It is often assumed that pet ownership improves peoples’ wellbeing, but evidence of this pet effect has been mixed. We extended past research on pet personality, the pet effect, and value congruence to examine whether people perceive their pets to have humanlike values and if owner-pet values similarity has a positive effect on owners’ life satisfaction. In a large and diverse sample of Australian dog and cat owners, we find that people imbue their dogs and cats with humanlike values in (...) a way that reflects the theoretical circular structure of values. Importantly, perceptions of the values of dogs and cats differed in that dogs were perceived to prioritize more social-focus values, whereas cats were perceived to prioritize more personal-focus values. Additionally, we find that similarity in the values profile of dog owners and their dogs is positively associated with life satisfaction, but this was not the case for cats. However, when we examined associations between individual values similarity and life satisfaction, our results suggest a more complex and nuanced picture of both direct and indirect similarity effects. (shrink)

The DAMA project is an observatory for rare processes and it is operative deep underground at the Gran Sasso National Laboratory of the I.N.F.N. In particular, the DAMA/LIBRA (Large sodium Iodide Bulk for RAre processes) set-up consists of highly radiopure NaI(Tl) detectors for a total sensitive exposed mass of ≃250 kg. Recent results, obtained by this set-up by exploiting the model independent annual modulation signature of Dark Matter (DM) particles, have confirmed and improved those obtained by the former DAMA/NaI experiment. (...) A model independent evidence for the presence of Dark Matter particles in the galactic halo is cumulatively obtained at 8.2 σ C.L. No systematics or side reactions able to account for the measured modulation amplitude and to contemporaneously satisfy all the many specific requirements of the signature have been found or suggested by anyone over more than a decade. An example of one of the many possible model dependent corollary quests for the candidate particles and for the related astrophysical, nuclear and particle physics scenarios is presented considering the whole cumulative exposure. Future perspectives are shortly addressed. (shrink)

Searches for non-paulian nuclear processes, i.e. processes normally forbidden by the Pauli–Exclusion–Principle (PEP) with highly radiopure NaI(Tl) scintillators allow the test of this fundamental principle with high sensitivity. Status and perspectives are addressed.

因為現代醫藥之發達與進步，我們身體的痛已大多有了消解之道；但思想、心理與性靈的病卻是越來越讓我們感到憂傷，越來越教我們心生恐懼，也越來越侵犯到我們原本一心盼望單單純純地「活在此時此刻」這極其謙卑的權利 與心願。 顯然，現代科技仍然效力有限，而無端的生命苦難更是難以預期與估量。我們還是得時時回頭看看自己這一身，回頭想想自己這一生，並同時回頭思量自己這一顆心到底蘊藏著什麼寶貝，或許，這樣的自力救濟與自力更生纔是生 活的王道。 且讓我們一起來細細品味兩千多年前這一位東方的「生命療癒先行者」――莊子到底是怎麼看待他自己這一身、這一生、這一世以及時時刻刻跳動在「此時此刻」的這一顆心，而其中又有何特殊光景值得莊子大書特書，這也許是 人類千年不變的生命共業。 原本，我們一出生就無法自外於大自然，而「自然」原來就在我們完完整整的這一身，它的符碼（甚至是密碼）就藏在我們人人心底，就靠我們自己來記憶，來存取，來開啟我們與生俱來的自我療癒的能力，而莊子如是言，如是 行，如是思量，如是觀想，如是腳踏實地，如是心無旁鶩，如是存活於此時此刻──而他已然為我們落下這八個無比精采的篇章： ◆逍遙之遊──莊子一心渴望真自由，而他到底是如何滿足這心底深沉的渴望？又是如何從地面起身躍向那無邊無界的天空？ ◆齊物之論──莊子彷彿心無是非，口無虛言，而只是靜觀萬物，平等看待這世上的一切，他是如何能夠保有這份真真切切的「自知之明」？如何在夢醒之際清清楚楚地守著這僅有的清明之心？ ◆養生之主──莊子先是如同一般人，一心只盼望健健康康，無疾也無病，但他還深刻地警覺生命最大的痛──死亡隨時隨處在窺伺著我們，我們又能如何真正地跳出這幾乎無所不在的死亡的幽谷？ ◆人間之世──莊子深知世上難免無妄之災，更難防故意之敵，但我們還是得盡量避禍，盡力解厄，同時盡心地處理好所有與我們相連相繫的人際關係；不過，當不順心不如意之事迎面而來之際，我們又當如何舉重若輕地一肩承 擔？莊子顯然有他自己的法子。 ◆真人之身──莊子不是教主，也不想開宗立派，他只是始終關心本來無價無償的生命到底該怎麼被我們認真地看待，而那「無用之用」的奧妙又有誰能真正了解？ ◆渾沌之死──就莊子看來，「渾沌」本無生亦無死；而如果說我們總是自己在「找死」，並不是死亡找上我們，這雖然看似重話，卻可能有警醒人心的作用。原來，莊子的「生命之壺」暗藏玄機，而縱然生死之謎究竟無解，但 我們又何妨放下心來，自由自在地在這世上走上一回。 ◆自然之道──莊子當然不懂現代科技，但他已經知道運用機械的後遺症。設想時下所謂的「科技新貴」能夠放下「釣魚上鉤」的念頭，靜靜地佇立水岸，觀賞那魚兒水中游，大概就將別有一番生活情趣與生命體悟。 ◆幸福之夢──莊子應該和任何人一樣，都想幸幸福福過一生，但我們到底該怎麼尋找終生的伴侶（甚至是「絕配」）？日子又該怎麼過得舒適？而和自己又能如何做一輩子的至親好友？這些問題的解答，可能就是打開那幸福之 門的鑰匙吧！ 作者：葉海煙 輔仁大學哲學博士，美國哈佛大學訪問學人、東吳大學哲學系教授兼系主任、長榮大學哲學與宗教學系教授兼系主任、台灣哲學學會會長、錢穆故居執行長、台南市哲學學會會長。現任南神神學院神學研究所專任哲學教授、國立 成功大學兼任哲學教授。專長道家哲學，當代新儒學，當代倫理學比較研究，台灣文化研究。著有《莊子的生命哲學》、《老莊哲學新論》、《道德、理性與人文的向度》、《中國哲學的倫理觀》、《人文與哲學的對話》、《傳 統倫理的現代挑戰》、《莊子的處世智慧》、《老子診療室》、《臺灣學入門》、《道家倫理學：理論與實踐》、《哲學與人生》、《哲學在哪裡》等近二十種著作。.

