How to think like a philosopher : scholars, dreamers and sages who can teach us how to live /
Cave, Peter,
How to think like a philosopher : scholars, dreamers and sages who can teach us how to live / Peter Cave. - xii, 291 pages ; 22 cm
Includes bibliographical references (pages 270-280) and indexes.
Prologue -- Lao Tzu: the way to Tao -- Sappho: lover -- Zeno of Elea: tortoise backer and Parmenidean helper -- Gadfly: aka 'Socrates' -- Plato: charioteer, magnificent footnote inspirer - 'nobody does it better' -- Aristotle: earth-bound, walking -- Epicurus: gardener, curing the soul, ably assisted by Lucretius -- Avicenna: flying man, unifier -- Descartes: with princess, with queen -- Spinoza: God-intoxicated atheist -- Leibniz: monad man -- Bishop Berkeley, 'that paradoxical Irishman': immaterialist, tar-water advocate -- David Hume: the great infidel or Le Bon David -- Kant: duty calls, categorically -- Schopenhauer: pessimism with flute -- John Stuart Mill: utility man, with Harriet, soul-mate -- Søren Kierkegaard: who? -- Karl Marx: Hegelian, freedom-fighter -- Lewis Carroll: curiouser and curiouser -- Nietzsche: God-slaying jester, trans-valuer -- Bertrand Russell: radical, aristocrat -- G. E. Moore: common-sense defender, Bloomsbury's sage -- Heidegger: hyphenater -- Jean-Paul Sartre: existentialist, novelist, French -- Simone Weil: refuser and would-be rescuer -- Simone de Beauvoir: situated, protester, feminist -- Ludwig Wittgenstein: therapist -- Hannah Arendt: controversialist, journalist? -- Iris Murdoch: attender -- Samuel Beckett: not I -- Epilogue.
"In showing how the great philosophers of human history lived and thought - and what they thought about - Peter Cave provides an accessible and enjoyable introduction to thinking philosophically and how it can change our everyday lives. With a lightness of touch, he addresses questions such as: Is there anything òut there' that gives meaning to our lives? Does reality tell us how we ought to live? What indeed is reality and what is appearance - and how can we tell the difference? This book paints vivid portraits of an assortment of inspiring thinkers: from Lao Tzu to Avicenna to Iris Murdoch; from Hannah Arendt to Socrates and Plato to Karl Marx; from Kierkegaard and Nietzsche to Sartre to Samuel Beckett - and let us not forget Lewis Carroll for some thought-provoking fantasies and Ludwig Wittgenstein for the anguishes of a genius. As well as displaying optimists and pessimists, believers and non-believers, the book displays relevance to current affairs, from free speech to abortion to the treatment of animals to our leaders' moral character. In each brief chapter, Cave brings to life these often prescient, always compelling philosophical thinkers, showing how their ways of approaching the world grew out of their own lives and times and how we may make valuable use of their insights today. Now, more than ever, we need to understand how to live, and how to understand the world around us. This is the perfect guide"--
9781399407915 1399407910 9781399405911 1399405918
GBC325113 bnb
020949959 Uk
Philosophy.
Philosophers--History.
Philosophers--Influence.
Conduct of life.
Philosophers--History--Influence.
How to think like a philosopher : scholars, dreamers and sages who can teach us how to live / Peter Cave. - xii, 291 pages ; 22 cm
Includes bibliographical references (pages 270-280) and indexes.
Prologue -- Lao Tzu: the way to Tao -- Sappho: lover -- Zeno of Elea: tortoise backer and Parmenidean helper -- Gadfly: aka 'Socrates' -- Plato: charioteer, magnificent footnote inspirer - 'nobody does it better' -- Aristotle: earth-bound, walking -- Epicurus: gardener, curing the soul, ably assisted by Lucretius -- Avicenna: flying man, unifier -- Descartes: with princess, with queen -- Spinoza: God-intoxicated atheist -- Leibniz: monad man -- Bishop Berkeley, 'that paradoxical Irishman': immaterialist, tar-water advocate -- David Hume: the great infidel or Le Bon David -- Kant: duty calls, categorically -- Schopenhauer: pessimism with flute -- John Stuart Mill: utility man, with Harriet, soul-mate -- Søren Kierkegaard: who? -- Karl Marx: Hegelian, freedom-fighter -- Lewis Carroll: curiouser and curiouser -- Nietzsche: God-slaying jester, trans-valuer -- Bertrand Russell: radical, aristocrat -- G. E. Moore: common-sense defender, Bloomsbury's sage -- Heidegger: hyphenater -- Jean-Paul Sartre: existentialist, novelist, French -- Simone Weil: refuser and would-be rescuer -- Simone de Beauvoir: situated, protester, feminist -- Ludwig Wittgenstein: therapist -- Hannah Arendt: controversialist, journalist? -- Iris Murdoch: attender -- Samuel Beckett: not I -- Epilogue.
"In showing how the great philosophers of human history lived and thought - and what they thought about - Peter Cave provides an accessible and enjoyable introduction to thinking philosophically and how it can change our everyday lives. With a lightness of touch, he addresses questions such as: Is there anything òut there' that gives meaning to our lives? Does reality tell us how we ought to live? What indeed is reality and what is appearance - and how can we tell the difference? This book paints vivid portraits of an assortment of inspiring thinkers: from Lao Tzu to Avicenna to Iris Murdoch; from Hannah Arendt to Socrates and Plato to Karl Marx; from Kierkegaard and Nietzsche to Sartre to Samuel Beckett - and let us not forget Lewis Carroll for some thought-provoking fantasies and Ludwig Wittgenstein for the anguishes of a genius. As well as displaying optimists and pessimists, believers and non-believers, the book displays relevance to current affairs, from free speech to abortion to the treatment of animals to our leaders' moral character. In each brief chapter, Cave brings to life these often prescient, always compelling philosophical thinkers, showing how their ways of approaching the world grew out of their own lives and times and how we may make valuable use of their insights today. Now, more than ever, we need to understand how to live, and how to understand the world around us. This is the perfect guide"--
9781399407915 1399407910 9781399405911 1399405918
GBC325113 bnb
020949959 Uk
Philosophy.
Philosophers--History.
Philosophers--Influence.
Conduct of life.
Philosophers--History--Influence.