The twenty-first century is arguably the century of computing. In such a world saturated by computing, Computational Thinking is now recognized as a foundational competency for being an informed citizen and being successful in STEM work. Nevertheless, how to effectively import different types of teaching methods in university courses is subjected to further evaluation. Currently, the arguments in favor of tangible robots including high interaction, great practicality, and specific operation results make themselves to be often used as a teaching medium (...) and tool for teaching activities between teachers and students. Hence, in addition to cultivating students with computational thinking ability, this paper discussed how to integrate tangible robots into project-based learning courses of thinking skills training to improve the learning performance of the computational thinking ability. This study conducted in one semester on the 105 students from three classes. Experimental results show that the project-based learning method integrated with the teaching material of robotic visual programs approach had significantly better effectiveness in improving students' learning achievements than the traditional teaching method integrated with paper practice teaching materials approach. Analysis of the questionnaire results showed that the proposed learning approach did not increase the students' cognitive burden. In sum, the proposed approach helps students' learning achievement and cognitive load. (shrink)

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)

BackgroundTo investigate the factors related to approval after review by an Institutional Review Board, the structure equation model was used to analyze the latent variables ‘investigators’, ‘vulnerability’ and ‘review process’ for 221 proposals submitted to our IRB.MethodsThe vulnerability factor included vulnerable cases, and studies that involved drug tests and genetic analyses. The principal investigator factor included the license level of the PI and whether they belonged to our institution. The review factor included administration time, total review time, and revision frequency. (...) The revision frequency and total review time influenced the efficiency of review.ResultsThe latent variable of reviewing was the most important factor mediating the PIs and vulnerability to IRB review approval. The local PIs moderated with genetic study and revision frequency had an impact on the review process and mediated non-approval.ConclusionsBetter guidance of the investigators and reviewers might improve the efficiency with which IRBs function. (shrink)

Metrics and their weaker forms are used to measure the difference between two data. There are many metrics that are available but not desired by a practitioner. This paper recommends in a plausible reasoning manner an easy-to-understand method to construct desired distance-like measures: to fuse easy-to-obtain pseudo-semi-metrics, pseudo-metrics, or metrics by making full use of well-known t-norms, t-conorms, aggregation operators, and similar operators. The simple reason to do this is that data for a real world problem are sometimes from multiagents. (...) A distance-like notion, called weak interval-valued pseudo-metrics, is defined by using known notions of pseudo-semi-metrics, pseudo-metrics, and metrics; this notion is topologically good and shows precision, flexibility, and compatibility than single pseudo-semi-metrics, pseudo-metrics, or metrics. Propositions and detailed examples are given to illustrate how to fabricate an expected or demanded WIVP-metric in practical problems, and WIVP-metric and its special cases are characterized by using axioms. Moreover, some WIVP-metrics pertinent to quantitative logic theory or interval-valued fuzzy graphs are constructed, and fixed point theorems and common fixed point theorems in weak interval-valued metric spaces are also presented. Topics and strategies for further study are also put forward concretely and clearly. (shrink)

Engineering ethics education is a complex field characterized by dynamic topics and diverse students, which results in significant challenges for engineering ethics educators. The purpose of this paper is to introduce a systematic approach to determine what to teach and how to teach in an ethics curriculum. This is a topic that has not been adequately addressed in the engineering ethics literature. This systematic approach provides a method to: (1) develop a context-specific engineering ethics curriculum using the Delphi technique, a (...) process-driven research method; and (2) identify appropriate delivery strategies and instructional strategies using an instructional design model. This approach considers the context-specific needs of different engineering disciplines in ethics education and leverages the collaboration of engineering professors, practicing engineers, engineering graduate students, ethics scholars, and instructional design experts. The proposed approach is most suitable for a department, a discipline/field or a professional society. The approach helps to enhance learning outcomes and to facilitate ethics education curriculum development as part of the regular engineering curriculum. (shrink)

The COVID-19 pandemic has brought hunger to millions of people around the world. Social distancing measures coupled with national lockdowns have reduced work opportunities and the overall household incomes. Moreover, the disruption in agricultural production and supply routes is expected to continue into 2021, which may leave millions without access to food. Coincidentally, those who suffer the most are poor people. As such, food security and tourism poverty alleviation are interlinked when discussing social problems and development. While the corporate interest (...) in tourism poverty alleviation is as old as the industrial revolution, little research has been conducted to show how social innovation can be leveraged to reinforce food security and alleviate poverty. Thus, this case study examines the food industry in rural China to establish how it conducts social innovation in food production and distribution to facilitate social development and mitigate poverty. (shrink)

