Immortality

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Prometheus Books, Dec 2, 2009 - Body, Mind & Spirit
Is there life after death or do we simply cease to exist? Renowned scholar Paul Edwards has compiled Immortality, a superb group of philosophical selections featuring the work of both classical and contemporary authors who address the topics of immortality, soul and body, transmigration, materialism, epiphenomenalism, physical research and parapsychology, reincarnation, disembodied existence, and much more. In addition to a 70-page editorial introduction offering an in-depth discussion of the forms which belief in immortality has taken, this volume includes selections from Thomas Aquinas, A.J. Ayer, Paul and Linda Badham, John Beloff, C.D. Broad, Joseph Butler, Rene Descartes, C.J. Ducasse, Paul Edwards, Hugh Elliot, Antony Flew, John Foster, Peter Geach, John Hick, John Hospers, David Hume, William James, Raynor Johnson, Immanuel Kant, John Locke, Lucretius, Donald MacKay, John Stuart Mill, Derek Parfit, Plato, H.H. Price, Joseph Priestley, Thomas Reid, Tertullian, Peter van Inwagen, and Voltaire. Also included is a detailed annotated bibliography.
 

Contents

Introduction
1
INTRODUCTION CONTENTS
2
The Astral Body
19
Can Matter Think?
37
The Resurrection of the Body
53
God and Survival
67
Lucretius The Mind and the Spirit
83
St Thomas Aquinas The Resurrection of Man
91
John Stuart Mill Immortality
172
Hugh Elliot Tantalus
184
Paul Edwards Karmic Tribulations
200
H H Price What Kind of Next World?
213
Antony Flew The Cartesian Assumption
220
John Hick The Recreation of
235
Peter van Inwagen The Possibility
242
Paul and Linda Badham The Evidence from Psychical
250

René Descartes The Incorporeal Soul
100
John Locke Personal Identity
109
Joseph Butler Of a Future Life
121
David Hume Of Personal Identity
130
Voltaire The Soul Identity
141
Thomas Reid Of the Nature and Origin
148
Immanuel Kant Refutation of Mendelssohns
155
John Beloff Is There Anything Beyond
259
A J Ayer What I Saw When I
269
John Hospers Is the Notion
279
Paul Edwards The Dependence
292
Derek Parfit Divided Minds and
308
Bibliographical Essay
316
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About the author (2009)

Paul Edwards (1923-2004) was the author of Heidegger's Confusions, Heidegger and Death, The Logic of Moral Discourse, and Reincarnation: A Critical Examination. He was also the editor of the monumental and highly acclaimed Encyclopedia of Philosophy, as well as Immortality. He taught for many years at Brooklyn College and the New School for Social Research.