This essay introduces the term arbitrary cause as a precise description of the contingent structural relationship of figurative language to social reality. At the present time our critical vocabulary lacks a term that characterizes that relationship. The aim of the present essay is to establish the importance of the notion of arbitrary cause in understanding the process of figurative representation. The essay examines Saussurean linguistics, structuralist and poststructuralist revisions of Saussure, and provides a detailed set of examples demonstrating the instability (...) of the concept of the arbitrary in common usage. The essay concludes with a discussion of literary expression. (shrink)

Drawing on the work of Max Weber, Edward Shils, Charles Camic and Thomas Spence Smith, among others, this article analyzes the effect of the breakdown of charismatic groups on tragic protagonists. Because criticism has usually focused on the isolation of tragic figures, little attention has been paid to group formation and group dissolution as significant components of tragedy. Yet group function makes a manifest contribution to tragic denouement: the vicissitudes of charismatic authority not only reflect but often bring about the (...) catastrophes in tragic drama. The article demonstrates this thesis in a concluding discussion of Shakespeare's Othello. (shrink)

The four theistic proofs of Monologion are based on the categories of being per se and being per aliud. This article analyses them through a comparative approach. The categories of per se and per aliud are compared with the categories of substance (ti) and function (yong) as touched on the first chapter of the Rectifying Ignorance (正蒙 Zhengmeng) of Zhang Zai (1020–1077), an exponent of neo-Confucianism. In fact, the two pairs of categories explain the relationship between an absolute, the supreme (...) nature (summum) or the Great Void (太虚 taixu) and the sensible world. Through the comparison, this article highlights the fundamental function of being per aliud in the rational knowledge of the supreme nature that exists per se and provides new insights into the process of derivation of being per aliud from the being per se.Contribution: This article, through the comparison with the Chinese philosophical tradition, intends to offer a new perspective on the understanding of the Anselmian categories of being per se and being per aliud. (shrink)

Many authors claim that being conscious constitutively involves being self-conscious, or conscious of oneself. This claim appears to be threatened by reports of `selfless' episodes, or conscious episodes lacking self-consciousness, recently described in a number of pathological and nonpathological conditions. However, the credibility of these reports has in turn been challenged on the following grounds: remembering and reporting a past conscious episode as an episode that one went through is only possible if one was conscious of oneself while undergoing it. (...) Call this the Memory Challenge. This paper argues that the Memory Challenge fails to undermine the credibility to reports of selfless episodes, because it rests on problematic assumptions about episodic memory. The paper further argues that we should distinguish between several kinds of self-representation that may be involved in the process of episodic remembering, and that once we do so, it is no longer mysterious how one could accurately remember and report a selfless episode as an episode that one went through. Thus, we should take reports of this kind seriously, and view them as credible counter-examples to the claim that consciousness constitutively involves self-consciousness. (shrink)

Many authors argue that conscious experience involves a sense of self or self-consciousness. According to the strongest version of this claim, there can be no selfless states of consciousness, namely states of consciousness that lack self-consciousness altogether. Disagreements about this claim are likely to remain merely verbal as long as the target notion of self-consciousness is not adequately specified. After distinguishing six notions of self-consciousness commonly discussed in the literature, I argue that none of the corresponding features is necessary for (...) consciousness, because there are states of consciousness in which each of them is plausibly missing. Such states can be said to be at least partially selfless, since they lack at least one of the ways in which one could be self-conscious. Furthermore, I argue that there is also preliminary empirical evidence that some states of consciousness lack all of these six putative forms of self-consciousness. Such states might be totally selfless, insofar as they lack all the ways in which one could be self-conscious. I conclude by addressing four objections to the possibility and reportability of totally selfless states of consciousness. (shrink)

