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On the Animal Trail
by Baptiste MorizotFrom the forests of Yellowstone to the steppes of the Haut-Var, the French philosopher and environmentalist Baptiste Morizot invites us to develop a different relationship to nature: to become detectives of nature and to follow the footprints of the many wonderful and extraordinary animals with which we share the Earth. By deciphering and interpreting an animal’s footprints and other signs, we gradually discover not only which animal it is, but the animal’s motives too. Through this kind of ‘philosophical tracking’, we come to see the world from the animal’s point of view, to learn to live in this world from the perspective of another species. We begin to let go of our anthropocentric point of view and to recapture the kind of perspective that our ancestors once had when they had no choice but to adopt an animal point of view if they wanted to survive. In short, by following animal trails, we learn how to pay increased attention to the living world around us and how to cohabit this world with others, thereby enriching our understanding of other species, of the world we share with them and of ourselves.
On the Art and Craft of Doing Science
by Kenneth CataniaA scientist&’s personal reflections on how to harness creativity and curiosity to generate new ideas and discover the unexpectedLike any creative endeavor, science can be a messy and chaotic affair. On the Art and Craft of Doing Science shares the creative process of an innovative and accomplished scientist, taking readers behind the scenes of some of his most pioneering investigations and explaining why the practice of science, far from being an orderly exercise in pure logic, is a form of creative expression like any other art.Kenneth Catania begins by discussing how ideas set the stage for scientific breakthroughs and goes on to describe ways to approach experimental design. He sheds light on the importance of art in making discoveries and demonstrates how to find and tell a compelling story about a scientific result while accurately communicating its findings. What role does failure play in science? Is it possible to fail better? How do you define success? Catania provides insights to these and other questions, along the way sharing the lessons he&’s learned from diverse figures ranging from science philosopher Thomas Kuhn to novelist Stephen King.Blending illuminating historical examples with insights from Catania&’s own groundbreaking research in biology and neuroscience, On the Art and Craft of Doing Science draws parallels with art and writing to reveal the creative side to the practice of good science.
On the Basis of Morality (Hackett Classics)
by Arthur SchopenhauerThis edition originally published by Berghahn Books.Schopenhauer's treatise on ethics is presented here in E. F. J. Payne’s definitive translation, based on the Hubscher edition (Wiesbaden, 1946-1950). This edition includes an Introduction by David Cartwright, a translator’s preface, biographical note, selected bibliography, and an index. For convenient reference to passages in Kant's work discussed by Schopenhauer, Academy edition numbers have been added.
On the Beaten Track: Zur Theorie der Bildungsreise im Zeitalter des Massentourismus (Kindheit – Bildung – Erziehung. Philosophische Perspektiven)
by Johannes Drerup Phillip D. Th. Knobloch Dilek DipcinWir leben in einer Welt der ausgetretenen Pfade. Es gibt kaum ein Ort auf diesem Planeten – vom Mount Everest Base Camp bis zur Antarktis –, der nicht in ein Objekt und Produkt möglicher touristischer Erfahrung transformiert wurde oder wird. In der globalen Praxis und im weltumspannenden sozioökonomischen System des modernen Massentourismus spiegeln sich wie in einem Brennglas die Ambivalenzen, Paradoxien und Widersprüche (post-)moderner Formen der individuellen und kollektiven Lebensführung und Selbstverständigung. Dies gilt auch für die in diesem Band diskutierten Zusammenhänge zwischen Reisen und Bildung, die nicht zu trennen sind von Formen der sozialer Distinktion und Ungleichheit, von Hierarchisierungen und Ranglisten und von Macht und Politik.
