SUNY series in Constructive Postmodern Thought – serie

Sorts out the confusion created by the use of the term "postmodern" in relation to widely divergent theological positions.This book sorts out the confusion created by the use of the term "postmodern" in relation to widely divergent theological positions. Four different types of postmodern theology are distinguished in the preface: constructive, deconstructive, liberationist, and conservative. Two forms of each type are discussed in the book.Writing from a constructive, postmodern perspective, the authors enter into dialogue with the deconstructive postmodernism of Mark C. Taylor and Jean-François Lyotard, with the liberationist postmodernism of Harvey Cox and Cornel West, and with the conservative postmodernism of George William Rutler and John Paul II.

This book examines how the spiritual longings of ordinary people have shaped the most progressive political and cultural movements of the twentieth century and given birth to a new postmodern perspective on existence that recoups the traditional religious verities on the far side of both literary modernism and neo-Marxism. Inchausti focuses on figures who have been instrumental in defending the sacred traditions of indigenous cultures and oppressed minorities. He demonstrates that Mahatma Gandhi, Alexander Solzhenitsyn, Elie Wiesel, Martin Luther King Jr., Mother Teresa, and Lech Walesa share an ethic that is, at once, plebeian in origin and yet sublime in aspiration.

The most important discoveries of the 20th century exist not in the realm of science, medicine, or technology, but rather in the dawning awareness of the earth's limits and how those limits will affect human evolution. Humanity has reached a crossroad where various ecological catastrophes meet what some call sustainable development. While a great deal of attention has been given to what governments, corporations, utilities, international agencies, and private citizens can do to help in the transition to sustainability, little thought has been given to what schools, colleges, and universities can do. Ecological Literacy asks how the discovery of finiteness affects the content and substance of education. Given the limits of the earth, what should people know and how should they learn it?

The first book on East-West comparative thought to critically analyze the Zen Buddhist model of self in modern Japanese philosophy from the standpoint of American pragmatismThe thesis of this work is that in both modern Japanese philosophy and American pragmatism there has been a paradigm shift from a monological concept of self as an isolated "I" to a dialogical concept of the social self as an "I-Thou relation," including a communication model of self as an individual-society interaction. It is also shown that for both traditions all aesthetic, moral, and religious values are a function of the social self arising through communicative interaction between the individual and society. However, at the same time this work critically examines major ideological conflicts arising between the social self theories of modern Japanese philosophy and American pragmatism with respect to such problems as individualism versus collectivism, freedom versus determinism, liberalism versus communitarianism, and relativism versus objectivism.

Shows the vital relationship between human life and the philosophical placement of value, emphasizing the now-occurring transition from the old mechanical world view to the postmodern alternative inspired by ecology.Being and Value begins with a discussion on metaphysics, showing the vital relationship between human life and the philosophical placement of value, and emphasizing the current transition from the old mechanical worldview to the postmodern alternative inspired by ecology.Being and Value shows how intimately premodern philosophy bound value into the fabric of things, and analyzes the expulsion of value from factual being during the modern period. Special attention is given to beauty: What is the relationship between the subjective and objective conditions of beauty? Is the beauty of nature merely the product of human appreciation? The answer is that beauty-and value-is a more potent ingredient in the structure of things than modern reductionism allows.

Examines why parapsychology has been held in disdain by scientists, philosophers, and theologians, explores the evidence for ESP, psychokinesis, and life after death, and suggests that these phenomena provide support for a meaningful postmodern spirituality.In this book, David Ray Griffin, best known for his work on the problem of evil, turns his attention to the even more controversial topic of parapsychology. Griffin examines why scientists, philosophers, and theologians have held parapsychology in disdain and argues that neither a priori philosophical attacks nor wholesale rejection of the evidence can withstand scrutiny.After articulating a constructive postmodern philosophy that allows the parapsychological evidence to be taken seriously, Griffin examines this evidence extensively. He identifies four types of repeatable phenomena that suggest the reality of extrasensory perception and psychokinesis. Then, on the basis of a nondualistic distinction between mind and brain, which makes the idea of life after death conceivable, he examines five types of evidence for the reality of life after death: messages from mediums; apparitions; cases of the possession type; cases of the reincarnation type; and out-of-body experiences. His philosophical and empirical examinations of these phenomena suggest that they provide support for a postmodern spirituality that overcomes the thinness of modern religion without returning to supernaturalism.

Explains how human social evolution has led both to worthwhile achievements and moral horrors and provides perspective on today's planetary crisis by viewing it as a transition within the larger picture of social evolution.

