Notes on Post‐Secular Society

The resurgence of political Islam and the endurance of broad religious belief in the most modern of societies—America—has created a crisis of faith among secularists. If modernity no longer implies a secular outlook, and secularism, by definition, cannot generate any values beyond an indifferent tolerance of all belief, what role will religion play in the 21st century? In an interesting confluence of reflection, Jürgen Habermas, one of Europe's leading secular liberal thinkers, argues that secular citizens must be open to religious influence, especially since the very identity of Western culture is rooted in Judeo‐Christian values. In his political afterlife, Tony Blair has converted to Catholicism and established a Faith Foundation to press for religious literacy because “you can't understand the modern world unless you understand the importance of religious faith.” Similarly, when Pope Benedict XVI visited secular France in September, President Nicholas Sarkozy scandalized the lay establishment by saying, like Habermas, that “rejecting a dialogue with religion would be a cultural and intellectual error.” He called for “a positive secularism that debates, respects and includes, not a secularism that rejects.” Despite the flurry of controversy over a recent spate of books extolling the virtues of atheism in the wake of Islamist terrorism, the more interesting issue by far is the emergence of post‐secular modernity.     

商品疫苗对FMDV O/YNGM/97株的免疫效果评价

利用血清学方法对我国流行毒株O/YNGM/97进行鉴定.并对其生物学特性和免疫学特性进行了研究.结果显示,该流行毒株为O型12蹄疫病毒(FMDV),其对乳鼠和BHK21细胞的适应性比较好,致病性较强,LD50.和TCID50分别为10-6.33/0.2 mL和10-4.75/0.05 mL.VP1基因序列的比较结果显示,O/YNGM/97株与国外FMDV参考毒株O/TAI/1/92的同源性为91.4%,与国内疫苗毒株OZ/93、OA/58和OY/80的同源性分别为79.2%、83.6%和78.99/6.用商品疫苗OZ株、OY株口蹄疫O型灭活疫苗和牛羊.口蹄疫O-Asial型双价灭活疫苗免疫的小鼠均可产生较高的免疫抗体,并对流行毒株O/YNGM/97的攻击具有较好的保护性.说明,使用现有商品疫苗完全可以预防该毒株在我国的流行.     

对当代资本主义阶级关系新变化的有益探索——赖特的《阶级》一书评介

阶级分析理论是马克思历史唯物主义的重要组成部分。二战以后,随着科学技术上的革新带来的社会经济的发展,使资本主义社会经济结构和就业结构发生变化,从而造成当代资本主义社会的阶级关系出现新的变化,呈现出新的特征。正是由于这些变化,一些人开始质疑阶级分     

蛋鸡输卵管中与精子储存相关四种酶分布的组织化学染色观察

应用组织化学方法在组织和细胞水平上对碱性磷酸酶、酸性磷酸酶、过氧化氢酶以及三磷酸腺苷酶在蛋鸡输卵管内的分布特点及分布意义进行了研究分析。结果显示,4种酶在蛋鸡输卵管各段的分布部位以及反应强弱存在差异。碱性磷酸酶在子宫部分布最多,在有精子储存的黏膜固有层腺体和血管周围也有明显分布;酸性磷酸酶在阴道子宫交界部分布最多,酸性磷酸酶阳性反应呈颗粒状,主要分布于黏膜上皮和固有层腺体;过氧化氢酶在输卵管各段血管周围以及子宫阴道交界处精子腺和蛋白分泌部反应明显;三磷酸腺苷酶在各段尤其是子宫阴道交界处精子腺部位黏膜上皮纤毛和腺体分布较多,血管也有一定分布。表明这些酶在精子储存时对精子的活性和储存环境的维持、物质运输及分泌等活动具有一定的生物学作用。     

非结构蛋白2高变区在PRRSV复制中的作用

为了研究nsp2的非必需区在动脉炎病毒复制中的作用,采用定点突变PCR(site direct PCR)法对PRRSV全长感染性克隆pAPRRS的nsp2进行了系列缺失。结果显示,通过病毒拯救发现,nsp2部分区段可以忍受一定程度的缺失,但大幅度的缺失影响了病毒的复制、RNA合成翻译甚至病毒颗粒的成熟过程。结果表明,nsp2中多个氨基酸的变化可能影响PRRSV中多聚蛋白的水解、加工、成熟或RTC的组装。     

