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“Whitehead, LSD, and Transpersonal Psychology” by Leonard Gibson
This is a truly fascinating piece written by Leonard Gibson bringing Whitehead into conversation with Stan Grof. Gibson uses Whitehead’s account of experience to undertake a rhetorical explication of the LSD experience. A few samples: Every event prehends the entire universe, with gradations of relevance. In our ordinary perception of events we take into account… Read more
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Schelling’s and Shankara’s Nondual Visions [audio and video]
I was recently in dialogue with a friend and colleague at CIIS, James Barnes. We discussed the convergences and divergences in the thoughts of Schelling and Shankara. To what extent were both after a nondual philosophy? I suggested that Schelling ends up affirming a trinitarian view of Godhead that preserves differentiation (though still a differentiation-in-unity) for the… Read more
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The Beginning and the End of Positive Philosophy
In the Theaeteus, Plato has Socrates say that “wonder is the feeling of a philosopher, and philosophy begins in wonder.” In his Metaphysics, Aristotle echoes this by writing that “it was their wonder, astonishment, that first led men to philosophize and still leads them.” In the Phaedo, Plato has Socrates say that “those who really apply… Read more
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Cosmopolitical Reflections on Economy, Society, and Religion
When was the day that money became an idol instead of an instrument? Was it August 15, 1971, when to pay for the Vietnam War Nixon shocked the world by erasing the Gold Standard, thereby unilaterally making the value of the US Dollar the reserve currency of the world economy? Or was it in the… Read more
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C. S. Peirce on Chaos and Law–On the Mystery of Naming the Real
After Nature/Leon has brought my attention to a review of a new book, Peirce and the Threat of Nominalism by Paul Forster. “[Peirce’s] opposition to nominalism motivated him as nothing else did and, as Forster shows, is central to his philosophical program. While Peirce’s argument against nominalism was strictly philosophical, his objection to it extended… Read more
“In one sense philosophy does nothing. It merely satisfies the entirely impractical craving to probe and adjust ideas which have been found adequate each in its special sphere of use. In the same way the ocean tides do nothing. Twice daily they beat upon the cliffs of continents and then retire. But have patience and look deeper; and you find that in the end whole continents of thought have been submerged by philosophic tides, and have been rebuilt in the depths awaiting emergence. The fate of humanity depends upon the ultimate continental faith by which it shapes its action, and this faith is in the end shaped by philosophy.”
—Alfred North Whitehead
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