3/7 (Sat.) Almond's Talk: 貨幣賽局—東亞匯率政策制定之理論與實務介紹

主講: Almond Meng
時間: 3/7(Sat.), 2:00-4:30 pm
地點: RLM 7.116
講題: 貨幣賽局—東亞匯率政策制定之理論與實務介紹
內容預告:

東亞的匯率政策及其發展在近年來，一直是比較與國際政治經濟學中熱門且重要的研究議題。東亞國家因其對外出口為主的經濟發展模式，使得各國的匯率長期維持著穩定且具競爭性的政策特質。然而，這樣的政策導向，卻也為東亞國家帶來了內政與外交上的爭端。

研究東亞匯率政策有其理論與實務的重要性。匯率影響了各項物品以及有關進出口匯兌的價格，因而也就影響了資源的配置和所得的分配。如此一來，政府、利益團體和民眾都會試圖影響匯率政策的決定，以滿足他們的各別政治目的或極大化他們的經濟偏好。在國際政治上，一般來說，貨幣貶值有利出口，但會削弱國內購買力；相反的，貨幣升值有助提升消費力，卻會遲滯出口競爭力。許多東亞國家刻意地貶低匯率以刺激出口。然而，這樣的貨幣操控，不只引發了部分國內（尤其是以內銷及進口為主的產業）的反彈，也帶來了貿易伙伴間的外交紛爭。例如，1980年代的美日貿易逆差，以及近十年來，逐漸擴大的中美貿易逆差，就使得雙邊外交經貿關係不斷地緊張。

雖然現今研究都認同匯率政策的選擇是不同政治、社經與制度利益的折衝結果，然而，在理論與經驗研究的文獻上，對發展中國家如何選擇適合他們的匯率政策研究，還是相當的貧瘠。對於在文獻中，常被提及代表發展中國家的東亞，由於多為新興或民主程度較低的政體，擁有較強的國家主導權、臣屬性的市民社會，和較不健全的政黨與政治體系；僅運用主要由西方經驗所建構起來的理論模型，對於在分析東亞的匯率政策發展時，常產生解釋謬誤或不足的問題。
本次講演將介紹當前在比較與國際政治經濟學的研究中，對於匯率政策的相關討論，並側重東亞發展歷程給予理論修正。此外，由於一般的統計驗證缺乏對不同時空因素所形成的差異性進行考量，而使得對經驗資料與事實發展的分析，出現過於絕對，甚或有誤解的情況。因而本次講演，將提供一個貝式階層模型（Bayesian Hierarchical Model）對「貫時跨區」（time-series cross-sectional）資料的初步分析，期能對此種於不同時空下，所造成的匯率政策動態調整，來提供明確的解釋。

Sheng-Cheng, 10/18/2008

講題：淺談 Karl Popper 與 Jacques Derrida
主講: 聖程; 主持：一帆
時間：10月18日(星期六)，2-4:30pm
地點：RLM 5.116

內容：

• 為何理工學院的學生特別愛吐槽? 為何情書中沒寫出來的比有寫出來的重要?
• 實驗科學的精神可以檢驗這世上的每件事嗎? 解構主義會讓你更明白還是更混亂?
• 粗淺的介紹一下近代著名的兩個哲學家, Popper 和 Derrida, 以及他們的哲學論點 (Popper's Falsificationism and Derrida's deconstruction) 在實驗科學與比較文學所造成的影響.

Popper

View SlideShare presentation or Upload your own. (tags: tt-forum popper)

台灣聊天室：食品安全。

Pei-Lin 10/4/2008

Time: 10月4日(星期六)，2-4:30pm
Location: RLM 5.118
Speaker: 珮琳
Host: 紀尊
Topic: 用外地人的眼光看美國的種族/族群議題: 一個從社會學角度出發的探討

內容：
- 什麼是種族/族群?
- 種族/族群的區分從何而來?
- 一個人的種族/族群身分對他的整體生活影響有多大?
如果您對以上問題有所興趣或感到好奇、有自己的想法，歡迎參加TT Forum在下禮拜六舉行的Open House! TT Forum隔週便在校園(附近)聚會一次，由成員輪流上台發表自己的研究或是其他學術方面的專長，題目不限領域，從社會學到教育、從傳播到數學、從神經科學到哲學... 內容相當多元且豐富。TT Forum希望能成為一個跨學術領域交流的平台，也歡迎有興趣的您加入!!!

