Nietzsche was struck by the similarities between Greek and Indian philosophy. From the perspective elaborated in On the Genealogy of Morality - in which values are derived from the physiological, psychological, and social domains - we would expect the similarities of thought to derive from similarities in the conditions of the two cultures. A role is played here by the agonal spirit manifest in the Iliad, Hesiod, and Heraclitus as well as in Indian philosophy and in (...) the Mahabharata and Ramayana. Nietzsche found in both cultures viable models of self and state, born from an agonal context, that provided for him modes of being alternative to the Christian slave morality that he despised. (shrink)

supplies English-language readers with a crucial missing link in Nietzsche's development by reproducing the text of a lecture series delivered by the young philosopher at the University of Basel between 1872 and 1876. In these lectures, Nietzsche surveys the Greek philosophers from Thales to Socrates, establishing a new chronology for the progression of their natural scientific insights. He also roughly sketches concepts such as the will to power, eternal recurrence, and self-overcoming and links them to specific pre-Platonics.

Both Heraclitus and Democritus, as the philosophers of historia peri phuseôs, consider nature and human character, habit, law and soul as interrelated emphasizing the links between phusis, kinesis, ethos, logos, kresis, nomos and daimon. On the one hand, Heraclitus’s principle of change (panta rhei) and his emphasis on the element of fire and cosmic motion ultimately dominate his ethics reinforcing his ideas of change, moderation, balance and justice, on the other, Democritus’s atomist description of phusis and motion underlies his principle (...) of moderation and his ideas of health and measured life. In this series, particularly referring to the main principles of motion, moderation and justice, I attempt to describe a coherent pre-Socratic ethical perspective based on the Heraclitean and Democritean fragments. I explore the connections between their physics and ethics also borrowing from Nietzsche’s lectures and writings on the Pre-Socratics. I redefine such Heraclitean and Democritean concepts as harmony, order, perfection, health, self-control, contentment, cheerfulness, concord, sound judgment, wisdom, measure and balance and discuss them under the principles of motion (phusis), moderation (sophrosyne) and justice. In doing so, I also expose the relevance of the Heraclitean notion of logos (interpreting it as the underlying categorical principle of transition between phusis and ethos) in bringing together these ideas and principles. Finally, based on this pre-Socratic Weltanschauung, I assess the possibility of a coherent picture of humanity, its nature and conduct as extending from or fitting into or extending-from-when-fitting-into the cosmos of moving forces and atoms. (shrink)

Plato. Aristotle. Augustine. Hume. Kant. Hegel. Every student of philosophy needs to know the history of the philosophical discourse such giants have bequeathed us. Philosopher C. Stephen Evans brings his expertise to this daunting task as he surveys the history of Western philosophy, from the Pre-Socratics to Nietzsche and postmodernism—and every major figure and movement in between.

For some of the world's great thinkers, including Aristotle, Aquinas, and Hegel, philosophy is a vast system of fixed, capital-T Truth for humankind to discover, explore and comprehend. For others, even among those with philosophies as diverse as William James and Ludwig Wittgenstein, philosophy is simply a tool, or a process for ascertaining individual factual truths specific to a given time and place. It is often said that if you ask any ten philosophers to define their subject, you're (...) likely to get ten different answers. Here, presented for non-specialist readers, is an easy-to-understand survey of ideas put forth by 100 important philosophers, from the pre-Socratics of ancient Greece to the analytic philosophers of the present day. Each thinker is summarized in a single illustrated page, or in many instances, in a two-page spread. Each entry includes the philosopher's birth and death dates, titles of major works, major influences, a capsule biographical sketch, and a brief summary of his or her most important ideas. In addition to philosophers in our own Western tradition, readers will find Chinese sages, including Confucius and Lao-tzu, the Indian Buddhist philosopher Ngrjuna, and thinkers representing other cultures. Just a few of the 100 important thinkers represented in this book are: Plato Aristotle Augustine of Hippo Roger Bacon Thomas Aquinas Thomas Hobbes John Locke Rene Descartes Baruch Spinoza Immanuel Kant G.W.F. Hegel Friedrich Nietzsche William James Ludwig Wittgenstein Martin Heidegger Jean-Paul Sartre Alfred Jules Ayer Willard V.O. Quine Thomas Kuhn Donald Davidson and many othersThe text is enhanced with more than 250 illustrations and a glossary of philosophical terms. (shrink)

