Bridging the gap between the world of science and the realm of the spiritual, B. Alan Wallace introduces a natural theory of human consciousness that has its roots in contemporary physics and Buddhism. Wallace's "special theory of ontological relativity" suggests that mental phenomena are _conditioned_ by the brain, but do not _emerge_ from it. Rather, the entire natural world of mind and matter, subjects and objects, arises from a unitary dimension of reality that is more fundamental than these dualities, as (...) proposed by Wolfgang Pauli and Carl Jung. To test his hypothesis, Wallace employs the Buddhist meditative practice of _samatha_, refining one's attention and metacognition, to create a kind of telescope to examine the space of the mind. Drawing on the work of the physicist John Wheeler, he then proposes a more general theory in which the participatory nature of reality is envisioned as a self-excited circuit. In comparing these ideas to the Buddhist theory known as the Middle Way philosophy, Wallace explores further aspects of his "general theory of ontological relativity," which can be investigated by means of _vipasyana_, or insight, meditation. Wallace then focuses on the theme of symmetry in reference to quantum cosmology and the "problem of frozen time," relating these issues to the theory and practices of the Great Perfection school of Tibetan Buddhism. He concludes with a discussion of the general theme of complementarity as it relates to science and religion. The theories of relativity and quantum mechanics were major achievements in the physical sciences, and the theory of evolution has had an equally deep impact on the life sciences. However, rigorous scientific methods do not yet exist to observe mental phenomena, and naturalism has its limits for shedding light on the workings of the mind. A pioneer of modern consciousness research, Wallace offers a practical and revolutionary method for exploring the mind that combines the keenest insights of contemporary physicists and philosophers with the time-honored meditative traditions of Buddhism. (shrink)

Do psychological traits predict philosophical views? We administered the PhilPapers Survey, created by David Bourget and David Chalmers, which consists of 30 views on central philosophical topics (e.g., epistemology, ethics, metaphysics, philosophy of mind, and philosophy of language) to a sample of professional philosophers (N = 314). We extended the PhilPapers survey to measure a number of psychological traits, such as personality, numeracy, well-being, lifestyle, and life experiences. We also included non-technical ‘translations’ of these views for eventual use in other (...) populations. We found limited to no support for the notion that personality or demographics predict philosophical views. We did, however, find that some psychological traits were predictive of philosophical views, even after strict correction for multiple comparisons. Findings include: higher interest in numeracy predicted physicalism, naturalism, and consequentialism; lower levels of well-being and higher levels of mental illness predicted hard determinism; using substances such as psychedelics and marijuana predicted non-realist and subjectivist views of morality and aesthetics; having had a transformative or self-transcendent experience predicted theism and idealism. We discuss whether or not these empirical results have philosophical implications, while noting that 68% of our sample of professional philosophers indicated that such findings would indeed have philosophical value. (shrink)

Bridging the gap between the world of science and the realm of the spiritual, B. Alan Wallace introduces a natural theory of human consciousness that has its roots in contemporary physics and Buddhism. Wallace's "special theory of ontological relativity" suggests that mental phenomena are _conditioned_ by the brain, but do not _emerge_ from it. Rather, the entire natural world of mind and matter, subjects and objects, arises from a unitary dimension of reality that is more fundamental than these dualities, as (...) proposed by Wolfgang Pauli and Carl Jung. To test his hypothesis, Wallace employs the Buddhist meditative practice of _samatha_, refining one's attention and metacognition, to create a kind of telescope to examine the space of the mind. Drawing on the work of the physicist John Wheeler, he then proposes a more general theory in which the participatory nature of reality is envisioned as a self-excited circuit. In comparing these ideas to the Buddhist theory known as the Middle Way philosophy, Wallace explores further aspects of his "general theory of ontological relativity," which can be investigated by means of _vipasyana_, or insight, meditation. Wallace then focuses on the theme of symmetry in reference to quantum cosmology and the "problem of frozen time," relating these issues to the theory and practices of the Great Perfection school of Tibetan Buddhism. He concludes with a discussion of the general theme of complementarity as it relates to science and religion. The theories of relativity and quantum mechanics were major achievements in the physical sciences, and the theory of evolution has had an equally deep impact on the life sciences. However, rigorous scientific methods do not yet exist to observe mental phenomena, and naturalism has its limits for shedding light on the workings of the mind. A pioneer of modern consciousness research, Wallace offers a practical and revolutionary method for exploring the mind that combines the keenest insights of contemporary physicists and philosophers with the time-honored meditative traditions of Buddhism. (shrink)

