This paper gives a definition of self-reference on the basis of the dependence relation given by Leitgeb (2005), and the dependence digraph by Beringer & Schindler (2015). Unlike the usual discussion about self-reference of paradoxes centering around Yablo's paradox and its variants, I focus on the paradoxes of finitary characteristic, which are given again by use of Leitgeb's dependence relation. They are called 'locally finite paradoxes', satisfying that any sentence in these paradoxes can depend on finitely many sentences. I prove (...) that all locally finite paradoxes are self-referential in the sense that there is a directed cycle in their dependence digraphs. This paper also studies the 'circularity dependence' of paradoxes, which was introduced by Hsiung (2014). I prove that the locally finite paradoxes have circularity dependence in the sense that they are paradoxical only in the digraph containing a proper cycle. The proofs of the two results are based directly on König's infinity lemma. In contrast, this paper also shows that Yablo's paradox and its nested variant are non-self-referential, and neither McGee's paradox nor the omega-cycle liar paradox has circularity dependence. (shrink)

In analysing the problems with commemorative artefacts, philosophers have tended to focus on objectionable monuments that honour inappropriate subjects. The problems with such monuments, however, do not exhaust problems with a society’s public commemorative landscape – the totality of public commemorative artefacts in general, and the institutions involved in their creation and maintenance. I argue that a public commemorative landscape can implicate authoritative ideas, including stereotypes about people in virtue of their group membership. This contributes to what I term hermeneutical (...) constriction – a situation in which people are given reason to rely on an authoritative subset of the totality of hermeneutical resources that they actually have access to. Critiquing and resisting these problems with a public commemorative landscape that contributes to hermeneutical constriction is fraught with difficulties. Attempts to do so render activists vulnerable to a range of serious criticisms. (shrink)

What should we do about “tainted” public commemorations? Recent events have highlighted the urgency of reaching a consensus on this question. However, existing discussions appear to be dominated by two naïve opposing views – to remove or preserve them. My aims in this essay are two-fold. First, I argue that the two views are not naïve, but undergirded by concerns with securing self-respect and with the character of our engagement with the past. Second, I offer a qualified defence of vandalising (...) tainted commemorations. The defence comprises two parts. I consider two prominent suggestions – to install counter-commemorations and to add contextualising plaques – and argue that they are typically beset with difficulties. I then argue that in some circumstances, constrained vandalism is a response to tainted commemorations which effectively adjudicates the demands of the two opposing views. (shrink)

We can classify the (truth-theoretic) paradoxes according to their degrees of paradoxicality. Roughly speaking, two paradoxes have the same degrees of paradoxicality, if they lead to a contradiction under the same conditions, and one paradox has a (non-strictly) lower degree of paradoxicality than another, if whenever the former leads to a contradiction under a condition, the latter does so under the same condition. In this paper, we outline some results and questions around the degrees of paradoxicality and summarize recent progress.

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This article intends to briefly discuss the relevant knowledge and experience of cognitive science research, and also to seek advice from colleagues in the academic circle and all scholars who are concerned about the development of cognitive science.

Science and technology are undergoing rapid development and progress. It is due to the increasing number of modern inventions. Among the technological discoveries that are very important are in the medical field. With modern medical equipment, the suffering of a patient can be reduced. But in reality, there are still some patients who have severe suffering. Patients who experience prolonged illness invites empathy from the family. To relieve his suffering, the family who could not bear to see his condition asked (...) the doctor to take actions that could shorten the patient's life, this kind of action in the medical world is known as euthanasia. This study aims to find out how the study of active euthanasia in the view of Christian law. This study is a literature review using an ethical-theological approach by studying books and scientific works related to the discussed problem. (shrink)

The diabetic foot is a global threat to public health because it can result in infection and amputation, as well as cause the patient to experience considerable pain and incur financial costs. The condition of patients with diabetic foot in North China is distinguished by more severe local ulcers, a worse prognosis, and a longer duration of disease than that of patients with diabetic foot in the south. Through appropriate preventive measures, the diabetic foot can be effectively avoided. This study (...) assesses the existing knowledge, attitudes and practices associated with diabetic foot prevention among adults with diabetes living in rural areas of North China. (shrink)