Hsiang-Yun 9/20/2008

Time: Saturday 9/29 [BBQ 11:30; talk begins at 2]
Location: H&H's
Speaker: Hsiangyun
Host: Hanbing
Topic: Thought Experiment and Philosophical Analysis

I will begin by sketching a picture of what philosophy is----what philosophers do, by briefly going through the following different ways to categorize philosophy (or philosophers).

* from the temporal, regional perspective
* from the topical perspective

I will then take a few examples (from different areas of philosophy) to illustrate how philosophers do what they do---philosophical analysis-- via methods and tools such as thought experiment and logic.

* Descarte's cogito
* Brains in a vat
* Twin-Earth
* The Chinese room
* The king of France is bald? The queen of Taiwan has secret accounts?
* Goedel and the incompleteness theorem
* Trolley problem

The sketch being a sketch is by no means conclusive, but I hope the audience will, after thinking along through these examples, get to enjoy what philosophers enjoy doing.

Kaiman 4/19/2008

Time: Saturday 4/19, 2 PM
Location: CMA3.116
Speaker: Kai-man Chang
Host: Fangas
Topic: 從不散談起：蔡明亮電影裏的停看聽

Presentation summary:很多看過不散的人對於片中似有似無的劇情和屈指可數的對白，多多少少會覺得蔡明亮好像在考驗觀眾們的耐性。片中的兩個主角：一個是瘸腳的售票員（陳湘琪），另一個是在戲院裏尋覓 "同好" 的日本人，兩個人走遍了整個福和大戲院，卻可以完全沒有任何交集。其實打從第一部電影開始，蔡導就愛在電影裏玩 "情慾" 捉迷藏。還記得青少年哪吒中，小康是如何如影隨形地跟蹤阿澤，和愛情萬歲裏的兩男一女又是怎麼在無人公寓裏玩你躲我藏的愛情遊戲。同樣地，不散中的每個角色似乎都在真實和假象中游移，在現在和過去裏徘徊，更在光影明暗之間翻騰隱藏。種種說不出口的情慾和渴望都透過看似簡單而卻複雜的影像和聲音給呈現出來了。我希望藉由觀看不散來對蔡明亮電影中的情慾生態做個停看聽。在短短八十分鐘的影片裏，蔡導利用胡金銓的龍門客棧來借屍還魂，製造出許多餘音繞樑和若隱若現的電影世界。我將藉由停格的Powerpoint 影像來重新拼貼蔡導的電影，看看他是如何（or為何）不靠對白和劇情來說故事。


台灣聊天室：三鶯和溪洲部落相關討論；下學期schedule。

Teh-Sheng 3/22/2008

Time: 3/22/08 Saturday 1:30pm
Location: across from 2809 San Jacinto Blvd
Speaker: Teh-Sheng
Host: Chi-Tsun
Topic:Short talk on neurodegenerative disease and unveiling the Animal Research Center

Abstract:
This will be a short talk introducing neurodegenerative diseases, including Parkinson's Disease and ALS disease(漸凍症).
I will give you an update about my research results working with the rats and mice model for these diseases. And how through the measurement of their vocalization, we can learn more from a different viewpoint on these diseases. Before the talk, I will give you a short tour of the animal lab that I work in and also the rats and mice that contribute greatly to these types of research.

