This article summarizes the recommendations concerning robotics as issued by the Commission for the Ethics of Research in Information Sciences and Technologies (CERNA), the French advisory commission for the ethics of information and communication technology (ICT) research. Robotics has numerous applications in which its role can be overwhelming and may lead to unexpected consequences. In this rapidly evolving technological environment, CERNA does not set novel ethical standards but seeks to make ethical deliberation inseparable from scientific activity. Additionally, it provides tools (...) and guidance for researchers and research institutions. (shrink)

"As representatives of two different worlds and two entirely different attitudes, the two authors explore the wide domain of Eastern and Western philosophy. They believe that the only possible means of achieving harmonious co-operation between these two worlds lies in Yoga -- the conscious development of mind, soul, and body" -- Back cover.

The articles published in this volume will bring that knowledge which alone fortifies a student against wrong or fanciful occultism, as against the perils of ...

Yoga, Immortality and Freedom. Mircea Eliade. Translated from the French by Willard R. Trask. Arkana, London 1989.

The chapter focuses on the yogic and other ascetic practices of the sadhus of the Ramananda Sampraday, the largest renunciant order in the world.

This is a new release of the original 1927 edition.

This unique book is a complete guide to spiritual Raja and Kriya Yoga. Beginning with historical and spiritual accounts of all Yoga traditions, it covers Raja and Kriya Yoga in depth, with instruction on the asanas, breathing techniques and meditations. The book is an invaluable resource for yoga practitioners, as well as spiritual seekers.

Providing a complete manual for the study and practice of Raja Yoga--the path of concentration and meditation--a new deluxe printing of a collection of timeless teachings is a treasure to be read and referred to again and again by seekers treading the spiritual path. Reprint.

What is Yoga? How is Self-realization achieved through Yoga? The great Sage Pātañjali (3rd Century B.C.) defined yoga in the Yoga-Sūtras as “the restraint of the modifications of the mind” (yogaś-citta-vritti-nirodah). In his Yoga-Sūtras (196 sutras), Pātañjali systematically laid down the exact methods and techniques for attaining Self-realization through the Eight Limbs of Pātañjali’s Yoga (Ashtānga-yoga). This system is commonly known as Rāja-yoga (Royal yoga). This Eight Steps is the way to attain self-transcendence. It consists of yama, niyama, āsanas, prānāyāma, (...) pratyāhāra, dhāranā, dhyāna and samādhi. This article will focus on Ashtānga-yoga in the practical and philosophical contexts. Other systems of yoga also use this Eight Steps, but each yoga may start from and emphasize different aspects of yoga. However all systems of yoga accept and practice the Eight Steps of yoga to achieve the final goal, that is liberation (kaivalya, moksha, mukti). Yoga also reconciles the six systems of Indian Philosophy (Shadh Darśana). Keywords: Rāja-yoga (Royal yoga), Hatha-yoga (Hard yoga), Bhakti-yoga (Yoga of Devotion), Jñāna-yoga (Yoga of Knowledge), Ashtānga-yoga (Eight limbs of Yoga), Citta-vritti-nirodha (Restraint of modification of the mind), Purusha (Spirit), Prakriti (Matter), Iśvara-pranidhāna (Surrender to God), Moksha (Liberation). (shrink)

Great Systems of Yoga is a short review of the major schools of yoga, including Hindu, Buddhist and Sufi varieties. Chapters include: The Ten Oriental Yogas; Patanjali's Raja Yoga; Shri Krishna's Gita-Yoga; Shankaracharya's Gnyana-Yoga; The Hatha and Laya Yogas; The Bhakti And Mantra Yogas; The Occult Path of Buddha; The Chinese Yoga; and, The Sufi Yogis.

