Download or read book Just Thinking About Philosophy written by Shell Abegglen and published by AuthorHouse. This book was released on 2016-03-31 with total page 446 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Washed up on warm beaches around the world is a creature called the Bluebottle Jellyfish, or Man O' War, a small harmless looking mass of blue jelly with a rather painful stinging response to human touch and curiosity. Having been warned about the Bluebottle Jellyfish, I have stayed away from it. However, I have ignored the warnings about the stinging response to the human mind from the jelly mass of philosophers and how their philosophical ideas will befuddle your thinking. Eventually my curiosity overcame my reluctance to go near it, and now after considerable study, I have put together a succinctly canned overall historical look at philosophy and the lives of the great philosophers. It is written as an introduction to philosophy, as opposed to being hit upside the head with a plethora of complex books on comprehensive philosophical knowledge designed for a much longer period of study. Therefore this introduction to Philosophy is a fun quick intellectual look for those who have been stung with a mild curiosity for this subject, but neither has the time nor the inclination to get deeply involved in the many complicated avenues of the esoteric discipline of philosophy.
Download or read book Thinking About God written by Gregory E. Ganssle and published by InterVarsity Press. This book was released on 2010-06-18 with total page 192 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: What is God like? What can God do? What can God know? How does God communicate? Philosopher Gregory E. Ganssle appeals to philosophy for some answers to these questions in this introduction to thinking clearly and carefully about God.
Download or read book Empty Ideas written by Peter Unger and published by Oxford University Press. This book was released on 2017 with total page 273 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: During the middle of the twentieth century, philosophers generally agreed that, by contrast with science, philosophy should offer no substantial thoughts about the general nature of concrete reality. Instead, philosophers offered conceptual truths. It is widely assumed that, since 1970, things have changed greatly. This book argues that's an illusion that prevails because of the failure to differentiate between "concretely substantial" and "concretely empty" ideas.
Download or read book Thinking to Some Purpose written by Susan Stebbing and published by Taylor & Francis. This book was released on 2022-06-30 with total page 184 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: "I am convinced of the urgent need for a democratic people to think clearly without the distortions due to unconscious bias and unrecognized ignorance. Our failures in thinking are in part due to faults which we could to some extent overcome were we to see clearly how these faults arise. It is the aim of this book to make a small effort in this direction." - Susan Stebbing, from the Preface Despite huge advances in education, knowledge and communication, it can often seem we are neither well-trained nor well practised in the art of clear thinking. Our powers of reasoning and argument are less confident that they should be, we frequently ignore evidence and we are all too often swayed by rhetoric rather than reason. But what can you do to think and argue better? First published in 1939 but unavailable for many years, Susan Stebbing's Thinking to Some Purpose is a classic first-aid manual of how to think clearly, and remains astonishingly fresh and insightful. Written against a background of the rise of dictatorships and the collapse of democracy in Europe, it is packed with useful tips and insights. Stebbing offers shrewd advice on how to think critically and clearly, how to spot illogical statements and slipshod thinking, and how to rely on reason rather than emotion. At a time when we are again faced with serious threats to democracy and freedom of thought, Stebbing’s advice remains as urgent and important as ever. This Routledge edition of Thinking to Some Purpose includes a new Foreword by Nigel Warburton and a helpful Introduction by Peter West, who places Susan Stebbing’s classic book in historical and philosophical context.
Download or read book The Power of Critical Thinking written by Lewis Vaughn and published by . This book was released on 2016-03-01 with total page 560 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: This comprehensive and engaging introduction to the essential components of critical analysis uses a multidisciplinary approach to examine how psychological and social factors can impede clear thinking and lead to faulty reasoning. Emphasizing the importance of critical thinking to personaldevelopment and success, The Power of Critical Thinking provides students with the skills they need to engage meaningfully with the world around them - both inside and outside of the classroom.
Download or read book Ultimate Questions written by Nils Ch Rauhut and published by Longman Publishing Group. This book was released on 2004 with total page 278 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: This inexpensive and brief text offers careful explanations of how problems are connected to our thinking about the universe then uses vivid and engaging examples to further enhance this up-to-date examination of the main problems in contemporary philosophy. More than 100 " Food for Thought" exercises elicit reaction to philosophical problems, give readers a chance to test whether they have grasped important philosophical concepts, and offer opportunities for genuine conversations about philosophy. Readers interested in contemporary philosophy.
