Kevin R. D. Shepherd: Profile
Born in Cambridge in 1950, I am a British citizen. More specifically, I am Irish-English, my father being Irish, and my mother being English. My paternal grandmother was Irish-Scots.
From January 1981 until 1993, with a reference from a sponsor at Corpus Christi College, I undertook a private research project at Cambridge University Library. I was fortunate enough to accumulate many notebooks that are still useful. My first book was Psychology in Science (1983), relating to the history of science. At that period I formulated an interdisciplinary approach called anthropography, which was outlined in Meaning in Anthropos: Anthropography as an interdisciplinary science of culture (1991). I have since referred to this approach in terms of a philosophy of culture; my version of anthropography should be distinguished from ethnography.
During the 1980s, I was able to establish IRCA (Intercultural Research Centre of Anthropography) in Cambridge. This was a private undertaking. The project attempted a "cross-cultural relevance to Western, Islamic, Jewish, Indian, Chinese, and other culture-groups," to quote from my prospectus. Subsequently, I decided against the rather officious format, which was influenced by academe. Instead, I preferred from then on a purely citizen identity.
I became tagged as a “serious amateur,” a phrase in unofficial use at Cambridge and Oxford Universities that describes, e.g., a writer who does not hold academic honours but who does attempt serious work with annotations. I wrote an annotated book extending to a thousand pages (Minds and Sociocultures Vol. One: Zoroastrianism and the Indian Religions, 1995). All my books (fourteen in total) are annotated. See further my bibliography.
During the 1990s I lived in Moray, Scotland, and was there in a position to survey “new age” trends relating to the Findhorn Foundation, which I declined to join. This organisation preached unconditional love and "global village" paradise. In contradiction, they afflicted dissidents with suppression. Commercial "workshop" mysticism was favoured, but is open to strong criticism. Furthermore, ecological science is realistically out of place in such a market. Some of my conclusions were expressed in the book Pointed Observations (2005), which has the sub-title Critical reflections of a citizen philosopher on contemporary pseudomysticism, alternative therapy, David Hume, Spinoza, and other subjects.
From the far north, I moved back to England, thereafter undertaking the temporary self-publishing venture called Citizen Initiative. Time has moved on; that citizen phrase now signifies an internet activity, extending to eight websites. The Citizen Initiative website went online August 31st, 2007, after I was persuaded that the internet can be a means of providing relevant information, whatever the distractions predominating. The internet is also a hazard which can produce misinformation, as I discovered when becoming the target of a sectarian troll and cyberstalker who gained temporary influence on Wikipedia. See my response to defamation at Not Exposed.
The following is a list of my other websites and the dates of commencement:
kevinrdshepherd.net (September 23rd, 2008)
kevinrdshepherd.info (August 17th, 2009)
independentphilosophy.net (November 17th, 2009)
citizenphilosophy.net (January 9th, 2010)
citizenthought.net (January 29th, 2011)
I have also maintained Commentaries since November 2009.
Kevin R. D. Shepherd