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In The Next Enlightenment, Walter
Truett Anderson treats Eastern spiritual traditions and
Western philosophy, psychology, and science as steps along
the same evolutionary path rather than as completely separate
and incompatible schools of thought.
In the opening chapters, he looks at five
different "Liberation Movements" that emerged
in the modern world: the eighteenth-century European Enlightenment,
the nineteenth-century upheaval resulting from the publication
of Darwin's Origin of Species, and in the twentieth
century, existentialism, psychoanalysis, and the human potential
movement of the 1960s and 1970s. He then argues that this
century's next surge of thought and action will regard the
exploration of the physical universe and the study of human
consciousness as two sides of the same coin, and equally
important, come to understand personal enlightenment as
a natural process of growth rather than a supernatural gift
bestowed upon a chosen few.
Elegantly argued and written with a sense
of humor, The Next Enlightenment offers a refreshing
vision of how the ancient quest for enlightenment is taking
on new life in a rapidly changing, globalizing world.
Walter Truett Anderson has explored many
different facets of contemporary life and evolutionary change
in his essays, books, poetry, and journalism. His recent
books include The Future of the Self, Evolution
Isn't What It Used to Be, and All Connected Now.
He lives near San Francisco, California.
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