Download or read book Lectures on the History of Political Philosophy written by John Rawls and published by Harvard University Press. This book was released on 2009-06-30 with total page 497 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Constantly revised and refined over three decades, Rawls's lectures on various historical figures reflect his developing and changing views on the history of liberalism and democracy. With its careful analyses of the doctrine of the social contract, utilitarianism, and socialism, this volume has a critical place in the traditions it expounds.
Download or read book Evil in Modern Thought written by Susan Neiman and published by Princeton University Press. This book was released on 2015-08-25 with total page 408 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Whether expressed in theological or secular terms, evil poses a problem about the world's intelligibility. It confronts philosophy with fundamental questions: Can there be meaning in a world where innocents suffer? Can belief in divine power or human progress survive a cataloging of evil? Is evil profound or banal? Neiman argues that these questions impelled modern philosophy. Traditional philosophers from Leibniz to Hegel sought to defend the Creator of a world containing evil. Inevitably, their efforts--combined with those of more literary figures like Pope, Voltaire, and the Marquis de Sade--eroded belief in God's benevolence, power, and relevance, until Nietzsche claimed He had been murdered. They also yielded the distinction between natural and moral evil that we now take for granted. Neiman turns to consider philosophy's response to the Holocaust as a final moral evil, concluding that two basic stances run through modern thought. One, from Rousseau to Arendt, insists that morality demands we make evil intelligible. The other, from Voltaire to Adorno, insists that morality demands that we don't.
Download or read book Bob Dylan and Philosophy written by Carl J. Porter and published by Open Court. This book was released on 2011-05-24 with total page 225 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: The legions of Bob Dylan fans know that Dylan is not just a great composer, writer, and performer, but a great thinker as well. In Bob Dylan and Philosophy, eighteen philosophers analyze Dylan’s ethical positions, political commitments, views on gender and sexuality, and his complicated and controversial attitudes toward religion. All phases of Dylan’s output are covered, from his early acoustic folk ballads and anthem-like protest songs to his controversial switch to electric guitar to his sometimes puzzling, often profound music of the 1970s and beyond. The book examines different aspects of Dylan’s creative thought through a philosophical lens, including personal identity, negative and positive freedom, enlightenment and postmodernism in his social criticism, and the morality of bootlegging. An engaging introduction to deep philosophical truths, the book provides Dylan fans with an opportunity to learn about philosophy while impressing fans of philosophy with the deeper implications of his intellectual achievements.
Download or read book The Good Life Method written by Meghan Sullivan and published by Penguin. This book was released on 2022-01-04 with total page 305 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Two Philosophers Ask and Answer the Big Questions About the Search for Faith and Happiness For seekers of all stripes, philosophy is timeless self-care. Notre Dame philosophy professors Meghan Sullivan and Paul Blaschko have reinvigorated this tradition in their wildly popular and influential undergraduate course “God and the Good Life,” in which they wrestle with the big questions about how to live and what makes life meaningful. Now they invite us into the classroom to work through issues like what justifies our beliefs, whether we should practice a religion and what sacrifices we should make for others—as well as to investigate what figures such as Aristotle, Plato, Marcus Aurelius, Iris Murdoch, and W. E. B. Du Bois have to say about how to live well. Sullivan and Blaschko do the timeless work of philosophy using real-world case studies that explore love, finance, truth, and more. In so doing, they push us to escape our own caves, ask stronger questions, explain our deepest goals, and wrestle with suffering, the nature of death, and the existence of God. Philosophers know that our “good life plan” is one that we as individuals need to be constantly and actively writing to achieve some meaningful control and sense of purpose even if the world keeps throwing surprises our way. For at least the past 2,500 years, philosophers have taught that goal-seeking is an essential part of what it is to be human—and crucially that we could find our own good life by asking better questions of ourselves and of one another. This virtue ethics approach resonates profoundly in our own moment. The Good Life Method is a winning guide to tackling the big questions of being human with the wisdom of the ages.
