Female customers are an important market for fitness centers. This study aims to examine successful fitness training health models used by female fitness clubs. A case study approach and the interview method were used to collect data regarding the marketing strategies of female fitness clubs. Purposive sampling was employed to select executives working at the headquarters of a female-only gym, and semi-structured interviews were conducted to provide a context for fitness behaviors and to discuss the business’ marketing mix. Six managers (...) at Curves across six different positions were interviewed. This study found that Curves’ most significant difference compared to other private fitness clubs is that it makes women feel comfortable. Through charitable activities combined with promotions, women feel as if the gym empathizes with them. This study is unique in that it is one of the first studies to explore the business model of the female fitness club. In particular, this research suggests that sports organizations should focus their services strategies on female exercise demands. The findings of this study will support the development of marketing strategies to promote the growth of women’s health as a priority within the fitness industry. (shrink)

This paper considers the debate between economists and philosophers about the role of values in economic analysis by examining the recent debate between Hilary Putnam and Sir Partha Dasgupta. It argues that although there has been a failure to communicate there is much more agreement than it seems. If Dasgupta's work is seen as part of the methodological tradition expounded by John Stuart Mill and John Neville Keynes, economists and philosophers will have a better basis for understanding each other. Unlike (...) the logical-positivist tradition, which treats facts and values as two mutually exclusive concepts, the Mill- Keynes tradition recognizes that facts and values are intertwined. Unlike the Smithian tradition, which blends the study of facts and normative rules, it divides economics into a science that studies "what is" and an art which considers "what ought to be done". (shrink)

By focusing on Chinese cultural formations and critical discourses of the last decade of the century, the author dissects the intellectual, economic, and political contradictions of a turbulent era. This wide-ranging, deeply interdisciplinary work demarcates the cultural terrain by examining diverse media: film, television, avant-garde art, and literature, as well as critical theory and intellectual history.

Python language has become the most popular computer language. Python is widely adopted in computer courses. However, Python language’s effects on the college and university students’ learning performance, motivations, computer programming self-efficacy, and maladaptive cognition have still not been widely examined. The main objective of this study is to explore the effects of learning Python on students’ programming learning. The junior students of two classes in a college are the research participants. One class was taught Java language and the other (...) class was taught Python language. The learning performance, motivations, and maladaptive cognition in the two classes were compared to evaluate the differences. The results showed that the motivations, computer programming self-efficacy, and maladaptive cognition on the learning performance were significant in the Python class. The results and findings of this study can be used in Python course arrangement and development. (shrink)

Interference effects from semantically similar items are well-known in studies of single word production, where the presence of semantically similar distractor words slows picture naming. This article examines the consequences of this interference in sentence production and tests the hypothesis that in situations of high similarity-based interference, producers are more likely to omit one of the interfering elements than when there is low semantic similarity and thus low interference. This work investigated language production in Mandarin, which allows subject noun phrases (...) to be omitted in discourse contexts in which the subject entity has been previously mentioned in the discourse. We hypothesize that Mandarin speakers omit the subject more often when the subject and the object entities are conceptually similar. A corpus analysis of simple transitive sentences found higher rates of subject omission when both the subject and object were animate (potentially yielding similarity-based interference) than when the subject was animate and object was inanimate. A second study manipulated subject-object animacy in a picture description task and replicated this result: participants omitted the animate subject more often when the object was also animate than when it was inanimate. These results suggest that similarity-based interference affects sentence forms, particularly when the agent of the action is mentioned in the sentence. Alternatives and mechanisms for this effect are discussed. (shrink)

This paper discusses how the theory of evolutionary Asiacentrism and the Peking Man findings at the Zhoukoudian site stimulated Chinese intellectuals to construct Sinocentric ethno-nationalism during the period from the late 1920s to the early 1940s. It shows that the theory was first popularized by foreign scientists in Beijing, and the Peking man discoveries further provided strong evidence for the idea that Central Asia, or to be more specific, Tibet, Xinjiang, and Mongolia, was the original cradle of humans. Chinese scholars (...) in the late 1930s and 1940s appropriated the findings to construct the monogenesis theory of the Chinese, which designated that all the diverse ethnic groups within the territory of China shared a common ancestor back to antiquity. (shrink)

