The Philosophy Book

ISBN 978-1-4549-1847-9

9 781 45 4 91 8479

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Manufactured in the USA

$29.95Can. $33.95

Gregory Bassham is professor of philosophy at King’s College in Wilkes-Barre, Pennsylvania, where he specializes in the philosophy of law, critical thinking, and the connections between pop culture and philosophy. He is also coeditor

of several books, including The Lord of the Rings and Philosophy and The Ultimate Harry Potter and Philosophy, and the lead writer of Critical Thinking: A Student’s Introduction. Bassham earned his PhD at the University of Notre Dame, and his articles and essays on philosophy are featured in numerous periodicals and books.

Also available in the STER LING MILESTONES

ser ies:

250 of the most intriguing philosophy milestones, including:

The Vedas (c. 1500 BCE) • No-Self (Annata) (c. 525 BCE) • The Book of Job (c. 500 BCE)

• Survival of the Fittest (c. 450 BCE) • Know Thyself (c. 430 BCE) • Maybe Life Is a Dream

(c. 320 BCE) • Universal Moral Law (c. 51 BCE) • Platonism and Christianity (c. 150 CE)

• The Way of Negation (c. 500) • The Consolations of Philosophy (524) • Islamic Philosophy

Begins (c. 840) • Revival of Confucianism (c. 1180) • The Guide for the Perplexed (c. 1190)

• The Five Ways (c. 1265) • Ockham’s Razor (c. 1320) • The Renaissance Begins (c. 1350)

• Utopia (1516) • The Humanist Ideal (c. 1520) • The Prince (1532) • Meditations on First

Philosophy (1641) • Leviathan (1651) • Ethics (1677) • Human Rights (1689) • To Be Is

to Be Perceived (1713) • Deism (1730) • The Spirit of the Laws (1748) • The Social

Contract (1762) • Critique of Pure Reason (1781) • A Vindication of the Rights of Woman

(1792) • American Transcendentalism (1836) • Existentialism (1843) • The Communist

Manifesto (1848) • On Liberty (1859) • The Methods of Ethics (1874) • “God Is Dead”

(1882) • Phenomenology (1900) • Ethical Intuitionism (1903) • The Problems of Philosophy

(1912) • Being and Time (1927) • The Rejection of Metaphysics (1934) • Nausea (1938)

• The Second Sex (1949) • Philosophical Investigations (1953) • Intention (1957)

• Deconstruction (1967) • Mind-Brain Identity Theory (1968) • A Theory of Justice (1971)

• The Rise of Informal Logic (c. 1971) • Animal Liberation (1975) • The Chinese Room

(1980) • Reasons and Persons (1984) • The Capability Approach (2000) • The New

Atheists (2004) • The Triple Theory of Ethics (2011)

Bassham

What is the purpose of life?

What does it mean to “flourish” as a human being?

Why does evil exist?

These are just a few of the thought-provoking questions addressed in this beautifully illustrated book. Join author Gregory Bassham as he explores 250 of the most significant and pervasive philosophy milestones, from c. 1500 BCE to 2011.

The Philosophy Book presents varied theories, events, and seminal publications in the history of philosophy—all in an accessible, conversational voice. It provides an authoritative overview while also offering an array of noteworthy stories and insights. Bassham delves back into ancient times, looking at such early landmarks as the Hindu Vedic scriptures, and the birth of Western philosophy, when thinkers began to rely on reason and observation to answer the deeper questions of existence. He ends with recent developments, like Philosophical Zombies (fictional creatures who lack consciousness) and “the Triple Theory” of ethics. Also covered are diverse topics including universal love (Mozi), the theory of forms (Plato), the invention of logic (Aristotle), The City of God (St. Augustine), A Treatise of Human Nature (Hume), truth is subjectivity (Kierkegaard), existential defiance (Camus), feminist philosophy, and postmodernism.

The concise essays, accompanied by stunning color images, are organized chronologically while the “Notes and Further Reading” section provides resources for more in-depth study.

