Ming Hanedanlığı'nın sonlarında ve 17. yüzyılın ortalarındaki Qig Hanedanlığı'nın başlarında yaşamış olan Şeyh Wang Daiyu, Çinli Muhammed b. Abdullah b. Elias'tan sonra Çin'deki en meşhur Müslüman alimlerden biridir. Şeyh'in yaşadığı dönem, İslam'ın Çin'de yükselişe geçtiği bir döneme karşılık gelmektedir. Bu dönemde Şeyh Wang Daiyu; bilimsel makaleler ve kitaplar yazmaya başlamış, Kur'ân-ı Kerim ve Hz. Peygamber’in sünnetindeki İslami fikirleri açıklamak için bazı Konfüçyüsçü terimler almış ve Konfüçyüsçü fikirleri İslami fikirlerle uzlaştırmaya çalışmıştır. Aynı zamanda İslam'a davet, İslam kültürünü yayma ve İslami yükseliş (...) hakkında sistematik fikirler ortaya koyma vazifesini üstlenmiştir. Bu makale temel olarak Şeyh'in biyografisine, tarihsel arka planına ve Çin medeniyeti ile İslam medeniyetinin nasıl uzlaştırılacağına dair analitik bir araştırmaya odaklanmaktadır. Nitekim onun döneminde İslam büyük bir gelişme ve canlılık kazanmıştır. Buradan hareketle Şeyh Wang Daiyu'nun İslam kültürü ile Çin kültürünün etkileşimine büyük katkı sağladığını söyleyebiliriz. Bu makale, -dünyanın Çin’i (ve Çin’li Müslüman âlimleri) daha iyi tanıması maksadıyla- “Çin hikayelerini iyi anlatın” milli sloganını gerçekleştirmeyi amaçlamaktadır. Ayrıca araştırmacı, bin yılı aşkın bir süredir Çin'de İslam'a davet etmek ve İslam medeniyetini yaymak için koşturan, vatana ve millete büyük katkılar sunan Müslüman alimleri dünyaya tanıtmayı hedeflemektedir. Araştırmanın mümkün olduğunca eksiksiz olabilmesi için tarihsel ve analitik yöntem bir arada kullanılmıştır. Araştırmada; Şeyh Wang Daiyu’nun hayatı, eserleri, İslâm’ın onun dönemindeki özellikleri ve Şeyh’in, Çin medeniyeti ile İslam medeniyetini nasıl uzlaştırdığı gibi hususlar ele alınacaktır. (shrink)

Epistemic invariantism, or invariantism for short, is the position that the proposition expressed by knowledge sentences does not vary with the epistemic standard of the context in which these sentences can be used. At least one of the major challenges for invariantism is to explain our intuitions about scenarios such as the so-called bank cases. These cases elicit intuitions to the effect that the truth-value of knowledge sentences varies with the epistemic standard of the context in which these sentences can (...) be used. In this paper, I will defend invariantism against this challenge by advocating the following, somewhat deflationary account of the bank case intuitions: Readers of the bank cases assign different truth-values to the knowledge claims in the bank cases because they interpret these scenarios such that the epistemic position of the subject in question differs between the high and the low standards case. To substantiate this account, I will argue, first, that the bank cases are underspecified even with respect to features that should uncontroversially be relevant for the epistemic position of the subject in question. Second, I will argue that readers of the bank cases will fill in these features differently in the low and the high standards case. In particular, I will argue that there is a variety of reasons to think that the fact that an error-possibility is mentioned in the high standards case will lead readers to assume that this error-possibility is supposed to be likely in the high standards case. (shrink)

This book explores how one can bring about changes in the brain through meditation, both through attention-focus training and through compassion training. Recent findings in the natural sciences have confirmed that it is possible for humans to achieve these structural and functional changes through various life-style practices. It is argued that meditation enables us to influence some aspects of our biological make-up and, for example, could boost our cognitive flexibility as well as our ability to act compassionate. Such changes are (...) likely to facilitate the instilling of a number of epistemic virtues which have great bearing on our quality of life. This book offers the reader an accessible introduction to a set of neuro-enhancement methods, with a special focus on meditation techniques, and explores how such practices could contribute to make us better decision-makers and improve our moral virtues. The book is suitable for anyone looking for a text discussing the effects of neuro-enhancement from a secular ethics perspective. (shrink)

