This book is a wonderful breath of fresh air and a book for the general reader as much as for philosophers. Mary Midgley (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mary_Midgely) explores the relation between men and other animals in an original but common sense way. The book has garnered more relevance to bioethical controversies today than it had on publication in […]
Beast and Man by Mary Midgley Read More »
Simon Blackburn (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Simon_Blackburn and (http://www2.phil.cam.ac.uk/~swb24/) puts forward a compelling and original philosophy of human motivation and morality. Why do we behave as we do? Can we improve? Is our ethics at war with our passions, or is it an upshot of those passions? Blackburn seeks the answers to such questions in an exploration of the
Ruling Passions by Simon Blackburn Read More »
The problem of the ultimate causes of evil, especially human strife and suffering, has agitated people’s minds from the beginning of history. The problem was particularly acute for the Christian tradition, with its faith in an all-loving and all-powerful God. A whole branch of theology, ‘theodicy’ (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Theodicy), developed to deal with this problem. Good recommendations
The Evolution of Evil by Timothy Anders Read More »
A cheeky blend of impish pleasure and serious intent, Lust (2004) rescues this life-giving impulse from the revulsion of the dessicated desert fathers (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Desert_Fathers), the smug detachment of ascetics, and Puritans the world over. What is lust? Even though our language makes it clear that it can have broader applications, lust is often associated with sexual
Lust by Simon Blackburn Read More »
Many readers love Roger Scruton (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Roger_Scruton) for his traditionalist conservatism whether that be in aesthetics, politics, The Church of England, or public affairs (e.g. issues like fox hunting). Making love to Roger might be a whole lot trickier. He has allowed the fecundity of his mind to generate a tome on the philosophical aspects of
Sexual Desire by Roger Scruton Read More »
Nicholas Carr’s (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nicholas_G._Carr) contention is that the internet is rewiring our brains to negative effect. He is not merely talking about ‘dumbing down’. What he posits is more significant: that human culture has been built steadily over our literate history by deep and meditative reading, and the internet threatens to undo this process. Millions of people are
The Shallows by Nicholas Carr Read More »
Anyone out there pretty much wedded to Enlightenment ideals? I hope so. Sadly, in recent decades these have come under attack from a whole slew of irrationalisms. Cults, quackery, gurus, hysterical panics, moral confusion and an epidemic of mumbo-jumbo, pre-modernists and post-modernists, medieval theocrats and New Age mystics. They’re all here trying to drag us back
How Mumbo-Jumbo conquered the world by Francis Wheen Read More »
At Sunday School in The Channel Isles about 150 years ago I was taught to sing ‘All Things Bright and Beautiful‘ the opening verse of which is: ‘All things bright and beautiful, All creatures great and small, All things wise and wonderful, The Lord God made them all’. Mrs Phillips, our teacher, didn’t mention the
Pilgrim at Tinker Creek by Annie Dillard Read More »
This is a thoroughly researched history of the drug trade showing that all the efforts of governments and law enforcement are futile against global trafficking and desperation to escape the nightmare which is human experience. Spanning five centuries and several continents in a sweeping portrait of addiction, The Pursuit of Oblivion (2001) traces the history
The Pursuit of Oblivion by Richard Davenport-Hines Read More »