Offers a postmodern theory of knowledge based on an ecological worldview that stresses real relations and the pervasiveness of values.Modern thought, finally free from premodern excesses of belief, immediately fell prey to excesses of doubt. This book points toward a postmodern approach to knowing that moves beyond the tired choice between dogma and skepticism. Its key deconstructive aim is to help contemporary philosophers see that their paralyzing modern "epistemological gap" is a myth. Its positive outcome, however, reverses the identification of "postmodern" with deconstruction rather than construction, with the "end of philosophy" rather than renewal in philosophy.Knowing and Value begins by tracing how we got here, and argues that much of our modern dilemma rests on choices that might have gone otherwise. Key value judgments underlying Plato's and Aristotle's epistemological norms, which still tend to govern our theories of knowledge, are clarified. Next the value-laden sources of premodern attitudes toward knowing are exposed by showing how the Christian synthesis of faith and reason was at first built by medieval Platonists and Aristotelians, then razed by premodern nominalists. This diagnostic account concludes with a close look at how modernity, from Hobbes and Descartes to Kant, designed its own epistemological trap by rejecting some premodern values, while accepting others.The book also examines the principal ways moderns (positivists, idealists, existentialists, and pragmatists) have tried to cope with the supposed epistemological gap-each without success, but with every failure leaving resources for rebuilding.In a constructive climax, the book shows how an ecological worldview, emphasizing real relations (the view proposed in its predecessor volume, Being and Value) can heal the needless ruptures on which modern epistemic maladies depend. A reformed account of human experience confronts modern skepticism head-on; a fresh "process" approach to language and thinking is proposed; and finally, a postmodern, pluralist view of theories and truth is offered under a guiding aesthetic metaphor: "Knowing is the music of thought."

Explores the thought of twentieth-century philosopher Michael Polanyi.The Tacit Mode exposes and explores the central insights in Michael Polanyi's major works. It focuses on his epistemological insights concerning tacit knowing, and explores their ramifications for philosophy, science, art, language, political theory, and religion. The notion of tacit knowledge reconstructs the modern concept of objectivity while avoiding the self-stultifying effects of "deconstructivist" postmodernism and puts Polanyi on the cutting edge of contemporary philosophy.

Articulates a metaphysical position capable of rendering both science and religious experience simultaneously and mutually intelligible.Winner of the 2000 Scientific and Medical Network Book Prize In this book, David Ray Griffin argues that the perceived conflict between science and religion is based upon a double mistake-the assumption that religion requires supernaturalism and that scientific naturalism requires atheism and materialism.

A study in comparative virtue ethics.Virtue ethics has been a major focus in contemporary moral philosophy since the publication of Alasdair MacIntyre's book After Virtue. Here, in The Virtue of Nonviolence, Nicholas F. Gier argues that virtue ethics is the best option for constructive postmodern philosophy and that Gandhi's own thought is best viewed in light of this tradition. He supports this position by formulating Gandhi's ethics of nonviolence as a virtue ethics, giving a Buddhist interpretation of Gandhi's philosophy, and presenting Gandhi as a constructive postmodern thinker. Also included is an assessment of the saints of nonviolence-Buddha, Christ, King, and Gandhi-and a charismatic theory of the nature of the saints.

A study in comparative virtue ethics.Virtue ethics has been a major focus in contemporary moral philosophy since the publication of Alasdair MacIntyre's book After Virtue. Here, in The Virtue of Nonviolence, Nicholas F. Gier argues that virtue ethics is the best option for constructive postmodern philosophy and that Gandhi's own thought is best viewed in light of this tradition. He supports this position by formulating Gandhi's ethics of nonviolence as a virtue ethics, giving a Buddhist interpretation of Gandhi's philosophy, and presenting Gandhi as a constructive postmodern thinker. Also included is an assessment of the saints of nonviolence-Buddha, Christ, King, and Gandhi-and a charismatic theory of the nature of the saints.

Argues for a pragmatic canon always in need of renovation.George Allan argues that the so-called "culture wars" in higher education are the result of the dogmatic and unyielding certainty that both canonists and anti-canonists bring to any discussion of how best to organize an undergraduate curriculum. He then proposes a middle way. Drawing from William James, John Dewey, and Alfred North Whitehead, he contrasts the absolutist claims of both canonists and anti-canonists with a fallibilist approach and argues for a more pragmatic canon that is normative and always in need of renovation.A wide variety of voices are heard in Allan's conversation about the nature and meaning of an education canon, including philosophers Aristotle, Descartes, Arthur Lovejoy, Hannah Arendt, Spengler, Emerson, Lyotard, and Rorty. Contemporary voices include Eva Brann, Charles Anderson, Francis Oakley, Martha Nussbaum, Gerald Graff, Henry Louis Gates Jr., and Bill Readings.

