本书包括:生命的本质;计算主义;时空本性;科学主义和人体主义哲学;科学技术与社会;学术互动访散记等内容。.

From 1979 to 1999, a heated dispute over the science or pseudoscience of extraordinary power or extrasensory perception took place in China. During these two decades, many so-called “grandmasters” of ESP and Qigong emerged, and millions of people across the country studied with them; this was known as “Qigong Fever” or “ESP Fever.” The supporters of ESP argued that ESP existed, people could cultivate ESP through specific Qigong training, and ESP was a science; whereas the opponents of ESP denied all (...) of these. Both sides of the dispute had many supporters. With the onset of Qigong Fever in China, some Qigong and ESP masters developed their Qigong organizations into Chinese-style religions. Qigong Fever ended when the religions were banned by the Chinese government. The rise of Qigong Fever demonstrated that basic questions about the boundaries between science and pseudoscience were not easy to answer. Different theoretical and practical consequences resulted from different answers to these questions. (shrink)

The symbol grounding problem (SGP) proposed by Stevan Harnad in 1990, originates from Searle’s “Chinese Room Argument” and refers to the problem of how a pure symbolic system acquires its meaning. While many solutions to this problem have been proposed, all of them have encountered inconsistencies to different extents. A recent approach for resolving the problem is to divide the SGP into hard and easy problems echoing the distinction between hard and easy problems for resolving the enigma of consciousness. This (...) however turns out not to be an ideal strategy: Everything related to consciousness that cannot be well-explained by present theories can be categorized as a hard problem which as a consequence would doom the SGP to irresolvability. We therefore argue that the SGP can be regarded as a general problem of how an AI system can have intentionality, and develop a theoretical direction for its solution. (shrink)

Head transplantation has ignited intense discussions about whether it should be done scientifically and ethically. This paper examines the ethics of head transplantation from a Confucian perspective and offers arguments against the permissibility of head transplantation. From a Confucian point of view, human beings are the most precious organisms in the world, and ren and li are the basic moral principles of human beings. As long as head transplant technology remains underdeveloped, this procedure should not be done because it will (...) pose a serious risk of harm to humans and thus violate the principles of Confucian ren and li. If head transplant technology matures to the point that it would be safe to try in humans, it still should not be performed because it would change the selfhood or identity of the head donor and the body donor and create a new person. Confucian personal virtues greatly depend on selfhood or personal identity, and selfhood or personal identity depend on one’s body cultivation and mind rectification. Through the hard effort of body cultivation and mind rectification, one transforms one’s selfhood or identity and personality. This selfhood, identity, and personality cannot be separated from one’s body but are embedded in one’s body. Thus, head transplant would destroy two persons’ identities and result in a new person, and the characteristics of this new person’s identity are still unknown. (shrink)

This work attempts to respond to Tomas Aquinas' Cosmological Argument in a way that combines Set Theory with the idea of the ‘Book of Change’. The study defines the ith Cause Set on which to operate on, which leads to the ontological commitment of austerity that the ‘First Cause's Compromise with emergence’ cannot be avoided. It is argued in the present paper that the concept that ‘emergence only consists of Synchronic Emergence and Diachronic Emergence’ should be extended to a broader (...) notion of emergence, which is made up of the two discussed elements and a third one ‘No-Boundary Emergence’ (beyond the time dimension). The article defines the concept of No-Boundary Emergence, proves why it is a type of emergence that differs from the traditional two types, and asserts that it underlies the bottom layer of the cosmos. This study describes the common feature of all emergence as communication protocols between layers. The assemblage of all emergences behaves similar to a distributed system that cannot be restricted by Gödel's theorem. The paper provides evidence (in Big Bang Cosmology, Conformal Cyclic Cosmology, Superstring Theory, Quantum Gravity) for this point of view, and notes that emergence (in the context of No-Boundary Emergence) is not only a simple scientific theory but also a progressive scientific research programme that can spontaneously grow from scientific theory based on Platonism at the expense of a degenerating shift to the ontological commitment of austerity. This paper proposes an improved model of Schrödinger Cat that provides a new explanation for quantum measurement and argues that there must be a forbidden zone of thought experiments. The study also introduces the implications of ancient Chinese thoughts (namely, the ‘Book of Change’ and Confucius). The paper comes to the conclusion that emergence (crossing the gap between ‘being’ and ‘nothing’, while ignoring the forbidden zone of thought experiments) relieves ‘cosmological insufficiency’ in the sense of Neo-Aristotelism. (shrink)