On the Blissful Islands with Nietzsche & Jung: In the shadow of the superman
by Paul BishopWhat are the blissful islands? And where are they? This book takes as its starting-point the chapter called ‘On the Blissful Islands’ in Part Two of Nietzsche’s Thus Spoke Zarathustra, and its enigmatic conclusion: ‘The beauty of the Superman came to me as a shadow’. From this remarkable and powerful passage, it disengages the Nietzschean idea of the Superman and the Jungian notion of the shadow, moving these concepts into a new, interdisciplinary direction. In particular, On the Blissful Islands seeks to develop the kind of interpretative approach that Jung himself employed. Its chief topics are classical (the motif of the blissful islands), psychological (the shadow), and philosophical (the Übermensch or superman), blended together to produce a rich, intellectual-historical discussion. By bringing context and depth to a nexus of highly problematic concepts, it offers something new to the specialist and the general reader alike. So this book considers the significance of the statue in the culture of antiquity (and in alchemy), and investigates the associated notion of self-sculpting as a form of existential exercise. This Neoplatonic theme is pursued in relation to a poem by Schiller, at the centre of which lies the notion of self-sculpting, thus highlighting Nietzsche’s (and Jung’s) relationship to Idealism. Its conclusion directly addresses the vexed (and controversial) question of Nietzsche’s relation to Plato. This book’s main ambition is to provide a cross-cultural, interdisciplinary reading of key themes and motifs, using Jungian ideas in general (and Jung’s vast seminar on Zarathustra in particular) to uncover a dimension of deep meaning in key passages in Nietzsche. Engaging the reader directly on major existential questions, it aims to be an original, thought-provoking contribution to the history of ideas, and to show that Zarathustra was right: There still are blissful islands! This book will be stimulating reading for analytical psychologists, including those in training, and academics and scholars of Jungian studies, Nietzsche, and the history of ideas.
On the Border of Opportunity: Education, Community, and Language at the U.s.-mexico Line (Sociocultural, Political, and Historical Studies in Education)
by Marleen C. PugachIn 1993, the author set out to try and gain some understanding about school and community in Havens, New Mexico--a place where she had the opportunity to be immersed in border culture, where she could learn how the border figured into everyday life, and where she could pay uninterrupted attention to the issues as they occurred in the personal and professional lives of those who taught in and administered the schools--and in the lives of the students who studied there. This book offers an interpretation that is disciplined by the long hours, days, and months spent in Havens, and by the personal stance the author brings to the study of a place and its people. This book tells the story of Havens from the perspective of what it is, of the present in all of its complexity, and as a window on what might exist in the future in this border community. It begins with a description of Havens and its inevitable interdependence with its Mexican neighbors, followed by an introduction of three "cultural mediators"--two students and one teacher from Havens High School. Focusing on the relationship between the use of Spanish and English, the language landscape in the community and in the schools is laid out. This is followed by a specific description of the development of bilingual education programs in the district, and an introduction of the social structure of the high school, describing the students' interactions across cultural lines. The final chapter presents an alternative metaphor for thinking about the border and identifies markers of opportunity that already exist in Havens as it works toward defining what it means to be a bicultural and binational community.
On the Brink of Paradox: Highlights from the Intersection of Philosophy and Mathematics (The\mit Press Ser.)
by Agustin RayoAn introduction to awe-inspiring ideas at the brink of paradox: infinities of different sizes, time travel, probability and measure theory, and computability theory.This book introduces the reader to awe-inspiring issues at the intersection of philosophy and mathematics. It explores ideas at the brink of paradox: infinities of different sizes, time travel, probability and measure theory, computability theory, the Grandfather Paradox, Newcomb's Problem, the Principle of Countable Additivity. The goal is to present some exceptionally beautiful ideas in enough detail to enable readers to understand the ideas themselves (rather than watered-down approximations), but without supplying so much detail that they abandon the effort. The philosophical content requires a mind attuned to subtlety; the most demanding of the mathematical ideas require familiarity with college-level mathematics or mathematical proof.The book covers Cantor's revolutionary thinking about infinity, which leads to the result that some infinities are bigger than others; time travel and free will, decision theory, probability, and the Banach-Tarski Theorem, which states that it is possible to decompose a ball into a finite number of pieces and reassemble the pieces so as to get two balls that are each the same size as the original. Its investigation of computability theory leads to a proof of Gödel's Incompleteness Theorem, which yields the amazing result that arithmetic is so complex that no computer could be programmed to output every arithmetical truth and no falsehood. Each chapter is followed by an appendix with answers to exercises. A list of recommended reading points readers to more advanced discussions. The book is based on a popular course (and MOOC) taught by the author at MIT.
On the Causes of the Greatness and Magnificence of Cities
by Geoffrey SymcoxThe first treatise ever written on the sociology of cities, On the Causes of the Greatness and Magnificence of Cities (1588) marked a radical departure from previous literature on urban centres. It provided a revolutionary analysis of how cities function, and of the political, economic, demographic and geographic factors that cause their growth and decline. Noteworthy too is Botero's strikingly original use of sources in his analysis: moving beyond familiar classical and biblical references, he drew groundbreaking insights from reports by travelers and missionaries about cities in the non-European world, especially in China.Though seminally important to the history of urban studies, On the Causes of the Greatness and Magnificence of Cities has not been available in a modern translation until now. This edition of the treatise - which includes an introduction by Geoffrey W. Symcox on the intellectual context within which it was conceived - is a must-read for anyone interested in the life of cities both historical and contemporary.
