User intent classification is a vital component of a question-answering system or a task-based dialogue system. In order to understand the goals of users’ questions or discourses, the system categorizes user text into a set of pre-defined user intent categories. User questions or discourses are usually short in length and lack sufficient context; thus, it is difficult to extract deep semantic information from these types of text and the accuracy of user intent classification may be affected. To better identify user (...) intents, this paper proposes a BERT-Cap hybrid neural network model with focal loss for user intent classification to capture user intents in dialogue. The model uses multiple transformer encoder blocks to encode user utterances and initializes encoder parameters with a pre-trained BERT. Then, it extracts essential features using a capsule network with dynamic routing after utterances encoding. Experiment results on four publicly available datasets show that our model BERT-Cap achieves a F1 score of 0.967 and an accuracy of 0.967, outperforming a number of baseline methods, indicating its effectiveness in user intent classification. (shrink)

Past research on talk radio discourses has illustrated the crucial role of the hosts in managing the conversation and shaping the voices of callers. However, past research focused mostly on dyadic host–caller interactions. Radio talk shows in Hong Kong, in contrast, often have more than one host. This study is interested in the implications of the triadic setting of radio talk shows in Hong Kong. It uses Radio Television Hong Kong’s evening program Open Line Open View as a case study. (...) Employing the techniques of conversation analysis, this study replicates some of past studies’ findings about the source of host power. More importantly, the analysis shows that the second host in a triadic setting can play three important roles: the program conductor, the buffer, and the counterweight. The micro-level interactional patterns have important implications for the overall character of the program itself and the role of talk radio in the politics of public opinion in Hong Kong. More generally, this study illustrates the utility of paying attention to the differences between dyads and triads in the microsociological analysis of conversations in broadcast media. (shrink)

This article provides current Schwartz Values Survey (SVS) data from samples of business managers and professionals across 50 societies that are culturally and socioeconomically diverse. We report the society scores for SVS values dimensions for both individual- and societal-level analyses. At the individual-level, we report on the ten circumplex values sub-dimensions and two sets of values dimensions (collectivism and individualism; openness to change, conservation, self-enhancement, and self-transcendence). At the societal-level, we report on the values dimensions of embeddedness, hierarchy, mastery, affective (...) autonomy, intellectual autonomy, egalitarianism, and harmony. For each society, we report the Cronbach’s α statistics for each values dimension scale to assess their internal consistency (reliability) as well as report interrater agreement (IRA) analyses to assess the acceptability of using aggregated individual level values scores to represent country values. We also examined whether societal development level is related to systematic variation in the measurement and importance of values. Thus, the contributions of our evaluation of the SVS values dimensions are two-fold. First, we identify the SVS dimensions that have cross-culturally internally reliable structures and within-society agreement for business professionals. Second, we report the society cultural values scores developed from the twenty-first century data that can be used as macro-level predictors in multilevel and single-level international business research. (shrink)

There is growing concern that decision-making informed by machine learning (ML) algorithms may unfairly discriminate based on personal demographic attributes, such as race and gender. Scholars have responded by introducing numerous mathematical definitions of fairness to test the algorithm, many of which are in conflict with one another. However, these reductionist representations of fairness often bear little resemblance to real-life fairness considerations, which in practice are highly contextual. Moreover, fairness metrics tend to be implemented in narrow and targeted toolkits that (...) are difficult to integrate into an algorithm’s broader ethical assessment. In this paper, we derive lessons from ethical philosophy and welfare economics as they relate to the contextual factors relevant for fairness. In particular we highlight the debate around acceptability of particular inequalities and the inextricable links between fairness, welfare and autonomy. We propose Key Ethics Indicators (KEIs) as a way towards providing a more holistic understanding of whether or not an algorithm is aligned to the decision-maker’s ethical values. (shrink)