Contributes a black Atlantic perspective to postmodernism, theology, and metaphysics.Bringing a black Atlantic approach to constructive postmodern efforts to understand and transcend modern worldviews and modern world orders, Mothership Connections draws upon the work of scholars in the tradition of W. E. B. Du Bois, Charles H. Long, Alfred North Whitehead, and Charles Hartshorne. The author shows that connections to the originating influences of transatlantic slavery and black Atlantic experiences are essential to any adequate account of modernity and postmodernity. He also argues that metaphysics is essential to theology and moral theory, synthesizing neoclassical metaphysics and black theology to develop a black Atlantic account of metaphysical aspects of struggle, power, and ethical deliberation.

Describes the move from modern, mechanistic science to a post-modern, organismic science.This book describes the move from modern, mechanistic science to a post-modern, organismic science. David Ray Griffin gives voice to a revisionary postmodernism, based on the work of Whitehead and Hartshorne that contrasts with the relativistic, nihilistic postmodernism of Heidegger, Derrida, and Wittgenstein. The book brings together some of today's most creative thinking about science.Griffin's introductory essay summarizes the way in which the mechanistic view led to the disenchantment of science and the various reasons for the reversal of this process in our time. The essays on physics, cosmology, biology, ecology, psychosomatic medicine and parapsychology bring out the various dimensions of the reenchantment of science: the replacement of modern dualism and reductionism with an ecological, organismic paradigm; the priority of internal relations to external; the casal power of experience; the presence of experience, purpose, and intrinsic value throughout nature; influence at a distance; the laws of nature as habits; the presence of a divine whole in all the parts; and the history of the universe as a self-creative, meaningful story. This book gives a powerful voice to this emerging movement's proposals for a postmodern science, spirituality, and world order.

This book takes a genuinely new spiritual stance reflecting the emergence of a post-modern science and differing from the relativistic nihilism that calls itself postmodern but is really modernism extended to its limit.Based on a direct experience of reality as divine, this postmodern spirituality transcends modernity's individualism and patriarchy, its forced choices between dualism and materialism, anthropocentrism and relativism, supernaturalism and atheism, intolerance and nihilism. Bringing moral and ethical values back into rational discourse, this book provides a critique of various aspects of modern society—political, economic, social, agricultural, and technological aspects. This criticism, informed by the postmodern worldview, points toward a more satisfying form of personal existence and a sustainable form of global order.

Addressed to readers who have found liberal theology empty or who believe that one cannot be religious and fully rational and empirical at the same time.The naturalistic theism presented in this book is addressed to readers who have found liberal theology empty or who believe that one cannot be religious and fully rational and empirical at the same time. Griffin shows that the postmodern view is more empirical and rational than that of late modern materialism.This is not a return to early modern dualistic supernaturalism. The mechanism and sensationalism of Descartes and Newton precluded a real union of religion and science. Griffin's postmodernism offers a deeply religious and fully scientific theology, providing a new basis for spiritual discipline and for a pacific mortality that could reverse the militarism of modernity.Griffin proposes a revisionary, constructive postmodern theology challenging the deconstructive philosophy that calls itself postmodern and leads to relativism and nihilism.

Proposes religious philosophies to succeed the waning worldview of modernity.In this book, Huston Smith and David Ray Griffin propose religious philosophies to succeed the waning worldview of modernity. Huston Smith proposes the perennial philosophy or primordial tradition, and David Ray Griffin offers postmodern process theology. The ultimate issue debated is whether we should return to a traditional religious philosophy or seek a new never-before-articulated worldview.The debate covers the following issues: the relation of Christianity to other religions; the ultimate reality of a personal God in relation to a transpersonal absolute; the ultimate reality of time and progress; the problem of evil; the nature of immortality; the relation of humans to nature; the relation of science to theology; the relation of upward to downward causation; and the possibility of nonrelativistic criteria for deciding between competing worldviews.

Shows the interconnections between postmodernism, religion, politics, economics, and art.This book shows the interconnections between postmodernism, religion, politics, economics, and art. It shows that the awareness of interconnectedness is at the center of the postmodern sensibility. Sacred Interconnections illustrates the rejection of the modern idea that these subjects can be discussed as separate disciplines.While the term "postmodern" has been widely used for deconstructive, cynical, even nihilistic attitude, especially in the world of art and literature, the book represents the emergence of a reconstructive, reenchanting postmodernism, even within the artistic and literary circles.

