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1. Journal of Interdisciplinary Studies: Volume > 1 > Issue: 1/2
Oskar Gruenwald Why a Journal of Interdisciplinary Studies?
2. Journal of Interdisciplinary Studies: Volume > 1 > Issue: 1/2
James O. Buswell III Toward a Christian Metaanthropology
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Since integration is preferable to compartmentalization, problems of the identity or posture of the Christian anthropologist in academic or professional contexts are examined. The question is then asked, can there be a "Christian anthropology?" If so, what are its distinctive features and what difference does it make in the doing of anthropology? David Bidney's concept of "metaanthropology" is explored, adding fundamental contrasts between naturalistic and supematuralistic presuppositions, Sidney's basic concerns of metaanthropology, "the problems of cultural reality and the nature of man," are discussed, respectively, in terms of distinctive Christian positions on mankind as the culture-bearing species in the Image of God and on the matter of human origin.
3. Journal of Interdisciplinary Studies: Volume > 1 > Issue: 1/2
David O. Moberg Is There a "Christian Sociology?"
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Even as there is no "Christian mathematics" or "Christian physics," some argue that there can be no "Christian sociology." Yet values infuse every aspect of the social science enterprise. There are at least five major ideal-type definitions of "Christian" Christian presuppositions are evident in terms of the spirit of science, divine revelation, and human nature, as are Christian values related to faith, the nature of God, Christian relativism, sin, and the sacredness of all domains and activities. Christian sociologists have developed no unique theories, methods, or subject matter, but Christian values and presuppositions often modify, qualify, and enrich their work. Whether there is a unique "Christian sociology" is hence problematic, although it is as valid a label as "Marxist," "humanist," "Islamic," or "positivist" sociology.
4. Journal of Interdisciplinary Studies: Volume > 1 > Issue: 1/2
Natalie Isser, Lita Linzer Schwarz Interdisciplinary Research: The Quest for New Gestalts
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Interdisciplinary research is perceived as a natural outgrowth of the realization that few facets of the world exist in isolation. Indeed, interdisciplinary research provides a challenge to develop new perspectives, paradigms, or Gestalts. An examination of interdisciplinary teaching and research applications reveals that such an approach is both viable and fruitful. Impediments to the implementation of interdisciplinary research are discussed from the individual point of view and at the institutional level. Despite barriers, the outlook for interdisciplinary research in the future is promising.
5. Journal of Interdisciplinary Studies: Volume > 1 > Issue: 1/2
William R. Marty Reflections on The Limits of Science
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For most, science now has the mantle of authority once possessed by philosophy and theology. But there are reasons for caution in the appeal to scientific authority in human affairs, as in philosophy and theology. There are limits to the methods of science as well as an extraordinary number of examples of the serious misuse of science and its authority. Recognizing the limitations of science and the fallibility of human beings can enhance understanding of both theory and policy, and place science and its authority in proper perspective.
6. Journal of Interdisciplinary Studies: Volume > 1 > Issue: 1/2
Zygmunt Stankiewicz Der Ursprung der schoenen Kuenste
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Der Mensch hat eine Zielsetzung: seine biologischen Bedürfnisse zu stillen Seine zweite Zielsetzung dagegen stillt Bedürfnisse, die schwiering zu deftnieren sind, da sie sein Innenleben betreffen, wie dies bei der Kunst der Fall ist. Es scheint, dass dank der bestehenden Wechselwirkung zwischen diesen gegensätzlichen Zielsetzungen der Mensch nicht nur psychisch sich im Gleichgewicht halten, aber auch von dem einen Schwierigkeitsgrad der Problematik zum andern übergehen kann, und dass sich darin das Phänomen der Kreativität verbergen muss, Der Mensch mit seiner kreativen Lebensweise befindet sich also im Kreislaufdes All-Natur-Geschehens, und obwohl er erdgebunden ein kosmisches Wesen ist, hat er damit ein Privileg die seelisch-geistige Dimension der Schöpfung zu erkennen und sich mit dem Ursprung der Schöpfung zu vereinen.
7. Journal of Interdisciplinary Studies: Volume > 1 > Issue: 1/2
Mihajlo Mihajlov The Return of the Grand Inquisitor: A Critique of Solzhenitsyn
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Since 1974, when Aleksandr Sokhenitsyn's Letter to the Soviet Leaders was published after his exile from the Soviet Union, a schism has developed in the previously unified dissident movement into two conflicting political-ideological currents: national-authoritarian and liberal-democratic. This article focuses on Sokhenitsyn's essay. The Mortal Danger: How Misconceptions About Russia Imperil America, It is my thesis that Sokhenitsyn's political vision of a benevolent authoritarian order based on a revival of Russian nationalism begs the question of individual freedom, the rule of law, and genuine spiritual rebirth. Only human rights, the rights of the individual, each person's spiritual freedom have real meaning in the struggle against communist totalitarianism. Such a struggle is impossible without a spiritual and religious renaissance that restores the highest value, the value of each individual person.
