James Giles (born 1958) is a Canadian philosopher and psychologist. He has written about the philosophy of perception,James Giles, A Study in Phenomenalism, Aalborg, Denmark: Aalborg University, 1994. personal identity and the self,James B. Sauer (1997). No Self to be Found: The Search for Personal Identity by James Giles (review). The Personalist Forum 13 (2, Fall 1997): 321–325. mindfulness,James Giles, "The Relevance of the No-self Theory for Contemporary Mindfulness", Current Opinion in Psychology (Special issue on Mindfulness) 28, 2019, 298-301. BuddhistJames Giles, "Hakuin, Scepticism, and Seeing into One's Own Nature", Asian Philosophy, 25, 2015, 1-18. and Taoist philosophy,James Giles, The Way of Awareness in Daoist Philosophy, St. Petersberg, Florida: Three Pines Press, 2020. and has published theories of the evolution of human hairlessness,[s.n.] (8 June 2011). Naked love - A gripping new theory . La Trobe University Bulletin. Accessed March 2014. the nature of sexual desire,Robert Scott Stewart (25 August 2009). Review - The Nature of Sexual Desire by James Giles; University Press of America, 2008 . Metapsychology online reviews 13 (35). Accessed March 2014. sexual attraction,James Giles, Sexual Attraction: The Psychology of Allure, Santa Barbra, California: Praeger, 2020. and gender.James Giles, Sexual Essays: Gender, Desire, and Nakedness, Lanham, Maryland: Hamilton Books, 2020. His wide range of academic interests and often controversial views have earned him the title of an "interdisciplinary maverick."
Schooling and career Giles was born in Vancouver, British Columbia, Canada, grew up in West Point Grey, and graduated from Point Grey Secondary School. He studied at the University of British Columbia (BA Hons, MA) and at the University of Edinburgh (PhD). In addition to teaching at UBC and Edinburgh, he has also taught at the University of Aalborg, the University of Copenhagen, Denmark, Hawaii College of Kansai University, Japan, the University of Guam, and La Trobe University, Australia. Giles is a Panel Tutor in Philosophy at the Institute of Continuing Education, University of Cambridge.
In addition to his academic research, Giles has also written for several media, including Monitor on Psychology, The Copenhagen Post, The Ottawa Citizen, Science of Relationships, The Vancouver Sun, Daily Pacific News, and The Conversation. James Giles, "Psychology and the death penalty," Monitor on Psychology (American Psychological Association), 2014, 45, 4.1 James Giles, "Kierkegaard: daunting, inconsistent, but rewarding nevertheless", The Copenhagen Post, 4–10 May 2013, 8. James Giles, "Banning prostitution a way to control women's sexuality," The Copenhagen Post, 10 January 2013. https://cphpost.dk/2013-01-10/opinion/opinion-banning-prostitution-a-way-to-control-womens-sexuality James Giles, "The key to sexual fulfilment," The Ottawa Citizen, 19 August 2012. James Giles, "Hairless skin and romantic love: the naked love theory," Science of Relationships, 6 May 2012. https://theconversation.com/why-do-women-have-less-body-hair-than-men-4733 James Giles, "Naked love: Here's a theory about why you aren't covered in fur," The Vancouver Sun, 13 July 2011. https://www.pressreader.com/canada/vancouver-sun/20110713/282604554495274 James Giles, "Reverend cloaks sexism in flowery language," Pacific Daily News, 6 November 2005, p. 14. James Giles, "Why do men have less body hair than women?" The Conversation, 15 December 2011.https://theconversation.com/why-do-women-have-less-body-hair-than-men-4733.
Notable ideas No-self theory Giles takes David Hume's notion of personal identity being a fiction and develops it in terms of Buddhist accounts of no-self and theories of language. Giles points out that many theories of personal identity are reductive theories. They try to reduce the idea of personal identity to elements such as memory, personality, or bodily continuity. The no-self theory, however, is an eliminative theory. That is, it eliminates the idea of personal identity altogether. He allows that we are sometimes aware of psychological and emotional states that seem to give immediate awareness of self. He argues, however, that what we are aware of at these times is not a persisting self, but rather a "constructed or condensed self-image", namely "a composite of related images and meanings referring to how I see myself at that moment".James Giles, No Self to Be Found, Lanham, Maryland: University Press of America, 1997, p. 189. These moments, however, make only rare appearances in consciousness. Giles is a major proponent of the no-self theory. His contributions have been anthologized,Donald C. Abel, Fifty Readings in Philosophy, fourth edition, New York: McGraw Hill, 2012, p. 244. received extensive discussion in such diverse fields as philosophy,Antony Flew, "James Giles on Personal Identity", Philosophy, 67, 261, 1992, pp. 394-398.V. Çifteci, "The Ideas of the Self and Time in Hume: Are these Two Ideas Reconcilable?". Metamind: Journal Of Artificial Intelligence And Philosophy Of Mind, 2, 1, 2019, pp. 33-47. psychology,Mohammad Manzoor Malik Obhasa, "The Concept of Non-Self In Theravada Buddhism And Its Relation To Human Behavior", Prajñā Vihāra, 23, 2, 2022, pp. 81-94. history,Bernadette Baker, "Curriculum Studies, Invisible Objects and Twenty-first Century Societies",Journal of Curriculum Theorizing, 29, 1, 2013, pp. 25-47. and communication,Min-Sun Kim, “Towards new conceptions of multicultural identity in intercultural communication,” Empedocles European Journal for the Philosophy of Communication, 12 (2) 2021:183-202. and called one of the best comparative studies of Hume and Buddhist philosophy.Nicholas F. Gier and Paul Kjellberg, “Buddhism and the Freedom of the Will: Pali and Mahayanist Responses.” In Freedom and Determinism: Topics in Contemporary Philosophy, Edited by J. K. Campbell, D. Shier, and M. O’Rourke (Cambridge: MIT Press, 2004), pp. 277-304. Giles has also argued for the role of the no-self theory in contemporary mindfulness-based interventions.James Giles, "The Relevance of the No-self Theory for Contemporary Mindfulness," Current Opinion in Psychology (Special issue on Mindfulness) 28, 2019, 298-301 His original account of the place of the no-self theory here has been widely cited and discussed.Obhasa and Mohammad Manzoor Malik, “The Concept Of Non-Self in Theravada Buddhism and Its Relation to Human Behavior”, Prajna Vihara: Journal of Philosophy and religion, 23, 2, July to December 2022, 81-94.Bernadette B. Forrest, Qualitative Descriptive Exploration of College Students’ Opinions Toward and Experiences with Participating in Mindfulness Programs on a College Campus, Doctoral Dissertation, The University of Alabama, 2022.