On the Chilean Social Explosion (Routledge Studies in Radical History and Politics)
by Maxwell WoodsOn the Chilean Social Explosion uses the methods of literary, cultural, and subaltern studies to examine what cultural foundations and practices gave rise to this political uprising. On 18 October 2019, Chile exploded into a series of nationwide protests that placed the socio-political order of neoliberalism, settler colonialism, and patriarchy under structural crisis. In March 2020, however, the quarantining measures taken in response to the COVID-19 pandemic put this grassroots rebellion on pause. The author explores and analyzes these five months which have come to be known as the Chilean social explosion [estallido social]. This book will be of value to researchers of cultural studies, cultural and radical politics, resistance and protest, subaltern studies, and Chilean and Latin American politics. It will also interest a broader audience concerned with social movements, grassroots organizing, and expressions of dissent across the world.
On the Christian Religion
by Marsilio FicinoThis is the first translation into English of Marsilio Ficino’s De Christiana religione, a text first written in Latin in 1474, the year after its author’s ordination in the Roman Catholic Church. On the Christian Religion is this Florentine humanist’s attempt to lay out the history of the religion of Christ, the Logos ("Word" or "Reason"), in accordance with the doctrines of ancient philosophy. The work –focuses on how Christ in his pre-incarnate form was revealed as much to certain ancient pagan sages and prophets as to those of the Old Testament, and how both groups played an equal role in foreshadowing the ultimate fulfilment of all the world’s religions in Christianity. The first part elucidates the history of the prisca theologia – the ancient theology – a single natural religion shared by the likes of Zoroaster, Hermes Trismegistus, Orpheus, Aglaophemus, Pythagoras, and Plato, and how it was fulfilled by Christ’s Incarnation and the spread of his Church through his apostles. The second part of the work, however, constitutes a series of attacks against the ways in which the books of the Old Testament were variously interpreted by Islamic and, more importantly, Jewish sages who threatened Ficino’s own Christological interpretations of Scripture. This new English translation includes an introduction that situates the text within the broader scope of Ficino’s intellectual activity and historical context. The book allows us to encounter a more nuanced image of Ficino, that of him as a theologian, historian, and anti-Jewish, anti-Islamic, anti-pagan polemicist.
On the Cognitive, Ethical, and Scientific Dimensions of Artificial Intelligence: Themes from IACAP 2016 (Philosophical Studies Series #134)
by Don Berkich Matteo Vincenzo D’AlfonsoThis edited volume explores the intersection between philosophy and computing. It features work presented at the 2016 annual meeting of the International Association for Computing and Philosophy. The 23 contributions to this volume neatly represent a cross section of 40 papers, four keynote addresses, and eight symposia as they cut across six distinct research agendas. The volume begins with foundational studies in computation and information, epistemology and philosophy of science, and logic. The contributions next examine research into computational aspects of cognition and philosophy of mind. This leads to a look at moral dimensions of man-machine interaction as well as issues of trust, privacy, and justice. This multi-disciplinary or, better yet, a-disciplinary investigation reveals the fruitfulness of erasing distinctions among and boundaries between established academic disciplines. This should come as no surprise. The computational turn itself is a-disciplinary and no former discipline, whether scientific, artistic, or humanistic, has remained unchanged. Rigorous reflection on the nature of these changes opens the door to inquiry into the nature of the world, what constitutes our knowledge of it, and our understanding of our place in it. These investigations are only just beginning. The contributions to this volume make this clear: many encourage further research and end with open questions.
