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Relative Truth, Ultimate Truth
By Lama Thubten Zopa Rinpoche, Geshe Tashi Tsering, Gordon Mcdougall. 1959
Relative Truth, Ultimate Truth is a clear and remarkably practical presentation of a core Buddhist teaching on the nature of…
reality. Geshe Tashi Tsering provides readers with an excellent opportunity to enhance not only thier knowledge of Buddhism, but also a powerful means to profoundly enhance their view of the world. The Buddhist teaching of the "two truths" is the gateway to understanding the often-misunderstood philosophy of emptiness. This volume is an excellent source of support for anyone interested in cultivating a more holistic and transformative understanding of the world around them and ultimately of their own conciousness.Why Hope?: The Stand Against Civilization
By Lang Gore, John Zerzan. 2015
The infamous eco-anarchist John Zerzan whose books have resulted in recent interviews by Vice and Believer magazines, checks in with…
further provocative articles about the chaotic results of civilization and technology.Says novelist Lang Gore in his introduction:"The present collection of essays continues the overarching thrust of John's scholarship, unveiling the post-apocalyptic nature of our times by noting the apocalypse was yesterday, several thousand years ago, to be precise, and that nothing produced by civilization can ever redeem the systematic attempt it has undertaken these (very) few millennia to destroy or alienate any human connection with the earth."In fact, when civilized Europeans imposed themselves everywhere on Earth, they created a terminal crisis for themselves by their very contact with indigenous societies. Suddenly, those with eyes to see and ears to hear could recognize that patriarchy, property and authority, and certainly slavery, were neither necessary nor desirable, let alone determined by 'human nature.'"Being Different : An Indian Challenge to Western Universalism
By Rajiv Malhotra. 2013
Social Ethics in a Changing China
By Cheng Li, John L. Thornton, Huaihong He. 2015
Over the past half-century, China has experienced incredible human dramas, ranging from Red Guard fanaticism and the loss of education…
for an entire generation during the Cultural Revolution to the Tiananmen tragedy, the economic miracle, and its accompanying money worship and rampant official corruption. Social Ethics in a Changing China: Moral Decay or Ethical Awakening? provides a rich empirical narrative and thought-provoking scholarly arguments that highlight the imperative for an ethical discourse in a country increasingly seen by many as a materialistic giant and spiritual dwarf.Professor He Huaihong has been not only an extraordinary witness to all of these dramas, but has also played a distinct role as a historian, an ethicist, and a social critic exploring the deeper intellectual and sociological origins of these events.Incorporating ethical theories with his expertise in the culture, history, religion, literature, and politics of the country, He reviews the remarkable transformation of ethics and morality in the People's Republic of China and engages in a global discourse about the major ethical issues of our time. He's book aims to reconstruct Chinese social ethics in an innovative philosophical framework, reflecting China's search for new virtues."The analysis of social ethics in today's China presented by Professor He in this volume is formidable. It is natural to wonder if the new ethics he proposes is powerful enough to uproot and supplant the old. "--from the Foreword by John L. Thornton"While this volume focuses on the intellectual odyssey of one truly extraordinary Chinese ethicist, it is also about the broader experience of China's journey into the twenty-first century--about the country's painful attempt to recover from its severe moral decay."--from the Introduction by Cheng LiPrehension: The Hand and the Emergence of Humanity
By Colin Mcginn. 2015
This book is a hymn to the hand. In Prehension, Colin McGinn links questions from science to philosophical concerns to…
consider something that we take for granted: the importance of the hand in everything we do. Drawing on evolutionary biology, anatomy, archaeology, linguistics, psychology, and philosophy, among other disciplines, McGinn examines the role of the hand in shaping human evolution. He finds that the development of our capacity to grasp, to grip, to take hold (also known as prehension) is crucial in the emergence of Homo sapiens. The human species possesses language, rational thought, culture, and a specific affective capacity; but there was a time when our ancestors had none of these. How did we become what we so distinctively are, given our early origins? McGinn, following Darwin and others, calls the hand the source of our biological success. When our remote ancestors descended from trees, they adopted a bipedal gait that left the hands free for other work; they began to make tools, which led to social cooperation and increased brain capacity. But McGinn goes further than others in arguing for the importance of the hand; he speculates that the hand played a major role in the development of language, and presents a theory of primitive reference as an outgrowth of prehension. McGinn sings the praises of the hand, and evolution, in a philosophical key. He mixes biology, anthropology, analytical philosophy, existential philosophy, sheer speculation, and utter amazement to celebrate humans' achievement of humanity.The Pleasures of Reason in Plato, Aristotle, and the Hellenistic Hedonists
