The Circle of Life is more than the food web. It's a self-organizing system of global life-cooperation and energy dissipation. Its balance and stability have been taken for granted for millennia. But in the age of the climate crisis, the Circle is breaking down. From the 1960s onward, philosophers, artists and spiritual teachers promoted the idea of the 'Green Self' to help us understand how the Circle works, and how we harm ourselves when we damage it. But in all that time, the climate crisis only got worse. The Greening of the Self didn't happen. Using the science of ecology and a deep dive into human nature, this book explores what the Circle of Life really is, and what becomes of us when we face it in different ways. The exploration reveals a deeper eco-spiritual perspective, in which the Immensity of the Earth, and the breakdown of the Circle, are calls to action: to heal the Circle, and to create a better world.

Pagans often claim that their spiritual inspiration comes not from a written scripture but from personal experience and original creativity. Yet, there are many written works which also constitute its testament. Some of them are thousands of years old, such as the "Descent of Ishtar", and "The Homeric Hymn to Demeter". Others are more recent, such as "The Charge of the Goddess". "A Pagan Testament" collects these original works together, along with the poetry and prose that inspired the founders of the modern Pagan movement. It also includes the largest collection of circle songs and wisdom teachings ever published, which are the Pagan equivalent of the Biblical Psalms and Proverbs. They were collected by the author in a survey of Pagan folklore, from almost 2,000 people in twelve countries around the world. They show that Paganism is continually expanding and developing. Finally, the book includes an original and valuable philosophical commentary and interpretation.

What is civilization, and is it a good thing? It's a name for the most glorious of humanity's monuments and cultural achievements; yet it also speaks of the conquests, oppressions, and empires which make their glory possible. This book explains the essence of civilization, then asks what's wrong with it, and considers what can be done about it.

The Celts, the old Norse and Germanic people, the Greeks of the time of Homer and Hesiod, and other ancient heroic societies are popularly believed to be tribal warrior cultures, where the light of civilisation had not yet dawned. In fact, this is far from the case. Many of our own most fundamental ideas about politics, justice, friendship, true love, the good life, and especially the notion of Virtue itself, come from their world. To them, virtue had nothing to do with purity, nor modesty, nor God-given laws, nor sin and guilt, nor with any Sunday-school pretentiousness.Rather, it originally meant 'excellence' and 'greatness of soul'. It was tied to more assertive qualities like strength and courage, and to social qualities like friendship. It was also connected to spiritual principles like the nature of the soul, the hope for immortality, and even the pursuit of happiness itself. Using ancient heroic epics and sagas like "Beowulf", the "Illiad" and "Odyssey", the "Eddas", the "Tain Bo Cuailnge", and literature inspired by them including the works of the Renaissance and Romanticism, Shakespeare, Tolkien, and J.K. Rowling, this book explains the world-view that gave birth to our virtues. In that world-view, life involves inevitable confrontations with inexplicable events like fortune, nature, other people, and death itself. However, the good life itself becomes possible when we face them and respond to them. Finally, the book calls for a revival of heroic and classical virtue in our time.

What is the ethical significance of the environment? How shall we dwell on, and with, the earth? And what, if anything, do we owe to future generations? "Time and the Land" pursues these questions through each of the four most prominent theories of ethics in the western philosophical tradition: Utilitarianism, Distributive Justice, Kantian Deontology, and Virtue Ethics. For each theory, Derek Parfit's Non-Identity Problem serves as a test case. Parfit showed how some environmental policy decisions might harm no one in the far distant future, even if they produce situations all would agree are intrinsically repugnant. Myers seeks a theory of environmental ethics that not only responds to pressing moral problems in environmental policy, but also avoids the paradox of the Non-Identity Problem. Myers concludes that no single theory by itself can accomplish this task. A synthesis of ethics is required: but Virtue must lead the way. As Virtue is not a 'utility-maximizing' theory, it avoids the Non-Identity Problem. At the same time, its potential for responding to environmental ethics dilemmas is deep. Myers concludes that the aim for a worthwhile human life must include the aim to create and sustain the environmental conditions in which the worthwhile human life is possible and supported. A Virtuous person takes care of the future through aiming at ends which are, while achievable in the present, also temporally continuous and ongoing, even beyond the one's own lifetime. And the future which it is virtuous to aim for is the one which brings out one's best qualities in the course of striving for it.