本书凝聚了作者一生的思考与智慧,回应的是人类生活与命运的永恒问题的挑战,杜兰特在书中就人生各个阶段,宗教,道德,种族,性,战争,艺术,科学,教育,历史以及社会制度等问题,给出了充满智慧和经过深思熟虑的 答案.

本书从人类文明发展的历史进程和人与自然的关系入手,着重对20世纪以来日益加剧的全球生态危机进行严肃反思,预警人与自然界“异化”将会导致的不堪后果。.

本书包括“‘五四之子’:文化养成和学业背景”、“西南联大七年的岁月”、“思想的自我放逐之旅”、“自由主义思想背景走向前台”、“跟着‘五四’的脚步前进”、“我不分享这个时代的价值”、“志未酬:晚年的思想 与学术”、“殷海光与后‘五四’时期中国思想的演进”八个部分。.

Current work in language models (LMs) helps us speed up or even skip thinking by accelerating and automating cognitive work. But can LMs help us with critical thinking -- thinking in deeper, more reflective ways which challenge assumptions, clarify ideas, and engineer new concepts? We treat philosophy as a case study in critical thinking, and interview 21 professional philosophers about how they engage in critical thinking and on their experiences with LMs. We find that philosophers do not find LMs to (...) be useful because they lack a sense of selfhood (memory, beliefs, consistency) and initiative (curiosity, proactivity). We propose the selfhood-initiative model for critical thinking tools to characterize this gap. Using the model, we formulate three roles LMs could play as critical thinking tools: the Interlocutor, the Monitor, and the Respondent. We hope that our work inspires LM researchers to further develop LMs as critical thinking tools and philosophers and other 'critical thinkers' to imagine intellectually substantive uses of LMs. (shrink)

This essay defends the moral permissibility, as a form of punishment, of banishment, namely the exclusion by a state of a citizen from its territory. I begin by outlining the prima facie case for banishment, consider for whom it may be appropriate, and acknowledge constraints on its permissibility. I then defend banishment against the main objections in the literature to banishment or the related measure of denationalization (stripping citizens of their citizenship): impermissible permanency; excessive severity; ineffectiveness; unfairness to those who (...) are punished and the creation of two classes of citizens; unfairness among states; and that banishment without denationalization is incompatible with the nature of citizenship. I adopt a ‘cantilever strategy’: if incarceration is permissible notwithstanding a certain objection, so is banishment. In concluding, I sympathetically discuss the view that, despite the moral permissibility of banishment, the power to banish should not be instituted because of the risk of abuse. (shrink)