Nietzsche's opinions on philosophy and aesthetics developed under strong and lasting impulses from classical antiquity. These were not always the same, for at various periods in his life Nietzsche placed Heraclitus, Empedocles, Aeschylus, and even Socrates and Plato on the highest summit of wisdom. In his so-called first stage of development the pre-Socratics were generally his favourite thinkers, and in the third and last stage these same figures tend to come into prominence again. On the other hand, in the (...) works of Nietzsche's second, rationalistic period, when he was particularly influenced by Comte, Voltaire, and Darwin, Socrates and Plato—usually so hated and despised—are mentioned with affection, with gratitude or even with warm enthusiasm; and so, over and over again, is Epicurus. (shrink)

Pre-Socratic -- Socrates (469-399 B.C.) -- Plato (429-347 B.C.) -- Existentialism -- Aristotle (384-322 B.C.) -- The ship of Theseus -- Francis Bacon (1561-1626) -- The cow in the field -- David Hume (1711-1776) -- Hedonism -- Prisoner's dilemma -- St. Thomas Aquinas (1225-1274) -- Hard determinism -- Jean-Jacques Rousseau (1712-1778) -- The trolley problem -- Realism -- Immanuel Kant (1724-1804) -- Dualism -- Utilitarianism -- John Locke (1632-1704) -- Empiricism versus Rationalism -- Georg Wilhelm Friedrich Hegel (1770-1831) -- René (...) Descartes (1596-1650) -- A-Theory -- The liar paradox -- Thomas Hobbes (1588-1679) -- Philosophy of language -- Metaphysics -- Jean-Paul Sartre (1905-1980) -- Free will -- Philosophy of humor -- The Enlightenment -- Friedrich Nietzsche (1844-1900) -- The Sorites paradox -- Ludwig Wittgenstein (1889-1951) -- Aesthetics -- Philosoph of culture -- Epistemology -- Twin Earth -- Arthur Schopenhauer (1788-1860) -- Karl Marx (1818-1883) -- Martin Heidegger (1889-1976) -- Voltaire (1694-1778) -- Relativism -- Eastern philosophy -- Avicenna (980-1037) -- Bertrand Russell (1872-1970) -- Phenomenology -- Nominalism -- Gottfried Wilhelm Leibniz (1646-1716) -- Ethics -- Philosophy of science -- Baruch Spinoza (1632-1677) -- Philosopy of religion. (shrink)

INDIAN AND WESTERN PHILOSOPHY- A Study in Contrasts By BETTY HEIMANN. Originally published in I937. Contents include: 1. INTRODUCTION 13 2. THEOLOGY 2Q 3. ONTOLOGY AND ESCHATOLOGY 46 4. ETHICS 63 5. LOGIC 79 6. AESTHETICS 98 7. HISTORY AND APPLIED SCIENCE Il6 8. THE APPARENT RAPPROCHEMENT BETWEEN WEST AND EAST 131 EPILOGUE 147 INDEX OF PROBLEMS TREATED 149. INDIAN AND WESTERN PHILOSOPHY. CHAPTER I. INTRODUCTION: ONE ceuvre dart est un coin de la creation vu d (...) travers un temperament, says Zola and we may be justified in applying this aphorism when we venture on a some what similar survey and attempt an artificial selection from World-Philosophy throughout the ages. My aim, however, is not to elaborate any finished outline of all the philosophical conceptions that have arisen in East and West up to the present day, but merely to indicate the essential and fundamental tendencies and principles. In tracing the sources of Western Philosophy to Plato and Aristotle, and still earlier to the pre-Socratics of ancient Greece, I became convinced that all translations are, to a greater or less degree, modes of interpretation. I studied the Classics, therefore, from the linguistic standpoint, and this procedure ultimately developed into a philosophical method intimately associated with the psychological aspects of Philology. In pursuing this task I discovered at the same time the specifically material basis of all Western thought. In other words in my regress from the history of modern Philosophy to the dawn of Greek speculation, or to repeat to the pre-Socratics, I found myself able to trace the main trends of Western Philosophy to the prior era of the Greek Sophists, whose outstanding role as the actual founders of Western thought is, in my opinion, too frequently underestimated. Their basic dogma which has held good in the West ever since was, Man is the Measure of all things. At this point an equally important feature must be emphasized for throughout this age of the Sophists there persists the profound contrast between the typically Western, and the equally distinctive Eastern, intellectual and spiritual atmospheres. In this connection, still further, I was deeply impressed by the far-reaching divergence of the Western anthropological tendency from the older cosmic out look upon Man as being part and parcel of the Universe And this radical antithesis is to be dis cerned in contemporary Greek drama. For Aeschylus, the Marathonomaches, creates all his immortal tragedies in the genuinely cosmic mood. Every in fraction of cosmic order, with no single exception, must generate its own inevitable reaction, and also its punishment, in order that the primal cosmic harmony may once more be restored... (shrink)

