Links to the files of which
follow the introductory remarks below:–
Here at last,
compared with texts like Pathways to 'the Kingdom', is a more informal
and even relaxed work, which enabled me to lay one or two old autobiographical
ghosts to rest while still continuing to haunt the realm of philosophy in no
uncertain metaphysical terms!In fact,
it may be that this 2001 project enabled me to lay one or two long-standing
philosophical ghosts to rest as well, since I did not shy away from a fresh
look at some old theories and was duly rewarded, I believe, by a new
perspective on certain things which I had begun to take – foolishly or naively
– too much for granted, even though my previous treatment of them had been
anything but conventional!I believe
that courage is its own reward and that he who dares to venture where none has
gone before deserves the beneficial consequences, whatever they may be.All I can say is that in this text certain
very complicated and even paradoxical philosophical and moral issues have been
tackled afresh and solved, to the best of my ability, in a way and with a
structural comprehensiveness which leaves very little room for dissent.In that, I think I have achieved, with a work
that went on to become more universal than personal, far more than I could
possibly have hoped for at the beginning! – John O’Loughlin.
John O’Loughlin was born in Salthill, Galway, the Republic
of Ireland,
of mixed Irish- and British-born parents in 1952. Following a parental split
he was brought over to England by his mother and grandmother (who upon the death of her Aldershot-based husband had intially returned to Ireland after a lengthy marital absence) in the mid-50s and subsequently attended schools in
Aldershot, Hants and, upon the death and repatriation of his ethnically-protective grandmother and an enforced change of
denomination from Catholic to Protestant in consequence of having been put into
care by his mother, Carshalton, Surrey. Upon leaving high school in pre-GCSE era 1970 with an
assortment of CSEs
(Certificate of Secondary Education) and GCEs
(General Certificate of Education), including history and music, he moved to London and went on, via two short-lived
jobs, to work at the Associated Board of the Royal Schools of Music in Bedford
Square, where as a clerical officer he eventually became responsible for booking venues throughout Britain and Ireland for the Board's classical music exams.
After a brief flirtation with further education at Redhill Technical College back in Surrey, where he was then living, he returned to his former job in the West End
but, due to a combination of factors, left the ABRSM in 1976 and began to pursue a literary vocation which,
despite a brief spell as a computer tutor and office-skills at Hornsey Management Agency within the local YMCA in the late '80s and
early '90s, he has steadfastly continued with ever since. His novels include Changing Worlds (1976), An Interview
Reviewed (1979), Secret
Exchanges (1980), Sublimated
Relations(1981), and Deceptive
Motives (1981). Since the mid-80s John O'Loughlin has dedicated himself to
philosophy, which he regards as his true literary vocation, and hss penned several titles of a
philosophical nature, including Devil and
God (1985–6), Towards
the Supernoumenon(1987), Elemental Spectra (1988–9), Philosophical Truth (1991–2) and,
more recently, The Best
of All Possible Worlds (2008), The Centre of Truth
(2009), Insane but not Mad (2011) and Philosophic Flights of Poetic Fancy (2012).
