S Liu

This study aims to explore the potential of utilizing 3D printing technology for repurposing discarded wooden furniture. Our study combines literature review and case analysis to identify effective methods and implementation steps for integrating 3D printing into the upcycling processes of furniture. Our findings provide valuable insights into the practical application of 3D printing technology and offer a clear roadmap for sustainable furniture revitalization. This work also contributes to reducing waste, enhancing resource efficiency, and promoting sustainability in the furniture industry. Ultimately, our research underscores the innovative potential of 3D printing technology in this context.

From June 26 to 27, 2021, the “Seminar on Civilizational Dialogue from a Belt and Road perspective” was held online. The conference was hosted by the Institute for Advanced Study in Dialogue of Civilizations of Wuhan University, the School of Philosophy and Sociology of Lanzhou University, the School of Philosophy of Wuhan University, Center for Comparative Philosophy and Culture Strategy Research of Wuhan University (a key humanistic base in Hubei Province), and the editorial department of Science, Economy and Society, Gansu Ethnic Culture and Education Promotion Association, and Gansu Sanyuan Longshang Real Estate Development Co., Ltd. More than 30 experts and scholars from more than 20 well-known universities and research institutions in China delivered brilliant speeches on the theme of the conference and engaged in lively discussions.

The main contents of contemporary utilitarianism are almost all formed, developed and proved in the academic debates and even theoretical conflicts between contemporary utilitarianism and non-utilitarianism, and those between different schools of contemporary utilitarianism. Centering on the core proposition of utilitarianism, carefully sorting out and accurately analyzing the basic viewpoints and ideological propositions of different schools of contemporary utilitarianism, we can effectively reveal the overall logic and development course of contemporary utilitarianism and reflect the overall theoretical picture of contemporary utilitarianism.

Utilitarianism is an important and influential school of political thoughts, which for the first time systematically links morality and the maximization of human happiness, explaining the origin and essence of morality from the perspective of human needs and the actual interest relationship between people and taking the greatest happiness of man as judgment criterions of moral principles. But, in today's discourse system, utilitarianism is considered an outdated theory. Many researchers put forward that utilitarianism is no longer applicable to the discourse system of contemporary political philosophy, in which the primary virtue of the social system is to achieve social fairness and justice. This book systematically examines the contemporary evolutionary trajectory of utilitarianism and elucidates its development and contributions. The serious consideration and reference of utilitarianism are imperative, given its undeniable advantages.

Although contemporary utilitarianism inherits the basic features of classical utilitarianism, it is already a new utilitarian theory. The “new” development of contemporary utilitarianism is manifested in the change of its ontology, and in the process of reflecting on classical utilitarianism, contemporary utilitarianism no longer holds a purely individualistic position, but holds a claim that requires attention to the relationship between human beings, and calculates the utility value of an act in the relationship of interpersonal interaction. Contemporary utilitarianism attaches great importance to the role of rules, treats individuals and communities in a relatively balanced approach, endows communities a relatively independent subject status, and reconstructs the basic norms of utilitarianism on the position of treating individuals and communities in a balanced manner. It is because of the breakthrough of ontology that contemporary utilitarianism undergoes the theoretical evolution above-mentioned and achieves the effective compatibility of the utility principle with the theory of rights, the theory of equality with the theory of public interests, so that utilitarianism had won a place in discussion of contemporary political philosophy. It can be said that the trajectory of contemporary utilitarianism's evolution is along the direction from individualism to community-individual equilibrium.

The theoretical evolution from classical utilitarianism to contemporary utilitarianism reflects the transformation of utilitarian theory from simply paying attention to the absoluteness and priority of the individual to a theory that takes both the individual and the community into account and attaches importance to the coordinated development of the individual and the community. Contemporary utilitarianism has changed the misconception of classical utilitarianism about community—the community is not a fictitious but an organic entity, which is not only an activity field for individuals to freely obtain their own interests, but also an interest subject that regulates individual interests, coordinates conflicts of interests, and safeguards and promotes the development of social public interests.

This paper proposes non-labelled sequent calculi, G(K45PAL) and G(SK5PAL), for the public announcement expansions of modal logics K45 and S5. We transform each of the recursion axioms of PAL into left and right rules for the sequent calculi. For G(K45PAL), the cut elimination theorem is shown using the complexity measure introduced by van Ditmarsch et al. (2007). This measure was originally employed to establish semantic completeness via recursion axioms. While the cut elimination theorem fails in G(SK5PAL), we adopt Takano’s strategy (1992) to establish that the cut formula in G(SK5PAL) can be restricted to the set of suitably extended subformulas (i.e., closure) of the conclusion of the cut rule.

