ANIMAL PASSIONS AND BEASTLY VIRTUES: COGNITIVE ETHOLOGY AS THE UNIFYING SCIENCE FOR UNDERSTANDING THE SUBJECTIVE,EMOTIONAL, EMPATHIC,AND MORAL LIVES OF ANIMALS

Abstract. In this essay, my response to four papers that were presented at the 2004 annual meeting of the American Academy of Religion in a session devoted to my research on animal behavior and cognitive ethology, I stress the importance of interdisciplinary research and collaboration for coming to terms with various aspects of animal behavior and animal cognition. I argue that we have much to learn from other animals concerning a set of “big” questions including who we are in the grand scheme of things, the role science (“science sense”) plays in our understanding of the world in which we live, what it means to “know” something, what some other ways of knowing are and how they compare to what we call “science,” and the use of anecdotes and anthropomorphism to inform studies of animal behavior. I ask, Are other minds really all that private and inaccessible? Can a nonhuman animal be called a person? What does the future hold if we continue to dismantle the only planet we live on and persecute the other animal beings with whom we are supposed to coexist? I argue that cognitive ethology is the unifying science for understanding the subjective, emotional, empathic, and moral lives of animals, because it is essential to know what animals do, think, and feel as they go about their daily routines in the company of their friends and when they are alone. It is also important to learn why both the similarities and differences between humans and other animals have evolved. The more we come to understand other animals, the more we will appreciate them as the amazing beings they are, and the more we will come to understand ourselves.     

SURVIVORS OF THE HOLOCAUST AND THEIR CHILDREN

Despite the importance given in their narratives to the birth of their children and grandchildren, in most of the interviews I conducted with Holocaust survivors they do not discuss their children or family life in detail. Rather, for many of them, discussion is generally connected to how or what they have explained to their children about their experiences during the war. Survivors’ preoccupation with this issue could be understood as a response to the context in which they find themselves, in which a particular social discourse about survivors has developed. This discourse arguably engendered particular responses from survivors: it is a question that survivors expect to be asked, and it is seen as part of their prescribed role. Based on over 50 narrative interviews with survivors of the Holocaust, this article explores how survivors reflect and understand their parenting. It examines to what extent their behaviour has been influenced by their experiences during the war, or in reaction to a particular social discourse. Whilst literature on the second generation has been predominantly based on the responses of the children of survivors, this article provides important evidence of how survivors reflect on and understand their parenting.     

Emerging Worldviews: The Supplicate Order—Invocation of the Sacred

Approaches to supplication, such as faith and single-minded devotion to an ultimate value or deity, are proposed to constitute the human interface between the manifest and the unmanifest. A reciprocal, resonant interchange between the unmanifest and human summoning of the holy can bring the sacred to expression in cultural forms and personal experience. Addressing the boundaries between the human and the divine, this paper presents a cross-cultural model for spiritual supplication. This model utilizes the anthropological term ritual frame and provides an integrative worldview with which to examine the dynamics of sacred contact and invocation. This suggests that supplication is the universal and fundamental human orientation to invoke the reception of profound healings, as well as spiritual blessings, cross-cultural understandings and innumerable gifts of creativity.     

THE TRUTH OF TRIPARTITION

Since the arguments that Plato provides in the Republic for the thesis that the human soul consist of three parts (reason, spirit, appetite) are notoriously problematic, I propose other reasons for accepting tripartition: reasons that we too could endorse, or at least entertain with some sympathy. To wit, (a) the appetitive part of Plato's divided soul houses desires and tendencies we have because we are animal bodies programmed to survive (as individuals and as a species) in disequilibrium with a variegated, often varying environment, (b) the spirited middle part houses status concerns that belong to us as social animals, while (c) what makes us rational animals is a faculty of reason, conceived in strikingly non-Humean terms, which determines what is best all things considered. Other psychic tendencies may then be explained in terms of the education and mutual interaction of the three parts we are 'programmed' for from birth.     

THE VARIETIES OF NON‐RELIGIOUS EXPERIENCE

I want to consider the suggestion that certain essential components of human experience are by their nature distinctively religious, and thus that the atheist is either debarred from participating fully in such experiences, or fails to understand their real nature. I am going to look at five kinds of experience:

• ? the experience of the moral ‘ought’;
• ? the experience of beauty;
• ? the experience of meaning conferred by stories;
• ? the experience of otherness and transcendence;
• ? the experience of vulnerability and fragility.