​Authors, Factions, and Courts in Angevin England: A Literature of Personal Ambition (12th-13th Century) advances a model for historical study of courtly literature by foregrounding the personal aims, networks, and careers as the impetus for much of the period’s literature. The book takes two authors as case studies – Gerald of Wales and Walter Map – to show how authors not only built their own stories but also used popular narratives and the tools of propaganda to achieve their own, personal (...) goals. The purpose of this study is to overturn the top-down model of political patronage, in which patrons – and particularly royal patrons – set the cultural agenda and dictate literary tastes. Rather, Fabrizio De Falco argues that authors were often representative of many different interests expressed by local groups. To pursue those interests, they targeted specific political factions in the changeable political scenario of Angevin England. Their texts reveal a polycentric view of cultural production and its reception. The study aims to model a heuristic process which is applicable to other courtly texts besides the chosen case-studies. (shrink)

1. Hobbes-Gay.--2. Hume-Bentham and Index.

Kyle Stanford has recently given substance to the problem of unconceived alternatives, which challenges the reliability of inference to the best explanation (IBE) in remote domains of nature. Conjoined with the view that IBE is the central inferential tool at our disposal in investigating these domains, the problem of unconceived alternatives leads to scientific anti-realism. We argue that, at least within the biological community, scientists are now and have long been aware of the dangers of IBE. We re-analyse the nineteenth-century (...) study of inheritance and development (Stanford’s case study) and extend it into the twentieth century, focusing in particular on both classical Mendelian genetics and the studies by Avery et al. on the chemical nature of the hereditary substance. Our extended case studies show the preference of the biological community for a different methodological standard: the vera causa ideal, which requires that purported causes be shown on non-explanatory grounds to exist and be competent to produce their effects. On this basis, we defend a prospective realism about the biological sciences. 1 Introduction2 Stanford on Unconceived Alternatives3 Pangenesis: A Re-analysis4 The Vera Causa Ideal I: Negative Aspect5 Rendering Heredity Accessible6 The Vera Causa Ideal II: Positive Aspect7 Implications for Scientific Realism8 Conclusion. (shrink)

Many authors claim that being conscious constitutively involves being self-conscious, or conscious of oneself. This claim appears to be threatened by reports of ‘selfless’ episodes, or conscious episodes lacking self-consciousness, recently described in a number of pathological and nonpathological conditions. However, the credibility of these reports has in turn been challenged on the following grounds: remembering and reporting a past conscious episode as an episode that one went through is only possible if one was conscious of oneself while undergoing it. (...) Call this the Memory Challenge. This paper argues that the Memory Challenge fails to undermine the credibility to reports of selfless episodes, because it rests on problematic assumptions about episodic memory. The paper further argues that we should distinguish between several kinds of self-representation that may be involved in the process of episodic remembering, and that once we do so, it is no longer mysterious how one could accurately remember and report a selfless episode as an episode that one went through. Thus, we should take reports of this kind seriously, and view them as credible counter-examples to the claim that consciousness constitutively involves self-consciousness. (shrink)

Philosophical and empirical research on bodily awareness has mostly focused so far on bodily disorders – such as anorexia nervosa, somatoparaphrenia, or xenomelia (body integrity dysphoria) – and bodily illusions induced in an experimental setting – such as the rubber hand illusion, or the thermal grid illusion. Studying these conditions can be illuminating to investigate a broad range of issues about the nature, function, and etiology of bodily experience. However, a number of psychoactive compounds can also induce a remarkably wide (...) variety of bodily effects that have received little attention despite their relevance to these issues. Some of these effects are similar to those associated with bodily disorders or experimental bodily illusions, while others appear to be unique. The purpose of this chapter is to provide an overview of these lesser known bodily effects of psychoactive compounds, and outline some ways in which they can bear on recent debates regarding bodily awareness and bodily ownership. (shrink)

