Download or read book Socrates Meets Marx written by Peter Kreeft and published by Ignatius Press. This book was released on 2010-02-12 with total page 212 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Utilizing the dialogue format that the Greek philosopher made famous, Kreeft presents the latest in his series of small books on philosophy. In a unique and compelling take on the philosophies of the modern world, Kreeft pits the ancient Greek philosopher against the founder of Communism. Humorous, frank, and insightful, this book challenges the reader to step in and take hold of what is right and to cast away what is wrong. Topics covered include such varied subjects as private property, the individual, the ಜThree Philosophies of Manಝ, women, individualism, and more. A wonderful introduction to philosophy for the neophyte, and a joy for the experienced student.
Download or read book Socrates Meets Machiavelli written by Peter Kreeft and published by Ignatius Press. This book was released on 2003-01-01 with total page 178 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: There is no better way to understand our present world than by exploring the Great Books written by the great minds that have made it. There is no better way to study the beginning of modern political philosophy than by studying its foundations in Machiavelli's The Prince. There is no better way to study the Great Books than with the aid of Socrates, the philosopher par excellence. What if we could overhear a conversation in the afterlife between Socrates and Machiavelli, in which Machiavelli has to submit to an Oxford tutorial style examination of his book conducted by Socrates using his famous "Socratic method" of cross-examination? How might the conversation go? This imaginative thought-experiment makes for both drama and a good lesson in logic, in moral and political philosophy, in "how to read a book," and in the history of early modern thought. Thus this book is for readers looking for a thought-stretching "good read" and for use in college classes in logic, philosophy, ethics, political science, literature, communication, rhetoric, anthropology, and history.
Download or read book Socrates Meets Descartes written by Peter Kreeft and published by Ignatius Press. This book was released on 2011-03-23 with total page 244 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: This is the 5th volume in the series of popular volumes by Peter Kreeft, in which the "Father of Philosophy", Socrates, cross-examines various other important philosophers and thinkers (in previous books he examined Marx, Sarte, Machiavelli, and Socrates himself.) Kreeft states that Socrates and Descartes are perhaps the two most important philosophers who have ever lived, because they are the two who made the most difference to all philosophy after them. These two fathers of philosophy stand at the beginning of the two basic philosophical options: the classical and the modern. Kreeft focuses on seven features that unite these two major philosophers and distinguish them from all others. So this dialog between Socrates and Descartes is a dialog between the fundamental stages in the history of philosophy, the history of consciousness, and the history of Western culture. Like his other works in this popular series, this book is profound and witty reading that makes for an entertaining and insightful exploration of modern philosophy. It will appeal to both the common reader as well as to those more philosophically inclined.
Download or read book Socrates Meets Hume written by Peter Kreeft and published by Ignatius Press. This book was released on 2010-01-01 with total page 228 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: This book is the 6th book in a series of Socratic explorations of some of the Great Books. The books in this series are intended to be short, clear, and non-technical, thus fully understandable by beginners. Through such Socratic dialogues, Peter Kreeft introduces (or reviews) the basic questions in the fundamental divisions of philosophy: metaphysics, epistemology, anthropology, ethics, logic, and method. In Socrates Meets Hume, Kreeft presents a Socratic examination of enquiry concerning human understanding in relation to the skepticism of Hume, posing questions that challenge the concepts that Hume proposed. Kreeft states that Hume is the "most formidable, serious, difficult-to-refute skeptic in the history of human thought." Kreeft invites you to take part in the process of refuting Hume's skeptical arguments, with the aid of Socrates. Based on an imaginary dialogue between Socrates and Hume that takes place in the afterlife, this profound and witty book makes an entertaining and informative exploration of modern philosophy.