Legal Judgment Prediction (LJP) is an essential component of legal assistant systems, which aims to automatically predict judgment results from a given criminal fact description. As a vital subtask of LJP, researchers have paid little attention to the numerical LJP, i.e., the prediction of imprisonment and penalty. Existing methods ignore numerical information in the criminal facts, making their performances far from satisfactory. For instance, the amount of theft varies, as do the prison terms and penalties. The major challenge is how (...) the model can obtain the ability of numerical comparison and magnitude perception, e.g., 400 < 500 < 800, 500 is closer to 400 than to 800. To this end, we propose a judicial knowledge-enhanced magnitude-aware reasoning architecture, called NumLJP, for the numerical LJP task. Specifically, we first implement a contrastive learning-based judicial knowledge selector to distinguish confusing criminal cases efficiently. Unlike previous approaches that employ the law article as external knowledge, judicial knowledge is a quantitative guideline in real scenarios. It contains many numerals (called anchors) that can construct a reference frame. Then we design a masked numeral prediction task to help the model remember these anchors to acquire legal numerical commonsense from the selected judicial knowledge. We construct a scale-based numerical graph using the anchors and numerals in facts to perform magnitude-aware numerical reasoning. Finally, the representations of fact description, judicial knowledge, and numerals are fused to make decisions. We conduct extensive experiments on three real-world datasets and select several competitive baselines. The results demonstrate that the macro-F1 of NumLJP improves by at least 9.53% and 11.57% on the prediction of penalty and imprisonment, respectively. (shrink)

This book demonstrates how a radical version of physicalism (‘No-Self Physicalism’) can offer an internally coherent and comprehensive philosophical worldview. It first argues that a coherent physicalist should explicitly treat a cognitive subject merely as a physical thing and should not vaguely assume an amorphous or even soul-like subject or self. This approach forces the physicalist to re-examine traditional core philosophical notions such as truth, analyticity, modality, apriority because our traditional understandings of them appear to be predicated on a cognitive (...) subject that is not literally just a physical thing. In turn, working on the assumption that a cognitive subject is itself completely physical, namely a neural network-based robot programmed by evolution (hence the term ‘No-Self’), the book proposes physicalistic theories on conceptual representation, truth, analyticity, modality, the nature of mathematics, epistemic justification, knowledge, apriority and intuition, as well as a physicalistic ontology. These are meant to show that this No-Self Physicalism, perhaps the most minimalistic and radical version of physicalism proposed to date, can accommodate many aspects that have traditionally interested philosophers. Given its refreshingly radical approach and painstakingly developed content, the book is of interest to anyone who is seeking a coherent philosophical worldview in this age of science. (shrink)

In Sahan et al ’s article,1 they present the ethical challenges faced by clinical laboratory scientists in genetic medicine, including labour allocation and responsibility, interpretation and accuracy of results with new technologies, and the need for better standardisation and ethical consistency. At the same time, they also propose a potential solution to the aforementioned challenges: ethical preparedness(EP). Along with their vivid case discussions and insightful analysis, I would like to propose two more points that are worth further examination and discussion (...) to aid stakeholders in better comprehending the ethical issues that clinical laboratory scientists face in the practice of genetic medicine. The case 1 reported by Sahan et al raises concerns about who should be responsible for tracking families or individuals with genetic results, particularly in the absence of mainstream services to track future risks. However, this should not be a factor influencing the decision to inform gene carriers. If there is a clear division of responsibilities in current practice, clinical laboratory scientists can report detected gene carriers without psychological burden. However, the decision to report gene carriers should be based on who is being served when clinical laboratory scientists face genetic problems in clinical practice and who is being considered when …. (shrink)

L'auteur veut mettre son ouvrage à la disposition de tous les penseurs africains et non pas seulement des philosophes. C'est en ces termes qu'il justifie la publication d'un texte par lequel il contribue à ce qu'ils sont de plus en plus nombreux à appeler «la problématique de la philosophie en Afrique». Et l'originalité, c'est précisément d'avoir opté pour la «phénoménologie» d'une question, au moment même où l'on pourrait croire soit qu'une réponse en a déjà été donnée, soit qu'il est plus (...) urgent d'y répondre. Mais ce que l'on croit perdre d'une main - la philosophie - on le récupère amplement de l'autre! Car, une fois le «questionneur» supposé de bonne foi, ou tout au moins de bonne volonté, le «questionné», lui, est un philosophe africain de formation européenne occidentale dont les attitudes possibles, face à la question posée, servent d'armature à toute la phénoménologie, et, à qui l'auteur suggère de consentir à n'être peut-être qu'un «penseur africain», mais de veiller à l'être pleinement. (shrink)

v. 1. Qian Sugeladi zhe xue yan jiu, Sugeladi ji qi zhe xue si xiang -- v. 2. Si, shi, shi.

v. 1. Qian Sugeladi zhe xue yan jiu, Sugeladi ji qi zhe xue si xiang -- v. 2. Si, shi, shi.

