In this paper, we analyze how citizens evaluate their president, especially focusing on why voters lower their evaluations at an individual-level perspective. We assert that citizens raise their evaluations of a new president when their expectations are met and lower their opinions when his or her performance disappoints them. Furthermore, the evaluations of the president are not only affected by a government's economic and diplomatic performance, but are also influenced by individual awareness of salient political issues, the contents of the (...) news, and their own perceived influence on politics. We test the theoretical hypotheses using Taiwan's Election and Democratization Study panel survey data. The statistical results support our theoretical hypotheses and show that when President Ma's performance did not meet respondents media exposure and political efficacy are significantly associated with the change in their opinions of Ma. (shrink)

Problematic smartphone use is an expanded public health heed that requires more study to clarify the influence elements of different populations. The aim of this study was to investigate the relationship between smartphone use, and sleep quality, self-perceived health, and exercise participation in university students. A total of 1,575 Taiwanese undergraduate students from 7 universities participated in the study. Three questionnaires were completed by the study individuals. The results show the overall PSU rate was 11.8%. Average smartphone users were more (...) likely to feel in good health, better sleep quality and less unsatisfactory exercise participation than those who were problematic smartphone users. Multiple logistic regression analysis indicated that PSU, low weekly exercise frequency, and poor sleep quality were significant indicators of poor self-perceived health. We concluded that both low physical activity and PSU did have negative impacts on self-perceived health and sleep quality for undergraduate students. (shrink)

Delineation of the subthalamic nuclei on MRI is critical for deep brain stimulation surgery in patients with Parkinson’s disease. We propose this retrospective cohort study for quantitative analysis of MR signal-to-noise ratio, contrast, and signal difference-to-noise ratio of the STN on pre-operative three-dimensional stereotactic MRI in patients with medication-refractory PD. Forty-five consecutive patients with medication-refractory PD who underwent STN-DBS surgery in our hospital from January 2018 to June 2021 were included in this study. All patients had whole-brain 3D MRI, including (...) T2-weighted imaging, T2-weighted fluid-attenuated inversion recovery, and susceptibility-weighted imaging, at 3.0 T scanner for stereotactic navigation. The signal intensities of the STN, corona radiata, and background noise were obtained after placing regions of interest on corresponding structures. Quantitative comparisons of SNR, contrast, and SDNR of the STN between MR pulse sequences, including the T2WI, FLAIR, and SWI. Subgroup analysis regarding patients’ sex, age, and duration of treatment. We used one-way repeated measures analysis of variance for quantitative comparisons of SNR, contrast, and SDNR of the STN between different MR pulse sequences, and we also used the dependent t-test for the post hoc tests. In addition, we used Mann–Whitney U test for subgroup analyses. Both the contrast and SDNR were highest on FLAIR. The SNR was highest on SWI, and both the SNR and SDNR were lowest on T2WI. Subgroup analyses demonstrated significantly lower SDNR on SWI for patients receiving medication treatment for ≥13 years. In conclusion, on 3D stereotactic MRI of medication-refractory PD patients, the contrast and SDNR for the STN are highest on FLAIR, suggesting the optimal delineation of STN on FLAIR. (shrink)

While consumer motivation to maintain a relationship with a retailer is a function of personal idiosyncratic characteristics, specific perceptions of retailers may play a role in influencing receptivity to relationship maintenance. This study integrates relationship marketing tactics and corporate associates into a model of consumer ethical purchasing behavior that improves the relationship between sellers and buyers. Results show social benefits, special treatment benefits, CSR, and service quality have direct and indirect impact on ethically questionable consumer behaviors in retailing. This study (...) also modifies the consumer ethics scale of Muncy and Vitell for the East Asian market with good reliability and validity in order to measure ethically questionable consumption behaviors in retailing. Finally, some theoretical contribution and practical implications are discussed. (shrink)

The primary purpose of this study is to link the effects of consumer personality traits on green buying intention via the mediating variable of consumer ethical beliefs so as to extend the context of green buying intentions with consumer ethics literatures. Based on a survey of 545 Taiwanese respondents, consumer personality traits were found to significantly affect consumer ethical beliefs. The results also indicate that some dimensions of consumer ethical beliefs significantly predict consumer intention to buy green products. Generally speaking, (...) this study enhances our knowledge of consumers’ ethical decision-making in the context of green consumption behaviors. Theoretical and managerial implications, limitations, and future research are also provided. (shrink)