Download or read book Socrates Meets Sartre written by Peter Kreeft and published by Ignatius Press. This book was released on 2005-01-01 with total page 230 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Christian philosopher Kreeft (philosophy, Boston College) uses an imaginary dialogue between Socrates and Sartre to challenge the fundamental concepts of existentialist philosophy. The conversational style and non-technical language he employs serves to make the concepts discussed accessible to both students and general readers. Kreeft is also the
Download or read book Socrates Meets Freud written by Peter Kreeft and published by St Augustine PressInc. This book was released on 2014 with total page 177 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: "Probably no single thinker since Jesus has influenced the thoughts and lives of more people living in the Western world today than Sigmund Freud. Even agnostics like William Barrett, in Irrational Man, and atheists like Nietzsche, agree that the single most radical change in the last thousand years of Western civilization has been the decline of religion. And the four most influential critics of religion have certainly been Nietzsche, Marx, Darwin, and Freud. Of the four, Freud is by far the most popular No name is more associated with, and in fact responsible for, "the sexual revolution" than Freud. And no revolution in history, at least none since the one around a cross and an empty tomb, and perhaps even none since the one around a snake and an apple, has been more life-changing, and has more potential to continue to be more radically life-changing in the future, than the sexual revolution. To see this, just read Huxley's Brave New World. (And remember that Huxley was far from being a theist.) Freud wore three hats. Freud was (1) a practicing psychoanalyst (indeed, the inventor of psychoanalysis), (2) a professional theoretical psychologist and sociologist, and (3) an amateur philosopher. This book explores only his philosophy, for that is the point of his intersection with Socrates. If Socrates is right in his deepest convictions about the power of reason and the importance of philosophy, Freud's philosophy is the ultimate source, foundation, explanation, and justification for his psychology"--
Download or read book The Unaborted Socrates written by Peter Kreeft and published by InterVarsity Press. This book was released on 1983-07-13 with total page 160 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Peter Kreeft's Socrates enters the debate on abortion, considering the arguments of psychology, medicine and philosophy.
Download or read book The Platonic Tradition written by Peter Kreeft and published by . This book was released on 2018 with total page 0 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: The Platonic tradition in Western philosophy is not just one of many equally central traditions. It is so much THE central one that the very existence and survival of Western civilization depends on it. It is like the Confucian tradition in Chinese culture, or the monotheistic tradition in religion, or the human rights tradition in politics. In the first of his eight lectures, Peter Kreeft defines Platonism and its "Big Idea," the idea of a transcendent reality that the history of philosophy has labeled "Platonic Ideas" or Platonic Forms. In the second lecture, he briefly explores Plato's two basic predecessors or sources, myth and Socrates; and then looks at 12 applications of the Forms in Plato's own dialogues. The third lecture covers the three most important modifications or additions to Plato himself in the Platonic tradition: Aristotle, Plotinus, and Augustine, each of whom gave the Forms a new metaphysical address. The fourth lecture explores six Christian Platonists, three in the New Testament and three philosophers, Justin Martyr, Bonaventure, and Aquinas. The next three lectures explore the consequences of the modern abandoning of Platonism, beginning with William of Ockham's Nominalism, as the source of nearly all modern philosophical errors, and its results in the Empiricism of Locke and Hume, the so-called Copernican Revolution in philosophy in Kant, the so-called "analytic philosophy," which still dominates English and American philosophy departments. In the sixth essays, Kreeft looks at 13 influential kinds of positivism or reductionism in modern thought: in method, history, metaphysics, epistemology, ethics, sociology, politics, logics, linguistics, sex, psychology, and theology, exemplified by Descartes, Machiavelli, Hobbes, Marx, Kant, Comte, Rousseau, Rawls, Ayer, Derrida, Freud, Skimmer, Nietzsche, and Sartre. Lecture 7 looks at the results of abandoning the Platonic tradition in ethics, the values vacuum, or nihilism, in Ecclesiastes, Pascal, Kierkegaard, Nietzsche, Heidegger, Sartre, Dostoyevsky, Tolstoi, Marcel, and Buber. In the last lecture, Kreeft looks at some experiential evidence for Platonism, doors out of the cave that are still open, signals of transcendence.
Download or read book Sophie s World written by Jostein Gaarder and published by Farrar, Straus and Giroux. This book was released on 2007-03-20 with total page 544 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: One day Sophie comes home from school to find two questions in her mail: "Who are you?" and "Where does the world come from?" Before she knows it she is enrolled in a correspondence course with a mysterious philosopher. Thus begins Jostein Gaarder's unique novel, which is not only a mystery, but also a complete and entertaining history of philosophy.
