A geometric lattice is the lattice of closed subsets of a closure operator on a set which is zero-closure, algebraic, atomistic and which has the so-called exchange property. There are many profound results about this type of lattices, the most recent one of which, due to Czédli and Schimdt, says that a lattice L of finite length is semimodular if and only if L has a cover-preserving embedding into a geometric lattice G of the same length. The goal of our (...) paper is to offer the following result: a lattice of finite length is semimodular if and only if every cell in L is a 4-element Boolean lattice and the 7-element non-distributive atomistic lattice having 3 atoms is not a cover-preserving sublattice of L. (shrink)

The category \(\mathbb {DRDL}{'}\), whose objects are c-differential residuated distributive lattices satisfying the condition \(\textbf{CK}\), is the image of the category \(\mathbb {RDL}\), whose objects are residuated distributive lattices, under the categorical equivalence \(\textbf{K}\) that is constructed in Castiglioni et al. (Stud Log 90:93–124, 2008). In this paper, we introduce weak monadic residuated lattices and study some of their subvarieties. In particular, we use the functor \(\textbf{K}\) to relate the category \(\mathbb {WMRDL}\), whose objects are weak monadic residuated distributive lattices, (...) and the category \(\mathbb {WMDRDL}{'}\), whose objects are pairs formed by an object of \(\mathbb {DRDL}{'}\) and a center weak universal quantifier. (shrink)

Prior research on citizenship behavior has mainly focused on its voluntary side—organizational citizenship behavior. Unfortunately, although compulsory behavior is a global organizational phenomenon, the involuntary side of CB—compulsory citizenship behavior, defined as employees’ involuntary engagement in extra-role work activities that are beneficial to the organization : 77–93, 2006)—has long been neglected and very little is known about its potential negative consequences. Particularly, research on CCB–counterproductive work behavior association is still in its nascent stage. Therefore, drawing on moral disengagement theory and (...) social exchange theory, we firstly attempt to systematically investigate how and when CCB leads to CWB. Specifically, we see employee silence as a critical form of passive CWB and propose a moderated mediation model. In the model, CCB predicts silence through MD—a set of cognitive mechanisms that deactivate moral self-regulatory processes, with the Chinese culture-specific concept of supervisor–subordinate guanxi, which captures the supervisor–subordinate non-work-related personal ties, acting as the contextual condition. Two-wave data collected from a sample of 293 employees in 17 manufacturing firms in China supported our hypotheses. The results revealed that the more employees experienced compulsory feelings caused by CCB, the more they morally disengaged and, in turn, resorted to avoidant or passive responses as a coping strategy. Further, s–s guanxi serves as a reverse moderator in that high s–s guanxi mitigates the destructive impact of CCB, makes employees less inclined to morally disengage, and thereby largely prevents them from practicing workplace silence behavior. Implications for theory and intervention strategies for practice are discussed. We also propose several promising avenues for future research. (shrink)

Management literature has repeatedly shown that an absence of voice can have serious negative influences on team and organization performance. However, employees often withhold suggestions or advices when they have ideas, concerns, or opinions. The present study proposes leader behavioral integrity as a key antecedent of employee voice, and investigates how and when leader behavioral integrity influences employee voice. Specifically, we argue that leader behavioral integrity affects employee voice via team independence climate. In addition, we propose a moderating effect of (...) corporate ethical values. The results from a study of 134 managers and 408 employees provide support for this moderated mediation model. Leader behavioral integrity positively affects employee voice via team independence climate, but only when ethical values are emphasized in organizations. These results suggest that leader behavioral integrity, along with team independence climate and corporate ethical values, is very important for fostering employee voice. (shrink)

