Creating Consilience

Creating Consilience PDF Author: Edward Slingerland
Publisher: OUP USA
ISBN: 0199794391
Category : Education
Languages : en
Pages : 467

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Book Description
Calls for a "consilient" or "vertically integrated" approach to the study of human mind and culture have, for the most part, been received by scholars in the humanities with either indifference or hostility. One reason for this is that consilience has often been framed as bringing the study of humanistic issues into line with the study of non-human phenomena, rather than as something to which humanists and scientists contribute equally. The other major reason that consilience has yet to catch on in the humanities is a dearth of compelling examples of the benefits of adopting a consilient approach. Creating Consilience is the product of a workshop that brought together internationally-renowned scholars from a variety of fields to address both of these issues. It includes representative pieces from workshop speakers and participants that examine how adopting such a consilient stance -- informed by cognitive science and grounded in evolutionary theory -- would concretely impact specific topics in the humanities, examining each topic in a manner that not only cuts across the humanities-natural science divide, but also across individual humanistic disciplines. By taking seriously the fact that science-humanities integration is a two-way exchange, this volume takes a new approach to bridging the cultures of science and the humanities. The editors and contributors formulate how to develop a new shared framework of consilience beyond mere interdisciplinarity, in a way that both sides can accept.

Creating Consilience

Creating Consilience PDF Author: Edward Slingerland
Publisher: OUP USA
ISBN: 0199794391
Category : Education
Languages : en
Pages : 467

Get Book Here

Book Description
Calls for a "consilient" or "vertically integrated" approach to the study of human mind and culture have, for the most part, been received by scholars in the humanities with either indifference or hostility. One reason for this is that consilience has often been framed as bringing the study of humanistic issues into line with the study of non-human phenomena, rather than as something to which humanists and scientists contribute equally. The other major reason that consilience has yet to catch on in the humanities is a dearth of compelling examples of the benefits of adopting a consilient approach. Creating Consilience is the product of a workshop that brought together internationally-renowned scholars from a variety of fields to address both of these issues. It includes representative pieces from workshop speakers and participants that examine how adopting such a consilient stance -- informed by cognitive science and grounded in evolutionary theory -- would concretely impact specific topics in the humanities, examining each topic in a manner that not only cuts across the humanities-natural science divide, but also across individual humanistic disciplines. By taking seriously the fact that science-humanities integration is a two-way exchange, this volume takes a new approach to bridging the cultures of science and the humanities. The editors and contributors formulate how to develop a new shared framework of consilience beyond mere interdisciplinarity, in a way that both sides can accept.

Consilience

Consilience PDF Author: E. O. Wilson
Publisher: Vintage
ISBN: 0804154066
Category : Science
Languages : en
Pages : 485

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Book Description
NATIONAL BESTSELLER • "A dazzling journey across the sciences and humanities in search of deep laws to unite them." —The Wall Street Journal One of our greatest scientists—and the winner of two Pulitzer Prizes for On Human Nature and The Ants—gives us a work of visionary importance that may be the crowning achievement of his career. In Consilience (a word that originally meant "jumping together"), Edward O. Wilson renews the Enlightenment's search for a unified theory of knowledge in disciplines that range from physics to biology, the social sciences and the humanities. Using the natural sciences as his model, Wilson forges dramatic links between fields. He explores the chemistry of the mind and the genetic bases of culture. He postulates the biological principles underlying works of art from cave-drawings to Lolita. Presenting the latest findings in prose of wonderful clarity and oratorical eloquence, and synthesizing it into a dazzling whole, Consilience is science in the path-clearing traditions of Newton, Einstein, and Richard Feynman.

Consilience Leadership: Using Innovative Ideas from Economics, Science, and Neuropsychology to Create Breakthroughs in Leading Organizations

Consilience Leadership: Using Innovative Ideas from Economics, Science, and Neuropsychology to Create Breakthroughs in Leading Organizations PDF Author: Gary Cook
Publisher:
ISBN: 9780615140049
Category : Business & Economics
Languages : en
Pages : 194

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Book Description
Consilience Leadership introduces business leaders to the multitude of ways that science in all its forms is helping to transform the art of leadership into the science of leadership. What do Osama Bin Laden's death, April's deadly tornados in the southern US, the "Arab Spring," and recent comments from the US Coast Guard and others about the Deepwater Disaster all have in common? They all are examples of what leaders can learn from Consilience Leadership. Cook demonstrates how lessons learned from Highly Reliable Organization theory, behavioral economics, neuroscience and other disciplines are helping us understand how to better deal with terrorism and Katrina-like disasters. You and your organization can learn to better anticipate and avoid political and other disasters by reading Gary Cook's new book.