To speak of Socrates’ pre-Socratism is puzzling. It suggests that there was a time at which Socrates was not Socrates. That is not entirely misleading. There was something special about Socrates, special enough so that Nietzsche, for one, thought it appropriate to name a problem after him. Plato and Nietzsche agree that there was something uncommon about Socrates; yet in this very uncommonness was revealed something fundamental about what it means to be human. Still, out of the mouth of Plato’s (...) Socrates in the Phaedo we learn that there was a time at which Socrates was not special. His pre-Socratism refers to that time, a time which we may call Socrates’ "first sailing," a time when he inquired into the causes of the coming to be, perishing, and being of each thing. Obviously this way of inquiry can be first only from the perspective of Socrates’ famous "second sailing." It is this second sailing which makes Socrates special. For that reason it has been legitimately the object of more attention than the first sailing. Truth has a greater claim on us than error, even Socrates’ error. Nevertheless, the need for a second sailing can become clear only as a result of an awareness of the deficiencies of the first. If we are to understand specialness we must understand its origins in commonness. With that in mind it is to the deficiencies of Socrates’ first sailing that I would now like to turn. (shrink)

Published in France in 1980, Marine Lover is the first in a trilogy in which Luce Irigaray links the interrogation of the feminine in post-Hegelian philosophy with a pre-Socratic investigation of the elements.

This collection brings together in translation the finest postwar German-language scholarship on Nietzsche's philosophy, ranging over his concept of irony, his thoughts on music, his relation to the pre-Socratics, his concept of truth, and numerous other topics. Many of the essays appear in English here for the first time, and all are newly translated for the volume.

Introduction -- The pre-socratic philosophers -- Sixth and fifth centuries B.C.E. -- Thales -- Anaximander -- Anaximenes -- Pythagoras -- Heraclitus -- Parmenides -- Zeno -- Empedocles -- Anaxagoras -- Leucippus and Democritus -- The Athenian period -- Fifth and fourth centuries B.C.E. -- The Sophists -- Protagoras -- Gorgias -- Thrasymachus -- Callicles and Critias -- Socrates -- Plato -- Aristotle -- The Hellenistic and Roman periods -- Fourth century B.C.E. through fourth century C.E. -- Epicureanism -- Stoicism -- (...) Neoplatonism -- Medieval and Renaissance philosophy -- Fifth through fifteenth centuries -- Saint Augustine -- The encyclopediasts -- John Scotus Eriugena -- Saint Anselm -- Muslim and Jewish philosophies -- Averroës -- Maimonides -- The problem of faith and reason -- The problem of the universals -- Saint Thomas Aquinas -- William of Ockham -- Renaissance philosophers -- Continental rationalism and British empiricism -- The seventeenth and eighteenth centuries -- Descartes -- Hobbes -- Spinoza -- Leibniz -- Locke -- Berkeley -- Hume -- Kant -- Post-kantian British and continental philosophy -- The nineteenth century -- Hegel -- Schopenhauer -- Kierkegaard -- Marx -- Nietzsche -- Utilitarianism -- Bentham -- Frege -- Pragmatism, the analytic tradition, and the phenomenological tradition and its aftermath -- The twentieth century -- Pragmatism -- James -- Dewey -- The analytic tradition -- Moore -- Russell -- Logical positivism -- Wittgenstein -- Quine -- The phenomenological tradition and its aftermath -- Husserl -- Heidegger -- Sartre -- Structuralism and poststructuralism -- Saussure -- Lévi-Strauss -- Lacan -- Derrida -- Irigaray. (shrink)

The present work is designed to survey the evolution of philosophical thought in the Vedic and post-Vedic periods preceding the rise of Jainism and Buddhism.