Das Recht ist eine Erscheinung der Kultur. Die Rechtswissenschaft kennt in ihrem Bereich die Begriffe Recht und Gerechtigkeit und bedient sich keines Ausdruckes so häufig wie des Begriffs „Recht und Gerechtigkeit“. Die Legitimität der Staatsgewalt hängt mit Gerechtigkeit und Recht eng zusammen. In der Frage des Widerstandsrechts und seiner Erlaubtheit spiegeln sich Verständnisse von Politik, Recht, bürgerlicher Freiheit und Verantwortung. Sie tauchen auch oft in der Kunst und Literatur auf. In diesem Aufsatz werde ich zwei Beispiele erläutern: den Roman „Die Räuber vom Liang-Schan-Moor“ (14. Jahrhundert) und das Drama „Wilhelm Tell“ (1804).

Our project “Idea of Justice in Literature/ Die Idee der Gerechtigkeit in der Literatur” was firstly proposed by the chief editor, Shing-I LIU from Taiwan, and planed as an international dialogue joined by the co-editors, Aurelio de PRADA from Spain, Christoph LUETGE from Germany, and Hiroshi KABASHIMA from Japan. For this international collaboration, we organized five sessions in two days in English and German, on Monday, 27 July and Thursday, 30 July, 2015, in the form of a Special Workshop at the “XXVII World Congress of the International Society for the Philosophy of Law and Social Philosophy (IVR)” held at the Georgetown Law School in Washington D.C., the United States of America. In the sessions, we, the organizers, enjoyed so much our intellectual exchange with the excellent presenters and participants of all ages from all over the world who were engaged in the issue of “Justice in Literature”, as it is now to trace in this editorial work on hand.

The universe created humanity. Humans possess perception and feeling. They have subjective consciousness and have created language, words, numerical information tools, coordinate systems, and science. Humanity exists, feeling both the utmost happiness and the deepest suffering in the universe. As humanity becomes increasingly formidable, its existence form, through material philosophy thought, emerges as a primary threat to its survival. Only by living and existing can humanity study and understand what matter, existence, and humanity truly are. This paper discusses the origin of humanity. This discussion requires philosophical reflection on the origin of the universe, inspiring humanity’s understanding of itself, the universe, matter, and existence. The discussion is based on “The Yellow Emperor’s Inner Canon 黄帝内经.” In this way, we can further enlighten and think about solving the theoretical contradiction between quantum mechanics and relativity theory with the philosophical principle of the cosmic origin.

Space and time are linguistic, words, and numerical descriptions that humans use to represent the domains and processes of human and material existence. They form the fundamental questions of human philosophical thought. Some 2500 years ago, the philosophy of the cosmic origins contemplated space and the existence within it. Aristotle’s philosophy of matter pulled human philosophical inquiry down from the heavens to the earth, initiating the exploration of material philosophy and material science (Russell, 2017). This shift set aside the concept of space and the existence within space, treating time as a concrete existence (Liu, 2025a). Leaving behind the trap of Aristotelian material philosophy. Humanity then marched forward, probing into material science and material philosophy, until the advent of modern science—quantum mechanics and relativity—reached the pinnacle of material science. The resulting “theoretical contradictions” in these modern theories forced a renewed consideration of space and time. Humans have defined the terms “space” and “time,” but without clarifying what space and time truly are, we cannot resolve these theoretical contradictions in modern physics. This will hinder scientific progress and affect our understanding of existence and survival. Building upon six articles published in the UK discussing cosmic origins (Liu, 2024a) and five articles published in the US on the “theoretical contradictions” of quantum mechanics and relativity, as well as the author’s previously published books and all related articles (please see all the references), this paper continues the inquiry into these fundamental philosophical issues that humanity has created, Resolving the “theoretical contradiction” between quantum mechanics and relativity.