In the early twentieth century, with the development of Western scientific imperialism, Asia, South America, and Africa became sites for Western scientific exploration. Many paleontological specimens, including dinosaur bones, were discovered in China by foreign scientists and explorers and exported to museums in France, Sweden, and the United States. After the establishment of the Nationalist Government in Nanjing in 1927, anti-imperialist Chinese intellectuals attempted to prevent foreigners from exporting specimens unearthed on Chinese territory. In the summer of 1928, the fossils (...) discovered in the Gobi Desert by the Central Asiatic Expedition of the American Museum of Natural History were detained in China. A series of negotiations ensued between Chinese and American diplomats and scientists over the issues of the ownership of fossils and the format of international scientific collaborations. By studying the interests and stakes for players in the different social worlds involved in the dispute, this essay explores the relations among science, diplomacy, and the politics of deep time. (shrink)

Some arguments for moral vegetarianism proceed by appealing to widely held beliefs about the immorality of causing unjustified pain. Combined with the claim that meat is not needed for our nourishment and that killing animals for this reason causes them unjustified pain, they yield the conclusion that eating meat is immoral. However, what counts as a good enough reason for causing pain will depend largely on what we think about the moral status of animals. Implicit in these arguments is the (...) claim that sentience is sufficient for having moral status. These arguments, however, fail to specify the conceptual connection between the two. I argue in this paper that sentience is not sufficient for moral status. Thus, although animals experience pain as it is physically bad, their experience of it is not in itself morally bad. They are harmed in feeling pain, but this harm is not of a moral kind. This distinction parallels the more familiar distinction between moral and non-moral goods. When considered, this significantly mitigates the force of sentience-based arguments for moral vegetarianism. Since animals lack moral status, it is not wrong to eat meat, even if this is not essential to nutrition. (shrink)

Critics of industrial animal agriculture have argued that its practices are cruel, inhumane, or otherwise degrading to animals. These arguments sometimes form the basis of a larger case for the complete abolition of animal agriculture, while others argue for more modest welfare-based reforms that allow for certain types of industrial farming. This paper defends industrial farming against the charge of cruelty. As upsetting as certain practices may seem, I argue that they need not be construed as cruel or inhumane. Any (...) link between industrial farming and cruelty or inhumanity is contingent on certain cultural, behavioral, and psychological facts that are person-dependent. For many people working in animal agriculture, these facts do not obtain. To be sure, industrial animal agriculture has real moral hazards that must be carefully avoided, but all that this shows is that working with animals is not for everyone. (shrink)

As cable television channel bloomed and grew in Taiwan, more and more teenagers watched a wide variety of foreign TV programmers through hundreds of channels. The impact of this media trend among Taiwanese youth stresses the importance of research to assess whether local college students learn from foreign television programming. In this research, which supports the theoretical discussion in this paper, the nature of these learnings was analyzed as well. In general, this study aims to explore the relevant literature and (...) examine whether college students engage in critical thinking when viewing foreign television programs. This research used a popular Korean series shown in Taiwan to examine various perspectives and views related to the issue. Based from the gathered findings, college students appear to pay more critical attention to the program script, character, rhythm, plot and cultural differences. In relation to aesthetic, ideology and cultural identity issues, less response on the educational impact of the program was obtained from the participants. This confirms the claim that Taiwanese youth view television as an entertainment medium rather than an educational one. For this reason, the role of media education, specifically the integration of visual literacy and critical thinking, is highly significant to generate less passive television viewers. (shrink)