Generally, it is common knowledge that humans have the same time, 24 hours a day, seven days a week, 31 days a month, 365 days per year, but most of them do not know how to manage time and manage it to be something useful and effectively. That is because many people do not have the discipline in filling time. Those days are filled with things that are not directed, even worse is that filling the time of his or her (...) life with things that damage life. Even though wasting time is not unwise because it is a waste of the opportunity God has given and the time that has passed will not return, meaning that if the opportunity is not used, then the opportunity will be lost. How important is to redeem the time, especially for contemporary Christian leaders because all must be accountable to God. This study uses a research library. Library research is a literature study that is carried out by using relevant and available reading sources related to the topics discussed in the research. Books or journal articles related to the topics discussed are used as sources of reading to better understand time management and its application at the personal and organisational levels. From the various reading sources used, the writer develops this scientific article, including giving comments or critical comments that are conveyed in various parts of the writing, especially in the conclusions. (shrink)

Dunia sekarang ini terus mengalami perubahan termasuk pandangan orang terhadap masalah seks. Beberapa persoalan yang muncul adalah: Apakah yang dimaksud dengan pendidikan? Seks dalam dunia keberdosaan? Bagaimanakah Relasi Pendidikan Seks sebagai Landasan Iman Kristen? Jawabnya:(1) Pandangan Alkitab tentang pendidikan seks adalah merupakan karya Allah pada diri manusia sejak diciptakan.(2) Seks adalah sesuatu yang sakral sebagaiman Allah melembagakan pernikahan pertama kali di Eden.(3) Pendidikan seks dapat direlasikan dengan doktrin kekudusan sebagai landasan iman Kristen sebagai beriku: Pertama, perlunya dikembangkan pendidikan kekudusan di (...) sekolah-sekolah, seminar maupun di gereja agar memperjelas posisi keberdosaan seks yang dilakukan di luar pernikahan. Kedua, kekudusan yang berpusat kepada Allah menjadi ketergantungan hanya kepada Allah bukan kepada manusia. Ketiga, kekudusan yang diteladani oleh Yesus menjadi tokoh yang dapat diteladani oleh semua orang sehingga setiap orang mempunyai panggilan untuk hidup. (shrink)

This article is a lecture note I wrote for my philosophy of mathematics course. Its main task is to explain the main ideas of Gupta's acceptable model proposed in his paper [J. Philos. Logic 11(1), 1–60, 1982]. I aim to provide detailed information on a result established by Gupta. On the one hand, I hope this explanation can be helpful for those who are learning Gupta's acceptable model, and on the other hand, I also hope to provide a guide for (...) beginners to interpret literature. (shrink)

One recurring criticism of the best interests standard concerns its vagueness, and thus the inadequate guidance it offers to care providers. The lack of an agreed definition of ‘best interests’, together with the fact that several suggested considerations adopted in legislation or professional guidelines for doctors do not obviously apply across different groups of persons, result in decisions being made in murky waters. In response, bioethicists have attempted to specify the best interests standard, to reduce the indeterminacy surrounding medical decisions. (...) In this paper, we discuss the bioethicists’ response in relation to the state's possible role in clarifying the best interests standard. We identify and characterise two clarificatory strategies employed by bioethicists —elaborative and enumerative—and argue that the state should adopt the latter. Beyond the practical difficulties of the former strategy, a state adoption of it would inevitably be prejudicial in a pluralistic society. Given the gravity of best interests decisions, and the delicate task of respecting citizens with different understandings of best interests, only the enumerative strategy is viable. We argue that this does not commit the state to silence in providing guidance to and supporting healthcare providers, nor does it facilitate the abuse of the vulnerable. Finally, we address two methodological worries about adopting this approach at the state level. The adoption of the enumerative strategy is not defeatist in attitude, nor does it eventually collapse into (a form of) the elaborative strategy. (shrink)

There is a tendency among scholars to identify Alfarabi’s political philosophy in general and his theory of the state in particular with that of Plato’s The Republic. Undoubtedly Alfarabi was well versed in the philosophy of Plato and was greatly influenced by it. He borrows the Platonic concept of the philosopher king and uses it in his theory of the state. However, we argue that the identification of Alfarabi’s virtuous city with that of Plato’s The Republic is an inaccurate assessment (...) as it involves overlooking Alfarabi’s unique religiopolitical context. Alfarabi was a Muslim political philosopher, and the present article intends to understand Alfarabi’s theory of the state in light of his historical context. The article shows that, viewed through the prism of Islamic religion and political history, Alfarabi’s virtuous city seems distinct from that of Plato’s The Republic. (shrink)