By James Warren. 2014
Human lives are full of pleasures and pains. And humans are creatures that are able to think: to learn, understand,…
remember and recall, plan and anticipate. Ancient philosophers were interested in both of these facts and, what is more, were interested in how these two facts are related to one another. There appear to be, after all, pleasures and pains associated with learning and inquiring, recollecting and anticipating. We enjoy finding something out. We are pained to discover that a belief we hold is false. We can think back and enjoy or be upset by recalling past events. And we can plan for and enjoy imagining pleasures yet to come. This book is about what Plato, Aristotle, the Epicureans and the Cyrenaics had to say about these relationships between pleasure and reason.The New Abolition
By Gary Dorrien. 2015
The black social gospel emerged from the trauma of Reconstruction to ask what a "new abolition" would require in American…
society. It became an important tradition of religious thought and resistance, helping to create an alternative public sphere of excluded voices and providing the intellectual underpinnings of the civil rights movement. This tradition has been seriously overlooked, despite its immense legacy. In this groundbreaking work, Gary Dorrien describes the early history of the black social gospel from its nineteenth-century founding to its close association in the twentieth century with W. E. B. Du Bois. He offers a new perspective on modern Christianity and the civil rights era by delineating the tradition of social justice theology and activism that led to Martin Luther King Jr. "Drinking Molotov Cocktails with Gandhi
By Mark Boyle. 2015
More than ever, people are longing for deep and meaningful change. Another world is not only possible; it is essential.…
Yet despite our creative and determined efforts to attain social justice and ecological sustainability, our global crises continue to deepen.In Drinking Molotov Cocktails with Gandhi, best-selling author Mark Boyle argues that our political and economic system has brought us to the brink of climate catastrophe, ransacking ecosystems and unraveling communities for the benefit of the few at the expense of the many. He makes a compelling case that we must "rewild" the political landscape, as history teaches us that positive social change has always been wrought by movements prepared to use any means available.The time has come for pacifists, revolutionaries, and freedom fighters to work together for the creation of a world worth sustaining. Eloquent, visionary, and beautifully written, this incendiary manifesto strikes at the heart of the world's crises and reframes our understanding of how to solve them, signaling a turning point in our journey towards an ecologically just society.The three R's of the climate change generation--reduce, reuse, and recycle--are long overdue for an upgrade .Welcome to resist, revolt, rewild.Mark Boyle is the author of The Moneyless Man and The Moneyless Manifesto. He lived completely without money for three years, and is a director of the global sharing community streetbank.com.The Futurica Trilogy
By Alexander Bard, Jan Söderqvist. 2012
In the late 1990's, Swedish social theorists Alexander Bard and Jan Söderqvist started working on a radical new theory, since…
referred to as The Netocracy Hypothesis. At this early stage Bard & Söderqvist foresaw that the control of the internet would be the subject of the main power struggle for the next century.Wabi Sabi
By Andrew Juniper. 2003
Developed out of the aesthetic philosophy of cha-no-yu (the tea ceremony) in fifteenth-century Japan, wabi sabi is an aesthetic that…
finds beauty in things imperfect, impermanent, and incomplete. Taken from the Japanese words wabi, which translates to less is more, and sabi, which means attentive melancholy, wabi sabi refers to an awareness of the transient nature of earthly things and a corresponding pleasure in the things that bear the mark of this impermanence. As much a state of mind--an awareness of the things around us and an acceptance of our surroundings--as it is a design style, wabi sabi begs us to appreciate the simple beauty in life--a chipped vase, a quiet rainy day, the impermanence of all things. Presenting itself as an alternative to today's fast-paced, mass-produced, neon-lighted world, wabi sabi reminds us to slow down and take comfort in the simple, natural beauty around us.In addition to presenting the philosophy of wabi-sabi, this book includes how-to design advice--so that a transformation of body, mind, and home can emerge.Chapters include:History: The Development of Wabi SabiCulture: Wabi Sabi and the Japanese CharacterArt: Defining AestheticsDesign: Creating Expressions with Wabi Sabi MaterialsSpirit: The Universal Spirit of Wabi SabiThe Promise of Politics
By Hannah Arendt. 2005
After the publication of The Origins of Totalitarianism in 1951, Hannah Arendt undertook an investigation of Marxism, a subject that…
