Mere Label Research Articles

Reproaching heaven: The problem of evil in Mengzi

At first glance, the problem of evil has little place in Chinese thought. At least two assumptions associated with the classical European problem of evil are foreign to a Chinese context. If we take the tema "evil" in contrast to the merely '"oad," that is, if we give evil ontological status as a real force, then classical Chinese thinkers have no conception of evil, and thus no need to account for its origin. The second assumption connected to the problem of evil is God's creation of the world ex nibilo. If God is the total and complete cause of all that exists, God must be responsible for everything, including the bad things. Without a conception of creation ex nihila, early Chinese thinkers need not attribute evil to any divine being. Even in a European context, though, requiting a conception of evil as a positive force and the creation of the wodd ex nibilo defines the problem of evil too narrowly. Most thinkers in the European tradition responded to the problem of evil by denting the ontological status of evil. Those who maintained the benevolence of God denied his creation of evil by equating evil with nothingness or lack. Augustine developed this denial o f evil in response to Manicheanism and versions of his account are taken up by Descartes and Leibniz, among others. Even those who responded to the problem of evil by denying the existence of a benevolent deity tended to reduce evil from a real ontological category to a mere human label, as, for example, Spinoza does. Creation ex nibilo remains more consistently central to the problem but again seems unnecessary. Kant, for example, saw the problem of evil as

Social reactions toward people vs. computers: How mere lables shape interactions

What criteria afford a machine the status of a social agent? In this investigation, the mere label identifying an oral interviewer as human or computer was sufficient to affect participants' responses toward the interviewer during an online interview for a competitive mock job. Participants' impressions of the interviewer and self-reported emotional reactions to the interview were unaffected by the interviewer's identity. Despite this invariance, however, participants exhibited more interpersonal displays when the interviewer was identified as human. Overall, these results show that participants engaged in heightened impression management strategies (deferral to, or attempts to engage or appease) with the ''human'' interviewer. The computer interviewer did not merit equivalent social status.

Xunzi's Use of Zhengming: Naming as a constructive project

This paper challenges the view of several interpreters of Xunzi regarding the status of names, ming. I will maintain that Xunzi's view is consistent with the activity we see not only in his own efforts to influence language, but those of Confucius as well. Based on a reconsideration of translations and interpretations of key passages, I will argue that names are regarded neither as mere labels nor as indicating a privileged taxonomy of the myriad phenomena. Rather, Xunzi conceives them as constructs designed to facilitate social goals. Finally, I will suggest an alternative to overly simplistic understandings of how appropriate names are fashioned and of who is responsible for their form.

Madness and Automation: On Institutionalization

Madness and Automation: On Institutionalization Phoebe Sengers Institutionalization, October 11–18, 1991. What happened? The week was bizarre, inexplicable, intense. The week had a story, the story of a breakdown, a story whose breakdown delineates the workings of the psychiatric machine. This machine, operating on a streaming in/out flow of people, is not only institutional but institutionalizing; its inputs become institutionalized. It works where it breaks down; “The social machine’s limit is not attrition, but rather its misfirings; it can operate only by fits and starts, by grinding and breaking down, in spasms of minor explosions” (Anti-Oedipus 151). The breakdown of its patients is reflected onto the ward; in its case, however, breaking down is productive and creates the institutional moment. Understanding that experience of institutionalization, making it explainable, means reading that story and following its lines of flight. What results is a patchwork narrative, neither coherent nor choosy about its sources. The aim is not purity of form, but an answer to “What happened?” that respects the complexity of the institutional moment and a diversity of viewpoints on that moment. Nevertheless, from this patchwork emerges an effective understanding of social machines in general and the possibilities for agency even at the moment of subjugation; the narrative of this singularity leads to a general strategy for escape from totalization based on the postulates of machinic analysis. What Happened In the middle of September, I started to get depressed. By the middle of October, things had progressed to the point that I could no longer function: I couldn’t read or write and was having trouble walking. I went to see a counselor and told him, ‘I think I need to go to the hospital.’ He took me to Western Psychiatric Institute and Clinic.1 The fastest way into and out of theorizing about insanity is to state that people are labeled insane if they fail to correspond to social norms. Such a statement fails to take into account the experience of many mental patients who have committed themselves or of people who are seeking treatment outside the institutionalized stream. For these people the experience of being “crazy”—schizophrenic, depressed, or anxious, to follow the clinical classification—is routed through feelings of misery and, often, physical symptoms like an inability to concentrate, insomnia, or involuntary movement. This is not to deny that these physical symptoms bear the mark of the social formation (“[I]t is a founding fact—that the organs be hewn into the socius, and that the flows run over its surface” [Anti-Oedipus] 149). It is only to state that insanity and institutionalization are more complicated than a mere labeling on the part of a social organization. Insanity is something experienced both from the individual and from the social point of view. I do not pretend to be able to (re)present the real institutionalization, the real experiences of mental patients. Instead, I want to consider the period of institutionalization as a moment where two flows come into contact with each other: that of the institution, with its labels and categories, ready to take in new input, and that of the individual, who leaves his or her everyday life to become, for a while, a more-or-less functioning member of the social community under the auspices of the ward. Corresponding to these two flows there are two points of view or modes of representation of the conjunctural period to be considered, that of the institution and that of the patient. For the institution, any particular institutionalization is just a moment in its history, though each of these moments is in the strictest sense essential—the institution really only consists of the sum of these institutionalizations. For the individual, ripped from his or her normal existence and deprived of his or her accustomed social context, the commitment is a traumatic event, but one that is not constitutive—in most cases, the institutionalization will last only a moment in the scale of their lives. The meeting of the institution and the patient is a point of conjunction of the paths of two very different social machines. Here, I would like to consider the dis- and conjunctions...

