Philosophy Social philosophy

The five-day 12th South-South Forum on Sustainability, hosted by the Chinese Institute of Hong Kong and co-organised by the Centre for Cultural Research and Development of Lingnan University, the Global University for Sustainability, the Centre for Film Studies and Cultural Studies of Peking University, and the Tsinghua Institute for Advanced Study in Humanities and Social Sciences of Tsinghua University, and coordinated locally by the Shangyou County People’s Government, is currently being held in Shangyou County, Ganzhou City, Jiangxi Province, China, the first time the Forum has taken place in Jiangxi.

Hong Kong has one of the fastest-ageing populations in the world. Since the beginning of this year, a volunteer team of staff and students from Lingnan University has been involved in community care “Embracing Ageing: The Project on Community Support for Seniors”, to show their concern for the elderly in Tuen Mun and Yuen Long. The project includes four visits to over a hundred senior citizens who live alone, workshops on using smartphones, presentations by cybersecurity experts to explain the latest anti-fraud measures, and guidance on home safety precautions. Everyone came to the project’s closing ceremony on the Lingnan campus today, 15 May, and enjoyed traditional Naamyam and Cantonese opera and activities for all ages, which encourage physical and mental well-being as well as communication and unity.

With the rapid development of Artificial Intelligence (AI) and increasing environmental challenges, global catastrophic risks have gone beyond traditional natural disasters to raise controversial ethical issues. In view of this, the Hong Kong Catastrophic Risk Centre (HKCRC) of Lingnan University has introduced a new, free, online bilingual self-learning course on Ethics and Global Catastrophic Risks, taught by international authorities in philosophy and ethics. Designed to help people understand and cope with the complex landscape of global disaster risks through eight modules, the new programme, launched in late February this year, incorporates in-depth, real-life examples in AI, the environment, and the sciences, and has already attracted more than 8,000 participants from Mainland China, Hong Kong SAR, South Asia, the US, and Europe. It is now open to the public at no charge.

Prof Ruby Lai Yuen-shan, Assistant Professor of the Department of Sociology and Social Policy at Lingnan University in Hong Kong, has partnered with two Hong Kong artists, Ms Miu Law and Mr Victor Sham Chung-tat, for an interdisciplinary collaboration. Together, they have curated the exhibition “Listening to the Stories of 118.4 Square Feet”, which highlights a selection of real-life stories from residents of subdivided units.

A special issue of Horizon Journal of Humanities & Social Sciences Research (JHSSR Vol.4 (S) Oct. 20212) is now published. This issue includes papers on the Covid-19 pandemic, developments in business and digital practices, changes in social media behavior in South Asia.