Online deliberation is one important instance of civic tech that is both for and by the citizens, through engaging citizens in Internet-supported deliberative discussions on public issues. This article explains the origins of a set of symposium articles in this journal issue based on the 2017 'International Conference on Deliberation and Decision Making: Interdisciplinary Perspectives on Civic Tech' held in Singapore. Symposium articles are presented in a sequence that flows from designing decision making systems to platforms to specific technological nudges.

E. Husserl’s reflections in Logical Investigations on “intentional feelings” and “non-intentional feelings” are significant in both his later ethical explorations and M. Scheler’s thought on ethics. Through the incorporation of the views of Husserl and Scheler, we find that the phenomenology of the intentional feeling-acts is not only the foundation of the non-formal ethics of values in Scheler’s phenomenology, but also at least the constitutive foundation of the ethics of Husserl’s first orientation.

Stephen Yablo’s notion of proportionality, despite controversies surrounding it, has played a significant role in philosophical discussions of mental causation and of high-level causation more generally. In particular, it is invoked in James Woodward’s interventionist account of high-level causation and explanation, and is implicit in a novel approach to constructing variables for causal modeling in the machine learning literature, known as causal feature learning (CFL). In this article, we articulate an account of proportionality inspired by both Yablo’s account of proportionality (...) and the CFL account of variable construction. The resulting account has at least three merits. First, it illuminates an important feature of the notion of proportionality, when it is adapted to a probabilistic and interventionist framework. The feature is that at the center of the notion of proportionality lies the concept of “determinate intervention effects.” Second, it makes manifest a virtue of (common types of) high-level causal/explanatory statements over low-level ones, when relevant intervention effects are determinate. Third, it overcomes a limitation of the CFL framework and thereby also addresses a challenge to interventionist accounts of high-level causation. (shrink)

Critical realism, championed by its proponents as the most promising post-positivist social science paradigm, has gained significant influence in the last few decades. This paper provides a critical evaluation of the critical realism movement in the hope of facilitating more fruitful dialogues between its proponents and rivalling schools of sociologists. Two concerns are raised about contemporary critical realism. First, critical realism is not the only philosophical school against positivism and not necessarily the best. Second, critical realists exaggerate the importance of (...) critical realism to social science and conflate philosophy of science with sociological theories. (shrink)

Duncan Pritchard recently proposed a Wittgensteinian solution to closure-based skepticism. According to Wittgenstein, all epistemic systems assume certain truths. The notions that we are not disembodied brains, that the Earth has existed for a long time and that one’s name is such-and-such all function as “hinge commitments.” Pritchard views a hinge commitment as a positive propositional attitude that is not a belief. Because closure principles concern only knowledge-apt beliefs, they do not apply to hinge commitments. Thus, from the fact that (...) a subject knows that he is sitting in a room, and the fact that the subject’s sitting in a room entails his bodily existence, it does not follow that the subject also knows that he is not an envatted brain. This paper rejects Pritchard’s non-belief reading of hinge commitments. I start by showing that the non-belief reading fails to solve the skeptical paradox because the reasons that Pritchard uses to support the non-belief reading do not exempt hinge propositions from closure principles. I then proceed to argue that the non-belief reading is false as it claims that hinge commitments, unlike ordinary beliefs, are rationally unresponsive—with the help of a scenario in which a subject’s experience is internally chaotic, we can safely conclude that the hinge commitment that one is not systematically mistaken about the world is equally responsive to one’s evidential situations. (shrink)

In this thesis, I explore motivational internalism and externalism, which concern the relationship between moral judgments and motivation. I first introduce the basic terms and different forms of internalism and externalism, including the externalist objections to internalism based on the famous counterexamples. I then argue against externalism by defending and developing Michael Smith’s fetishism argument. I not only respond to the externalist objections to the fetishism argument but also further argue against different externalist explanations of moral motivation that intend to (...) avoid the fetishism charge. Finally, I re-examine different forms of internalism in order to argue for a new form of internalism that can better preserve our internalist intuitions whilst accommodating the externalist counterexamples. My ultimate conclusion will be that the most plausible form of internalism to accept is constitutional, unconditional, relatively strong, direct internalism that is formulated in terms of dispositional desires. (shrink)

Scientism denies change and creation in science, and humanism denies change and creation in humanity. They leave no room for freedom, equality and fraternity. This book is written as the deconstruction of both scientism and humanism.

Ratio, Volume 34, Issue 4, Page 303-311, December 2021.

