Every animal illustrates how they thrive, offering a model of how you might choose to thrive, too. If we're willing to listen--to follow the pawprints--we just might discover a kinder, braver, more courageous way of life.

Religion is universal human culture. No phenomenon is more widely shared or more intensely studied, yet there is no agreement on what religion is. Now, in Faces in the Clouds, anthropologist Stewart Guthrie provides a provocative definition of religion in a bold and persuasive new theory. Guthrie says religion can best be understood as systematic anthropomorphism--that is, the attribution of human characteristics to nonhuman things and events. Many writers see anthropomorphism as common or even universal in religion, but (...) few think it is central. To Guthrie, however, it is fundamental. Religion, he writes, consists of seeing the world as humanlike. As Guthrie shows, people find a wide range of humanlike beings plausible: Gods, spirits, abominable snowmen, HAL the computer, Chiquita Banana. We find messages in random events such as earthquakes, weather, and traffic accidents. We say a fire "rages," a storm "wreaks vengeance," and waters "lie still." Guthrie says that our tendency to find human characteristics in the nonhuman world stems from a deep-seated perceptual strategy: in the face of pervasive uncertainty about what we see, we bet on the most meaningful interpretation we can. If we are in the woods and see a dark shape that might be a bear or a boulder, for example, it is good policy to think it is a bear. If we are mistaken, we lose little, and if we are right, we gain much. So, Guthrie writes, in scanning the world we always look for what most concerns us--livings things, and especially, human ones. Even animals watch for human attributes, as when birds avoid scarecrows. In short, we all follow the principle--better safe than sorry. Marshalling a wealth of evidence from anthropology, cognitive science, philosophy, theology, advertising, literature, art, and animal behavior, Guthrie offers a fascinating array of examples to show how this perceptual strategy pervades secular life and how it characterizes religious experience. Challenging the very foundations of religion, Faces in the Clouds forces us to take a new look at this fundamental element of human life. (shrink)

A summary of teachings on the nature of incorporeal principles in the realm of Mind or Spirit.

The conceptualization of the vital force of living beings as a kind of breath and heat is at least as old as Homer. The assumptions that life and living things were somehow causally related to 'heat' and 'breath' would go on to inform much of ancient medicine and philosophy. This is the first volume to consider the relationship of the notions of heat, breath, and soul in ancient Greek philosophy and science from the Presocratics to Aristotle. Bringing together specialists both (...) on early Greek philosophy and on Aristotle, it brings an approach drawn from the history of science to the study of both fields. The chapters give fresh and detailed interpretations of the theory of soul in Heraclitus, Empedocles, Parmenides, Diogenes of Appolonia, and Democritus, as well as in the Hippocratic Corpus, Plato's Timaeus, and various works of Aristotle. (shrink)

Permanent congenital and early-onset hearing impairment is the most common sensory disorder among newborns. The WHO recommends newborn and infant hearing screening for all member states to facilitate early identification and intervention for children with PCEOHI. Ethical implications of newborn/infant hearing screening in low-income and middle-income countries should be considered. Although the Pacific Island region is estimated to have among the highest global burden of hearing loss, hearing health services are limited and virtually non-existent in Pacific Island countries. The aim (...) of this brief report is to consider the ethical implications of implementing hospital-based universal newborn hearing screening in Samoa. Based on well-acknowledged screening principles, this report found that the Samoan context does not satisfy the screening principles for such a programme, and that the implementation of UNHS would, therefore, be unethical. This conclusion was reached even after considering the hypothetical provision of necessary screening and diagnostic audiology equipment from external donors. We recommend that current efforts should be directed towards the wider professional community involved in the daily care of children with a permanent hearing loss. Given the high prevalence of paediatric ear disease in the Pacific Islander population, an interim ear and hearing programme could be considered at the community level. These strategies should provide the infrastructure and referral pathways required in the advent of UNHS in Samoa. (shrink)

Guthrie contends that religion can best be understood as systematic anthropomorphism - the attribution of human characteristics to nonhuman things and events. Religion, he says, consists of seeing the world as human like. He offers a fascinating array of examples to show how this strategy pervades secular life and how it characterizes religious experience.

All volumes of Professor Guthrie's great history of Greek philosophy have won their due acclaim. The most striking merits of Guthrie's work are his mastery of a tremendous range of ancient literature and modern scholarship, his fairness and balance of judgement and the lucidity and precision of his English prose. He has achieved clarity and comprehensiveness.

