Book picks similar to
Empathy: Philosophical and Psychological Perspectives by Amy Coplan


philosophy
psychology
non-fiction
05-psychology-mastering-self

The Dream of Reason: A History of Western Philosophy from the Greeks to the Renaissance


Anthony Gottlieb - 2000
    This landmark study of Western thought takes a fresh look at the writings of the great thinkers of classic philosophy and questions many pieces of conventional wisdom. The book invites comparison with Bertrand Russell's monumental History of Western Philosophy, "but Gottlieb's book is less idiosyncratic and based on more recent scholarship" (Colin McGinn, Los Angeles Times). A New York Times Notable Book, a Los Angeles Times Best Book, and a Times Literary Supplement Best Book of 2001.

Language and Mind


Noam Chomsky - 1968
    The first six chapters, originally published in the 1960s, made a groundbreaking contribution to linguistic theory. This edition complements them with an additional chapter and a new preface, bringing Chomsky's influential approach into the twenty-first century. Chapters 1-6 present Chomsky's early work on the nature and acquisition of language as a genetically endowed, biological system (Universal Grammar), through the rules and principles of which we acquire an internalized knowledge (I-language). Over the past fifty years, this framework has sparked an explosion of inquiry into a wide range of languages, and has yielded some major theoretical questions. The final chapter revisits the key issues, reviewing the 'biolinguistic' approach that has guided Chomsky's work from its origins to the present day, and raising some novel and exciting challenges for the study of language and mind.

Wickedness


Mary Midgley - 1984
    Here Mary Midgley does so, with her customary brilliance and clarity. Midgley's analysis proves that the capacity for real wickedness is an inevitable part of human nature. This is not however a blanket acceptance of evil. Out of this dark journey she returns with an offering to us: an understanding of human nature that enhances our very humanity.

"A Voyage on the North Sea": Art in the Age of the Post-Medium Condition


Rosalind E. Krauss - 2000
    Based on the 1999 Walter Neurath Memorial Lecture, this book uses the work of the Belgian artist Marcel Broodthaers to argue that the specifity of mediums, even modernist ones, can never be simply collapsed into the physicality of their support.

DO NOTHING!


Damian Mark Smyth - 2012
    It is the misunderstanding of the ‘function’ of individual thought systems that causes the problems, pain and suffering in the world. This ‘reactive’ thinking interferes with the flow of creative intelligence. When busy thinking subsides, new thought is available, and with it, innovation and resilience. The ‘trick,’ is simply to see how the ‘trick is done’. That’s it, no more. No processes, just an understanding. I point towards this understanding of the ‘human operating system’, which turns cause and effect, completely inside-out.What if you were able to live a perfect, happy life, effortlessly... right now!? What if you discovered the secret that has been talked about by mystics throughout the ages, that was not only incredibly simple but was also accessible to you without doing a thing? What if every area of your life could be improved with one realisation, one thought, one simple understanding? Damian Mark Smyth is a teacher of this understanding and he takes you through the most common misunderstandings and misconceptions to help you realise that humanity has, for the most part, been looking in the wrong direction when it comes to happiness. The ‘outside-in’ world of fame and money is not the way to be fulfilled - just look at the amount of rich and famous people in rehab and therapy. His approach is more in tune with who you really are. From relationships to money, the business environment, parenting to sport and even addiction, Damian will show you where the secret lies and how you too can access it.Here is what readers are saying about ‘DO NOTHING!’: I can’t believe how powerful this book is! “I’m impressed with this book. Read DO NOTHING! The wonders of the internal universe await.” Jack Pransky Ph.D (Author of ‘Somebody Should Have Told Us!’)This book is amazing!This is not the kind of book that teaches you, it is a book that TOUCHES you...I am now a big step closer to loving life.DO NOTHING! goes straight to your heart, it is a piece of music as much as a written text.It is very, very CONTAGIOUS!!! There is a happiness virus somewhere in the text! You open the book & have no choice but to get infected by itDO NOTHING’S chapter on money is one of the more useful things I’ve read in my life.Without this book, my life would be very different right now (and not in a good way!).DO NOTHING! is the missing link! Ever had trouble with stress, depression, anxiety, doubt or fear? This book will revolutionise the way you live.I just wish I’d read it earlier!! This is what the author, Damian Mark Smyth says himself about the Principles outlined within the pages of ‘DO NOTHING!’: “There are three formless facts that create our reality from moment to moment. Like gravity, they exist whether we believe them or not. With them, not only do we create our world through our thoughts, but we also create our world ‘of thought’. Merely by having an understanding of how they work allows us freedom from worry, stress and fear and opens us up to the infinite potential of the universe through creativity, compassion and love. And the way to access this inner source of wisdom is to DO NOTHING! Because we already have it. As the saying goes: “You are already enlightened, you just don’t know it yet...”

Machiavelli Mindset: How To Conquer Your Enemies, Achieve Audacious Goals & Live Without Limits From The Prince (Psychological Warfare, The Prince, Mindset)


R. Shaw - 2016
     Here's A Preview Of What Machiavelli Mindset Contains... An Introduction to Machiavelli Seeing the World through Machiavelli’s Eyes Getting Over The Guilt Moving Above And Beyond Conventional Thinking Machiavelli's Thoughts On Generosity Compassion Vs. Cruelty (Is It Better To Be Loved Or Feared?) What Machiavelli Says About Honesty How To Achieve Success The Machiavellian Way The Qualities Of A Great Leader How to Avoid Attracting Hatred and Other Lessons from the Prince And Much, Much More! Download Your Copy Now And Get Ahead Today!