8. Journal of Interdisciplinary Studies: Volume > 1 > Issue: 1/2
Robert H. Blank Human Genetic Intervention: Portent of a Brave New World?
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The centerpiece of Aldous Huxley's Brave New World is state control of the human reproduction process as a means of ensuring social stability. Although written as fiction, recent advances in human genetic and reproductive technology promise to give us more control over our biological destiny, including procreation. Concurrently, they create new social policy dilemmas, challenge prevailing "givens" of the human condition, and, technologically, increase the possibility of centralized control over reproduction. After reviewing the current status of human genetic technology and discussing its use in the United States, this article analyzes the implications of these innovations for the future.
9. Journal of Interdisciplinary Studies: Volume > 1 > Issue: 1/2
Jeffery L. Geller Pretotalitarian Values: Escape From Freedom?
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Two views of pretotalitarian motivation are examined. The pronouncements of Mustapha Mond in Brave New World and O'Brien in 1984 reveal two different sets of motives which could lead to the establishment and acceptance of totalitarianism, Huxley's Brave New World warns against hedonism, unwillingness to tolerate pain, an excessive valuation of stability, and the tendency to treat freedom as a commodity. Orwell's 1984 does not warn against the presence of any particular system of values, but rather, against the absence of ethical considerations from our thinking and, implicitly, against our deep desire to escape from freedom. In conclusion, a sense of self-worth and spiritual development are counterposed to the decline of ethics.
10. Journal of Interdisciplinary Studies: Volume > 1 > Issue: 1/2
James W. McGray The Golden Rule and Paternalism
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The aim of this article is to defend the morality of the Golden Rule from the objection that it will lead to intolerable paternalism. Once religious paternalism is allowed, Inquisitors come forward to care for the weak-willed and obtuse masses. Eventually, the Inquisitors lose their faith, and focus their concern upon harmony, health, and happiness in this life. The outcome is either a constrained distopia that is abhorrent (Huxley), or a cruel distopia which is the antithesis of what the Golden Rule is supposed to prescribe (Orwell), Paternalism presupposes knowledge that an agent is acting against his own best interests. Such epistemic justification is not available in matters of ethics or faith.
11. Journal of Interdisciplinary Studies: Volume > 1 > Issue: 1/2
Wayne P. Pomerleau Orwell's 1984 Society and Human Rights
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In this article Alan Gewirth's theory of social ethics is applied to the picture of life presented in Orwell's novel, 1984, in such a way as to justify one's sense of repulsive evil therein. It is the systematic denial of human rights to freedom and well-being that is fundamentally immoral and destructive of the capacity of people to function as prospective purposive agents. This denial of what Gewirth terms additive, nonsubtractive, and basic goods violates both privacy and personal autonomy, reducing man to a sub-human level.
12. Journal of Interdisciplinary Studies: Volume > 1 > Issue: 1/2
Andrew Ward God, Suffering and the Anti-Utopian Character of Brave New World
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This article explores the seemingly paradoxical thesis that the society depicted in Aldous Huxley's Brave New World is anti-utopian because it seeks to eliminate suffering. As Huxley suggests in The Perennial Philosophy and other works, suffering is a necessary condition for acquiring knowledge of God, and such knowledge constitutes genuine happiness. Since the Brave New World seeks to eliminate the necessary condition for its citizens' happiness, it is, therefore, anti-utopian.
13. Journal of Interdisciplinary Studies: Volume > 1 > Issue: 1/2
Michael F. Shaughnessy Transcending Totalitarianism: The Logotherapeutic Approach
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The attitudinal perspective of Viktor Frankl pits the "will to meaning" against those who would totalitarianize the world as the Nazis attempted to do with the Holocaust and the Blitzkrieg. Frankl's Man's Search for Meaning is juxtaposed against Orwell's 1984 and Huxley's Brave New World to compare and contrast the existential position of each and reemphasize the place of religious values in modem society. Frankl's philosophy and therapeutic system are also considered as a response to The Unheard Cry for Meaning in the contemporary world Further. Frankl provides an alternative to the "behavioristic technology" which reduces man to the status of a rat.
14. Journal of Interdisciplinary Studies: Volume > 1 > Issue: 1/2
Alfred G. Cuzán The Nicaraguan Revolution: From Autocracy to Totalitarian Diatatorship?
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In Totalitarian Dictatorship and Autocracy, Friedrich and Brzezinski present a model of a totalitarian regime. It is the fusion of a revolutionary ideology, an elitist party, and a secret police which sets off the dynamics of totalitarianism, implemented by means of terror. Using the model as a guide, this article evaluates the nature of the regime that has emerged in Nicaragua since the 1979 revolution against the Somoza autocracy. The ideology, party, and police of the Sandinista state fit the model in most respects, but other totalitarian traits are not fully developed. It concludes that the Sandinista regime has not completed the process toward mature totalitarianism.