In recent years, the scientific study of meditation and psychedelic drugs has seen remarkable developments. The increased focus on meditation in cognitive neuroscience has led to a cross-cultural classification of standard meditation styles validated by functional and structural neuroanatomical data. Meanwhile, the renaissance of psychedelic research has shed light on the neurophysiology of altered states of consciousness induced by classical psychedelics, such as psilocybin and LSD, whose effects are mainly mediated by agonism of serotonin receptors. Few attempts have been made (...) at bridging these two domains of inquiry, despite intriguing evidence of overlap between the phenomenology and neurophysiology of meditation practice and psychedelic states. In particular, many contemplative traditions explicitly aim at dissolving the sense of self by eliciting altered states of consciousness through meditation, while classical psychedelics are known to produce significant disruptions of self-consciousness, a phenomenon known as drug-induced ego dissolution. In this article, we discuss available evidence regarding convergences and differences between phenomenological and neurophysiological data on meditation practice and psychedelic drug-induced states, with a particular emphasis on alterations of self-experience. While both meditation and psychedelics may disrupt self-consciousness and underlying neural processes, we emphasize that neither meditation nor psychedelic states can be conceived as simple, uniform categories. Moreover, we suggest that there are important phenomenological differences even between conscious states described as experiences of self-loss. As a result, we propose that self-consciousness may be best construed as a multidimensional construct, and that “self-loss,” far from being an unequivocal phenomenon, can take several forms. Indeed, various aspects of self-consciousness, including narrative aspects linked to autobiographical memory, self-related thoughts and mental time travel, and embodied aspects rooted in multisensory processes, may be differently affected by psychedelics and meditation practices. Finally, we consider long-term outcomes of experiences of self-loss induced by meditation and psychedelics on individual traits and prosocial behavior. We call for caution regarding the problematic conflation of temporary states of self-loss with “selflessness” as a behavioral or social trait, although there is preliminary evidence that correlations between short-term experiences of self-loss and long-term trait alterations may exist. (shrink)

There is converging evidence that high doses of hallucinogenic drugs can produce significant alterations of self-experience, described as the dissolution of the sense of self and the loss of boundaries between self and world. This article discusses the relevance of this phenomenon, known as “drug-induced ego dissolution (DIED)”, for cognitive neuroscience, psychology and philosophy of mind. Data from self-report questionnaires suggest that three neuropharmacological classes of drugs can induce ego dissolution: classical psychedelics, dissociative anesthetics and agonists of the kappa opioid (...) receptor (KOR). While these substances act on different neurotransmitter receptors, they all produce strong subjective effects that can be compared to the symptoms of acute psychosis, including ego dissolution. It has been suggested that neuroimaging of DIED can indirectly shed light on the neural correlates of the self. While this line of inquiry is promising, its results must be interpreted with caution. First, neural correlates of ego dissolution might reveal the necessary neurophysiological conditions for the maintenance of the sense of self, but it is more doubtful that this method can reveal its minimally sufficient conditions. Second, it is necessary to define the relevant notion of self at play in the phenomenon of DIED. This article suggests that DIED consists in the disruption of subpersonal processes underlying the “minimal” or “embodied” self, i.e., the basic experience of being a self rooted in multimodal integration of self-related stimuli. This hypothesis is consistent with Bayesian models of phenomenal selfhood, according to which the subjective structure of conscious experience ultimately results from the optimization of predictions in perception and action. Finally, it is argued that DIED is also of particular interest for philosophy of mind. On the one hand, it challenges theories according to which consciousness always involves self-awareness. On the other hand, it suggests that ordinary conscious experience might involve a minimal kind of self-awareness rooted in multisensory processing, which is what appears to fade away during DIED. (shrink)

Mit dem Begriff des Subjekts soll ein logisch nicht hintergehbares Erkenntnissubjekt bezeichnet werden. Der Sinn dieses Unternehmens liegt darin, ein Emanzipationspotential für eine Kritische Gesellschaftstheorie auszuweisen. Dazu muss freilich gezeigt werden können, dass das Subjekt mehr ist als reine Theorie. Es muss über einen Gesellschaftsbezug verfügen können. "Die Politik des Subjekts“ versucht diesen Bezug auszuweisen und gleichzeitig auszuloten, welche normativen Grundlagen eine Theorie des Politischen für eine Kritische Theorie anbieten kann.