This paper explores multiple experimental interventions in molecular biology. By “multiple,” we mean that molecular biologists often use different modes of experimental interventions in a series of experiments for one and the same subject. In performing such a series of experiment, scientists may use different modes of interventions to realize plural goals such as testing given hypotheses and exploring novel phenomena. In order to illustrate this claim, we develop a framework of multiple modes of experimental interventions to analyze a series (...) of experiments for a single subject. Our argument begins with a brief characterization of Craver and Darden’s taxonomy of experiments, because the taxonomy they have made implies various modes of interventions. We propose to extract two interventional directions and two interventional effects from their taxonomy as the basis of classification. The vertical or inter-level direction means that an intervention is performed between different levels of organization and the horizontal or inter-stage direction means that an intervention is performed between different stages of a mechanism. Interventions may produce an excitatory or an inhibitory effect. As a consequence, we can classify modes of interventions according to different directions and effects. We illustrate our claims by doing a case study of the PaJaMo experiment, which is a series of experiments for a single subject. The final goal in this paper is to provide a taxonomy of characteristics of experimentation in which the PaJaMo experiment is adequately located. (shrink)

Patients with schizophrenia have a higher risk of cardiovascular diseases and higher mortality from them than does the general population; however, the underlying mechanism remains unclear. Impaired cerebral autoregulation is associated with cerebrovascular diseases and their mortality. Increased or decreased cerebral blood flow in different brain regions has been reported in patients with schizophrenia, which implies impaired cerebral autoregulation. This study investigated the cerebral autoregulation in 21 patients with schizophrenia and 23 age- and sex-matched healthy controls. None of the participants (...) had a history of cardiovascular diseases, hypertension, or diabetes. All participants underwent 10-min blood pressure and cerebral blood flow recording through finger plethysmography and Doppler ultrasonography, respectively. Cerebral autoregulation was assessed by analyzing two autoregulation indices: the mean blood pressure and cerebral blood flow correlation coefficient (Mx), and the phase shift between the waveforms of blood pressure and cerebral blood flow determined using transfer function analysis. Compared with the controls, the patients had a significantly higher Mx (0.257 vs. 0.399, p = 0.036) and lower phase shift (44.3° vs. 38.7° in the 0.07–0.20 Hz frequency band, p = 0.019), which indicated impaired maintenance of constant cerebral blood flow and a delayed cerebrovascular autoregulatory response. Impaired cerebral autoregulation may be caused by schizophrenia and may not be an artifact of coexisting medical conditions. The mechanism underlying impaired cerebral autoregulation in schizophrenia and its probable role in the development of cerebrovascular diseases require further investigation. (shrink)

An ever more aggressive anti-migration propaganda war is being waged by the majority of British media, where migration in any form is consistently portrayed on the basis of forming and consolidating a response to a security threat. While tens of thousands of migrant workers are exchanging their sweated labour for meagre wages in the 3-D jobs — dirty, dangerous and degrading — in Britain's food-processing, electronic manufacturing, catering, cleaning and hospitality industries outside any mechanism of labour protection, Britain today is (...) still declining to at least ratify the UN Convention on the Rights of Migrant Workers and Their Families in effect since last year. In the post-Morecambe debate on migration and demand for regularizing gangmasters, policing and immigration raids are seen as the quick cure for migrant labour exploitation. The argument sounds as if the only way to get rid of employers’ violation of minimum labour rights is to get rid of migrant workers. Britain has forgotten to ask — who are the migrant workers? They are the ones who sweep British roads, clean British supermarkets and serve you food in restaurants in every high street. They are the ones who sew the clothes you wear, put together your microwaves and process the British salads that you have on your dinner table everyday. Migrant workers are people you don't meet everyday but upon whom you depend. To find out about the chain of exploitation in which migrant workers live and the impact of British immigration controls that are fundamental to their lives, I lived undercover among the Chinese workers from whom I learnt a great deal. (shrink)