Evidentials and Modals offers an in-depth account of the meaning of grammatical elements representing evidentiality in connection to modality, focusing on theoretical/formal perspectives by eminent pioneers in the field and on recently discovered phenomena in Korean evidential markers by native scholars in particular. Evidentiality became a hot topic in semantics and pragmatics, trying to see what kind of evidential justification is provided by evidentials to support or be related to the 'at-issue' prejacent propositions. This book aims to provide a deeper (...) understanding of such evidentiality in discourse contexts in a broad range of languages such as American Indian, Korean and Japanese, Turkish and African languages over the world. In addition, an introduction to the concept of evidentiality and theoretical perspectives and recent issues is also provided. Contributors are Alexandra Y. Aikhenvald, Robert Botne, Kyung-Sook Chung, Martina Faller, Ezra Keshet, Iksoo Kwon, Chungmin Lee, Ji-Young Lee, Jungmee Lee, Dongsik Lim, Lisa Matthewson, William McClure, Elin McCready, Sarah E. Murray, Marisa Nagano, Jinho Park, Mary Shin Kim, Jaemog Song, Thomas Willett, and Kei Yoshimoto. (shrink)

This paper propounds a new reading of Berkeley's account of the activity of finite spirits. Against existing interpretations, the paper argues that Berkeley does not hold that we causally contribute to the movement of our bodies. In contrast, our volitions to move our bodies are but occasions for God to cause their movement. In answer to the question of wherein then consists our activity, the paper proposes that our activity consists in the dual powers to produce (1) our volitions ? (...) the acts of willing ? and (2) our ideas of imagination. (shrink)

v. 1. A critical edition of Mimamsa-Slokavarttika ad 1.1.2 (Codanasutra) -- v. 2. An annotated translation of Mimamsa-Slokavarttika ad 1.1.2 (Codanasutra).

Hospital ethics committees (HECs) are expected to play extremely broad and pivotal roles such as case consultation, education of staffs on healthcare ethics, and institutional policy formation. Despite the growing importance of HECs, there are no standards for setup and operation of HECs, and composition and activities of HECs at each institution are rarely disclosed in Japan. In addition, there is also a lack of information sharing and collaboration among HECs. Therefore, the authors established the Consortium of Hospital Ethics Committees (...) (CHEC) in October 2020, which has been regularly hosting a couple of core activities. One is the Healthcare Ethics Forum, held monthly online for CHEC members to freely discuss HECs and healthcare ethics consultation. The other is the Collaboration Conference of Hospital Ethics Committees, intended to provide a place for HEC members and administrative officers from across Japan to exchange information of their HECs, learn from each other, and cooperate to operate HECs appropriately. In this paper, the authors introduced CHEC as well as reported the results of a questionnaire survey conducted at the first conference among participating facilities, suggesting the diverse structures and activities of HECs in Japan. (shrink)

An important work offering a viable theory for the concept of "Sublime" in philosophy.

Is a human more conscious than an octopus? In the science of consciousness, it’s oftentimes assumed that some creatures (or mental states) are more conscious than others. But in recent years, a number of philosophers have argued that the notion of degrees of consciousness is conceptually confused. This paper (1) argues that the most prominent objections to degrees of consciousness are unsustainable, (2) examines the semantics of ‘more conscious than’ expressions, (3) develops an analysis of what it is for a (...) degreed property to count as degrees of consciousness, and (4) applies the analysis to various theories of consciousness. I argue that whether consciousness comes in degrees ultimately depends on which theory of consciousness turns out to be correct. But I also argue that most theories of consciousness entail that consciousness comes in degrees. (shrink)

Tao has been built into the foundation of East Asian culture for millennia, and many books have been written to explain it. But Tao cannot fully be explained in words; it can only felt and experienced. Tao is something you live, day by day, moment by moment. Its the omnipresent oneness beyond ephemeral phenomena that expresses itself in everything.

This paper examines the idea of "objective phenomenology," or a way of understanding the phenomenal character of conscious experiences that doesn’t require one to have had the kinds of experiences under consideration. My central thesis is that structural facts about experience—facts that characterize purely how conscious experiences are structured—are objective phenomenal facts. I begin by precisifying the idea of objective phenomenology and diagnosing what makes any given phenomenal fact subjective. Then I defend the view that structural facts about experience are (...) objective. I also argue that structural facts about experience, despite being objective, nevertheless still give rise to an explanatory gap. (shrink)

Kei Yoshida critically assesses five different theoretical approaches to cultural interpretivism and conclusions on rationality. This book reveals the need for a cogent solution to the problem of rationality and urges social scientists to interpret symbolic systems' or agents’ intentions as well as explain the consequences of human actions.