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64 THE PHILOSOPHY BOOK

The Athenian nobleman and general Alcibiades (c. 450–404 BCE) as a young man being advised by his teacher Socrates; Plato wrote one or possibly two dialogues featuring discourse between Alcibiades and Socrates. This painting is by François-André Vincent of France, 1776.

c. 399 BC

E

Socratic DialoguesPlato (c. 428–c. 348 BCE)

After Socrates’s death, a number of his disciples, including Aeschines, Antisthenes, and Aristippus, wrote books in dialogue form celebrating his memory. Books of this sort, which Aristotle called Socratic logoi (conversations), became something of a literary genre in fourth-century Greece. By far the greatest writer of Socratic logoi was Plato.

Plato was a wealthy Athenian aristocrat who originally planned to enter politics but decided instead to devote his life to philosophy after meeting Socrates and witnessing the political troubles of his day. After Socrates’s execution, Plato traveled widely and probably began writing what are termed the “early dialogues,” including such well-known works as Apology, Crito, and Euthyphro. The main character in those dialogues is Socrates, who emerges as an unforgettable personality: homely in body but concealing a mind and character of the finest gold. The Socrates of these early dialogues is merely a humble seeker of wisdom; he claims to know nothing except his own ignorance. By means of his famous Socratic (or “elenctic”) method of question-and-answer, he punctures false claims to knowledge, pursuing a deeper understanding of moral concepts and what it means to live a good human life. Invariably, these early dialogues end inconclusively, with valuable insights gained but no final conclusions reached. The only rock-solid convictions that emerge in these conversations are the critical importance of leading an “examined life” and caring more about the “greatest improvement of the soul” than about such things as money, status, or fame.

In Plato’s later writings, a quite different Socrates emerges. Instead of being an unassuming seeker of knowledge who claims to know nothing, Socrates confidently lays out grand theories of ethics, politics, knowledge, the soul, the afterlife, and the ultimate nature of Reality. This shift is part of what scholars call the “Socratic problem”: the difficulty in determining what the real Socrates was like given the limited and sometimes conflicting sources of information we possess. The general view among scholars is that in Plato’s later dialogues, he is actually espousing his own developing philosophical ideas, but there is no certain way of disentangling Socrates’s views from Plato’s.

SEE ALSO Know Thyself (c. 430 BCE), The Trial and Death of Socrates (399 BCE)


A detailed illustration of the human skeletal system is shown in a 1632 Persian edition of Avicenna’s Canon of Medicine, originally published in 1025.

c. 1015

Ibn S na’s Islamic Aristotelianism Ibn S na (Avicenna) (c. 980–1037)

Ibn S na, known to the Christian West as Avicenna, was the greatest Western philosopher over the thousand-year period from Plotinus in the third century to Aquinas in the thirteenth. Portions of his major philosophical work, The Book of Healing, were translated into Latin around 1150 and powerfully influenced key Christian thinkers such as Aquinas and Duns Scotus (c. 1266–1308).

Ibn S na was born near Bukhara, in the northeastern part of the Persian Empire, in what is today Uzbekistan. An intensely bookish and largely self-taught lad, Ibn S na acquired an astonishing range of learning by the age of eighteen. Despite a busy life as a doctor and a public official, he managed to write over one hundred works, including five encyclopedias. His major medical work, The Canon of Medicine, was a standard medical textbook in Western universities until the sixteenth century. Though a devout Muslim, Ibn S na was primarily a philosopher and taught a number of ideas (such as the eternity of the world and the denial of bodily resurrection) that seemed to clash with orthodox Islamic theology. In his work The Incoherence of the Philosophers (c. 1093), the conservative Islamic theologian al-Ghazal (c. 1058–1111) attacked Ibn S na’s philosophy, greatly diminishing its influence in the Muslim world.

Ibn S na’s worldview was basically a fusion of Aristotelianism, Neoplatonism, and Islamic doctrine. His God is the personal God of Islamic theology, but He acts in some ways like Plotinus’s transcendent One. The physical world “emanates” from God in an eternal and necessitated process that is completely deterministic. From God flows ten immaterial “Intelligences” that create and govern the cosmos. It is the tenth Intelligence, the Active Intellect or “Giver of Forms,” that creates human souls and infuses forms into material objects. The highest part of the human soul, the intellect, is constantly tuning in to the radiations of the Active Intellect. Only in this way can the human mind grasp general concepts and universal principles. Medieval Christian thinkers largely rejected Ibn S na’s Neoplatonic cosmology. But his proofs of God’s existence and of the immortality of the soul, as well as such fundamental metaphysical distinctions as essence/existence and necessary being/possible being, were widely influential.