The Technological Society


Jacques Ellul - 1954
    No conversation about the dangers of technology and its unavoidable effects on society can begin without a careful reading of this book."A magnificent book . . . He goes through one human activity after another and shows how it has been technicized, rendered efficient, and diminished in the process."-Harper's"One of the most important books of the second half of the twentieth-century. In it, Jacques Ellul convincingly demonstrates that technology, which we continue to conceptualize as the servant of man, will overthrow everything that prevents the internal logic of its development, including humanity itself-unless we take necessary steps to move human society out of the environment that 'technique' is creating to meet its own needs."-The Nation"A description of the way in which technology has become completely autonomous and is in the process of taking over the traditional values of every society without exception, subverting and suppressing these values to produce at last a monolithic world culture in which all non-technological difference and variety are mere appearance."-Los Angeles Free Press

Tragic Sense of Life


Miguel de Unamuno - 1912
    Take any book of apologetics-that is to say, of theological advocacy-and you will see how many times you will meet with this phrase-"the disastrous consequences of this doctrine." Now the disastrous consequences of a doctrine prove at most that the doctrine is disastrous, but not that it is false, for there is no proof that the true is necessarily that which suits us best. -from "The Rationalist Dissolution" This is the masterpiece of Miguel de Unamuno, a member of the group of Spanish intellectuals and philosophers known as the "Generation of '98," and a writer whose work dramatically influenced a wide range of 20th-century literature. His down-to-earth demeanor and no-nonsense outlook makes this 1921 book a favorite of intellectuals to this day, a practical, sensible discussion of the war between faith and reason that consumed the twentieth century and continues to rage in the twenty-first century. de Unamuno's philosophy is not the stuff of a rarefied realm but an integral part of fleshly, sensual life, metaphysics that speaks to daily living and the real world. Spanish philosopher MIGUEL DE UNAMUNO (1864-1936) was a prolific writer of essays, novels, poetry, and the stage plays. His books include Peace in War (1895), The Life of Don Quixote and Sancho (1905), and Abel Sanchez (1917)."

The Idea of the Brain: The Past and Future of Neuroscience


Matthew Cobb - 2020
    Yet, despite the astonishing discoveries of science, we still have only the vaguest idea of how the brain works. In The Idea of the Brain, scientist and historian Matthew Cobb traces how our conception of the brain has evolved over the centuries. Although it might seem to be a story of ever-increasing knowledge of biology, Cobb shows how our ideas about the brain have been shaped by each era's most significant technologies. Today we might think the brain is like a supercomputer. In the past, it has been compared to a telegraph, a telephone exchange, or some kind of hydraulic system. What will we think the brain is like tomorrow, when new technology arises? The result is an essential read for anyone interested in the complex processes that drive science and the forces that have shaped our marvelous brains.

Leviathan


Thomas Hobbes - 1651
    But his penetrating work of political philosophy - now fully revised and with a new introduction for this edition - opened up questions about the nature of statecraft and society that influenced governments across the world.

Intelligent Virtue


Julia Annas - 2011
    Annas argues that exercising a virtue involves practical reasoning of a kind which can illuminatingly be compared to the kind of reasoning we find in someone exercising a practical skill. Rather than asking at the start how virtues relate to rules, principles, maximizing, or a final end, we should look at the way in which the acquisition and exercise of virtue can be seen to be in many ways like the acquisition and exercise of more mundane activities, such as farming, building or playing the piano. This helps us to see virtue as part of an agent's happiness or flourishing, and as constituting (wholly, or in part) that happiness. We are offered a better understanding of the relation between virtue as an ideal and virtue in everyday life, and the relation between being virtuous and doing the right thing.

On Escape: De l'évasion


Emmanuel Levinas - 1936
    In it, Levinas not only affirms the necessity of an escape from being, but also gives a meaning and a direction to it. Beginning with an analysis of need not as lack or some external limit to a self-sufficient being, but as a positive relation to our being, Levinas moves through a series of brilliant phenomenological analyses of such phenomena as pleasure, shame, and nausea in order to show a fundamental insufficiency in the human condition. In his critical introduction and annotation, Jacques Rolland places On Escape in its historical and intellectual context, and also within the context of Levinas's entire oeuvre, explaining Levinas's complicated relation to Heidegger, and underscoring the way Levinas's analysis of "being riveted," of the need for escape, is a meditation on the body.

Social Theory: The Multicultural And Classic Readings


Charles Lemert - 1993
    It brings texts together in unexpected and exciting ways: those of Parsons and Dorothy Smith, Merton and Lacan, Wallerstein and Frantz Fanon, James Coleman and Molefi Asante. Extensive introductory essays by the editor situate the writings in their times, identifying the currents of social change that shaped fundamental questions of modern and postmodern life. The second edition includes new readings, a new section covering the postmodern controversies of recent years, and a postscript that addresses the changes and directions in social theory.

On Dialogue


David Bohm - 1996
    Renowned scientist David Bohm believed there was a better way for humanity to discover meaning and to achieve harmony. He identified creative dialogue, a sharing of assumptions and understanding, as a means by which the individual, and society as a whole, can learn more about themselves and others, and achieve a renewed sense of purpose.

The Weird and the Eerie


Mark Fisher - 2016
    The Weird and the Eerie are closely related but distinct modes, each possessing its own distinct properties. Both have often been associated with Horror, yet this emphasis overlooks the aching fascination that such texts can exercise. The Weird and the Eerie both fundamentally concern the outside and the unknown, which are not intrinsically horrifying, even if they are always unsettling. Perhaps a proper understanding of the human condition requires examination of liminal concepts such as the weird and the eerie. These two modes will be analysed with reference to the work of authors such as H.P. Lovecraft, H.G. Wells, M.R. James, Christopher Priest, Joan Lindsay, Nigel Kneale, Daphne Du Maurier, Alan Garner and Margaret Atwood, and films by Stanley Kubrick, Jonathan Glazer and Christoper Nolan.