Download or read book Socrates Meets Kant written by Peter Kreeft and published by Ignatius Press. This book was released on 2009-01-01 with total page 327 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Immanuel Kant is one of the greatest philosophers in history. But, as Peter Kreeft notes in this book, Kant is really two philosophers--a philosopher about how we know things (epistemology) and a philosopher of right and wrong (ethics). If he had written only on either topic, he would still be the most important and influential of the modern philosophers. The combination of the two, though, makes for a formidable thinker, one it would take a figure such as the Father of Philosophy, the relentless Socrates, to confront. Confront he does, in Peter Kreeft's next installment of the popular Socrates Meets series. Set in the afterlife, the conversation between the two great minds lays out the key issues. Kreeft's Socrates reflects what the historical philosopher would likely have made of Kant's ideas, while also recognizing the greatness, genius, and insightfulness of Kant. The result of their dialogues is a helpful, highly readable, even amusing book, useful for beginner as well as master. Kant's philosophy of knowing truly is a "Copernican revolution in philosophy" as he dubbed it. His ethics was intended to set out the rational grounds for morality. Did he achieve his goals? What would Socrates say about the matter? Dr. Kreeft has written a book no student of modern thought should be without.
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 Aristotle Adam Smith and Karl Marx written by Spencer J. Pack and published by Edward Elgar Publishing. This book was released on 2010-01-01 with total page 277 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: . . . a very valuable introduction to Aristotle s economics. History of Economic Ideas Spencer Pack is completely at home with the difficult works of Aristotle, Adam Smith and Karl Marx. To walk with him through their writings is to discover that they are surprisingly helpful in understanding the modern world of computers, credit crunches, religious differences, international conflicts, and unemployment due to oversaving in China and undersaving in America. One is left after reading them with growing admiration for the giants of past intellectual history. This is only one lesson that Pack teaches in this illuminating book. Mark Blaug, University of London and University of Buckingham, UK This is an unusually ambitious and unpretentious work. And it is successful. Pack effectively compares the ideas of each of the three great men without forcing those of one upon the others. The topics are exchange value, money, capital, character, government, and change, which the author considers to be the fundamental issues in 21st century political economy. Pack is especially successful in utilizing a wide spectrum of secondary (including contemporary) sources to enrich the analysis of the expected primary sources. Student readers will be exposed to the opportunities and problems of variation in interpretation. The author has studiously avoided insinuating and privileging his own views and naively repeating well-worn and misleading, if not also erroneous, ideology-laden positions. Warren J. Samuels, Michigan State University, US Spencer Pack has written a most illuminating and insightful book. Beginning from Aristotelian foundations, Pack focuses our attention on an essential economic and moral issue: the difference between value in use and value in exchange. From this vantage point, he evaluates the arguments of Smith and Marx, demonstrating how their theories, both drawing on Aristotle, unfold into a general analysis of capitalism. His account forces us to think deeply about the nature of capitalist society. I recommend it highly. John F. Henry, University of Missouri-Kansas City, US Spencer Pack compares and contrasts Aristotle s, Smith s and Marx s theoretical systems on six fundamental issues: exchange value, money, capital, character, government, and change. This book also provides insights on issues concerning the continuing development of world money, saving, managerial capitalism, corrupt governments, and various secular and religious movements for social change.
Download or read book Philosophy 101 by Socrates written by Peter Kreeft and published by Ignatius Press. This book was released on 2002 with total page 156 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: The popular author and Boston College philosophy professor, Kreeft, presents this introduction to philosophy to help beginners not only to understand philosophy but to fall in love with it. In his forty years of teaching philosophy, Kreeft says the most effective way to accomplish this purpose is to read Socrates. Philosophy means "the love of wisdom." Kreeft uses the dialogues of Socrates in this book to help the reader grow in that love of wisdom. He says that no master of the art of philosophizing has ever been more simple, clear, and accessible to beginners as Socrates. He focuses on Plato's dialogues, the Apology of Socrates, as a model partner for the reader to dialogue with. Kreeft calls it "the Magna Carta of philosophy," a timeless classic that is "a portable classroom."
Download or read book The Best Things in Life written by Peter Kreeft and published by InterVarsity Press. This book was released on 2009-08-20 with total page 193 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: What are the best things in life? Questions like that may boggle your mind. But they don't boggle Socrates. The indomitable old Greek brings his unending questions to Desperate State University. With him come the same mind-opening and spirit-stretching challenge that disrupted ancient Athens. What is the purpose of education? Why do we make love? What good is money? Can computers think like people? Is there a difference between Capitalism and Communism? What is the greatest good? Is belief in God like belief in Santa Claus? In twelve short, Socratic dialogues Peter Kreeft explodes contemporary values like success, power and pleasure. And he bursts the modern bubbles of agnosticism and subjectivism. He leaves you richer, wiser and more able to discern what the best things in life actually are.