SEE ALSO Islamic Philosophy Begins (c. 840), The Incoherence of the Philosophers (c. 1093), The Commentator (c. 1185)


A detailed illustration of the human skeletal system is shown in a 1632 Persian edition of Avicenna’s Canon of Medicine, originally published in 1025.

c. 1015

Ibn S na’s Islamic Aristotelianism Ibn S na (Avicenna) (c. 980–1037)

Ibn S na, known to the Christian West as Avicenna, was the greatest Western philosopher over the thousand-year period from Plotinus in the third century to Aquinas in the thirteenth. Portions of his major philosophical work, The Book of Healing, were translated into Latin around 1150 and powerfully influenced key Christian thinkers such as Aquinas and Duns Scotus (c. 1266–1308).

Ibn S na was born near Bukhara, in the northeastern part of the Persian Empire, in what is today Uzbekistan. An intensely bookish and largely self-taught lad, Ibn S na acquired an astonishing range of learning by the age of eighteen. Despite a busy life as a doctor and a public official, he managed to write over one hundred works, including five encyclopedias. His major medical work, The Canon of Medicine, was a standard medical textbook in Western universities until the sixteenth century. Though a devout Muslim, Ibn S na was primarily a philosopher and taught a number of ideas (such as the eternity of the world and the denial of bodily resurrection) that seemed to clash with orthodox Islamic theology. In his work The Incoherence of the Philosophers (c. 1093), the conservative Islamic theologian al-Ghazal (c. 1058–1111) attacked Ibn S na’s philosophy, greatly diminishing its influence in the Muslim world.

Ibn S na’s worldview was basically a fusion of Aristotelianism, Neoplatonism, and Islamic doctrine. His God is the personal God of Islamic theology, but He acts in some ways like Plotinus’s transcendent One. The physical world “emanates” from God in an eternal and necessitated process that is completely deterministic. From God flows ten immaterial “Intelligences” that create and govern the cosmos. It is the tenth Intelligence, the Active Intellect or “Giver of Forms,” that creates human souls and infuses forms into material objects. The highest part of the human soul, the intellect, is constantly tuning in to the radiations of the Active Intellect. Only in this way can the human mind grasp general concepts and universal principles. Medieval Christian thinkers largely rejected Ibn S na’s Neoplatonic cosmology. But his proofs of God’s existence and of the immortality of the soul, as well as such fundamental metaphysical distinctions as essence/existence and necessary being/possible being, were widely influential.

SEE ALSO Islamic Philosophy Begins (c. 840), The Incoherence of the Philosophers (c. 1093), The Commentator (c. 1185)


William of Ockham, depicted in a stained-glass window at All Saints’ Church, in Ockham, Surrey, parts of which date back to the twelfth century.

c. 1320

Ockham’s RazorWilliam of Ockham (c. 1285–c. 1347)

William of Ockham was the most influential philosopher of the fourteenth century. Curiously, however, the idea for which he is most famous, the principle of theoretical simplicity known as Ockham’s razor, was never endorsed by him in the way it is usually formulated.

Ockham was born in the village of Ockham, not far from London. After joining the Franciscan order in his teens, he studied at Oxford and was on the verge of becoming a regent master when his career was cut short by an accusation of heresy. Ockham spent four years at the papal court in Avignon trying to clear his name, but was finally forced to flee when he and the head of the Franciscan order, Michael of Cesena, butted heads with Pope John XXII on the issue of evangelical poverty. Both Franciscans were excommunicated, and spent the rest of their lives in Munich under the protection of Emperor Louis IV of Bavaria, who was at war with the pope.

Though he was a great admirer of Aristotle, Ockham’s central aim was to free Christianity from what he saw as the corrupting influences of Greek philosophy. Ockham denied that God’s existence or infinite perfection could be proved by reason. He also denied that reason can demonstrate the soul’s immortality or the existence of free will. Moreover, he completely rejected Aquinas’s natural-law approach to ethics, arguing instead that morality depends entirely upon the will or the commands of God. These views are consistent with Ockham’s overriding concern to widen the gap between theology and philosophy and to protect the omnipotence and freedom of God from any human-concocted notions that might limit them.