she had deliberately left out of her earlier work. Her inquiry into Marx's philosophy led her to a critical examination of the entire tradition of Western political thought, from its origins in Plato and Aristotle to its culmination and conclusion in Marx. The Promise of Politics tells how Arendt came to understand the failure of that tradition to account for human action.From the time that Socrates was condemned to death by his fellow citizens, Arendt finds that philosophers have followed Plato in constructing political theories at the expense of political experiences, including the pre-philosophic Greek experience of beginning, the Roman experience of founding, and the Christian experience of forgiving. It is a fascinating, subtle, and original story, which bridges Arendt's work from The Origins of Totalitarianism to The Human Condition, published in 1958. These writings, which deal with the conflict between philosophy and politics, have never before been gathered and published.The final and longer section of The Promise of Politics, titled "Introduction into Politics," was written in German and is published here for the first time in English. This remarkable meditation on the modern prejudice against politics asks whether politics has any meaning at all anymore. Although written in the latter half of the 1950s, what Arendt says about the relation of politics to human freedom could hardly have greater relevance for our own time. When politics is considered as a means to an end that lies outside of itself, when force is used to "create" freedom, political principles vanish from the face of the earth. For Arendt, politics has no "end"; instead, it has at times been-and perhaps can be again-the never-ending endeavor of the great plurality of human beings to live together and share the earth in mutually guaranteed freedom. That is the promise of politics.From the Hardcover edition.House of Cards and Philosophy
By J. Edward Hackett. 2016
Is Democracy overrated? Does power corrupt? Or do corrupt people seek power? Do corporate puppet masters pull politicians' strings? Why…
does Frank talk to the camera? Can politics deliver on the promise of justice? House of Cards depicts our worst fears about politics today. Love him or loathe him, Frank Underwood has charted an inimitable course through Washington politics. He and his cohorts depict the darkest dealings within the gleaming halls of our most revered political institutions. These 24 original essays examine key philosophical issues behind the critically-acclaimed series--questions of truth, justice, equality, opportunity, and privilege. The amoral machinations of Underwood, the ultimate anti-hero, serve as an ideal backdrop for a discussion of the political theories of philosophers as diverse as Plato, Aristotle, Nietzsche, Machiavelli, Hobbes, and Marx. From political and corporate ethics, race relations, and ruthless paragmatism to mass media collusion and sexual politics, these essays tackle a range of issues important not only to the series but to our understanding of society today.Living Yogacara
By Charles Muller, Tagawa Shun'Ei. 2014
Yogacara is an influential school of Buddhist philosophy and psychology that stems from the early Indian Mahayana Buddhist tradition. The…
Yogacara view is based on the fundamental truth that there is nothing in the realm of human experience that is not interpreted by and dependent upon the mind. Yogacara Buddhism was unable to sustain the same level of popularity as other Buddhist schools in India, Tibet, and East Asia, but its teachings on the nature of consciousness profoundly impacted the successive developments of Buddhism. Yogacara served as the basis for the development of the doctrines of karma and liberation in many other schools. In this refreshingly accessible study, Tagawa Shun'ei makes sense of Yogacara's subtleties and complexities with insight and clarity. He shows us that Yogacara masters comprehend and express everyday experiences that we all take for granted, yet struggle to explain. Eloquent and approachable, Living Yogacara deepens the reader's understanding of the development of Buddhism's interpretation of the human psyche.Good Thinking
By Guy P. Harrison. 2015
Critical-thinking skills are essential for life in the 21st century. In this follow-up to his introductory guide Think, and continuing…
his trademark of hopeful skepticism, Guy Harrison demonstrates in a detailed fashion how to sort through bad ideas, unfounded claims, and bogus information to drill down to the most salient facts. By explaining how the human brain works, and outing its most irrational processes, this book provides the thinking tools that will help you make better decisions, ask the right questions (at the right time), know what to look for when evaluating information, and understand how your own brain subconsciously clouds your judgment. Think you're too smart to be easily misled? Harrison summarizes scientific research showing how easily even intelligent and well-educated people can be fooled. We all suffer from cognitive biases, embellished memories, and the tendency to kowtow to authority figures or be duped by dubious 'truths' packaged in appealing stories. And as primates we are naturally status seekers, so we are prone to irrational beliefs that seem to enhance our sense of belonging and ranking. Emotional impulses and stress also all too often lead us into traps of misperception and bad judgment. Understanding what science has discovered about the brain makes you better equipped to cope with its built-in pitfalls. Good Thinking--the book and the practice-- makes clear that with knowledge and the right thinking skills, anyone can lead a safer, wiser, more efficient, and productive life.From the Trade Paperback edition.What Is Ancient Philosophy?