Identity and inner-city youth: beyond ethnicity and gender

Combining humanism and social science, the authors illustrate how youth organisations enable the young to link a sense of self beyond the mere labels of ethnicity and gender, to responsibility and supportive environments for work and play.

The effects of Actual Behavior Vs. Mere Labelling in attribution of Sex Differences

A recurrent problem in interpreting research showing differential reactions to the sexes is that such results may reflect real behavior differences among those observed or differential expectations of those observing. This study used a methodology which allowed these two competing explanations to be tested by assessing whether subjects’ ratings of taped interactants whose gender was ambiguous would be determined mainly by what gender the subjects thought the interactants were or by the interactants’ behavior. The results showed that the causes of the sex differences in assessments differed depending on what type of assessment was being made. Specifically, behavior differences and not observers’ expectations about such differences largely determined observers’ ratings of specific attributes of the interactants, but observers’ expectations and not behavior differences determined observers’ general ratings of masculinity/femininity.

The Effects of Actual Behavior vs. Mere Labelling in Attribution of Sex Differences

A recurrent problem in interpreting research showing differential reactions to the sexes is that such results may reflect real behavior differences among those observed or differential expectations of those observing. This study used a methodology which allowed these two competing explanations to be tested by assessing whether subjects' ratings of taped interactants whose gender was ambiguous would be determined mainly by what gender the subjects thought the interactants were or by the interactants' behavior. The results showed that the causes of the sex differences in assessments differed depending on what type of assessment was being made. Specifically, behavior differences and not observers' expectations about such differences largely determined observers' ratings of specific attributes of the interactants, but observers' expectations and not behavior differences determined observers' general ratings of masculinity/femininity.

Reflection elimination in secondary surveillance radar

Secondary Surveillance Radar in Air Traffic Control has evolved from a mere labelling device in support primary radar to a high integrity plotting system inits own right with primary radar relegated to the support role. This change in concept has placed increased demands on the system and there is a greater awareness of the shortcomings and idiosyncrasies which previously were unnoticed or accepted, among which is the problem of reflections causing false target reports. This paper outlines the nature of the difficulty and some of the principal methods for reducing it to an acceptable level.

The Generic Identity of the Novel

enormous difficulties critics have experienced in their efforts to arrive at a generally acceptable definition of the novel can be attributed in large measure to a failure to understand the nature of literary genres. Those familiar charges of pigeonholing and Procrustean beds levelled against attempts to treat genres systematically in the effort to move beyond the use of generic terms as mere labels of convenience point directly, if ineffectually, to misconceptions which have frustrated the labors of generic theorists, and point equally directly at inadequacies in the typical anti-generic stance. charges arise from the recognition that while conventional generic theory seeks to separate literary types into distinct rigidly delimited categories, literary works resist such tidy schemes and writers are too notoriously perverse to bow meekly to such dictates. Polonius's comments to Hamlet on the range of plays performed by the Players expose the manifest faults of such generic schematizing: The best actors in the world, either for tragedy, comedy, history, pastoral, pastoral-comical, historicalpastoral, tragical-historical, tragical-comical-historical-pastoral, scene individable or poem unlimited (II, 2). In this locus classicus for anti-generic critics we see all the endless ramifying of categories to accommodate the diversity of literary works, all the ad hoc adjustments of a rigid generic schema, all the foolishness of theoretical frameworks which treats genres as demarcated categories. What is peculiar about the position taken up by anti-generic critics is that it most often proceeds from an inability to conceive of any notion of genre beyond that of distinct categories, separate compartments into which works are flung whether they fit or not. Rather than try to discover if there is a conception of genre that works otherwise, the anti-generic critic assumes that the conventional way is, if not the right, the only way, and condemns the entire undertaking for limitations that are as much his own as those of the theorists he attacks. Frameworks that treat genres as delimited categories derive from Aristotelian essentialist thinking, which holds that an object possesses an essence, an essential property or set of properties which defines it as a particular kind or species of object and distinguishes it clearly from other kinds. To seek essences in this sense of the word is to search for properties that are both necessary and sufficient for identifying an object as a member of a particular species. Necessary properties are often readily established, but it is seldom if ever possible to discover a property or set of properties that are both necessary and sufficient. Listings of properties will usually be found to have one of three faults: the properties listed are mere accidental features; the list specifies so few features that it allows in more objects than the category is intended to admit; or it is so detailed and extensive that it eliminates objects thought properly to belong to the category.

