The Illusion of Freedom


Book Description

Alex Salmond's Scottish National Party is currently mounting Scotland's biggest challenge to the British union since the conception of the nation. Nevertheless, as Tom Gallagher makes clear, if the Union were demolished, widespread change would still remain elusive. Close-knit administrative, commercial, and religious elites continue to run Scotland with no strategy for reviving its economy and reforming its urban centers. Gallagher contends that the SNP is not committed to independence. Rather, it exists as a super-unionist party recoiling from popular sovereignty, seeking instead the federalist rule of a postnational Europe. Gallagher also points to the SNP's endorsement of a radical multiculturalism that devalues individual citizenship and places Scotland at the losing end of globalization. His hard-hitting analysis is beyond provocative, especially in its claim that if the SNP triumphs, the party will reinforce the very authoritarian trends that have disfigured Scottish history and encouraged emigration for decades.




The Illusion of Freedom and Equality


Book Description

Explores how Enlightenment values have been transformed in a technological civilization.




Freedom from an Illusion of Freedom


Book Description

First let me mention that the main characters in the book are the readers and the readers are the audience too. Find out how and what character describes you best throughout the novel. Fear is one of the main forces that create this illusion of freedom. "Just because you are scared does not mean you are entitled to back down," (Lemon). Believing the belief that you are free is the very belief that creates this illusion. Then this belief traps you within an illusion of freedom and is the very belief that prevents you from realizing you are not free by any means of what you thought freedom was and what freedom really is. You believing that belief is what prevent you from discovering, seeing, understanding and experiencing what true freedom is and means. My book is a manuscript that offers the following: internal psychology, optimistic/positive psychology, reflective psychology, self-improvement psychology, self-knowledge psychology, therapy, spirituality, sociology, philosophy, workology, streetology, survivology (higher survival awareness /teens and adults), better relationship awareness (work, couples, or in general) and is a parental guide. This is not a conspiracy theory novel nor is it fiction. It is real events and real experiences anyone can experience. This book is a self-improvement; self-developmental novel that shows people how to find and bring out their deep rooted power, true freedom, and potential of which they never knew existed or never knew how to bring out.




Illusions of Emancipation


Book Description

As students of the Civil War have long known, emancipation was not merely a product of Lincoln's proclamation or of Confederate defeat in April 1865. It was a process that required more than legal or military action. With enslaved people fully engaged as actors, emancipation necessitated a fundamental reordering of a way of life whose implications stretched well beyond the former slave states. Slavery did not die quietly or quickly, nor did freedom fulfill every dream of the enslaved or their allies. The process unfolded unevenly. In this sweeping reappraisal of slavery's end during the Civil War era, Joseph P. Reidy employs the lenses of time, space, and individuals' sense of personal and social belonging to understand how participants and witnesses coped with drastic change, its erratic pace, and its unforeseeable consequences. Emancipation disrupted everyday habits, causing sensations of disorientation that sometimes intensified the experience of reality and sometimes muddled it. While these illusions of emancipation often mixed disappointment with hope, through periods of even intense frustration they sustained the promise that the struggle for freedom would result in victory.




Free Will


Book Description

From the New York Times bestselling author of The End of Faith, a thought-provoking, "brilliant and witty" (Oliver Sacks) look at the notion of free will—and the implications that it is an illusion. A belief in free will touches nearly everything that human beings value. It is difficult to think about law, politics, religion, public policy, intimate relationships, morality—as well as feelings of remorse or personal achievement—without first imagining that every person is the true source of his or her thoughts and actions. And yet the facts tell us that free will is an illusion. In this enlightening book, Sam Harris argues that this truth about the human mind does not undermine morality or diminish the importance of social and political freedom, but it can and should change the way we think about some of the most important questions in life.




The Illusion of Freedom and Equality


Book Description

Explores how Enlightenment values have been transformed in a technological civilization.




