The study is designed to examine the perceptions of Chinese executives of corporate social responsibility (CSR) and to explore possible strategies by which well-established foreign multinational enterprises can carry out their CSR in China. The interviewees’ interpretation of CSR is found to be oriented toward internal operations of the Chinese subsidiaries and economic responsibility. Many interviewees have the classical view of CSR, while headquarters has the modern view. The main problems of implementing CSR are: specific Chinese business culture, intellectual property (...) rights, internal due process, and insufficient Chinese government support. It is recommended that socialization of Chinese executives about CSR be accomplished through personnel transfer among various functional areas in the corporate system, the development of a just organizational culture in the Chinese subsidiaries, and collaboration with external partnersthat advocate CSR. (shrink)

Introduction: Probationers, offenders with less serious and non-violent offences, and under statutory supervision, have low levels of self-esteem and physical health, and high level of family conflict, and poorer quality of family relationships. This study examined the effectiveness of the existing probation service and the additional use of a positive family holistic health intervention to enhance physical, psychological, and family well-being in probationers and relationships with probation officers.Methods: Probationers under the care of the Hong Kong Social Welfare Department were randomized (...) into a care-as-usual control group, a brief intervention group receiving two 1-h individual sessions [of a brief theory-based positive family holistic health intervention integrating Zero-time Exercise and positive psychology themes of “Praise and Gratitude” in the existing probation service], or a combined intervention group receiving BI and a 1-day group activity with family members. The outcomes were physical activity, fitness performance, self-esteem, happiness, anxiety and depression symptoms, life satisfaction, quality of life, family communication and well-being, and relationships with probation officers. Self-administered questionnaires and simple fitness tests were used at baseline, 1-month and 3-month follow-up. Linear mixed model analysis was used to compare difference in the changes of outcome variables among groups, adjusted of sex, age, and baseline values. Focus group interviews were conducted. Thematic content analysis was used.Results: 318 probationers were randomized into CAU, BI, or CI group. CAU showed enhanced physical activity, fitness performance and psychological health, and family communication with small effect sizes. BI and CI showed further improved physical activity, family communication and family well-being. Additionally, CI reported greater improvements in the relationships with probation officers than CAU with a small effect size. CI also reported greater increases in physical activity and family communication than BI with small to moderate effect sizes. Qualitative feedbacks corroborated the quantitative findings.Conclusion: Our trial provided the first evidence of the effectiveness of probation service and the additional use of an innovative, relatively low-cost, theory-based brief positive family holistic health intervention. This intervention may offer a new model for enhancing probation service.Trial Registration: The research protocol was registered at the National Institutes of Health. (shrink)

This study examines the perceptions of Chinese executives concerning corporate social responsibilities in their Chinese subsidiaries of foreign multinational corporations in China. These Chinese subsidiaries are found in the elementary stage of corporate citizen development even though their headquarters are in the advanced stage. The key challenges of moving Chinese subsidiaries to be better corporate citizens in China are specific Chinese business culture, intellectual property rights, internal due process, insufficient Chinese government support, and lack of knowledge of Chinese subsidiaries. Through (...) this study, foreign multinational corporations need to invest in social capital that facilitates the transfer of knowledge of comprehensive corporate responsible practices from the headquarters to their Chinese subsidiaries, and to encourage their Chinese subsidiaries to be more actively engaged with external business partners that support corporate social responsibility. (shrink)

An agent’s knowledge of her own intentional actions (agential knowledge) is non-observational. Yet, intentional actions typically consist of happenings external to the agents. A theory is needed to explain how agents are warranted to form such beliefs independent of observation. This paper first argues for three desirable features of an ideal theory about agential knowledge. After showing that no existing theories possess all three, a novel theory that does is presented. According to this theory, agential knowledge is the same kind (...) of knowledge as the Kripkean contingent a priori: they are knowledge justified a priori by stipulation. (shrink)

