Natural

Natural PDF Author: Alan Levinovitz
Publisher: Beacon Press
ISBN: 080701088X
Category : Nature
Languages : en
Pages : 266

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Book Description
Illuminates the far-reaching harms of believing that natural means “good,” from misinformation about health choices to justifications for sexism, racism, and flawed economic policies. People love what’s natural: it’s the best way to eat, the best way to parent, even the best way to act—naturally, just as nature intended. Appeals to the wisdom of nature are among the most powerful arguments in the history of human thought. Yet Nature (with a capital N) and natural goodness are not objective or scientific. In this groundbreaking book, scholar of religion Alan Levinovitz demonstrates that these beliefs are actually religious and highlights the many dangers of substituting simple myths for complicated realities. It may not seem like a problem when it comes to paying a premium for organic food. But what about condemnations of “unnatural” sexual activity? The guilt that attends not having a “natural” birth? Economic deregulation justified by the inherent goodness of “natural” markets? In Natural, readers embark on an epic journey, from Peruvian rainforests to the backcountry in Yellowstone Park, from a “natural” bodybuilding competition to a “natural” cancer-curing clinic. The result is an essential new perspective that shatters faith in Nature’s goodness and points to a better alternative. We can love nature without worshipping it, and we can work toward a better world with humility and dialogue rather than taboos and zealotry.

Natural

Natural PDF Author: Alan Levinovitz
Publisher: Beacon Press
ISBN: 080701088X
Category : Nature
Languages : en
Pages : 266

Get Book Here

Book Description
Illuminates the far-reaching harms of believing that natural means “good,” from misinformation about health choices to justifications for sexism, racism, and flawed economic policies. People love what’s natural: it’s the best way to eat, the best way to parent, even the best way to act—naturally, just as nature intended. Appeals to the wisdom of nature are among the most powerful arguments in the history of human thought. Yet Nature (with a capital N) and natural goodness are not objective or scientific. In this groundbreaking book, scholar of religion Alan Levinovitz demonstrates that these beliefs are actually religious and highlights the many dangers of substituting simple myths for complicated realities. It may not seem like a problem when it comes to paying a premium for organic food. But what about condemnations of “unnatural” sexual activity? The guilt that attends not having a “natural” birth? Economic deregulation justified by the inherent goodness of “natural” markets? In Natural, readers embark on an epic journey, from Peruvian rainforests to the backcountry in Yellowstone Park, from a “natural” bodybuilding competition to a “natural” cancer-curing clinic. The result is an essential new perspective that shatters faith in Nature’s goodness and points to a better alternative. We can love nature without worshipping it, and we can work toward a better world with humility and dialogue rather than taboos and zealotry.

Believers: Faith in Human Nature

Believers: Faith in Human Nature PDF Author: Melvin Konner
Publisher: W. W. Norton & Company
ISBN: 0393651878
Category : Religion
Languages : en
Pages : 222

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Book Description
An anthropologist examines the nature of religiosity, and how it shapes and benefits humankind. Believers is a scientist’s answer to attacks on faith by some well-meaning scientists and philosophers. It is a firm rebuke of the “Four Horsemen”—Richard Dawkins, Daniel Dennett, Sam Harris, and Christopher Hitchens—known for writing about religion as something irrational and ultimately harmful. Anthropologist Melvin Konner, who was raised as an Orthodox Jew but has lived his adult life without such faith, explores the psychology, development, brain science, evolution, and even genetics of the varied religious impulses we experience as a species. Conceding that faith is not for everyone, he views religious people with a sympathetic eye; his own upbringing, his apprenticeship in the trance-dance religion of the African Bushmen, and his friends and explorations in Christian, Buddhist, Hindu, Muslim, and other faiths have all shaped his perspective. Faith has always manifested itself in different ways—some revelatory and comforting; some kind and good; some ecumenical and cosmopolitan; some bigoted, coercive, and violent. But the future, Konner argues, will both produce more nonbelievers, and incline the religious among us—holding their own by having larger families—to increasingly reject prejudice and aggression. A colorful weave of personal stories of religious—and irreligious—encounters, as well as new scientific research, Believers shows us that religion does much good as well as undoubted harm, and that for at least a large minority of humanity, the belief in things unseen neither can nor should go away.