Waking, Dreaming, Being is an unusual book in many ways. I mention two. First, in some ways it is a memoir. Few philosophers started as a child doing the sort of philosophy that they did as a grown-up. Evan did. Evan grew up in the intellectually fertile world of the Lindisfarne Association, the collaborative of scientists, artists, ecologists, and contemplatives founded by his father, William Irwin Thompson, a polymath, whom I had the pleasure of meeting in 2004 at the Crestone (...) Zen Monastery in Colorado.Evan’s dad taught him Raja Yoga as a boy—when he was seven!—and read him Upanishadic children’s stories. Lindisfarne was the antithesis of a C. P. Snow–style Two Cultures environment where the sciences and... (shrink)

Né à Calcutta, Swâmi Vivekânanda (1863-1902) fut fasciné dans sa jeunesse par la modernité occidentale. Sa rencontre avec le grand mystique Râmakrishna changea le cours de sa vie. Il devint son principal disciple et après la mort du maître, il renonça au monde pour parcourir l'Inde en ermite errant. Sa participation au premier Congrès mondial des religions fut pour lui le départ d'une intense activité missionnaire qui introduisit la philosophie védantique en Amérique. Dans cet ouvrage de référence, il décrit et (...) analyse trois formes majeures de yoga : le Karma-Yoga, ou " yoga de l'action désintéressée ", le plus répandu en Occident ; le Bhakti-Yoga, ou " yoga de la dévotion " à une divinité, particulièrement populaire en Inde ; et le Râja-Yoga, " le roi des yogas ", discipline ascétique totale que seuls quelques rares initiés maîtrisent sans danger. (shrink)

A popular and critical success when it first appeared in France, _Yoga and the Hindu Tradition_ has freed Yoga from the common misconceptions of the recent Yoga vogue. Jean Varenne, the distinguished French Orientalist, presents the theory of classical Yoga, in all its richness, as a method—a concrete way to reach the Absolute through spiritual exercises—which makes possible the transition from existence to essence. This excellent translation, including line drawings and charts, a glossary of technical terms, and a complete translation (...) of the _Yoga Darshana Upanishad_, begins with a brief description of the metaphysical and religious history on which Yoga is based. Varenne discusses the theoretical conception of Yoga as the search for liberating knowledge, concluding with a brief indication of the physical practices and extra Yogic themes such as Kundalini and Tantrism. It is the author's hope that "those who read [this book] will come to realize that it is in fact dishonest to reduce Yoga to some sort of physical training, or to just an occult doctrine; it is a 'world view' a _Weltanschauung_ that comprehends reality in its totality." "The straightforward, well-organized presentation makes the book itself a microcosm of what Varenne singles out as a dominant feature of classical Hindu thought—a bringing of the complex and multitudinous into a unity."—Judith Guttman, _Yoga Journal _. (shrink)

A fresh translation of Yoga Sutras of Patanjali, with word-for-word meanings and precise commentary. New insight into the advanced practices of meditation, kriya yoga and raja yoga. - A gift from a great yogin-.

Many translations have been made from the original Sanskrit of the Yoga Sutras of Patanjali. They have become well loved, well used, and well applied by many in all parts of the world and of all religious beliefs. The Sutras have a power and a timelessness about them which demonstrate the accuracy with which they pinpoint the basic truths of human evolution from subservience to personality clamours to the serene freedom of the soul. Most human problems today originate in selfish (...) desire; the prostitution of the feeling nature to self-centred physical appetites. This is also brought out clearly in the teaching of the Lord Buddha, the treading of the Noble Eight-Fold path providing the only way out of the maze: Right Values; Right Speech; Right Mode of Living; Right Thinking; Right Expression; Right Conduct; Right Effort; Right Rapture or True Happiness. These are attributes of the soul. Patanjali explores exhaustively the means, the techniques and the mental posture which create the connecting thread between the form-centred personality and these stages towards spiritual achievement and soul fusion. The four parts of the book develop: 1. The Problem of Union (51 sutras). 2. sutras). 4. Illumination (34 sutras). Many different training techniques have been available over the centuries, depending on the condition of human consciousness and the phase of spiritual growth to be accomplished. Each Yoga has had its place, fulfilled its function, and become an absorbed part of human experience. In this book the factor of mind in meeting present-day needs is again given prominence as the agent of the soul, and the key to personality release. These Yoga Sutras of Patanjali are based on Raja Yoga, the kingly science of the soul: Through the science of Raja Yoga the mind will be known as the instrument of the soul and the means whereby the brain of the aspirant becomes illuminated and knowledge gained of those matters which concern the realm of the soul. The soul is concerned with the working out of planetary purpose and plan; so again we find that mental training, and the self-achievement of the individual, lead to cooperation and service on a scale far more comprehensive and of far greater evolutionary significance than merely the individual effects on the life of the disciple. venture on the path of union with the soul. When through the removal of hindrances and the purification of the sheaths, the totality of knowledge becomes available, naught further remains for the man to do. (shrink)