On the Colors of Vowels: Thinking through Synesthesia (Verbal Arts: Studies in Poetics)
by Liesl YamaguchiTreatments of synesthesia in the arts and humanities generally assume a clear distinction between the neurological condition and the literary device. Synesthetes’ descriptions of colors seen in connection with music, for example, are thought to differ fundamentally from common expressions that rely on transpositions across sensory dimensions (“bright vowels”). This has not always been the case. The distinction emerged over the course of the twentieth century, as scientists sought to constitute “synesthesia” as a legitimate object of modern science.On the Colors of Vowels investigates the ambiguity of visual descriptions of vowels across a wide range of disciplines, casting several landmark texts in a wholly new light. The book traces the migration of sound-color correspondence from its ancient host (music) to its modern one (vowels), investigating the vocalic Klangfarben of Hermann von Helmholtz’s monumental Sensations of Tone, the vowel colors reported in early psychology surveys into audition colorée (colored hearing), the mis-matched timbres that form poetry’s condition of possibility in Stéphane Mallarmé’s “Crisis of Verse,” and the vowel-color analogy central to both the universal alphabets of the nineteenth century and the phonological universals of the twentieth. The book’s final chapter turns to an intricately detailed account of vowel-color correspondence by Ferdinand de Saussure, suggesting how the linguist’s sensitivity to vowel coloration may have guided his groundbreaking study of Indo-European vocalism.Bringing out the diverse ways in which visual conceptions of vowels have inflected the arts and sciences of modernity, On the Colors of Vowels makes it possible to see how discourses of the nineteenth and twentieth centuries crafted the enigma we now readily recognize as “synesthesia.”
On the Commerce of Thinking: Of Books and Bookstores
by Jean-Luc NancyJean-Luc Nancy's On the Commerce of Thinking concerns the particular communication of thoughts that takes place by means of the business of writing, producing, and selling books. His reflection is born out of his relation to the bookstore, in the first place his neighborhood one, but beyond that any such "perfumery, rotisserie, patisserie," as he calls them, dispensaries "of scents and flavors through which something like a fragrance or bouquet of the book is divined, presumed, sensed." On the Commerce of Thinking is thus not only something of a semiology of the specific cultural practice that begins with the unique character of the writer's voice and culminates in a customer crossing the bookstore threshold, package under arm, on the way home to a comfortable chair, but also an understated yet persuasive plea in favor of an endangered species. In evoking the peddler who, in times past, plied the streets with books and pamphlets literally hanging off him, Nancy emphasizes the sensuality of this commerce and reminds us that this form of consumerism is like no other, one that ends in an experience-reading-that is the beginning of a limitless dispersion, metamorphosis, and dissemination of ideas. Making, selling, and buying books has all the elements of the exchange economy that Marx analyzed--from commodification to fetishism--yet each book retains throughout an absolute and unique value, that of its subject. With reading, it gets repeatedly reprinted and rebound. For Nancy, the book thus functions only if it remains at the same time open and shut, like some Moebius strip. Closed, it represents the Idea and takes its place in a canon by means of its monumental form and the title and author's name displayed on its spine. But it also opens itself to us, indeed consents to being shaken to its core, in being read each time anew.
On the Critique of Identity (Abhandlungen zur Medien- und Kulturwissenschaft)
by Ivo RitzerWith the rise of ‘identity politics’ both in right-wing extremism as well as in activist academia, arts and feuilleton, major differences between the traditional left and the right have become blurred. This book addresses the ideological shifts from a vantage point of critical theory, psychoanalysis, as well as Marxist interventions. Discussed are prevailing ideologies of identitarianism, putting the latter into social and historical, as well as philosophical and epistemological context. The chapters offer theoretical elaborations on the myriad connections of identitarianism and counter-enlightenment, analyzing in particular the role of ethnocentric populism, antisemitism, as well as conformist and conservative rebellion.
On the Currency of Egalitarian Justice, and Other Essays in Political Philosophy
by G. A. CohenG. A. Cohen was one of the most gifted, influential, and progressive voices in contemporary political philosophy. At the time of his death in 2009, he had plans to bring together a number of his most significant papers. This is the first of three volumes to realize those plans. Drawing on three decades of work, it contains previously uncollected articles that have shaped many of the central debates in political philosophy, as well as papers published here for the first time. In these pieces, Cohen asks what egalitarians have most reason to equalize, he considers the relationship between freedom and property, and he reflects upon ideal theory and political practice. Included here are classic essays such as "Equality of What?" and "Capitalism, Freedom, and the Proletariat," along with more recent contributions such as "Fairness and Legitimacy in Justice," "Freedom and Money," and the previously unpublished "How to Do Political Philosophy." On ample display throughout are the clarity, rigor, conviction, and wit for which Cohen was renowned. Together, these essays demonstrate how his work provides a powerful account of liberty and equality to the left of Ronald Dworkin, John Rawls, Amartya Sen, and Isaiah Berlin.
