Join us for a joint UCI Center for Nursing Philosophy & Knowledge, Technology and Society Center Lecture, titled “What Are Traditional Medicinal Substances When Separated from Traditional Ways of Life?” which will be delivered by Mark Lazenby, the Dean of the Sue & Bill Gross School of Nursing, and chaired by Tyrus Miller, the Dean of the School of Humanities.
About the Lecture
“A trend in integrative health is to identify and apply in conventional treatment modalities medicinal substances used, for instance, by indigenous people groups. In this lecture, I will rely on Pierre Hadot’s understanding of “way of life,” (Philosophy as a Way of Life, trans. M. Chase, Blackwell, 1995), to argue that separating a medicinal substance from the way of life in which it had its original application changes the substance’s mechanism of action. For Hadot, people adhered to a particular way of life for the purpose of engaging in its practices. These practices were spiritual because they intended to effect a modification and a transformation in the subject who practiced them. Adherents did not affirm the way of life’s world view as true, but rather, as a guide for how one needed to live for this effect to occur. The mechanistic separation common in the current trend in integrative health seeks to identify the truth of a substance’s action on the body but neglects the effect the way of life’s spiritual practices was to have on adherents. Absence of these spiritual practices means that the substance’s mechanism of action has changed. The question remains about whether ways of life’ spiritual practices can be incorporated into integrative health when traditional medicinal substances are used.”
Event Details
When: Feb 23, 2023 10:00 AM Pacific Time (US and Canada)
Format: Online
