The supernatural guilt trip does not take us far enough

Belief in souls is only one component of supernatural thinking in which individuals infer the presence of invisible mechanisms that explain events as paranormal rather than natural. We believe it is important to place greater emphasis on the prevalence of supernatural beliefs across other domains, if only to counter simplistic divisions between rationality and irrationality recently aligned with the contentious science/religion debate

Some aspects of the concept of unconscious purpose in modern philosophy

Thesis (Ph.D.)--Boston University, 194

Dialectical Thinking: A Proposed Foundation for a Post-modern Psychology

For the authors, the way from a modern to a post-modern psychology requires dialectical thinking. Dialectical thinking recognizes the importance of contradiction, change, and synthesis; it also includes recognition of the value as well as limits of modern epistemological approaches. The article describes foundations for both ongoing efforts to understand and research the ontogeny of dialectical thinking and for appreciating the scope of dialectical thinking and its relevance for establishing a bridge from modern to post-modern psychology.info:eu-repo/semantics/publishedVersio

The general metaphysics of William Ernest Hocking.

Thesis (Ph.D.)--Boston University.This dissertation is an investigation in the general metaphysics of William Ernest Hocking. The attempt is made to expound and evaluate his metaphysical system as a whole, rather than to center attention on any single aspect of it in particular. Thus, the concern is with the basic metaphysical issues of the experience, knowledge, and nature of ultimate reality, considered primarily in the context of man's relationship to that which is most real. Although there have been several studies of various aspects of Hocking's philosophy, particularly in mysticism and the philosophy of religion, there have been no previous comprehensive investigations of his metaphysics as such. The method of procedure in this dissertation has been to concentrate primarily on Hocking's own writings, with such attention to other thinkers as may have been necessary for clearer expression and comment. [TRUNCATED

On the adaptive advantage of always being right (even when one is not)

We propose another positive illusion – overconfidence in the generalisability of one’s theory – that fits with McKay & Dennett’s (M&D’s) criteria for adaptive misbeliefs. This illusion is pervasive in adult reasoning but we focus on its prevalence in children’s developing theories. It is a strongly held conviction arising from normal functioning of the doxastic system that confers adaptive advantage on the individual

An interpretation of philosophy and aesthetics for contemporary music education

Thesis (D.M.A)--Boston University N.B. Page 237 misnomeredWhen traced culturally, the history of music education in the United States reveals certain shiftings of emphasis from the religious (1625-l770) through the political (1770-1860) and the utilitarian eras (1860-1920) towards the motives of mass education (from 1920).(148:174) More recent trends indicate the emergence of the musical arts and music education as an integral aesthetic component of contemporary culture. The broadening interests in general education have stimulated the gradual promotion and clarification of such desirable democratic goals as equality of opportunity, child-centered interests, and the breakdown of parochialistic attitudes and ethnocentric tendencies. Ever since the efforts of Mason and others in introducing music into the public schools, the music education profession has made forward-looking strides to clarify objectives, to stimulate more effective teaching pedagogy, to improve standards, to broaden the horizons of music education, and to establish a working rapport with the social sciences. As a result of new concepts in changing society, important anti-thetical issues have risen from a great tradition of private and public school teaching, and have found more significant meanings in closer relations with the school, the home, and the community. These basic problems in both professional and amateur music are most crucial to the music educator today, in view of new leisure time patterns, technological advances; economic and political pressures, population growth, and the development of mass media in communication. [TRUNCATED

Unfinished Adults and Defective Children: On the Nature and Value of Childhood

Traditionally, most philosophers saw childhood as a state of deficiency and thought that its value was entirely dependent on how successfully it prepares individuals for adulthood. Yet, there are good reasons to think that childhood also has intrinsic value. Children possess certain intrinsically valuable abilities to a higher degree than adults. Moreover, going through a phase when one does not yet have a “self of one’s own,” and experimenting one’s way to a stable self, seems intrinsically valuable. I argue that children can have good lives, on several understandings of well-being – as a pleasurable state, as the satisfaction of simple desires or as the realization of certain objective goods. In reply to the likely objection that only individuals capable of morality can have intrinsic value, I explain why it is plausible that children have sufficient moral agency to be as deserving of respect as adults

What matter? Human nature beyond the Cartesian Framework. An essay in metapsychology

This thesis seeks to recast the body/mind problem and some of its associated questions in light of a historical diagnosis of the underlying metaphysical premises of the current debate and through a contrastive examination of two aternative metaphysical frameworks. Despite a proliferation of reductive and non-reductive perspectives in contemporary debates about mind/body interaction, a growing consensus recognizes that the dominant philosophical alternatives fall short of accounting for the complexity of human nature. Rather than simply adding another voice to this debate, this thesis argies that the present philosophical alternatives are only perceived as exhaustive in the first place because they share a certain philosophical 'framework' or set of assumptions - about matter, causation, mentality, reality, and the self - one that is distinctly Western and modern, and that provides the terms of the debate itself, framing and limiting the scope of questions and responses alike. Offering a historical diagnosis of what it calls the 'Cartesian framework', the thesis shows that despite functioning as a taken-for-granted background, this framework is in fact not a universal 'given' evacuated from historical circumstances. The thesis then examines two examples of pre-Cartesian and non-Western metaphysics, namely Thomism and Buddhist philosophy - neither of which encounter any body/mind problem in theor accounts of human nature because they do not share the assumptions of the Cartesian framework. Finally, it suggests that more than simply revealing the limitations of the Cartesian framework underpinning contemporary philosophical debates, drawing on these two case studies might offer ways of sidestepping the current philosophical dead-end, as well as having practical implications for any discipline concerned with human nature - our bodies, behavior and 'inner' life - beyond mere philosophical speculation

1954-1955 Xavier University Evening Division Bulletin Liberal Arts, Commerce and Finance Course Catalog

https://www.exhibit.xavier.edu/coursecatalog/1214/thumbnail.jp