Book categories

Professor Lundy's Guide to Rock Music Connoisseurship

Developing Defendable Aesthetic Judgment and Discovering the Most Worthwhile Music Experiences

by Duane Emerson Lundy

2023

This empirical and theoretical book should be of interest to anyone who dares to consider the contentious topic of measuring and justifying aesthetic value in music, as well as the issue of how experts compare to nonexperts in terms of aesthetic fluency, aesthetic sensitivity and aesthetic judgment in appraising music. The book should be both practical and personal for anyone who has a music collection and loves to see it grow continuously but wisely. What makes someone an expert? The key issue tackled here is how one develops into such a connoisseur of music. Overall, the book should spark much healthy debate about rock music quality and aesthetics in general, both among scholars of aesthetics and the musically passionate general public. Many of the ideas for connoisseur development for m...

Social Philosophy of Vivekananda and Indian Nationalism

by Sebastian Velassery

2021

Among the galaxy of scholars, Swami Vivekananda stands out as a majestic tower of light who has given a new tempo to the building up of a new sense of nationalism in modern India. The uniqueness of Vivekananda was his endeavour to translate every ounce of Vedanta into a social living and was never a cold theoretician or an abstract metaphysician. He was aware that India's life is governed by her sovereign sense of the infnite and inclusiveness which nourished her national life and India has been a spiritual strength for her people, implanting the seeds that have continuously sprouted and flowered in her art, literature, religion, philosophy, science and politics. It is a civilization that should be seen, not as a closed system or as a finished product, but as a dynamic and unfolding proces...

How Science Can Help Us Live In Peace

Darwin, Einstein, Whitehead

by Markolf H. Niemz, Ph.D.; James D. Dunn, trans.

2018

Award-winning biophysicist Markolf H. Niemz puts into a nutshell what the top 3 scientists on earth have discovered. Charles Darwin: Animal and man are not two. Albert Einstein: Space and time are not two. Alfred N. Whitehead: The world and I are not two. The world we live in is non-dualistic. Nature is crying for peace, but we shut off foreign from native, poor from rich, others from ourselves. It is our concept of the self that stands in the way of peace. Based on Darwin's, Einstein's and Whitehead's scientific discoveries the author demonstrates how easily we mistake reality. There is neither a personal self nor an external, almighty God. Eternity, which most religious people hope for, does not begin at death. It is here and now—at the speed of light when all distances turn zero.This bo...

Genes, Polymorphisms, and the Making of Societies

A Genetic Perspective of the Divergence between East and West (Revised and Extended Edition)

by Hippokratis Kiaris

2021

Our genes determine to a large extent who we are and why we are different from others. In this book, Hippokratis Kiaris explores how various genetic polymorphisms in different ethnic populations may affect the development of distinct cultures and eventually historical decisions. It should be read by anybody interested in history, anthropology, behavior, psychology or genetics. The reader will find clues linking together these scientific disciplines and how such genetically determined behavioral traits may play an undervalued, as yet, role in shaping historical outcomes. The book initially describes some basic concepts on genetics and proceeds with an outline of human evolution, the journey of early humans Out-of-Africa, and the colonization of Earth by different human populations that eve...

Education in a Postfactual World

From Knowing to Understanding

by Patrick M. Whitehead, PhD

2018

In this book, Whitehead argues against the fact-minded orientation of education and the practice of science. It is not that facts are unhelpful, but they have become a substitute for learning (learning is now tantamount to fact memorization). This change handicaps students by eliminating the possibility of creativity, curiosity, and critical thinking; it handicaps science by limiting the kinds of questions that can be asked and where to look for answers; and ultimately puts people out of touch with their experience. The problem is fact-mindedness. Facts are the relics of enlightenment thinking. They represent unbiased and unquestionable truth about our universe. The more you collect, the more you know; the more you know, the more powerful you are; the more powerful you are…. You get the...

The Paradox of the Good Bribe

A Discussion Defining and Protecting the Public Interest

by David J O'Regan

2020

What do Plato and the Bible tell us about bribery? Does it even matter? When it comes to ethical guidance on bribery should we look less to traditional wisdom and instead be seeking understanding and guidance primarily from modern sources? From economists with their talk of efficient markets, and from the critical theorists who focus on inequities in power relations? This book explores such questions in depth.Taking the form of a Platonic dialogue, the book contains a discussion of claims made for recognition of the positive aspects of bribery. This goes beyond the well-known "harmless" bribe - the facilitating or “grease” payment which encourages an official to speed up the performance of his or her existing duties, without additional favors. This type of baksheesh may be unattractive but...

Faith Physics

A New Theory of Everything

by Nathan V. Hoffman

2021

Faith Physics is a new Theory of Everything (ToE) combining ancient spiritual wisdom and modern quantum physics findings to deliver a belief system that is both intellectually sound and spiritually satisfying. It maintains an ineffable Supreme Consciousness is the catalyst of all material creation as a ‘great thought’ through pure white light in zero-point morphogenetic quantum fields. Faith Physics claims that consciousness is the cornerstone of base reality existing in a timeless state of now.By using the natural cause-and-effect laws of classical physics, the uncertainty principle of quantum mechanics, and dark matter/energy, Faith Physics posits pure consciousness manifests physical creation in a remarkable myriad of forms. In the wave/particle duality paradigm revealed by quantum me...