Life education, also known as life and death education, is an important subject in Taiwan with institutions offering degree programs and courses that focus on quality learning and implementation of life education. What is interesting from the perspective of Taiwanese Education is that the teaching of life education also incorporates a number of Eastern-derived and conceptualized tenets, for example, Buddhist teaching and the importance of spiritual wisdom. This premise contends then that life education in Taiwan, in general, is concerned with (...) the promotion, fulfillment, and cherishing of quality life experiences (e.g., personal contentment, happiness). One example of life education, which resonates with other spiritual beliefs and religious faiths (e.g., Hinduism), is related to spiritual cultivation and the enlightenment of life wisdom. Our own teaching of the subject, likewise, places emphasis on the goal of teaching students to seek meaningful understanding of and appreciation for three major, interrelated components of life education: life wisdom, life practice, and life care. Life education is a beneficial subject as its theoretical understanding may help individuals cope with pathologies and negative life experiences. One negative life experience, in this case, is the ultimate fate of humankind: death. Approaching death and/or the onset of grief is something that we all have to experience. How does one approach death? It is not easy feat and, of course, grief for a loved one is personal and some of us struggle with this. We contend that spiritual cultivation and enlightenment, arising from life education, may assist us with the coping of death (e.g., the possibility of transcendence beyond the realm of life). Forming the premise of the present article, we propose that a person’s ‘spiritual and enlightened self’, reflecting the convergence of three major aspects of life education (i.e., Philosophical reflection, Enrichment of personal well-being, and Spiritual cultivation), would result in the initiation and creation of a number of virtues and positive characteristics – for example: having a positive outlook in life, showing compassion, forgiveness, etc. These virtues and quality characteristics, from our philosophical reasoning, are equivalent to those qualities that positive psychology advocates for. (shrink)

Although considerable research indicates that mental energy is an important factor in many domains, including athletic performance (Cook & Davis, 2006), athletic mental energy (AME) has never been conceptualized and measured. Therefore, the aim of this study was to conceptualize and develop a reliable and valid instrument to assess athletic mental energy. In Study 1, a focus group interview established the initial framework of athletic mental energy. Study 2 used a survey to collect athletes’ experiences of athletic mental energy and (...) develop a scale draft titled “Athletic Mental Energy Scale (AMES).” In Study 3, we examined the psychometric properties and the underlying structure of AMES via item analysis, internal consistency, and exploratory factor analysis (EFA). In Study 4, we used confirmatory factor analysis (CFA) to examine AMES’s factorial validity; and examined concurrent and discriminant validity by examining correlations with athletes’ life stress, positive state of mind, and burnout. In study 5, we examined the measurement invariance of the 6-factor, 18-item AMES with Taiwanese and Malaysian samples. Study 6 examined the predictive validity by comparing AMES scores of successful and unsuccessful martial artists. Across these phases, results showed a 6-factor, 18-item AMES had adequate content validity, factorial structure, nomological validity, discriminant validity, predictive validity, measurement invariance, and reliability. We suggest future studies may use AMES to examine its relationships with athletes’ cognition, affect, and performance. The application of AMES in sport psychology was also discussed. (shrink)

Against the backdrop of economic internationalization and market globalization, the world has witnessed faster competitive contents with a more dynamic market environment, a more rapid technological innovation, and more diverse customer needs. Thus, for every enterprise especially led by entrepreneurs, the focus is to maintain the sustainability of competitive advantages and dynamically transform core capacity to avoid rigidity. This paper introduces the process of the deepened rigidity in WS Co. Company, which occurs due to the wrong cognition of Dr. S (...) and his teams who managed or failed to respond to the rigidity encountered by the company during different periods. The rigidity of its capacity is believed to be caused by the cognitive errors of the entrepreneur and his team facing every period of potential rigidity, which makes them fail to deal with it, thus leading to complete rigidity. This paper intends to explain how rigidity takes shape from the cognitive aspect of senior managers, which may serve as illuminations for the similar enterprises led by entrepreneurs. (shrink)