Chia-Liang 3/1/2008

Time: Saturday 3/1, 2 PM
Location: RLM 9.166 (Robert Lee Moore Hall)
Speaker: Sun, Chia-Liang
Host: Wang, Wei Ching
Topic: How many things are there? （那堆東西有多少？）
Presentation summary:

摘要：「台灣目前居民有xxxxxxxx人，較中華人民共和國居民xxxxxxxxxx人為少」，「上個月立委選舉國民黨政黨票得票數為xxxxxxx，較民進黨得票數xxxxxxx為多」，「新科立委共113人，其中國民黨占xx席，較民進黨的xx席為多」，「我有三個叔叔，三個阿姨」...
以上都是「計數」與「比較多少」的概念。數學家如何將這些概念推廣來回答以下的問題：
所有整數與所有正整數，何者較多？
所有分數與所有整數，何者較多？
一條兩公分的線段上所有的點，與一條200公分線段上所有的點，何者較多？
總之，數不完的兩堆東西可以比較多少嗎？我將以深入淺出的方式，配合實例與故事，一步一步告訴大家這個問題是如何被解決的；並探討「錯覺」產生的可能原因，藉此此說明「定義」在所有學術研究中的重要性；以及現代數學研究的方式。
在背景知識上，除了何謂「正整數」、「整數」、「有理數」（即「分數」）之外，不預設任何數學背景，歡迎大家踴躍參加。

領域：集合論(set theory)

Kevin 2/16/2008

Time: Sat. 2/16, 2pm
Location: UTC 3.102 (Changes will be posted on the door)
Speaker: Kevin Lee (AMD)
Topic: U.S. Economy and Housing Market

Presentation summary: The U.S. economy is losing its momentum because of the financial crisis associated with deteriorations in the housing market and sub-prime mortgage loans. From 2000 to 2006, the U.S housing market delivered huge returns on the investment. In some regions like California and Florida, home prices had doubled or even tripled in this time period. In this presentation, I will talk about the major factors that caused home values to skyrocket. In addition, I plan to show some mathematical formulas to explain why the mortgage banks make more profits by originating sub-prime mortgage loans. These risky loans were ultimately sold to individual investors by the Wall Street investment banks. Because many sub-prime mortgage loans are in default now, investors are no longer interested in buying mortgage notes. As a result, many financial companies are experiencing monetary liquidity problems; lenders are not able to convert their mortgage notes into cash for making new loans. When money supply is tight, banks will make fewer loans to business and consumers. This is a negative factor that is causing the U.S. economy slow down.

Almond 1/26/2008

After the long winter break, the first talk of this semester is right on this coming Saturday. Almond is going to talk about one of the hottest issues in Taiwan right now: the 2008 Taiwan Congress Election. Please come and join the discussion!

Time: Sat. 1/26, 2pm
Location: UTC 3.102
Speaker: Almond
Host: 李珮琳

Please see below for the abstract of Almond's talk.

都是制度惹的禍？談2008立法委員選舉

此次立委選舉結果顯現政黨得票率與當選席次有相當差距。一般評論皆認為是首次採行的單一選區兩票制所造成的結果，而這樣的結果，還招致了不利第三勢力、地方派系勢力茁壯和肉桶政治的批評。然而這樣的結果真是出乎意料嗎？「立委人數減半、單一選區兩票制」是2004年立法院經四分之三決議、而於2005年通過的主要修憲議題。亦即是，這樣的修憲主張在當時是主流的憲政改革議題。而今我們在歷經了選制改革後的首次選舉，各種選制改革的聲音又再次湧現。究竟什麼樣的選制比較符合人民的期待？政治學家如何看待不同選制的影響？我將初淺的以歷史制度論的角度來分析此次立委選舉的制度成因與影響，且一併討論選舉結果對台灣未來政治發展的可能走向。

維菁 12/1/07

Time: 12/1 Sat 2PM
Location: 湘韻家 (UT Brackenridge Apt)
Speaker: 王維菁 (Ph.D. Candidate, Department of Radio, TV, Film)
Host: 蕭靜慧

第一階段講題與綱要如下:
Origins of Economic Inequality in the Age of Information Society: Wage Structure, Unemployment, and Occupation Transformation in Taiwan after 1980