Political scientists generally consider that the incentive for legislators to switch parties lies in their desire to be re-elected. While some scholars attribute defection to the legislators’ popularity and strong connections with their constituents which enable them to be re-elected without relying on party labels, others assert that legislators switch if they perceive that staying put might threaten their chances of re-election. In this paper, we find that the two assumptions, to some extent, contradict each other. More surprisingly, the two (...) contradictory hypotheses cohabit under the single non-transferable vote system. From an analysis of the switching in the Taiwanese Legislative Yuan, the empirical evidence shows that because of fierce intraparty competition in the multimember districts, not only barely elected but also top-ranked legislators switched party affiliation in order to avoid the loss in votes or even seats to their copartisans and to maximize their chances of re-election. (shrink)

Consumer ethics is the moral principles and standards that guide consumers to determine the certain consumption behaviors are ethically right or wrong. Whereas cultural and personal dimensions are crucial constructs affecting individual ethical attitudes and behaviors, few studies consider Confucian dynamism and the role of money in consumer ethics. Confucian dynamism, a cultural dimension based on Confucianism, has played a central role in guiding moral obligations and ethics in human relations in several East Asian countries. Thus, this study tested its (...) hypotheses using a sample of 521 respondents obtained via a systematic random sampling technique. The authors find that individuals with a higher tendency to Confucian dynamism are less tolerant of unethical practices. These findings also show that the role of money partially influences consumer ethical beliefs. Finally, we examine the impact of demographic variables and find age and education affect consideration of ethical values. (shrink)

Outside the philosophy classroom, global skeptics – skeptics about all (purported) knowledge of the external world – are rare. But there are people who describe themselves as “skeptics” about various more specific domains, including self-professed “skeptics” about the reality of anthropogenic climate change. There is little to no philosophical literature that juxtaposes the climate change skeptic with the external world skeptic. While many “traditional” epistemologists assume that the external world skeptic poses a serious philosophical challenge in a way that the (...) climate change skeptic doesn’t, many “applied” or “social” epistemologists assume that there isn’t much to be learned from debates about the external world skeptic, finding her challenge to be distant from both common sense and real-world concerns. I try to show that both of these views are mistaken. The external world skeptic raises deep questions that are important for our everyday deliberation about what to believe, and there are significant structural parallels between the arguments for external world skepticism and those for at least a form of climate change skepticism that is idealized – but not too idealized! – from the views of flesh-and-blood climate change skeptics. As such, we have strong reasons to think in parallel about how to reply to both skeptics’ challenges. I thus finish by (briefly) considering how different widespread responses to the external world skeptic might or might not generalize happily to the climate change skeptic’s challenge. (shrink)

In this paper, I show that we should understand the direction of fit of beliefs and desires in normative terms. After rehearsing a standard objection to Michael Smith’s analysis of direction of fit, I raise a similar problem for Lloyd Humberstone’s analysis. I go on to offer my own account, according to which the difference between beliefs and desires is determined by the normative relations such states stand in. I argue that beliefs are states which we have reason to change (...) in light of the world, whereas desires are states that give us reason to change the world. After doing this, I show how the view avoids various objections, including two from David Sobel and David Copp. The paper ends by briefly discussing the relevance of the view to the Humean theory of motivation. (shrink)

While those who take a "structuralist" approach to racial justice issues are right to call attention to the importance of social practices, laws, etc., they sometimes go too far by suggesting that antiracist efforts ought to focus on changing unjust social systems rather than changing individuals’ minds. We argue that while the “either/or” thinking implied by this framing is intuitive and pervasive, it is misleading and self-undermining. We instead advocate for a “both/and” approach to antiracist moral education that explicitly teaches (...) how social structures influence ideas about race and how ideas about race shape, sustain, and transform social structures. Ideally, antiracist moral education will help people see how social change and moral progress depend on the symbiotic relations between individuals and structures. We articulate a conception of “structure-facing virtue” that exemplifies this hybrid approach to illuminate the pivotal role moral education plays in the fight for racial justice. (shrink)

