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The Greek Philosophers: from Thales to Aristotle (Routledge Classics)
by W. K. GuthrieWith an new foreword by James Warren Long renowned as one of the clearest and best introductions to ancient Greek philosophy for non-specialists, W.K.C Guthrie’s The Greek Philosophers offers us a brilliant insight into the hidden foundations of Greek philosophy – foundations that underpin Western thought today. Guthrie explores the great age of Greek Philosophy – from Thales to Aristotle – whilst combining comprehensiveness with brevity. He unpacks the ideas and arguments of Plato and Aristotle in the light of their predecessors rather than their successors and describes the characteristic features of the Greek way of thinking, emphasising what he calls the ‘cultural soil’ of their ideas. He also highlights the achievements of thinkers such as Pythagoras, who in contemporary accounts of Greek philosophy are frequently overlooked. Combining philosophical insight and historical sensitivity, The Greek Philosophers offers newcomers a brilliant introduction to the greatest thinkers in ancient Greek philosophy and the very origins of Western thought.
The Greek Search for Wisdom
by Michael K. KelloggThe philosopher Alfred North Whitehead once said that all of Western philosophy was "but a series of footnotes to Plato." By the same token, one could argue that all of Western civilization is but an extension of the ancient Greek cultural legacy. The Greeks invented tragedy, comedy, lyric poetry, history, philosophy, and democracy. They also made remarkable advances in science, medicine, and mathematics. In the author's view, what ties this wide-ranging intellectual ferment together is a restless search for wisdom. The author looks at ten outstanding examples of Greek wisdom, offering fresh and engaging portraits of the epic poets (Homer, Hesiod); dramatists (Aeschylus, Sophocles, Euripides, Aristophanes); historians (Herodotus, Thucydides); and philosophers (Plato, Aristotle) against the background of Greek history. In each case he asks what the author has to tell us-- regardless of genre--about our place in the world and how we should live our lives. By surveying some of the highest peaks of ancient civilization, the author argues that we gain perspective on the historical terrain that lies below. This book presents an eloquent and convincing case that a study of the Greek classics, as Gustave Flaubert explained, makes us "greater, wiser, purer."
The Greek Sophists
by John Dillon Tania GergelBy mid-5th century BC, Athens was governed by democratic rule and power turned upon the ability of the citizen to command the attention of the people, and to sway the crowds of the assembly. It was the Sophists who understood the art of rhetoric and the importance of transforming effective reasoning into persuasive public speaking. Their enquiries - into the status of women, slavery, the distinction between Greeks and barbarians, the existence of the gods, the origins of religion, and whether virtue can be taught - laid the groundwork for the insights of the next generation of thinkers such as Plato and Aristotle.
The Greeks and the Rational: The Discovery of Practical Reason (Sather Classical Lectures #76)
by Josiah OberTracing practical reason from its origins to its modern and contemporary permutations The Greek discovery of practical reason, as the skilled performance of strategic thinking in public and private affairs, was an intellectual breakthrough that remains both a feature of and a bug in our modern world. Countering arguments that rational choice-making is a contingent product of modernity, The Greeks and the Rational traces the long history of theorizing rationality back to ancient Greece. In this book, Josiah Ober explores how ancient Greek sophists, historians, and philosophers developed sophisticated and systematic ideas about practical reason. At the same time, they recognized its limits—that not every decision can be reduced to mechanistic calculations of optimal outcomes. Ober finds contemporary echoes of this tradition in the application of game theory to political science, economics, and business management. The Greeks and the Rational offers a striking revisionist history with widespread implications for the study of ancient Greek civilization, the history of thought, and human rationality itself.