This study examined whether transformational leadership would be affected by the predominance of a particular guna in a leader and his or her belief in Karma Yoga. An experiment was conducted using a sample of 110 marketing executives working in a financial services firm in eastern India. A 2 × 2 + 1 factorial design was used to manipulate the three gunas and Karma Yoga. Sattva and rajas were crossed with Karma Yoga to produce four cells, with tamas being the (...) fifth cell. Transformational leadership was the measured variable. Results show that compared to rajas, sattva enhances transformational leadership, whereas tamas reduces it. Further, Karma Yoga enhances transformational leadership when the leader is sattvic, but does not enhance transformational leadership when the leader is rajasic. Results imply that organizations interested in enhancing transformational leadership should develop s attvic qualities in their managers and encourage them to be duty oriented. (shrink)

This article discusses a peculiar Sā$$\dot {\text{n}}$$n˙khya-Yoga theory of transformation (pariṇāma) that the author of the Pātañjalayogaśāstra created by drawing upon Sarvāstivāda Buddhist theories of temporality. In developing his theory, Patañjali adaptively reused the wording in which the Sarvāstivāda theories were formulated, the specific objections against these theories, and their refutations to win the philosophical debate about temporality against Sarvāstivāda Buddhism. Patañjali’s approach towards the Sarvāstivāda Buddhist theories was possible, even though his system of Yoga is based on an ontology (...) that differs considerably from that of Sarvāstivāda Buddhism because both systems share the philosophical view that time is not a separate ontological entity in itself. Time is a concept deduced from change in the empirical world. This agreement results from the common philosophical orientation of Sarvāstivāda Buddhism and Yoga, which takes the phenomenon of experience as the basis of philosophical enquiry into the structure of the world. The intention that guided Patañjali’s adaptive reuse was twofold. On the one hand, he aimed at winning the debate with Sarvāstivāda Buddhism about how the problem of temporality can be solved. He thus integrated four mutually exclusive theories on temporality into a single theory of transformation of properties (dharma) involving a second-level and a third-level theory on the transformation of the temporal characteristic mark (lakṣaṇa) and on the transformation of states (avasthā), respectively. On the other hand, Patañjali intended to achieve philosophical clarification regarding the question of how exactly properties relate to their underlying substrate in the process of transformation of the three constituents or forces (guṇa) sattva, rajas and tamas of matter (pradhāna) that account for all phenomena of the world except pure consciousness (puruṣa). Patañjali’s theory of transformation is thus of central importance for his Sā$$\dot {\text{n}}$$n˙khya ontology, according to which the world consists of 25 categories or constituents (tattva), i.e., of primal matter (prakṛti) and its transformations and pure consciousness. (shrink)

The Yoga Sutras are of ancient origin, first reduced to writing by Patanjali, who is considered the founder of the Raja Yoga School. Control of the mind and its illumination by the soul are brought about through the practice of Raja Yoga. This volume is a paraphrase, with commentary, of the Yoga Sutras of Patanjali.

A timeless collection exploring the metaphysical power of breath and the limitless potential of the human mind. The Science of Breath is the definitive collection of books on yogic philosophy and wellness from William Walker Atkinson, writing as Yogi Ramacharaka. In this volume you'll find five revolutionary books, including: The Science of Breath The Science of Psychic Healing Raja Yoga or Mental Development The Science of Breath is part of The Library of Spiritual Wisdom, a beautifully designed series of curated (...) classics written by some of the greatest spiritual teachers of all time. With books covering topics ranging from prosperity and motivation to the occult and metaphysical thought, The Library of Spiritual Wisdom is the definitive collection of texts from some of the most revolutionary thought leaders of the last two centuries and belongs on the shelves of home libraries everywhere. (shrink)