本週討論將從批判政治經濟學的認識論—社會變遷與歷史、社會整體性、道德哲學、以及實踐—出發，探討台灣自1980年代進入知識、技術密集的資訊經濟生產時期後，經濟不平等所生的變化，並探究此一演變發生的可能核心因素。在討論中我們也將簡短回顧台灣經濟發展史，以理解政策、經濟生產模式等如何影響財富分配。至於本文中所欲探討的經濟不平等將聚焦於勞動市場結構，包括薪資不平等、失業、以及職業結構變遷等。

Introduction
The purpose of this research is to explore the changes in economic inequality, if any, that occur when a newly industrialized country (NIC) such as Taiwan ushers in an information economy, defined as information intensive and information technology (IT) production-centric; and further, to track the possible origins of this changing inequality. In terms of economy inequality, this dissertation will concentrate on labor market conditions, including wage inequality, unemployment, and occupation structure alteration, to see how the state and its policies, informationalization, industrial transformation, global competition, changed labor market institutions, and other possible economic factors might go hand in hand to shape the changes in wealth distribution and economic inequality in the age of information society. Since the 1980s, Taiwan industries have undergone a dramatic conversion from traditional labor intensive manufacturing to IT, information and skill intensive industries, as well as service industries. Both government and domestic enterprises were eager to promote this industrial upgrade by adopting informationalization and by expanding skill and information intensive industries such as IT, telecommunications, and knowledge-based industries. Consequently, from 1990 on, Taiwan has become a key producer of IT products and ranks highly worldwide in information and communication technology (ICT) penetration. In 2006, Taiwan’s service industry accounted for 73.44% of the total GDP, manufacturing accounted for 24.99%, and agriculture accounted for only 1.57%; among these sectors, knowledge concentrated manufacturing and service industries were estimated to jointly produce at least 45% of the total GDP. At a time when there are few relevant empirical studies of NICs in transition, Taiwan, whose industrial and economic transformation has been complete and well-documented, provides an excellent case study of changes in economic inequality in the transition from a NIC to an “information economy.”
(Data is calculated based on the Output-Input Data provided by the Council for Economic Planning and Development.)

第二部分的台灣聊天室 討論題目為目前台灣經濟發展狀況
Tentative focuses are
1. 目前台灣經濟發展狀況在國際環境下的優勢與劣勢
2. 未來台灣經濟發展的方向與可能性
3. 經濟成長與公平如何平衡，經濟成長對台灣大多數人是否真有獲益？ 進而思考
我們要的是一個什麼樣的社會？

維邦 11/3/2007

Time: 11/3 Sat 2PM
Location: UTC 3.102
Speaker: 王維邦
Host: 陳湘韻

Talk:The Social Causes of Depression: The Example of Aging Vector Model by Wei-Pang Wang (sociology)
Taiwan Chatting Room: "Going to the doctor and paying for the insurance---comparing TW and the US."

第一階段由邦邦哥 主講　講題與綱要如下
The Social Causes of Depression: The Example of Aging Vector Model

健康與病痛社會學 (Sociology of Health and Illness)是西方社會學界與人口學界近年最蓬勃發展的領域之一。該領域認為生老病死不僅是個人的各別生命經驗，更呈現社會因素所塑造的健康與病痛之不平等階層。雖然此觀點已在西方社會獲得廣泛的實證支持，相關議題卻甚少討論於台灣社會學界。
本講題因此試圖介紹教育程度—身為影響台灣社會階層的核心因素—是否亦影響台灣社會心理健康如憂鬱症狀（Depression）的不平等。演講內容將藉由台灣地區中老年身心社會生活狀況長期追蹤調查所提供長達十四年的長期貫時性資料及運用潛在成長曲線模型與老化向量圖(Latent Growth Curve Model with Aging Vectors Graphs)為帥氣又美麗的壇友們提供實證例子。

第二部分的台灣聊天室 討論題目為　「台美看病/保險 經驗/制度 比較」
相信大家對美國的醫療花費昂貴都有相當的感受　在台灣看病相較之下方便又便宜許多
但或許大家也聽說過'健保破產'的說法　甚至親身體驗到從前只要看一次的病　現在醫生要求你去診所兩次
這次的聊天室希望大家能分享自己在台灣跟美國（或是其他地方）的就醫與保險經驗　以及提供對兩地不同制度的認識