The Greeks: An Introduction to Their Culture (Peoples of the Ancient World)
by Robin Sowerby Brad CookThis fully revised, new edition of The Greeks is a concise but wide-ranging introduction to the culture of ancient Greece, providing a comprehensive survey that covers all the key elements of ancient Greek civilisation from the age of Homer to the Hellenistic period.It opens with an overview of ancient historical sources and their authors and perspectives before delving into early history, legends and excavations, and the famed age of classical Greece. Chapters follow on politics, religion, daily life, literature, philosophy, and art and architecture, with a concluding chapter on the Greek world following the death of Alexander the Great and during the Roman era. This new edition features: greater discussion of underrepresented groups, especially women and slaves; a chapter on ancient politics that provides a comparison of an ancient aristocracy, democracy, and monarchy in Sparta, Athens, and Macedon; new and revised images, all now with detailed captions to merge the artefacts and texts more fully and bring the narrative to life for every reader; and new translations of all ancient passages revised for accuracy and clarity. Clearly written, with generous references to original source material, The Greeks places ancient Greek culture firmly in its political, social, and historical context.The fourth edition of The Greeks remains an invaluable introduction for all students of Classics and an indispensable guide for students of other disciplines who require grounding in ancient Greek civilisation and history.
The Green Halo
by Erazim KohakThe Green Halo is a highly readable introduction to the vast field of contemporary ecological thought. It is a basic education in environmental philosophy and a welcome propadeutic for understanding the most crucial problem facing humankind in the coming century: How can humans live on this earth so that they do not destroy the preconditions for their own existence?
The Green Marble: Earth System Science and Global Sustainability
by David TurnerHumans have difficulty thinking at the global scale. Yet as we come to understand our planet as a single, interconnected, complex system and encounter compelling evidence of human impact on Earth’s climate and biosphere, the need for a truly global effort is increasingly urgent. In this concise and accessible text, David P. Turner presents an overview of global environmental change and a synthesis of research and ideas from the rapidly evolving fields of earth system science and sustainability science that is suitable for anyone interested in humanity’s current predicaments and what we can do about them.The Green Marble examines Earth’s past, contemporary human disruption, and the prospects for global environmental governance. Turner emphasizes the functioning of the biosphere—the totality of life on Earth—including its influence on geologic history, its sensitivity to human impacts, and its possible role in ameliorating climate change. Relying on models of the earth system that synthesize vast amounts of monitoring information and recent research on biophysical processes, The Green Marble describes a range of scenarios for our planetary home, exploring the effects of anthropogenic greenhouse gas emissions and factors such as economic globalization. Turner juxtaposes cutting-edge ideas from both the geosciences and the social sciences to illustrate how humanity has arrived upon its current dangerous trajectory, and how we might pull back from the brink of civilization-challenging environmental change. Growing out of the author’s popular course on global environmental change, The Green Marble is accessible to non-science majors and provides a framework for understanding the complex relationship of humanity to the global environment.
The Green Movement in West Germany (Routledge Library Editions: German Politics)
by Elim PapadakisThe Green Movement in Germany is widely regarded as one of the most powerful expressions of popular opposition to government policies. A broad analysis of this powerful group is made in this book, showing that the origins of the movement relate to the general protests against industrialisation in the nineteenth century and also to more recent forms of protest. The author assesses the challenge posed by the Green Movement to established groups and organisations both in proposing alternative policies and in a long run of electoral successes. The Green Movement has evidently had a great impact on assumptions about defence, welfare and environmental policies. Data from major surveys on public attitudes and interviews with senior officials complete the picture of the practical and theoretical dimensions of the Green Movement.
