Well-being – INSTITUTE FOR INTERDISCIPLINARY STUDIES

well-being: health and happiness

Interpersonal relationship as basis for happiness: Humans are basically relational beings: to flourish it is not enough for them to simply exist, they are called to co-exist, exist in relationship of mutual affection with others. This is the very meaning of the concept of human person: to be a person means to be in relationship with other persons. The importance of interpersonal relationship for wellbeing and mental health is well illustrated in a conversation between Dr. Francis Collins, Director of the National Institute of Health (NIH), and Dr. Joshua Gordon, Director of NIH’s National Institute of Mental Health, about “Dealing with Stress, Anxiety, and Grief during COVID-19.”

An anthropology for the XXIst century

Well-being requires a better understanding of what is a Human Being. It asks for an anthropology (philosophy of the human being) that is sound, scientific and accounts for the wonderful fact of the conservation of personal identity.

Prof. Juan Agustín García González gives an introductory talk at the University of Piura in Perú (video in spanish) to motivate why Leonardo Polo’s definition of “person” helps to expand the classical metaphysics as well as correct some errors and limitations of the different anthropologies proposed in the XXth Century.

In fact, a person is more than a rational animal, respectively an individual of rational nature. A person is not only an “I” in action (i.e. a “me” using his/her nature). It is also intimacy and relation. It is not only existence, but also co-existence.

In the following video, prof. Juan Fernando Sellés (University of Navarra), gives a short introduction (in Spanish) about Leonardo Polo’s transcendental anthropology.

For a brief introduction in English click HERE.
Click HERE if you are interested in
- The evolution of the notion of person from Boetius to Polo,
- Whether the separated soul is a person,
- Whether the person is the “whole” or the “esse” of the human being.

The future of medicine

After centuries of a medicine that aimed at healing from sickness, the future will be open to a new kind of medicine (health care): the medicine of well-being.

Dr. Jeffrey Rediger introduces the argument: A Medicine of Hope and Possibility.

contributions:

2020: Aging and the Dream of Immortality

Jean-David Ponci

It’s not necessarily a bad thing to want to be immortal… How are we doing in the possibility to become immortal?

2019: Can christian schools continue to teach only about traditional marriage?

Nikolai Püllen, Slideshare.

An approach to the big general issue whether faith schools should be allowed to teach based on their fundamental beliefs and discriminate amongst teachers and students because of their faith.