Social movements often impose nontrivial costs on others against their wills. Civil disobedience is no exception. How can social movements in general, and civil disobedience in particular, be justifiable despite this apparent wrong-making feature? We examine an intuitively plausible account—it is fair that everyone should bear the burdens of tackling injustice. We extend this fairness-based argument for civil disobedience to defend some acts of uncivil disobedience. Focusing on uncivil environmental activism—such as ecotage (sabotage with the aim of protecting the environment)—we (...) argue that some acts of uncivil disobedience can be morally superior to their civil counterparts, when and because such acts target people who are responsible for environmental threats. Indeed, insofar as some acts of uncivil disobedience can more accurately target responsible people, they can better satisfy the demands of fairness compared to their civil counterparts. In some circumstances, our argument may require activists to engage in uncivil disobedienceeven whencivil disobedience is available. (shrink)

The article sets out a primitive ontology of the natural world in terms of primitive stuff—that is, stuff that has as such no physical properties at all—but that is not a bare substratum either, being individuated by metrical relations. We focus on quantum physics and employ identity-based Bohmian mechanics to illustrate this view, but point out that it applies all over physics. Properties then enter into the picture exclusively through the role that they play for the dynamics of the primitive (...) stuff. We show that such properties can be local, as well as holistic, and discuss two metaphysical options to conceive them, namely, Humeanism and modal realism in the guise of dispositionalism. 1 Introduction2 Primitive Ontology: Primitive Stuff3 The Physics of Matter as Primitive Stuff4 The Humean Best System Analysis of the Dynamical Variables5 Modal Realism about the Dynamical Variables6 Conclusion. (shrink)

This chapter contains sections titled: Three Core Concepts of Critical Rationalism Stratagems Opposed to Criticism A Bias Towards Confirmation Can Students Be Taught to Falsify? Should Students Be Taught to Falsify? Conclusion References.

Does ‘remembering that p’ entail ‘knowing that p’? The widely-accepted epistemic theory of memory answers affirmatively. This paper purports to reveal the tension between ETM and the prevailing anti-luck epistemology. Central to my argument is the fact that we often ‘vaguely remember’ a fact, of which one plausible interpretation is that our true memory-based beliefs formed in this way could easily have been false. Drawing on prominent theories of misremembering in philosophy of psychology, I will construct cases where the subject (...) vaguely remembers that p while fails to meet the safety condition, which imply either that ETM is false or that safety is unnecessary for knowledge. The conclusion reached in this paper will be a conditional: if veritic epistemic luck is incompatible with knowledge, then ‘remembering that p’ does not entail ‘knowing that p’. (shrink)

It is proposed here that the Confucian li, norms of appropriate behavior, be understood as part of the dynamic process of moral self-cultivation. Within this framework li are multidimensional, as they have different functions at different stages in the cultivation process. This novel interpretation refocuses the issue regarding the flexibility of li, a topic that is still being debated by scholars. The significance of this proposal is not restricted to a new understanding of li. Key features of the various stages (...) of moral development in Confucian thought are also articulated. This account presents the picture of a Confucian paradigmatic person as critically self-aware and ethically sensitive. (shrink)

Para o profissional da informação, é necessário compreender como seus objetos de estudo se interligam, pois esta interligação é parte essencial na construção diária do saber científico. Além disso, é também a base para que estes conhecimentos possam ser aplicados na prática profissional. A interdisciplinaridade é a essência dessa questão, pois permite a união de diversas áreas do saber para que se consiga entender os fatos ocorridos. A Teoria da Complexidade também vem de encontro a essa necessidade de inter-relação entre (...) os objetos, pois prega o estudo dos fenômenos respeitando suas complexidades. Portanto, este estudo visa promover a compreensão da Teoria da Complexidade inserida na prática profissional de bibliotecários e arquivistas, por meio da análise de artigos publicados no âmbito das revistas da área de ciência da informação, disponibilizados pela plataforma BRAPCI nos anos de 2012 a 2022. Pode-se observar que diversos parâmetros da Teoria da Complexidade estão inseridos naturalmente na rotina do profissional da informação, dependendo apenas que se compreenda a que eles se referem. (shrink)

1. cilt. İnsan, evren, zaman -- 2. cilt. Yaradılış.