In his political treatise, Mabadi ara ahl al-madina al-fadhila, Abu Nasr Alfarabi, the medieval Muslim philosopher, proposes a theory of virtuous city which, according to prominent scholars, is modeled on Plato’s utopia of the Republic. No doubt that Alfarabi was well-versed in the philosophy of Plato and the basic framework of his theory of city is platonic. However, his theory of city is not an exact reproduction of the Republic’s theory and, despite glaring similarities, the two theories do differ in (...) many aspects. In both, Alfarabi’s Mabadi ara ahl al-madina al-fadhila and Plato’s Republic, the theory of virtuous city is accompanied by a theory of the soul. Since the theory of soul plays a foundational role in both theories of the virtuous city, the present article intends to provide an explanation for the differences between the two theories of the city in terms of the differences between the two theories of the soul. (shrink)

What is it for something to be a disability? Elizabeth Barnes, focusing on physical disabilities, argues that disability is a social category. It depends on the rules undergirding the judgements of the disability rights movement. Barnes’ account may strike many as implausible. I articulate the unease, in the form of three worries about Barnes’ account. It does not fully explain why the disability rights movement is constituted in such a way that it only picks out paradigmatic disability traits, nor why (...) only the traits identified by the movement as constituting experiences of social and political constraint count as disability. It also leaves out the contribution of people other than disability activists, to the definition of disability. I develop Barnes’ account. On my account, a person is disabled if she is in some state which is constitutive of some constraint on her legitimate interests. This state must be the subject of legitimate medical interest and be picked out by the disability rights movement as among the traits for which they are seeking to promote progress and change. My account addresses the worries about Barnes’ account. It is also able to include all disabilities, rather than only physical ones. (shrink)

I attempt to adjudicate the disagreement between those who seek to reconceptualize disability as mere difference and their opponents. I do so by reviewing a central conviction motivating the resistance, concerning the relationship between disability and well-being. I argue that the conviction depends on further considerations about the costs and extent of change involved in accommodating individuals with a particular disability trait. I conclude by considering three pay-offs of this clarification.

Wang Yangming’s doctrine of the “unity of knowing and acting” (zhi xing heyi 知行合一) can be traced back to Mencius’s theory of “original knowing” (liangzhi 良知). Similarly, Kant discussed the relationship of theory to practice on three different levels (morality, the law of the state, and international law) in his article, “On the Common Saying: This May Be True in Theory, But It Does Not Apply in Practice.” Kant proposed the unity of theory and practice on the level of morality. (...) So, this article uses Kant’s related concepts of theory and practice to interpret Wang’s doctrine of the “unity of knowing and acting” with the aim of clarifying some misinterpretations of it. Thereby, I argue that, although Wang Yangming put forward the doctrine of “the unity of knowing and acting” at a different time than his doctrines of “heart-mind is principle” (xin ji li 心即理) and “the extension of original knowing” (zhi liangzhi 致良知), these three doctrines are logically interconnected. (shrink)

Commemorative artefacts purportedly speak – they communicate messages to their audience, even if no words are uttered. Sometimes, such artefacts purportedly communicate demeaning or pejorative messages about some members of society. The characteristics of such speech are, however, under-examined. I present an account of the paradigmatic characteristics of the speech of commemorative artefacts (or, “commemorative artefactual speech”), as a distinct form of political speech. According to my account, commemorative artefactual speech paradigmatically involves the use of an artefact by an authorised (...) member of a group to declare the importance of remembering a subject, in virtue of some feature of the subject. Then, I outline a variety of ways that commemorative artefactual speech can go awry. Such speech can be unauthorised, involve unfair exclusion or incorrect identification, be aesthetically inadequate, invoke clandestine explanations, and be directed at inappropriate subjects. I conclude with a discussion of the implications of my account for resisting problematic commemorative artefactual speech. (shrink)

The present study aimed to explore the effect of subliminal priming on team trust and the mechanism through the mediating role of perceived trustworthiness. A total of 144 participants were asked to complete a lexical decision task that was embedded with the “trust” or “suspicion” Chinese words as the subliminal stimuli. Then, they played a public good game and evaluated the perceived trustworthiness of the team. The results of the study showed that subliminal stimuli had a significant effect on team (...) trust [β = –0.99, 95% CI = (−1.64, −0.33)]. Perceived trustworthiness was found to have a significant mediating effect between the priming condition and team trust [β = −0.35, 95% CI = (−0.72, −0.02)]. The current study revealed the underlying mechanism through which subliminal priming techniques influence team trust and informed efforts by altering perceived trustworthiness. (shrink)

