By exploring the cultural discrepancies in Chinese legal texts and their English versions and to what extent legal and cultural discrepancies influence and constrain legal translation, the study argues that it is useful to consider cultural discrepancies within a semiotic framework. Language is a phenomenon and factor that links different cultures; the use of language is crucial to any legal system. Law, as a cultural product, is attended by cultural discrepancies when switched into other languages for the purpose of achieving (...) equivalence. After a brief overview of cultural differences in translation, legal translation in particular, the study is set to examine the role of translation in crossing through different legal cultures and backgrounds and investigate barriers in the process of translation. Investigating cultural discrepancies in legal translation within a semiotic framework allows us to focus on certain interpretations by acknowledging that legal texts are composed with systems of systems and interacting with other cultural aspects in a wider context. (shrink)

This article aims to contribute to the understanding of Roy Bhaskar's philosophical evolution from critical realism to the philosophy of meta-Reality. Following Bhaskar's own terminology, I define his intellectual journey as the ‘identification of dualism and duality within non-duality’ by proposing that anti-anthropism plays a key role in the developmental consistency of his system from critical realism via dialectical critical realism to meta-Reality. For this purpose, I compare Bhaskar's philosophy with Andrew Collier's theory of human rationality and spiritual emancipation based (...) on Christianity and Tu Wei-Ming's anthropocosmic understanding of human beings and nature based on Confucianism. (shrink)

In recent years, there has been an escalation in cases of cyber violence, which has had a chilling effect on users' behavior toward social media sites. This article explores the causes behind cyber violence and provides empirical data for developing means for effective prevention. Using elements of the stimulus–organism–response theory, we constructed a model of cyber-violence behavior. A closed-ended questionnaire was administered to collect data through an online survey, which results in 531 valid responses. A proposed model was tested using (...) partial least squares structural equation modeling using SmartPLS 3.0, v. Research findings show that information inequality is a strong external stimulus with a significant positive impact on digital distrust and negative emotion. However, the effects of information overload on digital distrust and the adverse effects of communication overload on negative emotions should not be ignored. Both digital distrust and negative emotions have significant positive impacts on cyber violence and cumulatively represent 11.5% changes in cyber violence. Furthermore, information overload, communication overload, information inequality, and digital distrust show a 27.1% change in negative emotions. This study also presents evidence for competitive mediation of digital distrust by information overload, information inequality, and cyber violence. The results of this study have implications for individual practitioners and scholars, for organizations, and at the governmental level regarding cyber-violence behavior. To test our hypotheses, we have constructed an empirical, multidimensional model, including the role of specific mediators in creating relationships. (shrink)

Since the publication of Roy Bhaskar's A Realist Theory of Science in 1975, critical realism has been evolved as one of the new developments in the areas of philosophy of natural and social science which offers an alternatively fresh view to the existing theories including positivism and post-modernism. Bhaskar's intellectual movement, which is now fully international and multi-disciplinary, and continues to influence the philosophies of natural and social science, has transformed into 'Dialectical Critical Realism' and the philosophy of 'meta-Reality.' (...) class='Hi'>MinGyu will conclude that his anti-anthropic Non-duality continues through all the steps of Bhaskar's thought, maintaining the consistency of his scientific, metaphysical, and spiritual journey. The anti-anthropic motif is fully realized in the philosophy of Non-duality - the 'constellational identification of dualism, duality and non-duality' in his meta-Reality. Defending Bhaskar against Collier, Agar, and Morgan, MinGyu tries to show how its anti-anthropic and non-dualistic foundation is sustained through the whole of Bhaskar's journey, involving a transformation of its subject matters from reality, to the dialectic of reality, to the real truth underlying the former stages. This book provides an indispensible resource for all students of philosophy and the human sciences. (shrink)