The aim of this paper is to investigate how we can reunite social philosophy and philosophy of science to address problems in science and technology. First, referring to Don Howard?s, George Reisch?s, and Philip Mirowski?s works, I shall briefly explain how philosophy of science was depoliticised during the cold war. Second, I shall examine Steve Fuller?s criticism of Thomas Kuhn. Third, I shall scrutinise Philip Kitcher?s view of well-ordered science. Fourth, I shall emphasise the importance of autonomy and argue that (...) philosophy of science needs to cultivate a critical attitude towards authority. Fifth, drawing upon Ian Jarvie?s social reading of Karl Popper, I shall argue that Popper?s philosophy can be a model for reuniting social philosophy and philosophy of science. (shrink)

This edited volume focuses on what Hannah Arendt famously called “the raison d’être of politics”: freedom. The unique collection of essays clarifies her flagship idea of political freedom in relation to other key Arendtian themes such as liberation, revolution, civil disobedience, and the right to have rights. -/- In addressing these, contributors to this volume juxtapose Arendt with a number of thinkers from Isaiah Berlin, John Rawls and Philip Pettit to Karl Marx, Frantz Fanon and Geoffroy de Lagasnerie. They also (...) consider the continuing relevance of Arendt’s work to some of the most dramatic events in recent years, including the current global refugee crisis, the Arab uprisings of the 2010s, and the ongoing crisis of liberal democracy in the West and beyond. -/- Contributors include Keith Breen, Joan Cocks, Tal Correm, Christian J. Emden, Patrick Hayden, Kei Hiruta, Anthony F. Lang Jr., Shmuel Lederman, Miriam Leonard, Natasha Saunders, William Smith, and Shiyu Zhang. (shrink)

This paper will defend scientific study of the social by scrutinizing Clifford Geertz's interpretive anthropology, and evolutionary psychologists' criticism of it. I shall critically examine Geertz's identification of anthropology with literary criticism, his assumption that a science of society is possible only on a positivist model, his view of the relation between culture and mind, and his anti anti-relativism. Then I shall discuss evolutionary psychologists' criticism of Geertz's view as an exemplar of the so-called "Standard Social Science Model." Finally, I (...) shall claim that both Geertz and evolutionary psychologists misunderstand the aim of the social sciences, which is to explain the unintended consequences of human actions in institutional contexts. Key Words: Clifford Geertz • evolutionary psychology • interpretive anthropology • positivism • Standard Social Science Model (SSSM). (shrink)

The use of psychoanalytic ideas to explore social and political questions is not new. Freud began this work himself and social research has consistently drawn on his ideas. This makes perfect sense. Social and political theory must find ways to conceptualise the relation between human subjects and our social environment; and the distinctive and intense observation of individual psychical structuring afforded within clinical psychoanalysis has given rise to rich theoretical and methodological resources for doing just this. However, psychoanalytic concepts do (...) not remain the same when they are rearticulated in the context of research. This book traces the reiteration and transformation of concepts in the psychoanalytic theory of Freud, Klein and Lacan, the social theory of Butler, Derrida, Foucault, Laclau and Zizek, and case studies of empirical research ranging from the classic Tavistock Institute studies to contemporary work in politics, gender studies, cultural studies and education. Each chapter explores one cluster of concepts: Melancholia, loss and subjectivity Overdetermination and free association Resistance, reflexivity and the compulsion to repeat Repression, disavowal and foreclosure Psychic defenses and social defenses Arguing against the reification of psychoanalytic concepts, Claudia Lapping suggests the need for a reflexive understanding of the play of attachments and substitutions as concepts are reframed in the contrasting activities of psychoanalysis and research. (shrink)

Introspection, or looking inward to observe one's experience, is inherent in many methods used to study feelings, the experiential component of emotion. Challenges of introspection make faithful, high-fidelity descriptions of feelings difficult to attain. A method that (1) cleaves to a specific moment, (2) cleaves to pristine inner experience, (3) brackets presuppositions, and (4) utilizes an iterative process may be particularly well suited to this task. We review some contemporary introspective methods from the perspective of these four methodological constraints, finding (...) that Descriptive Experience Sampling (DES) addresses the constraints most fully. We present DES findings on feelings to highlight the unique contributions careful introspective methods make to emotion science. High-fidelity descriptions of feelings are necessary for a complete understanding of emotion. (shrink)