Nature's Wild

Nature's Wild PDF Author: Andil Gosine
Publisher: Duke University Press
ISBN: 1478021888
Category : Art
Languages : en
Pages : 131

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Book Description
In Nature's Wild, Andil Gosine engages with questions of humanism, queer theory, and animality to examine and revise understandings of queer desire in the Caribbean. Surveying colonial law, visual art practices, and contemporary activism, Gosine shows how the very concept of homosexuality in the Caribbean (and in the Americas more broadly) has been overdetermined by a colonially influenced human/animal divide. Gosine refutes this presupposed binary and embraces animality through a series of case studies: a homoerotic game called puhngah, the institution of gender-based dress codes in Guyana, and efforts toward the decriminalization of sodomy in Trinidad and Tobago—including the work of famed activist Colin Robinson, paintings of human animality by Guadeloupean artist Kelly Sinnapah Mary, and Gosine's own artistic practice. In so doing, he troubles the ways in which individual and collective anxieties about “wild natures” have shaped the existence of Caribbean people while calling for a reassessment of what political liberation might look like. Duke University Press Scholars of Color First Book Award recipient

Wild by Nature

Wild by Nature PDF Author: Tom Morrisey
Publisher: Baker Books
ISBN: 1441244360
Category : Religion
Languages : en
Pages : 205

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Book Description
This is a book for those who love adventure and who are driven to explore the earth God has created. The author draws from his own experiences in the world of sports to offer insight into the thoughts and reflections of athletes as they encounter a world of high drama and, at times, unanticipated beauty. While testing his determination and skill in mountain climbing or deep sea diving, for example, the author observes how biblical truths are as applicable in the wilds of nature as they are in a serene church setting on Sunday morning. No matter how extreme our lifestyle, God is there with those who honor him.

Rediscovering Faith

Rediscovering Faith PDF Author: Myles Munroe
Publisher: Destiny Image Publishers
ISBN: 0768496705
Category : Religion
Languages : en
Pages : 197

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Book Description
What is true faith? In The Power of Kingdom Faith, Dr. Myles Munroe strips away the common errors and misconceptions surrounding faith to reveal the nature, character, and power of true faith, or, Kingdom faith. Kingdom faith trusts not in the promises of God but in the God who promises; seeks not the blessings of God, but the God who blesses. Kingdom faith will always be tested, but because it places its trust in the King of the universe, will always prevail under testing. Kingdom faith, therefore is a triumphant faith that will overcome the world.

Toward a Theology of Nature

Toward a Theology of Nature PDF Author: Wolfhart Pannenberg
Publisher: Westminster John Knox Press
ISBN: 9780664253844
Category : Religion
Languages : en
Pages : 184

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Book Description
Pannenberg poses theological questions to natural scientists that illuminate his personal position on issues dealing with theology and the natural sciences, especially physics, reviewing the relationship between natural law and contingency, the importance of the spirit in the phenomenon of life, field theory, language, and the theological account for the nature of God and God's creative activity.

This Outside Life

This Outside Life PDF Author: Laurie Ostby Kehler
Publisher: Harvest House Publishers
ISBN: 0736975799
Category : Religion
Languages : en
Pages : 210

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Book Description
Step Into Wonder Has your breath ever caught at the sight of a sunset? Have you ever stopped in your tracks to listen to a birdsong? When was the last time you stood in awe of the world around you? If it’s been so long you can’t remember, living life at a sprint might be leaving you nature blind. If you’re feeling stressed, disconnected from God, and disenchanted with life, this book will help you find solace for your scattered soul. Through storytelling, practical application, and reflective questions, Laurie Kehler invites you on a journey of discovery to… escape the crazy and reset your spiritual compass to explore pathways of peace seek connections with nature and others—starting in your own backyard recognize God’s work in creation and in your life as you live in expectation of his promises Are you ready to set out on a new kind of adventure? Consider this your trail guide for uncovering God’s signposts in the world and revealing his fingerprints on your life.