Undoubtedly, the internet has become the most convenient and efficient communication and service delivery channel adopted by most government agencies, referred to as eGovernment. This study explores how eGovernment efficiency influences users’ subjective wellbeing, using trust as a covert stimulus with the capacity to alter individuals’ overt behavior. Covert and overt stimuli act as significant factors influencing the relationship between citizens and the online environment, moderated by socio-demographic characteristics. Using situation–organism–behavior–consequence theory, we propose a research model consisting of online environment (...) eGovernment efficiency influencing trust development, which in turn influences utilization, generating an impact on an individuals’ SWB. We followed the structural equation modeling approach to analyze the data survey N = 300, using Amos statistical techniques. Results reveal that the correlation between eGovernment efficiency and trust is positive and strong, trust and utilization is positive and moderate, and the correlation between utilization and SWB is positive and very strong. Stepwise regression analysis reveals that the control variables affect the relationship between eGovernment efficiency and trust. In the regression model: the highest education level explained 36% of the variance ; adding age increased the variance explained to 39%, and adding internet use frequency increased the variance explained to 41%. This study develops theoretical concepts of eGovernment use and how it affects citizens by indicating the psychological and behavioral situations as antecedents and mediators influencing SWB. It also provides practical suggestions for improving systems to correlate users’ feelings and behavior patterns to motivate trusting behavior, positively impacting users’ SWB to benefit citizens effectively. (shrink)

Evidence accumulation has been the core component in recent development of perceptual and value-based decision-making theories. Most studies have focused on the evaluation of evidence between alternative options. What remains largely unknown is the process that prepares evidence: how may the decision-maker sample different sources of information sequentially, if they can only sample one source at a time? Here we propose a normative framework in prescribing how different sources of information should be sampled proactively to facilitate the decision process: beliefs (...) for different noisy sources are updated in a Bayesian manner and participants can proactively allocate resource for sampling (i.e. saccades) among different sources to maximize the information gain in such process. We show that our framework can account for human participants’ actual choice and saccade behaviors in a two-alternative value-based decision-making task. Moreover, our framework makes novel predictions about the empirical eye movement patterns. (shrink)

This article aims to contribute to the understanding of Roy Bhaskar's philosophical evolution from critical realism to the philosophy of meta-Reality. Following Bhaskar's own terminology, I define his intellectual journey as the ‘identification of dualism and duality within non-duality’ by proposing that anti-anthropism plays a key role in the developmental consistency of his system from critical realism via dialectical critical realism to meta-Reality. For this purpose, I compare Bhaskar's philosophy with Andrew Collier's theory of human rationality and spiritual emancipation based (...) on Christianity and Tu Wei-Ming's anthropocosmic understanding of human beings and nature based on Confucianism. (shrink)

本书收入其论著22种. 主要有《经学通论》, 《中国文学史略论》, 《三礼述要》, 《旧唐书札迻》等.

We investigate a possible universal constraint on spatial meaning. It has been proposed that people attend preferentially to the endpoints of spatial motion events, and that languages may therefore make finer semantic distinctions at event endpoints than at event beginnings. We test this proposal. In Experiment 1, we show that people discriminate the endpoints of spatial motion events more readily than they do event beginnings—suggesting a non-linguistic attentional bias toward endpoints. In Experiment 2, speakers of Arabic, Chinese, and English each (...) described a set of spatial events displayed in video clips. Although the spatial systems of these languages differ, speakers of all three languages made finer semantic distinctions at event endpoints, compared to event beginnings. These findings are consistent with the proposal that event endpoints are privileged over event beginnings, in both language and perception. (shrink)