These seem to me to be integral features of any meaningful human life. They are aspects of what it is to be human. Some theists would simply agree with that statement. Others, however, would say that though essentially human they are also essentially religious, and that the secular humanist's participation in such experiences is in some way defective. That is the claim which I want to consider and contest.     

THE EPIC OF PERSONAL DEVELOPMENT AND THE MYSTERY OF SMALL WORKING MEMORY

Abstract. A partial analogy exists between the lifespan neuropsychological development of individuals and the biological evolution of species: In both of these major categories of growth, progressive emergence of wholes transcends inherently limited part‐processes. The remarkably small purview of each moment of consciousness experienced by an individual may be a crucial aspect of maintaining organization in that individual's cognitive development, protecting it from combinatorial chaos. In this essay I summarize experimental psychology research showing that working memory capacity comprises the so‐called magical number 7±2 items, not only for words and digits but for spatial items and other sorts of cognitive materials, and not only in humans but also in other species. This is so to such an extent that 7±2 may be a “constant of nature.” The small quantity range 7±2 independent items, which builds upon a more elementary, instantaneous working memory capacity of three or four items, is surprisingly independent of the time duration of a cognitive task. Moreover, it is largely independent of ontogeny. Explanations of these powerful facts about working memory are offered here within both a functionalistic framework and a framework of hypothetical neural processes. At the neural level, working memory dynamics may comprise certain brain wave harmonics or topological relationships in the sheetlike cortex. Within the functionalistic framework, I suggest an additional analogy, pertaining to cultural evolution, with Tom Gilbert's work on risk analysis and “the global problematic” that follows from unforeseen consequences of the expansiveness of human ambition. Several connections are drawn with ideas presented by participants in the Chicago Religion and Science Group about how theologies and sciences try to understand the possibility of adaptive exercises of human freedom in the face of the extreme finiteness of each human individual.     

MAKING SPACE FOR THE METHODOLOGICAL MOSAIC: THE FUTURE OF THE FIELD OF SCIENCE-AND-RELIGION

This article is a response to Josh Reeves's recent book Against Methodology in Science and Religion: Recent Debates on Rationality and Theology that welcomes Reeves's proposal for an anti-essentialist future for the field of science-and-religion, particularly because it has the potential to move the field beyond current, well-worn methods: the dominance of Christian theology and doctrine, the importance of credibility strategies, and the dependence upon philosophical discourses. Reeves’ proposal has the potential to open the science-and-religion field to other topics, problems, and methods, such as studying lived science-and-religion. One way of doing this is to study popular culture and its artifacts such as literature, which portrays a co-mingling of religion and science at the level of day-to-day experiences and practices of characters. For at the level of lived experience, religion and science are not well-defined disciplines neatly compartmentalized into separate academic departments.     

John S. Harding,Victor Sōgren Hori,and Alexander Souci,eds. Wild geese: Buddhism in Canada

Both Buddhism and Marxism have strengths and weaknesses in helping us to understand human experiences and social problems. Rather than trying to create a synthesis of the two perspectives, I attempt to discern the elements in each which can help us experience better lives and be more effective political activists. Buddhism identifies those understandings and practices which lead to greater happiness and less suffering in response to existential challenges that we all must face as mortal human beings, irrespective of the particular family, society, or historical era that we live in. But while Buddhism captures certain basic aspects of universal human experience, it does not take account of the interaction or dialectic between humans qua social beings and the relatively permanent social structures that humans both reinforce and challenge in the course of history. The latter is the province of a radical social theory, such as Marxism. At the same time, however, Marxism does not address the ways in which, at an experiential level, life causes suffering and anguish irrespective of the social context.     

INTERRELATING NATURE, HUMANITY, AND THE WORK OF GOD: SOME ISSUES FOR FUTURE REFLECTION

Abstract. This essay suggests some future items for an agenda about human viability, defined as survivability with meaning and purpose, by exploring interrelations between nature, humanity, and the work of God. It argues for intrinsic and creative value in nature, so there is a value kinship, as well as a factual kinship, between humans, nature, and God-working. It considers humans as "webs of culture, life, and cosmos" and suggests some implications of this notion of human nature for viability. And it asks what human fulfillment can be in light of the awesome creative-destroying-recreative activity that seems to be the ground of an evolving universe.     