Improvements of the happiness of the rural population are an essential sign of the effectiveness of relative poverty governance. In the context of today’s digital economy, assessing the relationship between digital literacy and the subjective happiness of rural low-income groups is of great practicality. Based on data from China Family Panel Studies, the effect of digital literacy on the subjective well-being of rural low-income groups was empirically tested. A significant happiness effect of digital literacy on rural low-income groups was found. (...) Digital literacy promotes the subjective happiness of rural low-income groups through income increase and consumption growth effects. The observed happiness effect is heterogeneous among different characteristic groups, and digital literacy significantly positively impacts the subjective happiness of rural low-income groups. Decomposition of subjective happiness into life satisfaction and job satisfaction shows that digital literacy significantly positively affects the job and life satisfaction of rural low-income groups. This paper demonstrates that digital literacy induces a practical happiness effect. To further strengthen the subjective welfare effect of digital literacy in the construction of digital villages, the government should focus on cultivating digital literacy among low-income groups from the demand side. The construction of digital infrastructure should be actively promoted from the supply side. (shrink)

In this paper, I focus on the representations of Black women in contrast to Black men found within Frantz Fanon’s philosophical work Black Skin, White Masks. I propose that while Fanon’s racial dialectical work is very significant, he often lacks acknowledgement of the multidimensionality of the Black woman’s lived experience specifically. Drawing on the theory of intersectionality, coined by Kimberlé Crenshaw, I argue that Fanon does not recognize the different layers of oppression operating in Black women’s lives to the degree (...) that he fails to include them within his framework of both liberation and resistance from racial oppression. (shrink)

Effective altruism is purportedly ecumenical towards different moral views, charitable causes, and evidentiary methods. I argue that effective altruists’ criticisms of purportedly less effective charities are inconsistent with their commitment to ecumenicity. Individuals may justifiably support charities other than those recommended by effective altruism. If effective altruists take their commitment to ecumenicity seriously, they will have to revise their criticisms of many of these charities.

In this article, we focus on the C-Manuscripts to see how Husserl reflects on the margins of phenomenality with reference to the three limit-phenomena of sleep, death, and others. We choose to juxtapose these three limit-phenomena, because in the C-Manuscripts Husserl has depicted their affinities, both in terms of their phenomenal characters and their transcendental functions, in a creative way. There Husserl has outlined at least two approaches for introducing the limit-phenomena of sleep, death, and others to the core concerns (...) of phenomenology. These two approaches rely on different heuristic strategies to shed light on the genetic constitution of monadic life and the generative constitution of humanity respectively. The first approach privileges sleep as the model of unconscious pause in order to illuminate the more perplexing cases of death and others. The second approach treats sleep and death as bridging-members of the constitution of the total human world, after the model of others in the constitution of transcendental intersubjectivity. (shrink)

Parmi les psychanalystes, c’est principalement Donald Winnicott qui a aidé Marc Richir à éclaircir et à approfondir la phénoménologie génétique déjà amorcée par Edmund Husserl. Ce travail a pour but de montrer les usages que Richir fait de Winnicott dans ses recherches visant à prolonger le projet husserlien. Selon la lecture de Richir, Winnicott insiste sur « la primauté de la constitution de l’objet transitionnel » en termes d’accès au réel. À l’aide des propres mots de Winnicott, nous allons démontrer (...) dans quel sens Winnicott privilégie le rôle constitutionnel de l’objet transitionnel, et comment Richir a assimilé et réinterprété cette étude de Winnicott. Suivant notre exposé, l’objet transitionnel va ainsi dévoiler sa complexité avec une fonction à la fois facilitatrice et dérangeante dans le processus « d’hominisation ». (shrink)

This paper examines the fortunes of non-European philosophies in histories of philosophy written by European and American philosophers from the 17th century to the present day. It charts the shift from inclusive histories of philosophy, which included non-European philosophies, to exclusive histories of philosophy, which excluded and/or marginalized non-European philosophies, at the end of the 18th century. This shift was motivated by racial Eurocentrism, which cast a long shadow over histories of philosophy written during the 19th and 20th centuries. The (...) paper also considers recent attempts to produce a more inclusive history of philosophy. By examining the history of the inclusion and exclusion of non-European philosophies in histories of philosophy, this paper seeks to challenge the assumption that philosophy began and has been practised exclusively by European or western thinkers. (shrink)