Consilience, Truth and the Mind of God

Consilience, Truth and the Mind of God PDF Author: Richard J. Di Rocco
Publisher: Springer
ISBN: 3030018695
Category : Philosophy
Languages : en
Pages : 164

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Book Description
This book argues that God can be found within the edifice of the scientific understanding of physics, cosmology, biology and philosophy. It is a rewarding read that asks the Big Questions which humans have pondered since the dawn of the modern human mind, including: Why and how does the universe exist? From where do the laws of physics come? How did life and mind arise from inanimate matter on Earth? Science and religion have a common interest in the answers to such questions, yet many scientists and believers have been at odds for centuries. The author and contributors present a program for moving beyond the vastly different perspectives of reality offered by science and religion. Historical proofs for the existence of God are considered in light of the possibility that the universe may be only one in an eternal multiverse that contains an infinite number of other universes. Readers will find a modification of St. Augustine’s Argument from Truth for the existence of the necessary, self-sufficient being commonly referred to as God. This book is suited to all with an interest in the crossing points of science and religion, providing much food for thought and reflection. If in the end, you cannot accede to philosophy’s proofs, or theism’s invitation to faith, perhaps you will nevertheless say ‘yes’ to the amazing universe in which we live.

Consecrating Science

Consecrating Science PDF Author: Lisa H. Sideris
Publisher: Univ of California Press
ISBN: 0520294998
Category : Philosophy
Languages : en
Pages : 294

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Book Description
"In Consecrating Science, Lisa Sideris offers a searing critique of 'The New Cosmology,' a complex network of overlapping movements that claim to bring together science and spirituality, all in the name of saving our planet from impending ecological collapse. Highly regarded in many academic circles, these movements have been endorsed by numerous prominent scholars, scientists, historians, and educators. Their express goal--popularized in numerous books, films, TED talks, YouTube videos, podcasts, and even introductory courses at places like Harvard or Washington University--is to instill in readers and audiences a profound sense of being at home in the universe, thereby fostering environmentally responsible behavior. Whether promoted as 'The New Story,' 'The Universe Story,' or 'The Epic of Evolution,' they all offer humanity a new sacred story, a common creation myth for modern times and for all people: the evolutionary unfolding of the universe from the Big Bang to the present. Evolutionary science and religious cosmology--together at last! But as Sideris shows, however, the New Cosmology actually underwrites a staggeringly anthropocentric vision of the world. Instead of cultivating an ethic of respect for nature, the project of 'consecrating science' only increases human arrogance and indifference to nonhuman life. Going back to the work of Rachel Carson and other naturalists, the author shows how a sense of wonder, rooted in the natural world and our own ethical impulses, helps foster environmental attitudes and policies that protect our planet"--Provided by publishe

The Troubadour of Knowledge

The Troubadour of Knowledge PDF Author: Michel Serres
Publisher: University of Michigan Press
ISBN: 9780472065516
Category : Education
Languages : en
Pages : 190

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Book Description
A meditatation on the nature of education and the necessity of cross-disciplinarity

Trying Not to Try

Trying Not to Try PDF Author: Edward Slingerland
Publisher: Crown
ISBN: 0770437621
Category : Psychology
Languages : en
Pages : 301