The essay undertakes a theological genealogy of the spirit of managerialism as it affects churches today by tracing it back to hermeneutical shifts in the history of (Protestant) theology: the loss of the externality of the word as a result of Schleiermacherian hermeneutics as it moved the centre of attention from a doctrine of the word to a doctrine of faith. The author demonstrates how the shift to inwardness created the conditions in which the market of 'spiritual needs' could emerge (...) that today's church managers capitalize on. Theological analysis is embedded in a narrative account of an instructive controversy in the German Protestant churches in the 1990s when a group of theologians produced a manifesto 'Against the Economisation of the Church'. (shrink)

This essay introduces the political thought of Hans G. Ulrich as it is presented in his seminal work Wie Geschöpfe leben. What sets Ulrich's thought apart from most other authors in the field is that his interest is not in an account of community or citizenship, but in the status politicus — the political form of existence that is bestowed on human beings as God's creatures who are called to be `ruled by the spirit' instead of succumbing to any form (...) of rule by which human beings exert dominion over human beings. Drawing from Biblical sources and a fresh reading of Luther's doctrine of the two regimes in the spirit of the Confessing Church, Ulrich arrives at a highly emancipative account of political existence that does not derive its rationale from the necessity for co-existence or common action, but from the liberation from `ungodly ties' that prevent people from free discourse and cooperation. (shrink)

The essay explains why, for Christians, responsible acting and living means responding to Christ and neighbour, and not to a `responsible self'. The history of the concept, `responsibility', is traced from its origin in Roman juridical language, by way of its being theologised in medieval times, up to the peculiar moral slant it acquired in modernity. The author challenges the mainstream understanding of `responsibility as accountability' by demonstrating that it rests on a theological mistake which ultimately invites moral self-justification. This (...) is demonstrated by critically contrasting H. R. Niebuhr's `responsible self' with Bonhoeffer's account of' responsible action'. (shrink)

Bringing together Deleuze, Blanchot, and Foucault, this book provides a detailed and original exploration of the ideas that influenced Deleuze's thought leading up to and throughout his cinema volumes and, as a result, proposes a new definition of art. Examining Blanchot's suggestion that art and dream are "outside" of power, as imagination has neither reality nor truth, and Foucault's theory that power forms knowledge by valuing life, Eugene Brent Young relates these to both Deleuze's philosophy of time and his work (...) with Guattari on art. In doing so, he uses case studies from literature and popular film, including Kafka's Castle, Villeneuve's Arrival, and Kubrick's Eyes Wide Shut. Providing important new insights for those working in literary and cinematic studies, this book advances a new definition of art as that which reverses the realities and truths of power to express obscure ideas and values beyond both our exterior and interior worlds. (shrink)

How does Christian ethics begin? This pioneering study explores the grammar of the Christian life as it is embodied and learned in worship as the formative experience of Christian communities. In a careful analysis of biblical and traditional conceptions of worship, Wannenwetsch demonstrates how worship challenges the deepest antagonisms in political thought and social practice. Particular worship practices are examined and their ethical and political significance is explored.

The late Jacob Klein’s important book is, remarkably, a lucid presentation of esoteric argument. Dealing with the famed Platonic triad, Theaetetus, Sophist, and Statesman, Klein settles the dispute about the missing dialogue, "The Philosopher," by first denying that it is missing and second showing that it is unnecessary. He argues, in short, that the triad is a dyad. That argument is reinforced by the distinction Klein strongly implies between the Socratic Theaetetus and the Eleatic Sophist and Statesman. "We can now (...) understand why the conversations of the ‘trilogy’ occur in two, not three, days and why the Sophist, the Statesman, and the Philosopher are dealt with in two, not three, dialogues". (shrink)

Wannenwetsch shows how worship challenges the deepest antagonisms in political thought and social practice through careful analysis of biblical and traditional conceptions of worship. Particular worship practices are examined for their ethical and political significance.