The Green and The Blue: Naive Ideas to Improve Politics in the Digital Age
by Luciano FloridiPresenting an array of innovative concepts to revolutionize politics in our digital world, this book is written by one of the most authoritative voices of contemporary philosophy The Green and the Blue explores the opportunities presented by the digital age for combining green environmental policies with blue digital solutions to strengthen democracy, reform capitalism, and work toward a sustainable and equitable future. With an engaging and readable style, world-renowned philosopher Luciano Floridi lays out a timely and convincing case for embracing responsible practices to ensure a sustainable environment, a better democracy, and an equitable information society. Drawing from his expertise in digital ethics and the philosophy of technology, Floridi offers fresh perspectives, innovative ideas, and bold strategies for improving political systems that emphasize the importance of cooperation, ethics, and long-term planning. Throughout the text, the author advocates for a political and economic framework of care that focuses on the quality of relations and processes rather than consumption and things. A groundbreaking call to action for individuals, policymakers, and technologists, The Green and the Blue: Naive Ideas to Improve Politics in the Digital Age: Provides a comprehensive, interdisciplinary, and well-rounded exploration of how to improve the present by designing good policies for the future Features insightful analysis by the founder of the philosophy of information and one of the key interpreters of the digital revolution Explains complex concepts to allow easy understanding and application of the ideas presented Includes compelling thought experiments that challenge traditional notions of capitalism and politics Encourages readers to think critically about the present and future of politics Offering a new way of thinking about democracy, the environment, and technology, The Green and the Blue: Naive Ideas to Improve Politics in the Digital Age is a must-read for undergraduate and graduate students, practitioners, and general readers who are seeking positive and sustainable change in the world of politics.
The Grieving Body: How the Stress of Loss Can Be an Opportunity for Healing
by Mary-Frances O'ConnorThe follow-up to celebrated grief expert, neuroscientist, and psychologist Dr. Mary-Frances O’Connor’s The Grieving Brain focuses on the impact of grief—and life’s other major stressors—on the human body. Coping with death and grief is one of the most painful human experiences. While we can speak to the psychological and emotional ramifications of loss and sorrow, we often overlook its impact on our physical bodies. Dr. Mary-Frances O’Connor specializes in the study of grief, and in The Grieving Body she shares vital scientific research, revealing imperative new insights on its profound physiological impact. As she did in The Grieving Brain, O’Connor combines illuminating studies and personal stories to explore the toll loss takes on our cardiovascular, endocrine, and immune systems and the larger implications for our long-term well-being.The Grieving Body addresses questions about how bereavement affects us, such as:Can we die of a broken heart?What happens in our bodies when we’re grieving?How do our coping behaviors affect our physical health?What is the cognitive impact of grief?Why are we more prone to illness during times of enormous stress?and moreResearch-backed, warm, and empathetic, The Grieving Body is an essential, hopeful read for those experiencing loss as well as their supportive friends and family.The Grieving Body is illustrated with black-and-white charts and graphs.
The Ground Between: Anthropologists Engage Philosophy
by Michael Jackson Veena Das Arthur Kleinman Bhrigupati SinghThe guiding inspiration of this book is the attraction and distance that mark the relation between anthropology and philosophy. This theme is explored through encounters between individual anthropologists and particular regions of philosophy. Several of the most basic concepts of the discipline--including notions of ethics, politics, temporality, self and other, and the nature of human life--are products of a dialogue, both implicit and explicit, between anthropology and philosophy. These philosophical undercurrents in anthropology also speak to the question of what it is to experience our being in a world marked by radical difference and otherness. In The Ground Between, twelve leading anthropologists offer intimate reflections on the influence of particular philosophers on their way of seeing the world, and on what ethnography has taught them about philosophy. Ethnographies of the mundane and the everyday raise fundamental issues that the contributors grapple with in both their lives and their thinking. With directness and honesty, they relate particular philosophers to matters such as how to respond to the suffering of the other, how concepts arise in the give and take of everyday life, and how to be attuned to the world through the senses. Their essays challenge the idea that philosophy is solely the province of professional philosophers, and suggest that certain modalities of being in the world might be construed as ways of doing philosophy.Contributors. João Biehl, Steven C. Caton, Vincent Crapanzano, Veena Das, Didier Fassin, Michael M. J. Fischer, Ghassan Hage, Clara Han, Michael Jackson, Arthur Kleinman, Michael Puett, Bhrigupati Singh
The Ground of Professional Ethics (Professional Ethics)
by Daryl KoehnAs each week beings more stories of doctors, lawyers and other professionals abusing their powers, while clients demand extra services as at a time of shrinking resources; it is imperative that all practising professionals have an understanding of professional ethics.In The Ground of Profesional Ethics, Daryl Koehn discusses the practical issues in depth, such as the level of service clients can justifiably expect from professionals, when service to a client may be legitimately terminated and circumstances in which client confidences can be broken. She argues that, while clients may legitimately expect professionals to promote their interests, professionals are not morally bound to do whatever a client wants.The Ground of Professional Ethics is important reading for all practising professionals, as well as those who study or have an interest in the subject of professional ethics.
