Atheism: A Very Short Introduction

2021 ◽  
Author(s):  
Julian Baggini
Keyword(s):  
East Asia ◽  
21St Century ◽  
Natural World ◽  
European History ◽  
Short Introduction ◽  
Richard Dawkins ◽  
Early 21St Century ◽  
World Today ◽  
The World ◽  
New Atheism

Atheism: A Very Short Introduction discusses the case for atheism. Atheism is often seen as simply a rejection of theism, but it encompasses so much more. Atheists are typically naturalists, who believe that meaning and morality are possible in a finite, natural world. ‘New Atheism’, a powerful new movement in atheism in the early 21st century, driven by books from authors such as Richard Dawkins and Sam Harris, has left a legacy. There is an important question to consider: whether East Asia has been historically atheist or not. Atheism can be located in recent European history. What is the position of atheists around the world today?

Monasticism: A Very Short Introduction

2018 ◽  
Author(s):  
Stephen J. Davis
Keyword(s):  
Everyday Life ◽  
21St Century ◽  
Modern World ◽  
Short Introduction ◽  
The Everyday ◽  
The World ◽  
Different Types ◽  
History Of ◽  
Monastic Communities

Monasticism is a social and religious phenomenon that originated in antiquity, which remains relevant in the 21st century. Monasticism: A Very Short Introduction discusses the history of monasticism from the earliest evidence for it, and the different types that have developed. It considers where monasteries are located around the world, and how their settings impact the everyday life and worldview of the monks and nuns who dwell in them. Exploring how monastic communities are organized, this VSI also looks at how all aspects of life are regimented. Finally, it discusses what the stories about saints communicate about monastic identity and ethics, and considers what place there is for monasticism in the modern world.

scholarly journals Art of the second half of XX — early XXI centuries as visual philosophy

2021 ◽  
Vol 4 ◽  
pp. 95-106
Author(s):  
Natalia Dyadyk ◽  
Keyword(s):  
20Th Century ◽  
Contemporary Art ◽  
21St Century ◽  
Visual Art ◽  
Conceptual Art ◽  
Early 21St Century ◽  
The World ◽  
Analysis And Synthesis ◽  
Death Of The Author ◽  
Contemporary Artists

Introduction. The article is focused on studying the area of intersection of contemporary art and philosophy, it is a continuation of the research project on conceptual art and its intersection with philosophy, which we started earlier. By conceptual art, we mean art aimed at intellectual comprehension of what has been seen, art that appeals to thinking and generates philosophical meanings. But if earlier we explored conceptual cinema and mainly visual art of the early 20th century, then in this article we want to turn to the visual art of the second half of the 20th century — the beginning of the 21st century, which is also called contemporary art by art critics. The empirical material of the study was the works of such contemporary artists as E. Warhol, D. Koons, D. Hirst, J. Ono, F. Bacon, I. Kabakov, D. Kossuth, the movement of “new realists” and photorealists, the movement of Moscow conceptualists and etc. Contemporary art is one of the ways of understanding the world, visual philosophy, which is of interest for philosophical understanding. The purpose of the article is to conduct a philosophical analysis of visual art of the second half of the 20th — early 21st I centuries in order to identify its philosophical sources and content. Methods. The author uses the following general scientific methods: analysis and synthesis, induction, deduction, abstraction. When analyzing works of conceptual art, we use hermeneutic and phenomenological methods, a semiotic approach. We also use the symbolic-contextual method of analyzing exhibition concepts, which is based on identifying the philosophical meanings and ideas of exhibitions of contemporary art. Scientific novelty of the study. We regard contemporary art as a visual philosophy. Philosophizing, in our opinion, can exist in various forms and forms from everyday practical (the so-called naive philosophizing) to artistic-figurative, that is, visual. Philosophical ideas or concepts are born not only from professional thinkers, but also from artists. The artistic concepts of contemporary artists are similar to the concepts of philosophers, since the goal of both is to cognize the world and grasp being. We find and describe the area of intersection of modern philosophy and contemporary art, each of which is in a situation of crisis separately and continuous dialogue together. Results. In the course of our research, we identify and describe the philosophical origins of visual art in the second half of the twentieth century - early twenty-first century: postmodern philosophical consciousness, conceptualism, the idea of “death of the author” and “death of art”, simulacrum, kitsch and camp, the method of deconstruction and its application in modern art. Conclusions. Visual art of the second half of the 20th century — early 21st century is a visual form of philosophical questioning about the essence of art itself, about the existence of a person and being in general. The works of contemporary artists are based on philosophical problems: meaning, speech and meaning, the ratio of the rational and the irrational, the problem of abandonment and loneliness of a person, the problem of the “death of the author” and the alienation of the creator from his work, the idea of the impossibility of objective knowledge of reality.