Ureteric reflux 1973: chronic pyelonephritis v. reflux nephropathy.

This is the first annotation in an occasional column that will examine matters of current interest. Readers' comments are invited on this as on any other feature of the journal.—The Editors. A lingering inflammation of the renal pelvis and parenchyma? Richard Asher might well have chosen chronic pyelonephritis as an example of the corrupting power of the sloppy word in medicine (Asher, 1972). Naming a condition amounts to much more than mere labelling: it imprints indelible ideas about aetiology. We have all found it rather hard to accept in recent years that the coarsely scarred kidney is generally the end stage of a childhood event, not the lingering, smouldering counterpart of chronic infections acquired in adult life. Worse is to come: bacterial infection of the kidney may not be the starting point of the disorder at all. Chronic pyelonephritis appeared an established clinical and pathological entity by the 1950s, with protagonists divided between haematogenous and ascending infection routes. At this time experimental studies in the rabbit and mouse showed that bacteraemic insults alone would produce the characteristic coarsely scarred kidney (De Navasquez, 1958). It is of interest that “intra-renal hydronephrosis”, abnormal dilatation of renal tubules, was a well-known complication in these studies, leading to speculation on the intra-renal urodynamic upset that might follow such changes. But a decade later vesico-ureteric reflux had come to be recognized as an important association of the coarsely scarred kidney in man (The Lancet, 1968), and is still pressing to the centre of the stage. Bacteraemia, or indeed bacteria anywhere have had an increasingly hard time in the wings.

From Skill Acquisition to Language Control

Some years ago, in an attempt to be helpful, undertook to give some lessons in English to a young Italian immigrant to Australia who happened to have wandered into my church and who was making rather futile efforts to make himself understood with the few words he had acquired haphazardly. Very, soon, however, he stopped coming for lessons since it was obvious to him that did not know how to teach a language. was trying to make him say things like I went to work yesterday; I'll go to work tomorrow. This, he was sure, was not the way to learn English. he wanted to know, and as quickly as possible, was the names of all the things he could see around him. My young immigrant's attitude reflects a very common misconception about language use: that it is essentially a naming process, that the first step in language acquisition must be the learning of labels for all the features of the environment so as to be able to talk about them to others. Many parents have this idea of language and spend time trying to teach their infants the names of all kinds of objects. Recent studies of child language acquisition, however, show that from their earliest efforts at speech children use words not as mere labels but with the operant force of more fully developed utterances.1 When a child says milk, he can mean a number of things. He may be naming a certain familiar liquid; since this desired reaction is rewarded by the obvious pleasure of his parents, he tends to repeat this label to retain their attention. He may repeat the word over and over, engaging merely in word play, enjoying the repetition of sounds and the approving attention he receives as he continues. On the other hand, he may say with a look of puzzlement, meaning Where is my milk? Isn't it time was fed? and if he is further ignored he may utter a peremptory milk! as a command to his mother to attend to his needs. Milk. . in a tone of anxiety may mean Look! I've knocked over my milk. will happen now? or it may be a solemn inquiry: What about my dolly? Isn't she to get a drink too?