The Ground of the Image (Perspectives in Continental Philosophy)
by Jeff Fort Jean-Luc NancyIf anything marks the image, it is a deep ambivalence. Denounced as superficial, illusory, and groundless, images are at the same time attributed with exorbitant power and assigned a privileged relation to truth. Mistrusted by philosophy, forbidden and embraced by religions, manipulated as “spectacle” and proliferated in the media, images never cease to present their multiple aspects, their paradoxes, their flat but receding spaces. What is this power that lies in the depths and recesses of an image—which is always only an impenetrable surface? What secrets are concealed in the ground or in the figures of an image—which never does anything but show just exactly what it is and nothing else? How does the immanence of images open onto their unimaginable others, their imageless origin? In this collection of writings on images and visual art, Jean-Luc Nancy explores such questions through an extraordinary range of references. From Renaissance painting and landscape to photography and video, from the image of Roman death masks to the language of silent film, from Cleopatra to Kant and Heidegger, Nancy pursues a reflection on visuality that goes far beyond the many disciplines with which it intersects. He offers insights into the religious, cultural, political, art historical, and philosophical aspects of the visual relation, treating such vexed problems as the connection between image and violence, the sacred status of images, and, in a profound and important essay, the forbidden representation of the Shoah. In the background of all these investigations lies a preoccupation with finitude, the unsettling forces envisaged by the images that confront us, the limits that bind us to them, the death that stares back at us from their frozen traits and distant intimacies. In these vibrant and complex essays, a central figure in European philosophy continues to work through some of the most important questions of our time.
The Growing Gap Between Emerging Technologies and Legal-Ethical Oversight
by Braden R. Allenby Gary E. Marchant Joseph R. HerkertAt the same time that the pace of science and technology has greatly accelerated in recent decades, our legal and ethical oversight mechanisms have become bogged down and slower. This book addresses the growing gap between the pace of science and technology and the lagging responsiveness of legal and ethical oversight society relies on to govern emerging technologies. Whether it be biotechnology, genetic testing, nanotechnology, synthetic biology, computer privacy, autonomous robotics, or any of the other many emerging technologies, new approaches are needed to ensure appropriate and timely regulatory responses. This book documents the problem and offers a toolbox of potential regulatory and governance approaches that might be used to ensure more responsive oversight.
The Growth of American Government: Governance from the Cleveland Era to the Present (Interdisciplinary Studies in History)
by Ballard C. CampbellHow and why has government gotten bigger? “Should be a compulsory assignment for any seminar on modern political culture.” —The Journal of American HistoryAmerican government has evolved over the generations since the mid-nineteenth century. The changing character of these institutions is a critical part of the history of the United States.This engaging survey focuses on the evolution of public policy and its relationship to the constitutional and political structure of government at the federal, state, and local levels. A new chapter in this revised and updated edition also examines the debate about “big government” in recent decades.“A marvelous multidisciplinary synthesis that builds on the findings of historians of national, state, and local government, along with those of economists and political scientists, to provide a coherent account of the rise of modern American governing structures.” —Journal of Interdisciplinary History
The Growth of Minds and Culture: A Unified Interpretation of the Structure of Human Experience
by Willem H. VanderburgThe impact of science and technology on culture raises a number of questions about the ways in which people relate to each other and to their environment. Such questions cannot be answered by traditional approaches. Thus another level of analysis is needed to complement the traditional approaches and to address future challenges. The first step in creating this new analysis was taken by Willem H. Vanderburg in 1985 with his pioneering work The Growth of Minds and Cultures. In this book, the first of a multi-volume series that includes Our Battle for the Human Spirit (2016), Vanderburg shows how the culture of a society underlies its science, technology, economy, social structure, political institutions, morality, religion, and art. As such, he seeks to build bridges not only between the ‘two cultures’ but between all the sciences in order to gain a deeper understanding of our age. This expanded second edition makes the author’s ground-breaking analysis available to a generation of digital natives.
