Description
Book SynopsisGebser’s central thesis was that a potent “leap” in thinking was happening in the 20th century. This new mode of thought would be a holistic-centered, or integral one; an answer to the type of thinking responsible for economic and industrial crisis, two World Wars, and what many today consider a dire, global ecological crisis.
Trade Review“Gebser’s noetic analysis, of Teilhardian scope, is only partially equaled by such works as Erich Neumann’s
The Origins and History of Consciousness or Gaston Bachelard’s
The Philosophy of No. A profound and sagaciously polemic work, remarkably relevant to discussions of holism and postmodern consciousness.” * Library Journal *
“Jean Gebser’s magnum opus is at long last available in a fine English rendering … I expect no less an interest in the English translation, and hope that Gebser’s work will now begin to receive the worldwide recognition it deserves.” * Emergent Paradigm Bulletin *
“(The book) impressed me as a very important, indeed in some respects pioneering, piece of work. It treads new paths, opens new vistas, and in so doing it is vastly, solidly, and subtly documented by a wealth of anthropological, mythological, linguistic, artistic, philosophical, and scientific material which is fruitfully brought into play and shown in its multifold and striking interrelationships. The book is brilliantly written and introduces many valuable new terms and distinctions. (It shows) that scholarly precision and faithfulness to given data are fully compatible with a broad, imaginative, and spiritual outlook; and (it exposes) the utter sterility of the prevailing positivistic, mechanistic, and wrongfully scientistic methods.”
“The gigantic attempt of one of the most creative and stimulating thinkers of modern Europe to integrate the most advanced knowledge of our time with the spiritual sources of the past.”