Nominalism, Platonism and "Being True of"

One attempt to avoid platonistic ontology involves using the notion true of.' Using this notion, one claims that predicate, say white, is true of particular object whereas sign such as proper name to the object. This is done to avoid holding (1)' that predicate to universal property while the proper name to an individual and (2) that sentence used to predicate the one sign of the other indicates the fact that the individual exemplifies the property. -Thus, an attempt is made to offer coherent ontology recognizing only individuals. If cogent, this gambit provides more parsimonious ontology than platonistic alternatives. Here I shall argue that the gambit fails. A key point will be that an ontology is reflected in our use of language not only by the signs we explicitly hold to be connected with objects but also by the ways we connect signs to things. Let a and W be proper name and predicate respectively. Let stand for refers to. On what I shall call the platonistic account the signs a and W both stand or are put in the relation R, to an individual and color respectively. They are, as some say, interpreted or paired with such objects. On the alternative account the name a is also thought of as referring to the particular but the predicate is not taken to refer to anything. To take the predicate as mere label of several objects just as the name is label of one is to propose different version of nominalism, one that is sometimes referred to as the doctrine of common names. On the present nominalistic gambit the predicate is taken to stand in different relation to the particular than the name stands in, the

The Roots of Radicalism

Terry Eagleton’s article, The Limits of Liberalism, in the April number of New Blackfriars is as important as it is absorbing. In it he acknowledges that Mrs Rosemary’s Haughton’s book, On Trying to be Human, represents ‘the most deeply creative point in one important contemporary Christian tradition—the tradition of liberal, open, personal concern with the concretely human in actual relationships’ (p. 353), and he seeks to bring it into contact with another ‘important contemporary Christian tradition’, the radical one, which has been articulating itself in a series of articles in New Blackfriars but which was risking becoming closed in on itself. More significantly still it promises to bring the debate between these two traditions, the liberal and the radical, to issue beyond the rhetoric of mere labelling, so enabling and compelling us to choose between them. The importance of the article to all those engaged in the debate and concerned with the exigencies of contemporary Christian commitment is therefore clear.Terry Eagleton’s contention is that Mrs Haughton’s affirmation and exploration of ‘the meaning of being human for a Christian’ is gravely deficient in that it systematically excludes ‘wider (and arguably deeper) connections of this immediate focus’ (p. 353). He devotes the bulk of his article to criticizing Mrs Haughton for attributing a distorted primacy to the spirit, the inward, the personal, with a consequential devaluation of the flesh, the external, the social and the political, and this on account of a misconception of the relationship between the two.

Recognition, Naming and Bare Particulars

In a recent discussion of the notion of substance Miss Anscombe points out that the following three doctrines are very closely associated: the doctrine that proper names lack all connotation, are mere labels, the view that there is nothing essential to the individual, and the doctrine that individuals are bare particulars with no properties in and of themselves. In this article as well as in other writings she rejects all three of these doctrines. And, along with P. T. Geach, whose position on this matter I take to be identical to hers, she defends a doctrine of proper names that is based upon this rejection. She is quite right in supposing that the notion of individuality embodied in these three doctrines is not a straw man. E. B. Allaire has recently defended the doctrine that there are bare particulars along with its corollaries about names and the nominal essence of individuals. He even thinks the doctrine can be defended on “common sense” grounds, independently of dialectical considerations. In this paper I wish to examine one of his arguments in defence of bare particulars.

A Commentary on “Radical Behaviorism”

B. F. Skinner is perhaps even more widely known for his views on science than for his experimental work. His comments on the role of theory in science have been labeled “anti-theoretical,” “ultra-empirical”, “non-theoretical,” “radical,” and worse. His position appears to be both extreme and untenable. Scriven [1] has given us a critique of Skinner that goes beyond mere labeling; it is an examination of the assumptions and implications of such a position.

The Classification of Defective Delinquents

emphasis upon classification, has come the natural corollary such emphasis-the work concept as definite procedure in the handling inmates correctional institution. Naturally enough, there has been sharp division opinion as to the value such classification. On the one hand, the proponents such classification have insisted upon its value to the correctional institution, whatever type. Opposed to this school have been those individuals who have seen in classification merely means to limited professional aggrandizement whereby highly paid professional such as psychiatrists and psychologists, the so-called bug doctors, have introduced mass impressive sounding terms for the designation types known to exist and so designated by all experienced correctional workers, by less impressive, but perhaps more descriptive, terms. As homely example this, we have the type, well known in correctional institutions, described by the psychiatrist as being of mental subnormality at times coupled with mental instability and by an experienced, but less didactic guard as being a dope who gets 'bug on' every once in while. Obviously, it is not enough that the professional worker content himself with what has been termed by some as appellative psychiatry and by others as being mere label sticking. Unfortunately, from the standpoint the professional worker, there has been great deal truth in the criticism levelled against him by experienced correctional workers. Too often, the psychologist and psychiatrist have dismissed such criticism by shrug the shoulders and smug phrase anent old time prison wardens. The fact remains that there is today, considerable dissension between case workers in the broad sense, and prison administrators. The problem