论《红字》中宗教与人性的冲突

美国作家霍桑的作品<红字>中关于自然法则与社会法则的对立描写最为突出.在作品中,霍桑十分深沉地表现了加尔文教的统治对人们的摧残和留在人们心灵上的烙印,描写了宗教压抑下的变态心理,思想矛盾和生活悲剧.同时也表现出作者自己的思想里也充满了矛盾,充满了消极处世的、具有神秘色彩的宗教意识.他经常陷入苦思冥想,执着于加尔文教义上的"恶"的概念,并往往从这一观念出发来看待社会现象,把一种具有神秘含义的恶当作造成一些社会问题的根本原因.这可能是由于作者一方面身受他生活的那个时代极其普遍存在的宗教的熏陶和影响,另一方面作者本人对自由和个性解放有着强烈的要求.然而,自始至终,霍桑站在自然法则的一边,热情地赞美野蔷薇及人们对人生幸福的追求和对自由的向往.本文拟从社会学及心理学入手,对作者创作的心理历程及其在作品中的反映略加探讨.     

马克思恩格斯列宁关于宗教与社会主义的关系

马克思、恩格斯和列宁关于社会主义与宗教关系的论述,主要集中在:宗教与国家的关系、宗教与政党的关系、政教分离、宗教信仰自由以及无神论等方面。他们都主张政教分离和宗教信仰自由,坚持无神论,强调对无神论的宣传。     

新石器时代的农事崇拜、祭祀和宗教萌芽

原始先民虽然荜路褴褛 ,艰苦奋斗 ,发明了农具 ,开辟了耕地 ,驯化了谷物和禽畜 ,创造了原始农耕文化 ,在征服自然、改造自然斗争中取得了划时代的伟大成就 ,被欧美的考古学家称之为“新石器革命”或“农业革命”。但是 ,由于当时的生产力还是低下 ,人们的思维能力和认识水平有限 ,对客观世界还不可能有科学的认识 ,对制约农业生产的一些自然因素和灾害现象无法作出正确的解释 ,往往把它们看作是自然的恩赐和惩罚 ,以为自然界有一种神奇的力量 ,是有灵性的东西 ,因此加以崇拜 ,进行祭祀 ,祈求其保佑和恩赐 ,以求得精神上的安慰 ,增强自信心 ,…     

基督教成为世界性宗教的原因

基督教作为世界第一大宗教,它不仅是西方文明的基石,而且对整个人类文明的发展产生了深远影响。它之所以能够迅速地突破民族、国家和地区的限制而成为世界性宗教,与其罗马帝国的"世界性"范围、基督教教义的普世性、简便易行的宗教仪式,罗马帝国统治者的大力扶持和利用有关。     

Science and product

Much of what needs to be changed in U.S. industry involves close ties to manufacturing, design for manufacturability, a rapid design cycle, and up-to-date technical knowledge on the part of the engineers themselves. Being up-to-date requires conscious company effort. Traveling to meetings, reading the technical literature, and being a part of the engineering community are necessities if we are to compete with others who make these efforts and are thus better able to incorporate technical change rapidly into their own products. Outside the product improvement cycle, a research (as opposed to development) organization in industry must have close ties to development and manufacturing in order to succeed. With these close ties, researchers can understand the progress of the cycle and can introduce new steps at the appropriate time and in an acceptable form. A research organization that surmounts the internal barriers and becomes an accepted contributor to the development and manufacturing process can, because of its greater technical depth, its scientific knowledge, and its close ties with the university world, become a forceful initiator of progress. It is more difficult, in our opinion, to make these contributions from a university base and from government laboratories as they are now constituted. Much has been said by industry and government leaders about reforming the educational system and strengthening the national science base-things that help build a strong foundation. A strong science base supplies a vast storehouse of new ideas, and a good educational system provides engineers and manufacturing workers with knowledge; but strength here cannot make up for inadequacies in the functioning of the development and manufacturing cycle. The United States must learn to succeed, not only in the ladder type of innovation in which a wholly new idea from science creates a wholly new product (the science-dominated process at which we have succeeded in the past), but also in the rapid, cyclical, engineer-dominated process of incremental product improvement. Neither process is a substitute for the other; we need both.