龍男 10/20/07 Open House

Time: 10/20/2007 (Saturday), 2:00pm
Place: CMA 3.116
Speaker: 陳龍男（MFA Candidate, RTF- FILM PRODUCTION）
Host: 張凱滿 (Kai-man Chang)

紀錄片欣賞及討論

片名: UTaiwan
紀錄片 / DV / 彩色 / 20分鐘 / 台灣,美國 / 2007 / 世界首映

----導演簡介----

凡亞思‧以撒克（陳龍男），阿美族，執導並製作過多部得獎紀錄片及短片，其中描述年輕搖滾樂團的第六部作品「海洋熱」更分別得到台灣、美國、瑞士、南韓及香港等地影展的高度肯定；和台灣公共電視也曾有多項合作計畫。2005年獲教育部公費，目前正於美國德州大學奧斯汀分校(University of Texas at Austin)就讀電影製作學系碩士。


----影片介紹---- (王佩瑜)

你都用什麼樣的話語在異地他鄉對別人形容故鄉"台灣"呢?

馬德生，曾懷萱，和陳銘駒，三個來自台灣的UT留學生，用行動表達出他們對台灣的情感和認同。這部紀錄片不僅刻畫著他們對家鄉的愛，也描繪出我們每一個人對於家鄉的執著。

台灣聊天室

配合龍男的影片,這禮拜的台灣聊天室就以 "影像台灣" 為主題,台灣是我們的故鄉我們的家, 但在別人眼中又是什麼呢? 美國人看到的台灣是什麼樣子? 沒看到的又是什麼? 台灣是不被聯合國承認的國家, 是全球最大的晶圓代工國, 也是王建民的國家, 還有呢? 下面是我在Youtube上看到有關台灣的影像, 歡迎大家能提供各種不同的台灣影像, 来幫助我們看見其中的異同．

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gvA-nKGbgzU

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gaSqgVIDdHo

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=h_FG_pKH5Q8

http://tw.myblog.yahoo.com/tinyzhan/article?mid=2635&prev=3015&l=f&fid=58

靜慧 3/17/2007

Time: 3/17/2007
Place: Ching-hui's apartment at Brackenridge
Speaker: Ching-hui Hsiao (蕭靜慧), Foreign Language Education
Host: Kaiman Chang


Do family Influences really matter?
--Researching the role of family influences on English education in Taiwan--

The purpose of this study is to investigate family influences on EFL education in Taiwan. Bourdieu (1977) uses the term, social reproduction, to analyze how the various forms of capital tend to transfer from one generation to the next. The children of privilege fit into the world of educational expectations with apparent “ease”, a process he calls “under-selection”. The unprivileged found the process to be “difficult”, presenting “challenges”, a process he calls “over-selection”. Yet both are dictated by their upbringing. Bourdieu regards this “ease” or “natural“ ability as the product of a great social labor, largely on the part of the parents, equipping their children with the dispositions of manner and ensuring they are able to succeed within the educational system and can then reproduce their parent’ class in the wider social system.

In his study conducted in a city in central Taiwan, Broaded (1997) nevertheless finds the standardized test scores of the entrance examination are not significantly correlated with students’ family backgrounds among a sample of 1,098 junior high graduates and concludes that institutional tracking in junior high schools in Taiwan reduces the influence of family background characteristics on the distribution to stratified senior secondary opportunities. Other than institutional factors, cultural (Confucianism) factors also help explain these differences--educational achievement values are more diffused into the lower levels of Taiwan’s class structure than the case in the U.S. because of the cultural legacy of Confucianism.

