Modern

This book develops the notion of a "culture of narcissim," a concept originally proposed by Christopher Lasch. The author puts forward a coherent theory of the role played by love in human attempts to grapple with the problems of finitude and...

A.J. Ayer burst like a supernova upon the Anglo-American philosophical world in 1936, with "Language, truth and logic", an eloquent, uncompromising manifesto for logical positivism which transformed the thinking of a generation. Inside a few years,...

This work, by one of the most innovative and challenging of contemporary thinkers, pivots on a Remark added by Hegel in 1831 to the second edition of his Science of Logic. As a model of close reading applied both to philosophical texts and the making of...

Students of the Enlightenment have long assumed that the major movement towards atheism in the Ancien Regime was centered in the circle of intellectuals who met at the home of Baron d'Holbach during the last half of the eighteenth century. This major...

Nietzsche, the Godfather of Fascism? What can Nietzsche have in common with this murderous ideology? Frequently described as the "radical aristocrat" of the spirit, Nietzsche abhorred mass culture and strove to cultivate an Ubermensch endowed...

This important new book is the first of a series of volumes collecting the essential articles by the eminent and highly influential philosopher Saul A. Kripke. It presents a mixture of published and unpublished articles from various stages of Kripke's...

Mark Textor presents a critical study of the work of Franz Brentano, one of the most important thinkers of the nineteenth century. His work has influenced analytic philosophers like Russell as well as phenomenologists like Husserl and Sartre, and...

Frederick C. Beiser presents a study of the two most important idealist philosophers in Germany after Hegel: Adolf Trendelenburg and Rudolf Lotze. Trendelenburg and Lotze dominated philosophy in Germany in the second half of the nineteenth century. They...

This volume collects contributions from leading scholars of early modern philosophy from a wide variety of philosophical and geographic backgrounds. The distinguished contributors offer very different, competing approaches to the history of philosophy. ...

Out from the Shadows showcases the work of 18 analytical feminists from a variety of traditional areas of philosophy: social and political philosophy, normative ethics, virtue theory, metaethics, philosophy of language, metaphysics, epistemology, and...

Wittgenstein: Comparisons and Context is a collection of P. M. S. Hacker's papers on Wittgenstein and Wittgensteinian themes written over the last decade. It presents Hacker's own (Wittgensteinian) conception of philosophy, and defends it against...

Desmond M. Clarke presents new translations of three of the first feminist tracts to support explicitly the equality of the sexes. The alleged inferiority of women's nature and the corresponding roles that women were (in)capable of exercising in society...

In Mill's Progressive Principles David Brink provides a systematic reconstruction and assessment of John Stuart Mill's contributions to the utilitarian and liberal traditions, examining his first principles and their application to issues of...

The idea of the Enlightenment has become a touchstone for emotive and often contradictory articulations of contemporary western values. Enlightenment Shadows is a study of the place of Enlightenment thought in intellectual history and of its continued...

In 1710 G. W. Leibniz published Theodicy: Essays on the Goodness of God, the Freedom of Man, and the Origin of Evil. This book, the only one he published in his lifetime, established his reputation more than anything else he wrote. The Theodicy brings...

Thirteen original essays by leading scholars explore aspects of Spinoza's ethical theory and, in doing so, deepen our understanding of the richly rewarding core of his system. Given its importance to his philosophical ambitions, it is surprising that his...

Cheryl Misak presents the first collective study of the development of philosophy in North America, from the 18th century to the end of the 20th century. Twenty-six leading experts examine distinctive features of American philosophy, trace notable...

A History of Scottish Philosophy is a series of collaborative studies by expert authors, each volume being devoted to a specific period. Together they provide a comprehensive account of the Scottish philosophical tradition, from the centuries that laid...

Georg Lukacs wrote that "there is autonomy and 'autonomy.' The one is a moment of life itself, the elevation of its richness and contradictory unity; the other is a rigidification, a barren self-seclusion, a self-imposed banishment from the dynamic...

This is the standard edition of John Locke's classic work of the early 1660s, Essays on the Law of Nature. Also included are selected shorter philosophical writings from the same decade. In his 1664 valedictory speech as Censor of Moral Philosophy at...