The Zhuangzi offers quite a few stories that centre on performance: a bellstand maker who selects wood to create wonderful bellstands; a ferryman who steers through rough waters; a cicada catcher who uses a stick, as if it were his hand, to catch cicadas; and a wheelmaker who, in using his chisel, feels it in his hand and responds with his heart. What is the role of the stick, for the cicada catcher, and the chisel, for the wheelmaker? What do (...) these masters know? I situate these questions within the intellectual context of the Zhuangzi, highlighting the text’s opposition to prevailing conceptions of a flourishing life. I draw on recent debates in extended mind and cognition to suggest that they offer interesting ways of understanding the knowledgeable practices of these masters. The frameworks and vocabulary of extended mind allow me to bring out how and why the Zhuangzi’s examples of mastery are apt and insightful reasons for rejecting the then current views on good government. The dialogue benefits both Chinese and Western traditions: the examples in the Zhuangzi help to diversify contemporary Western philosophy’s understanding of knowledge. (shrink)

The paper argues that there are structures rather than objects with an intrinsic identity in the domain of fundamental physics. We line out the standard metaphysics of objects with an intrinsic identity, recall the main objection against that position (section 1) and then retrace the development to epistemic structural realism (section 2) and to ontic structural realism (section 3). We elaborate on the arguments for ontic structural realism from quantum physics (section 4) and from space-time physics (section 5). Finally, we (...) claim that the main objection against the standard metaphysics of objects with an intrinsic identity is countered by structural realism only if the fundamental physical structures are conceived as causal structures (section 6). (shrink)

How precisely to understand and evaluate counterfactuals can be an intricate issue. The aim of this article is to examine a new set of difficulties for evaluating counterfactuals that arise in the context of the dynamical spacetimes described by the theory of general relativity (GR). The initial value formulation provides us with a methodology to pin down the specific combination of features of the theory at the origin of the difficulties, namely, non-linearity and certain non-local aspects (typically captured by ellipticity (...) at the analytical level), in particular when combined with the global and/or quasi-local character of physical quantities in GR. Finally, we connect the philosophical question about counterfactuals with concrete applied physical issues in GR about extracting meaningful predictions by constructing appropriate initial data sets, leading us to question the very suitability of the Cauchy approach to fully account for the explanatory power of the theory. (shrink)

Tainted political symbols ought to be confronted, removed, or at least recontextualized. Despite the best efforts to achieve this, however, official actions on tainted symbols often fail to take place. In such cases, I argue that political vandalism—the unauthorized defacement, destruction, or removal of political symbols—may be morally permissible or even obligatory. This is when, and insofar as, political vandalism serves as fitting counter-speech that undermines the authority of tainted symbols in ways that match their publicity, refuses to let them (...) speak in our name, and challenges the derogatory messages expressed through a mechanism I call derogatory pedestalling: the glorification or honoring of certain individuals or ideologies that can only make sense when members of a targeted group are taken to be inferior. (shrink)

This paper sets out a moderate version of metaphysical structural realism that stands in contrast to both the epistemic structural realism of Worrall and the—radical—ontic structural realism of French and Ladyman. According to moderate structural realism, objects and relations (structure) are on the same ontological footing, with the objects being characterized only by the relations in which they stand. We show how this position fares well as regards philosophical arguments, avoiding the objections against the other two versions of structural realism. (...) In particular, we set out how this position can be applied to space-time, providing for a convincing understanding of space-time points in the standard tensor formulation of general relativity as well as in the fibre bundle formulation. (shrink)

Courage is a basic virtue to any heroic society. It is the defining virtue of the aristocratic warrior in the Iliad. It came with a set of other related virtues, all functioning in a social setting unique to that heroic era. However, as society evolved beyond the heroics of war to the civility of settled city–states, courage would be reviewed and redefined. In fact the whole virtue complex would undergo fundamental changes. Still later, when from out of the cities philosophers (...) rose, they would, in their commitment to a higher justice or righteousness than what the city had to offer to date, submit courage to a third critique and transformation. We see this in Greece; we may also see it in China. (shrink)

Demonstrating the limitations of the one-at-a-time approach, crowd initiatives reveal the surprisingly powerful role of analytic and design choices in shaping scientific results. At the same time, cross-cultural variability in effects is far below the levels initially expected. This highlights the value of “medium” science, leveraging diverse stimulus sets and extensive robustness checks to achieve integrative tests of competing theories.