In lieu of an abstract, here is a brief excerpt of the content:Reviewed by:Vaiśeṣikasūtra – A Translation by Ionut Moise and Ganesh U. ThiteNils Seiler (bio)Vaiśeṣikasūtra – A Translation. By Ionut Moise and Ganesh U. Thite. London: Routledge, 2021. Pp. viii + 294. Paper $48.95, isbn 978-1-032005-90-4.Vaiśeṣikasūtra – A Translation by Ionut Moise and Ganesh U. Thite serves as an introduction to Vaiśeṣika thought and an introduction to the seventh-century commentary (vṛtti) on the Vaiśeṣikasūtra by Candrānanda. Their book is primarily (...) intended for non-specialists. As Moise notes, "The aim of this edition of Vaiśeṣikasūtra is, therefore, to introduce students of Western philosophy to some of the categories of Indian philosophy, and by way of this to demonstrate the necessity of conceptual correlation between Indian philosophy (particularly Vaiśeṣika) and the perennial and insoluble questions of today's World philosophy" (p. 6). Besides ShashiPrabha Kumar's Classical Vaiśeṣika in Indian Philosophy: On Knowing and What is to Be Known (2013) and the brief summaries included in surveys such as Raffaele Torella's The Philosophical Traditions of India: An Appraisal (2011), there is very little secondary literature in English that offers a general introduction to Vaiśeṣika thought, especially for non-specialists. Moise and Thite's work attempts to help fill this gap, but their work would have benefited from a longer, more descriptive introduction to Vaiśeṣika (à la Kumar and Torella). Primary literature in English on Vaiśeṣika is not much better. For example, as Moise and Thite note, only excerpts of Candrānanda's commentary have been translated into English. Thus, unlike Halbfass (1992), Nozawa (1993), and Thakur (2003) (p. ix), Moise and Thite offer the first complete translation of the earliest extant commentary on the Vaiśeṣikasūtra.The book is divided into three main parts: chapter 1 provides a brief introduction to Vaiśeṣika philosophy and a summary of Candrānanda's commentary, chapter 2 outlines the current state of manuscripts of the Vaiśeṣikasūtra and Vaiśeṣikasūtravṛtti, and chapter 3 contains a transliteration and translation of the Vaiśeṣikasūtravṛtti. The authors also include three appendices, two of which situate Vaiśeṣika philosophy within world philosophy and within its own commentarial tradition, and one of which outlines the extant manuscripts of the Vaiśeṣikasūtra and Vaiśeṣikasūtravṛtti.Moise uses chapter 1 to familiarize his philosophical audience with the tradition of Vaiśeṣika. He does this by drawing attention to the history of Greek and Indian thought, highlighting similarities between these traditions, and emphasizing the importance of naturalism, metaphysics, and ontology in both [End Page 1] traditions. Although it may seem an idiosyncratic way to introduce Indian philosophy, Moise uses the Greek tradition to build a foundation from which those unfamiliar with Indian thought may find a way into the tradition of Vaiśeṣika. This approach is more than pedagogical. Moise argues that his "preliminary survey on the Pre-Socratic Greek philosophy [sic] is important because of their conspicuous resemblance with the problems raised by the early Vedic and Upaniṣadic seers" (p. 2). The similarity between Greek and Vedic thought is essentially metaphysical, according to Moise. But there are also meaningful differences between the questions Greek and Indian thinkers pose and the answers they provide and attending to these differences can be philosophically fruitful. As Moise argues, "by matching unrelated systems of thought (Indian, Greek, analytic, and so forth), our knowledge rebuilds and reconstructs while the ontic definitions of the world gain more clarity than has ever been possible" (p. 6).According to Moise, Vaiśeṣika philosophy can challenge our metaphysical and ontological notions. Specifically, he argues that Vaiśeṣika ontology provides an alternative to the problematic dualism of matter and form in Aristotelian thought, as well as to the notions of essence and existence in the Medieval Scholastics (p. 4). Moise argues that disparate philosophical traditions can problematize and influence our understanding of philosophy: "In short, Indian philosophies begin, change, and challenge the scope of ontology" and... (shrink)