The development of biotechnologies has broadly interfered with a number of life processes, including human birth. An important moral question arises from the application of such medical technologies to birth: do biotechnological advancements violate human dignity? Many valid arguments have been raised. Yet bioethicists are still far from reaching a consensus on how best to protect the dignity of human birth. Confucianism is an influential ethical theory in China and presents a distinctive understanding of human dignity. In this paper, we (...) reconstruct the two Confucian concepts of dignity—namely, universal dignity and personal dignity. We then apply these concepts to human birth in the context of biotechnologies involving embryos and genetic enhancement. We conclude that the dual Confucian understanding of dignity contributes a valuable perspective to the question of whether biotechnologies related to human birth violate human dignity. (shrink)

With the emergence of clustered, regularly interspaced, short palindromic repeats (CRISPR)/CRISPR-associated protein 9 (Cas9) as one of the most promising new gene-editing techniques, scientists are now endeavoring to apply it to various domains. Among all the possible applications, gene editing in human embryos has received the most attention. Against this background, this article carries out a philosophical study on the ethical problems of human embryo gene editing or designing. Arguments against human embryo gene designing include that parents should be prohibited (...) from deciding their children’s future; commodifying children should be prohibited; the natural reproductive process should not be disturbed; and human embryo gene designing might foster discrimination. Arguments for human embryo gene designing include that parents should have the freedom to design their own babies and this freedom should not be limited; designing babies can promote the happy life of the baby; and totally forbidding embryo gene editing would drive the practice underground, where it would be performed illegally. This article analyzes all of these arguments and points out that all of them have some flaws. In order to draw a thoughtful conclusion, we turn to Confucianism and find a new perspective to determine whether designing babies with CRISPR technology is ethically permissible. (shrink)

The definition of life is a very important issue in the philosophy of biology, but this issue has unfortunately been neglected by the mainstream philosopher of biology for many years. In this paper, the difficulties with and the reasons for defining life are illustrated, the characteristics of life on Earth are explored, ways of defining life are examined, the main definitions of life are explained and evaluated, and finally, a new information definition of life is proposed.

In evolutionary theory, we generally believe that the evolution of life is from simple to complex, from single to diverse, and from lower to higher. Thus, the idea of evolutionary progress appears obvious. However, in contemporary academic circles, some biologists and philosophers challenge this idea. Among them, Gould is the most influential. This paper first describes Gould’s seven arguments against evolutionary progress, i.e., the human arrogance argument, anthropocentric argument, no inner thrust argument, no biological base argument, extreme contingency argument, statistical (...) error argument, and bacteria (other than human beings) ruling the earth argument. Gould’s arguments against evolutionary progress have great influence in contemporary evolutionary theory. Thus, it is necessary to conduct a careful philosophical analysis of each of Gould’s arguments to reveal his philosophical mistakes. This research contends that Gould’s arguments against evolutionary progress are invalid. (shrink)

One of the central problems in philosophy of artificial life (AL) is whether the artificial life entities we create can be genuine life. Proponents of strong AL believe that the artificial life entities exhibiting characteristics of natural life in a physical or a virtual environment can be real life. Opponents of strong artificial life, however, think that artificial life entities are not real life or just simulation of natural life. The aim of this paper is to demonstrate which view of (...) strong artificial life is valid. The method is to use philosophical theory and logics to analyze the opponents’ arguments. The conclusion is that the opponents’ arguments for denying strong AL are insufficient to exclude the possibility of strong AL. (shrink)

