Many of us, and I am no exception, have been led to assume, almost un-consciously, that Śankara is India's greatest philosopher and that the non-dualist philosophy he consolidated, Advaita Vedānta, is the supreme spiritual philosophy of India, if not of the whole world. Dualist opponents like Madhva, on the other hand, have usually been appreciated very little, if at all. Several of my colleagues think of Madhva as a reactionary, if brilliant, theist whose philosophy best serves as a foil to (...) Śankara's. Madhva, it almost seems, is studied not for his own philosophical virtues but as a means the better to appreciate Śankara's. I believe that we must weigh more carefully the dualist position, particularly its trenchant critique of non-dualism. We may discover in the process that Śankara, whatever else he was – brilliant stylist, mystic par excellence , deft polemicist – was not the originator or consolidator of anything like an internally consistent metaphysics. (shrink)

Abstract Sankara's philosophy fails definitively at the point where he leaves the human experience??sinning and suffering??unaccounted for. What in each of us, he asks, sins and suffers? Is it the antahkarana, the ?mental organ? giving rise to the series of mental states (buddins) that file by illumined by the atman? Impossible, he says, for the antahkarana by itself is material (jada,) and therefore unconscious (acit). Then is it the ?tman, upon which the antahkarana is superimposed? Inconceivable, he says, for the (...) atman is identical with Brahman, and Brahman is by definition pure bliss?consciousness, as far removed from sin and suffering as can be imagined. Then is the atman in conjunction with the antahkarana?a partnership that Sankara calls the jiva (or soul)?the sinner and sufferer? Yes, he says, as long as you remember that the sin and suffering are ultimately illusory, as illusory as the antahkarana itself. I show why Sankara's answer fails and what the failure implies, then suggest a fruitful way to approach Sankara and teach his philsophy to our students. (shrink)

Contemporary materialist theories purporting to account for experience are seriously flawed, for they fail to accommodate the full range of human experience, especially paranormal experience. Substance Dualism (SD) is re-examined in light of this experience,including telepathy and clairvoyance, mediumship, the near-death experience, and reincarnation cases involving children’s memories. A different kind of materialism postulating degrees of fi neness and vibration—one prefigured by the ancient Stoics and developed hereunder the heading Transcendental Materialism (TM)—is also explored. The inadequacies of both reductive and (...) non-reductive materialism are shown. McGinn, Chalmers, and Searle are given special attention. (shrink)

At a time when mysticism is at last emerging as a respectable field of study for philosophers and religious phenomenologists, we find this new field in considerable disarray. We see, for example, Eliot Deutsch defending as philosophically intelligible and as significant śankara's non-dualistic interpretation of the mystic's experience. 1 There is R. C. Zaehner, on the other hand, labelling śankara's mysticism ‘profane’ and sharply distinguishing it from the fuller, or ‘sacred’, mysticism of the theist. 2 A third modern-day interpreter, W. (...) T. Stace, finds both the ‘monism’ of śankara and the dualism of the theist inadequate and proposes ‘pantheism’ as the most plausible interpretation of the mystic's experience. 3 Still another interpreter, Ben-Ami Scharfstein, rejects, as did Bertrand Russell much earlier, 4 every metaphysical claim put forward by the mystic; any such claim, be it monist, pantheist, or dualist, is but an ‘ontological fairy tale’. 5. (shrink)

An ongoing debate in affective science concerns whether certain discrete, “basic” emotions have evolutionarily based signals that are easily, universally, and innatel...

The process by which emotion concepts are learned is largely unexplored. Hoemann, Devlin, and Barrett and Shablack, Stein, and Lindquist argue that emotion concepts are learned throug...