Published in France in 1980, _Marine Lover_ is the first in a trilogy in which Luce Irigaray links the interrogation of the feminine in post-Hegelian philosophy with a pre-Socratic investigation of the elements. Irigaray undertakes to interrogate Nietzche, the grandfather of poststructuralist philosophy, from the point of view of water. According to Irigaray, water is the element Nietzsche fears most. She uses this element in her narrative because for her there is a complex relationship between the feminine and (...) the fluid. Irigaray's method is to engage in an amorous dialogue with the male philosopher. In this dialogue, she ruptures conventional discourse and writes in a lyrical style that defies distinction between theory, fiction, and philosophy. (shrink)

This book presents a suggestive, creative, to some extent impatient reading of Nietzsche from the viewpoint of metaphor. Kofman has studied under Jacques Derrida, and this fact is evidenced in her book, e.g., in the consideration given to ériture [[sic]]. Kofman shows how the pre-Socratics are paradigmatic for Nietzsche’s understanding of philosophy. "It is a matter of making the original Greek philosophy return, of rescuing it from the oblivion where the triumph of nihilistic forces had caused it to (...) sink, of repeating it by taking it as a model". For Nietzsche, this means a return to the richness of metaphorical writing, as exemplified in Heraclitus, as opposed to the strictures of reason and its rigid concepts in Aristotle. Kofman goes on to discuss the oblivion of the metaphor, and the development of conceptual thinking. The world becomes simplified, generalized, in terms of the concept, which is itself, however, the product of a more diversified metaphorical activity. (shrink)

The topic of asymmetry between the semantic and the phono-morphological levels of language emerges very early in Indian technical and speculative reflections as it also does in pre-socratic Greek thought. A well established relation between words and the objects they denote seems to have been presupposed for each analysis of the signification long before its earliest statement. The present paper aims at shedding light on two different patterns of tackling the mentioned problem. The first approach sees asymmetry as an (...) exception to the regular correspondence between language and reality, whereas the second approach considers language in itself as a conceptualisation which does not faithfully represent reality. In the latter case, asymmetry is no longer an exception, but the rule. (shrink)

A study of the methods, approaches, prayers, etc to realize the 'unity experience' with THE ONE REAL SELF (Vedanta, Hinduism, ) God (Judaism), Gottheit (Christianity), Buddha mind (Buddhism), The Beloved (Sufism, Islam) of a number of mystics from several religious traditions. I wrote about this in a number of books and articles, for example about methods, techniques, practices and methodology here: as well as exploring and illustrating the subject-matter of philosophizing here: Explorations, questions and searches not put down on paper (...) are probably more important than the ones mentioned above. These were occurrences for almost as long as I can remember. They took many forms, endless questions about everything under the sun, unsatisfied with unexplained socio-cultural institutions, communities, social relationships, social roles, behaviour, values, norms and much more – I had to question them rather than merely submit to them or act in accordance with them. Although I expressed these questions and queries about the status quo in many areas such as sport, art, social sciences, endless reading and marginal groups and relationships I realized that they form part of the philosophical discourse. Not the discourse that has become the expression of the professionalization of philosophy the last few hundred years, but of the not-institutionalized practice of original thinking, of creative philosophical thinking. As examples of the latter, Socrates, of course, the pre-Socratics, Plato, Leibniz, Spinoza, Kant, Hegel, Plotinus, writers on Mysticism such as Meister Eckhart, van Ruysbroeck, John of the Cross, Teresa of Avila, Nietzsche, Kierkegaard, from Advaita, Zen and other Buddhist schools, Wittgenstein, Hume, German Idealists, Rumi, novelists and poets, Paul Klee and other visual artists and many names who form part of the seeking for the unity-experience as explored in History of Mysticism (those who seek the unity experience, to become ONE with THE ONE, Godhead, the one real Self, Buddha mind, Sophos, etc). History of Mysticism *was first published by Atma Books in 1987, now and is a unique compendium of the lives and teachings of the world's best known mystics. They are presented in chronological order, and include representatives of every religious tradition, revealing the broad universality of genuine religious experience. expanded and revised Thirtieth Anniversary edition is available as a free downloadable PDF document on this website at my Downloads page. This book is fundamental for seasoned scholars of philosophy and religion as well as anyone new to the study of Mysticism. (shrink)

This book studies Wallace Stevens and pre-Socratic poetic philosophy, showing how concepts that animate Stevens’ poetry parallel concepts found in the works of Parmenides, Heraclitus, Empedocles, and Xenophanes.