Scholars, journalists, and activists working on climate change often distinguish between “individual” and “structural” approaches to decarbonization. The former concern choices individuals can make to reduce their “personal carbon footprint” (e.g., eating less meat). The latter concern changes to institutions, laws, and other social structures. These two approaches are often framed as oppositional, representing a mutually exclusive forced choice between alternative routes to decarbonization. After presenting representative samples of this oppositional framing of individual and structural approaches in environmental communication, we (...) identify four problems with oppositional thinking and propose five ways to conceive of individual and structural reform as symbiotic and interdependent. (shrink)

Climate change is often described as an existential risk to the human species, but this terminology has generally been avoided in the climate-justice literature in analytic philosophy. I investigate the source of this disconnect and explore the prospects for incorporating the idea of climate change as an existential risk into debates about climate justice. The concept of existential risk does not feature prominently in these discussions, I suggest, because assumptions that structure ‘ideal’ accounts of climate justice ensure that the prospect (...) of climate change as an extinction-level threat does not arise. Given persistent noncompliance with mitigation duties, however, we have reason to revisit these assumptions. I argue that the most promising way for theories of climate justice to account for the significance of existential risk is to look to the practices of protest and resistance in which a concern about extinction or global catastrophe is frequently given expression. (shrink)

Preferences are often thought to be relevant for well-being: respecting preferences, or satisfying them, contributes in some way to making people's lives go well for them. A crucial assumption that accompanies this conviction is that there is a normative standard that allows us to discriminate between preferences that do, and those that do not, contribute to well-being. The papers collected in this volume, written by moral philosophers and philosophers of economics, explore a number of central issues concerning the formulation of (...) such a normative standard. They examine what a defensible account of how preferences should be formed for them to contribute to well-being should look like; whether preferences are subject to requirements of rationality and what reasons we have to prefer certain things over others; and what the significance is, if any, of preferences that are arational or not conducive to well-being. (shrink)

Computational visual perception, also known as computer vision, is a field of artificial intelligence that enables computers to process digital images and videos in a similar way as biological vision does. It involves methods to be developed to replicate the capabilities of biological vision. The computer vision’s goal is to surpass the capabilities of biological vision in extracting useful information from visual data. The massive data generated today is one of the driving factors for the tremendous growth of computer vision. (...) This survey incorporates an overview of existing applications of deep learning in computational visual perception. The survey explores various deep learning techniques adapted to solve computer vision problems using deep convolutional neural networks and deep generative adversarial networks. The pitfalls of deep learning and their solutions are briefly discussed. The solutions discussed were dropout and augmentation. The results show that there is a significant improvement in the accuracy using dropout and data augmentation. Deep convolutional neural networks’ applications, namely, image classification, localization and detection, document analysis, and speech recognition, are discussed in detail. In-depth analysis of deep generative adversarial network applications, namely, image-to-image translation, image denoising, face aging, and facial attribute editing, is done. The deep generative adversarial network is unsupervised learning, but adding a certain number of labels in practical applications can improve its generating ability. However, it is challenging to acquire many data labels, but a small number of data labels can be acquired. Therefore, combining semisupervised learning and generative adversarial networks is one of the future directions. This article surveys the recent developments in this direction and provides a critical review of the related significant aspects, investigates the current opportunities and future challenges in all the emerging domains, and discusses the current opportunities in many emerging fields such as handwriting recognition, semantic mapping, webcam-based eye trackers, lumen center detection, query-by-string word, intermittently closed and open lakes and lagoons, and landslides. (shrink)

S-frames and i-frames do not represent two opposed types of intervention. Rather they are interpretive lenses for focusing on specific aspects of interventions, all of which include individual and structural dimensions. There is no sense to be made of prioritizing either system change or individual change, because each requires the other.