The three major schools of Vedanta— a kara's Advaita, R m nuja's Viśi dvaita, and Madhva's Dvaita—all claim to be based on the Upanishads, but they have evolved very different views of Brahman, or the Supreme Reality, and the soul's relation to that Reality once it is liberated from rebirth, when mok a or eternal life commences. Advaita teaches that liberated souls merge into the seamless blissful Brahman, the only Reality, and finally escape their earth dreams of sin and suffering, (...) even to the point of forfeiting individuality. Both Viśi dvaita and Dvaita are resolutely realist systems and see essential differences between Brahman and souls that are never transcended, even in the world of the liberated, visualized in these systems as a glorious paradise where God (Vishnu) reigns in splendor over blissful souls devoted to Him everlastingly. But whereas Madhva sees innate differences in souls, each with a greater or lesser capacity for bliss, R m nuja sees a universal sameness in the quality and degree of bliss, even to the point of equating it with the bliss of God Himself. The author points out these and other contrasts between the three views of mok a , critiques each, then develops a view of the liberated state more satisfactory (in his view) than any of the three in a marriage of East and West. (shrink)

This book's importance is derived from three sources: careful conceptualization of teacher induction from historical, methodological, and international perspectives; systematic reviews of research literature relevant to various aspects of teacher induction including its social, cultural, and political contexts, program components and forms, and the range of its effects; substantial empirical studies on the important issues of teacher induction with different kinds of methodologies that exemplify future directions and approaches to the research in teacher induction.

Interviews with Community Supported Agriculture (CSA) growers in Iowa, a majority of whom are women, shed light on the relationship between gender and CSA as a system of resource management. Growers, male and female alike, are differentiated by care and caring-practices. Care-practices, historically associated with women, place priority on local context and relationships. The concern of these growers for community, nature, land, water, soil, and other resources is manifest in care-motives and care-practices. Their specific mix of motives differs: providing safe (...) and nutritious food, educating self and others, and building relationships with other growers, shareholder-members, and the land. Care-practices include reducing or eliminating chemical usage, encouraging or accepting beneficial insects and wildlife, building soil, and creating resource management partnerships with shareholder members. CSA, viewed through a lens of care, may offer a means of transcending gender stereotypes. (shrink)

Unrecognized presuppositions about patient appearance have become increasingly important in medicine, medical ethics and medical law. Symptoms of these historically conditioned assumptions include common ageism, aesthetic surgery, and litigation about ‘wrongful life’. These phenomena suggest a societal intolerance for what is considered an ‘abnormal’ appearance. Among others, eighteenth-century artists and anatomists helped to set these twentieth-century precedents, actually measuring deviations of external traits to analogous deformations of the soul, and drawing moral conclusions from physiognomic measurements. Other eighteenth-century artists countered with (...) pathognomy, recognizing that uneven physical features may indicate humanity, instead of character flaws. We suggest that there is an important and as yet unrecognized role played by visual and perceptual preferences in our judgments concerning normalcy and anomaly. We further suggest a shift away from our current fashion-magazine, youth-oriented aesthetic, and towards an aesthetic of imperfection. Physicians and medical students can be made aware of their historically conditioned reactions to ‘abnormal’ appearing patients by studying the understandings and methods with which artists have portrayed those who are considered deformed in appearance. (shrink)

Le monde occidental s'interroge aujourd'hui sur la passion de la mort qui pousse de jeunes terroristes au suicide et au crime. Le présent essai traite d'une autre fascination, non moins troublante : celle qui travaille sourdement les grands textes de notre modernité. Après Alexandre Kojève, l'écriture de Georges Bataille, de Maurice Blanchot, de Jacques Derrida ou de Jacques Lacan, laisse transparaître un lyrisme de la destruction, un engouement pour l'abîme, qu'il faut savoir reconnaître sous la rigueur de la pensée. D'où (...) vient cette esthétique du malheur? Quels enjeux recouvre-t-elle? Au fil d'une minutieuse lecture, l'auteur s'attache à dénuder un complexe de valeurs et d'affects qui remontent aux origines symboliques de notre civilisation. On entrevoit peu à peu que cette revendication de la mort pourrait bien n'être que le signe inversé de la grande protestation humaine, de sa soif d'infini et de son désir d'être. Betty Rojtman, née à Paris, a dirigé le département de littérature française à l'université hébraïque de Jérusalem. Elle situe sa recherche au carrefour de la pensée contemporaine et de l'exégèse juive traditionnelle. Parmi ses publications : Feu noir sur feu blanc. Essai sur l'herméneutique juive (1986); Une grave distraction (préface de Paul Ricoeur, 1991) ; Une rencontre improbable (2002) et Moïse, prophète des nostalgies (2007). (shrink)

