Cornell College: Program in Science and Religion

Cornell College in Mount Vernon, Iowa, has established a new interdisciplinary program in science and religion. One of the features of this program is an undergraduate major in science and religion that requires substantial course work in at least one of the natural sciences as well as course work in philosophy, religion, and history. As a result of a grant from the John Templeton Foundation, Cornell College will offer a special course, God and Physics: From Aquinas to Quantum Mechanics (April 1998), and will sponsor an international symposium on creation and contemporary cosmology (April 1999). Opportunities exist for interested scholars to come to Cornell as Templeton Visiting Fellows in order to participate in these activities.     

Reviews

Thomas Ryba, The Essence of Phenomenology and Its Meaning for the Scientific Study of Religion
Daniel C. Dennett, Darwin's Dangerous Idea: Evolution and the Meaning of Life
Edited by Clifford N. Matthews and Roy A. Varghese, Cosmic Beginnings and Human Ends: Where Science and Religion Meet     

Selective attention and the breadth of learning: A developmental study

Nursery school and second-grade subjects were trained on an optional intradimensional/extradimensional shift task with (1) no overtraining, (2) overtraining on the initial problem only, (3) overtraining on the shift problem only, or (4) overtraining on both the initial and the shift problems. Predictions concerning the effects of age and training conditions on the type of solution and the breadth of learning for the shift problem were derived from selective attention theory. However, the results were not consistent with the one-look assumption of such models. Instead, a multiple-look theory in which the breadth of attention varies with task demands seems most tenable.     

The temporal course of the frustration effect

General activity subsequent to reward (R) and nonreward (N) was monitored at 5-sec intervals with a stabilimeter in the runway goal box. Activity of never-rewarded control Ss was also measured. In Expt 1 it was found that the frustration effect (difference between N- and R-trial activities) disappeared after about 40 sec of goal box confinement. This disappearance of the frustration effect was due to activity increase on R trials rather than activity decrease on N trials as a function of time. Comparison of N-trial activity with control group activity indicated that frustration does not dissipate within 60 sec. Expt 2 investigated activity following reward and nonreward as a function of reward magnitude. Evidence from these experiments suggests that the late R-trial activity increase results from frustration, possibly conditioned to apparatus cues on N trials.     

More than a feeling: Wittgenstein and William James on love and other emotions

One of the most significant features of Wittgenstein's Remarks on the Philosophy of Psychology (written after he had completed most of the Philosophical Investigations) is his reflections on emotions. Wittgenstein's treatment of this topic was developed in direct response to his reading of William James’s chapter on emotions in his 1890 masterpiece, The Principles of Psychology. This paper examines the competing views of emotions that emerge in these works, both of which attempt to overcome the Cartesian dualist conception in different ways. The main point of disagreement concerns the relation between emotions and their bodily expression (e.g. the relation between grief and weeping). My interpretation focuses on Wittgenstein's remarks on the emotion of love because, I argue, it is a particularly problematic case. To elucidate his largely unexplored view of love, I draw on his remarks on understanding and criteria in the Philosophical Investigations. I argue that by examining the examples of complex emotions like love, we can arrive at a more accurate characterization of Wittgenstein's general view of mental concepts and mental phenomena.     

Journal reviews

Articles reviewed: Bernstein, Jeanne Wolff. ‘Countertransference: our new royal road to the unconscious?’, Psychoanalytic Dialogues Crastnopol, Margaret. ‘The analyst's personality: Winnicott analyzing Guntrip as a case in point’, Contemporary Psychoanalysis Epstein, L. ‘The analyst's “bad-analyst” feelings: a counterpart to the process of resolving implosive defenses’, Contemporary Psychoanalysis Garwood, Alfred. ‘Psychic security: its origins, development and disruption‘, British Journal of Psychotherapy Haynes, Jane. ‘Facing the self: is man no more than this?’, Harvest Papadopoulos, Renos K. ‘Storied community as secure base: Response to the paper by Nancy Caro Hollander “Exile: Paradoxes of Loss and Creativity”’, British Journal of Psychotherapy Sand, Rosemary. ‘The interpretation of dreams: Freud and the Western tradition’ & Greenberg, Ramon & Pearlman, Chester. ‘The interpretation of dreams: a classic revisited’, Psychoanalytic Dialogues Spensley, Sheila. ‘Learning from Bion’, Journal of the British Association of Psychotherapists Wilgowicz, Perel. ‘Listening psychoanalytically to the Shoah half a century on’,International Journal of Psychoanalysis     

J. Wentzel van Huyssteen: Refiguring Rationality in the Postmodern Age

In his three books J. Wentzel van Huyssteen develops a complex and helpful notion of rationality, avoiding the extremes of foundationalism and postmodern relativism and deconstruction. Drawing from several postmodern philosophers of science and evolutionary epistemologists who seek to devise a usable notion of rationality, he weaves together a view that allows for a genuine duet betweenscience and theology. In the process he challenges much contemporary nonfoundationalist theology as well as the philosophical naïveté of some cosmologists and sociobiologists.     

The Argument from Design: What Is at Stake Theologically?

This article offers a brief overview of the argument for God's existence grounded in the evidence of design. It gives particular attention to the way the argument has evolved over time and in relation to changing scientific perspectives. The argument from de-sign has in fact been formulated and reformulated in response to the discoveries and challenges it has encountered from the field of science. The conclusion of the article explores the theological importance of this argument—its extent and its limits.