The critical narrative of this interdisciplinary book offers a first-time look at the interrelationship between biology, mythology and philosophy in human development. Its daring premise follows the trajectory of human thought, starting with the biological roots of fear and the original need for religion, truth-seeking, and myth-making. The narrative then innovatively links a number of maverick philosophical teachings over the centuries, from pre-Buddhist times to the Buddha, from Epicurus and Pyrrho to Lucretius, and eventually to the seminal poetry of Omar Khayyam. These emergent philosophies exemplified liberation from the grasp of mythical and religious thinking and instead espoused an empirical and joyful mind. The narrative concludes with a look at the emancipating philosophical movement that resulted in the European Enlightenment, and it suggests that the philosophical teachings explored in the book may offer the potential for a second, broader Enlightenment.

Acknowledgements
Author’s Remarks
Prologue

Part I Biology: Panic

Prelude Human: Not a Fallen Angel
Chapter 1 Tumultuous Human Evolution: The Leap and Lapse of the Mind
Chapter 2 The Cognitive and Biological Foundations of Religion: Terror-Management
Chapter 3 Instinctual Modules of Religion: Fear, Obedience, and Imitation

Part II Mythology: Taking Refuge

Chapter 4 Truth-Seeking and Myth-Making: Humans in Search of Reality

Part III Philosophy: Clarity

Chapter 5 The Indo-Greco-Roman Philosophies of Self-Rule: Nastikā Schools (Çārvāka, Ajīvikism, Jainism, Buddhism), Epicureanism, and Pyrrhonism
Chapter 6 Buddha’s Self-Rule Philosophy: A Model for Ten “Mini-Nirvanas”
Chapter 7 Omar Khayyam’s Model of Liberation: Existence, Pleasure and Nothingness

Epilogue Enlightenment Revisited: The Second Enlightenment

Bibliography

Index

Mostafa Vaziri, physician and anthropologist, is currently a lecturer at the University of Innsbruck, Austria, and formerly fellow of Princeton University and the University of California, Berkeley. He is the author of Rumi and Shams’ Silent Rebellion: Parallels with Vedanta, Buddhism and Shaivism (NY & London: Palgrave Macmillan 2015), Buddhism in Iran: An Anthropological Approach to Traces and Influences (NY & London: Palgrave Macmillan 2012), including several other academic works.

Evolution, Myth-Making, Truth-Seeking, Liberation, Happiness, Philosophy, Mind, Buddhism, Çarvaka, Ajivikism, Epicureanism, Pyrrhonism, Khayyam, Enlightenment, Self-Rule - - Greek Philosophies, Asian Philosophies, Persian Poetry