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The Art Of Aidagara: Ethics, Aesthetics, And The Quest For An Ontology Of Social Existence In Watsuji Tetsurō’S Rinrigaku, James Shields Nov 2009

The Art Of Aidagara: Ethics, Aesthetics, And The Quest For An Ontology Of Social Existence In Watsuji Tetsurō’S Rinrigaku, James Shields

Faculty Journal Articles

This paper provides an analysis of the key term aidagara (“betweenness”) in the philosophical ethics of Watsuji Tetsurō (1889-1960), in response to and in light of the recent movement in Japanese Buddhist studies known as “Critical Buddhism.” The Critical Buddhist call for a turn away from “topical” or intuitionist thinking and towards (properly Buddhist) “critical” thinking, while problematic in its bipolarity, raises the important issue of the place of “reason” versus “intuition” in Japanese Buddhist ethics. In this paper, a comparison of Watsuji’s “ontological quest” with that of Martin Heidegger (1889-1976), Watsuji’s primary Western source and foil, is followed by …


Monsters And The Moral Imagination, Stephen Asma Oct 2009

Monsters And The Moral Imagination, Stephen Asma

Stephen T Asma

The article discusses the cultural interest in monsters in the 21st century. The author speculates on the reasons for the interest, citing anxiety after the September 11, 2001 terrorist attacks, the war in Iraq, or the global financial crisis of 2008-2009. He notes a conference in September 2009 at the University of Oxford entitled "Monsters and the Monstrous." Cultural uses of monsters, he notes, include scolding ourselves for failure to be inclusive, the medievals' punishment for the sin of pride, or the ancient Greeks' warnings of impending calamity. He notes that monster stories can promote the individual's thought about what …


Ancient Antidotes To Timeless Troubles: Stoicism And The Recession, Stephen Asma May 2009

Ancient Antidotes To Timeless Troubles: Stoicism And The Recession, Stephen Asma

Stephen T Asma

The article reviews the books "The Present Alone is Our Happiness," by Arnold I. Davidson and Jeannie Carlier and "A Life Worthy of the Gods: The Materialist Psychology of Epicurus" by David Konstan.


Happy Serf Liberation Day: China And Tibet, Stephen Asma May 2009

Happy Serf Liberation Day: China And Tibet, Stephen Asma

Stephen T Asma

No abstract provided.