Download or read book Aristotle s Children written by Richard E. Rubenstein and published by HMH. This book was released on 2004-09-20 with total page 389 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: A true account of a turning point in medieval history that shaped the modern world, from “a superb storyteller” and the author of When Jesus Became God (Los Angeles Times). Europe was in the long slumber of the Middle Ages, the Roman Empire was in tatters, and the Greek language was all but forgotten—until a group of twelfth-century scholars rediscovered and translated the works of Aristotle. The philosopher’s ideas spread like wildfire across Europe, offering the scientific view that the natural world, including the soul of man, was a proper subject of study. The rediscovery of these ancient ideas would spark riots and heresy trials, cause major upheavals in the Catholic Church—and also set the stage for today’s rift between reason and religion. Aristotle’s Children transports us back to this pivotal moment in world history, rendering the controversies of the Middle Ages lively and accessible, and allowing us to understand the philosophical ideas that are fundamental to modern thought. “A superb storyteller who breathes new life into such fascinating figures as Peter Abelard, Albertus Magnus, St. Thomas Aquinas, Roger Bacon, William of Ockham and Aristotle himself.” —Los Angeles Times “Rubenstein’s lively prose, his lucid insights and his crystal-clear historical analyses make this a first-rate study in the history of ideas.” —Publishers Weekly
Download or read book Thinking of Answers written by A. C. Grayling and published by Bloomsbury Publishing USA. This book was released on 2010-08-10 with total page 353 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: A volume of philosophical essays by the London Times and Prospect columnist shares accessible insights into provocative questions about such topics as human self-deception, the relevance of beauty and the relationship between goodness and happiness. Original.
Download or read book The Truth about Everything written by Matthew Stewart and published by Prometheus Books. This book was released on with total page 482 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: A deliciously iconoclastic and often funny historical survey of Western philosophy. . . . This irreverent tour will goad armchair philosophers to independent thought. - Publishers WeeklyAnyone thinking of a major in philosophy would do well to read this . . . - Philadelphia City PaperHis acid humor and frank discussions are a welcome comic interlude for the serious student of philosophy. - Philosophy and Religion Expert Editor's Recommended Book, Amazon.com. . . delightful irreverence . . . brilliant ending. - New HumanityThroughout history, well-known theories of reality, knowledge, mind, and most particularly the professional philosophers who rely on them for their intellectual existence, have sought to isolate universal truths and structure the history of philosophy to distinguish schools and movements that seek a comprehensive understanding of our world. But in this well-intended pursuit of truth, have we lost sight of what philosophy is? Matthew Stewart believes we have.His rowdy guided tour of the search for truth romps through traditional histories of philosophy using parables, imaginary dialogues, and illustrations to demonstrate that knowing theories, recognizing revered schools, and distinguishing the views of the great philosophers isn't what philosophy should be about. Once removed from the clutches of historicism, the compulsion for universal answers, and the perception that reason is a peculiarly Western possession, the nature of philosophy can be seen as a genuine human disposition to love and respect knowledge coupled with a desire for critical thinking.Matthew Stewart (New York, NY) holds a doctorate in philosophy from Oxford University and is a founding partner of the Mitchell Madison Group, a management consulting firm.
Download or read book Death Contemplation and Schopenhauer written by R. Raj Singh and published by Routledge. This book was released on 2016-05-13 with total page 141 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: The connections between death, contemplation and the contemplative life have been a recurrent theme in the canons of both western and eastern philosophical thought. This book examines the classical sources of this philosophical literature, in particular Plato's Phaedo and the Katha Upanishad and then proceeds to a sustained analysis and critical assessment of the sources and standpoints of a single thinker, Arthur Schopenhauer, whose work comprehensively pursues this problem. Going beyond the well examined western influences on Schopenhauer, Singh offers an in-depth account of Schopenhauer's references to eastern thought and a comprehensive examination of his eastern sources, particularly Vedanta and Buddhism. The book traces the pivotal issue of death through the whole range of Schopenhauer's writings uncovering the deeper connotations of his crucial notion of the will-to-live.
