Introduction to philosophy books
August 7th 2010 01:34
Someone wanted to start a philosophy discussion group, and asked me for recommendations -- introductions to philosophy, complete overviews, etc.
Here's some suggestions, but I'm definitely not the best person to ask; my experience is limited and has holes (a better bet is to drop any philosophy prof an e-mail).
I'll update this page once in a blue moon if any better thoughts occur to me. And if anyone reading this has any good ideas, feel free to post in the comments section below.
Overviews
-- Bertrand Russell, History of Western Philosophy -- outdated, and always regarded as biased and unfair, but still a decent overview
-- Frederick Coppleston, History of Philosophy (1946-1975) -- eleven volumes, very detailed; praiseworthy for covering even minor figures; but not up-to-date. For the brave.
-- If you're willing to read a series rather than a single book, there's the "Philosophers in 90 minutes" series by Paul Strathern. They're exactly what the title promises -- each book won't take more than 90 minutes to read -- and what you get is some sense of the author's biography and context, together with Freudian speculations about the connection between life and writing. The ideas are simplified and watered down -- but, if nothing else, the books are concise and entertaining.
There's plenty of other histories of philosophy out there. I think they're all much of a muchness and can only take you so far. But if you want to find them, maybe simply browse your local bookshop.
Dictionaries
-- Oxford Companion (witty in places, opinionated in others)
-- Cambridge Dictionary (more inclusive of Continental philosophy)
And there's any number of cheaper ones, including one by Antony Flew, and another by Simon Blackburn.
By author
-- Simply do a library search, but there's plenty of "greatest hits" collections -- for almost anyone you can think of -- for Mencius, for Marx, for CS Pierce, for Jung, for de Sade... Heidegger: Basic writings, edited by David Farrell Krell, is good for Heidegger.
By subject matter
Introductions, overviews, readers...
-- For ethics, I'd recommend Ethics, edited by Peter Singer, in the Oxford Reader series. In fact, that entire series is great. For Continental ethics, The Continental ethics reader, edited by Matthew Calarco and Peter Atterton.
-- For political philosophy, there's Will Kymlicka's Contemporary political philosophy -- excellent overview of different schools of thought -- but, as the title suggests, it's basically 20th century only.
-- For science, What is this thing called science? by Alan Chalmers. It deals with basic issues, like the demarcation issue, so it's a great place to start; but I think philosophy of science as actually practised has moved on into much more specific questions.
-- For philosophy of mind, Philosophy of mind and cognition by David Braddon-Mitchell and Frank Jackson.
-- For epistemology, I have no idea.
-- For aesthetics, I like the Oxford Reader on the topic, but I'm aware that there's a bunch of weightier tomes out there, including a Routledge Companion, and various books on Continental aesthetics.
-- For philosophy of language, I don't know of a good overview. Logicism and the philosophy of language edited by Arthur Sullivan is a good reader for Frege and Russell, but I haven't looked into more contemporary readers and surveys.
-- For metaphysics, there's a good overview by Richard Taylor, published by Prentice Hall in the Foundations of Philosophy series (and this isn't a reader, and I don't think it references particular thinkers -- it's more a case of dipping your toe into each of the main questions).
-- For philosophy of economics, The Philosophy of Economics, edited by Daniel M Hausman.
-- For other "philosophy of x"... of logic, of history, of biology... There are readers and anthologies if you search for 'em, but I haven't read any of them.
-- For logic (rather than the philosophy of logic), there's a couple of books that are standardly used, but I can't speak to them; this really isn't my area.
-- For ancient philosophy, I'm sure there's a lot of readers, but it's also not something I can comment on. Ditto for mediaeval and Church philosophy.
-- Ditto for Eastern philosophy (Indian, Buddhist, contemporary Chinese, Japanese, Islamic). I've actually read some of these, but none blew me away.
-- For other "world" philosophy (eg African philosophy, Australian philosophy), your guess is as good as mine. There's a book sitting on my shelf called World philosophies by Ninian Smart. It looks like an interesting overview, but I'm yet to read it.
-- For analytic philosophy in general, Analytic philosophy: an anthology, edited by Aloysius Martinich and E David Sosa.
-- For Continental philosophy in general, there are a number of readers, but I have to say I haven't been blown away by them. The field is too diverse to get a good concise overview. You're probably better off finding a reader for each of the strands -- hermeneutics, psychoanalytic philosophy, Bergsonian philosophy, Marxist philosophy, Heideggerian philosophy, existentialism, Foucauldian philosophy, phenomenology, structuralism, post-structuralism, postmodernism...
Other thoughts
-- The Stanford Encyclopaedia of Philosophy online. It's really very good. It's written clearly; and it's a lot easier, and a lot more useful, to read the Stanford's entry on Kant, than to wade through Kant's actual writings.
-- Course readers and course notes. Can be obtained from University Copy Centres. I've personally found them a mixed bag; it really depends on the course and the lecturer.
-- Podcasts and recorded lectures... plenty of them online...
-- At the end of the day, there's no substitute for going to the actual texts...
Here's some suggestions, but I'm definitely not the best person to ask; my experience is limited and has holes (a better bet is to drop any philosophy prof an e-mail).
I'll update this page once in a blue moon if any better thoughts occur to me. And if anyone reading this has any good ideas, feel free to post in the comments section below.
