Paul Whicker

Celebrity Buddhism and the strange case of Suella Braverman

THE FOLLOWING BLOG ENTRY IS AIMED MAINLY AT STUDENTS AND TEACHERS OF A-LEVEL BUDDHISM, ESPECIALLY THOSE FOLLOWING THE EDEXCEL SYLLABUS ON TRIRATNA,THOUGH IT MAY ALSO BE OF INTEREST TO THOSE WHO ARE CURIOUS TO KNOW MORE ABOUT THE ASYLUM SEEKER ISSUE. These days, the ‘pie’ depicted above is well past its sell-by date. Celebrity Buddhists […]

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What should they be reading? Which books are worth recommending to students of Philosophy and Religious Studies?

The following is a rather personal list of publications that I would recommend to sixth-formers who wish to expand their horizons a little by engaging in some supplementary reading over and above their course textbooks. Teachers who are inclined to read around the subject may enjoy some of them too. Note that I am restricting

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Revision tests and an exemplar answer for the OCR Syllabus on Business Ethics

NOTE: Occasionally, new information is introduced in some of the questions. Of course, that might mean that a guess is required, but there is then every chance of the correct answer then being more readily recalled. The answers to the questions can be found towards the end of this blog post. Macro-economic theories (Fill in

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Extension material for students of the OCR syllabus on Business Ethics: Kwasi Kwarteng’s 2022 ‘Trickle-Down’ Mini-Budget, a recommendation for further reading, and reviews of Ronald E. Purser’s McMindfulness: How Mindfulness Became The New Capitalist Spirituality, and Byung-Chul Han: Capitalism and the Death Drive.

THIS POST RELATES TO THE ISSUE OF ‘WHETHER OR NOT HUMAN BEINGS CAN FLOURISH IN THE CONTEXT OF CAPITALISM AND CONSUMERISM’. ‘Trickle-Down’ Economics Neoliberalism, the predominant global form of modern capitalism, is one that – rather like Covid-19 – has given rise to a number of variants, namely, Thatcherism, Bill Clinton’s Market Globalism (which basically

Extension material for students of the OCR syllabus on Business Ethics: Kwasi Kwarteng’s 2022 ‘Trickle-Down’ Mini-Budget, a recommendation for further reading, and reviews of Ronald E. Purser’s McMindfulness: How Mindfulness Became The New Capitalist Spirituality, and Byung-Chul Han: Capitalism and the Death Drive. Read More »

Extension Material on Environmental Issues for students of the Edexcel syllabus: Kohei Saito – Marx in the Anthropocene.

From the syllabus for Religion and Ethics (Paper 2): 1.1 Environmental issues a) Concepts of stewardship and conservation from the point of view of at least one religion and at least one secular ethical perspective; animal welfare and protection, sustainability, waste management and climate change.  b) Strengths and weaknesses of significant areas of disagreement and

Extension Material on Environmental Issues for students of the Edexcel syllabus: Kohei Saito – Marx in the Anthropocene. Read More »

Course Notes for students of the OCR syllabus on Business Ethics as part of the Religion and Ethics Component

This blog entry is a one of several that are of relevance to the OCR syllabus for Business Ethics. The site itself is structured around the current Edexcel course. Business Ethics does not feature on that course. However, an attempt has been made here to ‘kill two birds with one stone’, insofar as some of

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Book Review/Summer Reading 2 Martha Nussbaum – Not for Profit : Why Democracy Needs the Humanities

The American philosopher Martha Nussbaum may already be familiar to some readers of this blog, as Greek philosophy is one area of particular academic interest for her, and she has made a significant contribution to the field of modern virtue ethics. Specifically, she interprets Aristotle’s virtues as absolutes, and argues that justice, temperance etc. are

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BOOK REVIEW/SUMMER READING Brad Warner – The Other Side of Nothing : The Zen Ethics of Time, Space and Being

NOTE: This blog entry is aimed more at teachers than students, as its purpose is to introduce a number of fairly recent texts that overlap with the territory of Religious Studies and Philosophy. Pretty much all the titles referenced here come highly recommended, including Brad Warner’s other publications, and especially Megan Phelps-Roper’s book Unfollow :

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Revision test for the Edexcel syllabus on Sexual Ethics

THESE QUESTIONS ARE BASED ON THE COURSE NOTES FOR THE ABOVE TOPIC THAT CAN BE FOUND HERE, HERE, AND HERE. THE SECTION ON EMBRYOLOGICAL RESEARCH, IVF, AND PRE-IMPLANTATION GENETIC DIAGNOSIS THAT IS DISCUSSED HERE IS ALSO OF RELEVANCE WITH RESPECT TO CHILDLESSNESS. THIS TEST (AND MANY OF THE OTHERS ON THIS SITE) MAY ALSO BE OF

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Course notes for Edexcel students on Paper 4B (Christianity) topic 4.3 (New Movements in Theology) – the impact of the beliefs and practices of Evangelicalism, Pentecostal and Charismatic Christianity on the lives of believers today.

From the 4B Christianity syllabus: 4.3 New Movements in Theology (cont’d) (b) The global development of Evangelicalism, and of the nature and influence of Pentecostal and Charismatic Christianity in the US and beyond, migration as a factor in the spread of a variety of forms of Christian worship, notably in the African Christian diaspora. The

Course notes for Edexcel students on Paper 4B (Christianity) topic 4.3 (New Movements in Theology) – the impact of the beliefs and practices of Evangelicalism, Pentecostal and Charismatic Christianity on the lives of believers today. Read More »