This essay investigates the idea of self-proprietorship as the concealed ideological basis beneath our most fraught ethical discourses on bodily matters pertaining to birth, health, sex and death. It questions the sense in which such discourses, and their corresponding societal practices, in turn serve as a practical apology for this troubling anthropology that has come to sustain capitalism. ‘Self-proprietorship’ is analysed for its phenomenological basis in the actual task of learning to own one’s body, and traced in its early philosophical (...) instantiations in Hobbes and Locke. These sources are then contrasted with an account of non-proprietary possession of one’s body, rooted in the astonishing authority granted the spouses in Paul’s letter to the Corinthians, a nuanced treatment of porneia and chastity, and the evocative bodily receptions of Christian worship. (shrink)

The essay critically engages Woltertorff’s account of justice by challenging the political status of its archaeological defence of rights language, its prioritizing of ‘primary’ and therefore ‘procedural’ justice, its suggestion to think of rights as ‘social bonds’ and the validity of subjecting God and world under one and the same concept of ‘worth’.

À la négligence théologique de la loi, faiblesse de la tradition éthique protestante, l’auteur propose un remède : un « sensus aestheticus legis ». Il établit d’abord comment l’opposition de la Loi à l’Évangile a conduit à en retenir surtout les connotations négatives. Mais ce caractère unilatéral, montre-t-il aussitôt, dérive d’une interprétation étroite de la théologie de Luther, ignorant que le réformateur reconnaît dans la loi un don divin avant la chute. En second lieu, à partir d’une relecture du psaume (...) 119, l’auteur attire l’attention sur le rapport sensuel du psalmiste à la Torah. La parole divine n’est pas objet d’interprétation mais sujet vivant dans un dialogue ; elle est « voix » plutôt que « texte ». La métaphore de la loi en tant que « lampe des pieds » invite donc à « promener » les commandements de Dieu dans le but d’explorer le monde grâce à la lumière qu’ils donnent. (shrink)

The essay is intended to shed light on the back-stage of contemporary debates about death and the dying, and more specifically on newer trends that emphasise the importance of ‘dying well’ and the moral viability of a ‘good death’. It raises the question as to whether there is a hidden conceptual link between the high medieval tradition of ars moriendi and the modern trend towards embracing (assisted) suicide as a final expression of human autonomy and suggests that this link becomes (...) visible only when death is theologically understood in a twofold way: according to its spiritual side on the one hand, and according to its physical on the other. Drawing inspiration from Bonhoeffer’s exposition of the biblical myth of the Fall and his insights into the link between thanatos and techne, the essay suggests that the compulsive fashion in which modern societies tend to shy away from any contact with the dying that is not mediated by technology or bureaucracy is owed to their refusal to acknowledge the dual character of death, as it is open to theological analysis. (shrink)

The article examines sin through the lens of forgetfulness, as both are phenomena situated between passivity and activity, and intricately linked in the biblical tradition. It shows how the propensity to forget God is rooted in a particular form of presence that is characteristic of YHWH. The narrative of the making of the golden calf is analysed for its potential to highlight the ‘predicament’ peculiar to the Jewish and Christian faiths: to seek a more palpable divine presence than that in (...) the word alone. The article explores this theme further by way of theologically juxtaposing the calf with the Agnus Dei and offering considerations on conscience, confession and the opacity of the Christian life. (shrink)

The _Platform Sutra_ records the teachings of Hui-neng, the Sixth Patriarch, who is revered as one of the two great figures in the founding of Ch'an (Zen) Buddhism. This translation is the definitive English version of the eighth-century Ch'an classic. Phillip B. Yampolsky has based his translation on the Tun-huang manuscript, the earliest extant version of the work. A critical edition of the Chinese text is given at the end of the volume. Dr. Yampolsky also furnishes a lengthy and detailed (...) historical introduction which contains much information hitherto unavailable even to scholars, and provides the context essential to an understanding of Hui-neng's work. He gives an account of the history and legends of Ch'an Buddhism, with particular attention to the traditions associated with Hui-neng, quoting or summarizing the most important narratives. He then discusses the various texts of the _Platform Sutra_, and analyzes its contents. (shrink)

A guide for scientists who would like to contribute to the professional development of science teachers for elementary schools. Based on information from over 180 programs, describes what activities work and why, and suggests how to identify programs teachers have found to be effective and take the initial steps to become involved. Also provides vignettes illustrating the daily work of science teachers. Annotation copyright by Book News, Inc., Portland, OR.