In lieu of an abstract, here is a brief excerpt of the content:Reviewed by:The Philosophy of the Yogasūtra: An Introduction. Series: Bloomsbury Introductions to World Philosophies by Karen O’Brien-KopChristopher Key Chapple (bio)The Philosophy of the Yogasūtra: An Introduction. Series: Bloomsbury Introductions to World Philosophies. By Karen O’Brien-Kop. London: Bloomsbury Academic, 2023. Pp. xii + 186, Paper $22.95, ISBN 978-135-02-8616-0.This concise book summarizes key parts of the speculative content of Patañjali’s Yogasūtra, leaning heavily on Gerald Larson’s translation of the commentary attributed (...) to Vyāsa. True to its title, this book emphasizes the philosophical arguments regarding ontology and the origins of things. It explains the firm distinction made in Sāṃkhya and Yoga between an unchanging consciousness or Self (ātman/puruṣa) and an ever-changing realm of actions (karma) and substances (dravya) emanating from primordial matter (prakṛti) and expressed through her three modes (guṇa-s) of heaviness (tamas), passion (rajas), and lightness (sattva). This perspective differs radically from other Indian systems as well as from ancient Greek thought and the European Enlightenment tradition that gave way to analytical and continental philosophy.Sāṃkhya and Yoga proclaim that all manifestation arises from a pre-existent cause (sat-kārya-vāda). This position distinguishes these schools from Buddhism, which proclaims the constant rise and fall of constituents of reality (dharma-s), and the various schools of Vedānta, which aver toward a unified view of reality that tends to dismiss the realm of change as ultimately insignificant or even unreal. O’Brien-Kop deftly summarizes various debates on causation. The book mentions the theological nuance that the inclusion of the existence of Īśvara brings to the Yoga table. However, these explorations are more in the realm of theory than practice. For instance, the book neglects the important reference to one’s chosen deity (iṣṭa-devatā, II:44) and leaves unexplored some decidedly theological, religious and devotional implications of the Yogasūtra.The author could have been more careful in explicating Jainism. Statements such as “all forms of action are morally dubious” and that “only death can bring liberation” (p. 60) repeat tropes often heard about Jain thought that echo Hindu and Buddhist critiques. This position overlooks the nuances contained in Umasvati’s Tattvārthasūtra that delineate the Jain 14-fold progression of ascent (guṇasthāna-s) wherein an individual attains a state of freedom while living in the human body at the 13th stage.This book sets the stage for further research into under-explored areas of the Yogasūtra. The rich celebration of the efficacy of ethical comportment in [End Page 1] the second chapter, though competently summarized in O’Brien-Kop’s chapter seven, calls out for further explication. The details regarding the body and the subtle body found in the third chapter of the Yogasūtra receive scant attention. One would hope that in future works the author will engage interlocutors such as Merleau-Ponty and Luce Irigaray on breath and embodiment. O’Brien-Kop’s chapter nine, “The Aesthetics of Freedom” calls into focus the centrality of the enlightenment process through which Buddhi, the bridge between conscious awareness and the material real, reverts increasingly toward sattva, the most refined and hence most liberating state of being. Brief mention is made here of the body’s perfectibility (p. 148). The discussion of metaphor at the end of the chapter invites a more extended conversation about light, jewels, and steadiness. This book advances conversations long in process about the nature and purpose of Yoga. The Yogasūtra was rediscovered in the 19th century and popularized by Swami Vivekananda, whose book Raja Yoga introduced the Yoga tradition to millions worldwide. Scholars such as Dasgupta, Eliade, Feuerstein, Larson, Barbara Stoler Miller, Rukmini, Whicher, Bryant and many others have helped bring rigor to the study of this important text, complementing the many popular translations by Swamis and teachers of modern postural Yoga.The book includes discussion questions at the end of each of the chapters. It is written in a manner accessible to undergraduate students of philosophy. O’Brien-Kop reminds us that the philosophical rigor of the... (shrink)

