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Eric Dietrich, “Excellent Beauty: The Naturalness of Religion and the Unnaturalness of the World” (Columbia UP, )
Eric Dietrich, “Excellent Beauty: The Naturalness of Religion and the Unnaturalness of the World” (Columbia UP, )
ratings:
Length:
67 minutes
Released:
Apr 15, 2016
Format:
Podcast episode
Description
Although there are many deep criticisms of a scientific view of humanity and the world, a persistent theme is that the scientific worldview eliminates mystery, and in particular, the wonders and mysteries of the world’s religions. In Excellent Beauty: The Naturalness of Religion and the Unnaturalness of the World (Columbia University Press), Eric Dietrich argues that the human thirst for mystery would still be slated even if we explain away the mysteries of religion in scientific, specifically evolutionary, terms. Among the strange “excellent beauties”, he claims, are consciousness and infinity. Dietrich, professor of philosophy at Binghamton University, describes the structure of spiritual journeys, the social-bonding role of religious belief and our ineliminably “Janus-faced” nature as creatures who dislike open-ended mysteries but love magical thinking.Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices
Released:
Apr 15, 2016
Format:
Podcast episode
Titles in the series (100)
Eric Schwitzgebel, “Perplexities of Consciousness” (MIT Press, 2011): How much do we know about our stream of conscious experience? Not much, if Eric Schwitzgebel is right. In his new book Perplexities of Consciousness (MIT Press, 2011), Schwitzgebel argues for skepticism regarding our knowledge of the phenomenology of c... by New Books in Philosophy