Public and intellectual debates have long struggled with the concept of values and the difficulties of defining them. With The Genesis of Values, renowned theorist Hans Joas explores the nature of these difficulties in relation to some of the leading figures of twentieth-century philosophy and social theory: Friedrich Nietzsche, William James, Max Scheler, John Dewey, Georg Simmel, Charles Taylor, and Jürgen Habermas. Joas traces how these thinkers came to terms with the idea of values, and then extends beyond them with his own comprehensive theory. Values, Joas suggests, arise in experiences in self-formation and self-transcendence. Only by appreciating the creative nature of human action can we understand how our values arise.

Public and intellectual debates have long struggled with the concept of values and the difficulties of defining them. With The Genesis of Values, renowned theorist Hans Joas explores the nature of these difficulties in relation to some of the leading figures of twentieth-century philosophy and social theory: Friedrich Nietzsche, William James, Max Scheler, John Dewey, Georg Simmel, Charles Taylor, and Jürgen Habermas. Joas traces how these thinkers came to terms with the idea of values, and then extends beyond them with his own comprehensive theory. Values, Joas suggests, arise in experiences in self-formation and self-transcendence. Only by appreciating the creative nature of human action can we understand how our values arise.

Although values play a leading role in nearly every explanatory theory in the broad realm of the social and behavioral sciences, very little multidisciplinary research material on values is available. Addressing this need, the editors bring together distinguished social scientists, psychologists, and biologists who collaboratively explore fundamental questions about values: What are the determinants of social values, taboos, and ideologies? What are the determinants of individual values? What is the nature of motivations and rewards? Is there an evolutionary basis for the development of values?

This book argues that the phenomena of religion can not be reduced to the phenomena of biology.

In several branches of social science, interest in values and moral evaluations has increased in recent years, with group values taking centre-stage, yet a satisfactory, theoretical account of the concept of values and their role in social life remains lacking. Engaging with theories of value formation and the role of values in everyday life found in ethics, classical sociology and contemporary social theory and their implications for empirical work, Researching Values with Qualitative Methods argues for a pragmatist approach both to understanding values and the manner in which they are formed, as well as exploring the ways in which they can be studied empirically, using qualitative research methods. In this way, this book promises to resolve many of the practical problems involved in fieldwork with political groups, including the prominent question of how to account for the researcher's own values. Illustrated with examples from published as well as new research, this book provides the foundation for the theoretical understanding of values and their empirical investigation, thus strengthening the connection between social theory and the development of research methods. As such, it will be of interest to sociologists, anthropologists and geographers with interests in values, social theory and research methodology.

What are your values? What impact do they have on your personal growth, your family life, your professional life? 'The Genesis Effect is' a groundbreaking exploration of the relationship between values and growth. Bringing twenty years of research to his subject, Dr. Brian P. Hall shows how human, spiritual, and institutional growth are interconnected and form a dynamic whole. The author explains how values develop when a person's internal images and ideas interact with the external world. The Genesis Effect is the growth that takes place when these values create transformations in ourselves, in others, and in the organizations we belong to.

There are many questions that intelligent people have about the Bible, science and evolution theory. Finding intelligent answers is difficult. The problem is that specialization is required in the sciences, in philosophy and theology, so people tend to pick one and disregard the others. There aren't so many people that consider all three fields with much depth of understanding. I made a try at that and wrote a book that is free to download. It is not only difficult to understand all three fields, it is difficult to select what should be written about, and difficult to write well. I didn't by any means cover everything; there is lots to cover.

In Rationalities in History the distinguished historian David d'Avray writes a new comparative history in the spirit of Max Weber. In a strikingly original reassessment of seminal Weberian ideas, d'Avray applies value rationality to the comparative history of religion and the philosophy of law. Integrating theories of rational choice, anthropological reflections on relativism, and the recent philosophy of rationality with Weber's conceptual framework, d'Avray seeks to disengage 'rationalisation' from its enduring association with Western 'modernity'. This mode of analysis is contextualised through the examples of Buddhism, Imperial China and sixteenth-century Catholicism - in the latter case building upon unpublished archival research. This ambitious synthesis of social theory and comparative history will engage social scientists and historians from advanced undergraduate level upwards, stimulating interdisciplinary discourse, and making a significant contribution to the methodology of history. D'Avray explores the potential of this new Weberian analysis further in his companion volume, Medieval Religious Rationalities.

This is a collection of contemporary writings on the work of Holmes Rolston, III. The authors contributing to this volume are a mixture of senior scholars in environmental ethics and new voices in philosophy and in literature. Together they provide an in depth evaluation of many of the topics discussed by Rolston. Rolston himself, in a detailed reply to each of his critics at the end of the volume, reveals where some of these criticisms sting him the most.