Following the COVID-19 pandemic, online learning has become a new mode of learning that students must adapt to. However, the mechanisms by which students receive and grasp knowledge in the online learning mode remain unknown. Cognitive load theory offers instructions to students considering the knowledge of human cognition. Therefore, this study considers the CLT to explore the internal mechanism of learning under the online mode in an experimental study. We recruited 76 undergraduates and randomly assigned them to four groups in (...) which they will watch videos at four different kinds of speed. The study observed and analyzed how video playback speed affected students' learning and cognitive load to obtain the following results: Video playback speed significantly influenced the students' learning effect. The best effect was observed at the speed of 1.25× and 1.5×. The speed that affected the learning effect best differed according to the students' learning abilities. High-level group students performed best at the speed of 1.5×, whereas low-level group students performed best at the speed of 1.25×. The 1.5× speed showed significant differences in the learning effect by students' majors. This indicates that the cognitive load of liberal arts students increased greatly at this speed. A change in playback speed has a significant impact on the cognitive load. Accelerated playback speed increases the cognitive load of students. The highest learning effect is observed under medium cognitive load. (shrink)

This study aims to explore the current situation and strategy formulation of sports psychology teaching in colleges and universities following adaptive learning and deep learning under information education. The informatization in physical education, teaching methods, and teaching processes make psychological education more scientific and efficient. First, the relevant theories of adaptive learning and deep learning are introduced, and an adaptive learning analysis model is implemented. Second, based on the deep learning automatic encoder, college students’ sports psychology is investigated and the (...) test results are predicted. Finally, the current situation and development strategy of physical education in colleges and universities are analyzed. The results show that when the learning rate is 1, 0.1, and 0.01, there is no significant change in the analysis factors of recall, ndcg, item_coverage, and sps. When the learning rate is 1, their analysis factors change obviously, and it is calculated that the optimal learning rate of the model is 1. And the difficulty of the recommended test questions by using the sports psychology teaching method based on adaptive learning and deep learning is relatively stable. The test questions include various language points of sports psychology. Compared with others methods, adaptive learning and deep learning can provide comprehensive test questions for sports psychology teaching. This study provides technical support for the reform of sports psychology teaching in colleges and universities and contributes to optimizing the information-based teaching mode. (shrink)

Historians and philosophers of science have, in recent decades, offered evidence in support of several influential models of conceptual change in science. These models have often drawn on and in turn driven research on conceptual change in childhood and in science education. This nexus of reciprocal influences is held together by several largely unexamined analogies and by several assumptions concerning analogy itself. In this chapter, we aim to shed some light on these hidden premises and subject them to critical scrutiny. (...) Our critical survey suggests the following hypothesis: conceptual change in both childhood and science is driven by the epistemic subject’s quest for coherence. (shrink)

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In order to usurp the Party, seize power and restore capitalism, the Wang-Chang-Chiang-Yao anti-Party clique has turned out counterrevolutionary opinions in the ideological realm. They have tried in every way to distort and revise history and have fabricated the "struggle between the Confucianists and the Legalists" in history. They have confounded different social contradictions and have replaced the class struggle with the "struggle between the Confucianists and the Legalists" and the antagonism within the landlord class with the "line struggle." (...) To them, Legalists were always "progressive" and "innovative" while Confucianists always "represented the forces of restoration." They have tried their best to glorify emperors, kings, generals and ministers in history, to praise Legalists as "saviors," to cover up the Legalists' nature as an exploiting class, to call for metaphysics and the idealist viewpoint of history, and to turn out revisionist fallacies. Because important changes took place in the Confucian and Legalist schools during the periods of the Western and Eastern Han dynasties, the "Gang of Four" and the writers in its service have showed a great interest in histories of the dynasties and have published a series of articles on the so-called "struggle between the Confucianists and the Legalists." In the current struggle against the "Gang of Four," it is of great practical significance to review the changes in the Confucian and Legalist schools and their roles and class nature during the Han dynasties, to criticize and expose the criminal clique's counterrevolutionary political intrigues and plots, and to clarify the historical facts confused by the "Gang of Four.". (shrink)