How precisely to understand and evaluate counterfactuals can be an intricate issue. The aim of this article is to examine a new set of difficulties for evaluating counterfactuals that arise in the context of the dynamical spacetimes described by the theory of general relativity. The initial value formulation provides us with a methodology to pin down the specific combination of features of the theory at the origin of the difficulties, namely, non-linearity and certain non-local aspects, in particular when combined with (...) the global and/or quasi-local character of physical quantities in general relativity. Finally, we connect the philosophical question about counterfactuals with concrete applied physical issues in general relativity about extracting meaningful predictions by constructing appropriate initial data sets, leading us to question the very suitability of the Cauchy approach to fully account for the explanatory power of the theory. (shrink)

“主体性”是哲学中一个十分重大的课题，在20世纪80年代至90年代，“主体性”观念在中国当代哲学的进程中产生了十分特殊的作用，对于推动思想解放、观念变革居功至伟。今天我们究竟应该怎样理解和评估“主体性 ”原则？马克思哲学的“主体性”思想在哲学史上所具有的重大意义究竟是什么？对我们今天重新阐释“主体性”思想有什么价值？本书正是试图围绕上述问题，在当代哲学的历史语境中对“主体性”观念进行专门研究和当代阐 释。.

The introduction sets out how the chapters in the volume draw on Eastern and Western philosophical traditions to enrich and diversify our present conceptions of knowledge. Three meanings of extension are employed across the volume’s chapters. First, the chapters challenge prevailing conceptions of knowledge in Western epistemology. Second, they propose that to have knowledge is not only to have ideas cogitating in the mind, but also to perceive, feel, act and respond by engaging mind and body in specific environments. Third, (...) the chapters evoke scenarios to challenge Western epistemology’s predominantly theoretically bound conceptions of knowledge. (shrink)

Every man, says Mencius, has within him this mind of commiseration, this pu-jen chih hsin that cannot bear to see another person suffer. To support his argument, Mencius cites the parable of the child about to fall into a well. A man with an innate mind of compassion unable to bear to see the child suffer would naturally feel the urge to run ahead to save the child . Yet elsewhere in Mencius 4A.17, it appears that had the potential victim (...) been a drowning sister-in-law, the man would also be momentarily checked by a fear of impropriety. Since the sense of propriety has its beginning in the mind as much as the sense of compassion, is not the mind of goodness somehow divided against itself? The present essay will examine this possible dilemma. (shrink)

It’s intuitive to think that an intentional action requires that the agent knows that she’s doing so. In light of some apparent counterexamples, Setiya suggests that this intuitive insight is better captured in terms of credence: performing an intentional action requires the agent to have a higher credence that she’s doing so than she would have otherwise. I argue that there is no such thing as an agent’s credence for what she’s doing. After distinguishing this thesis from an idea some (...) defend under the slogan “deliberation crowds out prediction”, I explore the thesis’s broader epistemological implications for the belief-credence relation. (shrink)

The concepts dao and de in the Daodejing may be evoked to support a distinctive and plausible account of environmental holism. Dao refers to the totality of particulars, including the relations that hold between them, and the respective roles and functions of each within the whole. De refers to the distinctiveness of each particular, realized meaningfully only within the context of its interdependence with others, and its situatedness within the whole. Together, dao and de provide support for an ethical holism (...) that avoids sacrificing individuals for the sake of the whole. The integrity and stability of the whole are important not because the whole is an end-in-itself but because those conditions assist in preserving the well-being of the constituent parts. In other words, the ethical holism supported in the Daodejing does not present individuals and wholes in mutually exclusive terms, but sees them in symbiotic relation, allowing for events to be mutually beneficial, or mutually obstructive, to both. In addition, two other Daoist concepts, wuwei and ziran, provide further support for this construction of holism. If the distinctiveness of particular individuals is valued, then unilateral or reductive norms which obliterate such individuality are inappropriate. In this regard, the methodology of wuwei allows for the idea of individuals developing spontaneously in relation to others. According to this view of holism,individuals manifest and realize their integrity in relation to others in the environmental context, achieving an outcome that is maximally co-possible within those limits, rather than one that is maximally beneficial only for particular individuals. (shrink)

The Zhuangzi is noted for its advocacy of many different perspectives—chickens, cicadas, fish and the like. There is much debate in the literature about the implications of Zhuangzi’s pluralist inclinations. I suggest that Zhuangzi highlights the limitations of individual, perspectivally-constrained, knowledge claims. He also spurns the ‘view from nowhere’ and is sceptical about the possibility of an ideal observer. For him, wisdom consists in understanding the epistemological inadequacies of each perspective. I propose that Zhuangzi’s philosophy offers significant insights to an (...) increasingly globalized world characterized by a plurality of ethical and value commitments. It does not assume there will necessarily be universal agreement or a standardized answer. Most importantly, it is a position that seeks to augment self-understanding and enrich the self in dialogue with and response to others. (shrink)