This paper demonstrated the influences of initiation, development, turn-down, and reinitiation of the dynamic capability of an entrepreneurial firm in the solar energy industry. The focus is on the impact of entrepreneurial hubris, which may affect the decision of ambidexterity that can vitalize dynamic capability. The findings indicate that, when the major decision maker has the trait of hubris, the decision-making process may be overly arbitrary, and a decision of being exploratory or exploitative alone is likely to be made. On (...) the contrary, when the founder entrepreneur is aware of the hubris and shares decisive power, the decision of being ambidextrous as a dynamic capability is more freely achieved. This paper contributes by discovery of the cognitive-based microfoundation of entrepreneurial ventures and linkage of such microfoundation to organizational ambidexterity. (shrink)

本书前半段以西方为焦点,探讨“思想方法”、“人生的真相”、“神话与悲剧”等普通的知识背景,提供由人生省思走向哲学的途径。后半段以“中国哲学的起源与特质”、“儒家的风格”与道德智慧为主题,揭示中国传统文 化中体大思精的人生哲理与玄妙卓越的人生境界。.

This study aims to identify research trends of scaffolding in the field of science education. To this end, both descriptive analysis and co-word analysis were conducted to examine the selected articles published in the Social Science Citation Index journals from 2000 to 2019. A total of 637 papers were retrieved as research samples through rounds of searching in Web of Science database. Overall, this study reveals a growing trend of science educators' academic publications about scaffolding in the recent two decades. (...) In these sample papers, from 1,487 non-repeated keywords, we extracted 286 author-defined keywords shared by at least two studies as a benchmark dictionary. A series of co-word analyses were then conducted based on the dictionary to reveal the underlying co-occurring relationships of the words in title and abstract of the sample papers. Results showed that “scaffolding,” “support,” and “design” were the top three most frequently used keywords during 2000 and 2019. Visualization of co-word networks in each 5-year period further helps clarify both educators' common research foci and relevant research trends. Derived discussion and potential research directions are also provided. (shrink)

Photovoltaic power forecasting can provide strong support for the safe operation of the power system. Existing forecasting methods are ineffective for grid scheduling decisions or risk analysis. The novel multicluster interval prediction method is proposed to consider the volatility and randomness of PV power output. First, this method utilizes the sparse autoencoder and Bayesian regularized NARX network for point forecasting of PV power. Second, density peak clustering improved by kernel Mahalanobis distance is applied to classify the dataset into multiple clusters, (...) including forecasting error and meteorological factors. Finally, the joint probability density is established by multivariate kernel density estimation to accomplish the PV power interval prediction. The proposed hybrid method is applied for the interval prediction of PV power at Yulara, Australia. Comparative research of point forecasting is implemented to evaluate the machine learning and deep learning methods, with the proposed SAE-BRNARX under four different periods. Results shows that the average values of nRMSE, MRE, nMAE, and R2 for the four periods are 4.45%, 0.90%, −0.15%, 3.39%, and 95.93%, respectively. Moreover, the results of interval prediction obtained by the other interval prediction approaches are compared with the proposed KMDDPC-MKDE. It shows that the average values of PICP, PINAW, ACE, and nMPICD for four periods are 93.93%, 9.50%, 3.93%, and 7.10% at 90% confidence level, respectively. Outcomes demonstrate that the proposed method can obtain more accuracy, a higher coverage rate, narrower average bandwidth, and a closer distance between the middle of interval and actual value than other methods. (shrink)

本书分九章,内容包括:逍遥自在的人生智慧;胸怀天下的忍者之心;行如流水的无形心态;积水成渊的成事智慧;道法自然的处世箴言;顺其自然的发展规律;超然脱俗的真挚情感;得民心者的治理之要;行之有效的领导智慧 。.

本书主要从五个方面对老庄生命哲学进行梳理和阐发.一是老庄生命哲学形成的原因分析.二是老庄的生命本质论.三是老庄的生命价值论.四是老庄的生命过程论.五是老庄的生命境界论.