One of the tools Ockham uses to achieve these ends is the principle popularly known as Ockham’s razor. The standard formulation of the principle—that “entities are not to be multiplied beyond necessity”—is not found in Ockham’s works. He did say that “plurality is not to be posited without necessity,” which amounts to much the same thing. The core idea is that, all other things being equal, simpler theories and explanations are to be preferred. Understood in this sense, Ockham’s razor is a widely accepted methodological principle in both philosophy and science.

SEE ALSO Conceptualism (c. 1320), The Reformation Begins (1517)


William of Ockham, depicted in a stained-glass window at All Saints’ Church, in Ockham, Surrey, parts of which date back to the twelfth century.

c. 1320

Ockham’s RazorWilliam of Ockham (c. 1285–c. 1347)

William of Ockham was the most influential philosopher of the fourteenth century. Curiously, however, the idea for which he is most famous, the principle of theoretical simplicity known as Ockham’s razor, was never endorsed by him in the way it is usually formulated.

Ockham was born in the village of Ockham, not far from London. After joining the Franciscan order in his teens, he studied at Oxford and was on the verge of becoming a regent master when his career was cut short by an accusation of heresy. Ockham spent four years at the papal court in Avignon trying to clear his name, but was finally forced to flee when he and the head of the Franciscan order, Michael of Cesena, butted heads with Pope John XXII on the issue of evangelical poverty. Both Franciscans were excommunicated, and spent the rest of their lives in Munich under the protection of Emperor Louis IV of Bavaria, who was at war with the pope.

Though he was a great admirer of Aristotle, Ockham’s central aim was to free Christianity from what he saw as the corrupting influences of Greek philosophy. Ockham denied that God’s existence or infinite perfection could be proved by reason. He also denied that reason can demonstrate the soul’s immortality or the existence of free will. Moreover, he completely rejected Aquinas’s natural-law approach to ethics, arguing instead that morality depends entirely upon the will or the commands of God. These views are consistent with Ockham’s overriding concern to widen the gap between theology and philosophy and to protect the omnipotence and freedom of God from any human-concocted notions that might limit them.

One of the tools Ockham uses to achieve these ends is the principle popularly known as Ockham’s razor. The standard formulation of the principle—that “entities are not to be multiplied beyond necessity”—is not found in Ockham’s works. He did say that “plurality is not to be posited without necessity,” which amounts to much the same thing. The core idea is that, all other things being equal, simpler theories and explanations are to be preferred. Understood in this sense, Ockham’s razor is a widely accepted methodological principle in both philosophy and science.

SEE ALSO Conceptualism (c. 1320), The Reformation Begins (1517)


René Descartes in his study, a portrait created in 1687–1691, by Dutch engraver Cornelis A. Hellemans.

1637

The Father of Modern PhilosophyRené Descartes (1596–1650)

The seventeenth century marks the birth of modern philosophy. The most important figure in the transition from medieval to modern philosophy was the French philosopher, scientist, and mathematician René Descartes. With him, philosophy made a fresh start.

Descartes was born in La Haye en Touraine (now called Descartes) in central France. After receiving a fine liberal arts education at the Jesuit college of La Flèche, he traveled widely and briefly served as a soldier, desiring to learn from “the great book of the world,” as he later said. As a young man, Descartes dedicated himself to the monumental task of constructing a universal science, built on the model of mathematics. Coming from a well-to-do family, he was able to pursue this goal single-mindedly, without the distraction of needing to earn a living. He lived a quiet, scholarly life, in accordance with his personal motto: “He has lived well who has hidden well.”

Descartes believed that philosophy was stuck in a rut and could never achieve solid results until it became as rigorous as mathematics. In his classic Discourse on Method (1637), he laid down four rules for conducting careful intellectual inquiry. The first of these was to accept nothing as true that one does not clearly and distinctly perceive to be true.

