Classical Indian Philosophy: A history of philosophy without any gaps, Volume 5

Peter Adamson and Jonardon Ganeri present a lively introduction to one of the world's richest intellectual traditions: the philosophy of classical India. They begin with the earliest extant literature, the Vedas, and the explanatory works that these inspired, known as Upaniṣads. They also 
discuss other famous texts of classical Vedic culture, especially the Mahābhārata and its most notable section, the Bhagavad-Gīta, alongside the rise of Buddhism and Jainism. In this opening section, Adamson and Ganeri emphasize the way that philosophy was practiced as a form of life in search of 
liberation from suffering.\nNext, the pair move on to the explosion of philosophical speculation devoted to foundational texts called 'sutras,' discussing such traditions as the logical and epistemological Nyd=aya school, the monism of Advaita Vedānta, and the spiritual discipline of Yoga.\nIn the final section of the book, they chart further developments within Buddhism, highlighting Nagārjuna's radical critique of 'non-dependent' concepts and the no-self philosophy of mind found in authors like Dignāga, and within Jainism, focusing especially on its 'standpoint' epistemology. Unlike 
other introductions that cover the main schools and positions in classical Indian philosophy, Adamson and Ganeri's lively guide also pays attention to philosophical themes such as non-violence, political authority, and the status of women, while considering textual traditions typically left out of 
overviews of Indian thought, like the Cārvāka school, Tantra, and aesthetic theory as well.\nAdamson and Ganeri conclude by focusing on the much-debated question of whether Indian philosophy may have influenced ancient Greek philosophy and, from there, evaluate the impact that this area of philosophy had on later Western thought.

Politics & Social Sciences

Ganeri, Jonardon

Adamson, Peter

Philosophy

Oxford University Press

Artha: Meaning (Foundations of Philosophy in India)

This book examines the theories of meaning or artha. It discusses approaches in different schools of thought-Grammarian, Mimamsika, Buddhist, early Naiyayika, Navya Naiyayika, and Vedantin-highlighting the significant relationship between 'word' and 'meaning/knowing/ knowledge'. The author probes and explores the tension between tenets of the Navya-Nyaya school and elucidates on the important changes brought about by the introduction of modes of thought in the theory of meaning. An important contribution to the philosophy of language, this volume demonstrates that classical Indian theory of language can inform and be informed by contemporary philosophy.This book will interest students and scholars of philosophy, history, sociology, anthropology, and linguistics.

Fernando Pessoa: Imagination and the Self (Philosophical Outsiders)

This book examines the theories of meaning or artha. It discusses approaches in different schools of thought-Grammarian, Mimamsika, Buddhist, early Naiyayika, Navya Naiyayika, and Vedantin-highlighting the significant relationship between 'word' and 'meaning/knowing/ knowledge'. The author probes and explores the tension between tenets of the Navya-Nyaya school and elucidates on the important changes brought about by the introduction of modes of thought in the theory of meaning. An important contribution to the philosophy of language, this volume demonstrates that classical Indian theory of language can inform and be informed by contemporary philosophy. This book will interest students and scholars of philosophy, history, sociology, anthropology, and linguistics.

Jonardon Ganeri gives an account of language as essentially a means for the reception of knowledge. The semantic power of a word and its ability to stand for a thing derives from the capacity of understanders to acquire knowledge simply by understanding what is said. Ganeri finds this account in the work of certain Indian philosophers of language, and shows how their analysis can inform and be informed by contemporary philosophical theory.

Semantic Powers: Meaning and the Means of Knowing in Classical Indian Philosophy (Oxford Philosophical Monographs)

Clarendon Press

The Lost Age of Reason deals with a fascinating and rich episode in the history of philosophy, one from which those who are interested in the nature of modernity and its global origins have a great deal to learn. Early modernity in India consists in the formation of a new philosophical self, one which makes it possible meaningfully to conceive of oneself as engaging the ancient and the alien in conversation. The ancient texts are now not thought of as authorities to which one must defer, but regarded as the source of insight in the company of which one pursues the quest for truth. This new attitude implies a change in the conception of one's duties towards the past. After reconstructing the historical intellectual context in detail, and developing a suitable methodological framework, Ganeri reviews work on the concept of knowledge, the nature of evidence, the self, the nature of the categories, mathematics, realism, and a new language for philosophy. A study of early modern philosophy in India has much to teach us today - about the nature of modernity as such, about the reform of educational institutions and its relationship to creative research, and about cosmopolitan identities in circumstances of globalisation.

The Lost Age of Reason: Philosophy in Early Modern India 1450-1700 (The Oxford History of Philosophy)

History

Asia

The Self: Naturalism, Consciousness, and the First-Person Stance

What is it to occupy a first-person stance? Is the first-personal idea one has of oneself in conflict with the idea of oneself as a physical being? How, if there is a conflict, is it to be resolved? The Self recommends a new way to approach those questions, finding inspiration in theories about consciousness and mind in first millennial India. These philosophers do not regard the first-person stance as in conflict with the natural--their idea of nature is not that of scientific naturalism, but rather a liberal naturalism non-exclusive of the normative. Jonardon Ganeri explores a wide range of ideas about the self: reflexive self-representation, mental files, and quasi-subject analyses of subjective consciousness; the theory of emergence as transformation; embodiment and the idea of a bodily self; the centrality of the emotions to the unity of self. Buddhism's claim that there is no self too readily assumes an account of what a self must be. Ganeri argues instead that the self is a negotiation between self-presentation and normative avowal, a transaction grounded in unconscious mind. Immersion, participation, and coordination are jointly constitutive of self, the first-person stance at once lived, engaged, and underwritten. And all is in harmony with the idea of the natural.