Modern philosophy presents us with amalgams which testify to its vigour and vitality, but which also have their dangers for thespirit. A strange mixture of ontology and anthropology, of atheism and theology. A little Christian spiritualism, a little Hegeliandialectic, a little phenomenology (our modern scholasticism) and a little Nietzschean fulguration oddly combined in varying proportions.We see Marx and the Pre-Socratics, Hegel and Nietzsche, dancing hand in hand in a round in celebration of the surpassing of metaphysics and even the (...) death of philosophy properly speaking. (Deleuze, NP, 195). (shrink)

When we talk about Presocratic philosophy, we are speaking about the origins of Greek philosophy and Western rationality itself. But what exactly does it mean to talk about “Presocratic philosophy” in the first place? How did early Greek thinkers come to be considered collectively as Presocratic philosophers? In this brief book, André Laks provides a history of the influential idea of Presocratic philosophy, tracing its historical and philosophical significance and consequences, from its ancient antecedents to its (...) full crystallization in the modern period and its continuing effects today. Laks examines ancient Greek and Roman views about the birth of philosophy before turning to the eighteenth-century emergence of the term “Presocratics” and the debates about it that spanned the nineteenth and twentieth centuries. He analyzes the intellectual circumstances that led to the idea of Presocratic philosophy—and what was and is at stake in the construction of the notion. The book closes by comparing two models of the history of philosophy—the phenomenological, represented by Hans-Georg Gadamer, and the rationalist, represented by Ernst Cassirer—and their implications for Presocratic philosophy, as well as other categories of philosophical history. Other figures discussed include Plato, Aristotle, Cicero, Diogenes Laertius, Schleiermacher, Hegel, Nietzsche, Max Weber, and J.-P. Vernant. Challenging standard histories of Presocratic philosophy, the book calls for a reconsideration of the conventional story of early Greek philosophy and Western rationality. (shrink)

In The Beginning of Philosophy Gadamer explores the layers of interpretation and misinterpretation that have built up over 2500 years of Presocratic scholarship. Using Plato and Aristotle as his starting point his analysis moves effortlessly from Simplicius and Diogenes Laertius to the 19th-century German historicists right through to Hegel, Nietzsche and Heidegger. Gadamer shows us how some of the earliest philosophical concepts such as truth, equality, nature, spirit and being came to be and how our understanding of them today (...) is deeply indebted to Presocratic thinkers. The book is based on a series of lectures delivered by Gadamer in 1967 which were then translated into English and edited by Gadamer for this collection. This is a major philosophical-historical work from one of the 20th century's greatest thinkers. (shrink)

This collection introduces readers to some of the most respected Pre-Socratic scholarship of the twentieth century. It includes translations of important works from European scholars that were previously unavailable in English and incorporates the major topics and approaches of contemporary scholarship. Here is an essential book for students and scholars alike. "Students of the Pre-Socratics must be grateful to Mourelatos and his publishers for making these essays available to a wider public."--T. H. Irwin, American Journal of Philology "Mourelatos is a (...) superb editor, and teaching Pre-Socratics in the future with this collection on the reading list will not only be easier but also better."--Jorgen Mejer, The Classical World "The editor has done his work judiciously. It would be difficult to devise a better balance between different parts of the subject."--Edward Hussey, Archives internationales d'histoire des sciences "[This book] will undoubtedly become an indispensable aid for beginning and advanced students of the Pre-Socratics."--David E. Hahm, Isis. (shrink)

With fifty-four chapters charting the development of moral philosophy in the Western world, this volume examines the key thinkers and texts and their influence on the history of moral thought from the pre-Socratics to the present day. Topics including Epicureanism, humanism, Jewish and Arabic thought, perfectionism, pragmatism, idealism and intuitionism are all explored, as are figures including Aristotle, Boethius, Spinoza, Hobbes, Hume, Kant, Hegel, Mill, Nietzsche, Heidegger, Sartre and Rawls, as well as numerous key ideas and schools of thought. (...) Chapters are written by leading experts in the field, drawing on the latest research to offer rigorous analysis of the canonical figures and movements of this branch of philosophy. The volume provides a comprehensive yet philosophically advanced resource for students and teachers alike as they approach, and refine their understanding of, the central issues in moral thought. (shrink)

