Scientific conference on confucianist scholar Phan Thuc Truc, 1808-2852.

The notion of optimality is often invoked informally in the literature on metacognitive control. We provide a precise formulation of the optimization problem and show that optimal time allocation strategies depend critically on certain characteristics of the learning environment, such as the extent of time pressure, and the nature of the uptake function. When the learning curve is concave, optimality requires that items at lower levels of initial competence be allocated greater time. On the other hand, with logistic learning curves, (...) optimal allocations vary with time availability in complex and surprising ways. Hence there are conditions under which optimal strategies will be relatively easy to uncover, and others in which suboptimal time allocation might be expected. The model can therefore be used to address the question of whether and when learners should be able to exercise good metacognitive control in practice. (shrink)

Culture is a concept that is claimed these days as the last authority for appeal in most discussions on human affairs and as the ultimate cause of important differences among people: “[C]ulture is the sole source of the validity of a moral right or rule”1 Only culture seems to be conclusive for almost all of what men are and what they do. Culture is what we collectively create but, at the same time, what we are determined by; we are our (...) own masters and at the same time slaves of our own creations. The culture that is so decisive today, however, is not a universal culture common to everyone but the concrete culture of each society2 here and now. Thus the culture that is concretely relevant to us today is plural. Pluralism in the present understanding may not necessarily trouble Christians, but the relativism that accompanies it does. More alarming, however, is cultural determinism that seriously discourages Christian efforts for evangelism and, especially, foreign mission. (shrink)

Sun Yat-Sen was a Chinese philosopher and politician, who served as the provisional first president of the Republic of China, and first leader of the Kuomintang. He argued that common blood, language, customs, religion and livelihood were the five essential elements that constituted a nation. Sun was influenced by social Darwinism in his understanding that socio-cultural forces could override the innate characteristics of race. Thus, he employed racially defined nationalism by invoking anti-Manchuism. Although China’s modernisation in the first decades of (...) the 20th century was attributed to Sen, this paper shows that his insistence on the consanguine Han race produced inconsistencies, as his racially defined nationalism and republicanism were mutually exclusive, the latter being based on the inclusion of all citizens regardless of their ethnic background. Indeed, modern nations are constituted by both naturally inherited and culturally acquired qualities of the people. Since China consists of many ethnic groups, Sen’s emphasis on consanguine Chinese race has produced a racially exclusionary nation and has caused racial conflict. (shrink)

The rapid growth of Korean churches and the conflict-ridden Korean society may serve to illustrate how evangelists should face critical socio-political issues. The Korean experience seems to indicate that evangelists are most effective when they concentrate their entire efforts on preaching “Jesus Christ and Him Crucified” alone. Believers in general, however, should be keenly interested in such issues as human rights and social justice, not only for their own sake but also for the sake of effective future evangelism. The Church's (...) involvement in these issues gives a favourable impression of Christianity, which in turn facilitates evangelism. (shrink)

L'auteur montre tous les enjeux de la médiation pour une bonne administration de la justice dans le cadre des réformes en cours.

It is questions that children need to do higher-order thinking in a community of inquiry. There, more fundamental questions should be asked with some efforts to understand clearly and analyze the given texts. The initial questions should be elaborated into more fundamental ones through dialogues and discussions, and the process may be changed by the given conditions and contexts. In this paper, I show by some real cases how teachers can help children make more fundamental questions in a community of (...) inquiry. (shrink)