 sessions; differences as a function of the particular history were absent. Nine control animals given only fixed-interval training responded at lower levels initially, but rates increased with training. Despite differences in absolute rates, rates within the intervals and postreinforcement pauses indicated equivalent development of the accelerated response patterns suggestive of sensitivity to fixed-interval contingencies. The finding that the histories elevated rates without retarding development of differentiated patterns suggests that the effective response unit was a burst of several lever presses and that the fixed-interval contingencies acted on these units in the same way as for single responses. Regardless of history, the rats did not manifest the persistent, undifferentiated responding reported for humans under comparable schedules. We concluded that the shortcomings of animal models of human fixed-interval performances cannot be easily remedied by including a variable-ratio conditioning history within the model.     

Woman and the gift of reason

An incidental extension of the central domain of argumentation theory with non-classical ways of constructing arguments seems to automatically raise a question that is otherwise rarely posed, namely whether or not it is useful to consider the sex of the arguer. This question is usually posed with regard to argumentation by women in particular. Do women rely more, or differently than men do on non-canonical modes of reasoning stemming from the realm of the emotional, physical and intuitive, instead of the logical? One may simply refer this question to folk-linguistics. One may also take the question seriously, given the findings on women's linguistic behaviour, and for various other reasons that will be explained below.Section 1 sums up the most frequently quoted differences in language use between women and men. This is followed by a non-exhaustive, interdisciplinary review of studies on male/female differences in verbal and written argumentation.Section 2 discusses the role of language and texts in generating and maintaining ideas on gender. These gender messages not only influence the actual argumentation behaviour of women and men, but also the way such behaviour is valued.Section 3 subsequently shows that our ideas on rationality are gendered, and therefore also our ideas on the proper central domain of argumentation theory.Section 4 briefly reflects on why this kind of wrong question about the reasoning of women should sometimes be addressed seriously anyway.