Exploring the Illusion of Free Will and Moral Responsibility


Book Description

Exploring the Illusion of Free Will and Moral Responsibility investigates the philosophical and scientific arguments for free will skepticism and their implications. Skepticism about free will and moral responsibility has been on the rise in recent years. In fact, a significant number of philosophers, psychologists, and neuroscientists now either doubt or outright deny the existence of free will and/or moral responsibility—and the list of prominent skeptics appears to grow by the day. Given the profound importance that the concepts of free will and moral responsibility hold in our lives—in understanding ourselves, society, and the law—it is important that we explore what is behind this new wave of skepticism. It is also important that we explore the potential consequences of skepticism for ourselves and society. Edited by Gregg D. Caruso, this collection of new essays brings together an internationally recognized line-up of contributors, most of whom hold skeptical positions of some sort, to display and explore the leading arguments for free will skepticism and to debate their implications.




The Illusion of Money


Book Description

New York Times best-selling author and comedian-turned-motivational speaker, Kyle Cease, shows how your obsession with money is actually preventing you from living the life of your dreams. "I can't afford that." "Now's not the right time . . . I need to save up." "Quit my job? Are you nuts?!" Sound familiar? Money is one of the biggest excuses we make to not go after what we really want. Our fixation with money--the desire for more of it, and the fear of not having enough of it--is often really just a longing to feel safe. But this obsession with money is coming at a much bigger cost: our sanity, our creativity, our freedom, and our ability to step into our true power. This book is about eliminating the need to seek safety through the illusion of money, and learning to see ourselves for the perfection that we are--so that we can bring our gifts to the world in an authentic way, and allow ourselves to receive massive, true abundance as a result. Kyle Cease has heard excuses like the ones above countless times at his live events, and he has shown people how to completely break through them. In The Illusion of Money, he shares his own experiences as well as practical tools to help readers understand their ingrained beliefs and attachments to money, and how they can tap into our infinite assets and talents. "After 25 years as a successful comedian, actor, transformational speaker, author and junior-league amateur bowler, I've experienced many times how chasing money is not an effective way to create an abundant and fulfilling life. The most alive I've ever felt was after I left my comedy career at its peak to become a transformational speaker. I left tons of guaranteed money and so-called security for a complete unknown. It was terrifying--but what was on the other side of that terror was a completely different life that is not only more abundant financially, but has more freedom, more ease, more passion, more impact and more joy." -- Kyle Cease




The Illusion of Conscious Will


Book Description

A novel contribution to the age-old debate about free will versus determinism. Do we consciously cause our actions, or do they happen to us? Philosophers, psychologists, neuroscientists, theologians, and lawyers have long debated the existence of free will versus determinism. In this book Daniel Wegner offers a novel understanding of the issue. Like actions, he argues, the feeling of conscious will is created by the mind and brain. Yet if psychological and neural mechanisms are responsible for all human behavior, how could we have conscious will? The feeling of conscious will, Wegner shows, helps us to appreciate and remember our authorship of the things our minds and bodies do. Yes, we feel that we consciously will our actions, Wegner says, but at the same time, our actions happen to us. Although conscious will is an illusion, it serves as a guide to understanding ourselves and to developing a sense of responsibility and morality. Approaching conscious will as a topic of psychological study, Wegner examines the issue from a variety of angles. He looks at illusions of the will—those cases where people feel that they are willing an act that they are not doing or, conversely, are not willing an act that they in fact are doing. He explores conscious will in hypnosis, Ouija board spelling, automatic writing, and facilitated communication, as well as in such phenomena as spirit possession, dissociative identity disorder, and trance channeling. The result is a book that sidesteps endless debates to focus, more fruitfully, on the impact on our lives of the illusion of conscious will.




Freedom from Illusion


Book Description

An anthology of the complex issues of the ego, ambition, power and destructiveness from the perspective of a contemporary mystic. Osho shows the way to liberation from the illusions of the personality through an internal revolution - the psychology of the Buddhas. The ego is just the opposite of your real self. The ego is not you. It never allows you even a glimpse of your real authentic self, and your life is there, in your authenticity. Hence, this ego only produces misery, suffering, fighting, frustration, madness, suicide, murder -- all kinds of crime.