This paper develops an adaptive fixed-time trajectory tracking controller of an underactuated hovercraft with a prescribed performance in the presence of model uncertainties and unknown time-varying environment disturbances. It is the first time that the proposed method is applied to the motion control of the hovercraft. To begin with, based on the hovercraft's four degrees of freedom model, the virtual control laws are designed using an error transforming function and the fixed-time stability theory to guarantee that the position tracking errors (...) are constrained within the prescribed convergence rates and minimum overshoot. In addition, by combining the Lyapunov direct method and the adaptive radial basis function neural network, the actual control laws are designed to ensure that the velocity tracking errors converge to a small region containing zero while handling model uncertainties and external disturbances effectively. Finally, all tracking errors of the closed-loop system are uniformly ultimately bounded and fixed-time convergent. Results from a comparative simulation study verify the effectiveness and advantage of the proposed method. (shrink)

This study reports on a longitudinal inquiry into professional identity construction among six novice cross-border English language teachers from mainland China, who completed their pre-service teacher education in Hong Kong (HK) and began their teaching practice in local HK schools. The findings indicate that the participants navigated obstacles in teaching by deploying their own multiple languages as a cultural and linguistic repertoire. The findings also show that the teachers experienced difficulty legitimising their professional identity in the teaching community, where contextual (...) issues and power interplays mediated the process. Furthermore, it is found that the participants? commitment to teaching was negatively influenced by their non-legitimate position in the teaching community and the discordance between their teaching beliefs and the norms and values of their workplace. This study suggests that complex inter-relationships between marginal status in and legitimate membership of the community, between historical and cultural background, present practice, and future expectations, between social discourse and personal location, are involved in the process of identity construction. Measures to legitimate these teachers? position and to transform the linguistic and cultural repertories of these teachers into valuable resources of the local schools are suggested. Implications for future research are outlined. (shrink)

本书包括:周易是什么、天书解读、太极两仪四象八卦、六十四卦的生成、六十四卦的结构与本质属性归类、周易的上经与下经、六十四卦的象数与系辞、周易的蓍占、善易者不占十章。.

Although most schoolchildren can dispose of their own litter, they are typically not sensitive to environmental issues in the school’s public areas. How do we improve children’s sensitivity to public environments and cultivate pro-environmental behaviours? Based on Bandura’s social learning theory, this study explored the effects of various role models on the pro-environmental behaviours of children aged 7–13. A field study was conducted in which examples of postprandial garbage disposal behaviours were provided using role models and the subsequent behaviours of (...) the children were observed. We located the experiment in a real educational context and manipulated the type of role model and the behaviour being modelled. The results showed that different role models had different effects on the subjects’ pro-environmental behaviours. Only positive demonstration by teachers significantly improved the subjects’ pro-environmental behaviours, that is, teachers’ picking up of garbage in front of children significantly improved the children’s attention to the environment and their adoption of pro-environmental behaviours. Positive demonstration by peers, negative demonstration by teachers and negative demonstration by peers had no impact on the children’s pro-environmental behaviours. The results demonstrate that teachers must be mindful of their role as role models in the educational environment and facilitate students’ development of pro-environmental behaviours. (shrink)

The language game approach has recently been adopted to explore the conventionalization of linguistic knowledge in a social environment. Most contemporary studies focus on the dynamics of language games in random or predefined social networks, but neglect the reverse roles of communicative constraints in language evolution and social structures. This article, based on two forms of language games , examines whether a simple, distance-based communicative constraint can affect the conventionalization of linguistic knowledge. The study bridges the gap between random networks (...) and complex social structures, and illustrates that the internal properties of language games can influence the effects of communicative constraints and social structures. (shrink)

