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The bias in favor of science and against humanistic modes of thought is in line with the Cartesian paradigm which, as we shall analyze more thoroughly later on, cavalierly dispenses with the humanities—i.e., disciplines such as rhetoric, myth, poetry, religion—as being too inaccurate and not “scientific” enough, while privileging geometrical abstract reasoning; a kind of…
“I can’t tell whether to spit or go blind.” I’ve always liked this phrase (alternatively, “shit or go blind”). It’s slang for confusion in the face of options, and etymologists aren’t sure where it comes from. Its appeal, I suspect, is partly onomatopoetic—it sounds confused. Its appeal may also be the precision with which it…
Kepler’s laws of planetary motion which specify the nature of planetary orbits (elliptical) and their quantitative aspects (rate of motion and time periods) were arrived by generalizing data of observations which had been carefully collected by another astronomer (Tycho Brahe). Boyle’s law of gases which enunciated the relationship between the volume and pressure of a…
After a preparatory preamble on Providenceand the historical consciousness, I’d like to begin the journey into Vico’s mind with a metaphor from my own intellectual life-experience: that of a long journey on a train and the reflections it engendered. The train’s journey began from Ft.Lauderdale, Florida, bound for New Haven, Connecticut. It was the summer…
With support from the Spiritual Transformation Program of the Metanexus Institute, the National Spiritual Transformation Study (NSTS) was carried out as part of the 2004 General Social Survey (GSS). The 2004 GSS was an in-person, full-probability survey of adults living in households in the United States. An initial analysis of the NSTS is presented in…
©2007 Andrew Ilachinski My imaging philosophy is very simple. I strive to record the subtle, interconnected web of energy that makes up what we call the world. For me, beauty, which permeates everything around us, appears in its most sublime state when form, color, pattern and texture are all in harmony. In the same way…
Introduction1 What is Transhumanism? The term ‘transhumanism’ denotes a relatively young and still changing ideology that posits a new vision of humanity as a result of the confluence of advancements in the life sciences, neurosciences, genomics, robotics, informatics, and nanotechnology. These developments include new kinds of cognitive tools that combine artificial intelligence with interface technology,…
“But that was it—you never could think what things would be like if they weren’t just what and where they were. You never knew what was coming, either; and yet when it came, it seemed as if nothing else ever could have come. That was queer—you could do anything you liked until you’d done it,…
We are often told that we can’t solve our greatest problems today without thinking outside the box. But we are always creating boxes for ourselves, which confine our thought. We are engaged in creating (we hope) a peaceful world order, based on a flourishing globalized economy, on collective security and the rule of law. But…
Big gruff men—supersaturated with testosterone—bully people with their stentorian voices, raised hackles, and looming bulk. Wielding the yang sword of decisiveness they impose their will, and women and children scramble for safety. The scrambling pays off in counterstrategies. When you don’t have yang working for you, you make yin work instead. Centuries of co-evolving yang…