Book picks similar to
Animal Minds and Human Morals: The Origins of the Western Debate by Richard Sorabji
animals
philosophy
animal-studies
filosofía
The Greek Philosophers: from Thales to Aristotle
W.K.C. Guthrie - 1960
Guthrie has written a survey of the great age of Greek philosophy - from Thales to Aristotle - which combines comprehensiveness with brevity. Without pre-supposing a knowledge of Greek or the Classics, he sets out to explain the ideas of Plato and Aristotle in the light of their predecessors rather than their successors, and to describe the characteristic features of the Greek way of thinking and outlook on the world. Thus The Greek Philosophers provides excellent background material for the general reader - as well as providing a firm basis for specialist studies.
The End of Memory: Remembering Rightly in a Violent World
Miroslav Volf - 2006
But Miroslav Volf here proposes the radical idea that letting go of such memories - after a certain point and under certain conditions - may actually be the appropriate course of action. While agreeing with the claim that to remember a wrongdoing is to struggle against it, Volf notes that there are too many ways to remember wrongly, perpetuating the evil committed rather than guarding against it. In this way, the just sword of memory often severs the very good it seeks to defend. He argues that remembering rightly has implications not only for the individual but also for the wrongdoer and for the larger community. Volfs personal stories of persecution offer a compelling backdrop for his search for theological resources to make memories a wellspring of healing rather than a source of deepening pain and animosity. Controversial, thoughtful, and incisively reasoned, The End of Memory begins a conversation hard to ignore.
The Oxford History of Greece and the Hellenistic World
John Boardman - 1988
Now available in a smaller, more convenient format, the astonishingly in-depth and widely praised Oxford History of the Classical World offers the general reader the definitive companion to the Graeco-Roman world.The first volume, Classical Greece and the Hellenistic World, covers the period from the eighth to the first centuries B.C., a period unparalleled in history for its brilliance in literature, philosophy, and the visual arts. It also treats the Hellenization of the Middle East by the monarchies established in the area conquested by Alexander the Great. The second volume, Classical Rome, covers early Rome and Italy, the expansion of the Roman republic, the foundation of the Roman Empire by Augustus, its consolidation in the first two centuries A.D., and the later Empire and its influence on Western civilization. The editors, John Boardman, Jasper Griffen, and Oswyn Murrayall eminent classicistsintersperse chapters on political and social history with sections on literature, philosophy, and the arts, and reinforce the historical framework with maps and historical charts. The two volumes also offer bibliographies and a full index, as well as black and white photographs integrated into the text. The contributorsthirty of the world's leading scholarspresent the latest in modern scholarship through masterpieces of wit, brevity, and style. While concentrating on the aspects essential to the understanding of each period, they also focus on those elements of the classical world that remain of lasting importance and interest to readers today. Together, these volumes provide both a provocative and entertaining window into our classical heritage.
Common Sense of Science
Jacob Bronowski - 1951
Bronowski was both a distinguished mathematician and a poet, a philosopher of science and a literary critic who wrote a well-known study of William Blake. Dr. Bronowski's very career was founded on the premise of an intimate connection between science and the humanities, disciplines which are still generally thought to be worlds apart.The Common Sense of Science, a book which remains as topical today as it was when it first appeared twenty-five years ago, articulates and develops Bronowski's provocative idea that the sciences and the arts fundamentally share the same imaginative vision.
The Treason of the Intellectuals
Julien Benda - 1927
The "treason of the intellectuals" is a phrase that evokes much but is inherently ambiguous. The book bearing this title is well known but little understood. This edition is introduced by Roger Kimball.From the time of the pre-Socratics, intellectuals were a breed apart. They were non-materialistic knowledge-seekers who believed in a universal humanism and represented a cornerstone of civilized society. According to Benda, this all began to change in the early twentieth century. In Europe in the 1920s, intellectuals began abandoning their attachment to traditional philosophical and scholarly ideals, and instead glorified particularisms and moral relativism.The "treason" of which Benda writes is the betrayal by the intellectuals of their unique vocation. He criticizes European intellectuals for allowing political commitment to insinuate itself into their understanding of the intellectual vocation, ushering the world into "the age of the intellectual organization of political hatreds." From the savage flowering of ethnic and religious hatreds in the Middle East and throughout Europe today to the mendacious demand for political correctness and multiculturalism on college campuses everywhere in the West, the treason of the intellectuals continues to play out its unedifying drama.
