Science and Humanism in the 21 Century: Perspectives
International Congress
March 31 - April 2, 2005.
The Universidad Iberoamericana Ciudad de México
in conjunction with the Instituto de Investigación sobre la Evolución Humana, A.C.
invites all interested people to convene for the International Congress
"SCIENCE AND HUMANISM IN THE XXI CENTURY: PERSPECTIVES"
to celebrate the International World Year of Physics 2005 and in remembrance of the
50th anniversary of the death of Albert Einstein and Pierre Teilhard de Chardin.
Universidad Iberoamericana Ciudad de México, Campus Santa Fe, México, D. F.
Evolution: The Great Misunderstanding
Guillermo Agudelo Murguía; José Guillermo Alcalá Rivero
From its inception, Darwin's theory of evolution became a bulwark against creationism. As such, it became a dogma, as inflexible as creationism itself. When a new idea or theory emerges, most Darwinists figure that if its tenets agree with Darwinism, then it is not necessary to study it; and if it tenets disagree with Darwinism, then why bother reading it.
According to Máximo Sandín, we think that the struggle to introduce any new paradigm to evolutionary theory will be long and difficult. Yet new paradigms are there, and a new biology might emerge from them.
Sufism and Psychoanalysis
Dr. Javad Nurbakhsh
Next text is the second part of an article from doctor Javad Nurbakhsh called Sufism and Psychoanalysis, published in The International Journal of Social Psychiatry, Vol. 24, Nº 3. First part of the article: What is Sufism?, gives us a general view about what Sufism is, specially persian Sufism; and this second one makes a comparaison between Sufism and psychoanalysis.
Synthetic theory: Crisis and revolution
Dr. Máximo Sandín
From the very start, Darwinist theory suffered from significant weaknesses acknowledged by its author. Both the observation of natural species and the evidence derived from the fossil record were in direct conflict with two of its core concepts, natural selection and gradual change, giving rise to problems that deeply troubled Darwin and some of his followers.
But these problems, clearly observable, were "solved" in a theoretical way by mathematical population genetics modelling. Consequently, Darwinism consolidated in the middle of this century, in the shape of modern synthetic theory, the evolutionary model widely accepted since then by the scientific community.
Meanwhile, observations from the field of embryology were adding new discrepancies that contributed to a growing divergence between the observed evidence and the theoretical model.
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The Mind’s Sky
Report on the book of Timothy Ferris
Timothy Ferris develops in this book the following idea: human mind is composed by several entities. Decisions are taken by the common activity of them all. There is not a central entity to which all the others are subordinate.
Nevertheless it exists something that we can call the "interpreter", that interprets the common decision as taken just by himself. This interpreter situated in the center related to language, would be the highest exponent of "I", but of a false one. This interpreter is essentially a liar, but it is useful and even essential for survival, and, if it is disconnected, mind can be opened to authentic truth.
Next of Kin
Report on the book of Roger Fouts
We like to think that science is the noble search for objective knowledge, and that it is always serving truth, but actually, scientists represent the prejudices of the time they are living.
Our ethics are based in the difference between those who have the right to enter in our moral universe and those who have not. What would happen if we include in it any intelligent being, conscious of his own identity, able to maintain familiar relationships and have feelings? We would be immediately obliged to recognize the great primates -chimpanzees, gorillas and orangutans- as beings worthy of belonging to our community, since they all have these characteristics.
The Tao of Islam
Sachiko Murata
Chinese cosmology describes the whole universe in terms of yin and yang, which can be understood as the creative and receptive or male and female principles of existence. Nothing escapes this relationship. The famous symbol of Tai Chi, the "Great Ultimate" or the Tao, portrays yin and yang as constant movement and change. Yin carries within itself potential yang and yang carries within itself potential yin.
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