Humility and modesty are both emphasized in Eastern and Western societies. However, people usually conflate them in everyday usage. To reduce the confusion of the two constructs, it is very vital to carefully differentiate the two constructs and examine whether they lead to similar or different effects on job performance. In this study, we scrutinized the effects of the two constructs on four dimensions of job performance simultaneously, including task performance, citizenship behavior, unethical pro-organizational behavior, and innovative behavior. Using a (...) dataset of 239 employees and 77 supervisors, we showed that modesty is not related to task performance and voicing, but that it is positively related to unethical pro-organizational behavior and negatively related to helping and innovative behavior. In contrast, we showed that humility is negatively related to unethical pro-organizational behavior and positively related to task performance, helping, voicing, and innovative behavior. Our findings reveal that modesty and humility can lead to very divergent work outcomes. The results strongly support the idea that modesty and humility are distinct constructs embedded in separate nomological networks and strongly suggest that organizations should encourage employees’ humility rather than modesty. The theoretical and practical implications of this work are discussed. (shrink)

The current COVID-19 pandemic and the previous SARS/MERS outbreaks of 2003 and 2012 have resulted in a series of major global public health crises. We argue that in the interest of developing effective and safe vaccines and drugs and to better understand coronaviruses and associated disease mechenisms it is necessary to integrate the large and exponentially growing body of heterogeneous coronavirus data. Ontologies play an important role in standard-based knowledge and data representation, integration, sharing, and analysis. Accordingly, we initiated the (...) development of the community-based Coronavirus Infectious Disease Ontology in early 2020. -/- As an Open Biomedical Ontology (OBO) library ontology, CIDO is open source and interoperable with other existing OBO ontologies. CIDO is aligned with the Basic Formal Ontology and Viral Infectious Disease Ontology. CIDO has imported terms from over 30 OBO ontologies. For example, CIDO imports all SARS-CoV-2 protein terms from the Protein Ontology, COVID-19-related phenotype terms from the Human Phenotype Ontology, and over 100 COVID-19 terms for vaccines (both authorized and in clinical trial) from the Vaccine Ontology. CIDO systematically represents variants of SARS-CoV-2 viruses and over 300 amino acid substitutions therein, along with over 300 diagnostic kits and methods. CIDO also describes hundreds of host-coronavirus protein-protein interactions (PPIs) and the drugs that target proteins in these PPIs. CIDO has been used to model COVID-19 related phenomena in areas such as epidemiology. The scope of CIDO was evaluated by visual analysis supported by a summarization network method. CIDO has been used in various applications such as term standardization, inference, natural language processing (NLP) and clinical data integration. We have applied the amino acid variant knowledge present in CIDO to analyze differences between SARS-CoV-2 Delta and Omicron variants. CIDO's integrative host-coronavirus PPIs and drug-target knowledge has also been used to support drug repurposing for COVID-19 treatment. -/- CIDO represents entities and relations in the domain of coronavirus diseases with a special focus on COVID-19. It supports shared knowledge representation, data and metadata standardization and integration, and has been used in a range of applications. (shrink)

This study explored the relationship between the integrity of the supervisor and the manager and the creativity of employees who are below the supervisor. Drawing on social learning theory, we proposed a moderated mediation model for the trickle-down effects of perceived supervisor integrity. Using a sample of 716 employees and their supervisors, we found positive associations between both managers’ and supervisors’ integrity and employee creativity. Supervisors’ integrity partially mediates the relationship between managers’ integrity and employee creativity. In addition, supervisors’ perceptions (...) of professional ethical standards moderate the indirect effects of the managers’ integrity on employee creativity. Theoretical and managerial implications are discussed. (shrink)

ObjectiveTo investigate the influence of quality of life on unhealthy emotions as well as relevant factors among patients with endometriosis for supporting relevant clinical care.MethodsA convenience sampling method was used to administer questionnaires to 139 patients with endometriosis, using the Hamilton Anxiety Inventory, the Depression Anxiety Scale, and the SF-12 Health Survey Short Form, and the results were analyzed. The SPSS20.0 software was used for statistical analysis on relevant data. If P < 0.05, there was statistical significance.ResultsTwelve-Item Short Form for (...) health survey covered two comprehensive indexes, i.e., physical component summary and mental component summary scores. MCS score was the main factor influencing anxiety and depression in patients with endometriosis; the higher the MCS score, the lower the anxiety and depression degrees in patients with endometriosis. PCS score was a factor influencing anxiety degree; the higher the PCS score, the lower the anxiety degree.ConclusionThe QOL of patients with endometriosis is negatively correlated with anxiety and depression. Therefore, improvement in QOL may help relevant patients to relieve their unhealthy emotions. (shrink)