By Michael Chase, Pierre Hadot. 2002
Hadot takes ancient philosophy out of its customary realm of names, dates, and arid abstractions and plants it squarely in…
the thick of life. Through a meticulous historical reading, he shows how the various schools, trends, and ideas of ancient Greek and Roman philosophy all tended toward one goal: to provide a means for achieving happiness in this life, by transforming the individual's mode of perceiving and being in the world.Time, Will, and Purpose: Living Ideas from the Philosophy of Josiah Royce
By Randall E. Auxier. 2013
Josiah Royce (1855-1916) has had a major influence on American intellectual life - both popular movements and cutting-edge thought -…
but his name often went unmentioned while his ideas marched forward. The leading American proponent of absolute idealism, Royce has come back into fashion in recent years. With several important new books appearing, the formation of a Josiah Royce Society, and the re-organization of the Royce papers at Harvard, the time is ripe for Time, Will, and Purpose. Randall Auxier delves into the primary texts written by Royce to retrieve the most poignant ideas, the ideas we need most in the present day, while he also offers a new framework for understanding the development of Royce's philosophy. Auxier responds to everything that has been written about Royce, both early and recent.The Inner Citadel: The Meditations of Marcus Aurelius
By Michael Chase, Pierre Hadot. 1998
The Meditations of Marcus Aurelius is seen as one of the three most important expressions of Stoicism. Pierre Hadot here…
uncovers levels of meaning and expands the understanding of its underlying philosophy through what he argues are the deceptive clarity and ease of the work's style.Essays on Gödel's Reception of Leibniz, Husserl, and Brouwer
By Mark Van Atten. 2015
The book is organised around Gödel's use of Leibniz, Husserl and Brouwer. The four central essays are `Monads and sets',…
`On the philosophical development of Kurt Gödel', `Gödel and intuitionism', and `Construction and constitution in mathematics'.Symposium
By Plato, Paul Woodruff, Alexander Nehamas. 1989
A model of the kind of text one needs for lecture courses: the translation is extremely readable and made even…
more accessible by intelligent printing decisions (on dividing the text, spacing for clarification, etc.); the notes are kept to a minimum but appear when they are really needed for comprehension and are truly informative. And the introduction admirably presents both basic information and a sense of current scholarly opinion.Inventing Arguments: Brief 4th Edition
By John Mauk, John Metz. 2016
Organized around common rhetorical situations that occur all around us, INVENTING ARGUMENTS shows you that argument is a living process…
rather than a form to be modeled. Through the text's prominent focus on invention, you will learn to recognize the rhetorical elements of any argumentative situation and apply the tools of argument effectively in your own writing. The basic layers of argument are introduced in early chapters, with material arranged into increasingly sophisticated topics beginning with the most obvious or explicit layers (claims) and moving to more implied or "hidden" layers (assumptions, values, beliefs, ideology). By the time you finish Part 1, you will have a thorough understanding of argument, which you can then apply not just to the invention projects but also to your writing for other college courses and beyond.