Institutional Repositories DataBase (IRDB)
July 3, 2026
James C. Dobbins
D. T. Suzuki, the Japanese Buddhist thinker who popularized Zen in the West, is being reassessed. Recent scholarship moves beyond earlier controversies—where he was seen either as an authoritative conduit for Buddhist teachings or as presenting a skewed, Japan-aggrandizing version of Zen—to recognize him as an innovative thinker and international figure. Suzuki deeply absorbed Western learning and set it in conversation with Japanese tradition, producing a new elucidation of Buddhism suited to modernizing Japan and spiritually curious Western audiences. He is now characterized as a forerunner of the global Buddhism unfolding worldwide.
Institutional Repositories DataBase (IRDB)
March 27, 2026
博之 吉留
Horkheimer's 1930s philosophy sought to overcome the 'logical necessity' that constrained specialized sciences and traditional theory of knowledge. Tracing this necessity to Kant's concept of the understanding, Horkheimer rejected the 'philosophy of consciousness' that accepts this necessity and creates a second reality, opposing materialism as an alternative. Dialectic 'Representation'—the methodology of a materialist theory of knowledge—is grounded in Marx's inversion of Hegelian dialectics and operates according to a logic opposed to traditional logical inference, serving an emancipatory interest to disclose contradictions inherent in social reality.
Institutional Repositories DataBase (IRDB)
March 2, 2026
Koichi Yamaguchi
Dream research has evolved through three historical periods. The first began with Freud's 1900 'Dream Interpretation' and lasted until the 1950s. The second started with the discovery of REM sleep in the 1950s and extended to the 1990s, during which some neuroscientists viewed dreams as meaningless by-products, exemplified by Hobson's activation-synthesis hypothesis. Cognitive psychology in this period showed dream characteristics could be measured and were regular. In the third period, from the 2000s onward, neurological evidence revealed dreaming is not unique to REM sleep, shifting debate to dreams' psychological meaning. Recent empirical research demonstrates dreaming regulates emotions, consistent with psychoanalysis.
Institutional Repositories DataBase (IRDB)
March 2, 2026
Hitoshi Okada
Two large surveys of university students examined factors linked to how often people have lucid dreams. The first study, with about 700 students, found that lucid dream frequency was not significantly related to imaginative ability but was influenced by two factors: how often people had nightmares and how often they recalled their dreams. The second study, with about 7,900 students, identified two subgroups among frequent lucid dreamers: one group that also had frequent nightmares and distressing negative dreams, and another group with few nightmares and more positive emotions. Those who frequently experienced both nightmares and lucid dreams reported slightly less vivid colors in their dreams compared to those without lucid dreams.
Institutional Repositories DataBase (IRDB)
March 1, 2026
Maiko Higashimori, Kohei Tazuke
Survey research on dreams in clinical psychology in Japan is reviewed and classified into five areas: dream content, dream recall, dream emotions, dream structure, and dream engagement. Studies on dream content have examined themes and their links to personal characteristics. Dream recall research has explored relationships with personality, emotions, sensory experiences, and attitudes toward dreams. Dream emotion studies suggest both positive and negative emotions occur in dreams, with various hypotheses about their connection to waking emotions. Dream structure research indicates age-related differences. Engagement studies cover attitudes and ways of interacting with dreams.
Institutional Repositories DataBase (IRDB)
December 11, 2025
Michael F. Brown
Shamanism is a persistent human tendency, not a relic of the past, according to a work that blends vivid ethnography, global exploration, and theoretical debate to make this argument.