On the Death of the Pilgrim: The Postcolonial Hermeneutics of Jarava Lal Mehta
by Thomas B. EllisThis searching examination of the life and philosophy of the twentieth-century Indian intellectual Jarava Lal Mehta details, among other things, his engagement with the oeuvres of Martin Heidegger, Hans-Georg Gadamer, and Jacques Derrida. It shows how Mehta's sense of cross-cultural philosophy and religious thought were affected by these engagements, and maps the two key contributions Mehta made to the sum of human ideas. First, Mehta outlined what the author dubs a 'postcolonial hermeneutics' that uses the 'ethnotrope' of the pilgrim to challenge the philosophical hermeneutic emphasis on supplementation and augmentation. For Mehta, the hermeneutic encounter ruptures, rather than supplements, the self. Secondly, Mehta extended this concept of hermeneutics to interrogate the Hindu tradition, arriving at the concept of the 'negative messianic'. In contrast to Derrida's emphasis on the 'one to come', Mehta shows how the Hindu bhakti model represents the very opposite, that is, the 'withdrawn other,' identifying thereby the ethical pitfalls of deconstructivism's emphasis on the messianic tradition. This is the only full-length study in English of this high-profile Hindu philosopher.
On the Decline of the Genteel Virtues: From Gentility to Technocracy
by Jeff MitchellThis innovative book proposes that what we think of as “moral conscience” is essentially the exercise of reflective judgment on the goods and ends arising in interpersonal relations, and that such judgment constitutes a form of taste. Through an historical survey Mitchell shows that the constant pendant to taste was an educational and cultural ideal, namely, that of the gentleman, whether he was an ancient Greek citizen-soldier, Roman magistrate, Confucian scholar-bureaucrat, Renaissance courtier, or Victorian grandee. Mitchell argues that it was neither an ethical doctrine nor methodology that provided the high cultures with moral and political leadership, but rather an elite social order. While the gentry in the traditional sense no longer exists, it nevertheless made significant historical contributions, and insofar as we are concerned to understand the present state of human affairs, we need to grasp the nature and import of said contributions.
On the Deities of Samothrace (Studies in Continental Thought)
by F. W. SchellingIn 1815, F. W. J. Schelling presented a lecture titled "On the Deities of Samothrace" to the Bavarian Academy of Sciences. The lecture offered a startlingly original reading of the ancient Greek mystery religion on the island of Samothrace. It would be the last book Schelling himself published, and it is the key to his influential Philosophy of Mythology. Now, for the first time in English, this critical edition contains the entirety of Schelling's original text, including the lecture itself, Schelling's afterword, and all his extensive philosophical and philological endnotes. It also offers copious explanatory notes, photographs and maps of the site, and three interpretive essays by the editors and translators elucidating Schelling's text for contemporary readers. On the Deities of Samothrace is one of Schelling's most original and exciting works. It is a signature text in Schelling's thought and in the philosophy of religion generally.
On the Difficulty of Living Together: Memory, Politics, and History (New Directions in Critical Theory #21)
by Manuel CruzIn On the Difficulty of Living Together, Manuel Cruz launches a nuanced study of memory and forgetting, defining their forms and uses, political meanings, and social and historical implications. Memory is not an intrinsically positive phenomenon, he argues, but an impressionable and malleable one, used to advance a variety of agendas. Cruz focuses on five memory models: that which is inherently valuable, that which legitimizes the present, that which supports retributive justice, that which is essential to mourning, and that which elicits renunciation or revelation. His methodical approach makes sense of memory's positive and negative effects, its contradictions, and its tensions. Cruz shows us that remembering is not necessarily an end in itself, nor is it a supreme value, immune to external influence. The exercise of memory guarantees nothing, though many insist it is a progressive act preventing the repetition of past mistakes. Tying the making of memory to the movements of history, Cruz prioritizes memory's political dimensions over its philosophical aspects and helps us remember its myriad uses.