Metaphysics of awareness In a radical interpretation of early Taoist philosophy, Giles argues that the Tao has little to do with mysticism or cosmology. Rather, it refers to human awareness.Three Pines Press Interview LIVIA KOHN TALKS TO James Giles, 5 February 2921. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RhlWDG7xHoo The Taoist accounts of return and non-action, says Giles, provide us with insights into the nature of awareness and how meditative states can co-exist within and thus underpin everyday awareness.James Giles (2013). The Metaphysics of Awareness in the Philosophy of Laozi. International Philosophical Quarterly, 53, 4, 435-451. https://doi.org/10.5840/ipq201353443 This works through what he calls the double return, or a back and forth of stillness and constant flow of awareness. Giles compares this view of awareness with ancient Greek, Buddhist, existentialist, and analytic accounts of philosophy of mind in an "extension of the global philosophical palette".
Nature of sexual desire Giles first published his theory of sexual desire in an article entitled "A Theory of Love and Sexual Desire" in 1994.James Giles (1994). "A Theory of Love and Sexual Desire". Journal for the Theory of Social Behaviour 24: 339–357. doi:10.1111/j.1468-5914.1994.tb00259.x This theory was developed in The Nature of Sexual Desire in 2004/2008.The Nature of Sexual Desire, Wesport, Connecticut: Praeger. Paperback published in 2008 by University Press of America. Sexologists usually account for sexual desire either in terms of social constructionism or as a biological characteristic essential to reproduction. Giles rejects both these views, and attempts to show by a phenomenological approach that sexual desire is an existential need rooted in the human condition, based on a feeling of incompleteness from the experience of one's own gender as a form of disequilibrium. The desired person's gender, whether the same or different from one's own gender, is seen as completing one's own gender. As Crockett says, "The core of Giles' argument with regard to the relationship between gender and sexuality is that (gendered) sexual orientation is essential to the experience of sexual desire." Although the theory shows similarities to earlier theories such as those of Thomas Nagel on sexual perversion, or of Aristophanes on romantic love in Plato's Symposium, Giles' core thesis is quite distinct. This is the idea that sexual desire is just the desire for mutual vulnerability and care in the form of baring and caressing. Mutual Baring and caressing are thus the true objects of sexual desire.Robert Scott Stewart, "Saying How you Feel: Men and Women on Sexual Arousal and Desire," The International Journal of Interdisciplinary Social Sciences, 6.10, 2012, 203-212. On Giles' account, says Palm,
sexual interaction opens up as an arena of exploration of this traumatic instance of both being in control of and being exposed to the other. And the good thing about this sexual arena is that, it seems to situate the interplay between control and vulnerability in an arousing context of care, so that sexual interaction provides a safe form for the exploration of these threatening dimensions of existence.Fredrik Palm, "Sexual Arousal, Danger, and Vulnerability," in Bodies, Boundaries and Vulnerabilities, Crossroads of Knowledge, L.F. Käll (ed.), Springer International Publishing Switzerland, 2016, 119-140.
Giles' book on sexual desire has been extensively discussed and reviewed in journals from an array of different disciplines.
Rebecca Scott (2011). Book Reviews: The Nature of Sexual Desire, James Giles. Anthropological Forum, 21, 1, 77–108. DOI: 10.1080/00664677.2011.549451
Robert Scott Stewart, Ph.D. (2009). The Nature of Sexual Desire. Metapsychology Online Reviews, 13, 35. https://metapsychology.net/index.php/book-review/the-nature-of-sexual-desire/
Shahid Akhter (2009). The Nature of Sexual Desire by Dr. James Giles. Heal India, February, 66.
Helen Startup, The Nature of Sexual Desire, by James Giles, Sexual and Relationship 2006, 21, 1, 112. Giles is also known for both his critique of the attempt to pathologize high levels of sexual behaviourJames Giles, Sexual Essays: Gender, Desire, and Nakedness, New York: Hamilton Books, 2017, Chapter 6: No Such Thing as Excessive Levels of Sexual Behaviour. and his rejection of the idea that sexual orientation is socially constructed.Sexual Essays: Gender, Desire, and Nakedness, New York: Hamilton Books, 2017, Chapter 5: Gilbert Herdt on Sambian Sexual culture.
Vulnerability and care theory of love