According to Dignāga, the word “cow” makes one understand all cows in a general form by excluding non-cows. However, how does one understand the non-cows to be excluded? Hattori answers as follows: “On perceiving the particular which is endowed with dewlap, horns, a hump on the back, and so forth, one understands that it is not a non-cow, because one knows that a non-cow is not endowed with these attributes.” Hattori regards observation of a dewlap, etc. as the cause of (...) excluding non-cows. Akamatsu presents a view similar to Hattori’s. Tanizawa, however, criticises Akamatsu by pointing out that then the apohavādin would have accepted positive elements such as a dewlap as defining characteristics of a cow. Stating that X is not a cow because it is not endowed with a dewlap, etc., amounts to accepting that the dewlap, etc. are the defining characteristics of a cow. Instead of a real universal cowness the apohavādin would have accepted a dewlap, etc. Akamatsu’s understanding of apoha, if it was correct, implies Tanizawa, would destroy the essence of the Buddhist theory of apoha. Continuing the view of Hattori and Akamatsu, Yoshimizu recently published two articles on Dignāga’s theory of apoha. He claims that “the word “cow” excludes all horses by virtue of the fact that horns are never seen on them.” Thus, “the word “cow” can exclude all of them collectively by virtue of the fact that none of them has all the members of the set of characteristics that form the worldly definition of “cow”.” Horns, one of the characteristic features of cows, are indeed mentioned by Dignāga in PS 5:43. Yoshimizu understands Dignāga’s semantics as being parallel to the modern semantics of componential analysis. A question arises: what does Dignāga, the founder of the Buddhist theory of apoha, really think regarding this issue? The present article sheds light on the incompatibility of the two interpretations by investigating the relevant source texts. It further shows that the issue Tanizawa deals with was already discussed by Dignāga. Examining Dignāga’s discussions shows that Tanizawa is right in his understanding of apoha. The interpretation by Hattori and other scholars is not supported by Dignāga’s text. The present conclusion is also supported by Mādhava, Uddyotakara and Kumārila. None of them assumes Dignāga’s theory to be as Hattori, etc. take it. (shrink)

Estonia is a democratic, parliamentary republic with a health care system that is built on the principle of compulsory, solidarity-based insurance and the all-round availability of services of private service providers. Estonia has specific biobank legislation as well as oversight via data protection laws. Its population-based biobank, the Estonian Genome Center, established in 2001, is one of the largest biobanks in Europe, and its database may be used only for scientific research, public health research, and statistics. The EGCUT can issue (...) data to a third party, but only in coded form. This comprehensive database of genotypic, phenotypic, health, and genealogical information represents about 5% of Estonia's adult population, and is the largest cohort ever gathered in Estonia. Government approval is required for international data sharing, and sharing can be further limited by the requirement of ethics approval and permission from Estonian government. (shrink)

Totalitarianism is perhaps unanimously regarded as one of the greatest political evils of the last century and has been the grounds for much of Anglo-American political theory since. Confucianism, meanwhile, has been gaining credibility in the past decades among sympathizers of democratic theory in spite of criticisms of it being anti-democratic or authoritarian. I consider how certain key concepts in the classical Confucian texts of the Mencius and the Xunzi might or might not be appropriated for ‘legitimising’ totalitarian regimes. Under (...) an Arendtian approach to understanding totalitarianism, it is precisely an unproblematised relation to a normative History and Nature that underlies the potential compatibility or incompatibility. I argue against a longstanding prejudice that if any form of Confucianism would be totalitarian, it would have to be Xunzian. Against this, I hope to show that if any form of Confucianism would be totalitarian, it might well be a naturalistic Mencian Confucianism instead of a constructivist Xunzian one. (shrink)

