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Religion And Technology: Refiguring Place, Space, Identity And Community, Lily Kong Dec 2001

Religion And Technology: Refiguring Place, Space, Identity And Community, Lily Kong

Research Collection School of Social Sciences

This paper reviews the literature on the religion-technology nexus, drawing up a research agenda and offering preliminary empirical insights. Firsts I stress the need to explore the new politics of space as a consequence of technological development, emphasizing questions about the role of religion in effecting a form of religious (neo)imperialism, and uneven access to techno-religious spaces. Second, I highlight the need to examine the politics of identity and community, since cyberspace is not an isotropic surface. Third, I underscore the need to engage with questions about the poetics of religious community as social relations become mediated by technology. Finally, …


I Know What You Know: Assumptions About Others' Knowledge And Their Effects On Message Construction, Ivy Yee-Man Lau, Chi-Yue Chiu, Ying-Yi Hong Dec 2001

I Know What You Know: Assumptions About Others' Knowledge And Their Effects On Message Construction, Ivy Yee-Man Lau, Chi-Yue Chiu, Ying-Yi Hong

Research Collection School of Social Sciences

Current models of interpersonal communication assume that estimation of listener's knowledge is a basis for message formulation. By introducing methodological modifications to the Fussell and Krauss paradigm, the present study provides more definitive evidence for the use of knowledge estimation in message productions.


Overhauling The Wto: Opportunity At Doha And Beyond, John Audley, Ann Florini Oct 2001

Overhauling The Wto: Opportunity At Doha And Beyond, John Audley, Ann Florini

Research Collection School of Social Sciences

The world's trade ministers, who will meet at a WTOministerial in November 2001 in Doha, Qatar, are wrong to think that only a newround of negotiations will save the much-maligned international trade system.Carnegie senior associates John Audley and Ann M. Florini argue that theyshould, instead, simultaneously tackle internal and external reform of the WTOto make it a truly equitable institution. Internally, industrial countries muststart treating developing countries as equal partners in making the rules thatgovern global trade, and where necessary provide technical assistance to makethat equality possible. Externally, to satisfy legitimate public demands,members should improve the transparency of WTO proceedings …


Intelligent Island Discourse: Singapore’S Discursive Negotiation With Technology, Alwyn Lim Jun 2001

Intelligent Island Discourse: Singapore’S Discursive Negotiation With Technology, Alwyn Lim

Research Collection School of Social Sciences

The small nation-state of Singapore has increasingly been referred to in the popular media as the Intelligent Island of the future. With significant state investment in the promotion and dissemination of information-communications technology and attendant social ramifications, this has become an area that can no longer be ignored or taken for granted. This article intends to map the conditions of possibility on which Singapore can be conceived of as an Intelligent Island, in situating the role of information technology and Intelligent Island discourse within the discourses of postcoloniality, technocapitalism, late modernity, and globalization. In particular, this article attempts to show …


Mapping 'New' Geographies Of Religion: Politics And Poetics In Modernity, Lily Kong Jun 2001

Mapping 'New' Geographies Of Religion: Politics And Poetics In Modernity, Lily Kong

Research Collection School of Social Sciences

This article reviews geographical research on religion in the 1990s, and highlights work from neighbouring disciplines where relevant. Contrary to views that the field is incoherent, I suggest that much of the literature pays attention to several key themes, particularly, the politics and poetics of religious place, identity and community. I illustrate the key issues, arguments and conceptualizations in these areas, and suggest various ways forward. These 'new' geographies emphasize different sites of religious practice beyond the 'officially sacred'; different sensuous sacred geographies; different religions in different historical and place-specific contexts; different geographical scales of analysis; different constitutions of population …


Communication And Shared Reality: Implications For The Psychological Foundations Of Culture, Ivy Yee-Man Lau, Chi-Yue Chiu, Sau-Lai Lee Jun 2001

Communication And Shared Reality: Implications For The Psychological Foundations Of Culture, Ivy Yee-Man Lau, Chi-Yue Chiu, Sau-Lai Lee

Research Collection School of Social Sciences

Lau et al present a conceptualization of the evolution of shared beliefs from individual interactions, focusing on the role of communication. They argue that the reciprocal relationship between shared reality and communication enables the development of systems of social representations at an individual level.


Is Feminism Bad For Multiculturalism?, Chandran Kukathas Apr 2001

Is Feminism Bad For Multiculturalism?, Chandran Kukathas

Research Collection School of Social Sciences

Multiculturalism and feminism are in tension to the extent that multiculturalism is a doctrine that condones the tolera- tion of cultural communities which might not respect or value women's concerns or interests. This has led some feminist think- ers, notably Susan Okin, to ask whether multiculturalism is bad for women. This paper agrees with Okin that there is a tension between feminism and multiculturalism - some of her critics to the contrary notwithstanding - but argues that multiculturalism should take preceden


… But What Does 'Blue' Smell Like? Review Of J. Harrison, Synaesthesia: The Strangest Thing, Ilya Farber Apr 2001

… But What Does 'Blue' Smell Like? Review Of J. Harrison, Synaesthesia: The Strangest Thing, Ilya Farber

Research Collection School of Social Sciences

Reviews the book 'Synaesthesia: The Strangest Thing', by John Harrison.