Resumen: La deportividad china es la esencia de los deportes chinos y el espíritu nacional, y el alma y la esencia de los deportes chinos. En realidad, la gente entiende la deportividad como una forma de ejercicio desligada del nivel espiritual, descuidando el valor espiritual equiparable al ejercicio físico, ocultando sus profundas connotaciones espirituales y arrinconando el espíritu deportivo, lejos de la “valentía”. del alma y la vitalidad del cuerpo” de los deportes. Se han explorado y examinado los fundamentos filosóficos (...) y el desarrollo histórico de la deportividad china, con el objetivo de comprender la profunda connotación y el valor de la deportividad china. Desde la fundación de la República Popular China, el espíritu de los deportes chinos ha desempeñado un papel de liderazgo especial en China y ha sido ampliamente reconocido y afirmado por el Comité Central del Partido y diversas clases sociales. Sin embargo, la comprensión de la gente al respecto no es lo suficientemente profunda y se encuentra sólo en la etapa de investigación preliminar. Para adaptarse a diversas necesidades, la exploración en profundidad del examen filosófico de la deportividad china tiene un valor teórico y una importancia práctica significativos. La deportividad china no se trata sólo de ejercicio físico, sino que también enfatiza la armonía física y mental, el cultivo tanto interno como externo, y la búsqueda de un estado de placer y comodidad físico y mental. La deportividad china está en consonancia con los pensamientos filosóficos tradicionales chinos como la “armonía entre el cielo y el hombre” y la armonía social. (shrink)

Presently, the State Grid Corporation of China has accumulated a large amount of maintenance records for power primary equipment. Unfortunately, most of these records are unstructured data which lead to difficultly analyze and utilize them. The emergence of natural language processing technology and deep learning methods provide a solution for unstructured text data. This paper proposes a progressive multitype feature fusion model to recognize Chinese named entity of unstructured maintenance records for power primary equipment. Firstly, the textual characteristics and word (...) separation difficulties of maintenance records are analyzed, then 7 main entity categories of power technical terms from unstructured maintenance records are chosen, and 3452 maintenance records are labeled by these categories, which is so called EPE-MR training dataset. Secondly, the standard test reports, standard maintenance, and fault analysis reports for three types of power primary equipment are employed as corpus to train character embedding in order to obtain certain words representation ability of maintenance records. After that, progressive multilevel radicals feature extraction module is designed to get detailed and fine semantic information in a hierarchical manner. Further, radicals feature representation and character embedding are concatenated and sent to BiLSTM module to extract contextual information in order to improve Chinese entity recognition ability. Moreover, CRF is introduced to handle the dependencies among prediction labels and to output the optimal prediction sequence, which can easily obtain structured data of maintenance records. Finally, comparative experiments on public MSRA dataset, China People’s Daily corpus, and EPE-MR dataset are implemented, respectively, which show the effectiveness of the proposed method. (shrink)