Quantum mechanics and relativity spurred the Third Industrial Revolution, presenting no contradictions in applied engineering but significant theoretical discord. The electronic computer, another major achievement of this era, transformed humanity through the rise of information networks, marking information science as another critical outcome of the revolution. Matter transforms into energy, energy into matter, and mechanics serve as profound conduits for information, even enabling the creation of robots. Modern physics now faces interpretative divides, having seemingly overlooked philosophy and information science’s foundational roles. Human intellect, while reaching new heights through material philosophy, finds itself tangled in confusion. Has science achieved the apex of thought, or does it face an intellectual dead end? This question hints at a revolutionary awakening in human thought. This paper delves deeply into these questions by analyzing and reflecting on the “Scientific Cosmological Ontology,” “Modern Physical Philosophy Framework,” “The Physical Principles of Natural Philosophy,” and “Reflections on the Philosophy of Science.”

The previous three articles have discussed scientific ontology, resolving the contradictions between quantum mechanics and relativity using the cosmic origin philosophical framework, and interpreting the principles of natural philosophy through physics. Aristotle established material philosophy and material science, relegating the philosophical concepts of cosmic ontology and the cosmic origin to metaphysics and theology. As a result, philosophy was divided into first philosophy and second philosophy as scientific considerations. When material science developed into the ontology of the universe, able to explain the cosmic origin principle, a major issue arose: after 2500 years of development, humanity has only grasped the meaning of “matter.” Yet, what are “energy” and “information”? We still haven’t figured that out. Modern physics has brought both benefits and contradictions to humanity. To resolve these contradictions, we need to redefine the scientific consideration of “philosophy” and its philosophical concepts. This article continues to explore the contradictions between quantum mechanics and relativity using the principles of cosmic origin, reflecting on the basic concepts of philosophy and human thought.

Humans and donkeys have had a closely interactive relationship throughout history, despite being two completely different species. How has Chinese society viewed the donkey in its long history? How have donkeys been used? And what kind of boundaries do people place on the donkey? This study has focused on the consumption of donkey in Chinese history from medical, cultural and legal aspects. All in all, considering food, medicine, and legal viewpoints, from the medieval period to the Qing Dynasty (1644–1911), the question whether or not one should consume donkey depended on its characteristics, taste, texture, and the side effects, as well as whether the manner of consumption is consistent with social moral standards and its derived legal boundary issues.

The question whether corporate social responsibility (CSR) initiatives can be transferred to firm performance to achieve sustainable development goals (SDGs) prompted this study to investigate how CSR strategies influence both SDGs and financial performance. A mediated moderating model based on the organizational alignment theory was developed to examine the mediating and moderating roles of organizational structure and corporate governance, respectively. By analyzing the three-year panel data of 1,480 firm-year observations from publicly listed companies in Taiwan, we find that organizational structure mediates the relationship between a firm’s CSR strategy and firm performance consisting of SDG disclosures, sales revenue, net profit, and return on equity. Corporate governance plays a moderating role in the relationship between organizational structure and firm performance. Our objective financial data provide evidence supporting “doing well by doing good.” The proposed organizational alignment model and empirical results enhance the theoretical understanding of the CSR research field. The research findings have several practical implications for business executives to improve a firm’s social and financial performance.

Since mankind hide the truth because they are unjust, God's wrath is shown from heaven against all of their immorality. Because God has revealed to them everything, they can know about him, it is obvious to them. Since the beginning of time, his intangible qualities, namely, his everlasting power and divine nature, have been evident in the things that have been created. Thus, they have no justification. Because even though they were aware of God, they did not revere or express gratitude to him; instead, their hearts became darkened and their thinking became pointless. Therefore, it is obviously incorrect to consider God's transcendence to be a sort of fog that obscures God from human perception. Indeed, verses in the Bible highlight God's mystery and incomprehensibility, such "Oh, the depth of the riches and wisdom and knowledge of God!" How inexplicable his methods and how unsearchable his judgements! Because no one has ever understood the Lord's thoughts or served as his counsellor. Or has someone given him a present for which he may receive payment? Because everything comes from him, through him, and to him. Glory eternally to him. Amen. His "immanence," not his "transcendence," is enigmatic in this line. Even if God's historical facts are unfathomable, Paul is nonetheless able to explain them in understandable terms. He informs the Roman church of what they are unaware of and the reason for it. "Known unknowns" are the unknowns. Furthermore, a mystery involving a God otherwise "clearly" understood is always a mystery. If God's transcendence does not impede our understanding of him or our ability to articulate him clearly, how should we describe it? "On high" or "in Heaven," as used in the Bible, consistently alludes to God's regal status.