Jonardon Ganeri presents an account of mind in which attention, not self, explains the experiential and normative situatedness of human beings in the world. Attention consists in an organisation of awareness and action at the centre of which there is neither a practical will nor a phenomenological witness. Attention performs two roles in experience, a selective role of placing and a focal role of access. Attention improves our epistemic standing, because it is in the nature of attention to settle on what is real and to shun what is not real. When attention is informed by expertise, it is sufficient for knowledge. That gives attention a reach beyond the perceptual: for attention is a determinable whose determinates include the episodic memory from which our narrative identities are made, the empathy for others that situates us in a social world, and the introspection that makes us self-aware. Empathy is other-directed attention, placed on you and focused on your states of mind; it is akin to listening. Empathetic attention is central to a range of experiences that constitutively require a contrast between oneself and others, all of which involve an awareness of oneself as the object of another's attention. An analysis of attention as mental action gainsays authorial conceptions of self, because it is the nature of intending itself, effortful attention in action, to settle on what to do and to shun what not to do. In ethics, a conception of persons as beings with a characteristic capacity for attention offers hope for resolution in the conflict between individualism and impersonalism. Attention, Not Self is a contribution to a growing body of work that studies the nature of mind from a place at the crossroads of three disciplines: philosophy in the analytical and phenomenological traditions, contemporary cognitive science and empirical work in cognitive psychology, and Buddhist theoretical literature.

Attention, Not Self

Peter Adamson and Jonardon Ganeri present a lively introduction to one of the world's richest intellectual traditions: the philosophy of classical India. They begin with the earliest extant literature, the Vedas, and the explanatory works that these inspired, known as Upani.sads. They also discuss other famous texts of classical Vedic culture, especially the Mah=abh=arata and its most notable section, the Bhagavad-G=ita, alongside the rise of Buddhism and Jainism. In this opening section, Adamson and Ganeri emphasize the way that philosophy was practiced as a form of life in search of liberation from suffering. Next, the pair move on to the explosion of philosophical speculation devoted to foundational texts called 'sutras,' discussing such traditions as the logical and epistemological Nyd=aya school, the monism of Advaita Ved=anta, and the spiritual discipline of Yoga. In the final section of the book, they chart further developments within Buddhism, highlighting Nag=arjuna's radical critique of 'non-dependent' concepts and the no-self philosophy of mind found in authors like Dign=aga, and within Jainism, focusing especially on its 'standpoint' epistemology. Unlike other introductions that cover the main schools and positions in classical Indian philosophy, Adamson and Ganeri's lively guide also pays attention to philosophical themes such as non-violence, political authority, and the status of women, while considering textual traditions typically left out of overviews of Indian thought, like the C=arv=aka school, Tantra, and aesthetic theory as well. Adamson and Ganeri conclude by focusing on the much-debated question of whether Indian philosophy may have influenced ancient Greek philosophy and, from there, evaluate the impact that this area of philosophy had on later Western thought.

Jonardon Ganeri presents an account of mind in which attention, not self, explains the experiential and normative situatedness of human beings in the world. Attention consists in an organisation of awareness and action at the centre of which there is neither a practical will nor a phenomenological witness. Attention performs two roles in experience, a selective role of placing and a focal role of access. Attention improves our epistemic standing, because it is in the nature of attention to settle on what is real and to shun what is not real. When attention is informed by expertise, it is sufficient for knowledge. That gives attention a reach beyond the perceptual: for attention is a determinable whose determinates include the episodic memory from which our narrative identities are made, the empathy for others that situates us in a social world, and the introspection that makes us self-aware. Empathy is other-directed attention, placed on you and focused on your states of mind; it 
is akin to listening. Empathetic attention is central to a range of experiences that constitutively require a contrast between oneself and others, all of which involve an awareness of oneself as the object of another's attention. An analysis of attention as mental action gainsays authorial conceptions of self, because it is the nature of intending itself, effortful attention in action, to settle on what to do and to shun what not to do. In ethics, a conception of persons as beings with a characteristic capacity for attention offers hope for resolution in the conflict between individualism and impersonalism. 
Attention, Not Self is a contribution to a growing body of work that studies the nature of mind from a place at the crossroads of three disciplines: philosophy in the analytical and phenomenological traditions, contemporary cognitive science and empirical work in cognitive psychology, and Buddhist theoretical literature.

See the best price to sell, buy, or rent books by Ganeri, Jonardon. BookScouter helps to compare book prices from 25+ online bookstores and 30+ buyback vendors with a single search.

Books by Ganeri, Jonardon

See the best price to sell, buy, or rent books by Ganeri, Jonardon. BookScouter helps to compare book prices from 25+ online bookstores and 30+ buyback vendors with a single search.

Classical Indian Philosophy: A history of philosophy without any gaps, Volume 5

Artha: Meaning (Foundations of Philosophy in India)

Fernando Pessoa: Imagination and the Self (Philosophical Outsiders)

Artha: Meaning (Foundations of Philosophy in India)

Semantic Powers: Meaning and the Means of Knowing in Classical Indian Philosophy (Oxford Philosophical Monographs)

The Lost Age of Reason: Philosophy in Early Modern India 1450-1700 (The Oxford History of Philosophy)

The Self: Naturalism, Consciousness, and the First-Person Stance

Attention, Not Self

Classical Indian Philosophy: A history of philosophy without any gaps, Volume 5

Attention, Not Self