"Iron Age" is a political strategy game, in which players compete and co-operate with each other to build a community. The better you manage your village, and the better you manage your relations with other players, the more honour you will gain. And the more honour you gain, the better your position will be at a special democratic assembly called the Landsmoot, where one player is elected the Chieftain. Originally designed as a teaching tool for a college course in political science, the simple rules of Iron Age allow many strategic possibilities. From the "hard power" of the army to the "soft power" of trade and culture, just about every facet of politics in the real world can be represented here - all depending on how you play * Build farms, workshops, Great Halls, temples, and more * Recuit specialists like warriors, priests, and poets * Trade with other players to enrich your village, or put other players in your debt * Raise an army to protect your village, or to loot and pillage your neighbours * Build voting blocks, coalitions, and alliances * If you can get elected Chieftain of the Landsmoot often enough, and remain Chieftain long enough, you win the game Players: Between 3 and 8 Ages: 15 and up Includes: * Basic and Advanced versions of the game * Commentary on the philosophical roots of the game, especially in the political thought of Thomas Hobbes and David Hume, * Fifteen fun illustrations, * and a short essay on the nature of "soft power" games. Requires: * Character sheets for each player (available for free on the author's web site) * Three or more 6-sided dice. A Note for Philosophers and Educators: This game began as a project in experimental philosophy, which I presented to students of my "Theories of Social Justice" class. It is not mainly intended to teach facts: rather, it is intented to help students develop skills, especially in public speaking, political strategizing, and rational persuasion. It is also designed to reproduce and to experiment with what some philosophers call "the circumstances of justice," meaning the social or economic or political problems that call for a justice-based solution. David Hume is perhaps the first to draw up the list of circumstances that most philosophers have used ever since. On his list of these circumstances are: moderate scarcity of resources; approximate equality of power among all players; and moderate self-interest. Would players in these circumstances reach the justice-based conclusions that Hume claimed they would? Or would they remain in a Hobbsean "state of nature," leading nasty, brutish, and short lives? As players calculate the best way to either win the game, or else at least avoid being eliminated from the game, they end up negotiating and co-operating with each other to handle these circumstances. In the course of play, "Iron Age" also helps demonstrate to students things like: * how political supporters are won and lost * how players with the most honour are not always the clear winners * how to find the right "balance" between co-operation and competition * the importance of public speaking, argumentation, and persuasion * the importance of being alert to the movements of both allies and rivals * how political power flows from numerous sources * how to plan for the future, and how to grow a community sustainably * how much of our lives are unpredictable, and why it's important to prepare for the unexpected. "Iron Age" also demonstrates some features of Iron Age culture and history, such as the Heroic Feast, the importance of Honour, the role of fate and luck, and the early development of democracy.

The Affordable Care Act (ACA) has altered the landscape of health care by forcing behavioral health workers from their silos into a rapidly changing, fast-paced, integrative care setting of increased accountability and accessibility. In order to survive in this transition, behavioral health care will have to be transportable beyond traditional one-to-one psychotherapy models, be viewed as a less consumable commodity, and be able to efficiently treat the myriad of comorbid psychological disorders that are present in every area of medicine. Fortunately, cognitive behavioral therapy (CBT) has a long tradition of empirical success with a wide variety of clinical disorders in youth. Accordingly, CBT provides a robust platform from which to launch new clinical models and delivery systems beyond the limitations of a single-disorder paradigm to target transdiagnostic factors that perpetuate psychological disorders in youth. This book begins by briefly reviewing the challenges that clinicians face, working with children in the new health care era. The book then discusses trauma focused CBT for children with developmental disabilities; CBT for informal cancer caregivers; CBT in pain management of adult chronic nonmalignant pain patients; and CBT for rheumatoid arthritis.

Philosophy was invented by pagans. Yet this fact is almost always ignored by those who write the history of ideas. This book tells the history of the pagan philosophers, and the various places where their ideas appeared, from ancient times to the 21st century. The Pagan philosophers are a surprisingly diverse group: from kings of great empires to exiled lonely wanderers, from devout religious teachers to con artists, drug addicts, and social radicals. Three traditions of thought emerge from their work: Pantheism, NeoPlatonism, and Humanism, corresponding to the immensities of the Earth, the Gods, and the Soul. From ancient schools like the Stoics and the Druids, to modern feminists and deep ecologists, the pagan philosophers examined these three immensities with systematic critical reason, and sometimes with poetry and mystical vision. This book tells their story for the first time in one volume, and invites you to examine the immensities with them. And as a special feature, the book includes summaries of the ideas of leading modern pagan intellectuals, in their own words: Emma Restall Orr, Michael York, John Michael Greer, Vivianne Crowley, and more