It seems to the author that, though it is possible to reach an explanation of consciousness, there is no direct way for us to go. In other words, the author believes that, only through a detour, through an understanding of everything outside mind, we may and can and will finally reach an understanding of those inside. The author tries in this article to discuss some details of such a detour, first from the understanding of Being and being, universe and life, (...) organism and human, and finally to the understanding of the mind and the mystery of our consciousness. Here, to understand Being is the core activities of the whole detour, and there the being is understandably the source and the nature of life and consciousness. (shrink)

Reading science fiction in China as a science project, this paper articulates a philosophical reflection on the ontology and ethics of truth that stems from the world of China. Through the reading of various texts of and about science fiction in China, from the Republican to the contemporary period, this article analyzes the situation of science fiction in China. Since science fiction was originally conceived as a science novel—a literary form that meant to convey scientific truth in order to create (...) a self-determining Chinese public—the history of science fiction in China is punctuated with the political question of what scientific truth is and what it does. Reading though such a milieu and Liu Cixin’s short novel, Hearing Dao in the Morning, this article will demonstrate that science fiction in China offers science a different modality of truth, that evokes an ethic of truth based on the curiosity towards the “unknown unknown.” The “unknown unknown” truth is significant because it re-structures the relationship between science fiction, truth, self-determination and the public. (shrink)

Les questions les plus fondamentales de la phénoménologie du sentir de Max Scheler concernent la place de l’intentionnalité dans la phénoménologie du sentir et la structuration de la sphère émotionnelle. Dans la première section, nous nous focaliserons avant tout sur la différence entre les sentiments non intentionnels et le sentir intentionnel, en comparant sur ce point les positions de Scheler et de Husserl. En effet, Scheler critique ces deux thèses fondamentales de Husserl: 1) les actes affectifs et leurs corrélats (« (...) valeurs ») doivent être associés aux représentations et à leurs corrélats (« choses », Sachen ); 2) les actes affectifs, en tant qu’actes non objectivants, sont fondés dans les actes objectivants. D’une part, pour Scheler, la valeur est un objet unique en son genre du sentir des valeurs, et le sentir intentionnel est donc un acte indépendant. D’autre part, Scheler a d’abord entrepris de dépasser la séparation entre acte objectivant et acte non objectivant. Dans ce contexte, la recherche actuelle consacrée à Scheler se heurte à de nombreuses difficultés relatives à la structuration de la sphère émotionnelle en rapport avec la hiérarchie des modalités axiologiques et avec l’a priori corrélationnel. Dans la deuxième section, nous expliquerons d’abord les idées de Scheler, puis en discuterons les difficultés. C’est par le « commerce vivant » avec le monde dans le sentir intentionnel et dans les actes émotionnels intentionnels, par les corrélats intentionnels (valeurs matérielles), que Scheler se sépare du formalisme en éthique. A travers un « apriorisme matériel » qui présente trois espèce d’a priori (a priori axiologique, a priori émotionnel et a priori corrélationnel), l’éthique matérielle phénoménologique des valeurs de Sche­ler est guidée par l’esprit d’un « objectivisme et absolutisme éthique rigoureux ». (shrink)

This study has demonstrated that entropy is not a physical quantity, that is, the physical quantity called entropy does not exist. If the efficiency of heat engine is defined as η = W/W1, and the reversible cycle is considered to be the Stirling cycle, then, given ∮dQ/T = 0, we can prove ∮dW/T = 0 and ∮d/T = 0. If ∮dQ/T = 0, ∮dW/T = 0 and ∮dE/T = 0 are thought to define new system state variables, such definitions would (...) be absurd. The fundamental error of entropy is that in any reversible process, the polytropic process function Q is not a single-valued function of T, and the key step of Σ[(ΔQ)/T)] to ∫dQ/T doesn’t hold, P-V fig. should be P-V-T fig.in thermodynamics. Similarly, ∮dQ/T = 0, ∮dW/T = 0 and ∮dE/T = 0 do not hold, either. Since the absolute entropy of Boltzmann is used to explain Clausius entropy and the unit (J/K) of the former is transformed from the latter, the non-existence of Clausius entropy simultaneously denies Boltzmann entropy. (shrink)