本书共分九章内容：第一章论述了生命科学哲学兴起的背景，区分了生命科学哲学研究中的两种理论倾向，指出了生命科学哲学研究的主要问题，最后介绍了国内外生命科学哲学研究的进展；第二章分析了这种解释方式的合理性 及其与因果性解释方式的关系，并由此进一步讨论了生命科学的自主性问题；第三章从不同方面较详细地论述了正反两方面论证的依据，并对各种观点进行了比较，说明生物学理论缺少规律的原因；第四章讨论了还原概念和突现 概念的历史发展，分析了它们各自的认识论和本体论原因，指出了它们各自的优点和局限，最后指出了超越它们的途径；第五章着重讨论了进化论的统计特性与进化过程的决定论和非决定论问题；第六章讨论了生命难以定义的各 种原因，论述了定义生命的两种主要方法；第七章指出了人工生命提出的主要的哲学问题，从不同角度论证了强人工生命的可能性，分析了数字生命的实在论地位，揭示了人工生命所蕴含计算主义世界观；第八章分析了人类基因 组研究的价值及其所可能引起的伦理和法律问题；第九章总结了8年来关于人类克隆的主要争论和观点，并揭示了这些争论给我们的启示。.

The spread of sociobiology in China is not simply an internal event in the development of science. From the day it was introduced to China, its destiny was closely bound up with the development and change of Chinese society. Although it did not create as great disturbance as in America, it did have a significant impact in academic circles. However, scholars have paid little attention to these historical events. Today, sociobiology seems outdated and Wilson's grand agenda seems to have faded (...) with the passing of time, but the mark that he made on the history of science is still striking. A review of the process of reception of sociobiology in China is helpful for understanding this theory as well as the society of China. (shrink)

In recent years, many scientists and philosophers have begun to believe that a new theoretic revolution is occurring in cognitive science. The revolution is the rise of theoretical models of "4E+S" cognition. "4E" denotes "embodied", "embedded", "enacted", and "extended"; "S" denotes "situated". Differentiating from the traditional computational theory or representational theory of cognition, this branch of new cognitive scientists and philosophers have begun to claim that cognition is embodied, embedded, enacted, extended and situated. All of these five theories agree that (...) cognitive processes can proceed beyond the boundary of the brain. Thus we can synthesize them together as "transcranial cognition" or "transbrain cognition". The questions are: Are there common characteristics of these five models? Can we integrate them together with a new model of cognition? Is the "4E+S" model a real Copernicus style revolution of cognitive science? This article analyzes these questions and provides the following answers: There is a common characteristics of these cognitive theories and it is the characteristics of transcranialness, i. e. cognition or mind can exist beyond brain; We can integrate them together as transcranial cognition; The new theory of cognition or mind is a new big extended theory of traditional cognitive science. (shrink)

Ernst Mayr is a well-known biologist and philosopher in the twentieth century. Being a biologist, he is an important person in constructing the synthesis theory of evolution; being a philosopher, he has advocated a new philosophy, which, he claims, synthesizes the achievement of different biologies and physics, while at the same time getting rid of the influences of the traditional philosophy of science. In this essay, I will systematically investigate the main principles and the basic scheme of his new philosophy. (...) I find that Mayr’s new ideas of philosophy of biology can be summarized as the following five statements: The physical science is not the standard paradigm of the whole science; The historical narratives are more important than the explanation of laws; The explanation and the prediction are asymmetrical in life science; Concepts are more essential than laws in biology; There is no conflict between causality and teleonomy. (shrink)