All quantum-physical and cosmological causal/non-causal dilemmas have superluminally causal solutions if existents are processual by extension-change impact-transfer. Fixing the extent of applicability of mathematics to physics demonstrates Universal Causality for cosmogenetic theories. Whether the cosmos is of finite or infinite content, the Gravitational Coalescence Paradox in cosmogenetic theories yields a philosophical cosmology of infinite-eternal continuous creation: specifically, the Gravitational Coalescence Cosmology.

In recent years, a debate has emerged on whether bodily sensations are typically accompanied by a sense of body ownership, namely a distinctive experience of one's body or body part as one's own. Realists about the sense of body ownership heavily rely on evidence from experimentally-induced bodily illusions (e.g., the rubber hand illusion) and pathological disownership syndromes (e.g. somatoparaphrenia). In this chapter, I will introduce novel evidence regarding body disownership syndromes induced by psychoactive drugs rather than pathological conditions, and discuss (...) its relevance to the debate on the sense of body ownership. (shrink)

Ethical conflicts are arising as a result of the growing complexity of clinical care, coupled with technological advances. Most studies that have developed instruments for measuring ethical conflict base their measures on the variables ‘frequency’ and ‘degree of conflict’. In our view, however, these variables are insufficient for explaining the root of ethical conflicts. Consequently, the present study formulates a conceptual model that also includes the variable ‘exposure to conflict’, as well as considering six ‘types of ethical conflict’. An instrument (...) was then designed to measure the ethical conflicts experienced by nurses who work with critical care patients. The paper describes the development process and validation of this instrument, the Ethical Conflict in Nursing Questionnaire Critical Care Version (ECNQ-CCV). (shrink)

This books examines the conditions under which scientists compromised the ideals of science, and elucidates these with reference to the challenges of profit motives and national security concerns. The book also offers suggestions for changing the political and economic conditions under which the integrity of science and its ethos can be practiced.

Critical thinking is a complex, dynamic process formed by attitudes and strategic skills, with the aim of achieving a specific goal or objective. The attitudes, including the critical thinking attitudes, constitute an important part of the idea of good care, of the good professional. It could be said that they become a virtue of the nursing profession. In this context, the ethics of virtue is a theoretical framework that becomes essential for analyse the critical thinking concept in nursing care and (...) nursing science. Because the ethics of virtue consider how cultivating virtues are necessary to understand and justify the decisions and guide the actions. Based on selective analysis of the descriptive and empirical literature that addresses conceptual review of critical thinking, we conducted an analysis of this topic in the settings of clinical practice, training and research from the virtue ethical framework. Following JBI critical appraisal checklist for text and opinion papers, we argue the need for critical thinking as an essential element for true excellence in care and that it should be encouraged among professionals. The importance of developing critical thinking skills in education is well substantiated; however, greater efforts are required to implement educational strategies directed at developing critical thinking in students and professionals undergoing training, along with measures that demonstrate their success. Lastly, we show that critical thinking constitutes a fundamental component in the research process, and can improve research competencies in nursing. We conclude that future research and actions must go further in the search for new evidence and open new horizons, to ensure a positive effect on clinical practice, patient health, student education and the growth of nursing science. (shrink)

This book offers a unique perspective on Zionism. The author, a geneticist by training, focuses on science, rather than history. He looks at the claims that Jews constitute a people with common biological roots. An argument that helps provide justification for the aspirations of this political movement dedicated to the return of the Jewish people to their homeland. His study explores two issues. The first considers the assertion that there is a biology of the Jews. The second deals with attempts (...) to integrate this idea into a consistent history. Both issues unfolded against the background of a romantic national culture of Western Europe in the 19th century: Jews, primarily from Eastern Europe, began to believe these notions and soon they took the lead in the re-formulation of Jewish and Zionist existence. The author does not intend to present a comprehensive picture of the biological literature of the origins of a people and the blood relations between them. He also recognizes that the subject is emotionally-loaded. The book does, however, present a profound mediation on three overlapping questions: What is special or unique to the Jews? Who were the genuine Jews? And how can one identify Jews? This volume is a revised and edited English version of Tzionut Vehabiologia shel Hayehudim, published in 2006. (shrink)

