Search Results (4)

Radical enactivism supports radical embodied cognition (REC), which is the idea that basic or fundamental cognition (perception and action) does not need to be understood in representational, contentful terms. REC departs from the idea that the mind can be naturalized through biological functions, but rejects the idea that mental content, which is understood as having a representational nature, can be naturalized. For REC, the natural origins of content (or NOC) is a program based on the following hypothesis: first, we depart from basic cognitive processes that are target-based and guided by an Ur-intentionality or directedness toward the world, and then sociality enters in the picture when language appears into the scene, allowing for establishing full-blown semantic content in which that content is about worldly states of affairs. Here, we are going to focus on the phenomenon of directedness since there are blind spots in this picture: as many authors claim, REC takes Ur-intentionality as the starting point, but there is simply no explanation to date of how this directedness or Ur-intentionality is established. Therefore, how could we account for Ur-intentionality? How does this kind of intentionality emerge? We believe that we can answer this question if we invoke the best scientific evidence from ecological perceptual learning especially in regard to the role of the environment and the information for perceiving affordances in our learning processes. This allows us to offer an answer to the question of how the most basic form of cognition (Ur-intentionality or directedness) emerges in nature. Full article

The creation myths recorded in the Buddhist canon (Skt. Tripiṭaka; Pal. Tipiṭaka) reveal to us the various genesis scenarios adopted by early Buddhists concerning the formation of the world and the emergence of human beings in this world. The contents of these stories can be divided into three basic narrative elements: (1) the calamities and the formation of the world; (2) the devolution of sentient beings and the establishment of a worldly ruling order; and (3) the origin of the caste system and the royal pedigree of the Śākya clan. There are differences in the various accounts and in the details of the narratives as they appear in the Āgamas. Through a comparison of the narrative structure and content of various texts, this article will extrapolate on the narrative context that informed these myths. This article will argue, among other things, that when these myths were composed, they were directed at followers (Pal. bhikkhus) from Brahminical backgrounds. Segments of the genesis story were, moreover, incorporated into the Vinaya texts as narrative aids to help communicate certain lessons. The purpose of this article is to explore the topic of cosmology in texts such as the Shiji jing 世紀經 in the Dīrgha-āgama and the “Qiri pin” 七日品 in the Ekottara-āgama, both of which were later additions to these larger Āgamas. The Poluopo tang jing 婆羅婆堂經 in the Madhyama-āgama and the Aggañña-sutta in the Dīgha-nikāya both contain similar formulaic sentences and descriptions which show that they may come from the same source. The Poluopo tang jing might, however, be an older text. Finally, the different contents found in texts such as the Xiaoyuan jing 小缘經 that contains details on the five castes indicate that it may have come from a different source. Full article

The child is a trust from Allah and the ornament of the worldly life. In the early childhood period, which includes the preschool period, the child asks many questions, wants to understand everything around them, and shows an inexhaustible desire to learn. This research was carried out to examine the opinions of Qur’an course teachers about the religious and moral curiosity of preschool children. A qualitative method was used to ascertain the opinions of 40 participants in 2022. Six themes and 42 codes were determined from the answers provided by the participants to the questions in the semi-structured interview form. A content analysis method with a phenomenology design was used to analyze the data obtained in this study. It was found that children were intensely curious about the religious and moral issues of Allah, the Prophet, angels, death, heaven, hell and prayer; they can ask questions comfortably to satisfy their curiosity, and it was determined that they are excited when asking questions. It was found that teachers reacted positively to satisfy and expand children’s curiosity. In addition, we concluded that family and environmental learning are important factors that increase children’s curiosity, and activities such as drama, games and experiments conducted by teachers increase children’s curiosity. Full article

This paper critically reviews assertions that near-death and out-of-body experiences (ND/OBE) offer proof of extra-corporeal existence when the brain is supposedly “dead”. While this field has almost moved away from mere anecdotal recording, the current trend is focussed on demonstrating existence without functional brains. These endeavours have fallen far short of anticipated results—that cardiac patients would report on strategically-placed markers around acute resuscitation units. Two problems arise: a failure to produce corroborative empirical evidence for extra-corporeal cognition (a) when the brain is “dead”, (or “clinically dead”, so-called) and (b) how the memory required for recall could paradoxically be set down at that critical time-point. The view advanced here is that ND/OBE occur as subjects’ states are returning to complete resumption of conscious-awareness and which, from several published accounts, is particularly abrupt but which nevertheless accounts perfectly for memory—and recall. Similar transcendental adventures accompanying returns to conscious-awareness occur with other preceding states of reduced consciousness. Most recollections are intensely geo-physical, anthropomorphic, banal and illogical: their dream-like fantasy provides nothing revelatory about life without a brain, or importantly, about other supposed cosmic contexts. Additionally, it is proposed that since prevalence rates are so extremely low (<1% globally), the few subjects undergoing ND/OBE may have predisposed brains, genetically, structurally or resulting from previous psychological stress. In a somewhat similar vein to post-traumatic stress disorder, subjects with predisposed brains exhibit markedly changed post-experiential phenotypes, so that the ND/OBE itself could be viewed as a transient, accompanying epiphenomenon. Full article