Descartes is rightly called “the father of modern philosophy” for several reasons. First, he broke sharply from medieval philosophy and proposed a new model for doing philosophy, one founded on clear definitions and rigorous reasoning from indisputable starting points. Second, he shifted the main focus of philosophy from questions of being or existence to questions of knowledge, thus initiating what is known as the “epistemological turn” in early modern philosophy. Third, Descartes exalted the power of human reason, claiming that all sorts of fundamental truths about reality could be discovered just by thinking, without the aid of the senses. In so doing, he launched a powerful movement in philosophy known as “rationalism.” Finally, he rejected the dense, jargon-ridden writing style of the medieval Scholastics. Descartes wrote elegantly and clearly, setting an admirable pattern that most European philosophers followed until the close of the eighteenth century.

SEE ALSO Meditations on First Philosophy (1641), Ethics (1677)


René Descartes in his study, a portrait created in 1687–1691, by Dutch engraver Cornelis A. Hellemans.

1637

The Father of Modern PhilosophyRené Descartes (1596–1650)

The seventeenth century marks the birth of modern philosophy. The most important figure in the transition from medieval to modern philosophy was the French philosopher, scientist, and mathematician René Descartes. With him, philosophy made a fresh start.

Descartes was born in La Haye en Touraine (now called Descartes) in central France. After receiving a fine liberal arts education at the Jesuit college of La Flèche, he traveled widely and briefly served as a soldier, desiring to learn from “the great book of the world,” as he later said. As a young man, Descartes dedicated himself to the monumental task of constructing a universal science, built on the model of mathematics. Coming from a well-to-do family, he was able to pursue this goal single-mindedly, without the distraction of needing to earn a living. He lived a quiet, scholarly life, in accordance with his personal motto: “He has lived well who has hidden well.”

Descartes believed that philosophy was stuck in a rut and could never achieve solid results until it became as rigorous as mathematics. In his classic Discourse on Method (1637), he laid down four rules for conducting careful intellectual inquiry. The first of these was to accept nothing as true that one does not clearly and distinctly perceive to be true.

Descartes is rightly called “the father of modern philosophy” for several reasons. First, he broke sharply from medieval philosophy and proposed a new model for doing philosophy, one founded on clear definitions and rigorous reasoning from indisputable starting points. Second, he shifted the main focus of philosophy from questions of being or existence to questions of knowledge, thus initiating what is known as the “epistemological turn” in early modern philosophy. Third, Descartes exalted the power of human reason, claiming that all sorts of fundamental truths about reality could be discovered just by thinking, without the aid of the senses. In so doing, he launched a powerful movement in philosophy known as “rationalism.” Finally, he rejected the dense, jargon-ridden writing style of the medieval Scholastics. Descartes wrote elegantly and clearly, setting an admirable pattern that most European philosophers followed until the close of the eighteenth century.

SEE ALSO Meditations on First Philosophy (1641), Ethics (1677)


Martha Nussbaum at the University of Oviedo in Asturias, Spain, on October 24, 2012. She was there to receive the Prince of Asturias Award for Social Sciences.

2000

The Capability ApproachMartha Nussbaum (b. 1947)

How should one measure human welfare and international development? The traditional approach has been to look at purely quantitative measures such as per capita gross domestic product. Yet if a nation’s GDP goes up while growing numbers of its citizens struggle to get an education, find work, or be treated with dignity, is the nation really better off? An influential new theory of social justice, well-being, and human development is known as the “capability approach” or the “human development approach.” Among its primary architects is the American philosopher and classicist Martha Nussbaum, one of America’s best-known public intellectuals.

Born in New York City and raised in what she describes as an “East Coast WASP elite family” (she converted to Judaism in the early 1970s), Nussbaum received her PhD in philosophy from Harvard. Since 1994, Nussbaum has taught at the University of Chicago, where she is Ernst Freund Distinguished Service Professor of Law and Ethics, with joint appointments in the law school and the philosophy department. Her first major book, The Fragility of Goodness: Luck and Ethics in Greek Tragedy and Philosophy (1986), won wide acclaim throughout the humanities. A prolific writer, Nussbaum has published widely on topics such as global ethics, feminism, multiculturalism, emotions, civil liberties, and the value of the liberal arts. She is perhaps best known, however, for her work in developing and popularizing the capability approach, which she lays out most fully in Women and Human Development: The Capabilities Approach (2000) and Creating Capabilities: The Human Development Approach (2011).