Empirical adaptationism is often said to be an empirical claim about nature, which concerns the overall relative causal importance of natural selection in evolution compared with other evolutionary factors. Philosophers and biologists who have tried to clarify the meaning of empirical adaptationism usually share, explicitly or implicitly, two assumptions: (1) Empirical adaptationism is an empirical claim that is scientifically testable; (2) testing empirical adaptationism is scientifically valuable. In this article, I challenge these two assumptions and argue that both are unwarranted (...) given how empirical adaptationism is currently formulated. I identify a series of conceptual and methodological difficulties that makes testing empirical adaptationism in a biologically non-arbitrary way virtually impossible. Moreover, I show that those in favor of testing empirical adaptationism have yet to demonstrate the distinctive value and necessity of conducing such a test. My analysis of the case of empirical adaptationism also provides reasons for scientists to reconsider the value and necessity of engaging in scientific debates involving the notion of overall relative causal importance. (shrink)

The Cartesian thesis that some justifications are infallible faces a gradation puzzle. On the one hand, infallible justification tolerates absolutely no possibility for error. On the other hand, infallible justifications can vary in evidential force: e.g. two persons can both be infallible regarding their pains while the one with stronger pain is nevertheless more justified. However, if a type of justification is gradable in strength, why can it always be absolute? This paper explores the potential of this gradation challenge by (...) rejecting Fumerton's recent ‘semantic decision' solution. On Fumerton's suggestion, the putative gradation of infallible justifications is essentially semantic. It concerns only how we use the relevant term but not how well we perceive the truth. Regardless of its intuitive appeal, Fumerton's solution does not cover all the related situations. There is an irreducibly epistemic sense in which infallible justifications vary in degrees. (shrink)

Wuwei (nonaction) is one of the core concepts of Daoist ethics. Edward Slingerland pointed out that wuwei involves a paradox, and Arthur C. Danto questioned whether wuwei could support a genuine moral theory and the idea of right action. To defend Daoist ethics and its concept of right action, it is necessary to envisage Danto’s criticism and the problems raised by Slingerland. According to Ivanhoe, Wuwei is not a paradox, but a riddle or mystery about self-cultivation. He thinks that if (...) people could find the trick to the riddle, they can realize Wuwei. Ivanhoe’s analysis failed. Nickolas Knightly argues that we must acknowledge the paradox of Wuwei squarely. Based on criticizing Ivanhoe’s and Knightly’s schemes, this paper further analyzes the strategies to deal with the paradox of Wuwei. Wuwei should be placed in a specific situation and context. Wuwei requires the agents to have the corresponding psychological motivation, which will not continuously interfere with the purpose of action. Wuwei, as the behavior evaluation word of Daoist ethics, corresponds to moral anti-realism and nonassertive moral abolitionism. (shrink)

In order to have an effective and reliable understanding of the basic moral concepts, moral propositions and moral reasoning in Daoist ethical thoughts, it is necessary to use the methods of doing philosophy and doing ethics to engage in research work, and thus draw an intellectual conclusion about Daoist ethics. The methods of Daoist ethics mainly include analysis, explanation and comparison. The method of analysis focuses on logical analysis and language analysis of moral language in the classic texts of Daoist (...) ethics. The method of interpretation focuses on effective translation and understanding of moral language with unclear meaning in Daoist ethics. The method of comparison focuses on critical dialogue between ancient Daoist ethical thoughts and contemporary ethical theories and comparison between Confucian, Buddhist and Daoist ethics. Explaining the method of doing Daoist ethics clearly will promote the dialogue and understanding between Daoist ethics and contemporary ethics. (shrink)

Intertextuality (mutual illustration) is a common rhetorical device in ancient Chinese and has been used many times in Laozi (Dao Dejing). Intertextuality (mutual illustration) is of unique significance for understanding the linguistic structure and philosophical thoughts of Lao-zi. According to the current research on mutual illustration rhetoric on ancient Chinese, the forms of this rhetoric in Laozi can be divided into mutual illustration of single sentence, of multiple sentences and of ellipsis and antisense. There are only two references to mutual (...) illustration in the annotations of Laozi in the past dynasties, and most of the commentators ignore the importance of mutual illustration in understanding Laozi. By interpreting Laozi through mutual illustration rhetoric, we can make innovations in understanding methods, understanding contents and philosophical thoughts. (shrink)

The research method of Buddhist ethics is contemporary ethical theory, which focuses on precepts (Sila) and disciplines (Vinaya) in experience, rather than transcendental moral ideals (Nirvana or wisdom). Precepts are seen as external norms, while disciplines are internal norms. The former belongs to rule ethics and the latter belongs to virtue ethics. Although the exposition of duty and responsibility can be discovered in Buddhist ethics, there is no sufficient reason to interpret Buddhist ethics as deontology. Views on the consequences of (...) actions can also be found in Buddhist classics, but it is hard to say that Buddhist ethics is the theory of consequences or utilitarianism. The method of rule ethics in the discussion of Buddhist ethics has failed, and Buddhist virtue ethics is a feasible alternative. However, previous research on Buddhist virtue ethics was not perfect, and the teleology of Aristotelian was reasonably criticized. Influenced by caring ethics, emotionalism virtue ethics is a more suitable way to understand Buddhist ethics. The moral reason for Buddhism is a whole argumentation system, including moral rules and moral virtues. (shrink)