scholarly journals World politics, globalization and the crisis

2013 ◽  
Vol 65 (1) ◽  
pp. 24-41
Author(s):  
Predrag Simic
Keyword(s):  
International Relations ◽  
Economic Crisis ◽  
21St Century ◽  
World Politics ◽  
Human Environment ◽  
Early 21St Century ◽  
The World ◽  
Multilateral System ◽  
World Economic ◽  
World Economic Crisis

In the early 21st century, globalization and the world economic crisis changed the balance of powers between the old (declining) and new (emerging) industrial states replacing the unilateral with a multilateral system of international relations and changing the way in which world politics was functioning. Globalization has increased the number of transnational problems (protection of human environment, international traffic and communications, flows of capital, energy, migrations, etc.) that require global governance. However, these trends also indicate that in the 21st century, international relations and world politics will function in a significantly different manner than they did within the bipolar and unipolar order, which characterized the second half of the 20th century.

Global Anti-LGBT Politics

2019 ◽  
Author(s):  
Barry D. Adam
Keyword(s):  
21St Century ◽  
Well Being ◽  
Social Forces ◽  
Early 21St Century ◽  
Christian Morality ◽  
The World ◽  
Lgbt Politics ◽  
Global North ◽  
Major Transformation ◽  
Lgbt People

Anti-LGBT politics around the world have undergone a major transformation over the last half century. While European powers once held themselves up as defenders of Christian morality and patriarchy, characterizing Asia, Africa, and the Americas as locations of sexual disorder, in the 21st century many of the countries of the Global South construct LGBT sexualities as pathological, threatening, or criminal, while many countries of the Global North incorporate sexual orientation in a discourse of human rights, democracy, and individual freedom. Many of the social forces of nationalism and populism of the early 21st century place the well-being of LGBT citizens in jeopardy, and conflicts between these divergent visions of the good society continue to have grave consequences for LGBT people around the world.

Surface

2020 ◽  
Author(s):  
Shiamin Kwa
Keyword(s):  
21St Century ◽  
Film Studies ◽  
Decorative Arts ◽  
Literary Texts ◽  
Early 21St Century ◽  
Graphic Narratives ◽  
The World ◽  
History Of ◽  
Digital Stories ◽  
History Of Architecture

Thinking about surface and its historiography in the early 21st century is a way of thinking about ways of seeing in the world, and how people define themselves in relation to the things around them. From literary texts to the decorative arts, from graphic narratives to digital stories, and from film to the textile arts, the ways of reading those texts frequently raise questions about interactions with surfaces. Theories of surface have been engaged in many ways since their invocation by French theorists in the final decades of the twentieth century. They have a steady but by no means identical presence in the field of visual studies, history of architecture, and film studies; they have found an application in discussions of race and identity; they have enjoyed an early 21st century turn in the spotlight under the auspices of a broadly defined call for a “surface reading.” This critical move defines surface as worthy of scrutiny in its own right, rather than as something that needs to be “seen through,” and makes its most profound claims less by reactivating attention to reading surfaces, which arguably has been done all along, but by a shifting away from a model of interpretation that makes claims for authoritative symptomatic readings by an all-knowing interpreter.

