DescriptionThough Socrates left no written works, there were many ancient accounts of his life and his philosophy. The most important of the surviving accounts are from three contemporaries (the comic poet Aristophanes, the historian Xenophon, and the philosopher Pl…
DescriptionEthics, also know as The Nicomachean Ethics after its first editor, Aristotle's son Nicomachus, begins with these words: "Every art and every inquiry...every action and pursuit, is thought to aim at some good." The book is one of the most influential ethical treatises of all time. Written in 350 BC, it identifies happiness as life's goal. How do we achieve this goal? Not through the satisfactions that come from pleasure, wealth, or fame. According to Aristotle, the true path to happiness lies in contemplation of philosophic truth. This is the only action through which humans can exercise their distinctively unique trait: the ability to reason. Begin your own search for ultimate truth by listening to the complete text of this monumental work of Western philosophy.
DescriptionIt is 1912, and at Cambridge University the modern age is knocking at the gate. In lecture halls and laboratories, the model of a universe governed by the Mind of God is at last giving way to something wholly rational, a universe governed by the Laws of P…
DescriptionWe all know that murder, lying, and stealing are wrong. Many of us have also made up our minds on controversial topics like abortion or capital punishment. Yet we continue to have disagreements about such topics as we struggle to find what is the "right"…
DescriptionStoics and Epicureans date from the Hellenistic period, but the debate between these two modes of thought continues today. For the Stoics, the goal of human life was to align one's nature with the rational order of all things by cultivating pure reason. Through the practice of dialectic, they aimed for ethical righteousness and self-control. In sad or turbulent times, stoical endurance has appealed to many people as a way of coping. The Epicureans also valued moderation, but they were suspicious of overly sophisticated intellectual debate, relying more on sense impressions to establish truth. Concluding that life is simple and its truths easy to perceive, they sought a life of minimum pain and maximum pleasure by rejecting external pursuits in favor of lasting inner values, like wisdom, honor, and peace of mind.
DescriptionFrom Philo of Judea to Maimonides and beyond, medieval Jewish philosophy created an outstanding, unbroken tradition. Jewish thinkers worked to square Biblical faith with the demands of reason; their efforts to understand the individual in relation to God and to the human community powerfully foreshadowed contemporary problems. Maimonides, who can be compared with Saint Thomas Aquinas, profoundly influenced much subsequent philosophy. The World of Philosophy series is a dramatic presentation, in understandable language, of the concerns, questions, interests, and overall outlook of the world's great philosophers and philosophical traditions. Special emphasis on clear and relevant explanations gives you a new arsenal of insights toward living a better life.
DescriptionJust a century after it had begun, philosophy entered its greatest age with the appearance of Socrates, who spent so much of his time talking about philosophy on the streets of Athens that he never got around to writing anything down. His method of aggres…
DescriptionOften considered the greatest epic in any modern language, Paradise Lost tells the story of the revolt of Satan and his banishment from Heaven, and the fall of man and his expulsion from Eden. Writing in blank verse of unsurpassed majesty, Milton demonstrates his genius for imagery and cadence. His style is rich and sonorous, his characterizations are heroic, and his action is cosmic in scale. Paradise Lost could only be the work of a mastermind involved in a profound search for Truth. Milton's stated objective in writing Paradise Lost was to "justify the ways of God to men"; yet a controversy has developed among the literary community as to the epic's merit. "Poetry, " said Dr. Johnson in his life of Milton, "is the art of uniting pleasure with truth, by calling imagination to the help of reason." If Paradise Lost does not fulfill this definition, what does?