人生不如意事十常八九，誰都只想耍廢良久， 遭遇生命卡關接二連三，恭請37位哲學家帶我們破廢闖關！ 學校不會考，但一定要懂得哲學思考，人生困惑難解，卻能睿智面對。傅佩榮教授以輕鬆小品、深入淺出的方式，引領現代人換一顆哲學家的腦袋，用多元化的思維，應對各式各樣的生命大哉問！ 工作壓力神大，靠購物宣洩變成月光族，問問哲學家該怎麼辦？！享樂主義的代表魯克雷休斯教人搞清楚到底毛病出在哪裡，知道真正的快樂止於何處，敲開致富的最佳途徑。 生活充滿各種不大不小的痛苦，讓人軟弱無力受不了！看看西塞羅怎麼說？他認為要練習做到能忍受時就忍受，不能忍受時就躲開，逃避並不可恥而且可用。 傅佩榮教授介紹日常就在思索人生課題的三十七位西方哲學家，從古希臘時代的蘇格拉底、柏拉圖、亞里斯多德，以至中世紀的奧古斯丁、多瑪斯等人，透過同樣在愛恨情仇中努力活著的先哲的故事，以及一個精闢的觀念或一句 犀利的名言，常常可以想通某種奧妙的道理。原來，柏拉圖的戀愛使人陷入神聖的瘋狂，開始活出真正的自己，而西塞羅指出決定未來的是自己的勇氣，有了面對命運的勇氣，將更有誠意珍惜現在。灰心喪志想尋求力量？厭世耍 廢想找到良方？哲學是處理煩惱和焦慮的指南，傅教授從現代角度解讀哲學家的思考歷程，只要傾聽他們的忠告，就能翻轉腦袋，逆轉人生。 — 作者簡介｜ 傅佩榮 上海市人，臺大哲學研究所畢業，美國耶魯大學哲學博士，曾任臺大哲學系教授、系主任兼哲學研究所所長，比利時魯汶大學、荷蘭萊頓大學講座教授。 在臺大開設「哲學與人生」課程，座無虛席，受教者上萬人；另外，多次應邀前往馬來西亞、韓國、美國、新加坡等地的華人社團作傳統文化講座，亦在大陸多家電視臺主講國學。曾獲國家文藝獎、中正文化獎、教育部教學特優 獎，及大學生社團推薦最優通識課程、新浪、搜狐二〇〇七年度傑出文化人物、《民生報》評選校園熱門教授等獎項。 傅佩榮潛心研究國學，專心注解，並重新解讀《論語》、《孟子》、《易經》等傳統經典。他不但長年致力於國學的普及與推廣，更兼具中西文化之深厚學養，集四十年潛心治學心得，以哲學建構和邏輯分析的視角，搭建起東西 方思想的橋梁，堪稱中西文化的擺渡者。 已出版作品有《原來老子這樣說》、《原來孔子這樣說》、《原來莊子這樣說》、《原來孟子這樣說》、《論語的人文之美》[第一部]、《論語的生命解惑》（《論語的人文之美》第二部）、《人生困惑問莊子》[第一部]、 《人生困惑問莊子》[第二部]、《荒謬之外──卡繆思想研究》、《會思想的蘆葦》、《最後一張王牌》、《傅佩榮的易經入門課》、《無用的日子讀老莊》等書。 傅佩榮國學官方頻道：https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCk9S7VJzSXFj41-V6UV2sNA.

This study investigates the impacts of intellectual capital through Value-Added Intellectual Capital (VAIC) and its components: human capital efficiency (HCE) and structural capital efficiency (SCE) on financial performance in terms of return on assets (ROA) and return on equity (ROE). In addition, this study compares the effects between firms from financial and pharmaceutical industries. A total of 149 Vietnamese firms comprising of 108 financial firms and 41 pharmaceutical firms were examined. Based on the findings, VAIC and HCE show beneficial impacts (...) on both financial performance measures, ROA, and ROE. However, SCE shows adverse and beneficial implications on ROA and ROE, respectively. In terms of industry comparison, VAIC has positive effects on ROA and ROE among the firms from financial industry, whereas it has no effect in the firms from pharmaceutical industry. The effect of HCE on ROA is stronger in the firms from financial industry than firms from pharmaceutical industry while the effect of HCE on ROE is stronger in the firms from pharmaceutical industry than firms from financial industry. The effect of SCE on ROA is stronger in the pharmaceutical firms than financial firms while the effect of SCE on ROE is stronger in the financial firms than pharmaceutical firms. Lastly, the implications of the importance of knowledge-based resources on value creation were elaborated. (shrink)