Before the establishment of the Cenozoic Research Laboratory in 1929, paleoanthropological research in China was mainly in the hands of foreigners, individual explorers as well as organized teams. This paper describes the development of paleoanthropology in China in the 1920s and 1930s and its transformation from the international phase to an indigenized one. It focuses on the international elite scientist network in metropolitan Beijing whose activities and discoveries led to such transformation. The bond between members of the network was built (...) on shared scientific devotion, joint field experience, and social activities. However, such scientific internationalism was not immune from imperialistic and nationalistic interests and competition as most members of the network also belonged to institutions of the dominant hegemonic powers, such as the French Paleontological Mission and the American Museum of Natural History, operating by the logic of international system of imperialism. While these foreign institutions enjoyed relatively unrestricted access to the Chinese frontier and Mongolia in the early 20th century to discover and collect for the establishment of what they saw as universal scientific knowledge, in the late 1920s rising Chinese and Mongolian nationalisms began to interpret these activities as violations to their national sovereignty. The idea of establishing a “Chinese” institute to carry out paleoanthropological research in China took shape in such milieu. This paper highlights the entanglement between scientific internationalism, imperialism, nationalism in China in the early 20th century and the complicated process of knowledge formation at various national and personal levels. (shrink)

This study investigated the interconnected relationship between playful metaphors and sex jokes at the linguistic, conceptual, and discourse levels. Two ontological conceptual metaphors and two specific-level metaphors emerged. They demonstrated that variations in the form of empty metaphors and the creative invention of metaphors are still fundamentally iconic. The conceptual representation of sex acts is closely related to the cultural and ethnic specificity embedded in folk knowledge, such as food culture, the broader context of the physical environment and historical traditions, (...) and the conception of family relationships. Metaphors in sex stories showed that the shared values of Hakka people have pragmatic and socio-cultural implications. Seen as an in-between other by their blood family and their in-laws’ family, Hakka women are under dual strict cultural disciplines for their expected behaviors as women and for their expected roles as daughters-in-law. Metaphors in sex jokes serve as covert and humorous carriers to get around the uneasiness of socially tabooed and embarrassing topics regarding Hakka women and at the same time maintain relational and social harmony. (shrink)

While the traditional economic wisdom believes that an individual will become better off by being given a larger opportunity set to choose from, in this paper we question this belief and build a formal theoretical model that introduces decision costs into the rational decision process. We show, under some reasonable conditions, that a larger feasible set may actually lower an individual’s level of satisfaction. This provides a solid economic underpinning for the Simon prediction.

This paper proposes an experiment-based methodology for both classical genetics and molecular biology by integrating Lindley Darden’s mechanism-centered approach and C. Kenneth Waters’s phenomenon-centered approach. We argue that the methodology basing on experiments offers a satisfactory account of the development of the two biological disciplines. The methodology considers discovery of new mechanisms, investigation of new phenomena, and construction of new theories together, in which experiments play a central role. Experimentation connects the three type of conduct, which work as both ends (...) and means, occurring in a circular way and constituting an overall process of scientific practice from classical genetics to molecular biology. (shrink)

Brian Simon (1915–2002) was a leading advocate of comprehensive education in the second half of the twentieth century in Britain. In the 1980s, in the face of the ideological offensive from the New Right, he firmly stood by Marxist ideals and resolutely resisted policies of the right-wing leading to the 1988 Education Reform Act. Despite this rigorous campaigning that differed from that of the Labour Party, Simon’s significance has never been properly explored. In view of this, this paper aims to (...) fill the gap by exploring Simon’s distinctive contribution to the defence of comprehensive education in the 1980s. (shrink)

Students often face challenges while learning computer programming because programming languages’ logic and visual presentations differ from human thought processes. If the course content does not closely match learners’ skill level, the learner cannot follow the learning process, resulting in frustration, low learning motivation, or abandonment. This research proposes a web programming learning recommendation system to provide students with personalized guidance and step-by-step learning planning. The system contains front-end and back-end web development instructions. It can create personalized learning paths to (...) help learners achieve a sense of accomplishment. The system can help learners build self-confidence and improve learning effectiveness. In study 1, the recommendation system was developed based on the personal data and feedback of 41 professional web design engineers. The system uses C4.5 decision tree methods to develop a programming learning recommendation model to provide appropriate learning recommendations and establish personalized learning paths. The test group included 13 beginner programmers. After 4 weeks’ programming instructions in front-end and back-end web development, the learners were interviewed to understand their preferences and learning effectiveness. The results show that the effectiveness of the recommendation system is acceptable. In study 2, online real-time feedback and adaptive instruction platform is developed, which is different from the past adaptive curriculums mainly using the Internet platform and only the submitted assignments to determine the newly recommended learning process for students. The study found that the students’ learning performance in the adaptive instruction group is better than those in the fixed instruction group. (shrink)