Argues that the planetary crisis, which has been produced by modernity, demands a postmodern politics.This book argues that the planetary crisis, which has been produced by modernity, demands a postmodern politics, especially in the United States, the chief embodiment and exporter of modernity. What is needed is an America that promotes a new world order that is genuinely new-one based on a concern for the human race as a whole, and on a sustainable relationship between the human species and the rest of the biosphere. John B. Cobb, Jr., Richard Falk, David Ray Griffin, Wes Jackson, Frank Kelly, Frances Moore Lappé, Joanna Macy, Douglas Sloan, Jim Wallis, and Roger Wilkins write about various dimensions of this postmodern politics, including its educational aims, morality, time-consciousness, and ecological sensibility, its agricultural and other environmental policies, its truly democratic process, and a postmodern presidency. This book provides the most complete prescription yet for the kind of presidential leadership we need and the kind of transformation in the body politic necessary to evoke and complement such leadership.

The first book on East-West comparative thought to critically analyze the Zen Buddhist model of self in modern Japanese philosophy from the standpoint of American pragmatismThe thesis of this work is that in both modern Japanese philosophy and American pragmatism there has been a paradigm shift from a monological concept of self as an isolated "I" to a dialogical concept of the social self as an "I-Thou relation," including a communication model of self as an individual-society interaction. It is also shown that for both traditions all aesthetic, moral, and religious values are a function of the social self arising through communicative interaction between the individual and society. However, at the same time this work critically examines major ideological conflicts arising between the social self theories of modern Japanese philosophy and American pragmatism with respect to such problems as individualism versus collectivism, freedom versus determinism, liberalism versus communitarianism, and relativism versus objectivism.

Presents essays by Jewish thinkers who have found process thought to be a useful framework for contemporary Jewish thought and a set of conversations between Jewish and Christian thinkers on the appropriateness of process thought for Judaism and Christianity.This collection constitutes the first extended discussion of the relationship between Judaism and process thought. In the last half century the philosophies of Alfred North Whitehead and Charles Hartshorne have become important sources for contemporary theological reflection. Recently, a number of Jewish thinkers have examined process thought as a potentially valuable resource for postmodern Jewish theology. This book brings together many Jewish thinkers who have pioneered this discussion.Jewish thinkers who have found process thought to be a useful framework for contemporary Jewish thought discuss issues that are primarily theological, such as God's transcendence and immanence, the problem of evil, the idea of revelation. Also included is a dialogue between Jewish and Christian thinkers on the appropriateness of process thought for their religious traditions. Critical reflection on the continuities and discontinuities between Judaism and the process model is also covered.

Presents essays by Jewish thinkers who have found process thought to be a useful framework for contemporary Jewish thought and a set of conversations between Jewish and Christian thinkers on the appropriateness of process thought for Judaism and Christianity.This collection constitutes the first extended discussion of the relationship between Judaism and process thought. In the last half century the philosophies of Alfred North Whitehead and Charles Hartshorne have become important sources for contemporary theological reflection. Recently, a number of Jewish thinkers have examined process thought as a potentially valuable resource for postmodern Jewish theology. This book brings together many Jewish thinkers who have pioneered this discussion.Jewish thinkers who have found process thought to be a useful framework for contemporary Jewish thought discuss issues that are primarily theological, such as God's transcendence and immanence, the problem of evil, the idea of revelation. Also included is a dialogue between Jewish and Christian thinkers on the appropriateness of process thought for their religious traditions. Critical reflection on the continuities and discontinuities between Judaism and the process model is also covered.

An international group of environmental philosophers and educators propose ways universities can produce and promote ecological literacy and environmental ethics.On the eve of the 1992 Earth Summit in Rio de Janeiro, Fernando J. R. da Rocha challenged environmental philosophers to suggest and develop effective ways in which universities might engender ecological literacy and environmental ethics. The result was a preconference held in Porto Alegre, Brazil, whose aim was to put the summit in philosophical perspective, influence its outcome, and chart a new course, linking environment and ethics through university education.This book is an outgrowth of the Porto Alegre conference, and the international environmental philosophers and educators represented here inaugurate a constructive dialogue that will continue well into the twenty-first century. Among the contributors to the volume are environmental philosophers Andrew Brennan, J. Baird Callicott, Fernando J. R. da Rocha, and Holmes Ralston, III, and education theorists Peter Madsen and John Lemons. In addition, the book introduces English-language readers to the work of French philosopher Catherine Larrere, Spanish philosopher Nicholas Sosa, and Brazil's radical former Secretary for the Environment and deep ecologist Jose Lutzenberger.