The Guarantee of Perpetual Peace (Elements in the Philosophy of Immanuel Kant)
by Wolfgang ErtlThis Element tries to answer three questions about Kant's guarantee thesis by examining the 'first addendum' of his Philosophical Sketch; how the guarantor powers interrelate, how there can be a guarantee without undermining freedom, why there is a guarantee in the first place. Kant's conception of an interplay of human and divine rational agency encompassing nature is crucial: on moral grounds, we are warranted to believe the 'world author' knew that if he brought about the world, the 'supreme' good would come about too. Perpetual peace is the condition enabling the supreme good to be realized in history.
The Guardian of the Constitution: Hans Kelsen and Carl Schmitt on the Limits of Constitutional Law
by Lars VinxThis volume provides the first English translation of Hans Kelsen's and Carl Schmitt's influential Weimar-era debate on constitutional guardianship and the legitimacy of constitutional review. It includes Kelsen's seminal piece, 'The Nature and Development of Constitutional Adjudication', as well as key extracts from the 'Guardian of the Constitution' which present Schmitt's argument against constitutional review. Also included are Kelsen's review of Schmitt's 'Guardian of the Constitution', as well as some further material by Kelsen and Schmitt on presidential dictatorship under Article 48 of the Weimar Constitution. These texts show Kelsen and Schmitt responding to one another, in the context of a debate focused on a concrete constitutional crisis, thus allowing the reader to assess the plausibility of Kelsen's and Schmitt's legal and constitutional theories.
The Guardians of Concepts: Political Languages of Conservatism in Britain and West Germany, 1945-1980 (Studies in British and Imperial History #9)
by Martina SteberSince 1945, what ‘conservative’ means has troubled intellectuals, politicians and parties in the United Kingdom and West Germany. In Britain conservatism was an accepted term of the political vocabulary, denoting a particular tradition of political thought and practice. In West Germany, by contrast, conservatism was a difficult concept for the young democracy to swallow. It carried a heavy antiliberal and antidemocratic burden and led people to question whether there was a place for conservatism within democratic culture after all. The Guardians of Concepts scrutinizes the debates about conservatism in the UK and the Federal Republic of Germany from the late 1940s to the early 1980s. Informed by historical semantics, it conceives of conservatism as a flexible linguistic structure, and shows the importance of language for the self-understanding of many conservatives, who not by chance, have regarded themselves as the guardians of concepts. The intense national and transnational debates about the meaning of conservatism had far-reaching consequences and continue to influence politics today.
The Guest from the Future: Anna Akhmatova and Isaiah Berlin
by Gyorgy Dalo Andrea Dunai Antony WoodIn 1945 Berlin, Russian-born Oxford professor & first secretary for the British Embassy in Moscow, visited Russian poet Akhmatova. She saw him as a visitor from the democratic world that she'd never experienced. The KGB saw him as a British spy. The book deals with the interesting relationship between these extraordinary individuals as well as the history of Russia before and after communism, especially just after World War II.