Accurate and rapid defect identification based on pulsed eddy current testing plays an important role in the structural integrity and health monitoring of in-service equipment in the renewable energy system. However, in conventional data-driven defect identification methods, the signal feature extraction is time consuming and requires expert experience. To avoid the difficulty of manual feature extraction and overcome the shortcomings of the classic deep convolutional network, such as large memory and high computational cost, an intelligent defect recognition pipeline based on (...) the general Warblet transform method and optimized two-dimensional DCNN is proposed. The GWT method is used to convert the one-dimensional PECT signal to a 2D grayscale image used as the input of 2D DCNN. A compound method is proposed to optimize the baseline VGG16, a well-known DCNN, from four aspects including reducing the input size, adding batch normalization layer after every convolutional layer and fully connection layer, simplifying the FCs, and removing unimportant filters in Convs so as to reduce memory and computational costs while improving accuracy. Through a pulsed eddy current testing experiment considering interference factors including liftoff and noise, the following conclusion can be obtained. The time-frequency representation obtained by the GWT method not only has excellent ability in terms of the transient component analysis but also is less affected by the reduction of image size; the proposed optimized DCNN can accurately identify defect types without manual feature extraction. And compared to the baseline VGG16, the accuracy obtained by the optimized DCNN is improved by 7%, to about 99.58%, and the memory and computational cost are reduced by 98%. Moreover, compared with other well-known DCNNs, such as GoogLeNet, Inception V3, ResNet50, and AlexNet, the optimized network has significant advantages in terms of accuracy and computational cost, too. (shrink)

Photovoltaic power forecasting can provide strong support for the safe operation of the power system. Existing forecasting methods are ineffective for grid scheduling decisions or risk analysis. The novel multicluster interval prediction method is proposed to consider the volatility and randomness of PV power output. First, this method utilizes the sparse autoencoder and Bayesian regularized NARX network for point forecasting of PV power. Second, density peak clustering improved by kernel Mahalanobis distance is applied to classify the dataset into multiple clusters, (...) including forecasting error and meteorological factors. Finally, the joint probability density is established by multivariate kernel density estimation to accomplish the PV power interval prediction. The proposed hybrid method is applied for the interval prediction of PV power at Yulara, Australia. Comparative research of point forecasting is implemented to evaluate the machine learning and deep learning methods, with the proposed SAE-BRNARX under four different periods. Results shows that the average values of nRMSE, MRE, nMAE, and R2 for the four periods are 4.45%, 0.90%, −0.15%, 3.39%, and 95.93%, respectively. Moreover, the results of interval prediction obtained by the other interval prediction approaches are compared with the proposed KMDDPC-MKDE. It shows that the average values of PICP, PINAW, ACE, and nMPICD for four periods are 93.93%, 9.50%, 3.93%, and 7.10% at 90% confidence level, respectively. Outcomes demonstrate that the proposed method can obtain more accuracy, a higher coverage rate, narrower average bandwidth, and a closer distance between the middle of interval and actual value than other methods. (shrink)

Many studies have shown that about three biological motions can be maintained in working memory. However, no study has yet analyzed the difficulties of experiment materials used, which partially affect the ecological validity of the experiment results. We use the perspective of system anatomy to decompose BM, and thoroughly explore the influencing factors of difficulties of BMs, including presentation duration, joints to execute motions, limbs to execute motions, type of articulation interference tasks, and number of joints and planes involved in (...) the BM. We apply the change detection paradigm supplemented by the articulation interference task to measure the BM working memory capacity of participants. Findings show the following: the shorter the presentation duration, the less participants remembered; the more their wrist moved, the less accurate their memory was; repeating verbs provided better results than did repeating numerals to suppress verbal encoding; the more complex the BM, the less participants remembered; and whether the action was executed by the handed limbs did not affect the WMC. These results indicate that there are many factors that can be used to adjust BM memory load. These factors can help sports psychology professionals to better evaluate the difficulty of BMs, and can also partially explain the differences in estimations of BM WMC in previous studies. (shrink)

本书选录历代著名作家对龙舟竞技活动进行表现的诗文作品,介绍作者生平,注解难点字词,并对作品艺术手法、思想进行评论等。.