This special issue is about something most of us might find very hard to conceive: states of consciousness in which self-consciousness is radically disrupted or altogether missing.

This book is an enquiry into the concept of the 'self', transcending the barriers of 'non-self' and realizing the non-dual Consciousness within and without.

Introduction: The law of causality and its methodology -- Recent causal realism in quantum physics -- The law of causality : Hume, Quine and quantum physics -- Ontological and probabilistic causalisms -- Laplacean causalism in quantum physics -- Ontological commitment in quantum physics -- Causality in some quantum experiments -- Interpretations of important results in quantum physics -- Causality in the EPR paradox: Part 1. The physics -- Causality in the EPR paradox: Part 2. The physical ontology -- Causality in (...) a new double slit experiment and in EPR -- Causality in the special theory of relativity -- Micro-physical and cosmic causal continuity -- Conclusion: Causal ubiquity in the micro-world. (shrink)

This study discusses second generation scientific ontological categories: substance-tradition from Aristotle to Kant, Gödel, Quine, Strawson and others, Being-thinking from Aristotle to Heidegger, and system-building from Plato to Whitehead. The resulting ontology is termed Einaic Ontology for maximalist, mutually collusive, categorial reasons.

Band 1. Prolegomena -- Band 2. Im Anfang erschafft Gott Himmel und Erde und den Menschen.

Agnostisch in der Frage nach Gott zu sein, liegt im Trend. Der Glaube an Gott hingegen scheint eher Produkt infantilen Wunschdenkens zu sein, für viele vergleichbar mit dem Glauben an Märchen. Umso berraschender, wenn auch professionelle Philosophen die Frage nach Gott in der Gegenwart neu stellen. Dies tut in zahlreichen Veröffentlichungen der Berliner Philosoph Holm Tetens. In intensiver Auseinandersetzung mit ihm sowie Willard V. Quine, John Henry Newman und William James geht das Buch Argumentationsmustern für einen rational verantworteten Gottesglauben nach"-- (...) Back cover. (shrink)

John Stuart Mills Wissenschaftstheorie wird von den meisten Autoren mit wenig Wohlwollen betrachtet. Mills Vorstellungen der Ziele und Methoden der empirischen Wissenschaften, die er in seinem ASystem of Logic darstellte, werden sowohl für einfältig als auch für realitätsfern gehalten. Einfältig, weil die von Mill skizzierten empirischen Methoden bei näherer philosophischer Betrachtung unschlüssig und kraftlos erscheinen. Realitätsfern, weil Mill angeblich die Vertrautheit mit der Geschichte und Praxis der Wissenschaften fehlte, die Voraussetzung für eine erfolgreiche philosophische Analyse gewesen wäre. Im Licht der (...) jüngeren Wissenschaftsforschung ist allerdings in vielen Punkten eine günstigere Beurteilung der Mill’schen Position möglich, als traditionellerweise angeboten wird. (shrink)

Excerpt from Le Probleme de la Verite dans la Philosophie de Spinoza Pleant, ont partage l'opinion favorable qu'en ont recue le signataire de ces lignes, rapporteur du memoire, et, peu apres lui, a son entree en fonctions a la Faculte, M. Gueroult, professeur d'histoire de la philo sophie, qui ont pris l'initiative d'en demander l'impression la Com mission des Publications. Nous le soumettons avec confiance au juge ment du public philosophique. About the Publisher Forgotten Books publishes hundreds of thousands of (...) rare and classic books. Find more at www.forgottenbooks.com This book is a reproduction of an important historical work. Forgotten Books uses state-of-the-art technology to digitally reconstruct the work, preserving the original format whilst repairing imperfections present in the aged copy. In rare cases, an imperfection in the original, such as a blemish or missing page, may be replicated in our edition. We do, however, repair the vast majority of imperfections successfully; any imperfections that remain are intentionally left to preserve the state of such historical works. (shrink)