15. Journal of Interdisciplinary Studies: Volume > 10 > Issue: 1/2
William R. Marty Christians in the Academy: Overcoming the Silence
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The academy in the United States is almost wholly silent about Christianity, at least in the sense of providing Christian perspectives on the various fields. This silence about Christianity, and often real hostility toward it, ripples outward from the universities all the great institutions of society---the courts, media, entertainment industry, elementary and secondary schools---affecting all of society and culture. Silence or hostility at this great center of the life of the mind affects all else. To accept this silence in higher education is to surrender control of the institutions, mind, and spirit of the culture to those either indifferent or hostile to Christianity. Christians should break the silence by reaching out to other Christians both on campus and professionally, by establishing the whole apparatus of intellectual life, using the stress upon openness, pluralism, tolerance, diversity, and multiculturalism to wedge open a place for a Christian voice, including existing professional organtations and forums, and developing organizational and legal strategies to protect that voice.
16. Journal of Interdisciplinary Studies: Volume > 10 > Issue: 1/2
Ellen R. Klein Can Feminism Be Rational?
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The culture wars must not be viewed as over, for if they are, the wrong side has won. That aspect of multiculturalism which has infected American colleges and universities known as "Feminism" has been especially insidious. Underlying its destructive force is its fundamental commitment to epistemological relativism. This essity offers an allegory to demonstrate the logical absurdity, intellectual paucity, and, ironically, ultimate sexist nature of contemporary academic feminism. The conclusion follows that traditional-minded academics need to take up the intellectual charge and challenge feminism on their own battlefields in what may be the last chance to win the culture wars and reapprorpiate feminism for the good of men and women everywhere.
17. Journal of Interdisciplinary Studies: Volume > 10 > Issue: 1/2
Daniel W. Hollis III Cultural Origins of New Age Cults
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Western culture abounds in New Age cults, which have grown dramatically in size and influence since the 1970s. New Age cults represent a crisis of cultural identity, a major dilemma of Western civilization at the end of the twentieth century. Such cults reflect and contribute to the disintegration of social institutions, ranging from turmoil in mainline religions, a weakening of business, legal, and political ethics, the tenuous role of science, and the failure of public educational institutions to create informed and independent minds. The New Age, with its multiple historical roots, also gauges a widespread desire for the recovery of a virtuous society, certainty about the material universe, spiritual meaning and a nurturing social and familial unity. The New Age has emerged as one path in that quest. Yet what is needed is the restoration of a culture of virtue.
18. Journal of Interdisciplinary Studies: Volume > 10 > Issue: 1/2
Dale McConkey A Congregational Remapping of Culture Wars
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According to many, the United States is embroiled in a culture war between religious conservatives, who believe in a transcendent moral authority, and religious liberals, who hold that moral truth is historically and contextually conditioned. Amidst this conflict is a cultural anomaly called the evangelical left, which blends conservative theology with liberal politics. An ethnographic study of an evangelical left congregation suggests that their social and political action is neither liberal nor progressive. Instead, this congregation has created a local culture that resists and remaps the traditional boundaries of the culture wars. This remapping centers on the concept of conventional relationships, which envelops every aspect of their fellowship, including theology and morality as well as social action. Yet the relational focus of this fellowship is not a new or unique cultural formation, but rather a rediscovery of traditional Christian social action.
19. Journal of Interdisciplinary Studies: Volume > 10 > Issue: 1/2
Bruce W. Speck Relativism and the Promise of Tolerance
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Many people claim that they are relativists and proponents of tolerance. Yet relativism cannot foster tolerance in part because it is untenable as a coherent philosophy. There are at least three types of relativists---novice, generous, and radical. All three types demonstrate that even renowned scholars who hold to relativism are not tolerant, since a tolerant relativist is a contradiction in terms. Relativism is also theologically incoherent, since neutrality is impossible conceming truth claims. However, tolerance is essential for the social order to prosper. The ecumenical statement, "Evangelicals and Catholics Together," represents a model of tolerance in interreligious circles with clear promise for the rest of society. Since tolerance is founded on Biblical truths, the Church is responsible for promoting tolerance without sacrificing the truth. Once the Church deals with its own intolerance in a spirit of humility, it can become a catalyst in promoting tolerance to those of varied beliefs.
20. Journal of Interdisciplinary Studies: Volume > 10 > Issue: 1/2
Miloš Dokulil The Last Man's Culture--Revisited
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At the end of the second millennium, we seem to be somewhat nervous agairn. Twentieth-century scientific developments have opened up fascinating new fields of study both in the micro- and macrocosmos. Yet none of the new codes, paradigms, and ideologies appear to bring us nearer to some new and generally shared creed. Life without work for many, not only in the Third World, the successful integration of Europe, armed conflicts on local battlefields, as well as superficialities on TV screens, are our near-to-be contemporaneity. The seeming unlimited technical possibilities of artificial intelligence, the relativtatim of civic values, and a cartoon-like culture portend risks for the fiiture. Yet, while secular and lacking a binding sense of responsibility, postmodem society epitomizes spiritual hunger. Nurtured by good family traditions, the spiritual quest promises an open-ended, post-Godotian future.