Public welfare fundraising has been used to collect donations for medical supplies and has played an important role in the fight against the COVID-19 pandemic. This paper studies online crowdfunding donations from the Alumni Association of Wuhan University to North American alumni; donation data are used to investigate how individuals' donation behavior is affected by the previous donation amount and information provided by the fundraising platform. First, our results show that one's donation amount is positively affected by the previous donation (...) amount. Second, the donor's positive sentiment in the message that he or she leaves, as measured by either natural language processing or a manual rating, can affect the subsequent anonymity and messages but not the subsequent donation amount. Third, anonymous donations are much smaller than non-anonymous donations. (shrink)

This paper argues that the concept of primal wonder in P4C, proposed by Thomas E. Jackson, can be seen as a “sprout” or seed of intellectual virtue. My understanding of his insight is inspired by Mengzi’s view of moral cultivation and Aristotle’s eudaimonist account of virtue ethics. According to Mengzi, all humans possess four innate sprouts of virtue, and the aim of moral education is to nurture these moral sprouts so that they can grow up into fully ripened virtues. In (...) terms of P4C, Jackson contends that all of us are born already with a special feeling of wonder which he refers to as “primal wonder”. Synthesizing his statement with Mengzi’s agricultural metaphor of moral sprouts, I shall take one step forward by arguing that the innate sense of wonder within every child can be seen as a sprout of virtue. Additionally, once children’s primal wonder has been transformed into a virtue through implementing P4C in the classroom, this admirable character trait, I suggest, should be understood as an intellectual virtue according to Aristotelian virtue ethics. This is because the virtue of wonder can promote children’s intellectual flourishing, which is fully endorsed by Aristotle’s contention that the happiest kind of life is a philosophical one, and that philosophy begins in wonder. In short, if primal wonder as a sprout of intellectual virtue can lead to the highest good for human beings, then one of the main educational goals of doing philosophy with children, I suggest, is to turn their primal wonder into a virtuous habit so that they can live an examined life. (shrink)

To discern the indiscernibles is the main purpose of Danto’s philosophy of art. Influenced by analytical philosophy, Zen Buddhism, and symbolism, three ways of discernment can be identified in Danto’s text: the external discernment, the internal discernment, and the middle discernment, which, roughly speaking, mean a discernment by means of examining the object, self-reflection or enlightenment, and the relation between experience and expression, in Danto’s terms, the aboutness and embodiment, respectively. However, neither analytic philosophy and its external discernment nor Zen (...) and its internal discernment can distinguish the indiscernible indeed, only symbolism and its middle discernment have the potential to do so. Unfortunately, Danto was so indulged in analytical philosophy and Zen that he could not see this promise from symbolism. (shrink)

A closer look at Wilhelm Ostwald's articles that originally proposed the concept of autocatalysis reveals that he accepted reactants, not just products, as potential autocatalysts. Therefore, that a process is catalyzed by some of its products, which is the common definition of autocatalysis, is only a proper subset of what Ostwald meant by “Autokatalyse.” As a result, it is necessary to reconsider the definition of autocatalysis, which is especially important for origins‐of‐life research because autocatalysis provides an abiotic mechanism that yields (...) reproduction‐like dynamics. Here, we translate and briefly review the two key publications on autocatalysis by Ostwald to revive his understanding of autocatalysis, and we introduce the concepts of recessive and expansive autocatalysis. Then we discuss the twofold significance of such a revival: first, facilitating the search for candidate processes underlying the origins of life, and second, updating our view of autocatalysis in complex reaction networks and metabolism. (shrink)

The relationships between age and the life-supporting treatments use, and between gender and the life-supporting treatments use are still controversial. Using extracorporeal membrane oxygenation as an example of life-supporting treatments, the objectives of this study were: to examine the relationship between age and the extracorporeal membrane oxygenation use; to examine the relationship between age and the extracorporeal membrane oxygenation use; and to deliberate the ethical and societal implications of age and gender disparities in the initiation of extracorporeal membrane oxygenation. This (...) is a population-based, retrospective cohort study. Taiwan’s extracorporeal membrane oxygenation cases from 2000 to 2010 were collected. The annual incidence rate of extracorporeal membrane oxygenation use adjusting for both age and gender distribution for each year from 2000 to 2010 was derived using the population of 2000 as the reference population. The trend of extracorporeal membrane oxygenation use was examined using time-series linear regression analysis. We conducted joinpoint regression for estimating the trend change of extracorporeal membrane oxygenation use. The trends of extracorporeal membrane oxygenation use both for different gender groups, and for different age groups have been significantly increasing over time. Men were more likely to be supported by extracorporeal membrane oxygenation than women. Women’s perspectives toward life and death, and women’s perception of well-being may be associated with the phenomenon. In addition, the patients at the age of 65 or older were more likely to be supported by extracorporeal membrane oxygenation than those younger than 65. Family autonomy/family-determination, and the Confucian tradition of filial piety and respecting elders may account for this phenomenon. This study showed gender and age disparities in the initiation of extracorporeal membrane oxygenation use in Taiwan, which may be accounted for by the cultural and societal values in Taiwan. For a healthcare professional who deals with patients’/family members’ medical decision-making to initiate life-supporting treatments, he/she should be sensitive not only to the legality, but also the societal and ethical issues involved. (shrink)