People attribute purposes in both mundane and profound ways—such as when thinking about the purpose of a knife and the purpose of a life. In three studies (total N = 13,720 observations from N = 3,430 participants), we tested whether these seemingly very different forms of purpose attributions might actually involve the same cognitive processes. We examined the impacts of four factors on purpose attributions in six domains (artifacts, social institutions, animals, body parts, sacred objects, and human lives). Study 1 (...) manipulated what items in each domain were originally created for (original design) and how people currently use them (present practice). Study 2 manipulated whether items are good at achieving a goal (effectiveness) and whether the goal itself is good (morality). We found effects of each factor in every domain. However, whereas morality and effectiveness had remarkably similar effects across domains, the effects of original design and present practice differed substantially. Finally, Study 3 revealed that, within domains, the effects of original design and present practice depend on which entities design and use items. These results reveal striking similarities in purpose attributions across domains and suggest that certain entities are treated as authorities over the purposes of particular items. (shrink)

This study explores the polysemy of the word “bitter” in English and ku in Chinese. It examines the similarities and differences between their semantics and identifies the cognitive mechanisms that motivate their semantic expansion. The study attempts to answer two questions: (1) What are the similarities and differences between Chinese ku and English “bitter” in terms of meaning? (2) What cognitive mechanisms motivate meaning extensions of these two words? To this end, 汉语大词典 (Chinese Dictionary), 英汉大词典 (English-Chinese Dictionary), the British National (...) Corpus (BNC) and BLCU Corpus Center (BCC) were employed. The two dictionaries were utilised to investigate the multiple meanings of the two terms, while the BNC and the BCC were employed to identify metaphors and metonymies in sentences. Theoretically, the study is informed by Lakoff and Johnson’s conceptual metaphor and conceptual metonymy. The results showed that half of the meanings of “bitter” and ku overlapped, but there were still some differences. Their semantic expansion is motivated by both conceptual metonymy and conceptual metaphor. In addition, the words under investigation differ in the emotions expressed. English “bitter” is more negative, while Chinese ku is more positive. The present findings have important implications for education and cross-cultural communication in language. (shrink)

Based on the dispute between Protagoras and Socrates on the origin of ethics, one can ask the question of whether the principle of ethics is reason orfeeling/emotion, or whether ethics is grounded on reason or feeling/emotion. The development of Kant’s thoughts on ethics shows the tension between reason and feeling/emotion. In Kant’s final critical ethics, he held to a principle of “rational a priori.” On the one hand, this is presented as the rational a priori principle being the binding principle (...) of judgment. On the other hand, it is presented as the doctrine of “rational fact” as the ultimate argument of his ethics. Husserl believed that Kant’s doctrine of a rational a priori totally disregarded the a priori essential laws of feeling. Like Husserl, Scheler criticized Kant’s doctrine of a rational a priori, and therefore developed his own theory of an “emotional a priori”. Both of them focused their critiques on the grounding level of ethics. Scheler, however, did not follow Husserl all the way, but criticized him and reflected on his thoughts. At last, he revealed the primary status of a phenomenological material ethics of value. (shrink)

Can AI systems such as ChatGPT think? We present an argument from rationality for the negative answer to this question. The argument is founded on two central ideas. The first is that if ChatGPT thinks, it is not rational, in the sense that it does not respond correctly to its evidence. The second idea, which appears in several different forms in philosophical literature, is that thinkers are by their nature rational. Putting the two ideas together yields the result that ChatGPT (...) is not a thinker. The paper sets out the argument in detail and shows how it can withstand numerous objections. We end the paper by contrasting the argument from rationality with a more well-known argument often taken to show that ChatGPT doesn’t think, due to Bender and Koller. (shrink)

In December 2015, College of National Culture and Cognitive sciences was founded in Guizhou Minzu University, which is an important step in the construction of new cross discipline. In July 2016, the discipline of "national culture and cognitive science" was selected as the key construction discipline in our university. In August, in the evaluation of key disciplines in Guizhou province, we ranked the first in the Humanities and Social Science group, and was listed as the key discipline of Guizhou province. (...) This fully shows that the new cross discipline of national culture and cognitive science has a strong vitality and a promising prospect. As the head of the discipline of national culture and cognitive science, I will report the construction of this discipline and some of our experiences in five parts for all the experts and scholars. (shrink)