The author outlines a spiritually oriented model of cosmic education inspired by Advaita Vedanta philosophy. The description of the general principles of this Nondual Vedantic Cosmic Education (NVCE) will be preceded by a brief review of the writings of two Indian authors, Vivekananda and Aurobindo, who led the revitalisation of nondual vedantic philosophy. In order to utilize the nondual vedantic spiritual wisdom as a curriculum substrate for teaching/learning processes in classrooms, the NVCE model uses some core ideas from Ken Wilber’s (...) Integral Theory, which can serve as an interface theory between nondual vedantic philosophy and this new conception of cosmic education. NVCE will be organized around three main curriculum realms: a) “Purifying the mind”, b) “Controlling the Mind” and c) “Expanding the Mind”. These three curriculum realms are shown to respectively correspond with three processes in Wilber’s Integral Theory, such as a) Show Up, b) Wake Up and c) Grow Up), and also with the four classical yogas mentioned in the wisdom traditions of Hinduism: a) Bakhti Yoga and Karma Yoga, b) Raja Yoga and c) Jnana Yoga. The author holds that this world has no future unless spirituality becomes the substrate of educational processes. In NVCE, which is a proposal to raise the educational building from spiritual pillars, to educate is to guide others and ourselves on the path that leads to the nondual experience. From the nondual vedantic perspective, cosmic education is the path through which human beings progressively dissolve their limited individualities into the nature of God. (shrink)

William James considered Swami Vivekananda the paragon of monists. Yet he comes to reject Vivekananda's philosophy as a result of monism's ineluctable philosophical conundrums and because it ultimately did not suit his active temperament. James's simplified assessment of Vivekananda's philosophy, however, reveals he had only a limited understanding of Vedānta. It can be speculated that James's understanding of Vedānta was mainly the aspect of rāja yoga (the science of psychic control)—which is evinced by the fact that he disagrees with what (...) he perceives as a lack of ability to justify meliorism and a zestful life. But this conception of James's leaves out of consideration karma yoga—or the active principle of Vedānta—which advocates work as the means to realize the divine. Contra James's conception, it is more illustrative to understand Vedānta not as a doctrine of extreme “monism” but rather an attitude that cultivates every particular temperament and disposition. With this rectification, it becomes much clearer that there are significant parallels in viewpoints between James and Vivekananda that have been underappreciated. (shrink)

Since his death in 1950, Sri Aurobindo Ghose has been known primarily as a yogi and a philosopher of spiritual evolution who was nominated for the Nobel Prize in peace and literature. But the years Aurobindo spent in yogic retirement were preceded by nearly four decades of rich public and intellectual work. Biographers usually focus solely on Aurobindo's life as a politician or sage, but he was also a scholar, a revolutionary, a poet, a philosopher, a social and cultural theorist, (...) and the inspiration for an experiment in communal living. Peter Heehs, one of the founders of the Sri Aurobindo Ashram Archives, is the first to relate all the aspects of Aurobindo's life in its entirety. Consulting rare primary sources, Heehs describes the leader's role in the freedom movement and in the framing of modern Indian spirituality. He examines the thinker's literary, cultural, and sociological writings and the Sanskrit, Bengali, English, and French literature that influenced them, and he finds the foundations of Aurobindo's yoga practice in his diaries and unpublished letters. Heehs's biography is a sensitive, honest portrait of a life that also provides surprising insights into twentieth-century Indian history. (shrink)

Mircea Eliade's book Yoga: Immortality and Freedom has deservedly become a classic, and has reached, as he intended, a far wider audience than the narrow circle of Indologists. The book's popularity may justify the following remarks. It was originally published in French in 1936, then in an enlarged French version in 1954, and in English translation in 1958. There has thus been ample opportunity for revision, and indeed in the second English edition , which we are taking as our text, (...) Eliade notes that he has made ‘numerous minor corrections’. However, the accuracy of his observations on early Buddhism still leaves much to be desired. Let us try to set the record straight. (shrink)

