Self and others

ABSTRACT

What is the relation between self-knowledge and knowledge of others? And how do we develop an understanding of others and ourselves? In this paper, I will argue that our sense of self is thoroughly social even though self-knowledge is not based on the same kind of evidence as knowledge of others. Moreover, I will suggest that we need to distinguish between different kinds of self- and other-understanding: some are based on procedural knowledge or knowing-how and involve an implicit representation of self or other, while others involve conceptual abilities. I will conclude with some considerations regarding the role of the second-person perspective in structuring the development of the concept of ourselves and others as persons.     

Old dogs and new tricks: Recent developments in our understanding of the human–dog relationship

The reemergence of cognitive studies in comparative psychology and ethology, coupled with ongoing archaeological discoveries and recent advances in genomics, have contributed to the current explosion of scientific interest in dogs (Canis lupus familiaris). The long and complex evolution of a human-dog relationship is explored from the differing perspectives of ethology, cognitive sciences, evolutionary anthropology, archaeology, and paleoanthropology. Our understanding of dogs is again shedding light on human cognitive evolution and the complex, and at times controversial, process of domestication.     

Reluctant liars? Public debates on propaganda and democracy in twentieth-century Britain (ca. 1914–1950)

The place of propaganda in a democratic society has been discussed long before the age of fake news, as the heated debate on this issue that took place in the UK and other democracies from around 1914 to 1950 clearly shows. Drawing upon a variety of published and archival sources, the article examines the changing views of British political elites, intellectuals, publicity experts and the public on the proper role of government in the public sphere, while discussing their influence on government policies and exploring the light they shed on British—and, more broadly, liberal democratic—culture and identity.     

Education,parenting and concepts of childhood in England,c. 1945 to c. 1979

Both education and parenting became increasingly ‘child-centred’, or ‘progressive’, in post-war England. This article contends that the impact of this shift for concepts of childhood, and for children themselves, was equivocal. Progressive methods were physically and emotionally demanding for both teachers and parents, and popularised versions of developmental psychology and psychoanalysis shaped a limiting concept of the child. This article also suggests, in line with recent work by Thomson and Shapira, that changing concepts of childhood map democratic selfhood because the capabilities that children lacked were those that must be possessed by the adult citizen. By exploring how children were defined in relation to adults, and how adults’ needs were increasingly subordinated to those of the child, this article also begins to question how we might usefully use age as a ‘category of historical analysis’.     

论东汉中后期士人的群体心理

东汉中后期七人群体的形成是儒家经学的极盛这一特定历史时代的产物,是东汉中后期一个重要的社会群体。这一群体的成员通过心理和感情的交流,形成自己的群体心理,产生了心理相容、群体规范、群体凝聚、类化趋向等群体心理现象。它是我们研究东汉中后期社会状况与历史变迁的一个新的角度和方法。     

PRACTICING THE CULTURAL GREEN ECONOMY: WHERE NOW FOR ENVIRONMENTAL SOCIAL SCIENCE?

Debates concerning the development of the green economy necessarily focus on “upstream” issues that underpin the re‐structuring of national and regional economies through the lenses of financial, institutional and regulatory change. However, the growing interest in the cultural green economy requires a re‐scaling of debates surrounding the links that occur in complex socio‐technical systems, notably between individual consumers, social units and the architectures of the developing green economy. This necessitates a research and policy agenda that is attentive to both the complexities of such interactions (between structures, processes and practices) and the imperative to foster change in practices within wider society. This article explores the ways in which environmental social scientists have examined and evidenced these issues, arguing that two major barriers still exist for creating adequate understandings and opportunities for change. First, the overt focus on the individual consumer as a unit of measurement and political attention has stifled debate concerning the ways in which environmentally related social practices have developed in association with wider economic contexts. In this way, environmental social scientists have often failed to make the connections between individuals, practices and the economic system. Second, in adopting a largely individualistic perspective, environmental social scientists have tended to focus their attention on incrementalist and narrowly defined views of what ecological citizenship might look like and constitute in the green economy. The article therefore argues that environmental social scientists need to constructively engage in a new inter‐disciplinary dialogue about the role, purpose and ethics of citizen participation in developing and sustaining the green economy in an age of climate change and potential resource scarcity.     

(Re)Inhabiting awareness: geography and mindfulness

This paper opens up a dialogue between mindfulness and the discipline of geography. As a meditative practice that cultivates ‘present-centred non-judgmental awareness’, we claim that the practices and insights of mindfulness have important implications for various forms of geographical enquiry. This paper argues that mindfulness can inform geographical practices in relation to epistemology and methodology, and contribute towards geographically informed critical psychological theory and action. More specifically, we claim that mindfulness could offer a practice-based context to support the study of affects, extend the application of psychoanalytical geographical methods beyond the therapeutic, and contribute to emerging geographical studies of behavioural power and empowerment. This analysis explores these sites of interaction through a series of reflections on the Mindfulness, Behaviour Change and Engagement in Public Policy programme that was developed and delivered by the authors. This more-than-therapeutic mindfulness programme has been delivered to approximately 47 civil servants working in the UK Government.     

关于宗教信仰的心理基础及心理特点考察

宗教信仰心理缘起于人的依赖感和利己思想,它又具有臆造性等特点;宗教心理与道德合致,从而不受时空地域之限,持续地发挥其作用。     

Seal on Land, Elk at Sea: Notes on and Applications of the Ritual Landscape at the Seaboard

Ritual landscapes at sea are marked in the cognitive world of coastal people by a primary antagonism between sea and land. This contrast is negotiated by liminal 'foreign' agents, selected for their symbolic adherence to either part. The primary source of maritime culture is fishing as a survival of past hunter-gatherer societies. Forms of religious or magical management of this contrast are manifold, from recent superstitious magic to powerful symbols in ancient worship, objects, art, architecture and cult. Also described are ways of using the sea on land as a magic metaphor and a fundamental point of reference. Related dichotomies and ways of negotiating them, such as the liminal agent, exist elsewhere in the cognitive world of pre-industrial societies, so these ideas could have applications in archaeology.
© 2005 The Nautical Archaeology Society