Examines the concept of God which emerges from the writings of Nikos Kazantzakis and argues that he was a process theist.

Argues for a humanistic cultural reformation to counter our materialistic values and science-dominated intellectual life and shows how this would affect our lives and transform our society.A Society Fit for Human Beings contends that there is a profound incoherence in the foundations of modern Western civilization and that we are on a self-destructive course. With the quest for wealth and power our dominant concern, we find ourselves with a flourishing economy and a supreme military force based on science and technology, but with our moral, civic, and religious culture undermined by our way of comprehending the world. Our human identity is problematic, the wells of meaning that nourish the human spirit are polluted or drying up, and the social order is in disarray.This situation, E. M. Adams argues, requires nothing less than a historic cultural revolution based on a shift in priorities from wealth and power to humanistic values—those grounded in selfhood and lived experience that are essential for human growth, meaningful lives, and a healthy society. Such a shift in our governing values would require a restructuring of our intellectual vision of humankind and the world in terms of humanistic categories—those grounded in lived experience, the categories of the humanities.This book shows the import of such a humanistic cultural revolution for our human identity, morality, the social order, and our major institutions, including the family and community, education, the economy, the government, the military, and religion. It outlines how we can work toward such a cultural revolution and develop a constructive postmodern civilization with a society fit for human beings.

Offers a postmodern theory of knowledge based on an ecological worldview that stresses real relations and the pervasiveness of values.Modern thought, finally free from premodern excesses of belief, immediately fell prey to excesses of doubt. This book points toward a postmodern approach to knowing that moves beyond the tired choice between dogma and skepticism. Its key deconstructive aim is to help contemporary philosophers see that their paralyzing modern "epistemological gap" is a myth. Its positive outcome, however, reverses the identification of "postmodern" with deconstruction rather than construction, with the "end of philosophy" rather than renewal in philosophy.Knowing and Value begins by tracing how we got here, and argues that much of our modern dilemma rests on choices that might have gone otherwise. Key value judgments underlying Plato's and Aristotle's epistemological norms, which still tend to govern our theories of knowledge, are clarified. Next the value-laden sources of premodern attitudes toward knowing are exposed by showing how the Christian synthesis of faith and reason was at first built by medieval Platonists and Aristotelians, then razed by premodern nominalists. This diagnostic account concludes with a close look at how modernity, from Hobbes and Descartes to Kant, designed its own epistemological trap by rejecting some premodern values, while accepting others.The book also examines the principal ways moderns (positivists, idealists, existentialists, and pragmatists) have tried to cope with the supposed epistemological gap-each without success, but with every failure leaving resources for rebuilding.In a constructive climax, the book shows how an ecological worldview, emphasizing real relations (the view proposed in its predecessor volume, Being and Value) can heal the needless ruptures on which modern epistemic maladies depend. A reformed account of human experience confronts modern skepticism head-on; a fresh "process" approach to language and thinking is proposed; and finally, a postmodern, pluralist view of theories and truth is offered under a guiding aesthetic metaphor: "Knowing is the music of thought."

Explores the thought of twentieth-century philosopher Michael Polanyi.The Tacit Mode exposes and explores the central insights in Michael Polanyi's major works. It focuses on his epistemological insights concerning tacit knowing, and explores their ramifications for philosophy, science, art, language, political theory, and religion. The notion of tacit knowledge reconstructs the modern concept of objectivity while avoiding the self-stultifying effects of "deconstructivist" postmodernism and puts Polanyi on the cutting edge of contemporary philosophy.

A comparative philosophical consideration of the extremes of humanism, or "Titanism," this book critiques trends in Eastern and Western philosophy and examines solutions to them.This work in comparative philosophy uses the concept of Titanism to critique certain trends in both Eastern and Western philosophy. Titanism is an extreme form of humanism in which human beings take on divine attributes and prerogatives. The author finds the most explicit forms of spiritual Titanism in the Jaina, Samkhya, and Yoga traditions, where yogis claim powers and knowledge that in the West are only attributed to God. These philosophies are also radically dualistic, and liberation involves a complete transcendence of the body, society, and nature. Five types of spiritual Titanism are identified; and, in addition to this typology, a heuristic based on Nietzsche's three metamorphoses of camel, lion, and child is offered. The book determines that answers to spiritual Titanism begin not only with the Hindu Goddess religion, but also are found in Buddhism, Confucianism, and Daoism, especially Zen Buddhism and Confucianism.