Full Description
Alien Life and Human Purpose: A Rhetorical Examination through History provides a rhetorical examination of the way major historical figures connect their arguments for the absence of alien life, or "unity," to their philosophical, religious, and ethical agendas. Although the unity myth has often existed in the background of society, shaping institutions and values, during periods where relativism gained prominence, its opponents actively wielded the unity myth as a response; Plato used the unity myth against the sophists, Anglican theologian and philosopher William Whewell against the utilitarians, co-discoverer of evolution Alfred Russell Wallace against the social Darwinists, university professors Frank J. Tipler and John D. Barrow against the postmodernists, etc. These individuals presented scientific defenses of unity and then used the "fact" of unity to claim the universe is teleological, knowable, and ordered, rather than chaotic and relativistic. This book argues that unity and its complimentary mythic function have played an important role in shaping values throughout history and more importantly continue to do so today.
Contents
Acknowledgements
Introduction
Chapter One: Plato's Rhetorical Cosmology: The Unity of the World as Foundational Myth
Chapter Two: The Dominance of the Unity Cosmology from Plato to Galileo
Chapter Three: William Whewell and Alfred Russel Wallace: Unity Cosmology in the Modern Era
Chapter Four: Quantum Unity
Chapter Five: Unity in the Twenty-first Century
Conclusion: Humanity as the Measure vs. the Unity of the World
Bibliography