Adam Ferguson’s imperial thought casts new light on the age-old republican dilemma of the tension between empire and liberty. Generations of republican writers had been haunted by this issue as the decline of Rome proved that imperial expansion would eventually ruin the liberty of a state. Many eighteenth-century Scottish thinkers regarded this as an insoluble conundrum and thus became critics of empire. Ferguson shared their basic views but, paradoxically, was still able to defend the British Empire in the debates over (...) the American Revolution. His argument effectively offered a viable solution to the republican dilemma, which distinguished him from his contemporaries. In light of this, I argue that political representation was the pivotal conception for Ferguson to make empire and liberty compatible. It was on this ground that he could advocate the union with Ireland, which he believed would lead to a lasting balance of power in Europe. -/- ; British Empire; liberty; balance of power; political representation; American Revolution; Anglo-Irish Union. (shrink)

One of the central claims of the neurodiversity movement is that society should accommodate the needs of autistics, rather than try to treat autism. People have variously tried to reject this accommodation thesis as applicable to all autistics. One instance is Pier Jaarsma and Stellan Welin, who argue that the thesis should apply to some but not all autistics. They do so via separating autistics into high- and low-functioning, on the basis of IQ and social effectiveness or functionings. I reject (...) their grounds for separating autistics. IQ is an irrelevant basis for separating autistics. Charitably rendering it as referring to more general capacities still leaves us mistaken about the roles they play in supporting the accommodation thesis. The appeal to social effectiveness or functionings relies on standards that are inapplicable to autistics, and which risks being deaf to the point of their claims. I then consider if their remaining argument concerning autistic culture may succeed independently of the line they draw. I argue that construing autistics' claims as beginning from culture mistakes their status, and may even detract from their aims. Via my discussion of Jaarsma and Welin, I hope to point to why the more general strategy of separating autistics, in response to the accommodation thesis, does not fully succeed. Finally, I sketch some directions for future discussions, arguing that we should instead shift our attention to consider another set of questions concerning the costs and extent of change required to accommodate all autistics. (shrink)

The gig economy is a phenomenon that is rapidly expanding, redefining the nature of work and contributing to a significant change in how contemporary economies are organised. Its expansion is not unproblematic. This article provides a clear and systematic analysis of the main ethical challenges caused by the gig economy. Following a brief overview of the gig economy, its scope and scale, we map the key ethical problems that it gives rise to, as they are discussed in the relevant literature. (...) We map them onto three categories: the new organisation of work (what is done), the new nature of work (how it is done), and the new status of workers (who does it). We then evaluate a recent initiative from the EU that seeks to address the challenges of the gig economy. The 2019 report of the European High-Level Expert Group on the Impact of the Digital Transformation on EU Labour Markets is a positive step in the right direction. However, we argue that ethical concerns relating to algorithmic systems as mechanisms of control, and the discrimination, exclusion and disconnectedness faced by gig workers require further deliberation and policy response. A brief conclusion completes the analysis. The appendix presents the methodology underpinning our literature review. (shrink)

This paper puts forward the idea of five levels of human cognition: neural cognition, psychological cognition, linguistic cognition, thinking cognition and cultural cognition. It distinguishes the differences between low-order cognition and high-order cognition. Human cognition, that is, high-order cognition, is based on language and characterized by thinking and culture. The five levels of human cognition are divided according to the scientific standard, which means divided according to the level of cognitive process in human mind. This kind of division is the (...) basis of scientific research, too. The cognition of five levels determines the development of cognitive science, and their cross connection determines the development of more interdisciplinary subjects. This paper discusses in detail the present situation and achievements of research on the cognition of five levels, which helps us see not only the relationship between all levels, but also the relations between scientific research on cognitive science and its discipline development. The classification of five levels has important theoretical significance and practical value. (shrink)