The Challenge of Poverty, Near-Poverty, and Inequality in 21st-Century Hong Kong

2017 ◽  
Author(s):  
Yue Chim Richard Wong
Keyword(s):  
Hong Kong ◽  
Income Inequality ◽  
Middle Class ◽  
21St Century ◽  
Social Condition ◽  
Early 21St Century ◽  
Property Prices ◽  
Poverty And Inequality ◽  
The World ◽  
Political Problem

The essays in this volume show that poverty, near-poverty, and inequality are multi- faceted conditions. They have coalesced into a growing economic and social condition in Hong Kong, which is also developing into a difficult political problem. The origins can be traced to the effects of economic globalization and China’s opening in the 1980s. It then grew during the late 1990s and worsened in the early 21st century. Many rich cities in the world have experienced similar phenomena. First, a small fraction of the population is in poverty; some may even be destitute. Second, the middle class begins sinking as growing numbers of its members become less able to afford a comfortable life in the manner they are used to. Third, income inequality and inequality in the ownership of wealth rise, especially as a result of escalating property prices. Unlike in other places, in Hong Kong these conditions are developing at a faster pace and with greater severity.

Pakistan: A Very Short Introduction

2021 ◽  
Author(s):  
Pippa Virdee
Keyword(s):  
21St Century ◽  
Indian Subcontinent ◽  
Cultural Identities ◽  
British India ◽  
Short Introduction ◽  
Indus Valley ◽  
Nation States ◽  
The World ◽  
The Future

Pakistan: A Very Short Introduction describes Pakistan as one of the two-nation-states of the Indian subcontinent that emerged in 1947. It looks at the ancient past to understand the complex tapestry of linguistic, ethnic, political, and cultural identities and tensions of the region today. The region of the Indus valley has a 4,000-year-old history and is considered the site of one of the earliest riverine civilizations in the world. The modern nation of Pakistan was created as a postcolonial homeland for the Muslims of British India. This VSI also considers the challenges of the 21st century and the future of Pakistan.

3. Secularism diversifies

2019 ◽  
pp. 31-46
Author(s):  
Andrew Copson
Keyword(s):  
21St Century ◽  
Early 21St Century ◽  
Religious Traditions ◽  
The World ◽  
The Early 21St Century

In Asia in the 19th and 20th centuries, many reformers saw European secularism as an exemplar for their new political orders. Many Asian states went on to adopt a form they called secular, but that in practice conceals a diversity of ways of organizing religion. ‘Secularism diversifies’ examines two avowedly secular states—Turkey and India—who had resources within their own political and religious traditions with which to form their secularism. In the early 21st century, secularism is contested from all quarters, but is also winning new adherents in many parts of the world as populations subject to strong religious sanctions see it still as one of the essential aspects of modernity.

To Err in their Ways: The Attribution Biases of the New Atheists

2010 ◽  
Vol 39 (4) ◽  
pp. 573-588 ◽  
Author(s):  
Amarnath Amarasingam
Keyword(s):  
Social Psychology ◽  
Intergroup Relations ◽  
Social Psychological ◽  
Fundamental Attribution Error ◽  
Daniel Dennett ◽  
Richard Dawkins ◽  
Attribution Biases ◽  
The World ◽  
New Atheism ◽  
Psychological Studies

The term ‘‘new atheism’’ has been given to the recent barrage of anti-religion and anti-God books written by Richard Dawkins (2006), Sam Harris (2004, 2008), Christopher Hitchens (2007), Daniel Dennett (2006), and others. This paper contends that one of the fundamental arguments put forth by the new atheists — that religion poisons everything or that religion is responsible for much of the evil in the world — falls victim to one of the best established theories of interpersonal and intergroup relations in social psychology: the fundamental attribution error. Insights gleaned from social psychology are especially useful for critiquing the new atheism. Instead of simply arguing that the new atheists ‘‘over-generalize,’’ social psychological studies on the nature of individual and group attribution provide the tools needed to launch a more substantive critique.

scholarly journals The Relevance of Louis Adamic in the 21st Century

Two Homelands ◽  
2020 ◽  
Author(s):  
Janja Žitnik Serafin
Keyword(s):  
20Th Century ◽  
21St Century ◽  
Social Issues ◽  
Research Results ◽  
World Today ◽  
The World

The article first outlines the literature on Louis Adamic (1898–1951), the most successful writer of the Slovenian diaspora. The author then highlights Adamic’s prescience in a number of works dedicated to his original homeland. This is followed by a discussion of Adamic’s views on the mid-20th century global situation and the prospects for its development, which include some of the most pressing social issues in the world today. The author employs the overview method by supplementing her current research results with other scholars’ findings.

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