Ethics is one of the oldest scholarly topics, whether in Eastern Confucianism, Daoism, and Buddhism, or Western Deontology, Utilitarianism, and Virtue Theory, among others. Traditional ethics focuses on providing guidelines for behavior at a personal level. However, business ethics focuses more on corporations, with related studies addressing why corporations should practice social responsibility and embed ethics in business practices. Applying ethics to firms requires a variety of considerations in many areas. This is especially the case in Confucianism, which emphasizes self‐cultivation, (...) self‐reflection, and self‐discipline. This study investigates two modern representative cases of Confucian firms and observes how they integrate Confucianism into their business practices. It finds that despite the prevalence of a complex environment, Confucianism can still be adopted by them if they use certain methods. Besides, we also identify the common outcomes across these companies. These findings provide a reference for companies that want to incorporate Confucianism in their operations. (shrink)

The I Ching, or Book of Changes, has been one of the two or three most influential books in the Chinese canon. It has been used by people on all levels of society, both as a method of divination and as a source of essential ideas about the nature of heaven, earth, and humankind. During the eleventh and twelfth centuries, Sung dynasty literati turned to it for guidance in their fundamental reworking of the classical traditions. This book explores how (...) four leading thinkers--Su Shih, Shao Yung, Ch'eng I, and Chu Hsi--applied the I Ching to these projects. These four men used the Book of Changes in strikingly different ways. Yet each claimed to find in it a sure foundation for human values. Their work established not only new meanings for the text but also new models for governance and moral philosophy that would be debated throughout the next thousand years of Chinese intellectual history. By focusing on their uses of the I Ching, this study casts a unique light on the complex continuity-within-change and rich diversity of Sung culture. Originally published in 1990. The Princeton Legacy Library uses the latest print-on-demand technology to again make available previously out-of-print books from the distinguished backlist of Princeton University Press. These editions preserve the original texts of these important books while presenting them in durable paperback and hardcover editions. The goal of the Princeton Legacy Library is to vastly increase access to the rich scholarly heritage found in the thousands of books published by Princeton University Press since its founding in 1905. (shrink)

The I Ching, or Book of Changes, has been one of the two or three most influential books in the Chinese canon. It has been used by people on all levels of society, both as a method of divination and as a source of essential ideas about the nature of heaven, earth, and humankind. During the eleventh and twelfth centuries, Sung dynasty literati turned to it for guidance in their fundamental reworking of the classical traditions. This book explores how (...) four leading thinkers — Su Shih, Shao Yung, Ch’eng I, and Chu Hsi — applied the I Ching to these projects. These four men used the Book of Changes in strikingly different ways. Yet each claimed to find in it a sure foundation for human values. Their work established not only new meanings for the text but also new models for governance and moral philosophy that would be debated throughout the next thousand years of Chinese intellectual history. By focusing on their uses of the I Ching, this study casts a unique light on the complex continuity-within-change and rich diversity of Sung culture. (shrink)

This article assumes that a profession is a number of individuals in the same occupation voluntarily organized to earn a living by openly serving a moral ideal in a morally-permissible way beyond what law, market, morality, and public opinion would otherwise require. Our question is whether the concept of profession may have a far wider range than the term, so that, for example, pointing out that a certain language lacks a word for “profession” in our sense, is not enough to (...) show that those who speak the language also lack the concept. We believe the survey of 71 Chinese reported here begins to answer that question. This article has four parts. The first describes who was interviewed, how, when, and so on. The second describes some important features of the survey’s questions, explaining how the questions track the concept of profession. The third part reports and interprets the results relevant to our question. The forth defends a tentative answer to the question with which we began—arguing the survey supports the claim that China has a profession of engineering. This article should serve as a “proof of concept”, that is, a model for similar studies around the world both of engineering and of other occupations thought to be professions. (shrink)