Especially but not exclusively in the United States, there is a significant gulf between expert opinion and public opinion on a range of important political, social, and scientific issues. Large numbers of lay people hold views contrary to the expert consensus on topics such as climate change, vaccines, and economics. Much political commentary assumes that ordinary people should defer to experts more than they do, and this view is certainly lent force by the literally deadly effects of many denials of (...) established science. But there are complex philosophical issues here, concerning, among other things, (i) what an expert is; (ii) what kind of deference is called for; (iii) and when deference is called for. This entry gives an overview of these three issues and recent work on them. It then examines some potential collective and pragmatic disadvantages of deference, before concluding with reflections on what we can say to those who distrust experts. (shrink)

Response-dependence theories have historically been very popular in aesthetics, and aesthetic response-dependence has motivated response-dependence in ethics. This chapter closely examines the prospects for such theories. It breaks this category down into dispositional and fittingness strands of response-dependence, corresponding to descriptive and normative ideal observer theories. It argues that the latter have advantages over the former but are not themselves without issue. Special attention is paid to the relationship between hedonism and response-dependence. The chapter also introduces two aesthetic properties that (...) lead to wrong kinds of reasons problems for aesthetic response-dependence: insightfulness and the capacity to change one’s perspective. These properties do not have obvious parallels in the ethical domain, and so present an obstacle for response-dependence even in aesthetics. The chapter ends by examining replies on behalf of the response-dependence theorist, ultimately suggesting that a restricted form of response-dependence is the most promising way forward for fans of such theories. (shrink)

English has plural terms as well as singular terms. But our standard formal languages, e.g., the predicate calculus, feature only singular terms. How can the plural idiom be formalized?‘Changing the subject’ is by far the most common plurals strategy among both philosophers and linguists: a plural term is replaced by a singular term standing for some complex object that ‘contains’ the individuals to which the plural term alludes. For example, one might simply replace ‘A, B imply C’ with ‘{A, B} (...) implies [singular] C’. We uncover a surprising variety of ways to change the subject, of ever‐increasing complexity and ingenuity. Our question is whether any can made to work. (shrink)

With an eye on the power of literary utopias that forever remain on the printed page, architects have struggled with the question of whether architecture in practice—real buildings—can be utopian. Many architectural utopias have been imagined—unbuilt and even unbuildable—but does the act of rendering one into physical form eliminate its utopian potential? Recent scholarship, breaking with a generation of postmodern cynicism, has suggested that it does not and has pointed architectural utopias in new directions. But the incongruity between the burden (...) of being both real and radically transformative remains daunting.Despite this threshold conundrum, the contemporary era is no less wanting of new utopias than ages... (shrink)

Can a preference-based conception of welfare accommodate changes in people's preferences? I argue that the fact that people care about which preferences they have, and the fact that people can change their preferences about which preferences it is good for them to have, together undermine the case for accepting a preference-satisfaction conception of welfare.

Because of the coronavirus disease 2019 pandemic, the traditional didactic teaching method that is practiced in Confucian culture, an Eastern cultural model, is being challenged by multiple alternative teaching modes. In Western cultures, the teaching behavior of teachers is dependent on their ability to influence the temperament of students; in contrast, teachers in Eastern cultures are influenced by changes in external environment. This phenomenon can mainly be explained by the tendency of students in Eastern cultures to adopt a passive learning (...) style because of Confucianism. On the basis of Confucian culture and literature review, we conducted a Chinese-language questionnaire survey of temperament scales and learning motivation, and 724 effective questionnaires were collected and used to explore the relationship between students’ temperament and learning motivation under three teaching modes, namely, online teaching, traditional offline classroom teaching, and online–offline mixed teaching. Conclusions drawn were as follows. In a Chinese Confucian cultural system, the passive learning style of students and its relationship with the surrounding collective culture creates the temperament characteristics of sanguinity and phlegmatism. Influenced by the traditional Confucian values of benevolence and honesty, students with a melancholic temperament do not focus on their learning motivations. Furthermore, changes in external information, to which such students are sensitive, cause them to give up opportunities easily. Similarly, students with a choleric temperament are sensitive and prone to fluctuating emotions, and they tend to be affected by changes in their external environment. Although students have a strong learning motivation under the traditional offline teaching mode, a paradox in individual cognition exists because of differences between Chinese and Western cultures. Therefore, students generally prefer the online–offline mixed teaching mode to the traditional single teaching mode. This study explored factors that influence students’ learning motivation, namely, individual temperament and educational environment, and provides a reference for the future development of post epidemic education. (shrink)

