On the dark side of the 'secular': is the religious-secular distinction a binary?

Recent scholarship claims to have revealed the problematic nature of the religious-secular distinction: (1) the distinction is slippery or fluid; (2) the meanings of the words "religious" and "secular" have changed over multiple historical contexts; (3) the distinction is a binary; (4) it is essentialist in nature. Analyzing these objections, the article shows that it is very difficult to find a clear problem statement. To whom is the religious-secular distinction a problem and why? The distinction was originally made within Christian theology, where it concerned a triad rather than a binary: true religion, false religions, and the secular. The notion of the secular always required the presence of the opposition between truth and falsity in religion, because it was the sphere that remained after true and false religion had been demarcated. In this sense, the secular had a " dark side," namely, idolatry or false religion. To a Christian believer, there is no conceptual problem involved in making the religious-secular distinction, because his or her theology helps him specify what true and false religion are and, as a consequence, what the secular is. However, because of its neutrality in religious matters, the liberal state has tried to reduce the theological triad to a binary opposition between religion and the secular. The inevitable failure of this attempt has created a formless secular sphere that is haunted by its dark side: the notion of false religion

Doing development research in Asia: problems and perspectives

Because the notion of 'relevance' is deeply context bound, I argue that we need to broaden our understanding of development to include 'conditions for development'. In this paper, I reflect on the well-known adage about 'give a fish' and 'teach to fish' by adding the following: 'create the conditions for fishing, we will fish forever'. At the beginning of the 21st century, wich is also an era of rapid globalization, I reflect on (a) what it means to speak of development work (b) in a continent like Asia, wich has emerging industrial giants like China and India, both of whom know extremely lopsided development. Within this framework, I think about what it means to speak of developmentally relevant research. Without losing sight of the hard-won understanding of developmental work acquired over the decade, I plead that we look at development as a multi-layered process. If we do so, we can appriciate the fact that different kinds of research are relevant at different levels: what is relevant at one level does not need to be relevant at another. Thus, criteria for developmentally relevant research will have to keep these different levels seperate from each other. To answer the four questions posed by the taks force, I suggest that we split the global problem about 'developmentally relevant research' into three tractable subproblems, each of which giving a different answer at an appropriate level

Translation, Interpretation and Culture: On the Disingenuity of a Comparative Theology

In this three-part article, I look at Francis Clooney’s work on comparative theology, identify one of the crucial problems of translation that comparative studies confront and outline the nature of a task for the twenty-first century cross-cultural theology. In the first part, I show that there is no unique ‘translation problem’ but that it actually names a plethora of problems. Such problems include not only the translation of texts across languages but also the philosophical problems of incommensurability of theories and inter-theoretic reductions. In the second part, I undertake a fairly close examination of aspects of Clooney’s enterprise. Here, I show that, quite contrary to what he promises, his project simply rehashes old dogmas of earlier Christian writers albeit in a hidden and implicit manner. In the third part, I suggest that we need to rethink some of the ingrained but hardly orthodox assumptions, if we intend to understand the cultures and practices which are other than those in the West. I suggest that a new theological practice is more adequate to our times than what we have inherited from the past

Application of Linear Stochastic Models in the Investigation of the Effects of Parkinson’s Disease on the Cop Time Series

The primary objective of this study was to use linear stochastic modeling approach to investigate parameters which may be sensitive enough to detect and quantify the changes in postural instability (PI) related to the progression in Parkinson’s disease (PD). Data collected in a previous study were analyzed in the current study. Participants with mild PD (n=13), moderate PD (n=10) and age range match healthy controls (HC, n=21) were instructed to stand in a comfortable self-selected natural stance on a force platform in both eyes open (EO) and eyes closed (EC) conditions. The foot-floor reaction forces were used to calculate the center of pressure (COP) time series. This COP time series was fitted by two different linear stochastic models: 1) an autoregressive (AR), and 2) an autoregressive moving average (ARMA) model. The postural control system was modeled as an inverted pendulum to describe pure body mechanics and a proportional, derivative and integral (PID) strategy was assumed for balance regulation. Swiftness, damping and stiffness parameters were extracted from the AR model. Natural frequency and damping ratio were extracted from the ARMA model. The statistical analysis (ANOVA) of these parameters revealed significant differences in stiffness and swiftness parameters between the HC and moderate PD population in the EO condition. These three parameters showed trends with progression of PD. The swiftness parameter showed decreasing mean values as PD severity increased, indicating that PD caused slower reactions to small deviations from equilibrium when compared to healthy controls. The mild and moderate PD, compared to HC, demonstrated by higher mean values of stiffness, suggesting a more rigid control strategy. The analysis of damping parameter revealed that the PD, compared to HC, may have a reduced ability to attenuate sway velocity during quiet stance as indicated by lower mean values of damping parameter and damping ratio. The natural frequency did not show significant trends in EO condition, but revealed an increasing trend with progression of PD. This could indicate that the PD could have larger number of deviations of COP from equilibrium. The analysis of effect of condition (EO, EC) revealed significant differences in all the five parameters. The stiffness, damping parameter and damping ratio had higher mean values for EO, compared to the EC condition, indicating the vital role that the visual feedback plays in detecting small perturbations from equilibrium leading to a better posture regulation in EO condition. The swiftness parameter and natural frequency indicated higher mean values in EC, compared to the EO condition, suggesting that the various sensory cues might be weighted differently in EO and EC conditions. Future studies should investigate the sensitivity of these calculated parameters to changes in PI in PD using a larger sample size and longer duration of trials. Also the variations in these parameters in response to dynamic tasks such as gait initiation and balance recovery should be considered in future studies