Overviews
-- Bertrand Russell, History of Western Philosophy -- outdated, and always regarded as biased and unfair, but still a decent overview
-- Frederick Coppleston, History of Philosophy (1946-1975) -- eleven volumes, very detailed; praiseworthy for covering even minor figures; but not up-to-date. For the brave.
-- If you're willing to read a series rather than a single book, there's the "Philosophers in 90 minutes" series by Paul Strathern. They're exactly what the title promises -- each book won't take more than 90 minutes to read -- and what you get is some sense of the author's biography and context, together with Freudian speculations about the connection between life and writing. The ideas are simplified and watered down -- but, if nothing else, the books are concise and entertaining.
There's plenty of other histories of philosophy out there. I think they're all much of a muchness and can only take you so far. But if you want to find them, maybe simply browse your local bookshop.
Dictionaries
-- Oxford Companion (witty in places, opinionated in others)
-- Cambridge Dictionary (more inclusive of Continental philosophy)
And there's any number of cheaper ones, including one by Antony Flew, and another by Simon Blackburn.
By author
-- Simply do a library search, but there's plenty of "greatest hits" collections -- for almost anyone you can think of -- for Mencius, for Marx, for CS Pierce, for Jung, for de Sade... Heidegger: Basic writings, edited by David Farrell Krell, is good for Heidegger.
By subject matter
Introductions, overviews, readers...
-- For ethics, I'd recommend Ethics, edited by Peter Singer, in the Oxford Reader series. In fact, that entire series is great. For Continental ethics, The Continental ethics reader, edited by Matthew Calarco and Peter Atterton.
-- For political philosophy, there's Will Kymlicka's Contemporary political philosophy -- excellent overview of different schools of thought -- but, as the title suggests, it's basically 20th century only.
-- For science, What is this thing called science? by Alan Chalmers. It deals with basic issues, like the demarcation issue, so it's a great place to start; but I think philosophy of science as actually practised has moved on into much more specific questions.
-- For philosophy of mind, Philosophy of mind and cognition by David Braddon-Mitchell and Frank Jackson.
-- For epistemology, I have no idea.
-- For aesthetics, I like the Oxford Reader on the topic, but I'm aware that there's a bunch of weightier tomes out there, including a Routledge Companion, and various books on Continental aesthetics.
-- For philosophy of language, I don't know of a good overview. Logicism and the philosophy of language edited by Arthur Sullivan is a good reader for Frege and Russell, but I haven't looked into more contemporary readers and surveys.
-- For metaphysics, there's a good overview by Richard Taylor, published by Prentice Hall in the Foundations of Philosophy series (and this isn't a reader, and I don't think it references particular thinkers -- it's more a case of dipping your toe into each of the main questions).
-- For philosophy of economics, The Philosophy of Economics, edited by Daniel M Hausman.
-- For other "philosophy of x"... of logic, of history, of biology... There are readers and anthologies if you search for 'em, but I haven't read any of them.
-- For logic (rather than the philosophy of logic), there's a couple of books that are standardly used, but I can't speak to them; this really isn't my area.
-- For ancient philosophy, I'm sure there's a lot of readers, but it's also not something I can comment on. Ditto for mediaeval and Church philosophy.
-- Ditto for Eastern philosophy (Indian, Buddhist, contemporary Chinese, Japanese, Islamic). I've actually read some of these, but none blew me away.
-- For other "world" philosophy (eg African philosophy, Australian philosophy), your guess is as good as mine. There's a book sitting on my shelf called World philosophies by Ninian Smart. It looks like an interesting overview, but I'm yet to read it.
-- For analytic philosophy in general, Analytic philosophy: an anthology, edited by Aloysius Martinich and E David Sosa.
-- For Continental philosophy in general, there are a number of readers, but I have to say I haven't been blown away by them. The field is too diverse to get a good concise overview. You're probably better off finding a reader for each of the strands -- hermeneutics, psychoanalytic philosophy, Bergsonian philosophy, Marxist philosophy, Heideggerian philosophy, existentialism, Foucauldian philosophy, phenomenology, structuralism, post-structuralism, postmodernism...
Other thoughts
-- The Stanford Encyclopaedia of Philosophy online. It's really very good. It's written clearly; and it's a lot easier, and a lot more useful, to read the Stanford's entry on Kant, than to wade through Kant's actual writings.
-- Course readers and course notes. Can be obtained from University Copy Centres. I've personally found them a mixed bag; it really depends on the course and the lecturer.
-- Podcasts and recorded lectures... plenty of them online...
-- At the end of the day, there's no substitute for going to the actual texts...
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Comment by Paul M
Comment by Nonymous
Philosophy Blog
Comment by Margaret Bennett
Old Soul
Doctoring The Soul
Comment by Paul M
The problem with your list is that one could spend an inordinate amount of life reading all the books and receive very little wisdom in exchange.
Sure, the person reading would gain much trivial knowledge on the 'history of' and 'views and arguments of XYZ' on such and such topics, but that's only useful if writing a dissertation or trying to impress your friends.
Someone who loves wisdom should read books that discuss wisdom, not waste their time with books that only pretend a relation to wisdom.
Comment by Paul M
Really Long Link
I emphasise that wisdom is inherently practical and experiential. It not some unhinged left-brain and scholastic pastime of comtemplating and arguing about concepts and words (like 'Analytical Philosophy', which inherited Scholasticism and applied it to far less imaginative concepts when God became unpopular).
Comment by Daniel Wahba
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