Global justice or the lack thereof has internal connections with global poverty. Global justice is an ideal pursuit of cosmopolitanism, which regards basic human needs as its rightful object. The right to life, from the point of view of global justice, is the most fundamental in the list of Human Rights. International anarchy and the current international economic order, however, cast a utopian shadow on the realization of this right when we consider the de facto institutions and the ostensible goal (...) of impartial love for everyone. Humanitarian aid is another approach to the problem of contemporary global poverty. Its difficulty lies first in people’s different conceptions of obligation and donation. They consider the former as duty while the latter is seen to lie beyond the call of duty. Second, in terms of a correlation between right and duty, since everyone has the right to life, the duty falls accordingly upon organizations or individuals. Meanwhile, donation as duty is not perfect obligation, thus is not compulsory either. Finally, international humanitarian aid is constrained by nationalism and partial love. Hence, in the light of either government or individual, the humanitarian aid approach is beset with challenges. Global justice has gained academic importance worldwide since John Rawls’ later works. By contrast to domestic justice, it is a theory of justice that proposes to include all human beings. Global justice stands for a kind of utopian justice in regard to both the institutional path and the humanitarian aid approach. I shall examine the theory of global justice under these two aspects. (shrink)

The revival of modern Western virtue ethics presents the question of whether or not virtue ethics is appropriate for modern society. Ethicists believe that virtue ethics came from traditional society, to which it conforms so well. The appearance of the market economy and a utilitarian spirit, together with society’s diversification, is a sign that modern society has arrived. This also indicates a transformation in the moral spirit. But modern society has not made virtues less important, and even as modern life (...) has become more diversified, rule-following ethics have taken on even greater importance. Modern ethical life is still the ethical life of individuals whose self-identity contains the identity of moral spirit, and virtues have a very important influence on the self-identical moral characters. Furthermore, modern society, which is centered around utilitarianism, makes it apparent that rules themselves are far from being adequate and virtues are important. Virtues are a moral resource for modern people to resist modern evils. (shrink)

The literature on algorithmic fairness has examined exogenous sources of biases such as shortcomings in the data and structural injustices in society. It has also examined internal sources of bias as evidenced by a number of impossibility theorems showing that no algorithm can concurrently satisfy multiple criteria of fairness. This paper contributes to the literature stemming from the impossibility theorems by examining how informational richness affects the accuracy and fairness of predictive algorithms. With the aid of a computer simulation, we (...) show that informational richness is the engine that drives improvements in the performance of a predictive algorithm, in terms of both accuracy and fairness. The centrality of informational richness suggests that classification parity, a popular criterion of algorithmic fairness, should be given relatively little weight. But we caution that the centrality of informational richness should be taken with a grain of salt in light of practical limitations, in particular, the so-called bias-variance trade off. (shrink)

本书主要是针对我国当前改革建设的实践,运用马克思主义的哲学原理,加以深入的论述,特别是关于改革与社会心理、人的本质和人的价值、思维方式的变革、宗教等问题的论述、有新意、有深度。.

Global justice or the lack thereof has internal connections with global poverty. Global justice is an ideal pursuit of cosmopolitanism, which regards basic human needs as its rightful object. The right to life, from the point of view of global justice, is the most fundamental in the list of Human Rights. International anarchy and the current international economic order, however, cast a utopian shadow on the realization of this right when we consider the de facto institutions and the ostensible goal (...) of impartial love for everyone. Humanitarian aid is another approach to the problem of contemporary global poverty. Its difficulty lies first in people’s different conceptions of obligation and donation. They consider the former as duty while the latter is seen to lie beyond the call of duty. Second, in terms of a correlation between right and duty, since everyone has the right to life, the duty falls accordingly upon organizations or individuals. Meanwhile, donation as duty is not perfect obligation, thus is not compulsory either. Finally, international humanitarian aid is constrained by nationalism and partial love. Hence, in the light of either government or individual, the humanitarian aid approach is beset with challenges. Global justice has gained academic importance worldwide since John Rawls’ later works. By contrast to domestic justice, it is a theory of justice that proposes to include all human beings. Global justice stands for a kind of utopian justice in regard to both the institutional path and the humanitarian aid approach. I shall examine the theory of global justice under these two aspects. (shrink)