Death with dignity is a significant issue in modern bioethics. In modern healthcare, the wide use of new technologies at the end of life has caused heated debate on how to protect human dignity. The key point of contention lies in the different understandings of human dignity and the dignity of death. Human dignity has never been a clear concept in Western ethical explorations, and the dignity of death has given rise to more confusions. Although there is no such term (...) as “dignity” in Confucian ethics, there are discussions of a number of ideas related to human dignity and the dignity of death. Therefore, Confucian bioethics can offer a new perspective for understanding the theoretical difficulties associated with the dignity of death and new methods for solving them. In this article, we attempt to reconstruct Confucian views on human dignity and the dignity of death and, based on those views, to analyze the following issues: the relationship between the dignity of death and biological life, the relationship between the dignity of death and suffering, the relationship between the dignity of death and the autonomy of human beings, and the relationship between the dignity of death and social justice. This article will also compare the Confucian views on these issues with the views of Western philosophers. Confucian ethics can offer distinct answers to the above issues and help resolve some confusions concerning concepts and theories in Western research on the dignity of death. (shrink)

Aiming at suppressing harmful effect for building structure by surface motion, semiactive nonsmooth control algorithm with Deep Learning is proposed. By finite-time stable theory, the building structure closed-loop system’s stability is discussed under the proposed control algorithm. It is found that the building structure closed-loop system is stable. Then the proposed control algorithm is applied on controlling the building structural vibration. The seismic action is chosen as El Centro seismic wave. Dynamic characteristics have comparative analysis between semiactive nonsmooth control and (...) passive control in two simulation examples. They demonstrate that the designed control algorithm has great robustness and anti-interference. The proposed control algorithm is more effective than passive control in suppressing structural vibration. (shrink)

"Co-publication agreement between China Social Sciences Press (China) and Paths International Ltd (UK)"--Colophon.

本书以美国的价值哲学理论为依据,就其理论核心“价值本质论”,分析其价值本质的特色,揭示其本质论的根本缺陷等问题。.

This paper chooses car travel and bus travel as the research objects, establishes a dual-mode equilibrium model based on the bottleneck model, and compares the travel characteristics of the no-toll and fine-toll schemes. We find that the fine-toll scheme can eliminate the queuing time at the bottleneck, but it also increases the congestion risk cost of bus travel. In order to eliminate the queuing time at the bottleneck and reduce the congestion risk cost of bus travel without increasing the car (...) travel cost and bus travel cost, we propose an optimization scheme of fine toll and bus departure quantity and analyze its travel characteristics theoretically. Through the numerical example, we calculate and analyze the equilibrium results of no-toll scheme, fine-toll scheme, and optimization scheme of fine toll and bus departure quantity. The results indicate that the optimization scheme of fine toll and bus departure quantity can help travelers to choose a reasonable travel mode and travel time to travel in the rush hour. (shrink)

The term "religious Daoism" first appeared in the Xiang'er commentary to the Laozi. Prior to this commentary, historiographical works only mentioned a "Way of Huang-Lao." For example, the "Biography of Huangpu Song" in the History of the Later Han states:Previously, Zhang Jue from Julu had called himself Perfect Master of Great Excellence. He served the Way of Huang-Lao.

A major controversy in the study of the "Analects" has been over the relation between two central concepts, ren (humanity, human excellence) and li (rites, rituals of propriety). Confucius seems to have said inconsistent things about this relation. Some passages appear to suggest that ren is more fundamental than li, while others seem to imply the contrary. It is therefore not surprising that there have been different interpretations and characterizations of this relation. Using the analogy of language grammar and mastery (...) of a language, it is proposed here that we should understand li as a cultural grammar and ren as the mastery of a culture. In this account, society cultivates its members through li toward the goal of ren, and persons of ren manifest their human excellence through their practice of li. (shrink)

本书探究了李宗吾的家族渊源、学识流派以及思想体系,试图全面解读“厚黑教主”,在读者面前展现出一个真实、全面的李宗吾。.

本书内容包括:从康德的“道德宗教”论儒家的宗教性、重评张载由“气化论”证立的成德论、从历史中提取智慧、当今越南的宗教与社会等。.

本书收录了著名学者李石岑先生的15篇讲演,涉及怀疑与信仰、哲学与人生、佛学与人生、教育与人生等哲学与生命论题。.

本书主要记述作者赴欧盟国家考察法律制度的感受心得,收《权利,权利》、《丹麦的平民政治》、《风雨柏林墙》等40多篇文章。.