The Cambridge Companion to Nietzsche
Bernd Magnus - 1996
It is followed by three essays on the appropriation and misappropriation of his writings, and a group of essays exploring the nature of Nietzsche's philosophy and its relation to the modern and postmodern world. The final contributions consider Nietzsche's influence on the twentieth century in Europe, the United States and Asia.
Introducing the Ancient Greeks: From Bronze Age Seafarers to Navigators of the Western Mind
Edith Hall - 2014
They built the Parthenon and the Library of Alexandria. They wrote down the timeless myths of Odysseus and Oedipus, and the histories of Leonidas’s three hundred Spartans and Alexander the Great. But understanding these uniquely influential people has been hampered by their diffusion across the entire Mediterranean. Most ancient Greeks did not live in what is now Greece but in settlements scattered across Turkey, Syria, Egypt, Libya, France, Italy, Bulgaria, Russia, and Ukraine. They never formed a single unified social or political entity. Acclaimed classics scholar Edith Hall’s Introducing the Ancient Greeks is the first book to offer a synthesis of the entire ancient Greek experience, from the rise of the Mycenaean kingdoms of the sixteenth century BC to the final victory of Christianity over paganism in AD 391.Each of the ten chapters visits a different Greek community at a different moment during the twenty centuries of ancient Greek history. In the process, the book makes a powerful original argument: A cluster of unique qualities made the Greeks special and made them the right people, at the right time, to take up the baton of human progress. According to Herodotus, the father of history, what made all Greeks identifiably Greek was their common descent from the same heroes, the way they sacrificed to their gods, their rules of decent behavior, and their beautiful language. Edith Hall argues, however, that their mind-set was just as important as their awe-inspiring achievements. They were rebellious, individualistic, inquisitive, open-minded, witty, rivalrous, admiring of excellence, articulate, and addicted to pleasure. But most important was their continuing identity as mariners, the restless seagoing lifestyle that brought them into contact with ethnically diverse peoples in countless new settlements, and the constant stimulus to technological innovation provided by their intense relationship with the sea.Expertly researched and elegantly told, Introducing the Ancient Greeks is an indispensable contribution to our understanding of the Greeks.
Psycho Kitty?
Pam Johnson-Bennett - 1998
Johnson-Bennett shares real cases to illustrate various problems and explains how she arrives at an appropriate solution through behavior modification. Her method requires a positive approach to correcting the behavior rather than punishment. She also uses interactive toys, which she believes helps not only to correct the behavior problem, but also to put the cat/owner relationship back in sync.
Sexual Desire: A Philosophical Investigation
Roger Scruton - 1986
Beginning from purely philosophical premises, and ranging over human life, art and institutions, he surveys the entire field of sexuality; equally dissatisfied with puritanism and permissiveness, he argues for a radical break with recent theories. Upholding traditional morality - though in terms that may shock many of its practitioners - his argument gravitates to that which is candid, serene and consoling in the experience of sexual love.
The Doubter's Companion: A Dictionary of Aggressive Common Sense
John Ralston Saul - 1994
Voltaire wrote a sharply humorous "Philosophical Dictionary," while Samuel Johnson's dictionary of the English language was derisive and opinionated. These early dictionaries and encyclopedias were really weapons in a struggle for the soul of civilization between forces of humanistic enlightenment and the forces of orthodoxy and dogmatism. Their authors attacked and exposed the half-truths of their day by showing that it was possible to think differently about the social and political arrangements that everyone took for granted. But as John Ralston Saul argues in this decidedly unorthodox book, modern dictionaries have once again been captured by the forces of orthodoxy—albeit this time a rationalist orthodoxy. Our language has become as predictable, fragmented, and rhetorical as it was in the 18th century, divided as it is by special interest groups into dialects of expertise that are hermetically sealed off and inaccessible to citizens. In The Doubter's Companion, a marvelous subversive contribution to the great 18th century tradition of the humanist dictionary, Saul skewers and discredits the accepted content of common terms like Advertising, Academics, and Air Conditioning (defined as "an efficient means for spreading disease in enclosed public spaces"); Cannibal, Conservative, and Croissant; Dandruff, Death, and Dictionary ("opinions presented as truth in alphabetical order"); and several hundred others, including Biography ("a respectable form of pornography"), Museum ("safe storage for stolen objects"), and Manners ("people are always splendid when they're dead"). There is much in this volume that will stimulate, offend, provoke, perplex, and entertain. But Saul deploys these tactics of guerilla lexicography to advance the more serious purpose of reclaiming public language from the stultifying dialects of modern expertise.