Moderate pragmatic invariantism (MPI) is a proposal to explain why our intuitions about the truth-value of knowledge claims vary with stakes and salient error-possibilities. The basic idea is that this variation is due to a variation not in the propositions expressed (as epistemic contextualists would have it) but in the propositions conversationally implicated. I will argue that MPI is mistaken: I will distinguish two kinds of implicature, namely, additive and substitutional implicatures. I will then argue, first, that the proponent of (...) MPI cannot appeal to additive implicatures because they don’t affect truth-value intuitions in the required way. Second, I will argue that the proponent of MPI cannot appeal to substitutional implicatures either because, even though they may have the required effects on truth-value intuitions, they don’t feature in the relevant cases. It follows that MPI is mistaken because whether the proponent of MPI appeals to additive or substitutional implicatures, at least one of the claims that make up her view is false. Along the way, I will suggest principles about implicatures that should be relevant not only to MPI, but to pragmatic accounts of seemingly semantic intuitions in general. (shrink)

Episodic memories can no longer be seen as the re-activation of stored experiences but are the product of an intense construction process based on a memory trace. Episodic recall is a result of a process of scenario construction. If one accepts this generative framework of episodic memory, there is still a be big gap in understanding the role of the narrative self in shaping scenario construction. Some philosophers are in principle sceptic by claiming that a narrative self cannot be more (...) than a causally inefficacious attributed entity anyway. Thus, we first characterize a narrative self in detail and second we clarify its influential causal role in shaping our episodic memories by influencing the process of scenario construction. This happens at three stages, namely at the level of the input, the output and the process of scenario construction. (shrink)

This article brings together two sets of data that are rarely discussed in concert; namely, disagreement and testimony data. I will argue that relativism yields a much more elegant account of these data than its major rival, contextualism. The basic idea will be that contextualists can account for disagreement data only by adopting principles that preclude a simple account of testimony data. I will conclude that, other things being equal, we should prefer relativism to contextualism. In making this comparative point, (...) I will also defend self-standing relativist accounts of disagreement and testimony data. (shrink)

EDITOR’S ABSTRACTThe popular Chinese portrayal of the victory of Confucianism, or in Chinese terms “dismiss the hundred schools of thought and revere only the Confucian arts,” has been challenged by some scholars in the past decades. Ding’s essay illustrates not only how it has been challenged but also how the catch phrase influences the scholarly discussion. As he indicates, recent Chinese studies that attempt to subvert the traditional theory share the same “flow.” They fail to note that the expression (...) “dismiss the hundred schools of thought and revere only the Confucian arts” has had very negative connotations since it was invoked by Yi Baisha 易白沙 to harshly denounce Confucianism for being responsible for the centuries-long Chinese autocracy. (shrink)

In this paper, I will discuss what I will call “skeptical pragmatic invariantism” as a potential response to the intuitions we have about scenarios such as the so-called bank cases. SPI, very roughly, is a form of epistemic invariantism that says the following: The subject in the bank cases doesn’t know that the bank will be open. The knowledge ascription in the low standards case seems appropriate nevertheless because it has a true implicature. The goal of this paper is to (...) show that SPI is mistaken. In particular, I will show that SPI is incompatible with reasonable assumptions about how we are aware of the presence of implicatures. Such objections are not new, but extant formulations are wanting for reasons I will point out below. One may worry that refuting SPI is not a worthwhile project given that this view is an implausible minority position anyway. To respond, I will argue that, contrary to common opinion, other familiar objections to SPI fail and, thus, that SPI is a promising position to begin with. (shrink)

Although the Standard Model of particle physics is usually formulated in terms of fields, it can be equivalently formulated in terms of particles and strings. In this picture particles and open strings are always coupled. This offers an intuitive and graphical explanation for the otherwise mysterious gauge symmetry. In addition, the particle–string formulation avoids introducing redundant path integral configurations that are present in the field formulation. For its explanatory power and economy, the particle–string ontology may be preferred over the field (...) ontology for the Standard Model. (shrink)

This book shows how pressing issues in bioethics – e.g. the ownership of biological material and human cognitive enhancement – successfully can be discussed with in a virtue ethics framework. This is not intended as a complete or exegetic account of virtue ethics. Rather, the aim here is to discuss how some key ideas in Aristotle’s Nicomachean Ethics, when interpreted pragmatically, can be a productive way to approach some hot issues in bioethics. In spite of being a very promising theoretical (...) perspective virtue ethics has so far been underdeveloped both in bioethics and neuroethics and most discussions have been conducted in consequentialist and/or deontological terms. ​. (shrink)