In this infectiously exciting book, Bryan Magee tells the story of his own discovery of philosophy and not only makes it come alive but shows its relevance to daily life. Magee is the Carl Sagan of philosophy, the great popularizer of the subject, and author of a major new introductory history, The Story of Philosophy. Confessions follows the course of Magee's life, exploring philosophers and ideas as he himself encountered them, introducing all the great figures and their (...) ideas, from the pre-Socratics to Bertrand Russell and Karl Popper, including Wittgenstein, Kant, Nietzsche, and Schopenhauer, rationalism, utilitarianism, empiricism, and existentialism. (shrink)

Le terme consacré de " présocratique " n'est-il qu'une formule commode donnant un repère historique, ou peut-on trouver des lignes dominantes communes aux différentes écoles de cette période? S'il faut en croire Nietzsche et Heidegger, à partir de Socrate, quelque chose changerait et les philosophes présocratiques constitueraient la véritable tradition philosophique aujourd'hui perdue. Cet ouvrage nous invite à découvrir et comprendre ces philosophes dont seuls des fragments plus ou moins importants d'oeuvre nous ont été transmis : Thalès de Milet, Pythagore, (...) Héraclite, Parménide, Zénon d'Elée, Empédocle ou encore Anaxagore de Clazomènes. (shrink)

A lavishly decorated handbook of medicine was conceived for the lay public on topics such as human health, healing, medicine, and household management.

Written in 1888, while Nietzsche was at the height of his brilliance, these two polemics blaze with provocative, inflammatory rhetoric. Nietzsche's "grand declaration of war," Twilight of the Idol s examines what we worship and why. Intended by the author as a general introduction to his philosophy, it assails "idols" of Western philosophy and culture (Socratic rationality and Christian morality among them) and sets the scene for The Antichrist . In addition to its full-scale attack on Christianity and (...) Jesus Christ, The Antichrist denounces organized religion as a whole. Students of philosophy, history, and German literature will find both works essential reading. (shrink)

Physicists who work on canonical quantum gravity will sometimes remark that the general covariance of general relativity is responsible for many of the thorniest technical and conceptual problems in their field.1 In particular, it is sometimes alleged that one can trace to this single source a variety of deep puzzles about the nature of time in quantum gravity, deep disagreements surrounding the notion of ‘observable’ in classical and quantum gravity, and deep questions about the nature of the existence of spacetime (...) in general relativity. Philosophers who think about these things are sometimes skeptical about such claims. We have all learned that Kretschmann was quite correct to urge against Einstein that the “General Theory of Relativity” was no such thing, since any theory could be cast in a generally covariant form, and hence the general covariance of general relativity could not have any physical content, let alone bear the kind of weight that Einstein expected it to.2 Friedman’s assessment is widely accepted: “As Kretschmann first pointed out in 1917, the principle of general covariance has no physical content whatever: it specifies no particular physical theory; rather, it merely expresses our commitment to a certain style of formulating physical theories” (1984, p. 44). Such considerations suggest that general covariance, as a technically crucial but physically contentless feature of general relativity, simply cannot be the source of any significant conceptual or physical problems.3 Physicists are, of course, conscious of the weight of Kretschmann’s points against Einstein. Yet they are considerably more ambivalent than their philosophical colleagues. Consider Kuchaˇr’s conclusion at the end of a discussion of this topic. (shrink)