本文通过对德国著名汉学家、翻译家卫礼贤的最后一部哲学论著《中国哲学导 论》(1929)的翻译和研究,整理归纳了卫礼贤对中国哲学的核心词“道”的五种不同译法, 深入剖析了他如何用“一词多译”的方法,对中国哲学史上不同文本、不同哲学家、不同时代 及不同思想维度中的“道”进行诠释。同时,本文以术语学(Terminologie)为研究方法,聚焦 于卫礼贤用来翻译“道”的几个德语哲学术语,并对这些词汇进行溯源。以此为切入点, 本文 分析了卫礼贤作为对中国哲学与德国哲学均有深刻理解的汉学家,有意识地从跨文化比较哲学 的角度出发,将“道”转换为德国哲学中与之相匹配的哲学概念,并将其介绍给德国思想界的 路径。重新审视卫礼贤对“道”的“一词多译”,在加强当今中外文化互鉴和中文著作外译方面 具有积极且重要的作用。[This contribution is based on the translation and study of the book Chinesische Philosophie: Eine Einführung (Chinese Philosophy: An Introduction, 1929). It is the last philosophy-related work by the famous German sinologist and translator Richard Wilhelm. The article provides a compilation, summary, and in-depth analysis concerning Wilhelm's handling of the translation of "Dao", the "Urwort" (Heidegger) of Chinese philosophy. The study provides insight into how Wilhelm has used a poly-perspective method to (...) interpret the word “Dao" by using five different translation terms in relation to divergent texts, various philosophers, and different periods in the history of Chinese philosophy. Some of the German philosophical terms that were applied in these translations are investigated by tracing their etymological origins and general semantics. Richard Wilhelm was a sinologist with a deep understanding of both Chinese and German philosophical traditions. He deliberately imparted the different philosophical meanings of "Dao" in a way that was compatible with the context of the contemporary German intellectual community. In parts, he presented this semantic field from the perspective of transcultural philosophy. We believe that a re-examination of Richard Wilhelm's variational approaches to translate the term "Dao" can provide important methodological inspirations for the translation of complex Chinese texts as well as concerning the improvement of mutual cultural understanding between Chinese and other cultures.]. (shrink)

One purpose of cognitive diagnostic model is designed to make inferences about unobserved latent classes based on observed item responses. A heuristic for test construction based on the CDM information index proposed by Henson and Douglas has a far-reaching impact, but there are still many shortcomings. He and other researchers had also proposed new methods to improve or overcome the inherent shortcomings of the CDI test assembly method. In this study, one test assembly method of maximizing the minimum inter-class distance (...) is proposed by using mixed-integer linear programming, which aims to overcome the shortcomings that the CDI method is limited to summarize the discriminating power of each item into a single CDI index while neglecting the discriminating power for each pair of latent classes. The simulation results show that compared with the CDI test assembly and random test assembly, the new test assembly method performs well and has the highest accuracy rate in terms of pattern and attributes correct classification rates. Although the accuracy rate of the new method is not very high under item constraints, it is still higher than the CDI test assembly with the same constraints. (shrink)