Research suggests that interventions involving extensive training or counterconditioning can reduce implicit prejudice and stereotyping, and even susceptibility to stereotype threat. This research is widely cited as providing an “existence proof” that certain entrenched social attitudes are capable of change, but is summarily dismissed—by philosophers, psychologists, and activists alike—as lacking direct, practical import for the broader struggle against prejudice, discrimination, and inequality. Criticisms of these “debiasing” procedures fall into three categories: concerns about empirical efficacy, about practical feasibility, and about the (...) failure to appreciate the underlying structural-institutional nature of discrimination. I reply to these criticisms of debiasing, and argue that a comprehensive strategy for combating prejudice and discrimination should include a central role for training our biases away. (shrink)

The present studies investigate how the intentions of third parties influence judgments of moral responsibility for other agents who commit immoral acts. Using cases in which an agent acts under some situational constraint brought about by a third party, we ask whether the agent is blamed less for the immoral act when the third party intended for that act to occur. Study 1 demonstrates that third-party intentions do influence judgments of blame. Study 2 finds that third-party intentions only influence moral (...) judgments when the agent's actions precisely match the third party's intention. Study 3 shows that this effect arises from changes in participants' causal perception that the third party was controlling the agent. Studies 4 and 5, respectively, show that the effect cannot be explained by changes in the distribution of blame or perceived differences in situational constraint faced by the agent. (shrink)

Are women (simply) adult human females? Dictionaries suggest that they are. However, philosophers who have explicitly considered the question invariably answer no. This paper argues that they are wrong. The orthodox view is that the category *woman* is a social category, like the categories *widow* and *police officer*, although exactly what this social category consists in is a matter of considerable disagreement. In any event, orthodoxy has it that *woman* is definitely not a biological category, like the categories *amphibian* or (...) *adult human female*. -/- In the first part, a number of arguments are given for the view that women are adult human females; the second part turns to rebutting the main objections. Finally, a couple of morals are briefly noted: one for activist sloganeering, and one for ameliorative projects that seek to change the meaning of ‘woman’. (shrink)

China's political environment offers limited space for critical debates on domestic politics. In such a constrained environment, people tend to represent and articulate climate change issues without explicitly addressing their political aspects. The aim of this paper is to examine this political ambiguity in climate change discourses. Q methodology was employed to elicit the subjective positions of forty-five young and educated Chinese individuals. Three discourses were extracted: namely, prosaic environmentalism, co-operative economic optimism and actor scepticism. These discourses do not indicate (...) critical intent and deep engagement in the political arguments regarding climate change. This raises concern about the growth of climate citizenship within the country. (shrink)

