Placing GIS in sustainability education

As public awareness about sustainability grows and as higher education advances sustainability more comprehensively, geographers have an opportunity to take a role in sustainability education. This article examines (1) what constitutes sustainability education, (2) how geographic concepts and Geographic Information System (GIS) are relevant to sustainability education, and (3) how geospatial thinking can be incorporated into the sustainability curriculum using GIS. This research proposes five geospatial inquiries that students can make to explore sustainability issues using GIS, which are spatial distribution, spatial interactions, spatial relationships, spatial comparisons, and temporal relationships. Definition, examples, and uses of these five geospatial inquiries supported by GIS are provided.     

Intellectual Solidarity and Transcending Polarized Discourse

Abstract

Much of the discussion over our most contested issues in politics and ethics is characterized by polarization. Rather than even, honest disagreement, our public exchange is characterized by confusion, caricature, and defining one’s self in binary opposition to one’s opponent. One solution to this problem is an emphasis on what David Hollenbach calls intellectual solidarity. It is characterized by engagement, listening, and a willingness to change one’s mind. This article shows that even the most polarizing arguments imaginable, like those over abortion, can become manageable and even productive in the context of intellectual solidarity.     

Family assemblages

Abstract

In this paper, we develop and extend the emerging concept of ‘family assemblages’ to theorise the bodies, objects, habits, spaces, technologies, discourses and affects that participate in family life. We argue that existing conceptualisations of the family tend towards anthropocentrism, a sundering of the world into active human subjects and passive non-human objects. Assemblage theory offers a means of overcoming this anthropocentrism in order to generate richer accounts of the more-than-human dynamics of family life. From this perspective, anything that participates in the action of family life can be considered a member of the family assemblage, establishing the ontological ground for a non-anthropocentric and relational view of the family. We elaborate these arguments with reference to ethnographic research on fathers’ mental health conducted in Melbourne, Australia. Our ethnographic material provides a rich empirical context for the development of the notion of family assemblages. We conclude by suggesting that the concept of the family assemblage is not simply a provocation to the human-centric assumptions that guide most studies of family life, but may also prove useful for human and health geographers already attuned to the materiality of family life.     

毛泽东、邓小平、江泽民和胡锦涛关于党际关系的思想及实践

毛泽东、邓小平、江泽民和胡锦涛坚持把马列主义普遍真理同中国具体实际相结合,就党际关系的理论与实践进行了深入探索。本文在梳理毛泽东、邓小平、江泽民和胡锦涛关于党际关系思想及实践的基础上,总结了我国党际交往的基本经验,即必须坚持马克思主义党际关系理论的基本原则,紧密联系党和国家的具体实际;必须积极顺应时代潮流,与时俱进,开拓进取;必须始终把党的对外工作作为国家总体外交的一条重要战线,坚持服务于国家总体外交的需要,促进国家关系的发展;必须服从和服务于树立我们党良好国际形象的根本要求。     

“贵文贱艺”思想与近代知识分子阶层重心的转移

近代以降,随看中国内忧外患形势的日益加剧,知识分子阶层勇敢地承担起了救国救亡地历史使命。他们或以艺见长,或以突出。然而由于中国传统之重轻艺思想的深远影响,近代知识分子阶层只能遵循“学而优则仕”这条中国传统知识分子所走过的老路子。随着中国日益走向世界,此种情形直接阻碍了中国进一步现代化的进程。     

孙甫史学发微

孙甫是北宋史坛上最有影响的人物之一 ,他讲史、论史、私撰史书《唐史记》 ,是引经入史的倡导者和实践者 ,并在效法《尚书》、《春秋》大义的口号下 ,强调史学要为现实提供借鉴。他的史学思想及其史学成就对于宋代史学风气的转变和编年体史书的复兴具有重要影响。     