本书以通俗白话的形式演绎深奥的哲学问题,对于哲学定义、古人与哲学、世界观、哲学的分支等论题进行论述。.

本书内容共分:艺术思维论;艺术反映论;艺术典型化论;艺术本质特性论;艺术真实论等八章.

In lieu of an abstract, here is a brief excerpt of the content:Remarks at Harvard University Memorial Service for Benjamin I. SchwartzYu-sheng LinAmong the eminent intellectual historians in the world after World War II, Ben Schwartz was one of the most subtle and profound. He was deeply rooted in—but not confined by—the humanist tradition of Montaigne and Pascal, and this provided him with insights into the wretchedness as well as the grandeur of the human condition and with a conscious (...) Socratic moral and intellectual drive toward self-examination as a prerequisite for any inquiry into human affairs. Indeed, the distinctivecharacter of Ben's scholarship lay in his integration of morality and intellect. These humanistic resources in combination with his outstanding intellectual endowment enabled Ben to reach great heights of scholarly endeavor.To mention just a few of his many enduring achievements: Ben's thesis, advanced as early as 1951 and based on a study of the inner history of the rise of the Chinese Communist movement from a comparative perspective, developed the idea that the trajectory of Marxism eastward to Russia and China was, in fact, "a steady process of decomposition." This powerful argument has stood the test of time, whereas both the notion, on the Right, of a monolithic world communism and the idea, on the Left, of the Chinese Communist movement as the embodiment of the intellectual and moral legitimacy of Marxism fell by the wayside.His In Search of Wealth and Power: Yen Fu and the West, which offers a double mirror, with modern China illuminated by the modern West and vice versa, is a trailblazing work in intercultural intellectual history. Furthermore, The World of Thought in Ancient China, Ben's prizewinning magnum opus, which treats the whole range of ancient Chinese thought from a world-historical perspective, has achieved a methodological, no less than a historiographical, breakthrough. Ben's discussion of the need to "descend from the level of total cultural orientations to the level of shared problématiques" advances boldly beyond Max Weber's ideal-typical analysis in comparative world history. Historiographically, Ben's study of the general orientations in ancient China and their dialectical relations with the problématiques manifested in different schools of thought is the most incisive and comprehensive treatment of ancient Chinese thought to date.These great achievements derived from his ability to combine deep insights into historical realities with a humane simplicity in holding onto what is central in life. Such a simplicity was manifest in his spontaneous humility, a quality that furnished him with the moral and intellectual resources by which to develop empathetic understanding of the various strands of thought in China as well as in the West. Ben's analyses of human problems from a world-historical perspective, while characteristically erudite, subtle, complex, and at times extraordinarily brilliant, were singularly free from any trace of the influence of intellectual fashions and from any sort of [End Page 187] posturing or self-exhibition. He always struggled at the center of life and history, making the best effort to enter into the depth of human reality, drawing out its significanceas fully as he could. These great attainments were, I submit, a natural outgrowth of the strength of his moral and intellectual character, which led him to be truly open-minded and thus acutely perceptive. It was because he was so seriously interested in the study of humanity that he so seriously studied the Chinese. His universalist concerns fused with his humanist humility and thus empowered him to lift the field of Chinese studies out of its various forms of parochialism.The Confucian philosopher Xun Zi once said that the genuine scholar "explains with a humane compassion, listens with a studious attitude, and engages in disputation with an impartial mind." I know no one other than Ben Schwartz to have attained this ideal. His absolute joy in intellectual give-and-take and his delight, with his eyes gently sparkling, in reaching an understanding of a complex issue were infectious. It was indeed my good fortune and great privilege to be able to sit at the feet of Professor Schwartz. He embodied most eloquently the very essence of humanistic scholarship; his spirit is and shall always be a... (shrink)

The present research attempts to understand the importance of altruistic and egoistic values in determining consumers’ motives and intention to purchase organic foods. Using the face-to-face survey approach, a total of 1,067 responses were collected from consumers in China. Data analysis was performed using a two-step structural equation modeling approach, i.e., measurement and structural models. The findings indicated that both values influence the intention to purchase organic foods through the mediation of motives. Specifically, the altruistic value influences the environmental concern, (...) and the egoistic value influences the health concern. Moreover, the perceived uncertainty negatively moderates a relationship between consumer HC and organic purchase intention while positively moderating a relationship between consumer EC and organic purchase intention. Several implications and suggestions are also discussed. (shrink)