Do You QuantumThink?: New Thinking That Will Rock Your World
Dianne Collins - 2011
We're all looking for new ways of thinking that can bring about real solutions to modern problems, from the pursuit of inner serenity to solving world conflicts. In Do You QuantumThink? author Dianne Collins shares her ingenious discovery that reveals a critical missing link to make sense of our changing times. Her discovery provides us with the understanding and methodology to rise above problems of today by laying the foundation for an entirely new way to think.Part science, part philosophy, part spirituality, Do You QuantumThink? draws on a wide spectrum of sources, from cutting edge innovations in the sciences to the insights of the world's greatest spiritual leaders. This book will make you laugh, free you from limiting ideas, and introduce you to the most advanced principles and practical methods for living. Do You QuantumThink? will rock your world in the best of ways as you experience one revelation after another.
Propaganda: The Formation of Men's Attitudes
Jacques Ellul - 1962
With the logic which is the great instrument of French thought, [Ellul] explores and attempts to prove the thesis that propaganda, whether its ends are demonstrably good or bad, is not only destructive to democracy, it is perhaps the most serious threat to humanity operating in the modern world."--Los Angeles Times"The theme of Propaganda is quite simply...that when our new technology encompasses any culture or society, the result is propaganda... Ellul has made many splendid contributions in this book."--Book Week"An exhaustive catalog of horrors. It shows how modern, committed man, surrounded and seized by propaganda, more often than not surrenders himself to it only too willingly, especially in democracies--because he is educated for his rule as dupe. 'The most favorable moment to seize a man and influence him,' Ellul writes, 'is when he is alone in the mass; it is at this point that propaganda can be most effective. This is the situation of the 'lonely crowd,' or of isolation in the mass, which is a natural product of modern-day society, which is both used and deepened by the mass media.' "--Los Angeles Free Press
Your Conscious Mind: Unravelling the greatest mystery of the human brain (New Scientist Instant Expert)
New Scientist - 2017
It makes us aware of the world around us and our own self. How all this emerges from a kilogram of brain cells is one of the greatest unanswered questions. In Your Conscious Mind leading brain scientists and New Scientist take you on a journey through the mind to discover what consciousness really is, and what we can learn when it goes awry. Find out if we will ever build conscious machines, what animal consciousness can tell us about being human and explore the enigma of free will. ABOUT THE SERIESNew Scientist Instant Expert books are definitive and accessible entry points to the most important subjects in science; subjects that challenge, attract debate, invite controversy and engage the most enquiring minds. Designed for curious readers who want to know how things work and why, the Instant Expert series explores the topics that really matter and their impact on individuals, society, and the planet, translating the scientific complexities around us into language that's open to everyone, and putting new ideas and discoveries into perspective and context.
Run, Spot, Run: The Ethics of Keeping Pets
Jessica Pierce - 2016
We feel love for our companions, certainly, and happiness at the thought that we’re providing them with a safe, healthy life. But there’s another emotion, less often acknowledged, that can be nearly as powerful: guilt. When we see our cats gazing wistfully out the window, or watch a goldfish swim lazy circles in a bowl, we can’t help but wonder: are we doing the right thing, keeping these independent beings locked up, subject to our control? Is keeping pets actually good for the pets themselves? That’s the question that animates Jessica Pierce’s powerful Run, Spot, Run. A lover of pets herself (including, over the years, dogs, cats, fish, rats, hermit crabs, and more), Pierce understands the joys that pets bring us. But she also refuses to deny the ambiguous ethics at the heart of the relationship, and through a mix of personal stories, philosophical reflections, and scientifically informed analyses of animal behavior and natural history, she puts pet-keeping to the test. Is it ethical to keep pets at all? Are some species more suited to the relationship than others? Are there species one should never attempt to own? And are there ways that we can improve our pets’ lives, so that we can be confident that we are giving them as much as they give us? Deeply empathetic, yet rigorous and unflinching in her thinking, Pierce has written a book that is sure to help any pet owner, unsettling assumptions but also giving them the knowledge to build deeper, better relationships with the animals with whom they’ve chosen to share their lives.
Stolen Legacy
George G.M. James - 1954
The text asserts that the praise and honor blindly given to the Greeks for centuries rightfully belong to the people of Africa, and argues that the theft of this great African legacy led to the erroneous world opinion that the African continent has made no contribution to civilization. Quoting such celebrated Greek scholars as Herodotus, Hippocrates, Aristotle, Thales, and Pythagoras, who admit to the influence of Egyptian studies in their work, this edition sheds new light on traditional philosophical and historical thought. Originally published in 1954, this book features a new introduction.