According to the Hindu tradition, the origin of the various philosophical ideas that were developed in the philosophical systems lies in the Vedas, a body of texts that seem to have been composed around two thousand years Before the Common Era (BCE). While the Vedas contain a myriad of different themes, ranging from hymns for deities and rules of fire sacrifices to music and magic, there is no doubt that one finds in them an exemplary spirit of inquiry into “the (...) one being” (ekam sat) that underlies the diversity of empirical phenomena, and into the origin of all things. (“Was there being or non‐being at the beginning?”) One finds also predelineations of such concepts of ṛta (truth or moral order), karma and the afterlife, and the three qualities (or guṇas: sattva, rajas, and tamas) constituting nature (prakṛti). It is in the Upaniṣads (a group of texts composed after the Vedas and ranging from 1000 bce to the time of Gautama, the Buddha), that the thinking, while still retaining its poetic flavor, develops a more strictly philosophical character. While still concerned with many different themes belonging to cosmology (“How did the one being become many?”) and psychology (“What does the empirical person consist of?”), the Upaniṣads contain attempts to reinterpret, in symbolic terms, the elaborate Vedic sacrifices, and to defend, in many different ways, one central philosophical thesis – that is, the identity of Brahman (the highest and the greatest, the source of all things) and ātman (the self within each person). With this last identification, a giant step was taken by the authors of the Upaniṣads, a step that was decisive for the development of Indian philosophy. The Vedas had already decided, famously in the Nāsadiya Sukata, that at the beginning of things there must have been being and not non‐being (for something cannot come out of nothing); now this primeval being was said to be the same as the spirit within. The highest wisdom was intuitively realizing this identity of subject and object (tat tvarn asi). How to know it was the issue. Suggestions ranged from contemplative meditation to austere self‐mortification. The idea of yoga and a picture of the yogin make their appearance – possibly having a different origin – and blend with the central thesis of the Upaniṣads. If the reality underlying outer appearance is the universal spirit within, is then the world merely phenomenal appearance (like the magician's creation, māyā), or is the brahman‐ātman to be construed as the indwelling spirit of all things? These become the leading disputational questions amongst the commentators on the Upaniṣads, and amongst the various schools of the Vedānta philosophy. (shrink)

I entitled the paper ‘An Essay in Speculative Mysticism’ because it undertakes, in the tradition of such ancient and mediaeval mystics as Plotinus, Pseudo-Dionysius, Hugh and Richard of St Victor, Nicholas of Cusa, Ruysbroeck, and Meister Eckhart, to mate psychological introspection with ontological speculation, focusing on the rather fundamental themes of Identity, Alterity, Transcendant Identity , and Illusion . I acknowledge my more recent, general indebtment to the rich reservoir of contemporary research in the area of Transpersonal Psychology, a research (...) amply documented in the journal of Transpersonal Psychology , as well as in the bibliographies, most notably provided among others, in the respective works of Charles Tart, John White, and Ken Wilber. Since Transpersonal Psychology embraces within its attempts at controlled studies such sundries as altered states of consciousness, parapsychological phenomena, yoga, as well as doctrines which skirt the very frontiers of psychology's experimental ingenuity, namely the tenets of G. I. Gurdjieff, P. D. Ouspensky, H. P. Blavatsky, Oscar Icazo, John Lilly, Roberto Assagioli, and many others, the rapport between a speculative study in mysticism and the background data supplied by Transpersonal Psychology becomes readily apparent. Furthermore, I accede to any reader's deft detection in my essay of a rather uncommon medley of remnants from Thomism, German Romanticism, British Neo-Hegelianism, Vitalism, and Structuralism. If, at last, I were to be questioned on the methodology of my paper, I would have to respond that it probably resembles most closely the methodology of two French Reflective thinkers, viz., Jean Nabert and Henry Duméry, and the French existential metaphysician, Jean Wahl. Since I owe so much to so many, I simply acknowledge my general indebtedness at the beginning and allow the essay to emerge with its own internal cogency. The paper's rationale should, therefore, emanate from a clear inner coherence of its ideas as these reflect communicable psychological experience and unfold some of the latter's ontological implications. (shrink)