Montesquieu believes that human beings have three kinds of natures: self-preserving, imperfect knowledge and passions. The first and the third nature tend to conflict with each other, and the result is the state of war, in which human natures could not be satisfied. Montesquieu uses this theory of human nature to judge all the kinds of governments, and finds that the virtuous republic, despotism and monarchy all have important defects. Especially, the monarchy by nature tends to degenerate into despotism, which (...) is a realistic threat to him and his contemporaries. To solve this political problem, Montesquieu himself develops a two-fold solution: he wants to establish a certain kind of positive laws to satisfy the first nature, and wants to promote commerce to satisfy the third nature. Moreover, his ideal-government has important differences with the English political system. (shrink)

Generic statements, such as "Bees are striped" are thought to be a central vehicle by which essentialist beliefs are transmitted. But work on generics and essentialism almost never focuses on the type of properties mentioned in generic statements. We test the hypothesis that teleological properties, what something is for, affect categorization judgments more strongly than behavioral, biological, or social properties. In Experiment 1, participants categorized properties as being either behavioral, biological, social, or teleological. In Experiment 2, we used the top (...) four properties from each group to describe a generic noun or a specific individual. Participants then categorized creatures that had one of their properties transformed. We found that changes to teleological properties had the strongest impact on categorization judgments. In Experiment 3, we also found that teleological properties mattered more in an induction task. We suggest that teleological properties play this privileged role in categorization because they are treated as essential properties. (shrink)

In this article I give a critical evaluation of the use and limitations of null-model-based hypothesis testing as a research strategy in the biological sciences. According to this strategy, the null model based on a randomization procedure provides an appropriate null hypothesis stating that the existence of a pattern is the result of random processes or can be expected by chance alone, and proponents of other hypotheses should first try to reject this null hypothesis in order to demonstrate their own (...) hypotheses. Using as an example the controversy over the use of null hypotheses and null models in species co-occurrence studies, I argue that null-model-based hypothesis testing fails to work as a proper analog to traditional statistical null-hypothesis testing as used in well-controlled experimental research, and that the random process hypothesis should not be privileged as a null hypothesis. Instead, the possible use of the null model resides in its role of providing a way to challenge scientists’ commonsense judgments about how a seemingly unusual pattern could have come to be. Despite this possible use, null-model-based hypothesis testing still carries certain limitations, and it should not be regarded as an obligation for biologists who are interested in explaining patterns in nature to first conduct such a test before pursuing their own hypotheses. (shrink)

The results revealed that students who remained in China experienced challenges which included anxiety, closure of campuses, lockdown, their parents’ concern regarding health issues, and not being able to meet with friends. On the other hand, students who had left China during the pandemic were confined to their home countries. This group of students experienced more severe problems than the students who remained in China. Since the transition to home countries was “unplanned,” they were not ready to readjust to their (...) native culture and were vulnerable to severe reverse culture shock. Upon returning to their home countries, international students faced a number of challenges, including readjustment to their home countries and changes in their lives in host and home countries. In addition, they lost social and academic resources, such as the disruption of study environment, losing important group memberships, financial constraints, visa expiry, graduation delay, and academic suspension. (shrink)

Strauss’s analysis of Machiavelli is both about his argument and action. He looks Machiavelli’s argument through the lens of classicalpolitical philosophy especially Plato’s political philosophy. He believed Machiavelli had not achieved important theoretical innovation. He looks Machiavelli’s action through the lens of modernity. He believed Machiavelli’s political thought did not perform a good function as it did in the last several centuries any more. Moreover, Strauss supplement Machiavelli’s political thought with a discussion of the problem of technique. Strauss’s caution of (...) the technical innovation makes sense, but his distinction between theoretical science and technique is not convincing. (shrink)

The mind thoughts of Wang Yangming come from long-term moral and spiritual practices. After the knowledge and action are honed, they fall on the level of conscience. In the early years, Yangming paid close attention to the mind. With the help of the concentrated observation amendments of law in Buddhism, Yangming looked at the ideas that have been developed and not developed from the perspective of the doctrine of the mean. Yangming believes that the essence of the dynamic mind is (...) natural. Therefore, it realizes the subtle purity of the mind from keeping one and settling down and from pure to spontaneous. At the same time, Yangming believes that the depth of Tao has a charm that is different from ordinary consciousness. However, Yangming criticized Buddhism for obtaining the silence of the no mind and the immobile mind through the practice of emptiness. Contrarily, Yangming paid more attention to the experience of "light" in moral practice, which made Confucianism standardize the practice of knowledge and action to the practice of mindfulness and doing instead of being in vain. The paper explored the philosophy of mind of Wang Yangming from three dimensions: one mind, no mind, and Mindfulness. (shrink)