本书研究了西方各国科学哲学思想的源流、派别,以及各派思想之间的关系及与科学、宗教、社会思潮的牵连,探索了科学哲学思想的发展方向。.

Research has independently highlighted the roles of semantic memory and associative abilities in creative thinking. However, it remains unclear how these two capacities relate to each other, nor ho...

Student–teacher relationships have been examined by many studies. However, an omission still exists, the existing scales are not appropriate for studying STRs in private colleges because of the special character of these schools. This paper presents the development and validation of Private-College Student–Teacher Relationship Scale, the first instrument to evaluate student–teacher relationships in private colleges. The PCSTRS has six dimensions: trust, interaction, intimacy, care, approval, and comfort. In our main study, the validity and reliability of the six-factor PCSTRS model were (...) demonstrated. The result of internal consistency coefficient indicated the high reliability of the scale, and the result of concurrent validity indicated the significant correlational relationships between the PCSTRS with other STR measures. In supplementary study, the PCSTRS was administered to 360 participants to confirm the applicability of PCSTRS and investigate the relation of STRs and students’ traits, performance, and wellbeing, as well as the differences between the private school and the public school in this relation; the analyses revealed that there were significant differences in trust, intimacy, and care between private and public colleges; positive correlations were found between STRs and self-esteem, self-efficacy, academic performance, extracurricular activity involvement, and subjective wellbeing. Present research firstly develops the PCSTRS, examined the reliability and validity, and provides the proposed nomological network among related constructs. (shrink)

Academic mothers perform intersected roles. They carry out their profession in workplaces, while they take the “second shift” of motherhood back to their families. The contested expectations in family and career built by the heterosexual matrix cause tension to academic mothers. We qualitatively investigate the interview data of six Chinese women academics on how they perform to negotiate their motherhood and academic work in the context of Chinese higher education, driven by the Butlerian theoretical concept of the heterosexual matrix. The (...) findings suggest that Chinese academic mothers play a zero-sum game between being mothers and being academics, deriving from their ontological responsibilities of motherhood. We conclude that in the masculine academia, these women academics help maintain the heterosexual matrix by satisfying the gender normativity when they negotiate their performances in their family and career; meanwhile, most have developed some strategies to achieve their career advancement. (shrink)

The renormalization group has been characterized as merely a coarse-graining procedure that does not illuminate the microscopic content of quantum field theory, but merely gets us from that content, as given by axiomatic QFT, to macroscopic predictions. I argue that in the constructive field theory tradition, RG techniques do illuminate the microscopic dynamics of a QFT, which are not automatically given by axiomatic QFT. RG techniques in constructive field theory are also rigorous, so one cannot object to their foundational import (...) on grounds of lack of rigor. (shrink)

Abusive supervision, defined as subordinates’ perception of the extent to which supervisors engage in the sustained display of hostile verbal and non-verbal behaviors, excluding physical contact, is associated with various negative outcomes. This has made it easy for researchers to overlook the possibility that some supervisors regret their bad behavior and express remorse for their actions. Hence, we know little about how subordinates react to the perception that their supervisor is remorseful and how this perception affects the outcomes of supervisors’ (...) undesired behavior. Specifically, drawing on the social exchange theory and displace revenge literature, this study explains how abusive supervision leads to victims’ service sabotage behavior. In addition, this study also investigates how perceived supervisors’ remorse mitigates the adverse effects of abusive supervision. Based on time-lagged, dyadic data from Chinese individuals, this study found support for all the proposed relationships, i.e., abusive supervision leads to service sabotage through the mediating effect of revenge desire. The findings also conclude that PSR lessens the detrimental effects of abusive supervision on victims’ behavior with their customers. Finally, this research contributes to service sabotage literature by highlighting the possibility where abusive supervisors cause service sabotage behavior among victims. This study also shows the importance of PSR’s role in decreasing service sabotage behavior exhibited by victims of abusive supervisors in the service sector. (shrink)