Riassunto: L’antico teatro della Casa Ufficiale è un antico teatro esistente nell’area Montuosa del Taihang nella Provincia dell’Henan Settentrionale, il quale nacque nel periodo centrale della Dinastia Qing. L’aspetto dell’antico teatro della Casa Ufficiale è legato all’ambiente naturale locale, alla cultura popolare e alla produttività agricola. Ci sono otto antiche fasi della casa ufficiale nell’area Montuosa del Taihang nella Provincia dell’Henan Settentrionale, che forniscono prove fisiche per lo studio del dramma teatrale popolare nell’area Montuosa del Taihang durante la dinastia Qing. (...) Le iscrizioni sulle stele e sul palcoscenico dell’opera tradizionale cinese riflettono alcune caratteristiche del dramma teatrale rappresentato dai funzionari fin dalla dinastia Qing in Cina. I tipi di opere eseguite sono opere locali, le quali rappresentano dei preziosi materiali per lo studio storico. In una certa misura, è possibile ricostruire il percorso lo sviluppo regionale della società, della cultura e della vita quotidiana locale. (shrink)

In many countries where human embryo commercialization is banned, and no profit is allowed to be made directly from the transaction of frozen embryos between donor and recipient, there is still considerable opportunity for profiteering in medical fees arising from laboratory and clinical services rendered to the recipient. It is easy to disguise the 'sale' of altruistically donated human embryos through substantially increased medical fees, particularly in a private practice setting. The pertinent question that arises is what would constitute a (...) fair and honest profit margin for the medical professional and health institution in question? A suitable benchmark would obviously be the level of medical fees normally charged to patients for a self-freeze/thaw embryo transfer cycle, after initial failure at their first attempt in ART. This is because the level of medical expertise, clinical and laboratory services required for a donor- and self-freeze/thaw embryo transfer cycle should, in theory, be about the same, although slight variation in treatment can be expected owing to patients' respective medical histories, which results in varying predisposition to medical complications. In any case, the health authority should ensure that there is no gross disparity in the medical fees for both donor- and self-freeze/thaw embryo transfer cycle, as this could mask opportunistic profiteering by medical professionals and, in fact, be a covert form of embryo commercialization. (shrink)

Laozi zhe xue -- Zhuangzi zhe xue za lun -- Xian Qin zhu zi yan jiu wen xian mu lu.

Recognized as one of the greatest philosophers in classical China, Chu Hsi is especially known in the West through translations of one of his many works, theChin-su Lu. Julia Ching, a noted scholar of Neo-Confucian thought, provides the first book-length examination of Chu-Hsi's religious thought, based on extensive reading in both primary and secondary sources.

This project was undertaken to ascertain the perceptions of a group of Taiwan’s fourth-year bachelor of science in nursing (BSN) students regarding death and help expected from nurses during the dying process. Within the Chinese culture, death is one of the most important life issues. However, in many Chinese societies it is difficult for people to reveal their deepest feelings to their significant others or loved ones. It was in this context that this project was developed because little is known (...) about how Taiwan’s nursing students perceive death and the dying process. Using an open-ended, self-report questionnaire, 110 senior BSN students recorded their thoughts on: (1) their fears before physical death; (2) afterlife destinations; and (3) the help they would expect from nurses when dying. The data were analyzed using a three-layer qualitative thematic analysis. The students’ reported needs during the dying process were directed towards three main goals: (1) help in reaching the ‘triple targets of individual life’; (2) help in facilitating in-depth support so that both the dying person and significant others can experience a blessed farewell; and (3) help in reaching a destination in the afterlife. The results support the belief of dying as a transition occurring when life weans itself from the mortal world and prepares for an afterlife. (shrink)

This study contributes to the corporate social responsibility, stakeholder theory, and executive succession literature by examining the effect of corporate social irresponsibility on strategic leadership turnover. We theorize that firms’ CSiR increases the likelihood of executive turnover. We also investigate the nature of succession and successor origin following CSiR. We further examine how the CSiR–CEO succession relationship is moderated by firm visibility to stakeholders and industry dynamism. Our results, based on a dataset of 248 U.S. public firms between 2001 and (...) 2008, provide evidence that firms’ CSiR affects what is conventionally seen as primarily a market-driven decision on executive turnover, especially when firms operate in a more dynamic industry. Research contributions and implications are discussed. (shrink)