A popular solution to the causal exclusion problem in the non-reductive physicalist camp is the trope identity solution. But this solution is haunted by the “quausation problem” which charges that the trope only confers causal powers qua physical, not qua mental. Although proponents of the trope solution have responded to the problem by denying the existence of properties of tropes, I do not find their reply satisfactory. Rather, I believe they have missed the core presupposition behind the quausation problem. I (...) will argue that the presupposition is the generalist notion of causation. Then, for the trope theorists to solve the quausation problem, they need to abandon the generalist notion and adopt the singularist notion of causation. However, making that move will lead them to a new quausation problem, rendering irreducible mental types causally irrelevant and mental causal explanations reducible. Either adopting a generalist notion or a singularist notion of causation, a quausation problem awaits the trope solution. Given this dilemma, my conclusion is that the trope identity solution cannot solve the exclusion problem in a non-reductive way. Moreover, the dilemma can be generalized, showing that token physicalism is a shaky position. (shrink)

Creativity is a crucial aspect of entrepreneurship. However, research on the information processing mechanism of creativity in relation to entrepreneurship is still very limited. To explore factors contributing to creativity performance among entrepreneurs in terms of information processing, we applied the Bayesian Mindsponge Framework. We used the Serendipity-Mindsponge-3D (SM3D) knowledge management theory to construct models and conducted Bayesian analysis on the most comprehensive and well-designed dataset of 3071 Vietnamese entrepreneurs up to date. We found that entrepreneurs who give more time (...) to their startup attempts are likely to have lower levels of creativity. Both factors of higher levels of knowledge within one’s discipline and better connections to out-of-discipline knowledge are positively associated with more creativity. While the effect of openmindedness on the relationship between within-discipline knowledge and creativity is unclear, openmindedness was found to have a positive moderating effect on the association between out-of-discipline knowledge and creativity. These findings support entrepreneurs in understanding the information processing mechanisms behind creativity for creating more effective knowledge management strategies. (shrink)

With this article, the author argues that in reality nothing is or isn’t itself, that everything is both a relative proof and an absolute proof of God’s existence, and that our language, such as “nature” or “god”, is the only obstacle between Nature and God.

Both motivational internalism and externalism need to explain why sometimes moral judgments tend to motivate us. In this paper, I argue that Dreier’ second-order desire model cannot be a plausible externalist alternative to explain the connection between moral judgments and motivation. I explain that the relevant second-order desire is merely a constitutive requirement of rationality because that desire makes a set of desires more unified and coherent. As a rational agent with the relevant second-order desire is disposed towards coherence, she (...) will have some motivation to act in accordance with her moral judgments. Dreier’s second-order desire model thus collapses into a form of internalism and cannot be a plausible externalist option to explain the connection between moral judgments and motivation. (shrink)

We may never understand what the phrase “human being” means if we do not try to understand ontological meaning of the concept “Being” or “being” or “beings”. With two essays presented together, the author tries to explain not only this concept but also its ontological consequence to other concepts such as “universe”, “life”, “organism”, “human” and “human mind”.

Based on a crowdsourced truth value judgment experiment, we provide empirical evidence challenging two classical views in semantics, and we develop a novel account of counterfactuals that combines ideas from inquisitive semantics and causal reasoning. First, we show that two truth-conditionally equivalent clauses can make different semantic contributions when embedded in a counterfactual antecedent. Assuming compositionality, this means that the meaning of these clauses is not fully determined by their truth conditions. This finding has a clear explanation in inquisitive semantics: (...) truth-conditionally equivalent clauses may be associated with different propositional alternatives, each of which counts as a separate counterfactual assumption. Second, we show that our results contradict the common idea that the interpretation of a counterfactual involves minimizing change with respect to the actual state of affairs. We propose to replace the idea of minimal change by a distinction between foreground and background for a given counterfactual assumption: the background is held fixed in the counterfactual situation, while the foreground can be varied without any minimality constraint. (shrink)

