¿Qué es la conciencia? ¿Cómo pueden los procesos físicos en el cerebro dar lugar a la actividad de una mente consciente? Estas cuestiones suscitan las discusiones más acaloradas en el ámbito de la filosofía y la ciencia actuales. el filósofos David J. Chalmers ofrece aquí un análisis conciso de este debate y esboza una nueva teoría sobre la conciencia, que rechaza las tendencias reduccionistas y que sigue siendo compatible con las concepciones fisicalistas, pero va más allá de ellas. 

Consciousness is the cutting topic in scientific circles, its precise nature holding huge implications for the future of science itself. With so many recent advances in brain studies, questions of mind and consciousness have become of critical importance for scientists and theorists alike. Are we nothing but a pack of neurons' that will reveal their secrets in the laboratory? Or do our conscious mind and self-awareness stem from some dimension beyond material investigation? How, too, are we to account for parapsychological phenomena in which consciousness seems to defy space and time boundaries. These recent contributions to the database, selected from the annual "Beyend the Brain" conferences, show that it is time for a radical re-think of our theories and methods in investigating phenomena of the human mind.

Ed. Palgrave Macmillan

This book takes a refreshingly broad-based, balanced look at consciousness, featuring an in-depth analysis of recent research in neuroscience, quantum physics, cognitive science and psychology, and placing the topic within a framework that recognizes the transformational orientation of spiritual and mystical perspectives.  How might the enigma of consciousness be explained? Consciousness has certainly become one of the greatest challenges to philosophy, psychology and neuroscience in recent years. In proposing an answer to this question, Brian Lancaster delves deeply into a rich array of approaches, explaining with great clarity the distinctive contribution each can make, and demonstrating how insights from mystical can sharpen our interpretation of the contribution these disciplines make to explaining consciousness.

"In this stunningly book, Dr. Wade presents a theory of development that begins before birth and ends after death. She extends the boundaries of development in a way that leads us to rethink the nature of consciousness and the relation of consciousness to the brain. Dr. Wade draws on a wide range of cources from the fields of developmental psychology, brain research, new-paradigm studies, and mysticism. She brings these sources together in a synthesis that will make an important contribution to consciousness sutides and to transpersonal psychology". Michael Washburn. 

Ken Wilber explica que la conciencia, al igual que la radiación y la luz, se proyecta en una multitud de "longitudes de onda" al descender hacia el tiempo y el espacio. En consecuencia, diversas religiones y terapias se corresponden con distintas zonas del "espectro de la conciencia". 

The stream of consciousness - that flow of perceptions, purposeful thoughts, fragmentary images, distant recollections, bodily sensations, emotions, plans, wishes, and impossible fantasies- is our experience of life, our own persona life, from its begining to its end. As scientists, we may approach the subject for the joy of discovering how it works. As clinicians, therapists, and social engineers, we may study it in order to reduce human suffering. But simply as people, we are drawn to it precisely because ti is that portion of our being at once most familiar and most mysterious. How disappointing, then, to searh so much of the psychological literature and find reflected there so little of our day-to-day human experience. This is a book that talks about this day-to-day experience.

Por fin se reúnen en un libro importantes investigaciones del momento sobre teorías y prácticas transpersonales, con enfoques rigurosos y solventes, lejos del abuso comercial que últimamente ha generado el vocablo "transpersonal". En La consciencia transpersonal encontrará el lector desde visiones de conjunto hasta aplicaciones concretas como la música, pasando por la psicoterapia, la ontología, el chamanismo, la confrontación Oriente/Occidente... Se trata pues de una aportación rica, heterogénea y creativa, a la vez teórica y práctica que ofrece reflexiones sobre la tradición y la modernidad, nuevas perspectivas en psicoterapia, nuevos planteamientos ecológicos, prácticas de meditación, etc. Y todo ello en campos tan diferentes como la filosofía, la meditación, la sexualidad, la psicología, el arte y la experiencia en general. En La consciencia transpersonal se pueden contrastar las ideas de un pionero de la Gestalt como Claudio Naranjo, un filósofo como Salvador Pániker, un maestro de meditación Vipassana como Dhiravamsa, un psiquiatra transpersonal como Stanislav Grof, teóricos como Roger Walsh, Francis Vaughan y John Rowan. Todos ellos junto a otros eminentes investigadores provenientes de la cultura hispanoamericana. Manuel Almendro, prestigioso psicólogo transpersonal, ha sido el recopilador de los diversos trabajos.