Deep learning algorithms are rapidly changing the way in which audiovisual media can be produced. Synthetic audiovisual media generated with deep learning—often subsumed colloquially under the label “deepfakes”—have a number of impressive characteristics; they are increasingly trivial to produce, and can be indistinguishable from real sounds and images recorded with a sensor. Much attention has been dedicated to ethical concerns raised by this technological development. Here, I focus instead on a set of issues related to the notion of synthetic audiovisual (...) media, its place within a broader taxonomy of audiovisual media, and how deep learning techniques differ from more traditional approaches to media synthesis. After reviewing important etiological features of deep learning pipelines for media manipulation and generation, I argue that “deepfakes” and related synthetic media produced with such pipelines do not merely offer incremental improvements over previous methods, but challenge traditional taxonomical distinctions, and pave the way for genuinely novel kinds of audiovisual media. (shrink)

Mit dem Subjektbegriff wird auf eine logisch nicht hintergehbare Entität verwiesen, die sich aus den Überlegungen einer konstruktivistischen Erkenntnistheorie ableiten lässt. Gewonnen wird damit aber zunächst nur die Idee einer reinen Subjektivität, die nicht unmittelbar für gesellschaftstheoretische Fragen fruchtbar ist. Dies soll mit dem Fokus auf die Wirtschaft korrigiert werden. Die zentralen Fragen sind, wie sich die Wirtschaft auf der Grundlage einer radikalen Subjekttheorie konzipieren lässt, und welchen Beitrag eine solche Konzeption für die Entwicklung einer Gesellschaftstheorie leisten kann. Das übergeordnete (...) Ziel dieser Überlegungen ist das Projekt einer Kritischen Theorie der Gesellschaft, zu dem der Subjektbegriff den Maßstab der Kritik beisteuern soll. Der AutorDr. Raphael Beer ist Privatdozent am Institut für Soziologie der Westfälischen Wilhelms-Universität Münster. (shrink)

The BRAHMASUTRA of BADARAYANA represents the fundamental text of exegesis of Vedanta. The intent of Badarayana - the sage that for authority and realization of consciousness has been identified with Vyasa, the Rsi who ordered the texts of the Vedas - is that of providing the right perspective in the interpretation of the most profound and meaningful contents of the Upanisads. This had proven necessary in order to rectify some unilateral aspects propounded by several schools of thought, both orthodox and (...) non-orthodox. The Brahmasutra presents, in their simplicity and incisiveness, the assertions of the Sruti and of the Smrti, showing their concordance in the recognition of the Nirguna Brahman as the ultimate Realty. In his notes, RAPHAEL underlines the fact that Badarayana does not oppose the various philosophical schools, but the Rsi allows us to comprehend that their postulates cannot represent the ultimate Truth as expounded in the Vedas and in the Upanisads. Moreover, at times Raphael focuses on certain aspects of the Advaita Doctrine with references to the Western Tradition, and - making the relevant parallels to the philosophy of Parmenides, Plato, Plotinus, and so on - highlights the unity of the sole universal Tradition at the metaphysical level. (shrink)

Plato's Charmides is a rich mix of provocative drama and intricate argument. This book offers a comprehensive interpretation of its disparate elements. Paying close attention to its complex structure, and to the methodology of reading Plato, Raphael Woolf presents a compelling and unified reading of the work as a whole.

