CHANGING LANDSCAPE IN SCIENCE-RELIGION DIALOGUES

One peculiarity of the broad theme of science-religion dialogues is that while it has been growing significantly, it seems to be moving farther and farther away from its goal of establishing bridges and understandings between the two enterprises. This essay explores this unhappy situation, with particular reference to the works of two scholars who have been critical of some of the pioneer theologians and have suggested some radically new approaches to the issues.     

ARGUMENTS FROM NOTHING: GOD AND QUANTUM COSMOLOGY

This essay explores a simple argument for a Ground of Being, objections to it, and limitations on it. It is nonsensical to refer to Nothing in the sense of utter absence, hence nothing can be claimed to come from Nothing. If, as it seems, the universe, or any physical ensemble containing it, is past‐finite, it must be caused by an uncaused Ground. Speculative many‐worlds, pocket universes and multiverses do not affect this argument, but the quantum cosmologies of Alex Vilenkin, and J. B. Hartle and Stephen Hawking, which claim that the universe came from literally nothing, would. I argue that their novel project cannot work for reasons both physical (their “nothing” is actually a vacuum state governed by eternal physical laws) and methodological (physical theory cannot explain the emergence of the physical per se). Thus my argument stands. However, as David Hume showed, a posteriori arguments like mine infer a creation, and Creator, of a certain character, namely, a stochastic concept of creation and a panentheistic, partly physical Creator lacking omniscience and omnipotence. Rather than undermining the cosmological argument, as Hume intended, these limitations liberate the concept of the Ground from unnecessary problems, as Hartshorne suggested.     

Four noble truths based problem solving: a therapeutic view

This paper presents the application of the four noble truths based problem solving (FNTBPS) approach to supplement the contemporary and traditional Thai Theravada Buddhism literature on psychological healing. This paper outlines the core concept of FNTBPS, its key components and application, using an illustrated case example of Tom (????), a 50-year-old Thai man facing psychological problems due to his worsening eyesight. Lastly, this paper outlines the therapeutic implications of how an understanding of psychological healing via the knowledge of FNTBPS can be used for case formulation and treatment planning.     

The pessimistic origin of Nietzsche’s thought of eternal recurrence

ABSTRACT

In this article I argue that we should understand Nietzsche’s doctrine of eternal recurrence as the ideal of life affirmation opposed to philosophical pessimism, the view that life is not worth living. I first articulate Nietzsche’s psychological account of pessimism as a vengeful focus on the past and an aversion to time understood as transience. I then consider the question of why a person with the opposite psychological orientation – a creative relation to the future and an endorsement of time – would will the eternal recurrence of all things. My answer appeals to Nietzsche’s notions of will to power and the redemption of the past from its senselessness. The interpretation of eternal recurrence that emerges from this approach takes Nietzsche’s vision of a great, world-redeeming individual to be integral to his doctrine of eternal recurrence. This is just one way in which it differs from common interpretations of eternal recurrence as a cosmological theory or thought experiment.