These essays apply influential, pathbreaking psychological studies about women's lives to literature. In their analyses of fictional portraits, contributors both challenge and confirm psychological theories about female identity, about 'connection/separation' as developmental catalysts, and about the impact of gender on 'voice,' moral decision-making, and epistemology in relation to classical and contemporary literary texts, written by both women and men.

Dans la dernière partie de son livre sur L’Homme Moïse et la religion monothéiste1, alors qu’il cherche à fonder l’analogie entre les mécanismes des névroses et le développement du sentiment religieux, Freud rappelle de façon schématique les grandes étapes du circuit des pulsions : en dépit de son refoulement par le moi, qui se refuse à la satisfaire, la revendication pulsionnelle..

Les théories de la littérature nous ont accoutumés à saluer le signe dans son opacité. L’écriture poétique, où se concentre pour la sensibilité moderne la question même du langage, pose de manière emblématique « l’ambiguïté toute pure »1 de ses symboles et l’autonomie de ses formes signifiantes. Essentiellement intraduisible, le texte poétique résiste2 à l’interprétation..

Introduction, by J. D. Bettis.--An introduction to phenomenology: What is phenomenology? by M. Merleau-Ponty.--The phenomenology of religion: The meaning of religion, by W. B. Kristensen.--A naturalistic description: Religion in essence and manifestation, by G. van der Leeuw.--A supernaturalistic description: Approaches to God, by J. Maritain.--A projective description: The essence of Christianity, by L. Feuerbach.--Religion as a faculty: On religion, by F. Schleiermacher. The Christian faith, by F. Schleiermacher.--Religion as a dimension: Religion as a dimension in man's spiritual life, by P. (...) Tillich.--Religion as a social function: Magic, science, and religion, by B. Malinowski.--Religion as structure and archetype: The sacred and the profane, by M. Eliade.--Religion as encounter: I and thou, by M. Buber. (shrink)

A Bilingual International Conference on the History and Actuality of the Polish Contribution, from the Lvov-Warsaw school to phenomenology, to Twentieth Century Philosophy. Colloque international bilingue portant sur l'histoire et l'actualité de la contribution polonaise, de l'école de Lvov-Varsovie à la phénoménologie, à la philosophie du vingtième siècle.

La recherche récente autour du culte d’Héraclès tend à rejeter l’idée que les ambiguïtés mythiques du personnage se reflétaient dans le rituel. Cet article reprend la question, à la lumière d’études plus larges sur la prétendue opposition « ouranien/chthonien » dans la pratique religieuse des Grecs. Des éléments inhabituels apparaissent à coup sûr dans certains rituels pour Héraklès. En particulier, certains cas de sacrifices mixtes, impliquant la destruction partielle d’une victime, ou l’holocauste de petites victimes à côté d’un sacrifice régulier (...) sont attestés à Sicyone, à Thasos, à Milet et à Cos. À Athènes, la particularité tient plutôt à la forme des sanctuaires d’Héraklès, avec l’édifice à quatre colonnes, très discuté. Un autel primitif est également attesté parfois, ce qui n’a pas reçu beaucoup d’attention. La figure d’Héraklès comme heros theos livre au moins une possibilité d’explication pour tous ces éléments, et il ne faut pas en évacuer trop vite la portée.Herakles: the problem of the heros-theos yet again. Recent scholarship on the cult of Herakles has tended to argue against the idea that the ambiguities of his mythological character were reflected in ritual. This paper re-examines the case, in the light of broader studies of the supposed Olympian-chthonian opposition in Greek religious practice. Unusual elements can certainly be seen in Herakles’ ritual in a number of locations: in particular, various kinds of mixed sacrifice, involving partial destruction of a victim, or holocaust of a small victim alongside a regular sacrifice, are attested at Sicyon, Thasos, Miletos and Kos. At Athens the unusual feature is rather the form of Herakles’ sanctuaries, with their much-discussed four-column shrines; a primitive altar is also occasionally attested, which has not previously received much scholarly notice. Herakles’ character as heros theos provides at least a possible explanation for all of these elements, and we should not be too hasty to dismiss its significance. (shrink)