John Rawls’s use of the “fully cooperating assumption” has been criticized for hindering attempts to address the needs of disabled individuals, or non-cooperators. In response, philosophers sympathetic to Rawls’s project have extended his theory. I assess one such extension by Cynthia Stark, that proposes dropping Rawls’s assumption in the constitutional stage (of his four-stage sequence), and address the needs of non-cooperators via the social minimum. I defend Stark’s proposal against criticisms by Sophia Wong, Christie Hartley, and Elizabeth Edenberg and Marilyn (...) Friedman. Nevertheless, I argue that Stark’s proposal is crucially incomplete. Her formulation of the social minimum lacks accompanying criteria with which the adequacy of the provisions for non-cooperators may be assessed. Despite initial appearances, Stark’s proposal does not fully address the needs of non-cooperators. I conclude by considering two payoffs of identifying this lack of criteria. (shrink)

This study, by using 142 groups of data from 1990 to 2007 and the method of cross-temporal meta-analysis, researched the changing trend of status of mental health of 108736 members of the Chinese Army along with the change of years. All the data came from 94 related research reports, and all the research reports used SCL-90 (the Symptom Checklist 90) as the testing tool of mental health. The study found that: (1) mental health of members of the Chinese Army steadily (...) improved between 1990 and 2007; (2) during those 18 years, the Interpersonal Sensitivity factor of SCL-90 of Chinese Army members changed most significantly, and the least significantly changed factor was Somatization; (3) Chinese Army members showed evidence of fewest problems on the Photic Anxiety factor, in contrast to the consistent problems indicated by scores on the Obsessive-Compulsive and Interpersonal Sensitivity scales; (4) Chinese Army members from single-child families (N =1,944) showed significant lower evidence of positive mental health than soldiers from multiple child families (N =2,649); (5) The mental health of soldiers from non-agricultural backgrounds (N =7,808) was less positive than that of soldiers from agricultural households(N =11,459); (6) Chinese Army members with senior high school education level (N = 10,189) had less positive mental health than those with junior high school (N = 8,407) or university education (N = 863). (shrink)

According to a prominent argument, citizens in unjust societies have a duty to resist injustice. The moral and political principles that ground the duty to obey the law in just or nearly just conditions, also ground the duty to resist in unjust conditions. This argument is often applied to a variety of unjust conditions. In this essay, I critically examine this argument, focusing on conditions involving institutionally entrenched and socially normalised injustice. In such conditions, the issue of citizens’ duties to (...) resist is complicated. I conclude by considering how my discussions may clarify a contemporary problem about engaging in resistance to aid potential migrants who have been turned away by states in accordance with widely accepted rules. (shrink)

Abu Nasr Muhammad Alfarabi, the medieval Muslim philosopher and the founder of Islamic Neoplatonism, is best known for his political treatise, Mabadi ara ahl al-madina al- fadhila (Principles of the Opinions of the Inhabitants of the Virtuous City), in which he proposes a theory of utopian virtuous city. Prominent scholars argue for the Platonic nature of Alfarabi’s political philosophy and relate the political treatise to Plato’s Republic. One of the most striking similarities between Alfarabi’s Mabadi ara ahl al-madina al- fadhila (...) and Plato’s Republic is that in both works the theory of virtuous city is accompanied by a theory of soul. It is true that Alfarabi’s theory of soul differ considerably from that of Plato’s Republic. However, we propose that notwithstanding the differences, the two theories of soul do play an identically important role in the respective theory of virtuous city. The present article explores the relationship between the soul and the city in Plato’s Republic and Alfarabi’s Mabadi ara ahl al-madina al- fadhila, and intends to show that in both works the coexistence of the theory of soul and the city is neither coincidental nor a casual concurrence of two themes. Rather, the concept of soul serves as a foundation on which Plato and Alfarabi erect their respective theory of perfect association. Thus, Alfarabi’s treatise resembles Plato’s Republic not only in the coexistence of the theory of soul and the city, but also in the important role of the concept of soul in the theory of virtuous city. (shrink)

Reinterpretation of our data concerning sleep onset, motivated by the desire to pay close attention to “intra-individual regularities,” suggests that the experience of control might be a key factor in determining the subjective sense that sleep has begun. This loss of control seems akin to what Frith and others have described as “passivity experiences,” which also occur in schizophrenia. Although clearly sleep onset is not a schizophrenic episode, this similarity might help to explain other features of sleep onset. We further (...) speculate that we could build upon the discovery of various “intra-individual regularities” to construct a model of sleep onset and other forms of sleep mentation. (shrink)