Education In The Age Of The Internet: The Euphoria Of Technology, Lily Kong Mar 2001

Education In The Age Of The Internet: The Euphoria Of Technology, Lily Kong

Research Collection School of Social Sciences

In an earlier commentary (Kong, 1999), I raised the issue of distance from the 'centre' as a barrier to a researcher's participation in the academic circuit, despite the advent of technology and the possibilities it brings of decreasing relative distance. In this commentary, I wish to focus on what technology may and may not do for teaching and learning, and thus to balance some of the overstated claims about the imminent replacement of classrooms and lecture halls with virtual campuses.


Mentors Or Friends: Confucius And Aristotle On Equality And Ethical Development In Friendship, Sor-Hoon Tan Jan 2001

Mentors Or Friends: Confucius And Aristotle On Equality And Ethical Development In Friendship, Sor-Hoon Tan

Research Collection School of Social Sciences

In Thinking from the Han, David Hall and Roger Ames compare Plato's - and Confucius's views of friendship in relation to the question of transcendence and arrive at the sad conclusion that Socrates and Confucius could not be friends. "Socratic irony would not allow the inequality Confucius requires as a means of self-betterment. Confucius would not permit he and Socrates to hold all things in common." Along the way, they articulate an understanding of Confucius’ view of friendship as "a one-directional relationship in which one extends oneself by association with one who has attained a higher level of realization." Hall …


Education And Citizenship In Diverse Societies, Chandran Kukathas Jan 2001

Education And Citizenship In Diverse Societies, Chandran Kukathas

Research Collection School of Social Sciences

The question of the state's role in the control of sponsorship of education is addressed in the light of liberal political principles designed to keep peace and enforce toleration in culturally diverse societies. Some contemporary, self-described liberal philosophers argue for a much more substantial educational role for the state than liberal principles will really allow. Brian Barry's argument for that role assumes that the state can prescribe answers to controversial questions regarding the truth and the good life in which a truly liberal state would take no interest. Stephen Macedo is more accommodating to religious diversity than Barry, but his …


Social Logic As Business Logic: Guanxi, Trustworthiness And The Embeddedness Of Chinese Business Practices, Wai Keung Chung, Gary Hamilton Jan 2001

Social Logic As Business Logic: Guanxi, Trustworthiness And The Embeddedness Of Chinese Business Practices, Wai Keung Chung, Gary Hamilton

Research Collection School of Social Sciences

This chapter explores the nature of Chinese business practices by looking at their social foundations. We argue that the use of an inter-subjective logic based on the norms of social relationships provides an institutional foundation for economic transactions in Chinese business settings. The logic of social relationships-or what we call guanxi logic-is embedded in daily practices of the Chinese business community. Rather than making economic decisions less "economic", relational rules embedded in guanxi places interpersonal business transactions within a prescriptive framework, thereby increasing the calculability of economic outcomes. Guanxi logic is, therefore, a socially meaningful way to enhance economic rationality. …


Can A Liberal Society Tolerate Illiberal Elements?, Chandran Kukathas Jan 2001

Can A Liberal Society Tolerate Illiberal Elements?, Chandran Kukathas

Research Collection School of Social Sciences

Libertarians believe that all individuals are entitledto live as they choose, free from interference byother persons or by the state. They also believethat in the absence of such interference, whether bygovernment or other agents of the state intent ondesigning or planning for society as a whole, order willnonetheless prevail. Given the freedom to contract andexchange, markets will coordinate the production anddistribution of goods — and indeed do so better thanany other institution can.


Linguistic Gender Is Related To Psychological Gender: The Case Of Chinese Characters, Yuk-Yue Tong, Chi-Yue Chiu, Ho-Ying Fu Jan 2001

Linguistic Gender Is Related To Psychological Gender: The Case Of Chinese Characters, Yuk-Yue Tong, Chi-Yue Chiu, Ho-Ying Fu

Research Collection School of Social Sciences

Past research (Ervin, 1972; Konishi, 1993) suggests that a noun's linguistic gender is not just an arbitrary, semantically-empty linguistic category. Rather it may connote masculine or feminine properties, and thus can subtly influence responses to the noun and its referent. The present study extended this research by exploring how gendered radicals of nonsense Chinese characters might affect the characters' connotations. The results showed that when an unfamiliar Chinese character is encountered, meaning interpretation can be affected by the meaning of the radicals. Moreover, since gendered Chinese radicals are linked to share representations of psychological gender, such as representation may then …


Probabilistic Principles In Unsupervised Learning Of Visual Structure: Human Data And A Model, Shimon Edelman, Benjamin P. Hiles, Hwajin Yang, Nathan Intrator Jan 2001

Probabilistic Principles In Unsupervised Learning Of Visual Structure: Human Data And A Model, Shimon Edelman, Benjamin P. Hiles, Hwajin Yang, Nathan Intrator

Research Collection School of Social Sciences

To find out how the representations of structured visual objects depend on the co-occurrence statistics of their constituents, we exposed subjects to a set of composite images with tight control exerted over (1) the conditional probabilities of the constituent fragments, and (2) the value of Barlow's criterion of "suspicious coincidence" (the ratio of joint probability to the product of marginals). We then compared the part verification response times for various probe/target combinations before and after the exposure. For composite probes, the speedup was much larger for targets that contained pairs of fragments perfectly predictive of each other, compared to those …