In “The Philosopher and His Shadow,” from the late collection of essays called Signs, Merleau-Ponty turned to the shadow cast by phenomenology’s light, that is, to what eludes philosophy, but which cannot be dismissed from philosophy. “What resists phenomenology within us—natural being, the ‘barbarian’ source Schelling spoke of—cannot remain outside phenomenology and should have its place within it. The philosopher must bear his shadow, which is not simply the factual absence of future light.” In the working notes to the Visible and the Invisible, Merleau-Ponty proposes a “psychoanalysis of Nature” that takes up the question of the “ever new” and “always the same” in Nature, that is, “the barbarian principle,” the repressed shadow that haunts the shining face of Nature. These decisive references to Schelling stem from his late lecture course on Nature. I review Merleau-Ponty’s turn to Schelling on its own terms as well as in the light of the ecological crisis.

Mainstream scholarship conceives of misinformation as necessarily involving the concepts of either truth or accuracy. The following non-alethic definition is argued to be more satisfactory: an act of communication is misinformation if and only if it is conducted in a context that is misleading and violates the core informational preferences of relevant stakeholders relative to their goals. This account distinguishes misinformation from mere deception, articulates both propositional and non-propositional forms of misinformation, is sensitive to the value-laden features of misinformation, consonant with empirical psychological data, and applicable for policy purposes.

香港中文大學文學院於本月初，為一眾2023-24年度入學的國際生，舉行入學獎學金證書頒發典禮暨交流茶會，歡迎他們加入中大文學院及祝賀在學術領域中取得傑出成就的同學。

This paper argues that Descartes and Hume ought to be viewed as pioneers of cognitive externalism. However, externalism old or new faces some serious challenges. The second part of the paper enlists the empirical resources of recent works in psychology and neuroscience to argue for a thoroughly externalist view that meet the challenges. The view includes such claims as perceptual and fast thinking knowledge ought to be viewed separately from theoretical or slow thinking knowledge; the former falls into a Humean, the latter Cartesian, type externalism.

講者簡介
Professor Li Shen, based at Doshisha University in Japan, serves in dual capacities as a doctoral supervisor within the Faculty of Cultural Informatics and as the Director of the Doshisha University Research center for Linguistic Ecology Science. His groundbreaking work in language ecology theory encompasses two primary research areas.

In his first focus, Professor Shen employs Geographic Information Science (GIS) methods to reveal patterns of language variation and dissemination. Using a computational model titled "Calculating Language Dissemination Sequences through Geographic Information Systems," he investigates the spatiotemporal constraints on the expansion and contraction of dominant dialects. Published findings from this research appear in prestigious journals such as the "Zhongguoyuyanxuebao (Chinese Journal of Linguistics)" and "Yuyanjiaoxue yu Yanjiu (Language Teaching and Research)."

In the second research avenue, Professor Shen utilizes theoretical linguistics methods to explore interfaces between morphology and syntax across different language types. His work delves into why functions such as "CAUSE" or "EXPERIENCE" can only appear at the syntactic level in monosyllabic languages but can appear at both the syntactic and morphological levels in polysyllabic languages. Results of this research are disseminated in renowned domestic and international linguistic journals, including the "Journal of East Asian Linguistics," "Zhongguo Yuwen (Chinese Linguistics)," and "Dangdai Yuyanxue (Contemporary Linguistics)."

Speaker
Dr. Patrick ZHOU

Dr. Patrick ZHOU is a postdoctoral fellow in the Department of Translation at CUHK. His research interest lies at the intersection between translation studies and media studies. He is particularly interested in engaging contemporary translation theories (e.g. post-translation theory) with critical scholarship in media studies, in description of popular media reception phenomena. His PhD thesis investigates the reception of popular media in the context of social media-based convergence culture, drawing on an interdisciplinary framework comprised of theoretical and methodological elements from translation studies, media studies and fandom studies. His forthcoming article entitled ‘The multiple layers of Mulan’s legend in Chinese classical literature’ has been accepted by Monumenta Serica.

禤駿遠先生 (Mr. Ian Huen)，國學愛好者，從事投資多年，美國普林斯頓大學畢業，香港中文大學比較及公共史學文學碩士。著有 The Rising Sons: China's Imperial Succession & The Art of War 及 What Bruce Lee Didn't Know About Kung Fu and Other Revelations About China。新作《你說的是從前──清末與今日中國》於2023年5月由商務印書館（香港）有限公司出版。