Social movements often impose nontrivial costs on others against their wills. Civil disobedience is no exception. How can social movements in general, and civil disobedience in particular, be justifiable despite this apparent wrong-making feature? We examine an intuitively plausible account—it is fair that everyone should bear the burdens of tackling injustice. We extend this fairness-based argument for civil disobedience to defend some acts of uncivil disobedience. Focusing on uncivil environmental activism—such as ecotage (sabotage with the aim of protecting the environment)—we (...) argue that some acts of uncivil disobedience can be morally superior to their civil counterparts, when and because such acts target people who are responsible for environmental threats. Indeed, insofar as some acts of uncivil disobedience can more accurately target responsible people, they can better satisfy the demands of fairness compared to their civil counterparts. In some circumstances, our argument may require activists to engage in uncivil disobedienceeven whencivil disobedience is available. (shrink)

A review of Elizabeth Barnes' The Minority Body.

According to the PubMed resource from the U.S. National Library of Medicine, over 750,000 scientific articles have been published in the ~5000 biomedical journals worldwide in the year 2007 alone. The vast majority of these publications include results from hypothesis-driven experimentation in overlapping biomedical research domains. Unfortunately, the sheer volume of information being generated by the biomedical research enterprise has made it virtually impossible for investigators to stay aware of the latest findings in their domain of interest, let alone to (...) be able to assimilate and mine data from related investigations for purposes of meta-analysis. While computers have the potential for assisting investigators in the extraction, management and analysis of these data, information contained in the traditional journal publication is still largely unstructured, free-text descriptions of study design, experimental application and results interpretation, making it difficult for computers to gain access to the content of what is being conveyed without significant manual intervention. In order to circumvent these roadblocks and make the most of the output from the biomedical research enterprise, a variety of related standards in knowledge representation are being developed, proposed and adopted in the biomedical community. In this chapter, we will explore the current status of efforts to develop minimum information standards for the representation of a biomedical experiment, ontologies composed of shared vocabularies assembled into subsumption hierarchical structures, and extensible relational data models that link the information components together in a machine-readable and human-useable framework for data mining purposes. (shrink)

I review José Medina's The Epistemology of Protest: Silencing, Epistemic Activism, and the Communicative Life of Resistance, and raise some questions about the felicity, legitimacy and civility of protest.

We investigate the association between controlling shareholders' ownership (CS_Own) and firms' leverage decisions in the Singaporean context. We examine whether the impact of ownership concentration on leverage differs across excess and lower control. We report that shareholders with excess control prefer leverage financing for an optimal capital structure and focus on value maximisation rather using leverage as a tool of minority shareholders' expropriation. Our analysis shows that firms capital structure significantly influences by the coalition of shareholders particularly decisions about leverage (...) financing in addition to the firms' specific characteristics and institutional arrangements. Our empirical evidence shows that controlling shareholders with a lower fraction of equity are more concerned about limited holding thus prefer leverage over equity financing to inflate their equity stake to protect them from the potential takeovers and mergers. We report that capital structure decisions in Singapore are linked with the trade-off between the controlling shareholders' target of mitigating firm risk and their non-dilution entrenchment needs. Further, we found an inverted U-shaped association between control ownership and leverage financing. In terms of moderating effect of family-controlled ownership, our findings exhibit that leverage financing is less pronounced for family firms in Singapore due to the under-diversified investment portfolio. (shrink)

Objective: This study aimed to investigate and compare the effects of tubular gastroesophageal anastomosis and traditional gastroesophageal supra-arch anastomosis on the postoperative lung function of patients with esophageal carcinoma. -/- Methods: A total of 90 patients with middle-lower segmental esophageal cancer admitted in our hospital from August 2014 to August 2016 were recruited to our study. They were randomly divided into two groups. The observation group underwent tubular gastroesophageal anastomosis, whereas the control group underwent traditional gastroesophageal supra-arch anastomosis. Changes in (...) the postoperative pulmonary function were compared between the two groups. -/- Results: The numbers of CD4 cells (27.45 ± 5.48), CD8 cells (35.97 ± 7.16), and natural killer cells (20.79 ± 2.49), as well as the CH4/CD8 ratio (0.69 ± 0.18), of the patients in the observation group were significantly higher than the (38.45 ± 5.98), (20.45 ± 6.41), (39.44 ± 3.49), and (1.31 ± 0.48), respectively, of the patients in the control group. The differences between the two groups were statistically significant (P<0.05). By contrast, the preoperative forced expiratory volume in 1 s (FEV1), forced vital capacity (FVC), and maximum voluntary ventilation (MVV) did not significantly differ between the two groups (P>0.05). The FEV1 (1.76 ± 0.41 L), FVC (2.33 ± 0.32 L), and MVV (33.7 ± 5.2 L/min) of the observation group were significantly higher than those of the control group (P<0.05). Meanwhile, the complication rate of the observation group was 42.2%, which was significantly lower than that of the control group (75.6%) (P<0.05). -/- Conclusion: Tubular gastroesophageal anastomosis can benefit patients with esophageal cancer by significantly reducing the adverse effects on their postoperative pulmonary function and control the occurrence of postoperative complications. (shrink)