Download or read book A Philosophy of Madness written by Wouter Kusters and published by MIT Press. This book was released on 2020-12-01 with total page 769 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: The philosophy of psychosis and the psychosis of philosophy: a philosopher draws on his experience of madness. In this book, philosopher and linguist Wouter Kusters examines the philosophy of psychosis—and the psychosis of philosophy. By analyzing the experience of psychosis in philosophical terms, Kusters not only emancipates the experience of the psychotic from medical classification, he also emancipates the philosopher from the narrowness of textbooks and academia, allowing philosophers to engage in real-life praxis, philosophy in vivo. Philosophy and madness—Kusters's preferred, non-medicalized term—coexist, one mirroring the other. Kusters draws on his own experience of madness—two episodes of psychosis, twenty years apart—as well as other first-person narratives of psychosis. Speculating about the maddening effect of certain words and thought, he argues, and demonstrates, that the steady flow of philosophical deliberation may sweep one into a full-blown acute psychotic episode. Indeed, a certain kind of philosophizing may result in confusion, paradoxes, unworldly insights, and circular frozenness reminiscent of madness. Psychosis presents itself to the psychotic as an inescapable truth and reality. Kusters evokes the mad person's philosophical or existential amazement at reality, thinking, time, and space, drawing on classic autobiographical accounts of psychoses by Antonin Artaud, Daniel Schreber, and others, as well as the work of phenomenological psychiatrists and psychologists and such phenomenologists as Edmund Husserl and Maurice Merleau-Ponty. He considers the philosophical mystic and the mystical philosopher, tracing the mad undercurrent in the Husserlian philosophy of time; visits the cloud castles of mystical madness, encountering LSD devotees, philosophers, theologians, and nihilists; and, falling to earth, finds anxiety, emptiness, delusions, and hallucinations. Madness and philosophy proceed and converge toward a single vanishing point.
Download or read book Philosophy 101 written by Paul Kleinman and published by Simon and Schuster. This book was released on 2013-09-18 with total page 401 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Discover the world's greatest thinkers and their groundbreaking notions! Too often, textbooks turn the noteworthy theories, principles, and figures of philosophy into tedious discourse that even Plato would reject. Philosophy 101 cuts out the boring details and exhausting philosophical methodology, and instead, gives you a lesson in philosophy that keeps you engaged as you explore the fascinating history of human thought and inquisition. From Aristotle and Heidegger to free will and metaphysics, Philosophy 101 is packed with hundreds of entertaining philosophical tidbits, illustrations, and thought puzzles that you won't be able to find anywhere else. So whether you're looking to unravel the mysteries of existentialism, or just want to find out what made Voltaire tick, Philosophy 101 has all the answers--even the ones you didn't know you were looking for.
Download or read book Nasty Brutish and Short written by Scott Hershovitz and published by Penguin. This book was released on 2022-05-03 with total page 385 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: An NPR Best Book of 2022 * One of Christian Science Monitor's 10 best books of May “This amazing new book . . . takes us on a journey through classic and contemporary philosophy powered by questions like ‘What do we have the right to do? When is it okay to do this or that?’ They explore punishment and authority and sex and gender and race and the nature of truth and knowledge and the existence of God and the meaning of life and Scott just does an incredible job.” —Ryan Holiday, The Daily Stoic Some of the best philosophers in the world gather in surprising places—preschools and playgrounds. They debate questions about metaphysics and morality, even though they’ve never heard the words and perhaps can’t even tie their shoes. They’re kids. And as Scott Hershovitz shows in this delightful debut, they’re astoundingly good philosophers. Hershovitz has two young sons, Rex and Hank. From the time they could talk, he noticed that they raised philosophical questions and were determined to answer them. They re-created ancient arguments. And they advanced entirely new ones. That’s not unusual, Hershovitz says. Every kid is a philosopher. Following an agenda set by Rex and Hank, Hershovitz takes us on a fun romp through classic and contemporary philosophy, powered by questions like, Does Hank have the right to drink soda? When is it okay to swear? and, Does the number six exist? Hershovitz and his boys take on more weighty issues too. They explore punishment, authority, sex, gender, race, the nature of truth and knowledge, and the existence of God. Along the way, they get help from professional philosophers, famous and obscure. And they show that all of us have a lot to learn from listening to kids—and thinking with them. Hershovitz calls on us to support kids in their philosophical adventures. But more than that, he challenges us to join them so that we can become better, more discerning thinkers and recapture some of the wonder kids have at the world.