On the Digital Humanities: Essays and Provocations
by Stephen RamsayA witty and incisive exploration of the philosophical conundrums that animate the digital humanities Since its inception, the digital humanities has been repeatedly attacked as a threat to the humanities: warnings from literary and cultural theorists of technology overtaking English departments and the mechanization of teaching have peppered popular media. Stephen Ramsay&’s On the Digital Humanities, a collection of essays spanning the personal to the polemic, is a spirited defense of the field of digital humanities. A founding figure in what was once known as &“humanities computing,&” Ramsay has a well-known and contentious relationship with what is now called the digital humanities (DH). Here Ramsay collects and updates his most influential and notorious essays and speeches from the past fifteen years, considering DH from an array of practical and theoretical perspectives. The essays pursue a broad variety of themes, including the nature of data and its place in more conventional notions of text and interpretation, the relationship between the constraints of computation and the more open-ended nature of the humanities, the positioning of practical skills and infrastructures in both research and pedagogical contexts, the status of DH as a program for political and social action, and personal reflections on the author&’s journey into the field as both a theorist and a technologist. These wide-ranging essays all center around one idea: that DH not forsake its connection to the humanities. While &“digital humanities&” may sound like an entirely new form of engagement with the artifacts of human culture, Ramsay argues that the field well reveals what is most essential to humanistic inquiry.
On the Dignity of Man
by Pico Della Mirandola Paul J. W. Miller Charles Glenn Wallis Douglas CarmichaelReflecting the broad range of interests of a major Renaissance philosopher and his distinctive brand of syncretism, this anthology offers in their entirety three central works of Pico's. On the Dignity of Man , the quintessential expression of Renaissance humanism, appears in the context of two lesser known but equally representative mature works: On Being and the One , a treatise defending what Pico held to be the agreement between Aristotle and Plato on the relation between unity and being, and Heptaplus , an interpretation, influenced by a blend of cabalism and Christian doctrine, of the first verses of Genesis.
On the Dignity of Man
by Pico Della Mirandola Charles Glenn Wallis Douglas Carmichael Paul J. MillerReflecting the broad range of interests of a major Renaissance philosopher and his distinctive brand of syncretism, this anthology offers in their entirety three central works of Pico's. On the Dignity of Man, the quintessential expression of Renaissance humanism, appears in the context of two lesser known but equally representative mature works: On Being and the One, a treatise defending what Pico held to be the agreement between Aristotle and Plato on the relation between unity and being, and Heptaplus, an interpretation, influenced by a blend of cabalism and Christian doctrine, of the first verses of Genesis. New Selected Bibliography.
On the Divine Things and Their Revelation (McGill-Queen’s Philosophy of Religion Series #2)
by Friedrich Heinrich JacobiFriedrich Heinrich Jacobi (1743–1829) both introduced and epitomized the great philosophical controversies of his age. His influential text Von den göttlichen Dingen und Ihrer Offenbarung aroused the final debate about the intrinsic nihilism of modern philosophy, which, he postulated, ran the risk of becoming a serious threat to human life and intellect.In the first English translation of this text,* On the Divine Things and Their Revelation*, Paolo Livieri provides readers with a historical investigation of the debates that preceded and followed Jacobi’s book, as well as a philosophical review of its main topics and arguments. Jacobi’s concluding analysis against systematic philosophy, given at the closing of the era of German idealism, offers an overview of the possibility of connecting the human and the divine according to the metaphysical approach that he develops into theism. This philosophical testament revives the divisive ideas of his first publications and provides new insights into his critique of Baruch Spinoza’s philosophy, yielding a final evaluation of Immanuel Kant’s transcendental method.Bringing together Jacobi’s most famous themes – from faith to revelation and nihilism to immediate knowledge – On the Divine Things and Their Revelation expresses his tireless commitment to situating the human being at the centre of reality.
On the Duties of Brotherhood
by Robert Irwin Imam Al-GhazaliThe classic Islamic text and the central work by a great Arabic scholar. On the Duties of Brotherhood shows how brotherhood can be an aid to spiritual purification and the perfection of one's worship, as well as a source of help and comfort in the world. Readers will find the road to fellowship—by way of forgiveness, prayer, sincerity, loyalty, and consideration—and be enlightened by stories that illustrate the doctrine of brotherhood.
On the Duty of Civil Disobedience
by Henry David ThoreauCivil Disobedience argues that citizens should not permit their governments to overrule their consciences, and that they have a duty to avoid allowing their acquiescence to enable the government to make them the agents of injustice. Thoreau was motivated in part by his disgust with slavery and the Mexican-American War, but the sentiments he expresses here are just as pertinent today as when they were first written. A true American classic.