Determinism and Its Discontents

Morality, Religion, and the Need for Freedom of Will

by Suresh Kanekar

2021

The deterministic position is that all events are effects of previous events and causes of future events, in inexorable cause-effect sequences, which leave no room for intervention of anything outside of the stream of causal relationships, such as free will, thus rendering moral responsibility meaningless. Libertarians believe in freedom of will which is, for them, indispensable for moral responsibility. This controversy can be resolved only by making a clear distinction between two kinds of freedom. In common parlance, freedom means freedom from constraint or compulsion, which can be designated as contra-constraintual freedom. The second meaning of freedom is freedom from causation, which has been referred to as contra-causal freedom, and this is the meaning that is inherent in the conce...

The Healing Spirit

Embracing the Healing Spirit Between and Within Us

by Vincent L. Perri

2019

The Healing Spirit explores the idea that there is healing in dialogue. Using examples from Judaic, Christian and Buddhist philosophies and drawing on his personal and professional experiences, Dr. Perri explains how he believes the healing spirit emerges when two people unconditionally encounter each other. Introducing his concepts of the invisible matrix, archetypal language, and the naked essentials of relation he draws on the works of Martin Buber, Carl G. Jung and Abraham Joshua Heschel and their germinal contribution to the topic. The Healing Spirit can be a valuable guide to anyone in the healing or helping professions or anyone who simply wishes to help another. The Healing Spirit explores many of the personal encounters of people in the depths of sorrow, and how meaningful interpe...

Unbinding Christianity

Choosing the Values of Jesus over the Beliefs of the Church

by Jan G. Linn

2020

Unbinding Christianity is a book that will be good news for some readers while stretching others in uncomfortable ways. It begins with the premise that traditional Christian teaching is focused on right beliefs while the life and teachings of Jesus was all about right living. The book represents a fresh voice for Christians who struggle to accept traditional beliefs by assuring them that Jesus himself said much more about right values than he did right beliefs.The goal of this book is to unbind Christianity from the wrappings of creeds, doctrines, dogma, and beliefs in order to make room for an understanding of what it means to be Christian defined by values that invites unity among Christians without the need for conformity of beliefs.One of the important by-products of a values-based Chr...

Nihilism-In-Tension

A Theology of Kenosis as a Response to Some Nihilistic Inclinations in the Context of Contemporary Slovakia

by Martin Sebo, S.J.

2017

One of the pastoral problems of religiosity in Slovakia today is that contemporary Christianity is pervaded by nihil-inclinations. Such inclinations manifest themselves in the loss of orientation and meaning, and a disinterest in Christianity, which has by and large remained on a doctrinal, moralistic, and ritual level without offering a constructive faith response to the 'signs of the times'. This dissertation argues that nihilism is not an entirely negative or morose concept that leaves behind a void or abyss without values, rendering this world meaningless. Nihilism as such is not an absolute (demonizing) danger; rather, it is the failure to adequately engage it that constitutes the pro-nihilizing threat. My analysis of nihilism begins with Nietzsche. In analyzing his texts, I propose m...

The Veracity of Torah

Essays in Jewish Spirituality

by Tal Sessler

2020

Eight decades ago, the Jewish people underwent genocide in Europe. This apocalyptic event, was followed almost immediately by astonishing Jewish political and theological resurrection and renewal. This unique book ponders the tumultuous vicissitudes of the modern Jewish condition. Part memoir, part scholarship, and part theological conjectures, the book posits that to be a modern Jew entails constantly oscillating between seemingly disparate and contradictory polarities such as logos and revelation, worldliness and eternity, tradition and modernity, continuity and change. To be a modern Jew, postulates the author, is both fate and destiny, historicity and vocationalism. The Jewish saga, argues Rabbi Dr. Tal Sessler, is emblematic of the human saga writ large, inasmuch as all of us are, in ...

How Did We Get Here?

How Humanity Abused Philosophy, Religion and Science to Bring about Planetary Disaster and Totalitarian Lockdown

by Sohail Shakeri

2021

This book is about the journey that humanity has taken over the last 2500 years in its understanding of religion, philosophy and science to bring us to the brink of planetary destruction. It is intended for anyone with an interest in understanding religion, philosophy, the approach of modern medicine or the roots of our current climate crisis and ecocide. The book teaches that the roots of our current planetary crisis in the early 21st century stem well beyond the fossil fuel industry and actually have their origins in shifts in paradigms of religion, philosophy and science going back 2500 years all the way through the 20th and 21st centuries. The book helps to provide a root cause analysis to help comprehensively address humanity’s greatest problem of the 21st century in a unique manner t...