As of July 1, 2008, females aged 11-26 years seeking status as permanent residents in the United States must produce documentation that they have received the human papillomavirus vaccine before the U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services will approve their status adjustment. Immigration rights activists and public health officials have objected to this new requirement on the grounds that it is unnecessary and imposes unreasonable barriers to lawful immigration due to its expense. The Supreme Court has generally upheld mandatory vaccination requirements (...) for citizens and non-citizens and has tolerated federal immigration regulations that would be unconstitutional if applied to citizens. However, the HPV vaccination requirement may be arbitrary, unnecessary, and discriminatory as applied to green card applicants who pose no greater threat to public health than citizens who are not subject to the same requirements. Furthermore, the requirement may also impose unreasonable restraints on aliens individual liberties as well as real barriers to immigration. (shrink)

As of July 1, 2008, females aged 11-26 years seeking status as permanent residents in the United States must produce documentation that they have received the human papillomavirus vaccine before the U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services will approve their status adjustment. Immigration rights activists and public health officials have objected to this new requirement on the grounds that it is unnecessary and imposes unreasonable barriers to lawful immigration due to its expense. The Supreme Court has generally upheld mandatory vaccination requirements (...) for citizens and non-citizens and has tolerated federal immigration regulations that would be unconstitutional if applied to citizens. However, the HPV vaccination requirement may be arbitrary, unnecessary, and discriminatory as applied to green card applicants who pose no greater threat to public health than citizens who are not subject to the same requirements. Furthermore, the requirement may also impose unreasonable restraints on aliens individual liberties as well as real barriers to immigration. (shrink)

The “Chu shuo” 儲說 chapters of the Hanfeizi 韓非 子, attributed to Han Fei 韓非, encompass an extensive collection of anecdotes. The jing 經 sections of these chapters are traditionally understood to be a set of “canonical” teachings, to be explicated by the anecdotes in the shuo 說 sections. Eschewing this assumption, my analysis substantiates an alternative hypothesis that sees many of the jing texts as later superimpositions intended to serve as paratexts to existing anecdotal collections. By interpreting the jing (...) and shuo sections as paratexts and main texts, respectively, this study reveals how early compilers sought to organize and inventory information, as well as to guide future users’ understanding and memorization of the anecdotal materials. This approach not only facilitates the reconstruction of early frameworks of information management and knowledge acquisition, but also places the “Chu shuo” chapters in a comparative context. It also proffers new answers to several long-standing philological debates, such as the meaning and function of the label yi yue 一曰. In its conclusion, this study draws attention to potential continuities between the pre-imperial and imperial periods’ textual and bibliographical practices. (shrink)

With the assistance of the corpus analysis tool Wmatrix 4.0, this paper analyzes the semantic categories of the top 10 commercial banks of China and the United States to figure out their social-cultural behavior in the Internet business context. It is discovered that both common and distinctive identities were constructed: the common identities include the professional financial service provider, responsible corporation for employees, and relevant communities with environmental and social consciousness, while the distinctive identities are manifested in the communication strategy, (...) style, and persuasion mode: The Chinese Commercial Banks adopted the proactive strategy for corporate identity construction, are prone to take hierarchical and impersonal communication style, and more focused on the “credibility appeal” and “rational appeal” in persuasion mode; the commercial banks of the United States are more reactive in the communication strategy, position themselves in short distance with the putative audience in communication style, and conform to the typical “affective appeal” regarding the persuasion mode. From the intercultural perspective, the distinctions are the representation of the peculiar high-context culture and low-context culture based on Hofstede's cultural dimensions theory. Chinese banks should try to shorten the cultural gap by adopting communication strategy in conformity with the local cultural when going global rather than sticking to the domestic communication strategy. (shrink)

