Against a background of continuous strife, innovative thinkers came from both the eastern and western regions of the Greek world. Only fragments of their original writings survive, and our information about them comes from later philosophers such as Aristotle, who called them “Investigators of Nature”. By Sally MallamContributing Writer They used prose not poetry as …
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Featured Book Our Choice A Plan to Solve the Climate Crisis Al Gore Paperback edition 2009 “Our Choice gathers in one place all of the most effective solutions that are available now and that, together, will solve this crisis. It is meant to depoliticize the issue as much as possible and inspire readers to take …
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Not a few years from now, but today, we are facing an unprecedented catastrophe in the planet’s water supply. For drinking, for agriculture, and for preservation of wildlife and the global environment, we are confronted with critical water shortages on an unprecedented scale. Our response to this crisis will literally determine the future, not just …
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Growth of average incomes globally has resulted in a stunning decline in abject poverty. Yet more than a third of the world’s population – some 2.2 billion people – live on less than $2 a day, many without access to clean water, electricity, sanitation, and basic protection of the law. And the gap between rich …
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As we’ve noted elsewhere on the site, a pivotal way humanity has communicated throughout our human journey is through stories. As is typical of the ancient world, Jewish oral tradition included myths, memories and ideas absorbed and adapted from the whole region. They would become part of what we know today as the Old Testament. …
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Education isn’t just about textbooks and classrooms. From coding to communication skills, at its best education equips learners with the tools needed to thrive in the job market as well as in other aspects of life. By Kathleen Mazor, EdD, MSContributing Writer Education can equip learners with the knowledge and skills they need to succeed …
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About five and a half million years ago the human line of descent split from the ancestor we share with chimps and the lesser-known bonobos. 98.7% of our DNA is exactly the same as theirs, including some very basic traits often attributed only to humans. Are we more like the aggressive chimp or the peaceful …
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Socrates, the Founder of Western Philosophy, did not document his teachings. All that is known about him comes from the accounts of others: mainly the philosopher Plato and the historian Xenophon, who were both his pupils. By Sally MallamContributing Writer Karl Jaspers writes in The Great Philosophers, Vol. 1, “His mission was only to search in the company of men, …
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When the Heavens above did not existAnd earth beneath had not come into being –There was Apsû, the first in ordear, their begetter,And demiurge Tia-mat, who gave birth to them all;They had mingled their waters togetherBefore meadow-land had coalesced and reed-bed was to be found –When not one of the gods had been formedOr had …
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St. Paul by El Greco, Wiki Commons “As evolving creatures, the problem is not that we have fallen, but that we are not yet fully human. We are not sinners, the church got that wrong; we are rather incomplete human beings.” Rev. John Shelby Spong By Sally MallamContributing Writer As Robert Doran (Prof. of Religion, …
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Featured Book The Age of Empathy andThe Bonobo and the Atheist Frans de WaalPaperback editions 2009 and 2014 Over the past few decades, observations and experiments with social animals, including humans, have led to a conceptual revolution in the understanding of how human morality evolved and of humanity’s place in the animal kingdom. This information …
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Featured Book The Sixth Extinction An Unnatural History Elizabeth KolbertPaperback edition 2015 Our planet has experienced five mass extinction events in the past half billion years. The most recent occurred some 66 million years ago when an asteroid collided with earth, wiping out the dinosaurs and dramatically changing the biodiversity of life on our planet. …
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