Thomas Hurka presents the first full historical study of an important strand in the development of modern moral philosophy. His subject is a series of British ethical theorists from the late nineteenth century to the mid-twentieth century, who shared key...

In this volume, Karl Ameriks explores 'Kantian subjects' in three senses. In Part I, he first clarifies the most distinctive features-such as freedom and autonomy-of Kant's notion of what it is for us to be a subject. Other chapters then consider related...

Bernard Bolzano (1781-1850) is increasingly recognized as one of the greatest nineteenth-century philosophers. A philosopher and mathematician of rare talent, he made ground-breaking contributions to logic, the foundations and philosophy of mathematics,...

Alexander X. Douglas offers a new understanding of Spinoza's philosophy by situating it in its immediate historical context. He defends a thesis about Spinoza's philosophical motivations and then bases an interpretation of his major works upon it. The...

Sartre on Sin: Between Being and Nothingness argues that Jean-Paul Sartre's early, anti-humanist philosophy is indebted to the Christian doctrine of original sin. On the standard reading, Sartre's most fundamental and attractive idea is freedom: he...

According to George Berkeley (1685-1753), there is fundamentally nothing in the world but minds and their ideas. Ideas are understood as pure phenomenal 'feels' which are momentarily had by a single perceiver, then vanish. Surprisingly, Berkeley tries to...

Baumgarten and Kant on Metaphysics explores the metaphysics of Alexander Gottlieb Baumgarten (17141762) and its decisive influence on Immanuel Kant. For over a century, scholars have recognized the significance of Baumgarten's Metaphysics, both because...

J. G. Herder is enjoying a renaissance in philosophy and across the humanities. This book offers important new insights into the complexity and depth of his thought. This unprecedented collection fills a gap in the secondary literature, highlighting the...

This collection of new essays on the systematic thought and intellectual legacy of the American philosopher Wilfrid Sellars (1912-1989) comes at a time when Sellars's influence on contemporary debates about mind, meaning, knowledge, and metaphysics has...

Anthony Rudd introduces, explains, and discusses of some of Kierkegaard's central ideas, showing their relevance to current debates in ethics, epistemology, and the philosophy of religion. Rudd uses these ideas to illuminate questions about the...

In seventeenth-century philosophy the mind-body problem and the nature of personal immortality were two of the most controversial and sensitive issues. Nicholas Jolley seeks to show that these issues are more prominent in Locke's philosophy than has been...

This volume presents new essays exploring important aspects of Nietzsche's philosophy in connection with two major themes: mind and nature. A team of leading experts address questions including: What is Nietzsche's conception of mind? How does mind...

The author is not sure that his philosophical career merits an epilogue, but he had an itch to write one, and he thought of composing it in dialogue form, mainly for brevity's sake but also in the hope of imparting a touch of vitality. Yet writers of...

In this monograph Paul Crowther seeks to overcome some of the antagonistic positions taken in recent debates about postmodernism. He addresses such issues as the relation between art and politics, artistic creativity, and sublimity and the postmodern...

Responsibility is a key concept in our moral, social and political thinking, but is not itself properly understood. In this book J R Lucas elucidates it in terms of answerability - the obligation to answer the question 'Why did you do it?' He develops...

These essays constitute a welcome addition to the current re-engagement with the ethical thought of a prominent late Victorian philosopher and reformer. Henry Sidgwick wrote the first professional work of modern moral philosophy, yet one century after...

This volume of essays by Naomi Scheman brings together her views on epistemic and socio-political issues, views that draw on a critical reading of Wittgenstein as well as on liberatory movements and theories, all in the service of a fundamental...

A unifying theme of Loeb's work is epistemological - that Descartes and Hume advance theories of knowledge that rely on a substantial 'naturalistic' component, adopitng one or another member of a cluster of psychological properties of beliefs as the goal...

This is Volume 3 of the most comprehensive anthology of writings in Western philosophy in print. It assembles the classic essays of Western philosophy of the twentieth century which have given shape and value to its character and structure. From logical...

Although it is widely recognized that David Hume's A Treatise of Human Nature (1739-40) belongs among the greatest works of philosophy, there is little agreement about the correct way to interpret his fundamental intentions. It is an established...