Search

This paper argues that philosophy in the sense of metaphysical speculation is universal and not at all language-specific. At the beginning of traditional Chinese philosophy, the ancient Chinese thinkers were concerned with social morality, raising questions which differed greatly from those of ancient Greeks and the language they used was typologically different from the western languages, but in the end the thinking and debating over their questions gave rise to speculations on language names which were unmistakably metaphysical in nature and oriented toward the establishment of conditions of truth in language. This shows that truth-seeking is a universal predisposition. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Background: Although diabetic retinopathy (DR) is considered to be a major cause of blindness, this is the first meta- analysis to investigate the pooled prevalence of DR in mainland China. Methodology/Principal Findings: We conducted a search of all English reports on population-based studies for the prevalence of DR using Medline, EMbase, Web of Science, Google (scholar), and all Chinese reports were identified manually and on-line using CBMDisc, Chongqing VIP database, and CNKI database. A meta-analysis was carried out. The fixed effects model or random effects model was used as a statistical test for homogeneity. Nineteen studies were included. The prevalence of DR, non-proliferative diabetic retinopathy (NPDR) and proliferative diabetic retinopathy (PDR) in the pooled general population was 1.3% (95%CI: 0.5%-3.2%), 1.1% (95%CI: 0.6%-2.1%), and 0.1% (95%CI: 0.1%-0.3%), respectively, but was 23% (95%CI: 17.8%-29.2%), 19.1% (95%CI: 13.6%-26.3%), and 2.8% (95%CI: 1.9%-4.2%) in the diabetic group. The prevalence rate of DR in the pooled rural population was higher than that in the urban population, 1.6% (95%CI: 1.3%-2%), and the diabetic population, 29.1% (95%CI: 20.9%-38.9%). The prevalence of DR was higher in the Northern region compared with the Southern region. Conclusions/Significance: The prevalence of DR in mainland China appeared a little high, and varied according to area. NPDR was more common. This study highlights the necessity for DR screening in the rural areas of China. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]