LIVING WITH THE WICKED PROBLEM OF CLIMATE CHANGE

Outlining the characteristics of “wicked” and “super‐wicked” problems, climate change is considered as a global super‐wicked problem that is primarily about the future. Being global‐ and future‐oriented makes climate change something we have to learn to live with but cannot expect to solve. Because the Institute on Religion in an Age of Science (IRAS) is a multidisciplinary society that yokes the natural and social sciences with values, it is in a position to explore strategies for living with climate change—exemplified by the articles in this section. Finally, asking “who/what is in charge,” it is suggested that in a dynamically interrelated and evolving world no one is. It is important to distinguish between good that is already created and the creative interactions that give rise to new good. In order to live with climate change, our primary orientation should be to live with the creativity that has created and continues to create our life on Planet Earth—since we are not able to know what the future holds.     

Contributions of visual and embodied expertise to body perception

Recent research has demonstrated that our perception of the human body differs from that of inanimate objects. This study investigated whether the visual perception of the human body differs from that of other animate bodies and, if so, whether that difference could be attributed to visual experience and/or embodied experience. To dissociate differential effects of these two types of expertise, inversion effects (recognition of inverted stimuli is slower and less accurate than recognition of upright stimuli) were compared for two types of bodies in postures that varied in typicality: humans in human postures (human-typical), humans in dog postures (human-atypical), dogs in dog postures (dog-typical), and dogs in human postures (dog-atypical). Inversion disrupts global configural processing. Relative changes in the size and presence of inversion effects reflect changes in visual processing. Both visual and embodiment expertise predict larger inversion effects for human over dog postures because we see humans more and we have experience producing human postures. However, our design that crosses body type and typicality leads to distinct predictions for visual and embodied experience. Visual expertise predicts an interaction between typicality and orientation: greater inversion effects should be found for typical over atypical postures regardless of body type. Alternatively, embodiment expertise predicts a body, typicality, and orientation interaction: larger inversion effects should be found for all human postures but only for atypical dog postures because humans can map their bodily experience onto these postures. Accuracy data supported embodiment expertise with the three-way interaction. However, response-time data supported contributions of visual expertise with larger inversion effects for typical over atypical postures. Thus, both types of expertise affect the visual perception of bodies.     

Concluding Dialogue: Challenging the Past, Grasping the Future

Abstract. A dialogue between the outgoing and incoming directors of the Zygon Center for Religion and Science took place as part of the inaugural symposium. In their conversation they speak of the past and present challenges and goals of the Center, outline what is foremost in their minds, and offer glimpses into what they see as the Center's priorities for future work.     

ON THE VERY IDEA OF CRITERIA FOR PERSONHOOD

I examine the familiar criterial view of personhood, according to which the possession of personal properties such as self‐consciousness, emotionality, sentience, and so forth is necessary and sufficient for the status of a person. I argue that this view confuses criteria for personhood with parts of an ideal of personhood. In normal cases, we have already identified a creature as a person before we start looking for it to manifest the personal properties, indeed this pre‐identification is part of what makes it possible for us to see and interpret the creature as a person in the first place. This pre‐identification is typically based on biological features. Except in some interesting special or science‐fiction cases, some of which I discuss, it is human animals that we identify as persons.     

Citizenship Education and Human Rights in Sites of Ethnic Conflict: Toward Critical Pedagogies of Compassion and Shared Fate

The present essay discusses the value of citizenship as shared fate in sites of ethnic conflict and analyzes its implications for citizenship education in light of three issues: first, the requirements of affective relationality in the notion of citizenship-as-shared fate; second, the tensions between the values of human rights and shared fate in sites of ethnic conflict; and third, the ways in which citizenship education might overcome these tensions without falling into the trap of psychologization and instrumentalization, but rather focusing on providing opportunities for social and school practices that manifest shared fate and compassion in critical ways. It is argued that what teachers and schools should try to do is to make practices of shared fate and compassion possible through creating conditions for children and young people to experience what it means to enact such practices in sites of ethnic conflict. It is also suggested that teachers and schools in sites of ethnic conflict cannot produce ??new?? citizens on the basis of any values, no matter how ??noble?? these values may be. The most that can be done is to help children and young people to critically reflect upon the conditions under which people in sites of ethnic conflict can act on the basis of shared fate and compassion and provide support so that these possibilities can become realistic.     