This essay considers the theoretical disagreement between Isaiah Berlin and Hannah Arendt on the meaning and value of freedom. Berlin thinks that negative liberty as non-interference is commendable because it is attuned to the implication of value pluralism that man is a choice-making creature and cannot be otherwise. By contrast, the political freedom to act is in Arendt’s view a more fulfilling ideal because it is only in political action that man’s potentiality is actualised, his unique identity manifested and his (...) being-in-the-world-with-others reaffirmed. What lies beneath the two thinkers’ dispute over the most satisfactory meaning of freedom, I argue, is a deeper disagreement over human nature itself. The implication of this analysis for the contemporary debate between pluralist liberals and their agonistic critics is briefly discussed in conclusion. (shrink)

Bartky draws on the experience of daily life to unmask the many disguises by which intimations of inferiority are visited upon women. She critiques both the male bias of current theory and the debilitating dominion held by notions of "proper femininity" over women and their bodies in patriarchal culture.

Value pluralists see themselves as philosophical grown-ups. They profess to face reality as it is and accept resultant pessimism, while criticising their monist rivals for holding on to the naïve idea that the right, the good and the beautiful are ultimately harmonisable with each other. The aim of this essay is to challenge this self-image of value pluralists. Notwithstanding its usefulness as a means of subverting monist dominance, I argue that the self-image has the downside of obscuring various theoretical positions (...) that do not fall into either the pluralist or monist camp. Yet such positions do exist, as shown by my discussion of Albert Camus and Hannah Arendt. Near contemporaries of the pioneering value pluralist Isaiah Berlin, the pair, just like him, sought to be realistic about the lived experiences of political disasters and moral disorientation in the twentieth century. Moreover, they shared with Berlin a keen interest in real-world moral dilemmas, which seemed to them to have made traditional morality obsolete. But the three thinkers’ perspectives on ‘reality’ hardly converged, and neither Camus nor Arendt became a value pluralist as a result of their reflections on moral dilemmas. This, however, by no means indicates the pair’s immaturity. Rather, it shows that there is more than one way of observing fidelity to our actual experience and that value pluralists’ commitment to realism and resultant pessimism is not as uniquely mature as they would have us believe. (shrink)

A method for sharing private data through personalized searches is described. This method enables users to retrieve access-controlled private data as well as publicly available data by submitting a single query to a conventional search engine. Seamless integration of the method into current search services through a prototype on the Mozilla Firefox web browser, without any changes to existing search functions, such as crawling, indexing, and matching, is also described. Evaluations showed that the additional storage requirement is only 10% and (...) that the system implementing the method responds in 10 s with 1,000 dummy results for anonymization. (shrink)

Following Dharmakīrti’s interpretation, PS I 9ab has been understood as stating a view common to both Sautrāntikas and Yogācāras, i.e. a view that self-awareness is the result of a means of valid cognition. It has also been understood that Dignāga accepts two different views attributed to Sautrāntikas with regard to pramāṇaphala: in PS ad I 8cd he regards the cognition of an external object as the result; in PS ad I 9ab–cd he alternatively presents another view that self-awareness is the (...) result. Dignāga’s text, however, does not support these interpretations. Rather it contradicts them. In fact Dignāga presupposes a single view, and not two, attributed to Sautrāntikas, a view that the cognition of an external object is the result. In I 9ab he is presenting an alternative view that is attributed only to Yogācāras, i.e. a view that is not common to Sautrāntikas. Althogh the Sautrāntika sākāravāda essentially has an internal structure, Dignāga presupposes that an external object can be regarded as the object of cognition because it is similar to the image of object. He assumes that the objects of pramāṇa and phala, both being external objects, are identical. Criticizing Dignāga’s claim that bāhyārthajñāna is the phala, Kumārila points out that there is a serious gap between the objects of pramāṇa and phala. Consequently Dharmakīrti has to admit that even in the Sautrāntika view an external object is not directly cognized and instead proposes as the second view of Sautrāntikas that svasaṃvitti is the phala. At the same time he reinterprets Dignāga and defends from Kumārila’s criticism by introducing the two different levels. When investigating the real nature, i.e. in the paramārtha level, svasaṃvitti is the phala, whereas in the upacāra level, bāhyārthajñāna or bāhyārthaniścaya is the phala. Thus, Dharmakīrti avoids Kumārila’s criticism of Dignāga. Kumārila triggers Dharmakīrti’s new introduction of the second view of Santrāntikas that svasaṃvitti is the phala. (shrink)