PHILOSOPHY AND WORLD PROBLEMS – Volume III

PHILOSOPHY AND WORLD PROBLEMS – Volume III
Author: John McMurtry
Publisher: EOLSS Publications
Total Pages: 510
Release: 2011-12-11
Genre:
ISBN: 184826402X

Philosophy and World Problems theme is a component of Encyclopedia of Social Sciences and Humanities in the global Encyclopedia of Life Support Systems (EOLSS), which is an integrated compendium of twenty one Encyclopedias. The Theme on Philosophy and World Problems deals, in three volumes and covers several topics, with a myriad of issues of great relevance to our world on Philosophy and World Problems. Philosophy resists conclusions because its method across disagreements – like modern science to which it gives rise - always leaves issues open to counter-argument and furtherance of understanding. This is how philosophy differs from religious, sectarian and other dogmas and closed systems of thinking. Yet agreement across the research contributing to this work is implicit or explicit on one meta principle: whatever is incoherent with organic, social and ecological life requirements through time is false, and evil to the extent of its reduction and destruction of life fields and support systems. These three volumes are aimed at a wide spectrum of audiences: University and College Students, Researchers and Educators.

Encyclopedia of Reincarnation and Karma

Encyclopedia of Reincarnation and Karma
Author: Norman C. McClelland
Publisher: McFarland
Total Pages: 323
Release: 2018-10-15
Genre: Religion
ISBN: 0786456752

Featuring over 1,200 topical entries arranged alphabetically, this encyclopedia provides diverse and detailed coverage of the related subjects of reincarnation and karma. Its in-depth examination ranges from ancient beliefs to those of the present, incorporating all relevant world cultures. A series of broad thematic entries cover foundational aspects while over a thousand highly focused entries deal with various societies and organizations which support the concepts of reincarnation and karma; specific religious groups, sects, and associations; key individuals both historic and modern; and related beliefs, concepts, and practices.

The Myth of an Afterlife

The Myth of an Afterlife
Author: Michael Martin
Publisher: Rowman & Littlefield
Total Pages: 709
Release: 2015-03-12
Genre: Religion
ISBN: 0810886782

Because every single one of us will die, most of us would like to know what—if anything—awaits us afterward, not to mention the fate of lost loved ones. Given the nearly universal vested interest in deciding this question in favor of an afterlife, it is no surprise that the vast majority of books on the topic affirm the reality of life after death without a backward glance. But the evidence of our senses and the ever-gaining strength of scientific evidence strongly suggest otherwise. In The Myth of an Afterlife: The Case against Life after Death, Michael Martin and Keith Augustine collect a series of contributions that redress this imbalance in the literature by providing a strong, comprehensive, and up-to-date casebook of the chief arguments against an afterlife. Divided into four separate sections, this collection opens with a broad overview of the issues, as contributors consider the strongest evidence of whether or not we survive death—in particular the biological basis of all mental states and their grounding in brain activity that ceases to function at death. Next, contributors consider a host of conceptual and empirical difficulties that confront the various ways of “surviving” death—from bodiless minds to bodily resurrection to any form of posthumous survival. Then essayists turn to internal inconsistencies between traditional theological conceptions of an afterlife—heaven, hell, karmic rebirth—and widely held ethical principles central to the belief systems supporting those notions. In the final section, authors offer critical evaluations of the main types of evidence for an afterlife. Fully interdisciplinary, The Myth of an Afterlife: The Case against Life after Death brings together a variety of fields of research to make that case, including cognitiveneuroscience, philosophy of mind, personal identity, philosophy of religion, moralphilosophy, psychical research, and anomalistic psychology. As the definitive casebookof arguments against life after death, this collection is required reading for anyinstructor, researcher, and student of philosophy, religious studies, or theology. It issure to raise provocative issues new to readers, regardless of background, from thosewho believe fervently in the reality of an afterlife to those who do not or are undecidedon the matter.