Can we who have been touched by the scientific, intellectual, and experimental revolutions of modern and contemporary times still believe with and degree of coherence and consistency that we as individual persons are immortal. Indeed, is there even good cause to hope that we are? In examining the present relationship of reason to faith, can we find justifying reasons for faith? These are the central questions in Self, God, and Immortality, a compelling exercise in philosophical theology. Drawing upon the works (...) of William James and the principles of American Pragmatism, Eugene Fontinell extrapolates carefully from "data given in experience" to a model of the cosmic process open to the idea that individual identity may survive bodily dissolution. Presupposing that the possibility of personal immortality has been established in the first part, the second part of the essay is concerned with desirability. Here, Fontinell shows that, far from diverting attention and energies from the crucial tasks confronting us here and now, such belief can be energizing and life enhancing. The wider importance of Self, God, and Immortality lies in its pressing both immortality-believers and terminality-believers to explore both the metaphysical presuppositions and the lived consequences of their beliefs. It is the author's expressed hope that such explorations, rather than impeding, will stimulate co-operative efforts to create a richer and more humane community. (shrink)

Eames has given us what is perhaps the best introduction to the pragmatic philosophies and the pragmatic philosophy of Peirce, James, Dewey, and Mead. He has succeeded in describing the thought of these four thinkers in such a way that both their individual distinctness and shared concerns and characteristics emerge. This masterful exposition is presented under four major headings: "Nature and Human Life," "Knowledge," "Value," and "Education." These are then further subdivided into a total of twenty chapters focussing on more (...) specific questions which are presented with clarity and economy. Eames does not mechanically list the views of each thinker on every issue but rather each chapter is comprised of a fine integration and blending of their relevant views resulting in an organically unified response to fundamental questions. Since this is an expository rather than a critical introduction, Eames quite properly makes the views of the pragmatists themselves central and dominating. Using direct citation sparingly but effectively, he, for the most part, expresses their doctrines in his own language while maintaining a striking fidelity to the substance, tone, and texture of each philosopher's thought. (shrink)

"Logic" here is meant in an Hegelian sense "as an exhibition of philosophical thought in terms of its necessary self-development throughout modern history". Thus Galgan wishes to show, and in great measure succeeds in showing, that modernity has grown out of and in many respects is a continuation, development, and realization of crucial features of the medieval Christian experience. But Galgan makes the stronger and more controversial claim that even after modernity has emerged it remains inseparably bound up with Christianity. (...) Consequently, modernity is not intellectually viable--lacks an inner logic, "makes no sense,"--apart from Christianity. (shrink)