In lieu of an abstract, here is a brief excerpt of the content:Utopia on Earth?: Sustainability, White Tourism, and Neocolonial DesireRoslyn Fraser (bio)IntroductionSeveral scholars, and even a few journalists, 1have written about the figure of the international tourist who uses South Asia as a canvas upon which one can create and recreate the self. Perhaps the most discernable example in the pop culture imagination is Elizabeth Gilbert's trip to an ashram in India, documented in Eat Pray Love(2006), which inspired a (...) problematic succession of travelers who followed her footsteps to communities that simply could not accommodate the traffic. International travel and tourism from the Global North to places like India, Nepal, and Sri Lanka frequently represent a form of neocolonialism wherein destinations and the people who live there are imagined not as places with a complex history inhabited by humans with their own subjectivity, but as mirrors the traveler can hold up as part of their search for a personal identity. 2This imagining is perpetuated through imagery from film and literature (like Eat Pray Love), in tourism advertisements, on social media, and in spaces like yoga studios. These texts often objectify South Asian people as they beckon the middle-class Western traveler to the [End Page 226]subcontinent to embark on their own process of self-actualization and self-discovery. Specific to India, Rumya Putcha and Sangeeta Ballabhan explain the phenomenon in detail:In these stories, India is consistently described as a place where those from North America or Europe can "find themselves," "surrender," "find grace in poverty," "learn tolerance," "experience culture," or "withstand an assault on the senses." 3Whether the focus is a yoga retreat in India or a backpacking trip in Nepal, one need only look at a handful of online travel blogs to encounter these themes.One peculiar version of Western imaginings of South Asia is found in places like Auroville, a settler colonial utopia or intentional community near Pondichery in south India. In his 2021 book, Better to Have Gone: Love, Death, and the Quest for Utopia, Akash Kapur estimated that thousands of these utopian experiments were set up in the 1960s and 1970s. 4Focusing on the relationships and power dynamics inside Auroville, which still exists today, Kapur presents us with many reasons to question its idealism. But as a utopian experiment, Auroville continues to be praised as a model for sustainable living. 5Its site is protected by UNESCO and it receives funding from the Indian government. Auroville also receives aid from nongovernmental organizations (NGOs) and cash donations from individual donors, and supports itself through product sales and tourism. Photographs on their website highlight the 372 acres of farmland 6established at Auroville over the last fifty years as well as the community's commitment to "green practices." 7One cannot help but wonder how much of their success in reforesting land and sustainable living is a direct result of their economic resources alone.Colonial ResiduesThe enduring idea that South Asia is a space where utopia can be realized, experienced, or built has its roots in the era of European colonization of the subcontinent. In her analysis, Jessica Namakkal reminds us that Auroville was founded in the direct shadow of colonialism, twenty years after British Imperial rule ended and a mere six years after the end of French colonial rule [End Page 227]over Pondichery. 8Its opening ceremony was attended by an international cast of interested people, mostly from the Global North and West. A sizeable area for viewing the ceremony was reserved for people from the surrounding villages of Tamil Nadu, but with a barrier separating them from the rest of the crowd. 9Not exactly a great beginning for a place that was designated a cradle for a better humanity, or, as Aurovillians put it, "the city the Earth needs." 10For its part, Auroville addresses the issue of neocolonialism directly and succinctly in a section of its website for frequently asked questions, 11 question: Is Auroville sometimes accused of being neo-colonialist? answer:Very rarely; mostly by Westerners who know little about Auroville and how it functions, and equally little about the colonial era.How might we unpack the above statement? First, the... (shrink)

How is love different from lust or infatuation? Do love and marriage really go together “like a horse and carriage”? Does sex have any necessary connection to either? And how important are love, sex, and marriage to a well-lived life? In this lively, lucid, and comprehensive textbook, Raja Halwani pursues the philosophical questions inherent in these three important aspects of human relationships, exploring the nature, uses, and ethics of romantic love, sexuality, and marriage. The book is structured in three parts: (...) _Love_ begins by examining how romantic love differs from other types of love, such as friendship and parental love. It asks which properties of love are essential, whether people have a choice in whom they love, and whether lovers have moral obligations to one another that differ from those they owe to others _Sex_ demonstrates the difficulty in defining sex and the sexual, and examines what constitutes good and bad sex in terms of pleasure, 'naturalness', and moral permissibility. It offers theoretical and applied ethical approaches to a wide range of sexual phenomena _Marriage_ traces the history of the institution, and describes the various forms in which marriage exists and the reasons why people marry. It also surveys accounts of why people should or should not marry, and introduces the main arguments for and against gay marriage. Features include: suggestions for further reading online eResource site with dowloadable discussion questions a clear, jargon-free writing style. (shrink)

The Principle of the Identity of Indiscernibles, commonly attributed to Leibniz, has given rise to much discussion and debate. Thus philosophers have argued over how it should be formulated, whether it is true, and what, if any, metaphysical consequences it has.It is not my intention to add to these discussions here, having done so elsewhere. Rather, I intend to introduce and defend a closely related principle which I shall, for want of a better name, refer to as The Principle of (...) the Identity of Necessary Similarity’.In section II, I briefly recapitulate some of the distinctions and other relevant points which are customarily made in connection with. This is all too familiar material, but it is necessary in order to provide a general framework of concepts in terms of which we can discuss in an intelligible fashion. (shrink)