NONEMPIRICAL REALITY: TRANSCENDING THE PHYSICAL AND SPIRITUAL IN THE ORDER OF THE ONE

I describe characteristic phenomena of quantum physics that suggest that reality appears to us in two domains: the open and well‐known domain of empirical, material things—the realm of actuality—and a hidden and invisible domain of nonempirical, non‐material forms—the realm of potentiality. The nonempirical forms are part of physical reality because they contain the empirical possibilities of the universe and can manifest themselves in the empirical world. Two classes of nonempirical states are discussed: the superposition states of microphysical entities, which are nonempirical because observation destroys them, and the virtual states of material systems, which are nonempirical because they are empty. The non‐empirical part to physical reality represents a predetermined and hidden order that exists before it is empirical, and the visible world is an emanation out of it. I discuss consequences for our understanding of human nature, the origin of life, and human values. Reality is an indivisible wholeness that is aware of its processes, like a Cosmic Spirit, and it reveals its awareness in the mindlike properties of elementary processes as well as in the human consciousness. Thus, one is led to G. W. F. Hegel's thesis that the Cosmic Spirit is thinking in us.     

I TO WE: THE ROLE OF CONSCIOUSNESS TRANSFORMATION IN COMPASSION AND ALTRUISM

It is clear that human consciousness can be transformed through spiritual experiences and practices. Little is known, however, about what the predictors, mediators, and outcomes are of such transformations in consciousness. In‐depth structured interviews were conducted with forty‐seven teachers and scholars from religious and spiritual traditions and modern transformative movements to identify factors common to the transformative process across traditions. Compassion and altruism were almost universally identified as important outcomes of positive consciousness transformation. Results of our analysis suggest that altruism and compassion may arise as natural consequences of experiences of interconnection and oneness. These experiences appear to lead to shifts in perspective and changes in one's sense of self and self in relationship to others. Based on these findings, we suggest several mechanisms by which transformative experiences and practices might influence the development of compassion and altruism.     

THE BURNING FUSE: THE UNACCEPTABLE FACE OF RELIGION

Abstract. For pragmatic reasons more attention should be devoted to the serious study of religion. Although religions inspire great achievements of human creativity, it is important to understand them because they also promote violence and warfare. One can understand the unacceptable face of religion when one sees why religions matter to those who belong to them; why they are bound to be conservative, especially in times of stress; and why, therefore, believers become very passionate about defending the boundaries of their particular religious systems. Such understanding provides a realistic basis for working toward the peaceful coexistence of conflicting religious systems.     

Rethinking relationships in cyberspace

ABSTRACT

The ubiquity of the internet, which has been extensively theorised in the social sciences, provides, for some, a radically new context in which we must rethink both the significance and the performance of being human. For others, the internet is an extension rather than revision of our pre-existing practices, meaning that what it is to be human remains largely unchanged. This is a stimulating and pressing context for theological anthropological reflection: theological doctrines do not specifically address cyberspace, but they suggest idea(l)s of being human that are, on the one hand, enduring and yet can also be read as flexible for different contexts. What, then, are the challenges and promises that digital contexts pose for models of theological anthropology, specifically ones that highlight the significance of human relationships? Do digital contexts overstretch idea(l)s of human nature? On what grounds can we assess and reflect on our conduct in cyberspace?     

Citizen Vermigli

Abstract

Peter Martyr Vermigli’s flight from Italy in 1542 left him divested of his Catholic religious heritage, but the same is not to be asserted for his Florentine republicanism. Vermigli has been viewed either as a republican (Bravi) or inclined to monarchism (Kingdon and Kirby) consonant with his time in England. This essay treats Vermigli’s presuppositions on what the human animal is, and what polity best suits such a creature. This essay engages Vermigli the Humanist in light of his Christian anthropology, and in particular his thinking about the ultimate end for humans created in the image and likeness of God, as well as what this likeness tell us about the human ability to reach its telos faced with the reality of the Fall.     

Shadow and Spirituality

When we confront the meaning of spirituality in education confusion and conflict can arise as they arise from the confrontation with spirituality in ourselves. This occurs both at the personal and at the collective level, according to writers such as C.G. Jung. Failure to understand that human spirituality includes a shadow side of this kind is precisely what leads many forms of human spiritual expression, including organized religion, into deep splits and schisms. It is unsurprising, therefore, that the willing, but perhaps, nä L ve attempts of contemporary educationalists to understand spirituality within education in a wholly positive light have themselves run into trouble. This paper will attempt to argue that without balancing contemporary educational debate about spirituality against some writers', including C.G. Jung's, deepest insights into the place of shadow in spirituality, children will yet again be sold a misfaction [1] about the nature of that aspect of human being and becoming. This, in turn will merely deepen the chaos, confusion and conflict arising from the earnest and well-intentioned, but perhaps nä L ve, attempt to make spirituality part of the cross-curricular experience of all children in all common schools.[2]