志成 2/24/2007

Time: 2/24/2007, 2-5pm
Place: UTC 3.102
Speaker: Almond Meng (蒙志成), Department of Government
Host: Cheng-Fu Chen

Help Hindering? The Political Economy of Migrant Remittances Flows to Developing Democracies

This paper proposes to investigate the relative agenda-the impacts of migrant remittances on recipient countries’ politics and economic development. In practice, the study of the impact of remittances has never been more important than it is today. Migrant remittances are the crucial issues that accompany the mobility of migrant labors to many labor-outflow countries. According to the United Nations’ (2002) statistics, migrant remittances in developing countries have played the second-largest source of capital inflows, just behind the FDI. Moreover, a lack of research on migrant remittances has created the theoretical gap. Although migrant remittance is recognized by international financial institutions (IFIs), such as World Bank and IMF, and many development scholars, most of their revealed optimistic perspectives to development are unfounded. The key problem with current research on remittances is that researchers rarely pay attention to the impact that remittances have on politics. Within contemporary theoretical perspective, little study conveys how the substantial remittances affect recipient countries’ democratic ruling and constituents’ political attitudes as well. There is no study working on investigating how the regional or international political economy influence recipient countries’ governance and citizen’s ideas toward democracy through the inflows of remittances.

The objective of the paper is four-fold: to examine whether more inflows of remittances reduce citizens’ willingness of voicing dissent through political channels; to investigate whether more inflows of remittances result in defection of recipient governments’ accountability; to explore whether more inflows of remittances assimilate the citizens’ ideas towards democracy to the emigrant destination countries; and to analyze whether and how more inflows of remittances along with relative actors’ expectation retard the other external capital inflows thereby influencing recipient countries’ macroeconomic and socioeconomic development.

The time-series cross-sectional (TSCS) analysis of global data, vector autoregression (VAR) and spatial econometrics estimation will be conducted to test a series of hypotheses related to the paper’s objectives across 153 developing countries over 1980 to 2003. The results will provide insight into the real-world effects correlated to the dramatic increases of remittances within developing countries during the era of globalization.

Chat room topic: 留與歸 It's either this way or that way...

維瑄 02/10/07

Time: Saturday (02/10) 2PM
Location: Park
Speaker: Wei-Hsuan Serena Wang
Topic: Exploring the Fascination of Cross-Cultural Psychology
Taiwan Chatting Room: Me and You and Our Cross-Cultural Experiences
Host: Hsiangyun

Wei-Hsuan (Serena) Wang, a doctoral student in the Area of Human Development and Education, Department of Educational Psychology. I am highly interested in cultural and cross-cultural studies in Psychology. I also love watching Food Channel, especially Emril's show!

Exploring the Fascination of Cross-Cultural Psychology

Introduction:

"Like the fish that is unaware of water until it has left the water, people often take their own community's ways of going things for granted." – Barbara Rogoff

Do you still remember the cultural shock you had experienced when you first stepped onto the land of the U.S.? Have you ever pondered that how your cross-cultural experiences of studying abroad has influenced your way of thinking, perceiving, and behaving? Have you ever thought that each individual is actually the product of culturally-shaping process? We are just like the fish which has left the original water (Taiwan) and have immersed into another different water region (U.S.)., and culture is like the water or lens which affect the ways we view and evaluate the world.

In this talk, I will try to bring you to explore the fascination of cross-cultural psychology. I'll talk about some basic ideas of cross-cultural psychology, the relation between cultural background and the formation of self-concept, and the application of cross-cultural psychology to the real life.

Taiwan Chatting Room

I suggest the two following topics concerning the cross-cultural issues:

a) Taiwanese students' cross-cultural adaptation – Sharing your own experiences and your observation of other Taiwanese students.

b) Multicultural education in Taiwan – Please refer to the attachment which is a piece of interesting news from China Times in this January, regarding foreign spouses and their children's educational issues in Taiwan. I got this news when I was back to Taiwan in January and thought it can be a facilitating material for our chatting room.

德生 01/27/07

Details of the talk:
Time: 1/27/2007, 2:00PM
Place: UTC 3.110
Speaker: Teh-Sheng Ma (馬德生)
Host: Sheng-Cheng Huang (黃聖程)

Title:
Listening to what you cannot hear: from Parkinson's Disease to Rat Ultrasound Vocalization

Abstract:
Parkinson's Disease is a neurodegenerative disease that targets a certain type of neurons in the human brain. The death of these neurons result in the lost of muscle coordination in the human body. Tremors during hand movements are the most obvious symptoms in Parkinson's patients. Other symptoms like speech loss also brings detriments to the social life of patients.

