"Philosophy: 100 Essential Thinkers" by Philip Stokes
Knowledge and the sudden experience of understanding can be as thrilling as the solution to any puzzle or riddle, since knowledge always resolves a mystery-that of not knowing. Most people are familiar with the names Plato, Machiavelli, Spinoza, and Simone de Beauvoir, but remain unsure of their significance. Philosophy: 100 Essential Thinkers provides succinct descriptions of the essential thought of one hundred major philosophers, including some who are not seen primarily as philosophers, such as Darwin, Freud, and Einstein. Presenting biographical details, quotations, and clear explanations, Philosophy serves as a thorough and accessible introduction to the Western intellectual tradition, covering philosophical, scientific, political, and religious thought over a period of 2,500 years.
Thinking about Feeling: Contemporary Philosophers on Emotions (Series in Affective Science)
In this volume, the editor tries to bring together some of the best Anglo-American philosophers now writing on the philosophy of emotion. The essays included in this text should appeal to a broad spectrum of emotion researchers as well as philosophers.
The Philosophy of Science
This anthology of readings in the philosophy of science includes essays and articles from most well-known philosophers of science (Carnap,Dennett,Fodor,Hacking,Hempel,Kuhn,Popper,Putnam,Quine,Reichenbach,van Fraassen and many others)
Thinking It Through: An Introduction to Contemporary Philosophy (Hardcover)
Here is a thorough, vividly written introduction to contemporary
philosophy and some of the most crucial questions of human existence:
the nature of mind and knowledge, the status of moral claims, the
existence of God, the role of science, and the mysteries of language,
among them. In Thinking It Through, esteemed philosopher Kwame Anthony
Appiah shows us what it means to "do" philosophy in our time and why it
should matter to anyone who wishes to live a more thoughtful life.
Opposing the common misconceptions that being a philosopher means
espousing a set of philosophical beliefs, or being a follower of a
particular thinker, Appiah argues that "the result of philosophical
exploration is not the end of inquiry in a settled opinion, but a mind
resting more comfortably among many possibilities, or else the
reframing of the question, and a new inquiry." Thinking It Through is
organized around eight central topics--mind, knowledge, language,
science, morality, politics, law, and metaphysics. It traces how
philosophers in the past have considered each subject (how Hobbes,
Wittgenstein, and Frege, for example, approached the problem of
language) and then explores some of the major questions that still
engage philosophers today. More important, Appiah shows us not only
what philosophers have thought but how they think, giving us examples
we might use in our own attempts to navigate the complex issues that
confront any reflective person in the 21st century. Filled with
concrete examples of how philosophers work and written in the liveliest
prose, Thinking It Through guides readers through the process of
philosophical reflection and enlarges our understanding of the central
questions of human life.
Common Sense Philosophy In the first century BC the Roman statesman Marcus Tullius Cicero claimed “There is no statement so absurd that no philosopher will make it”. Indeed, in the history of Western thought, philosophers have rarely been credited with having much common sense. In the 17th century Francis Bacon made the point rather poetically and wrote “Philosophers make imaginary laws for imaginary commonwealths, and their discourses are as the stars, which give little light because they are so high”.
