Showing results by publisher "----RM Alexander" in Consciousness & Thought

L'occident contemporain est le théâtre d'une montée irrésistible des angoisses, depuis les plus petites - ce que nous mangeons, ce que nous respirons - aux plus grandes - annonces millénaristes de l'apocalypse et résurgence des nouveaux diables. Pourtant, d'un point de vue historique, nous vivons dans un monde plus sûr que jamais. Partant de ce paradoxe, Pierre-Henri Tavoillot pose clairement la question des grandes réponses apportées par l'humanité au problème de la peur.

Ancient medical science told us our minds and bodies are one. So did philosophers of old. Now modern science and new research are helping us to understand these connections. In Healing and the Mind, Bill Moyers talks with physicians, scientists, therapists, and patients - people who are taking a new look at the meaning of sickness and health.

Soul Machine takes us back to the origins of modernity, a time when a crisis in religious authority and the scientific revolution led to searching questions about the nature of human inner life. This is the story of how a new concept - the mind - emerged as a potential solution, one that was part soul and part machine but fully neither.

Ayurveda or ayurvedic medicine is an ancient medical system. This holistic medicine was originated in India about 3,000 years ago, and it is still going strong and expanding outside of India due to its effectiveness of healing people through diet, herbal remedies, and a holistic health approach.

Matter and Memory, (Matière et Mémoire), published in 1896, was the second book written by Henri Bergson (1859-1941), one of the leading French philosophers of his age. It followed Time and Free Will (1889) and helped to establish him as a major force in anti-mechanistic thought, opposing the trend towards uncompromisingly secular and scientific views. However, when Matter and Memory appeared, Bergson was 39 and had yet to become the hugely influential figure he became in the first decades of the 20th century.

Much of the world's landmass is already known. Deep sea and outer space are beyond most people's reach. It feels like there are fewer places left to discover. Psychedelics, on the other hand, reveal worlds that remain largely obscure. Altered states offer modern, 21st-century audiences boundless opportunities to explore what a human being can experience. In this book, I show you how to become a capable discovery-maker, sample-collecting naturalist, and rational thinker of visionary phenomena.

Postmodernism has become the buzzword of contemporary society over the last decade. But how can it be defined? In this highly engaging introduction, the mysteries of this most elusive of concepts are unraveled, casting a critical light upon the way we live now, from the politicizing of museum culture to the cult of the politically correct. The key postmodernist ideas are explored and challenged, as they figure in the theory, philosophy, politics, ethics, and artwork of the period, and it is shown how they have interacted within a postmodernist culture.

The question of artificial intelligence and how far we, as a people, should take the technology is one of our society's biggest debates at the moment; as AI generated art, texts, and even communications have increased as the technology grows altogether. The insight which each chapter provides into the concept of human consciousness and the evolution of that consciousness was so beautifully explored in this book, and the way evolution plays into the idea of adapting consciousness into the development of AI is remarkable.

This is a book about Nothing. You could also say it’s a book about Everything. Most accurately perhaps, it’s a book about Nothing-as-Everything and Everything-as-Nothing. It takes as its spine an account of a specific experience that seemed to happen to me, during which there wasn’t very much “Me” around. There have been many names given to these kinds of “non-experiences”, depending on what tradition or viewpoint they are being seen from.

This is a book that celebrates the most neglected but valuable emotion we can feel: melancholy. Melancholy isn’t depression, rage, or bitterness. It’s a serene, wise, and kindly response to the difficulties of being alive. It helps us navigate a wise and rational middle ground between extreme despair and naïve optimism. But melancholy is a well-kept secret. It isn't celebrated or recommended. It remains relatively unexplored in a hyper-competitive, noisy, frantic age.

In this highly acclaimed classic, psychedelic elder Ralph Metzner presents a guide to six ancient systems, once known only to the initiated few, to expand awareness and free your consciousness from exterior limitations and cultural conditioning.

David Fajgenbaum, a former Georgetown quarterback, was nicknamed the Beast in medical school, where he was also known for his unmatched mental stamina. But things changed dramatically when he began suffering from inexplicable fatigue. In a matter of weeks, his organs were failing and he was read his last rites. Doctors were baffled by his condition, which they had yet to even diagnose. Floating in and out of consciousness, Fajgenbaum prayed for a second chance, the equivalent of a dramatic play to second the game into overtime.

Does human life have any meaning? Does the question even make sense today? For centuries, the question of the meaning or purpose of human life was assumed by scholars and theologians to have a religious answer: Life has meaning because humans were made in the image of a good god. In the 19th century, however, Charles Darwin's theory of evolution changed everything - and the human organism was seen to be more machine than spirit.

'What is life?' asked the poet Shelley, and could not come up with an answer. Scientists, too, have not solved the puzzle. Yet biographers and obituarists continue to corral lives in a few columns, or a few hundred pages, aware all the time how fleeting and elusive their subject is. In Lifescapes, the acclaimed biographer and obituarist Ann Wroe reflects on a career spent pursuing life: a process, as she sees it, not of chronological narration but of trying to seize souls.

Perhaps the most important work of philosophy after the Allegory of the Cave. Incomparable logic and findings about the things that matter in life, with a clear, succinct prose touch.

Empathy is an extremely powerful ability. It allows one to feel what others are feeling, sympathize with them, and eventually influence their emotions to help them overcome any negative feelings. This sensitivity to emotions can sometimes reflect negatively on empaths - they are often victims of dark psychology techniques. Luckily, there’s a way that allows empaths to protect their mind against emotional predators, and achieve superior control over their empathic powers – Stoicism!

In Meditation Now or Never, Steve Hagen, a Zen priest and best-selling author of Buddhism Plain and Simple, provides an accessible and thorough manual on meditation for both newcomers and experienced practitioners. In the modern world, our lives are more frenetic than ever. We live with a burning sense that we have to get something done. But what do we really achieve? And why are we never satisfied? This book is an invitation to switch off and to enjoy stillness - right now.

Combine simple mantras with simple motions to create a holistic spark in mind, body, and spirit. You can harness your body's mental, physical, and spiritual energy to create the change you want and manifest your dreams. Through her unique, integrative, tri-fold approach, holistic wellness and fitness expert Erin Stutland will help you focus every ounce of energy in your body and voice to become your most singular, cohesive, self-improved you. Stutland guides you through nine foundational mantras, each accompanied with inspirational stories, plus much more....

This poignant philosophy about the human capacity for love in the face of tragedy from New York Times bestselling author Erich Fromm is as relevant today as it was when it was first broadcast. Transcribed from a series of recorded conversations streamed over German public radio in 1970, the profound ideas and thoughts collected in this volume represent a lifetime of the renowned psychoanalyst and social philosopher's explorations into human emotion and behavior throughout the twentieth century.

Whether on the job or at home, we've all yearned for a way to simplify our lives and become more organized. In A Simpler Way, authors Margaret J. Wheatley and Myron Kellner-Rogers use the latest scientific research to develop new structures to help us become more cooperative, creative, and free. By simplifying our individual worlds, Wheatley and Kellner-Rogers explain that we will inevitably increase our self-assurance, resulting in a continuous cycle of creativity, accomplishment, and learning.