Since the 1950s, Lee Joseph of Zhu Xi of the Road, learn to criticism that many aspects of Taoism is similar to Whitehead's qualification process philosophy, which Zhu large amount of philosophical comprehensive work is the right assessment, triggering In order to controversy . This paper argues that there are many real reason is that Zhu and Whitehead都qualification processes philosopher. According to Whitehead's thought, emphasizing the role or function of qualifications process description is the qualification process may philosopher. Zhu Xi (...) said in his clear emphasis on learning裡qualification process, change, transformation and innovation of other concepts. Description of this method less controversial, but the problem is in the end "qualification process" concept in terms of how important Zhu? He has "qualification process" concept is obvious? Over the past eight hundred years have an ongoing controversy, Zhu Xi Road School for the qualification process as the subject is so obvious? Zhu Xi describes the nature of the universe is life and life does not interest, is well known. However, many scholars have argued Zhu Xi's description of the main school - "Management", or the original management, channel management, pattern, or order, in fact, is a static concept. If "management" is static or just the original order or pattern in the form of management, it is difficult to establish qualification process is a description of the key themes of philosophy. Like a dead Yuzhe how it is possible to control a horse living ? This is a serious topic, in fact, followed by South Korean scholars to discuss the subject, which launched the great "forty-seven Debate." This article will certainly "reasonable" can indeed be interpreted as a life principle of management by a manager or management Concept. Really the case, said Zhu Xi's learning can rightly be regarded as a strongly significant qualification process philosophy, such as Whitehead and Lee Snow and other scholars advocated. Zhu Xi to provide In order many of the "reasonable" interpretation, possible these things in the world or the events of the original treatment or reason, interpreted with the qualification process in nature, even creative, with its complex of Taoist system role. This will be Chen Chun highly influential book of the "North Creek word meaning" to prove the wisdom of philosophy of Zhu Xi's disciples will be the most "reasonable" as a "way of qualifications." Therefore, based on an important school of Zhu Xi's interpretation of Taoism, we can agree and support the Joseph Lee, Zhu Xi Neo-Confucianism as the philosophy of the Core see qualification process. Ever since Joseph Needham in the 1950s made the comment that in many ways the daoxue of Zhu Xi resembled the process philosophy of Alfred North Whitehead there has been a debate on whether or not this is an accurate assessment of the Master Zhu's massive philosophical synthesis. This paper argues that there are substantive grounds to suggest that both Master Zhu and Whitehead are process philosophers. Based on Whitehead's observation that some philosophers emphasize the role or function or process as a key element of their philosophical vision and hence can be deemed 'process' philosophers, it is clear that Zhu certainly affirmed a central place for notions of process, change, transformation and creativity within his daoxue or Teaching of the Way. In many ways there is little argument about the general nature of this comment: the problem is, just how central to Zhu's daoxue is the notion of process? Is process more apparent than real? There has been a constant debate for the last eight hundred years as to whether or not Zhu Xi's commitment to process as a central theme or motif of daoxue is as strong as it appears at first glance. Zhu was famous for saying that the nature of the cosmos is, for instance, constant generation or shengsheng buxi life and life does not interest rates. Nonetheless, many competent scholars have argued that Zhu's crucial notion of li management or principle, rationale, pattern, or order might actually be a static concept: hardly the kind of key theme to build a process philosophy around if indeed it is the case that principle is a static or merely a formal principle of order or pattern . One of the best ways of putting the question was, how can a dead rider ride a live horse ? This is a serious question, and in fact later Korean scholars debated the issue with great subtlety in the great Four-Seven Debate. This paper will defend the notion that li can indeed be interpreted as a living principle or rationale. If this is the case, then Zhu's daoxue can be rightly deemed a process philosophy in the strongest sense of the term as defined by scholars such as Whitehead and Nicholas Rescher. Although Zhu Xi offered a number of different interpretations of li, it is entirely plausible that principle or the rationale for the things and events of the world can be construed as processive, even creative in terms of its role in the complex daoxue architectonic. For instance, the influential Beixi ziyi [or Neo-Confucian Terms Explained as translated by Wing-tsit Chan] of Chen Chun proves that one of Master Zhu's most philosophically astute disciples understood li to be proccessive. Therefore, based on one important stream of exegesis of Zhu's daoxue, we can agree with and support Joseph Needham's insight that daoxue is a form of process philosophy. (shrink)

This essay responds to the criticism that contemporary efforts to redress discrimination and inequality are overly individualistic. Critics of individualism emphasize that these systemic social ills stem not from the prejudice, irrationality, or selfishness of individuals, but from underlying structural-institutional forces. They are skeptical, therefore, of attempts to change individuals’ attitudes while leaving structural problems intact. I argue that the insistence on prioritizing structural over individual change is problematic and misleading. My view is not that we should instead prioritize individual (...) change, but that individual changes are integral to the success of structural changes. These theorists urge a redirection of attention, claiming that we should think less about the individual and more about the social. What they should urge instead is that we think differently about the individual, and thereby think differently about the social. (shrink)

The difference between the unity of the individual and the separateness of persons requires that there be a shift in the moral weight that we accord to changes in utility when we move from making intrapersonal tradeoffs to making interpersonal tradeoffs. We examine which forms of egalitarianism can, and which cannot, account for this shift. We argue that a form of egalitarianism which is concerned only with the extent of outcome inequality cannot account for this shift. We also argue that (...) a view which is concerned with both outcome inequality and with the unfairness of inequality in individuals‘ expected utilities can account for this shift. Finally, we limn an alternative view, on.. (shrink)