Lü-shih ch'un-ch'iu [Spring and Autumn of the House of Lü] appeared on the scene in 239 B.C. This was the latter part of the Warring States period. Our country's transition from slavery to feudalism had already been basically completed, but chaotic wars of secession among the feudal princes still occurred. Remnant forces of the slave system were still quite strong, and the restoration-counterrestoration struggle between the declining slave-owning class and the newly emerging landlord class was proceeding violently. Lü Pu-wei (...) was a careerist and plotter of the declining slave-owning class and a representative of the Confucians. In response to the needs of the slave-owning class's counterrevolutionary restoration, Lü adopted the tactic of "attacking the mind." He sneaked into the government of the newly emerging landlord class in the state of Ch'in and played the role of an ardent vanguard for restoration. This big commercial slave owner, who had originally run around among Ch'in, Chao, and other states, had amassed thousands of gold pieces at home and possessed more than ten thousand slaves. He played around with political conspiracies and became chancellor of the state of Ch'in. Before King Ying Cheng of Ch'in personally took power in 238 B.C., political power fell for a time into Lü's hands. Lü Pu-wei worked in collusion with Lao Ai, a eunuch he sponsored, and joined the industrial and commercial slave owners and the aristocratic slave owners to form a frenzied restorationist force. On the one hand, they formed factions to strengthen private interests, expanded their power, and prepared for an armed coup d'état. On the other hand, they took in riff-raff [literally, people who had surrendered and rebelled], assembled Confucian scholars, set to work on ideology, and grandly created public opinion for the restoration of the slave system. At that time, a reactionary adverse current favoring the restoration of the slave system hung over the state of Ch'in. Lü-shih ch'un-ch'iu, which was compiled under Lü's direction by his retainers, was the product of this adverse current. (shrink)

We investigate how short and long-range word length correlations evolve in Chinese narrative texts. The results show that, for short-range word length correlations, no significant linear evolutionary trend was found. But for long-range correlations, there are two opposite tendencies for two different regimes: the Hurst exponent of small-scale word length correlations decreases over time, and the exponent of large-scale shows an increasing tendency. The increase of word length is corroborated as an essential regularity of word evolution in written Chinese. Further (...) analyses show that a significant correlation coefficient is obtained between Hurst exponents from the small-scale correlations and mean word length across time. These indicate that word length correlation evolution possesses different self-adaptive mechanisms in terms of different scales of distances between words. We speculate that the increase of word length and sentence length in written Chinese may account for this phenomenon, in terms of both the social-cultural aspects and the self-adapting properties of language structures. (shrink)

The present study investigates Taiwanese college students’ perceptions of plagiarism. Specifically, this study seeks to explore how perceptive students pursuing higher education in Taiwan are in recognizing plagiaristic writing, in what terms they perceive source use in writing as appropriate and inappropriate, and view why plagiarism occurs. The study included 30 high- and 30 low-achieving students selected out of 396 students in English writing classes at a university in Taiwan. Drawing upon evidence from a writing exercise and individual interviews with (...) these 60 Taiwanese college students, the present study identified a variety of reasons why students may plagiarize. Most of the students participating in the study had some basic understanding of plagiarism. They had some familiarity with the Western notion of plagiarism, but based on the writing exercise, more often than not they were not able to recognize plagiarism when it actually occurred. Students’ understanding was generally, but not entirely, consistent with their source use behavior. More than half of the students considered that plagiarism is a cultural issue. However, there are also other factors that may lead to plagiarism. Finally, recommendations in terms of writing pedagogy are made. (shrink)

This book brings together leading scholars and practitioners from the United States, Europe, and Asia. The contributors come from different disciplines, including medicine, criminology, sociology, psychology, forensic sciences, and law. As a group, they have the background to discuss and conduct research in the area and to propose and critique theories and typologies of animal cruelty. In addition, they have the expertise to evaluate policy issues and to recommend best practices for protecting animals and intervening with those who abuse or (...) neglect them. (shrink)

本书分为“后现代:历史、政治和伦理”、“书评”、“评论”、“书目索引”四部分,收录了15篇文章。.

本辑编入19篇论文,分别分为“柯林武德论历史哲学”、“柯林武德的历史思想”以及“历史哲学”三大部分。包括“历史循环理论”、“历史知识的界限”、“克里齐的历史哲学”、“纳粹究竟残害了多少犹太人”等文章。 .