Some researchers have concluded that nonverbal recognition is generally superior to verbal recognition memory performance. The present study involved two experiments designed to assess claims of superior nonverbal memory. Experiment 1 compared performance for letter (common words) and nonletter (meaningful line drawings) items with matched high-imagery values. Experiment 2 compared performance for matched low-imagery items consisting of letters (pseudowords) and nonletter items (geometric matrices). Performance did not differ significantly between verbal and nonverbal items in either experiment, although the expected effects (...) of presentation rate and type of retrieval task were significant. It was concluded that recognition memory performance is not necessarily dependent upon the “verbalness ” or “non-verbalness ” of stimulus items. (shrink)

A dominant strand of philosophical thought holds that natural kinds are clusters of objects with shared properties. Cluster theories of natural kinds are often taken to be a late twentieth-century development, prompted by dissatisfaction with essentialism in philosophy of biology. I will argue here, however, that a cluster theory of kinds had actually been formulated by William Whewell (1794-1866) more than a century earlier. Cluster theories of kinds can be characterized in terms of three central commitments, all of which are (...) present in Whewell’s work on classification. Like contemporary cluster theorists, Whewell claims that kinds are united by similarity, that many kinds do not have essences, and that there are “gaps” between kinds. Moreover, Whewell advises taxonomists to look for consilience (roughly, convergence) between different classificatory schemes, a recommendation that reinforces the identification of natural classes with property clusters. Thus Whewell was not only an early cluster theorist, but one with important insights into what a cluster theory of kinds means for the practice of classification. (shrink)

On September 1, 2023, Texas made important revisions to it its decades‐old statute granting legal safe harbor immunity to physicians who withhold or withdraw life‐sustaining treatment over the objection of critically ill patients’ surrogate decision‐makers. However, lawmakers left untouched glaring flaws in a key safeguard for patients—the transfer option. The transfer option is ethically important because, when no hospital is willing to accept the patient in transfer, that fact is taken as strong evidence that the surrogates’ treatment requests fall outside (...) accepted medical practice. But there are serious shortcomings in how the transfer option is carried out in Texas and many other states, which undermines the ethical usefulness of the process. We identify these shortcomings and recommend revisions to state statutes and professional guidelines to overcome them. (shrink)

Despite All Critique (2014) -- World Politics and Western Reason (1980) -- The Doubled Outsides of the Modern International (2005) -- The Subject of Security (1995) -- The Protection of Nature and the Nature of Protection (2005) -- Social Movements/World Politics (1994) -- Europe is Not Where It is Supposed to Be (2000) -- They Seek it Here, They Seek it There : Looking for Politics in Clayoquot Sound (2003) -- Violence, Modernity, Silence : From Weber to International Relations (1993) (...) -- Hobbes, Origins, Limits (2011) -- War, Terror, Judgement (2002) -- International, Imperial, Exceptional (2005) -- Which Democracy for Which Demos? (2013) -- The Political Theory of Boundaries and the Boundaries of Political Theory : Interview With Raia Prokhovnik (2012). (shrink)

A particular feature of this book is substantial "Stretch and Challenge" material throughout which allows students to develop further.

While the question of free will does not figure as prominently in Buddhist writings as it does in western theology, philosophy, and psychology, it is a topic that was addressed in the earliest Buddhist writings. According to these accounts, for pragmatic and ethical reasons, the Buddha rejected both determinism and indeterminism as understood at that time. Rather than asking the metaphysical question of whether already humans have free will, Buddhist tradition takes a more pragmatic approach, exploring ways in which we (...) can acquire greater freedom to make wise choices that are truly conducive to our own and others' genuine well-being. One key to achieving such freedom is the cultivation of attentional skills so that one can deliberately focus one's attention with continuity and clarity on one's chosen object. A second theme is the cultivation of insight into the manner in which our own attitudes shape experience, allowing for the possibility of altering not only the way we experience events in the present, but also how we are influenced by our memories of the past. Finally, the Great Perfection school of Tibetan Buddhism emphasizes the realization of the deepest dimension of consciousness -- pristine awareness -- which transcends the nexus of causality. This is regarded as the ultimate source of freedom and the ultimate nature of human identity. (shrink)