Talk is a way of human existence. Through talk we can trace signs of existence. However, existence is not merely limited to the restricted domain of talk. Language serves as a medium of communication between people and is a resort of written signs. The sphere of existence, at the same time, is much deeper than that of language. In this vaster sphere of existence, and especially in aspects such as relations between man and god, man and universe, man and the (...) self, much more space is devoted to communications without words. Throughout history, records in written signs constitute only a small part of existence. The relationship between language and existence is open, as is the relationship between method and substance. However, existence in this relationship is prior to language, which has existence as its main subject. (shrink)

This study examines whether penalties issued to Chinese listed companies by securities regulators for violations of corporate law affect the cost of debt, and the moderating role of corporate social responsibility fulfillment on this relationship. Our sample consists of firms listed on Shanghai and Shenzhen stock exchanges from 2011 to 2017 and the data are collected from the announcements of China Securities Regulatory Commission. The findings are as follows: punishment announcements by regulatory authorities increase the cost of debt; and the (...) effect of punishment announcements on the cost of debt is partially offset by prior CSR performance. These findings are shown to be robust. The reputation insurance effect of CSR is more pronounced in state-owned enterprises and in an institutional environment with low marketization, a weak legal environment, and low information transparency. The findings support the reputation insurance hypothesis of CSR and employ the cost of debt as a governance mechanism. (shrink)

Green consumption values have been shown to motivate consumers to engage in green consumption practices. However, surprisingly little research has examined how green consumption values develop in young people. In the current study, we employed ecological socialization theory as a framework to investigate the process by which parents’ green consumption values shape similar values in their young adolescents. In Study 1, data from 722 Chinese families that included an early adolescent showed that both mothers’ and fathers’ green consumption values were (...) positively associated with early adolescents’ green consumption values, and this association was mediated by each parent’s environmentally responsible consumption behavior. Study 2 replicated the results of Study 1 using two waves of matched parent-adolescent data collected a month apart from another group of 477 Chinese families. Furthermore, Study 2 showed that the mediation process identified in Study 1 was evident only when there was a close parent–child relationship. These findings have implications for cultivating the green consumption values of today’s youth. The results also have heuristic value for future research on the ecological socialization and inter-generational transmission of pro-environmental values. (shrink)

From the time of the Eastern Han dynasty [A.D. 23-220] onward, Buddhism gradually became a very important ideological tool for the feudal landlord class in China in their establishing their rule over the country. Although Buddhism had its roots in India and was transmitted to China in the form of seeds of ideas, it found even more fertile soil in China and grew into a tall and leafy tree with a stout trunk, casting its protective shadow over the entire Chinese (...) system of feudalism. In the age of feudalism in China, the political power of Buddhism was constantly in competition with that of the Daoist religion in areas populated by the Han people, and there was quite an ebb and flow. However, it is fair to say that in terms of ideological and cultural influence Buddhism enjoyed a great advantage. Naturally, the other imported religions and/or regional religions, which were by and large even weaker than the Daoist religion, were even less of a match for Buddhism. Nevertheless, in terms of China's historical conditions, owing to intermittent class conflict — primarily the revolutionary peasant wars, to a powerful despotic system of concentration of political power and to the conflict of practical interests between secular landlords and monastic landlords — monastic orders who controlled land on the basis of the monastery economy, and also owing to the traditionally powerful influence of Confucianist orthodoxy — all these factors combined to wage war against religion and theology. As a result, the development of Buddhism was greatly hindered, and, unlike the religions of Europe and other Asian countries, it was unable to place religious authority over and above secular political authority or to achieve an absolute monopoly over the realm of ideology and culture. In China, no matter how brightly the star of Buddhism shone and how great and compelling its power and prestige came to be, it still nonetheless always huddled up at the feet of the feudalistic monarchy and was never able to take the place of the orthodoxy of Confucianism. Still, it was indispensable as a supplementary tool of government. (shrink)