Mengzi states that our human nature consists of our ability to feel compassion, disdain, respect, and (dis-)approval: all human beings have them. But he also states that we lose these four emotional capacities if we don’t reflect on or attend to them. There is an apparent contradiction in saying that all humans have them, but some have lost them. This essay offers a close reading of Mengzi’s phrase “to lose it” that helps explain away this appearance of contradiction. In doing (...) so, Mengzi is interpreted to be offering an ethics of attention about how we should attend to ourselves and others selectively to have a functional social life. (shrink)

This volume takes a look at the status quo of whistleblowing in several jurisdictions from around the world. Covering a topic that draws the attention of a broad public and is gaining importance amongst legislators, practitioners and scholars all over the globe, the book examines the various aspects of whistleblowing. It looks at what kind of legal protection of whistleblowers is in force, who is protected, what kind of behaviour is protected, and what kind of behaviour whistleblowers are protected against. (...) This is achieved by a combination of a general comparative report with country-specific reports that give information on whistleblowing in various jurisdictions. These countries include, amongst others, Canada, Germany, France, Italy, the Netherlands and the USA. A synopsis comprises information on whistleblowing in 23 countries in one tabula. The chapters of this book were originally prepared for the XIXth International Congress of Comparative Law (20th and 21 July 2014) of International Academy of Comparative Law in Vienna.shrink)

I argue against mnemic reliabilism, an influential view that successful remembering must be produced by a reliable memory process. Drawing on empirical evidence from psychology and neuroscience, I refute mnemic reliabilism by demonstrating that: (1) patients with memory impairments (e.g., Alzheimer’s disease) can also successfully remember the past despite the unreliability of their corresponding memory processes; (2) some reliability-affecting factors (e.g., stress, divided attention, and insufficient encoding time) can render the memory processes of healthy individuals unreliable without preventing them from (...) occasionally resulting in successful remembering. Potential responses available for mnemic reliabilism are also evaluated. I show that those responses are susceptible to a challenge akin to the generality problem for process reliabilism. (shrink)

Theories of quantum gravity generically presuppose or predict that the reality underlying relativistic spacetimes they are describing is significantly non-spatiotemporal. On pain of empirical incoherence, approaches to quantum gravity must establish how relativistic spacetime emerges from their non-spatiotemporal structures. We argue that in order to secure this emergence, it is sufficient to establish that only those features of relativistic spacetimes functionally relevant in producing empirical evidence must be recovered. In order to complete this task, an account must be given of (...) how the more fundamental structures instantiate these functional roles. We illustrate the general idea in the context of causal set theory and loop quantum gravity, two prominent approaches to quantum gravity. (shrink)

The procedures of canonical quantization of the gravitational field apparently lead to entities for which any interpretation in terms of spatio-temporal localization or spatio-temporal extension seems difficult. This fact is the main ground for the suggestion that can often be found in the physics literature on canonical quantum gravity according to which spacetime may not be fundamental in some sense. This paper aims to investigate this radical suggestion from an ontologically serious point of view in the cases of two standard (...) forms of canonical quantum gravity, quantum geometrodynamics and loop quantum gravity. We start by discussing the physical features of the quantum wave functional of quantum geometrodynamics and of the spin networks of loop quantum gravity that motivate the view according to which spacetime is not fundamental. We then point out that, by contrast, for any known ontologically serious understanding of quantum entanglement, the commitment to spacetime seems indispensable. Against this background, we then critically discuss the idea that spacetime may emerge from more fundamental entities. As a consequence, we finally suggest that the emergence of classical spacetime in canonical quantum gravity faces a dilemma: either spacetime ontologically emerges from more fundamental non-spatio-temporal entities or it already belongs to the fundamental quantum gravitational level and the emergence of the classical picture is merely a matter of levels of description. On the first horn of the dilemma, it is unclear how to make sense of concrete physical entities that are not in spacetime and of the notion of ontological emergence that is involved. The second horn runs into the difficulties raised by the physics of canonical quantum gravity. (shrink)