Keeping Faith with Nature

Keeping Faith with Nature PDF Author: Robert B. Keiter
Publisher: Yale University Press
ISBN: 0300128274
Category : Science
Languages : en
Pages : 448

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Book Description
As the twenty-first century dawns, public land policy is entering a new era. This timely book examines the historical, scientific, political, legal, and institutional developments that are changing management priorities and policies—developments that compel us to view the public lands as an integrated ecological entity and a key biodiversity stronghold. Once the background is set, each chapter opens with a specific natural resource controversy, ranging from the Pacific Northwest’s spotted owl imbroglio to the struggle over southern Utah’s Colorado Plateau country. Robert Keiter uses these case histories to analyze the ideas, forces, and institutions that are both fomenting and retarding change. Although Congress has the final say in how the public domain is managed, the public land agencies, federal courts, and western communities are each playing important roles in the transformation to an ecological management regime. At the same time, a newly emergent and homegrown collaborative process movement has given the public land constituencies a greater role in administering these lands. Arguing that we must integrate the new imperatives of ecosystem science with our devolutionary political tendencies, Keiter outlines a coherent new approach to natural resources policy.

Colors of Nature

Colors of Nature PDF Author: Alison H. Deming
Publisher: Milkweed Editions
ISBN: 1571318143
Category : Nature
Languages : en
Pages : 353

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Book Description
“An anthology of nature writing by people of color, providing deeply personal connections to—or disconnects from—nature.” —NPR From African American to Asian American, indigenous to immigrant, “multiracial” to “mixed-blood,” the diversity of cultures in this world is matched only by the diversity of stories explaining our cultural origins: stories of creation and destruction, displacement and heartbreak, hope and mystery. With writing from Jamaica Kincaid on the fallacies of national myths, Yusef Komunyakaa connecting the toxic legacy of his hometown, Bogalusa, LA, to a blind faith in capitalism, and bell hooks relating the quashing of multiculturalism to the destruction of nature that is considered “unpredictable”—among more than thirty-five other examinations of the relationship between culture and nature—this collection points toward the trouble of ignoring our cultural heritage, but also reveals how opening our eyes and our minds might provide a more livable future. Contributors: Elmaz Abinader, Faith Adiele, Francisco X. Alarcón, Fred Arroyo, Kimberly Blaeser, Joseph Bruchac, Robert D. Bullard, Debra Kang Dean, Camille Dungy, Nikky Finney, Ray Gonzalez, Kimiko Hahn, bell hooks, Jeanne Wakatsuki Houston, Pualani Kanaka’ole Kanahele, Robin Wall Kimmerer, Jamaica Kincaid, Yusef Komunyakaa, J. Drew Lanham, David Mas Masumoto, Maria Melendez, Thyllias Moss, Gary Paul Nabhan, Nalini Nadkarni, Melissa Nelson, Jennifer Oladipo, Louis Owens, Enrique Salmon, Aileen Suzara, A. J. Verdelle, Gerald Vizenor, Patricia Jabbeh Wesley, Al Young, Ofelia Zepeda “This notable anthology assembles thinkers and writers with firsthand experience or insight on how economic and racial inequalities affect a person’s understanding of nature . . . an illuminating read.” —Bloomsbury Review “[An] unprecedented and invaluable collection.” —Booklist

Barbaric Heart

Barbaric Heart PDF Author: Curtis White
Publisher: Routledge
ISBN: 1351220004
Category : Political Science
Languages : en
Pages : 171

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Book Description
Smart, funny, and fresh, The Barbaric Heart argues that the present environmental crisis will not be resolved by the same forms of crony capitalism and managerial technocracy that created the crisis in the first place. With his trademark wit, White argues that the solution might very well come from an unexpected quarter: the arts, religion, and the realm of the moral imagination.