The goal of this article is to provide a slightly different spin on economists' use of the positive-normative distinction by providing some context for its use. The major difference is the following: philosophers and philosophically oriented economists, such as Hilary Putnam and John Davis, see the positive-normative distinction in economics as following from the logical positivist position, and they interpret comments made by economists as reflecting scientific methodological positions that have long since been repudiated by philosophers of science. This article (...) argues that economists' use of the positive-normative distinction developed from the Mill–Keynes methodological tradition, which did not hold logical positivist views. Instead, it had pragmatic purposes and was designed to encourage economists to be more modest in their claims for the implications of economic theory. We conclude by arguing that economist's current use of the positive-normative distinction is problematic, as Davis suggests, but th.. (shrink)

In an earlier paper, I defended the moral permissibility of eating meat against sentience-based arguments for moral vegetarianism. The crux of my argument was that sentience is not an intrinsically morally salient property, and that animals lack moral status because they lack a root capacity for rational agency. Accordingly, it is morally permissible to consume meat even if doing so is not strictly necessary for our nutrition. This paper responds to critiques of my argument by Bruers :705–717, 2015) and Erdös. (...) I then show that their criticisms are easily dispatched and therefore fail to undermine my defense of meat consumption. (shrink)

Emotion is closely associated with language, but we know very little about how children express emotion in their own writing. We used a large‐scale, cross‐sectional, and data‐driven approach to investigate emotional expression via writing in children of different ages, and whether it varies for boys and girls. We first used a lexicon‐based bag‐of‐words approach to identify emotional content in a large corpus of stories (N>100,000) written by 7‐ to 13‐year‐old children. Generalized Additive Models were then used to model changes in (...) sentiment across age and gender. Two other machine learning approaches (BERT and TextBlob) validated and extended these analyses, converging on the finding that positive sentiments in children's writing decrease with age. These findings echo reports from previous studies showing a decrease in mood and an increased use of negative emotion words with age. We also found that stories by girls contained more positive sentiments than stories by boys. Our study shows the utility of large‐scale data‐driven approaches to reveal the content and nature of children's writing. Future experimental work should build on these observations to understand the likely complex relationships between written language and emotion, and how these change over development. (shrink)

The moral right to keep and bear arms is entailed by the moral right of self-defense. We argue that the ownership and use of firearms is a reasonable means of exercising these rights. Given their defensive value, there is a strong presumption in favor of enacting civil rights to keep and bear arms ranging from handguns to ‘assault rifles.’ Thus, states are morally obliged as a matter of justice to recognize basic liberties for firearm ownership and usage. Throughout this paper (...) we build upon the relevant criminological and social science research in addition to the work of other philosophers who have in recent years argued in favor of gun rights. Although we believe the statistical evidence supports our case, our argument is primarily non-consequentialist. We do, however, address consequentialist objections in the last section of this paper. (shrink)

Arguments in favor of an individual moral right to keep and bear firearms typically appeal to the value of guns as a reasonable means of self-defense. This is, for the most part, an empirical claim. If it were shown that allowing private gun ownership would lead to an overall net increase in crime or other social harms, then the strength of a putative right to own a gun would be diminished. But would it be defeated completely? I do not think (...) so, and indeed I want to suggest in this paper that even if the harms outweigh the benefits, that neither an outright ban on handguns nor restrictive discretionary ownership policies are justified as an initial reaction. In other words, given that the overall harms outweigh the overall benefits, the default position is still one in favor of reasonably permissive gun laws over a total ban or restrictive discretionary policies. (shrink)