Scottish philosophy and intellectual history have become the increasingly fashionable fields of academic studies. Alexander Broadie, one of the pioneers and an accomplished scholar of the Scottish Enlightenment, returns to the basic question, namely, “what is Scottish philosophy?”, and presents a comprehensive work on the history of Scottish philosophy. Broadie successfully elucidates the nature and significance of Scottish philosophy both historically and philosophically. He argues that Scottish philosophy must be studied in its historical context, for it is not only a (...) philosophical enterprise but also a persistent tradition which has united the Scottish nation for centuries. The advancements in science, literature, politics, and culture in Scotland would be extremely unlikely, if not impossible, without such an intellectual culture established by thinkers in that tradition. This article is intended as a review of Broadie’s A History of Scottish Philosophy in the background of his shifting academic interests from philosophy to history while he holds the professorship in University of Glasgow. His commitment to Scottish philosophical culture deserves the attention of contemporary historians and philosophers, for his work opens up a space for dialogue between intellectual history and history of philosophy, an issue addressed at the end of this paper. (shrink)

Poster Presentation accepted for the July 2014 conference in Bournemouth, England. -/- Abstract: Current service-quality models in the Hong Kong fast-food restaurant (HK FFR) industry are primarily designed on the basis of fast service and standardised fast-food service process that are expected to enhance customer retention. This study explores the feasibility of a new service-quality (SQ) model that could offer enhanced customer satisfaction and retention in the competitive Hong Kong FFR context. A qualitative, phenomenological-interview approach incorporating the critical incident technique (...) (CIT) was used. A purposeful sample of 30 HK taxi drivers was selected due to their frequency of eating at FFRs. The taxi drivers’ FFR experiences assisted in understanding the phenomenological nature of the HK FFR context. An Employee-Centric SKIP-based (Service, Knowledge, Information, Process) SQ model emerged from the data and is presented, where SKIP SQ drives trust, perceived value and satisfaction, and then retention in turn. In contrast to traditional models that simply focus on fast service and standardised fast-food service process, this study found that current FFR SQ models are ineffective in enhancing HK FFR customers’ repurchase intentions. The findings suggest that a SKIP-based SQ model incorporating a focal point of customisation and innovativeness could improve competitive advantage in the HK FFR context. -/- . (shrink)

A review essay on Jonathan Israel, The Expanding Blaze: How the American Revolution Ignited the World, 1775-1848 (Princeton: Princeton University Press, 2017) and Richard D. Brown, Self-Evident Truths: Contesting Equal Rights from the Revolution to the Civil War (New Haven: Yale University Press, 2017).

The Protein Ontology (PRO; http://purl.obolibrary.org/obo/pr) formally defines and describes taxon-specific and taxon-neutral protein-related entities in three major areas: proteins related by evolution; proteins produced from a given gene; and protein-containing complexes. PRO thus serves as a tool for referencing protein entities at any level of specificity. To enhance this ability, and to facilitate the comparison of such entities described in different resources, we developed a standardized representation of proteoforms using UniProtKB as a sequence reference and PSI-MOD as a post-translational modification (...) reference. We illustrate its use in facilitating an alignment between PRO and Reactome protein entities. We also address issues of scalability, describing our first steps into the use of text mining to identify protein-related entities, the large-scale import of proteoform information from expert curated resources, and our ability to dynamically generate PRO terms. Web views for individual terms are now more informative about closely-related terms, including for example an interactive multiple sequence alignment. Finally, we describe recent improvement in semantic utility, with PRO now represented in OWL and as a SPARQL endpoint. These developments will further support the anticipated growth of PRO and facilitate discoverability of and allow aggregation of data relating to protein entities. (shrink)