The lixue 理学 (learning of the Neo-Confucian principles) of the Qing Dynasty followed the tradition of lixue in the Song, Yuan and Ming dynasties, but it had its own characteristics. First, there was no primary direction and core train of ideas. Second, there was no creativity and the emphasis was made on ethics. Third, after the Opium War, the lixue of the Qing Dynasty was influenced by Western culture, partly resisting and partly integrating with the latter. Fourth, the tradition of (...) Neo-Confucianism of the Song Dynasty and the tradition of the Confucianism of the Han Dynasty co-existed and had disputes with each other, but also learned from each other. (shrink)

This study examines the influence of an indigenous concept – face on online purchases in China. Specifically, we test the mediating role of materialism and the moderating role of price consciousness. We conduct a survey of 315 Chinese consumers. The results demonstrate that consumers tend to make online purchases to satisfy some facets of their materialistic needs and then gain face, especially for those highly conscious of price. The current research can help both scholars and practitioners better understand Chinese consumers (...) and their decision-making processes. Implications, limitations, and directions for future research are also provided. (shrink)

We provide the first comprehensive and robust evidence on the relationship between CSR disclosure quality and the costs of corporate bonds in China. We find that firms with high CSR disclosure quality are associated with lower costs of corporate bonds. Our findings are robust to endogeneity issues arising from reverse causality, omitted variable bias, and the interdependencies between price and non-price terms. The negative relationship between CSR disclosure quality and the costs of corporate bonds is stronger in weak corporate governance (...) firms and in firms located in regions with weak institutional environments. We also find that firms’ misconduct significantly mitigates the influence of CSR disclosure quality. In the additional analyses, we provide evidence that CSR disclosure can offer incremental information beyond the credit ratings. Regarding non-price terms, we conclude that firms with higher quality of CSR information are less likely to be subject to collateral terms, but they tend to include more restrictive covenants. Further analyses also show that compared with low-quality or mandatory CSR disclosure firms, bond investors perceive firms with CSR disclosures rated above “A” categories or voluntary CSR disclosure as less likely to cause asymmetric information problems and thus charge lower risk premiums. Overall, this study demonstrates that CSR disclosure quality is an important determinant that affects both price and non-price bond contract terms. (shrink)

Events that violate the laws of nature are, by definition, impossible, but recent research suggests that people view some violations as “more impossible” than others. When evaluating the difficulty of magic spells, American adults are influenced by causal considerations that should be irrelevant given the spell’s primary causal violation, judging, for instance, that it would be more difficult to levitate a bowling ball than a basketball even though weight should no longer be a consideration if contact is no longer necessary (...) for support. In the present study, we sought to test the generalizability of these effects in a non-Western context – China – where magical events are represented differently in popular fiction and where reasoning styles are often more holistic than analytic. Across several studies, Chinese adults showed the same tendency as American adults to honor implicit causal constraints when evaluating the plausibility of magical events. These findings suggest that graded notions of impossibility are shared across cultures, possibly because they are a byproduct of causal knowledge. (shrink)

This article investigates “impaired insight,” a controversial psychiatric category describing a mad person unable to know his or her madness. Like “moral insanity” and other concepts before it, impaired insight offers a way to link the disparate logics of human responsibility in psychiatry and the law. I attribute its development to changes wrought by deinstitutionalization, the rise of antipsychotic medication, and patient incarceration in penal settings. In a system that aims to govern psychiatric patients through their freedom, the logic of (...) impaired insight introduces a wrinkle: can a person make an informed choice to refuse treatment if madness itself impairs awareness of illness? Drawing on tools from the sociology of science, I trace the process by which researchers recast psychodynamic “denial” as a neurological and therefore non-volitional “impairment” in the 1990s. I then show how social movement actors mobilized the materialized form in the legal and policy fields in the 2000s, bringing insight science to bear upon the very questions of custodial management and patient rights that gave birth to it. At stake is this dilemma: how can societies that simultaneously privilege individual responsibility and somatic accounts of behavior govern those at the border of legal capacity, and with what justification? (shrink)