It has been argued that epistemic contextualism faces the so-called factivity problem and hence cannot be stated properly. The basic idea behind this charge is that contextualists supposedly have to say, on the one hand, that knowledge ascribing sentences like “S knows that S has hands” are true when used in ordinary contexts while, on the other hand, they are not true by the standard of their own context. In my paper, I want to show that the argument to the (...) factivity problem fails because it rests on the mistaken premise that contextualists are committed to the truth of particular ordinary knowledge attributions. (shrink)

Adverbialists propose to analyse sentences of the form ‘Jane has a blue afterimage’ as ‘Jane afterimages blue-ly’. One commonly raised objection to adverbialism is the many-property problem, the problem of accounting for sentences that seem to ascribe more than one property to an afterimage . Plausible responses to this objection may be on offer. In this note, however, I will argue that the many-property problem resurfaces at the level of relations and that, at this level, no solution for the problem (...) is in sight. (shrink)

In this paper we investigate problems about densities ofe-generic,s-generic andp-generic degrees. We, in particular, show that allp-generic degrees are non-branching, which answers an open question by Jockusch who asked: whether alls-generic degrees are non-branching and refutes a conjecture of Ingrassia; the set of degrees containing r.e.p-generic sets is the same as the set of r.e. degrees containing an r.e. non-autoreducible set.

This article explores from a semiotic perspective the structural features of the ‘poetic logic’ that lies behind metonymy and metaphor. More specifi-cally, it treats metonymy and metaphor not as ‘abnormal’ uses of language but as the results of the same indexical and iconic ways of thinking that we see elsewhere in our lives. The paper also brings to bear on the topic of metaphor some important insights from the late Chinese scholar Qian Zhong-shu, whose ‘two handles and several sides’ theory (...) of metaphor seems to complement contemporary Western ‘metaphorology’ very well. (shrink)

Indian philosophy of Yoni-Linga may be examined as a parallel to the Chinese philosophy of “Yin-Yang.” This essay will compare the similarities and distinctions between the two kinds of dichotomies through a theoretical formulation: certain conceptual, analytical and cross-cultural perspectives. The study will be focused on semiologieal, aesthetical, ontological and theological comparisons between these two of the most famous pairs of conceptual antonyms which have been developed by later Sino-Hindu philosophies and theologies as human worldviews widened and deepened with Eastern (...) civilization. (shrink)

We investigate diagonal actions of Polish groups and the related intersection operator on closed subgroups of the acting group. The Borelness of the diagonal orbit equivalence relation is characterized and is shown to be connected with the Borelness of the intersection operator. We also consider relatively tame Polish groups and give a characterization of them in the class of countable products of countable abelian groups. Finally an example of a logic action is considered and its complexity in the Borel reducbility (...) hierarchy determined. (shrink)

EDITOR’S ABSTRACTThis article argues that the early Laozi text underwent three stages: The first had section divisions on the basis of the meaning. The second stage was the formative period of the Laozi text influenced by cosmological numerology; the Silk Manuscript version A is its testimony. The third stage finalized the text through the canonization of the Classic by Emperor Jing; it is represented by the Peking University Han Bamboo Slips, Yan Zun, and Liu Xiang versions and became the received (...) edition. From the Han Bamboo Slips to the Liu Xiang version, the Laozi’s two parts and section numbering became increasingly balanced and symmetric. Ding urges scholars to pay attention to all these developments when studying the Laozi text. (shrink)

We investigate Borel reducibility between equivalence relations $E(X;p)=X^{\mathbb{N}}/\ell_{p}(X)'s$ where X is a separable Banach space. We show that this reducibility is related to the so called Hölder(α) embeddability between Banach spaces. By using the notions of type and cotype of Banach spaces, we present many results on reducibility and unreducibility between E(L r ; p)'s and E(c 0 ; p)'s for r, p ∈ [1, +∞). We also answer a problem presented by Kanovei in the affirmative by showing that $\mathrm{C}\left({\mathrm{\mathbb{R}}}^{+}\right)/{\mathrm{C}}_{0}\left({\mathrm{\mathbb{R}}}^{+}\ri ght)$ (...) is Borel bireducible to $\mathbb{R}^{\mathbb{N}}/c_{0}$. (shrink)

Name der Zeitschrift: Semiotica Jahrgang: 2016 Heft: 213 Seiten: 165-175.