The common understanding of Chuang-Tzu as one of the earliest deconstructionists is only half true. This article sets out to challenge conventional characterizations of Chuang-Tzu by adding the important caveat that not only is he a philosophical deconstructionist but that his writings also reveal a non-relativistic, transcendental basis to understanding. The road to such understanding, as argued by this author, can be found in Chuang-Tzu’s emphasis on the illusory or dream-like nature of the self and, by extension, the subject-object dichotomy (...) inherent in all forms of conceptualization and descriptive language. These two obstacles to true understanding - the self and literal, linguistic expressions - are overcome in the Chuang-Tzu by implementing metaphorical and poetic language, such as the Kun-Peng myth, the swamp pheasant parable, the introduction of physically deformed interlocutors, various dream analogies, and so forth. By employing such literary devices in a comprehensible and non-mystical manner, this article concludes that Chuang-Tzu successfully communicates his essential wisdom by guiding the reader to a higher state of spiritual awareness, a state in which one transcends the self, language, conceptual paradoxes, and even the idea of transcendence itself. Consequently, through the following explication of Chuang-Tzu’s complementary emphasis on both preventing mental rigidity and promoting spiritual transcendence, this article seeks to earn Chuang-Tzu the reputation of a deconstructionist with a difference. (shrink)

Animation is widely acknowledged for dynamically visualizing information and has been increasingly used in educational context. However, the growing presence of educational animation has not been accompanied by well-informed studies that focus on the semiotic features of animation. An emerging perspective influenced by Social Semiotics and Systemic Functional Linguistics greatly complements the current trend of animation studies in the field of science education. Studies taking that perspective model animation as stratified systems (consisting of an expression plane and a content plane) (...) of meaning-making options. Building on their work, this paper further develops the systems of animation on the two planes. Besides the concept of stratification, this paper also introduces a metafunctional perspective for the modeling of animation, focusing on building the ideational meaning system and textual meaning system for animation on the content plane based on an examination of online science animations. It is found that educational animation is not homogenous: animation can construe different human experience and can be used to fulfill different functions. The paper closes with a discussion of the advantages of adopting a stratified metafunctional model in studying animation and the implications for future studies in the field of multimodal semiotics and science education. (shrink)

Australia has experienced difficulties engaging with Asia-Pacific regional integration. Despite Australian attempts to punch above its weight in regional forums and to be a regional leader, it is still not regarded as a full member or as quite fitting into the region. It is an in the Asian context, and has experienced the of being neither here nor there. The former Rudd government's proposal for an (APC) by the year 2020 was a substantive initiative in Australia's ongoing engagement with Asia. (...) It has, however, attracted a high level of criticism both at home and abroad. The main critical analysis of the proposal has focused on institutional building or architecture, or its relationship with existing regional institutions, but overlooks a host of often fraught questions about culture, norms, identities, and international power relations. The APC concept needs to be scrutinized in terms of these questions with a critical eye. This paper examines the cultural, cognitive, and normative dimensions of Rudd's proposal. It analyses four dilemmas or awkward problems that the APC faces. (shrink)

In the world of social media, people are free to choose names based on their preferences, which may potentially reflect certain levels of uniqueness. In this study, we have attempted to explore the possibility of applying the ecological theory of individualism/collectivism in the context of social media. We, thus, examined provincial variations in the uniqueness of nicknames among more than 13 million Sina Weibo users. Initially, the nickname uniqueness indicator was set at the provincial level. It was found that the (...) uniqueness of nicknames was the highest in provinces with temperate climates, for example Guangdong, and the lowest in provinces with demanding climate, such as Ningxia. Regression analysis results partially supported that inhabitants in provinces with temperate climate were more likely to use unique nicknames on social media compared to those from harsh climate. This finding is significant in terms of ecology. (shrink)

Influenced by the example of China, a literature is emerging that advocates a modernized version of Confucian meritocracy, often as an alternative to liberal democracy and even democracy itself. We...