This is a study of the treatment of library patron privacy in licenses for electronic journals in academic libraries. We begin by distinguishing four facets of privacy and intellectual freedom based on the LIS and philosophical literature. Next, we perform a content analysis of 42 license agreements for electronic journals, focusing on terms for enforcing authorized use and collection and sharing of user data. We compare our findings to model licenses, to recommendations proposed in a recent treatise on licenses, and (...) to our account of the four facets of intellectual freedom. We find important conflicts with each. (shrink)

Although patterns of human activity show a large degree of freedom, they exhibit structural patterns subjected by geographic and social constraints. Aiming at various problems of personalized recommendation in mobile networks, a social network recommendation algorithm is proposed with a variety of context-aware information and combined with a series of social network analysis methods.Based on geographical location and temporal information, potential social relations among users are mined deeply to find the most similar set of users for the target user, then (...) recommendations are carried out incorporating with social relations of the mobile users to effectively solve the problem of recommendation precision. The above study can not only help LBSN designers and developers to better understand their users and grasp their want, but also help to refine the design of their system to provide users with more appropriate applications and services.The experimental results on the real-world dataset verify the feasibility and effectiveness of the proposed algorithm, and it has higher prediction accuracy compared with existing recommendation algorithms. (shrink)

Currently, little is known about the mechanism of how university students’ attitudes toward entrepreneurship education (ATEE) affect entrepreneurial self-efficacy (ESE) in the post-pandemic entrepreneurial environment. Based on the existing research, this study explores the relationship between ATEE, the post-pandemic entrepreneurship environment, and ESE through a questionnaire survey. A total of 910 university students from three universities in Zhejiang Province, China participated, with an effective rate of 92.9%. The data collection focused on the period from August to December 2020. In this (...) study, Stepwise Multiple regression analysis was used to analyze university students' ATEE and its impact on ESE, as well as the moderating effect of the post-pandemic entrepreneurial environment. (shrink)

The main goal of this paper is to investigate the relation between the meaning of a sentence and its truth conditions. We report on a comprehension experiment on counterfactual conditionals, based on a context in which a light is controlled by two switches. Our main finding is that the truth-conditionally equivalent clauses (i) "switch A or switch B is down" and (ii) "switch A and switch B are not both up" make different semantic contributions when embedded in a conditional antecedent. (...) Assuming compositionality, this means that (i) and (ii) differ in meaning, which implies that the meaning of a sentential clause cannot be identified with its truth conditions. We show that our data have a clear explanation in inquisitive semantics: in a conditional antecedent, (i) introduces two distinct assumptions, while (ii) introduces only one. Independently of the complications stemming from disjunctive antecedents, our results also challenge analyses of counterfactuals in terms of minimal change from the actual state of affairs: we show that such analyses cannot account for our findings, regardless of what changes are considered minimal. (shrink)

The year 2020 and 2021 have been decimated by the pandemic, leading to outbound vacations largely scrapped. Staycation, a typical domestic journal, has then been adopted by those who are tired of self-isolation for so long. This study aims to explore and assess the drivers exerting impact on attitude of tourists toward staycation and the interrelationship among the research constructs is also examined. A quantitative analysis is employed for evaluating the roles of reduced risk perception, benign envy, and perceived benefits (...) as they exert the effect on attitude toward staycation. An online questionnaire survey was used, and a total of 213 samples were collected from target respondents in Hong Kong, which were still under lockdown at the time of the study. The results of the study showed that reduced risk perception, benign envy as well as perceived benefits will influence tourists’ attitude toward staycation. The managerial and theoretical implications of the results are discussed based on the significant relationships identified in the study. (shrink)

God is free. If free, God certainly hates being omniscient, omnipotent, eternal and perfection. If God hates so, ....

“Being” or “being and beings” might be the meta-notion when philosophy and science were still sharing the same mind or minds in ancient Greek and Europe. To find its meaning and to become a part of the meaning are however more and more vital nowadays, not for philosophy but for science, especially for physics and biology. The author proposes in this essay that this concept may mean to us nothing more or less than the unity or unification of Parmenides’ idea (...) “being is one” and Heraclitus’ idea “all things are in flux and nothing may remain the same”. That is just as to say that a being and an entity may never be identified with the same boundary. In other words, nothing or none should ever be understood as a being. This understanding is conceptualized and linguisticalized by the author as the compound symbol “OC”. And the OC represents a synthetic and also analytical understanding of both our universe and us together. And its value and strength may be found more obvious in his concise discussion, in the last part of the essay, on the OC’s meanings to ontology, epistemology, axiology, logic, mathematics, physics, biology, cosmogony and more. (shrink)