In lieu of an abstract, here is a brief excerpt of the content:Introduction to Benjamin I. Schwartz' "China and Contemporary Millenarianism—Something New under the Sun"Lin Yu-shengIn the spring of 1998, my colleague Mike Clover, a historian of the ancient West and an admirer of Benjamin I. Schwartz' The World of Thought in Ancient China, invited Professor Schwartz to participate, with Heiko Oberman, J. C. Heesterman, and Catherine Coquery-Vidrovitch, among others, in a conference he had been organizing on "Eurasia and Africa (...) during the Last Thousand Years." The essay that follows—the last piece of scholarly writing by Ben Schwartz, finished thirty-seven days before his passing—was read by me on his behalf at the conference, held on October 11 and 12, 1999, in Madison.From my telephone conversations with Ben in the summer of 1999, I learned that while he intended to work on a paper for the conference to be titled "The Idea of Unilinear Evolution and the Destinies of China," his attention was very much drawn to the fact of the onset in America of unbridled consumerism and materialism, whose characteristic of feeding on themselves with ever increasing intensity and widespread impact seemed to indicate to him the rise of a profoundly disturbing new phenomenon in this world. When I visited with Ben and Bunny (Mrs. Schwartz) in Cambridge on October 2 and 3, Ben was in the midst of writing an essay on what he would call the "new technological-economic millenarianism" or "materialistic apocalypticism." He said that he preferred to have me read this essay, which he would finish before the conference, rather than the one he originally intended to write. Since the conference was meant to take note of the significance of the passage of time from a world-historical perspective, the reflections by a thinker as deeply serious and searching as Ben Schwartz at the juncture of the end of the second millennium and the beginning of the third on the implications of an entirely new worldwide phenomenon as he perceived it—though having little direct bearing on China's past—would of course be most welcome at the conference.Ben's health deteriorated almost immediately after he had completed the essay on Friday, October 8, and he died on November 14, 1999. We now know from hindsight that Ben had probably felt that he might soon leave us, but he summoned enough energy not to let this happen before his completion of the essay, partly due to his sense of responsibility to deliver what he had promised and partly, and more importantly, because of the imperative he felt to issue, in the spirit of the old prophets, as his parting words, a grave warning to his fellow human beings.The essay is discursive, with many important points implied through nuance rather than formally argued. We can hardly expect more, given the physical condition of its author at the time of its writing. Although this does not, in my opinion, diminish its importance, it does demand close reading from its readers. The following is my brief attempt at this task, for whatever it may be worth. [End Page 189]To begin with, that Ben chooses to use religious language (which is related to "ultimate concerns")—words like "millenarianism" or "apocalypticism," which are ordinarily reserved for depicting the rare and drastic deliverance of humankind from "the vast burden of human suffering and despair"—as a means to explore metaphorically the nature and implications of the new consumerism and materialism is indicative of how serious he has perceived the onset of the phenomenon under consideration to be.To the extent that consumerism and materialism promise to their true believers "a totally new way of neutralizing the age-old causes of human suffering" (italics mine) through their "total attention on every aspect of human life from the techno-economic side," it is legitimate to speak of them as "materialistic apocalypticism," in that they transcend all tensions and agonies in life and elevate the true believers to a state of salvation. However, in its exclusive concern with "unalloyed, unreflective contentment" and pleasure in the self without any regard for the ethical consequences of techno-economic progress, it is a new materialism very different from... (shrink)

本书包括:中西文化之“会通和合”;写在《中国审美意识的探讨》出版之际;学者的使命;“诗言志”小注等内容。.

The “wisdom of the crowd” phenomenon refers to the finding that the aggregate of a set of proposed solutions from a group of individuals performs better than the majority of individual solutions. Most often, wisdom of the crowd effects have been investigated for problems that require single numerical estimates. We investigate whether the effect can also be observed for problems where the answer requires the coordination of multiple pieces of information. We focus on combinatorial problems such as the planar Euclidean (...) traveling salesperson problem, minimum spanning tree problem, and a spanning tree memory task. We develop aggregation methods that combine common solution fragments into a global solution and demonstrate that these aggregate solutions outperform the majority of individual solutions. These case studies suggest that the wisdom of the crowd phenomenon might be broadly applicable to problem-solving and decision-making situations that go beyond the estimation of single numbers. (shrink)