Unlike other disease that can be treated with medicine, Parkinson's Disease is a progressive disease that torments patients for their remaining days. Dreaded by this irreversible result, researchers have been trying to find ways to relieve the symptoms or early detect this deadly disease.

My talk will be focused on the rat vocalization model that I have developed to help tackle this issue. In this talk, you will learn about the most recent clinical therapy for speech loss in Parkinson's patients and also how the rat model parallels the speech loss in human patients. You will also learn why patients are not aware of their speech loss and how this vocalization model might become an early detector for future Parkinson's Disease translational studies.

力榕 12/2/06

Time: Saturday (12/2) 2PM
Location: UTC 3.102.
Speaker: Li-Jung Chen (MBA, School of Business)
Topic: How to read a financial report...


Li-Jung, a MBA student in business school, will share with us from her professional training of how to fully grasp useful information hidden within financial reports of large corporations.

Following this session, house business will take place and schedules for next semester's speakers and hosts will be discussed.





posted by Teh-Sheng Ma

聖程 10/28/06

Time: Saturday (10/28) 2PM
Location: UTC 3.102.
Speaker: Sheng-Cheng Huang (School of Information).
Topic: A Semiotic View of Information: Semiotics as a Foundation of LIS Research
in Information Behavior.

Traditional information behavior studies in library and information science (LIS) research have focused on primarily two trends: one is to provide physical access to material objects and the other is to direct users to certain thoughts and ideas. Both focuses are two sides of the same problem that LIS researchers have worked to address: how to provide a better system or service to accommodate people's need for information. Among the domains of users, material objects, and meaningful ideas, applying the concept of information as sign with semiotics not only joins these two trends in the analysis of the pragmatic-syntactic relationship and the pragmatic-semantic relationship, but it also gives an additional focus on the syntactic-semantic relationship. It is this additional focus that helps LIS professionals/researchers understand an individual's states of knowing and ways of obtaining knowledge through physical and mental interactions with informative objects. The author conducts a review of information studies, the epistemological concerns and pragmatic traditions in LIS, and semiotics in an attempt to seek a holistic principle that will incorporate both the traditional trends of LIS research and provide an additional awareness in assisting users to make connections between material objects and ideas in information behavior studies. By applying a semiotic view of information and the concept of information as sign, LIS researchers of information behavior will find semiotics a useful epistemological framework.


台灣聊天室；
1) “王建民現象“.
我們可延伸討論運動產業的國際化與在地化，台灣職棒的生存～Lanew熊封王的職業觀效應，媒體與巨蛋迷思，甚至分享看過的大聯盟與小聯盟經驗。
2) 討論下學期 Schedule.

凱滿 10/21/06

Time: Saturday 10/21 2-4PM
Location: UTC 3.102
Speaker: 張凱滿 (Kai-man Chang), the expert of director Tsai
Synopsis:
看蔡明亮的電影，我常會覺得自己好像被迫去注視一具具無言的軀體，平凡卻又詭異的空間，和永無止境的孤寂。看完後我又不自覺不停地去思索電影中想要呈現的是什麼。看似簡單的故事，為何會讓許多人看不懂，又為何會讓我頭殼壞掉地去拿他的電影來寫論文。歡迎TT-Forum的朋友們一起來探討和分享看蔡明亮電影的經驗。我的報告會簡單介紹一些西方學者對身體性別和空間的論述，並播放電影“河流” 和“不散” 中的一些片段來分析身體和空間之間情慾交流與對話的可能性。

關於蔡明亮導演： imdb; wikipedia

天明 10/07/06

Location: RLM 13.202

Title: Myth & Misunderstanding in Daily Physics生活中的物理誤解與迷思

微波爐可以加熱水嗎？微波加熱的水有害健康？什麼是MRI?天空為何是藍色的？

For slides, click here