The recent interest in wisdom in professional health care practice is explored in this article. Key features of wisdom are identified via consideration of certain classical, ancient and modern sources. Common themes are discussed in terms of their contribution to ‘clinical wisdom’ itself and this is reviewed against the nature of contemporary nursing education. The distinctive features of wisdom (recognition of contextual factors, the place of the person and timeliness) may enable their significance for practice to be promoted in more (...) coherent ways in nursing education. Wisdom as practical knowledge (phronesis) is offered as a complementary perspective within the educational preparation and practice of students of nursing. Certain limitations within contemporary UK nursing education are identified that may inhibit development of clinical wisdom. These are: the modularization of programmes in higher education institutions, the division of pastoral and academic support and the relationship between theory and practice. (shrink)

The third volume of Professor Guthrie's great history of Greek thought, entitled The Fifth-Century Enlightenment, deals in two parts with the Sophists and Socrates, the key figures in the dramatic and fundamental shift of philosophical interest from the physical universe to man. Each of these parts is now available as a paperback with the text, bibliography and indexes amended where necessary so that each part is self-contained. The Sophists assesses the contribution of individuals like Protagoras, Gorgias and Hippias to (...) the extraordinary intellectual and moral fermant in fifth-century Athens. They questioned the bases of morality, religion and organized society itself and the nature of knowledge and language; they initiated a whole series of important and continuing debates, and they provoked Socrates and Plato to a major restatement and defence of traditional values. (shrink)

Despite the popularity of leadership studies programs at universities, critics have questioned their purpose, costs, and outcomes. In the face of these questions, two ethics faculty who have taught in such programs explore more specifically the purpose of leadership ethics education within higher education. The “Proponent” speaks on behalf of these programs and the “Skeptic,” responds, well, skeptically. Originally an oral presentation, the dialogue engages in a fair share of rhetoric and comedy in trading points of view. It concludes with (...) a set of questions that might be used by others engaged in such work. (shrink)

This audio recording contains a lecture led by Dr. William Christian, Dr. Shirley C. Guthrie, and Dr. Stanley R. Hopper on November 20, 1965 as a part of the America and the Future of Theology Lecture Series. Dr. William Christian discusses the possibility of interaction between metaphysics and theology, the concept of God in Alfred North Whitehead’s metaphysics, the relation of Whitehead’s metaphysics to Platonism, and the relation of Whitehead’s metaphysics to Christian theology. Dr. Guthrie responds to Dr. (...) Christian by accepting the interaction of metaphysics and theology as a possible subject and how metaphysics is necessary to theology, but only as an instrument not a dictator. Dr. Stanley responds to Dr. Christian by posing two questions: Can the relationship between theology and philosophy or theology and metaphysics be adequately represented when the concept of God has a strong family resemblance according to Whitehead, and What is the relationship between metaphysics and theology? Lastly, Dr. Christian responds to both Dr. Guthrie and Dr. Stanley. (shrink)

The vertebrate nervous system performs the most complex functions of any organ system. This feat is mediated by dedicated assemblies of neurons that must be precisely connected to one another and to peripheral tissues during embryonic development. Motor neurons, which innervate muscle and regulate autonomic functions, form an integral part of this neural circuitry. The first part of this review describes the remarkable progress in our understanding of motor neuron differentiation, which is arguably the best understood model of neuronal differentiation (...) to date. During development, the coordinate actions of inductive signals from adjacent non‐neural tissues initiate the differentiation of distinct motor neuron subclasses, with specific projection patterns, at stereotypical locations within the neural tube. Underlying this specialisation is the expression of specific homeodomain proteins, which act combinatorially to confer motor neurons with both their generic and subtype‐specific properties. Ensuring that specific motor neuron subtypes innervate the correct target structure, however, requires precise motor axon guidance mechanisms. The second half of this review focuses on how distinct motor neuron subtypes pursue highly specific projection patterns by responding differentially to spatially discrete attractive and repulsive molecular cues. The tight link between motor neuron specification and axon pathfinding appears to be established by the dominant role of homeodomain proteins in dictating the ways that navigating motor axons interpret the plethora of guidance cues impinging on growth cones. BioEssays 23:582–595, 2001. © 2001 John Wiley & Sons, Inc. (shrink)

The third volume of Professor Guthrie's great history of Greek thought, entitled The Fifth-Century Enlightenment, deals in two parts with the Sophists and Socrates, the key figures in the dramatic and fundamental shift of philosophical interest from the physical universe to man. Each of the two parts is available as a paperback with the text, bibliography and indexes amended where necessary so that each part is self-contained. Socrates dominated the controversies of this period, as he has dominated the subsequent (...) history of western philosophy. He was the first to identify and grapple with some of the most intractable and persistent logical and philosophical problems; but he was also and has remained a highly controversial figure because of his extraordinary personal qualities and his remarkable career. Professor Guthrie offers a balanced and comprehensive picture of the man, his life, and his thought. (shrink)