The Guide for the Perplexed (Barnes And Noble Library Of Essential Reading)
by Moses MaimonidesThis is the full, unabridged text of one of the greatest philosophic works of all time. Written by a 12th- century thinker who was equally active as an original philosopher and as a Biblical and Talmudic scholar, it is both a classic of great historical importance and a work of living significance today.The Guide for the Perplexed was written for scholars who were bewildered by the conflict between religion and the scientific and philosophic thought of the day. It is concerned, basically, with finding a concord between the religion of the Old Testament and its commentaries, and Aristotelian philosophy. After analyzing the ideas of the Old Testament by means of "homonyms," Maimonides examines other reconciliations of religion and philosophy (the Moslem rationalists) and then proposes his own resolution with contemporary Aristotelianism. The Guide for the Perplexed was at once recognized as a masterwork, and it strongly influenced Jewish, Christian, and Moslem thought of the Middle Ages. It is necessary reading for any full comprehension of the thought of such scholastics as Aquinas and Scotus, and indispensable for everyone interested in the Middle Ages, Judaism, medieval philosophy, or the larger problems which Maimonides discusses.
The Guide of the Perplexed (Hackett Classics)
by Moses Maimonides Daniel H. Frank"The reissue of Guttmann's edition of Rabin's translation is a welcome event. There has long been a need for a readable, judicious edition, for classroom use, of this large and complex work." --Michael L. Morgan, Indiana University
The Guide of the Perplexed, Volume 1
by Moses MaimonidesThis monument of rabbinical exegesis written at the end of the twelfth century has exerted an immense and continuing influence upon Jewish thought. This edition contains extensive introductions by Shlomo Pines and Leo Strauss, leading authorities on Maimonides.
The Guide of the Perplexed, Volume 2
by Moses MaimonidesThis monument of rabbinical exegesis written at the end of the twelfth century has exerted an immense and continuing influence upon Jewish thought. Its aim is to liberate people from the tormenting perplexities arising from their understanding of the Bible according only to its literal meaning. This edition contains extensive introductions by Shlomo Pines and Leo Strauss, a leading authority on Maimonides.
The Guide to Gethsemane: Anxiety, Suffering, Death (Perspectives in Continental Philosophy)
by Emmanuel FalqueAnxiety, suffering and death are not simply the “ills” of our society, nor are they uniquely the product of a sick and sinful humanity. We must all some day confront them, and we continually face their implications long before we do. In that sense, the Garden of Gethsemane is not merely a garden “outside the walls” of Jerusalem but also the essential horizon for all of us, whether we are believers or not.Emmanuel Falque explores, with no small measure of doubt, Heidegger’s famous statement that by virtue of Christianity’s claims of salvation and the afterlife, its believers cannot authentically experience anxiety in the face of death. In this theological development of the Passion, already widely debated upon its publication in French, Falque places a radical emphasis on the physicality and corporeality of Christ’s suffering and death, marking the continuities between Christ’s Passion and our own orientation to the mortality of our bodies. Beginning with an elaborate reading of the divine and human bodies whose suffering is masterfully depicted in the Isenheim Altarpiece, and written in the wake of the death of a close friend, Falques’s study is both theologically rigorous and marked by deeply human concerns.Falque is at unusual pains to elaborate the question of death in terms not merely of faith, but of a “credible Christianity” that remains meaningful to non-Christians, holding, with Maurice Blondel, that “the important thing is not to address believers but to say something which counts in the eyes of unbelievers.” His account is therefore as much a work of philosophy as of theology—and of philosophy explicated not through abstractions but through familiar and ordinary experience. Theology’s task, for Falque, is to understand that human problems of the meaning of existence apply even to Christ, at least insofar as he lives in and shares our finitude. In Falque’s remarkable account, Christ takes upon himself the burden of suffering finitude, so that he can undertake a passage through it, or a transformation of it.This book, a key text from one the most remarkable of a younger generation of philosophers and theologians, will be widely read and debated by all who hold that theology and philosophy has the most to offer when it eschews easy answers and takes seriously our most anguishing human experiences.