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Book Description
A deeply original exploration of the power of spontaneity—an ancient Chinese ideal that cognitive scientists are only now beginning to understand—and why it is so essential to our well-being Why is it always hard to fall asleep the night before an important meeting? Or be charming and relaxed on a first date? What is it about a politician who seems wooden or a comedian whose jokes fall flat or an athlete who chokes? In all of these cases, striving seems to backfire. In Trying Not To Try, Edward Slingerland explains why we find spontaneity so elusive, and shows how early Chinese thought points the way to happier, more authentic lives. We’ve long been told that the way to achieve our goals is through careful reasoning and conscious effort. But recent research suggests that many aspects of a satisfying life, like happiness and spontaneity, are best pursued indirectly. The early Chinese philosophers knew this, and they wrote extensively about an effortless way of being in the world, which they called wu-wei (ooo-way). They believed it was the source of all success in life, and they developed various strategies for getting it and hanging on to it. With clarity and wit, Slingerland introduces us to these thinkers and the marvelous characters in their texts, from the butcher whose blade glides effortlessly through an ox to the wood carver who sees his sculpture simply emerge from a solid block. Slingerland uncovers a direct line from wu-wei to the Force in Star Wars, explains why wu-wei is more powerful than flow, and tells us what it all means for getting a date. He also shows how new research reveals what’s happening in the brain when we’re in a state of wu-wei—why it makes us happy and effective and trustworthy, and how it might have even made civilization possible. Through stories of mythical creatures and drunken cart riders, jazz musicians and Japanese motorcycle gangs, Slingerland effortlessly blends Eastern thought and cutting-edge science to show us how we can live more fulfilling lives. Trying Not To Try is mind-expanding and deeply pleasurable, the perfect antidote to our striving modern culture.

Minds Make Societies

Minds Make Societies PDF Author: Pascal Boyer
Publisher: Yale University Press
ISBN: 0300235178
Category : Psychology
Languages : en
Pages : 393

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Book Description
A scientist integrates evolutionary biology, genetics, psychology, economics, and more to explore the development and workings of human societies. “There is no good reason why human societies should not be described and explained with the same precision and success as the rest of nature.” Thus argues evolutionary psychologist Pascal Boyer in this uniquely innovative book. Integrating recent insights from evolutionary biology, genetics, psychology, economics, and other fields, Boyer offers precise models of why humans engage in social behaviors such as forming families, tribes, and nations, or creating gender roles. In fascinating, thought-provoking passages, he explores questions such as: Why is there conflict between groups? Why do people believe low-value information such as rumors? Why are there religions? What is social justice? What explains morality? Boyer provides a new picture of cultural transmission that draws on the pragmatics of human communication, the constructive nature of memory in human brains, and human motivation for group formation and cooperation. “Cool and captivating…It will change forever your understanding of society and culture.”—Dan Sperber, co-author of The Enigma of Reason “It is highly recommended…to researchers firmly settled within one of the many single disciplines in question. Not only will they encounter a wealth of information from the humanities, the social sciences and the natural sciences, but the book will also serve as an invitation to look beyond the horizons of their own fields.”—Eveline Seghers, Evolutionary Studies in Imaginative Culture

Mind and Body in Early China

Mind and Body in Early China PDF Author: Edward Slingerland
Publisher:
ISBN: 019084230X
Category : Health & Fitness
Languages : en
Pages : 401

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Book Description
Mind and Body in Early China critiques Orientalist accounts of early China as a radical "holistic" other, which saw no qualitative difference between mind and body. Drawing on knowledge and techniques from the sciences and digital humanities, Edward Slingerland demonstrates that seeing a difference between mind and body is a psychological universal, and that human sociality would be fundamentally impossible without it. This book has implications for anyone interested in comparative religion, early China, cultural studies, digital humanities, or science-humanities integration.

What Science Offers the Humanities

What Science Offers the Humanities PDF Author: Edward Slingerland
Publisher: Cambridge University Press
ISBN: 9780521701518
Category : Religion
Languages : en
Pages : 390

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Book Description
What Science Offers the Humanities examines some of the deep problems facing current approaches to the study of culture. It focuses especially on the excesses of postmodernism, but also acknowledges serious problems with postmodernism's harshest critics. In short, Edward Slingerland argues that in order for the humanities to progress, its scholars need to take seriously contributions from the natural sciences-and particular research on human cognition-which demonstrate that any separation of the mind and the body is entirely untenable. The author provides suggestions for how humanists might begin to utilize these scientific discoveries without conceding that science has the last word on morality, religion, art, and literature. Calling into question such deeply entrenched dogmas as the "blank slate" theory of nature, strong social constructivism, and the ideal of disembodied reason, What Science Offers the Humanities replaces the human-sciences divide with a more integrated approach to the study of culture.