First developed by the distinguished Indian philosopher and economist Amartya Sen (b. 1933), the capability approach is a broad theoretical framework for assessing human well-being and international development. The core tenet of the capability approach is that well-being should not be measured simply in terms of aggregate material resources or simple subjective criteria such as happiness, but rather by reference to multidimensional standards of human dignity and human flourishing that focus crucially on questions of what actual opportunities are available to people, of what they can really do and be. This is an approach that is increasingly gaining prominence in international development, scholarship, and policy making.

SEE ALSO A Theory of Justice (1971)


Martha Nussbaum at the University of Oviedo in Asturias, Spain, on October 24, 2012. She was there to receive the Prince of Asturias Award for Social Sciences.

2000

The Capability ApproachMartha Nussbaum (b. 1947)

How should one measure human welfare and international development? The traditional approach has been to look at purely quantitative measures such as per capita gross domestic product. Yet if a nation’s GDP goes up while growing numbers of its citizens struggle to get an education, find work, or be treated with dignity, is the nation really better off? An influential new theory of social justice, well-being, and human development is known as the “capability approach” or the “human development approach.” Among its primary architects is the American philosopher and classicist Martha Nussbaum, one of America’s best-known public intellectuals.

Born in New York City and raised in what she describes as an “East Coast WASP elite family” (she converted to Judaism in the early 1970s), Nussbaum received her PhD in philosophy from Harvard. Since 1994, Nussbaum has taught at the University of Chicago, where she is Ernst Freund Distinguished Service Professor of Law and Ethics, with joint appointments in the law school and the philosophy department. Her first major book, The Fragility of Goodness: Luck and Ethics in Greek Tragedy and Philosophy (1986), won wide acclaim throughout the humanities. A prolific writer, Nussbaum has published widely on topics such as global ethics, feminism, multiculturalism, emotions, civil liberties, and the value of the liberal arts. She is perhaps best known, however, for her work in developing and popularizing the capability approach, which she lays out most fully in Women and Human Development: The Capabilities Approach (2000) and Creating Capabilities: The Human Development Approach (2011).

First developed by the distinguished Indian philosopher and economist Amartya Sen (b. 1933), the capability approach is a broad theoretical framework for assessing human well-being and international development. The core tenet of the capability approach is that well-being should not be measured simply in terms of aggregate material resources or simple subjective criteria such as happiness, but rather by reference to multidimensional standards of human dignity and human flourishing that focus crucially on questions of what actual opportunities are available to people, of what they can really do and be. This is an approach that is increasingly gaining prominence in international development, scholarship, and policy making.

SEE ALSO A Theory of Justice (1971)

SEPTEMBER 2016History / World History$29.95 ($33.95 Canada)Hardcover with Jacket7 5/16 × 8 7/16 • 528 pages ISBN 9781454918479

DISCLAIMER Reviewers are reminded that changes may be made in this uncorrected proof before books are printed. If any material from the book is to be quoted in a review, the quotation should be checked against the final bound book. Dates, prices, and manufacturing details are subject to change or cancellation without notice.

For publicity inquiries, contact Joshua Redlich at (646) 688-2484 or [email protected].

septemer 2016 Philosophy explores the deepest, most fundamental questions of reality—

and this accessible and entertaining chronology presents 250 milestones

of the most important theories, events, and seminal publications in the field

over the last 3,500 years. Brief, engaging, and beautifully illustrated entries

cover a range of topics and cultures, from the Hindu Vedas and Plato’s

theory of forms to Pascal’s Wager, existentialism, feminism, and the Triple

Theory of Ethics.

national print and online publicity campaign goodreads giveaway holiday gift guides

Gregory Bassham is professor of philosophy at King’s College in Wilkes-Barre, PA, where he

specializes in the philosophy of law, critical thinking, and the connections between pop culture

and philosophy. He is also coeditor of several successful books, including The Lord of the

Rings and Philosophy (Open Court) and The Ultimate Harry Potter and Philosophy (Wiley), and

the lead writer of Critical Thinking: A Student’s Introduction (5th ed., McGraw-Hill). Bassham

earned his PhD at the University of Notre Dame, and his articles and essays on philosophy are

featured in numerous periodicals and books. Having taught philosophy for 25 years, he has read

virtually every major work of philosophy ever written. Gregory lives in PA.

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The Philosophy Book