Mystical religious experiences typically purport to engage with the transcendent and often claim to involve encounters with spiritual entities or a detachment from the material world. Daoism diverges from this paradigm. This paper examines Daoist mystical experiences of bodily transformations and explores their epistemological implications. Specifically, we defend the justificatory power of Daoist somatic experiences against the disanalogy objection. The disanalogy objection posits that mystical experiences, in contrast to sense perceptions, are not socially verifiable and thereby lack prima facie epistemic (...) value. We argue that some Daoist mystical bodily states, being essentially spatiotemporal, are exempt from this challenge. This leads to a broader understanding of mysticism and offers a partial resolution to the disanalogy objection. (shrink)

Based on the ontological proposition, “life is the only attribute of mind, and mind also the only attribute of life”, a model of the human mind is hypothesized in this article. It may be deduced from the proposition and the model: 1. All the structures of a brain are the potentials of its intelligence. 2. Consciousness is only the language used in the communication of an awakened brain. 3. Qualia are the same mental language manipulated by different memories. 4. Life (...) is the only meaning of all mental languages. -/- . (shrink)

Mystical experiences are often regarded as potential sources of epistemic justification for religious beliefs. However, the ‘disanalogy objection’ maintains that, in contrast to sense perceptions, mystical experiences lack social verifiability and are thus merely subjective states that cannot substantiate objective truths. This article explores a novel externalist response that involves the concept of angels. As spiritual beings, angels can directly perceive God and verify these perceptions in their celestial community. Thus, the ‘direct perception of God’ is not inherently incapable of (...) social verification. While invoking angels might appear contentious, it coheres with the externalist approach of conceptualising cognitive states under hypothetical settings. Despite the differences between humans and angels and their lack of interaction for verification purposes, our approach remains valid because mystics not only exemplify the same general type of ‘direct perception of God’ as angels but can also be preliminary members of a wider celestial community. (shrink)

This book attempts to contribute a historical and interpretive study of Descartes' epistemology. It provides a systematic and exhaustive clarification of the mysterious and puzzling doctrine of "clear and distinct perception" and illuminates the relationships between this doctrine and four other central notions: "truth," "metaphysical doubt," "(metaphysical) certainty," and "knowledge." -/- Roughly speaking, a clear and distinct perception is a pure understanding, an intellectual perception, or a mental intuition in which a purified and attending mind has a simple mental intuition (...) of a simple proposition or a necessary deduction (i.e., a complex mental intuition) from such simple propositions to a complex proposition. A simple proposition can be regarded as a necessary conjunction of simple ideas. Descartes' composition theory of ideas, which supposes that all ideas are composed of simple ideas, provides a crucial basis for clear and distinct perception. -/- Descartes' doctrine of clear and distinct perception is an attempt at mathematizing epistemology and is the main content of his new "method" (for truth and knowledge), which he sought throughout his life. -/- This book attempts to shape a new image of Descartes' epistemology. (shrink)

Sie ist eine systematische und dialektische Auseinandesetzung mit Kants Architektonik der reinen Vernunft in der Kritik der reinen Vernunft. Damit zeigt Sie uns an, dass die Kritik der reinen Vernunft sich mit der Unterscheidung von Anschauung und Begriffen als eine Aufklärung einer praktischen Zweckmäßigkeit unserer Vernunft vorstellt.

The topics approached in the 52 papers included in this book are: neutrosophic sets; neutrosophic logic; generalized neutrosophic set; neutrosophic rough set; multigranulation neutrosophic rough set (MNRS); neutrosophic cubic sets; triangular fuzzy neutrosophic sets (TFNSs); probabilistic single-valued (interval) neutrosophic hesitant fuzzy set; neutro-homomorphism; neutrosophic computation; quantum computation; neutrosophic association rule; data mining; big data; oracle Turing machines; recursive enumerability; oracle computation; interval number; dependent degree; possibility degree; power aggregation operators; multi-criteria group decision-making (MCGDM); expert set; soft sets; LA-semihypergroups; single valued (...) trapezoidal neutrosophic number; inclusion relation; Q-linguistic neutrosophic variable set; vector similarity measure; fundamental neutro-homomorphism theorem; neutro-isomorphism theorem; quasi neutrosophic triplet loop; quasi neutrosophic triplet group; BE-algebra; cloud model; Maclaurin symmetric mean; pseudo-BCI algebra; hesitant fuzzy set; photovoltaic plan; decision-making trial and evaluation laboratory (DEMATEL); Choquet integral; fuzzy measure; clustering algorithm; and many more. (shrink)