我国宪法内容历次变动的思路、重点、特点及其原因分析

从我国实际情况出发、维护绝大多数中国人民的根本利益、建设富强民主文明的社会主义国家,是我国宪法内容变动的基本思路;经济制度和公民权利是我国宪法变动中的重要内容;非公有制经济地位由降低变为不断提高、坚持公有制由社会经济主体变为全部又变为主体、坚定不移地捍卫社会主义的基本原则、公民权利不断加强,是我国宪法内容变动的四大显著特点。我国宪法内容的历次变动,反映了社会主义革命与建设实践的要求,是对国情和社会主义建设规律认识的不断深化,是马克思主义理论探索的具体体现。     

王稼祥的党际外交思想述论

王稼祥是一位杰出的外交家,在党际外交方面贡献突出,思想丰富,主要包括党际外交的前提条件、基础、原则和目的等重要内容。其党际外交思想对党际外交理论和国际共运的发展都做出了重要的贡献。     

INTENTIONALISM,INTENTIONALITY, AND REPORTING BELIEFS1

The dominant view of twentieth‐century analytic philosophy has been that all thinking is always in a language, that languages are vehicles of thought. The same view has been widespread in continental philosophy as well. In recent decades, however, the opposite view—that languages serve merely to express language‐independent thought‐contents or propositions—has been more widely accepted. The debate has a direct equivalent in the philosophy of history: when historians report the beliefs of historical figures, do they report the sentences or propositions that these historical figures believed to be true or false? In this paper I argue in favor of the latter, intentionalist, view. My arguments center mostly on the problems with translation that are likely to arise when a historian reports the beliefs of historical figures who expressed them in a language other than the one in which the historian is writing. In discussing these problems the paper presents an application of John Searle's theory of intentionality to the philosophy of history.     

The Chemists' Style of Thinking

Der Denkstil der Chemiker. Der Aufsatz diskutiert die Tragfähigkeit des Begriffes “Denkstil”, wie er von Alistair Crombie eingeführt und Ian Hacking aufgegriffen wurde, für das Verständnis dessen, wie das Fach Chemie historisch seine Identität ausgeprägt hat. Obwohl weder Crombie noch Hacking den Begriff “Denkstil” in Bezug auf einzelne Disziplinen verwendet haben, erscheint im Fall der Chemie seine Anwendung besonders vielversprechend, weil er hier hilft, ein zentrales Problem zu thematisieren – nämlich die Frage, wie es Chemikern trotz wechselnder Gegenstandsbereiche und theoretischer Umbrüche gelang, eine eigenständige und stabile Identität auszubilden. Nach einer Einführung in den Begriff “Denkstil”, argumentiert der Aufsatz, dass die Beständigkeit der Chemie als eines Faches wesentlich in ihren Laborpraktiken gründet, die ihrerseits wiederum die spezifische Art der Fragen bestimmten, die Chemiker in ihren Forschungen stellten bzw. die Form der Antworten, nach denen sie suchten. Folgende Merkmale kennzeichnen diesen “chemischen Denkstil” (1) eine spezifische, im Herstellen begründete Form des Wissens, (2) die Befassung mit einzelnen Stoffen und Materialien statt mit Materie im Allgemeinen und (3) eine Beobachtung von Natur besonders im Hinblick auf Transformationsprozesse. The Chemists' Style of Thinking. This paper discusses the relevance of the notion of “styles of scientific thinking” introduced by Alistair Crombie and revisited by Ian Hacking, for understanding how chemistry shaped its identity. Although neither Crombie nor Hacking applied this notion to individual disciplines, it seems appropriate to use it in the case of chemistry because it helps to address a puzzling issue: how did chemists manage to shape an identity of their own, despite shifting territories and theoretical transformations? Following a presentation of the notion of style, I will argue that the stable identity of chemistry is rooted in laboratory practices, which determined the specific questions that chemists put to nature as well as the answers to their questions. The “chemical style of thinking” is characterized by i) a specific way of knowing through making, ii) the concern with individual materials rather than matter in general and iii) a specific commitment to nature.