Download or read book Changing the Subject written by Raymond Geuss and published by Harvard University Press. This book was released on 2017-10-23 with total page 363 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: “A history of philosophy in twelve thinkers...The whole performance combines polyglot philological rigor with supple intellectual sympathy, and it is all presented...in a spirit of fun...This bracing and approachable book [shows] that there is life in philosophy yet.” —Times Literary Supplement “Exceptionally engaging...Geuss has a remarkable knack for putting even familiar thinkers in a new light.” —Notre Dame Philosophical Reviews “Geuss is something like the consummate teacher, his analyses navigable and crystal, his guidance on point.” —Doug Phillips, Key Reporter Raymond Geuss explores the ideas of twelve philosophers who broke dramatically with prevailing wisdom, from Socrates and Plato in the ancient world to Nietzsche, Wittgenstein, and Adorno. The result is a striking account of some of the most innovative thinkers in Western history and an indirect manifesto for how to pursue philosophy today. Geuss cautions that philosophers’ attempts to break from convention do not necessarily make the world a better place. Montaigne’s ideas may have been benign, but the fate of those of Hobbes, Hegel, and Nietzsche has been more varied. Yet in the act of provoking people to think differently, philosophers remind us that we are not fated to live within the systems of thought we inherit.
Download or read book On the Nature of Marx s Things written by Jacques Lezra and published by Fordham Univ Press. This book was released on 2018-03-27 with total page 280 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: On the Nature of Marx’s Things is a major rethinking of the Marxian tradition, one based not on fixed things but on the inextricable interrelation between the material world and our language for it. Lezra traces to Marx’s earliest writings a subterranean, Lucretian practice that he calls necrophilological translation that continues to haunt Marx’s inheritors. This Lucretian strain, requiring that we think materiality in non-self-evident ways, as dynamic, aleatory, and always marked by its relation to language, raises central questions about ontology, political economy, and reading. “Lezra,” writes Vittorio Morfino in his preface, “transfers all of the power of the Althusserian encounter into his conception of translation.” Lezra’s expansive understanding of translation covers practices that put different natural and national languages into relation, often across periods, but also practices or mechanisms internal to each language. Obscured by later critical attention to the contradictory lexicons—of fetishism and of chrematistics—that Capital uses to describe how value accrues to commodities, and by the dialectical approach that’s framed Marx’s work since Engels sought to marry it to the natural philosophy of his time, necrophilological translation has a troubling, definitive influence in Marx’s thought and in his wake. It entails a radical revision of what counts as translation, and wholly new ways of imagining what an object is, of what counts as matter, value, sovereignty, mediation, and even number. In On the Nature of Marx’s Things a materialism “of the encounter,” as recent criticism in the vein of the late Althusser calls it, encounters Marxological value-form theory, post-Schmittian divisible sovereignty, object-oriented-ontologies and the critique of correlationism, and philosophies of translation and untranslatability in debt to Quine, Cassin, and Derrida. The inheritors of the problems with which Marx grapples range from Spinoza’s marranismo, through Melville’s Bartleby, through the development of a previously unexplored Freudian political theology shaped by the revolutionary traditions of Schiller and Verdi, through Adorno’s exilic antihumanism against Said’s cosmopolitan humanism, through today’s new materialisms. Ultimately, necrophilology draws the story of capital’s capture of difference away from the story of capital’s production of subjectivity. It affords concepts and procedures for dismantling the system of objects on which neoliberal capitalism stands: concrete, this-wordly things like commodities, but also such “objects” as debt traps, austerity programs, the marketization of risk; ideologies; the pedagogical, professional, legal, even familial institutions that produce and reproduce inequities today.
Download or read book The Death of Socrates written by Jean Paul Mongin and published by Diaphanes. This book was released on 2015 with total page 0 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: "'Tell us, Delphic Oracle, who is the wisest man in all of Greece?' So begins The Death of Socrates. No mortal man is wiser than Socrates, who, on his daily walks through Athens, talks to all the people he meets. When the person he talks to takes himself to be very wise, Socrates asks so many questions that the person ends up admitting he knows nothing. When he runs into people who know little, Socrates sets them on the way to wisdom. But not everyone shares Socrates's love for the truth. When the people of Athens put him on trial for his ceaseless questioning, how will he find the courage to continue to speak the truth?" from publisher's website.