This paper’s core concern is Boris Groys’ theory of the total art of Stalinism, which is devoted to rewriting Soviet art history and reinterpreting Socialist Realism from the perspective of the equal rights between political and artistic Art Power. The aim of this article is to decode Groys and the total art of Stalinism, based on answering the following three questions: 1) why did Groys want to rewrite Soviet art history? 2) How did Groys re-narrate Soviet art history? 3) What (...) are the pros and cons of his reordering of the total art of Stalinism? Groys offers an effective paradigm that could rethink two theoretical genres: a) other Socialist Realisms inside or outside the Soviet bloc, during or after the Soviet era; b) the aesthetical rights of political artworks before, during and after the Cold War, and the historical debates about art, especially about art for art’s sake, or art for political propaganda. However, Groys’ total art of Stalinism and its core theory of the Socialist Realism frame hides some dangers of aestheticizing Stalin and Stalinism. (shrink)

Since the first successful attempt to clone a dog in 2005, dogs have been cloned by Somatic Cell Nuclear Transfer for a variety of purposes. One of these is to clone dogs as companion animals. In this paper we discuss some of the ethical implications that cloning companion dogs through SCNT encompasses, specifically in relation to human–dog relationships, but also regarding animal welfare and animal integrity. We argue that insofar as we understand the relationship with our companion dogs as one (...) of friendship, the meaningfulness of cloning a companion dog is seriously questionable. Cloning may both disrupt the uniqueness of the relationship, as the shared history underlying the relationship can neither be repeated nor copied, and it may violate the meaning we attribute to friendship, as the notion of singularity inherent in our understanding of friendship is incompatible with the replaceability embedded in the practice of cloning. We further argue that the application of cloning technology to companion dogs can be interpreted as a violation of the integrity of dogs on at least two accounts: negative welfare implications associated with the cloning process, and the instrumentalisation of the dog inherent in cloning. (shrink)

This study investigated the differences between past and future temporal discounting in terms of neural activity in relation to temporal distance. Results show that brain regions are engaged differently in past and future temporal discounting. This is likely because past temporal discounting requires memory reconstruction, whereas future temporal discounting requires the processing of uncertainty about the future. In past temporal discounting, neural activity differed only when preferences were made between rewards received one hour prior and rewards received further in the (...) past. The peak amplitudes of P2 and P3 varied as the temporal distance increased from 2 weeks to 50 years. In future temporal discounting, neural activity differed only when preferences were evaluated between two delayed rewards. The delay conditions and had a significant influence on P2 and N2. Findings indicate the existence of different decision-making systems operating in past and future temporal discounting. (shrink)

OBJECTIVE: To report and analyse the pattern of end-of-life decision making for terminal Chinese cancer patients. DESIGN: Retrospective descriptive study. SETTING: A cancer clinical trials unit in a large teaching hospital. PATIENTS: From April 1992 to August 1997, 177 consecutive deaths of cancer clinical trial patients were studied. MAIN MEASUREMENT: Basic demographic data, patient status at the time of signing a DNR consent, or at the moment of returning home to die are documented, and circumstances surrounding these events evaluated. RESULTS: (...) DNR orders were written for 64.4% of patients. Patients in pain (odds ratio 0.45, 95% CI 0.22-0.89), especially if requiring opioid analgesia (odds ratio 0.40, 95% CI 0.21-0.77), were factors associated with a higher probability of such an order. Thirty-five patients were taken home to die, a more likely occurrence if the patient was over 75 years (odds ratio 0.12, 95% CI 0.04-0.34), had children (odds ratio 0.14, 95% CI 0.02-0.79), had Taiwanese as a first language (odds ratio 6.74, 95% CI 3.04-14.93), or was unable to intake orally (odds ratio 2.73, 95% CI 1.26-5.92). CPR was performed in 30 patients, none survived to discharge. CONCLUSIONS: DNR orders are instituted in a large proportion of dying Chinese cancer patients in a cancer centre, however, the order is seldom signed by the patient personally. This study also illustrates that as many as 20% of dying patients are taken home to die, in accordance with local custom. (shrink)