Courses and Workshops
The Center offers courses and workshops that reflect its vision and philosophy. Courses will run in the morning and late afternoon, leaving time after lunch for a siesta, quiet reflection or a walk in the surrounding countryside. There may also be some time set aside for sightseeing.
We are happy to help those who wish to gain continuing education or professional development credits and will contact their organizations if requested.
Accommodation and all meals, traditional Tuscan cooking, are included in the price of the courses. To register for a course, participants must send in a non-refundable deposit.
To be placed on our mailing list or for further information please write to info@paricenter.com.
Courses to be offered during 2008
F. David Peat
15-21 May
Art, Science and the Sacred
F. David Peat
4-10 September
Synchronicity: The Bridge between Matter and Mind
F. David Peat and Shantena Sabbadini
2-8 October
This workshop/course, given by David Peat, will range over many of the issues discussed in his books and Web site (www.fdavidpeat.com). It will consider the implications of new ideas and new thinking for human values, society, community, the environment and our common future. It will explore the links between art, science, psychology and consciousness, creativity, the spirit of place, the nature of language and an exploration of alternative worldviews.
While the course will draw upon the paradigms of modern science these will be presented in a non-technical way, with many examples and metaphors, so as to be accessible to non-scientists. The content will include: the quantum nature of matter, chaos theory and self-organization, Synchronicity and an introduction to Jungian ideas, creativity, the role of the observer in quantum theory and the limits to language, the participatory universe; artificial intelligence, mind-body problem, perception; Native American world-views. The ideas of David Bohm, Ludwig Wittgenstein and Neils Bohr will also be explored.
The course will also draw upon Peat 's The Blackwinged Night: Creativity in Nature and Mind, Synchronicity: The Bridge between Matter and Mind and From Certainty to Uncertainty: The History of Thought in the Twentieth Century.
Instructor: Dr. F. David Peat
Dates: 15-21 May 2008
This course/workshop will explore the deep connections, as well as the boundaries, between art, science and the sacred. It will explore the ways in which the artist and the scientist engage the universe and encounter mystery. It will touch on the sense of awe and wonder that many scientists experience about the cosmos. It will look at ways in which the arts have sought to portray, symbolize and point to the sacred. The course will also explore the physicist Wolfgang Pauli's views on the "return of the sacred" to matter as well as the ideas of Carl Jung.
It will look to the origin of music, the notion that the cosmos was created out of sacred vibrations. It will investigate J.S.Bach's use of sacred number mysticism in some of his compositions as well as ways in which contemporary composers express the sacred. The week will also look at symbolism in sacred art and ask what is the nature of a sacred object. Time permitting we will look at some of the sacred art in Siena as well as visiting a site such as the burial place of Saint Galgano.
Note: Since "Synchronicity:The Bridge between Matter and Mind" is not being offered as a seperate course in 2007 some of that material will be incorporated into the present course.
Instructor: Dr. F. David Peat
Dates:4-10 September 2008
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Synchronicity: The Bridge between Matter and Mind
Carl Jung definied synchronicities as "meaningful cooincidences" and "acausal connecting principles". The workshop/course will explore the mysterious nature of these connections between our inner and outer world and in so doing explore some Jungian ideas. It will also reflect on such things as James Joyce's "ephiphanies" and the poet and priest Gerard Manley Hopkins' "inscape". Joyce also worked closely with the physicist Wolfgang Pauli who believed that we must learn to come to terms with "he irrational in matter", and that it should be possible to unify matter and psyche, physics and psychology. As part of this course Dr Sabbadini, whose recent translation of the I Ching has been published in the UK and North America, will discuss the "books of changes", ancient Chinese notions of causality and chance, how to frame a question, consult and interpret the answer.Instructor: Dr. F David Peat, with Dr Shantena Sabbadini
Dates 2-8 October, 2008For a complete course description
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