Au Ier siècle de notre ère, une dédicace à Livie divinisée est placée dans le sanctuaire de Némésis à Rhamnonte (Ve siècle av. n.è.). Cet article étudie l’inscription sur l’arrière-plan de l’histoire du sanctuaire, du développement du culte impérial à l’est et de la réception de Némésis à Rome. Il développe des hypothèses antérieures concernant l’asso­ciation du sanctuaire avec l’idée de vengeance contre des ennemis orientaux et révalue les témoignages qui associent la dédicace à Claude. L’inscription implique une identification remarquablement (...) étroite entre une impératrice et une divinité, et elle constitue une contribu­tion importante à la discussion sur l’interaction entre le culte impérial et la religion grecque traditionnelle. (shrink)

This paper explores the complex relationship between the plant evolutionist G. Ledyard Stebbins and the animal evolutionist Theodosius Dobzhansky. The manner in which the plant evolution was brought into line, synthesized, or rendered consistent with the understanding of animal evolution (and especially insect evolution) is explored, especially as it culminated with the publication of Stebbins's 1950 book Variation and Evolution in Plants. The paper explores the multi-directional traffic of influence between Stebbins and Dobzhansky, but also their social and professional networks (...) that linked plant evolutionists like Stebbins with Edgar Anderson, Carl Epling, and the 'Carnegie team' of Jens Clausen, David Keck, and William Hiesey with collaborators on the animal side like I. Michael Lerner, Sewall Wright and L.C. Dunn and other 'architects' of the synthesis like Ernst Mayr, Julian Huxley and George Gaylord Simpson. The compatibility in training, work styles, methodologies, goals, field sites, levels of analysis, and even choice of organismic systems is explored between Stebbins and Dobzhansky. Finally, the extent to which coevolution between plants and insects is reflected in the relationship is explored, as is the power dynamic in the relationship between two of the most visible figures associated with the evolutionary synthesis. (shrink)

The legacy of Nisbett and Wilson’s classic article, Telling More Than We Can Know: Verbal Reports on Mental Processes , is mixed. It is perhaps the most cited article in the recent history of consciousness studies, yet no empirical research program currently exists that continues the work presented in the article. To remedy this, we have introduced an experimental paradigm we call choice blindness [Johansson, P., Hall, L., Sikström, S., & Olsson, A. . Failure to detect mismatches between intention and (...) outcome in a simple decision task. Science, 310, 116–119.]. In the choice blindness paradigm participants fail to notice mismatches between their intended choice and the outcome they are presented with, while nevertheless offering introspectively derived reasons for why they chose the way they did. In this article, we use word-frequency and latent semantic analysis to investigate a corpus of introspective reports collected within the choice blindness paradigm. We contrast the introspective reasons given in non-manipulated vs. manipulated trials, but find very few differences between these two groups of reports. (shrink)

The aim of this paper is to investigate a Curry-Howard interpretation of the intersection and union type inference system for Combinatory Logic. Types are interpreted as formulas of a Hilbert-style logic L, which turns out to be an extension of the intuitionistic logic with respect to provable disjunctive formulas (because of new equivalence relations on formulas), while the implicational-conjunctive fragment of L is still a fragment of intuitionistic logic. Moreover, typable terms are translated in a typed version, so that --typed (...) combinatory logic terms are proved to completely codify the associated logical proofs. (shrink)