Policy Inertia and the Persistence of Systemic Fragility

Many observers have diagnosed a fundamental shift in financial regulation since the 2008 crisis. In contrast, this article argues that changes have mostly been superficial. The ideas underpinning regulation have been adapted rather than overturned. Our financial system remains highly fragile, even if exceptionally loose monetary policy obscures such fragility temporarily. Governments show little appetite to correct the lopsided relationship between the financial sector and the real economy and turn the sector into a reliable engine of prosperity and stability rather than a continued source of systemic risk.     

Post‐Secular Turkey

For 500 years the West was on the rise, culminating in Globalizaiton 1.0—the open system of trade, information flows and the spread of technology on the terms and in the image of the West. The benefits of that system over the last 30 years have led to the rise of the emerging economies. As a result we are entering the new era of Globalization 2.0 characterized by new forms of non‐Western modernity and the interdependence of plural identities. The advent of this new era has been hastened by the fiscal and financial crisis in Europe and the United States. Turkey, with its Islamic‐oriented democracy that has become a template for the liberated peoples of the Arab Spring, and China, with its effective neo‐Confucian form of governance, are the most sharply defined new players in this multi‐polar and multi‐dimensional world. In this section, one of Turkey's most insightful sociologists examines the post‐secular transformation of that nation. One of China's more provocative philosophers proposes a hybrid model that combines what has been learned from the experience of Western and Chinese governance in a way that “enhances democracy” in both systems.     

Economic grievances and political protest

How do economic grievances affect citizens’ inclination to protest? Given rising levels of inequality and widespread economic hardship in the aftermath of the Great Recession, this question is crucial for political science: if adverse economic conditions depress citizens’ engagement, as many contributions have argued, then the economic crisis may well feed into a crisis of democracy. However, the existing research on the link between economic grievances and political participation remains empirically inconclusive. It is argued in this article that this is due to two distinct shortcomings, which are effectively addressed by combining the strengths of political economy and social movement theories. Based on ESS and EU-SILC data from 2006–2012, as well as newly collected data on political protest in 28 European countries, a novel, more fine-grained conceptualisation of objective economic grievances considerably improves our understanding of the direct link between economic grievances and protest behaviour. While structural economic disadvantage (i.e., the level of grievances) unambiguously de-mobilises individuals, the deterioration of economic prospects (i.e., a change in grievances) instead increases political activity. Revealing these two countervailing effects provides an important clarification that helps reconcile many seemingly conflicting findings in the existing literature. Second, the article shows that the level of political mobilisation substantially moderates this direct link between individual hardship and political activity. In a strongly mobilised environment, even structural economic disadvantage is no longer an impediment to political participation. There is a strong political message in this interacting factor: if the presence of organised and visible political action is a decisive signal for citizens that conditions the micro-level link between economic grievances and protest, then democracy itself – that is, organised collective action – can help sustain political equality and prevent the vicious circle of democratic erosion.     

Use of forensic investigations in anti-doping

The fight against doping is mainly focused on direct detection, using analytical methods for the detection of doping agents in biological samples. However, the World Anti-Doping Code also defines doping as possession, administration or attempted administration of prohibited substances or methods, trafficking or attempted trafficking in any prohibited substance or methods. As these issues correspond to criminal investigation, a forensic approach can help assessing potential violation of these rules. In the context of a rowing competition, genetic analyses were conducted on biological samples collected in infusion apparatus, bags and tubing in order to obtain DNA profiles. As no database of athletes' DNA profiles was available, the use of information from the location detection as well as contextual information were key to determine a population of suspected athletes and to obtain reference DNA profiles for comparison. Analysis of samples from infusion systems provided 8 different DNA profiles. The comparison between these profiles and 8 reference profiles from suspected athletes could not be distinguished. This case-study is one of the first where a forensic approach was applied for anti-doping purposes. Based on this investigation, the International Rowing Federation authorities decided to ban not only the incriminated athletes, but also the coaches and officials for 2 years.