The claim that consciousness constitutively involves self-consciousness has a long philosophical history, and has received renewed support in recent years. My aim in this paper is to argue that this surprisingly enduring idea is misleading at best, and insufficiently supported at worst. I start by offering an elucidatory account of consciousness, and outlining a number of foundational claims that plausibly follow from it. I subsequently distinguish two notions of self-consciousness: consciousness of oneself and consciousness of one’s experience. While “self-consciousness” is (...) often taken to refer to the former notion, the most common variant of the constitutive claim, on which I focus here, targets the latter. This claim can be further interpreted in two ways: on a deflationary reading, it falls within the scope of foundational claims about consciousness, while on an inflationary reading, it points to determinate aspects of phenomenology that are not acknowledged by the foundational claims as being aspects of all conscious mental states. I argue that the deflationary reading of the constitutive claim is plausible, but should be formulated without using a term as polysemous and suggestive as “self-consciousness”; by contrast, the inflationary reading is not adequately supported, and ultimately rests on contentious intuitions about phenomenology. I conclude that we should abandon the idea that self-consciousness is constitutive of consciousness. (shrink)

Das zentrale Thema des vorliegenden Buches ist die Subjektphilosophie. Angelegt ist das Buch dabei sowohl historisch als auch systematisch. Es behandelt einerseits die Subjektphilosophie seit der klassischen Aufklärung. Andererseits werden die zu diesem Zweck zugrunde gelegten philosophischen Erkenntnistheorien mit soziologischen Gesellschaftstheorien konfrontiert. Dabei zeigt sich ein Spannungsverhältnis im Denken über das Subjekt, das mit den Polen aktives und passives Subjekt umrissen wird. Um den Blick auf das Subjekt zu ergänzen, werden zudem mögliche praktische Bezüge des Subjekts mittels eines Streifzuges durch (...) die politische Philosophie, die Moralphilosophie und die Wirtschaftstheorie (wiederum seit der Aufklärung) ausgelotet. Wie im Untertitel angedeutet, geht es dabei letztlich immer um die Frage der Emanzipation, die, so eine Hauptthese, argumentationslogisch mit einem starken – mithin: cartesianisch-kantischem – Subjektbegriff verbunden ist. Da mit der Erkenntnistheorie, der Gesellschaftstheorie, der politischen Philosophie, der Moralphilosophie und der Wirtschaftstheorie ein bereits Spektrum wissenschaftlich-philosophischer Themenfelder behandelt wird, eignet sich das Buch auch als Überblicks- bzw. Studienbuch. (shrink)

Maturity, that is often gained under the hammer of suffering, sooner or later will force us to remove the Eye of intelligence from things that are not (world of duality) and direct it toward the splendor of one's own essential nature. Undoubtedly, this implies an overturning of values, a psychological revolution, tending no longer toward the ineffective and unfruitful horizontal line, but toward the vertical one leading to awakening, to the unveiling of marvellos potentialities, the prerogative of the human soul.

Much more than a system of physical exercise for health, Yoga is a complex and ancient path to spiritual growth, enshrined in the Vedas and the Upanishads. Only by truly understanding its origins, philosophy and practices can we fully explore the limitless spiritual terrain in can lead us into. This unique book describes in detail the principles and spiritual origins of yoga, as well as the complex and comprehensive commitment each of us must make to practice it fully. It covers (...) the various branches of yoga, its philosophical vision, and the practice of Yoga ethics, abstinence and observances. Through the wisdom and insights offered in this book we come to understand that yoga, in its various forms, is the bridge that leads the soul that is inside us to the Soul Divine. (shrink)

The author offers an introduction to Plato's thought aimed at realizing Plato's teaching about being a real philosopherNone who sees the WholeNwhile leaving the task of meditating on Plato's texts to the reader.

NON-DUALISM, DUALISM AND MONISM Q.1 What do the following terms, often used by the Vedanta: dualism, monism, monotheism and non-dualism, mean? A. Every philosophical or cosmological vision which affirms two opposing and irreducible...