This book bring together an international group of neuroscientists and philosophers who are investigating how the content of subjctive experience is correlated with events in the brain. The fundamental methodological problem in consciousness research is the subjectivity of the target phenomenon - the fact that consicous experience, under standard condiction, is always tied to an individual, first-person perspective. The core empirical question is whether and how physical states of the human nervous system can be mapped onto the content of conscious experience. The search for the neural correlates of consciousness (NCC) has become a highly active field of investigation in recent years. Thomas Metzinger is Professor of Philosophy at the University of Osnabrück, Germany.

Can prayer heal? Can social unrest foment physical disorder in the world? Is there anything faster than the speed of light? This rigorously reasoned manifesto by an eminent parapsychologist tackles all these questions and more as it unveils persuasive empirical evidence for the existence of psychic phenomena. Dean Radin also reveals the extent to which corporations, governments, and academia have embraced "psi" and explores what the effects will be when - inevitably - mainstream science and society do so as well.  

Ring and Cooper explore evidence that even those blind from birth can "see" during near-death experiences. Their evidence reveals a unique type of perception. More than just "seeing" it involves a deep awareness and profound ability to know that the authors have called Mindsight. This volume is a ground-breaking work in the field of near-death studies. It investigates the astonishing claim that blind personas, including those blind from birth, can actually "see" during near-death or out-of-body episodes. The authors represent their findings in scrupulous detail, investigating case histories of blind persons who have actually reported visual experiences under these conditions. 

Este libro explica las fascinantes historias de individuos que han establecido conexiones curativas con su pasado, con el inconsciente junguiano y con el universo total.

Este libro arranca de los estados no ordinarios de conciencia y se describe la realidad como un juego asombroso del principio cósmico creador que trasciende el tiempo, el espacio, la causalidad lineal y todo tipo de polaridades; un juego que sugiere que la psique individual, cuando alcanza su máximo potencial, posee la misma identidad que el principio creador universal y la totalidad de la existencia. Esta identidad transpersonal es el secreto y el núcleo de las grandes tradiciones espirituales. Este libro lo recomiendo encarecidamente, cuando lo leí, me quedé fascinado!

La última obra de Stanislav Grof, uno de los fundadores de la psicología transpersonal, constituye un testamento definitivo de su valerosa exploración de los estados modificados de consciencia, en el que podemos apreciar sus importantes contribuciones a los campos de la psiquiatría y de la psicología, en particular su seminal concepto de experiencia holotrópica. Grof sostiene que los supuestos básicos y los conceptos de la psicología y de la psiquiatría exigen una revisión radical basada en una investigación sistemática de la experiencia holotrópica, sugiriéndonos que una transformación interior radical de la humanidad sumada al hecho de alcanzar un nivel superior de consciencia constituyen nuestra única esperanza de futuro.

Consciousness is perplexing: too familiar and intimate to ignore, too complex and elusive to understand. Although consciousness is embedded in all our experience and is considered basic to all our knowing, no one seems to know what exactly it is, and the concept is both widely used and much abused. For the better part of the twentieth century, the sutdy of consciousness was viewed as unworthy of scholarly and scientific pursuit. Research has consequently suffered. This cross-cultural examination frist explores the varieties of consious experience and reflects on the attempts to understand and explain consciousness in the Western scholarly and scientific tradition. The second section deals with Eastern spiritual traditions and how they differ from and complement the Western viewpoints. In the final chapters the two traditions are reconcilied for a comprehensive understanding.  

Consciousness is personal. Indeed, it is so close to the core of what it is to be human that it has puzzled thinkers from the beginnings of recorded history. What it is? What does it do? How does it relate to the physical world and to the workings of our bodies and brains? At the dawn of the new millennium answers to some these questions are beginning to emerge. However, there is not one mind-body problem, but many. Some of the problems are empirical, some are conceptual, and some are both. This book deals with some of the deepest puzzles and paradoxes.