In this paper it is argued that we should amend the traditional understanding of the view known as the guise of the good. The guise of the good is traditionally understood as the view that we only want to act in ways that we believe to be good in some way. But it is argued that a more plausible view is that we only want to act in ways that we believe we have normative reason to act in. This change (...) – from formulating the view in terms of goodness to formulating it in terms of reasons – is significant because the revised view avoids various old and new counterexamples to the traditional view, because the revised view is better motivated than the traditional view, and because the revised view is better placed to explain certain features of desire than the traditional view. The paper finishes by showing that the conclusions reached are compatible with theories such as the buck passing account of value. (shrink)

Targeted modifications of the human epigenome, epigenome editing (EE), are around the corner. For EE, techniques similar to genome editing (GE) techniques are used. While in GE the genetic information is changed by directly modifying DNA, intervening in the epigenome requires modifying the configuration of DNA, for example, how it is folded. This does not come with alterations in the base sequence (‘genetic code’). To date, there is almost no ethical debate about EE, whereas the discussions about GE are voluminous. (...) Our article introduces EE into bioethics by translating knowledge from science to ethics and by comparing the risks of EE with those of GE. We, first (I), make the case that a broader ethical debate on EE is due, provide scientific background on EE, compile potential use-cases and recap previous debates. We then (II) compare EE and GE and suggest that the severity of risks of novel gene technologies depends on three factors: (i) the choice of an ex vivo versus an in vivo editing approach, (ii) the time of intervention and intervention windows and (iii) the targeted diseases. Moreover, we show why germline EE is not effective and reject the position of strong epigenetic determinism. We conclude that EE is not always ethically preferable to GE in terms of risks, and end with suggestions for next steps in the current ethical debate on EE by briefly introducing ethical challenges of new areas of preventive applications of EE (III). (shrink)

Bystander information is information about others’ attitudes towards a text (i.e. about whether they agree or disagree with it). Social media platforms force bystander information upon us when we read posts thereon. What effect does this have on how we respond to what we read? The dominant view in the literature is that it changes our minds (the so-called “bandwagon effect”). Simplifying a little: if we see that most people agree (disagree) with what a post says, we are more likely (...) to agree (disagree) with what it says. This paper argues that we should take seriously a competitor view and care about the difference between it and the dominant view. The competitor view proposes that bystander information changes what a text seems to us to say: although bystander information may lead us to change what attitude we express toward a post, that’s not because we’ve changed our attitude toward any fixed content (i.e. fixed thing that the post says). This paper argues that, if this competitor view is correct, then social media is likely to be an especially hazardous place for the practice of sharing content. (shrink)

Efforts from diverse disciplines, including evolutionary studies and biomechanical experiments, have yielded new insights into the genetic, signaling, and mechanical control of tooth formation and functions. Evidence from fossils and non‐model organisms has revealed that a common set of genes underlie tooth‐forming potential of epithelia, and changes in signaling environments subsequently result in specialized dentitions, maintenance of dental stem cells, and other phenotypic adaptations. In addition to chemical signaling, tissue forces generated through epithelial contraction, differential growth, and skeletal constraints act (...) in parallel to shape the tooth throughout development. Here recent advances in understanding dental development from these studies are reviewed and important gaps that can be filled through continued application of evolutionary and biomechanical approaches are discussed. (shrink)

What can we do—and what should we do—to fight against bias? This final chapter introduces empirically-tested interventions for combating implicit (and explicit) bias and promoting a fairer world, from small daily-life debiasing tricks to larger structural interventions. Along the way, this chapter raises a range of moral, political, and strategic questions about these interventions. This chapter further stresses the importance of admitting that we don’t have all the answers. We should be humble about how much we still don’t know and (...) dedicate efforts to gathering as much knowledge as possible. Even so, we know enough now to start making a difference, and this chapter ultimately aims to chip away at the gap between our abstract commitments to treat people fairly and our lived habits and experiences, which continue to be shaped by implicit and explicit prejudices and stereotypes about race, gender, and other social categories. (shrink)