The Dense Philosophy of Iain McGilchrist, Part 1—with Robert “Doc” Hall

Many of us are reading McGilchrist’s tome, The Matter with Things: Our Brains, Our Delusions, and the Unmaking of the World, 28 chapters in all, and not designed to need reading front-to-back. We will concentrate only on Chapter 22, “Time,” which appears to a hinge point connecting the warm-up chapters on how we think to McGilchrist’s final chapters on the nature of reality and human values and purpose in life. Even Ch 22 bounces from one deep concept to another, so if we can address the opening dozen pages of it in one session, we will do well. What is time technologically, and what is it psychologically? (Right brain and left brain.) Doc will attempt to provide a copy of these pages for everyone to read before the meeting.

Robert “Doc” Hall is Prof Emeritus of Supply Chain Management, Indiana University, and spent a career promoting lean methods to managers who rarely understood either the human side of them, or the environmental fallout from them.

Bloomsday Eve: Here Comes Everybody—Elizabeth Wrightman and John Dotson

Devotees of James Joyce observe Bloomsday, June 16, as a feast day. We will prepare with Joyce and Jung—and Marshall McLuhan too.

Like every true prophet, the artist is the unwitting mouthpiece of the psychic secrets of his time and is often as unconscious as a sleepwalker. … I had an uncle whose thinking was always to the point. One day he stopped me on the street and asked, ‘Do you know how the devil tortures the souls in hell?’ When I said no, he declared, ‘He keeps them waiting.’ … This remark occurred to me when I was ploughing through Ulysses for the first time. —Jung

Why is Jung so rude to me? He doesn’t even know me. —Joyce

Joyce could see no advantage in our remaining locked up in each cultural cycle as in a trance or dream. He discovered the means of living simultaneously in all cultural modes while quite conscious. —McLuhan

Climate Change, Addiction, and Spiritual Liberation: A Story for McGowan House

This evening will be dedicated to the reading and commenting of Margaret Bullitt-Jonas’ essay, “Climate Change, Addiction, and Spiritual Liberation,” which highlights the urgent need for a transformation of society to preserve a habitable planet for human beings. Drawing on her personal journey of recovery from addiction and decades of climate activism, she explores how understanding addiction and recovery dynamics can inform our efforts to protect the web of life.

This essay has the potential to be a seminal reference for transformation, especially when discussed at McGowan House, a place of transition, spirituality and healing. Let’s explore how this text can help us actualize the potential of this place as a transformative force for our community and beyond.

End of content

No more pages to load