Few thinkers have addressed the political horrors and ethical complexities of the twentieth century with the insight and passionate intellectual integrity of Hannah Arendt. She was irresistible drawn to the activity of understanding, in an effort to endow historic, political, and cultural events with meaning. Essays in Understanding assembles many of Arendt’s writings from the 1930s, 1940s, a…
First published in 1967, Writing and Difference, a collection of Jacques Derrida's essays written between 1959 and 1966, has become a landmark of contemporary French thought. In it we find Derrida at work on his systematic deconstruction of Western metaphysics. The book's first half, which includes the celebrated essay on Descartes and Foucault, shows the development of Derrida's method of deco…
In "What is Philosophy?" the philosopher Dietrich von Hildebrand analyzes the datum of knowledge itself in its different forms, from the most casual perception of some object in our naive experience to "a priori knowledge", taken as consisting of absolutely certain insights into "necessary essences". Plato's central teaching about the kind of human knowledge which transcends the world of time a…
REASON AND RESPONSIBILITY: READINGS IN SOME BASIC PROBLEMS OF PHILOSOPHY has a well-earned reputation for clarity and breadth, with a proven selection of high-quality readings that cover centuries of philosophical debate. The anthology includes the central issues in metaphysics, epistemology, philosophy of religion, philosophy of mind, and ethics, as well as debates over the value of philosophy…
Jurgen Habermas has developed the theory of communicative action primarily in the context of critical social and political theory and discourse ethics. The essays collected in this volume, however, focus on the theory's implications for epistemology and metaphysics. They address two fundamental issues that have not figured prominently in his work since the early 1970s. One is the question of na…
This fully revised and updated edition of Nicholas Bunnin and E.P. Tsui-James’ popular introductory philosophy textbook brings together specially-commissioned chapters from a prestigious team of scholars writing on each of the key areas, figures and movements in philosophy.
From the internationally heralded author of How Proust Can Change Your Life comes this remarkable new book that presents the wisdom of some of the greatest thinkers of the ages as advice for our day to day struggles. Solace for the broken heart can be found in the words of Schopenhauer. The ancient Greek Epicurus has the wisest, and most affordable, solution to cash flow problems. A remedy f…