In lieu of an abstract, here is a brief excerpt of the content:Philosophies versus Philosophy:In Defense of a Flexible DefinitionRein RaudIt is strange that no one has taken up Carine Defoort's clearly formulated and timely argument about the intercultural tensions in interpreting what philosophy is, although the issue deserves at least a roundtable, if not an international conference.1 I doubt that this is because there is a general consensus that the matter is now settled, and I would therefore (...) like to develop the argument a bit further and offer a few additional factors to consider. It is also obvious that the problem is not limited to the subject of Chinese philosophy alone: all traditions of thought from all over the world, but most notably the Indian, Islamic, and Japanese heritages, are affected by the positions we adopt. As in most debates about the commensurability of cultural traditions, we can find differences when we look for them, and similarities if these are what we would like to see, so the "conflict of sensitivities"2 is also a matter of attitudes. My own position is that regardless of what we prefer to call the practice of deeper thought (and 'philosophy' is a very good name), it would be extremely useful for all of its participants, whatever their origin and upbringing, to find a common denominator for them to be able to exchange ideas and mutually enrich each other on its basis. In what follows I shall try to sketch a perspective from which this could, in my opinion, be theoretically grounded.Four PositionsDefoort has identified four possible points of view on the problem of whether classical Chinese thought could or should be called 'philosophy,' which could be summarized as follows.1. Chinese classical thought is not philosophy, because it does not satisfy the conditions of philosophy as it is generally and traditionally understood in the West.2. Chinese classical thought is philosophy, because it reveals the necessary characteristics if analyzed with the help of an appropriate (Western-type) observation language.3. Chinese classical thought can be called philosophy, but only if we redefine philosophy in order to accommodate some of its nontypical or clearly deviant features.4. Chinese classical thought should not be called philosophy, because philosophy is a culturally closed Western phenomenon with a limited scope and incapable of understanding fundamentally different modes of thought. [End Page 618]If we dismiss the birthright variety of the first position, we could label it essentialist, and its weakest point is certainly that Western philosophy has not remained unchanged during the course of history. It is highly doubtful that Socrates, Diogenes, scholastics, Nietzsche, and Gareth Evans could all be members of the same set if the same strict criteria were applied to all periods and all cultural settings in the same way, and, as Defoort herself stresses,3 the fact that seventeenth-century Jesuits (the basis of whose original worldview, we should think, was much farther from the Chinese than ours) had no problem in calling Chinese thought philosophy should show us that the paradigm shift of the thing called 'philosophy' has occurred in the West and is, so to speak, our problem and not theirs.Now, it is also possible that in some circles even some prominent names in the Western tradition do not qualify as real philosophers, in the sense in which Hegel was treated by Bertrand Russell4 and Heidegger was dismissed by Alfred Ayer5 in their respective histories of philosophy (while they nevertheless felt compelled to include chapters or passages on them). A definition of philosophy that puts forward such criteria that a considerable number of thinkers would have to remain outside its borders should be labeled sectarian-and it can still be met, even if ever less often, in some analytical schools of philosophy. It is my conviction, however, that in our globalizing world any definition that would leave non-European philosophy outside the borders of 'philosophy proper' should be considered sectarian in nature. The main problem that I have with Defoort's family model6 is precisely that in it the head of the family, who makes the decisions as to who can be adopted and who cannot, is always Western, and the... (shrink)

An introduction to Pre-Socratic philosophy. It is not intended for scholars - though the interpretation of Parmenides is wholly original. It is for students in a class on Greek Philosophy, giving a useful account of the Pre-Socratics in a course that will be dominated by Socrates, Plato and Aristotle.

The philosophical activities during the Safavid era mark the peak of a renewed engagement with Greek sources unmediated by Ibn Sina's interest in them and their successive incorporation into his philosophy.1 Among the topics for which the Safavid thinkers consulted ancient Greek authors were cosmology, the role of the intellect and the ways of acquiring knowledge, the nature of the soul, and the process of emanation.2 This engagement, to be sure, did not mean an antiquarian, philological return to the (...) original texts in Greek. Rather, it was a re-reading of their Arabic translations from the ninth to tenth centuries to find ideas beyond those of which Ibn Sina made use, and to legitimize—through their... Read More. (shrink)

In lieu of an abstract, here is a brief excerpt of the content:Philosophies versus Philosophy:In Defense of a Flexible DefinitionRein RaudIt is strange that no one has taken up Carine Defoort's clearly formulated and timely argument about the intercultural tensions in interpreting what philosophy is, although the issue deserves at least a roundtable, if not an international conference.1 I doubt that this is because there is a general consensus that the matter is now settled, and I would therefore (...) like to develop the argument a bit further and offer a few additional factors to consider. It is also obvious that the problem is not limited to the subject of Chinese philosophy alone: all traditions of thought from all over the world, but most notably the Indian, Islamic, and Japanese heritages, are affected by the positions we adopt. As in most debates about the commensurability of cultural traditions, we can find differences when we look for them, and similarities if these are what we would like to see, so the "conflict of sensitivities"2 is also a matter of attitudes. My own position is that regardless of what we prefer to call the practice of deeper thought (and 'philosophy' is a very good name), it would be extremely useful for all of its participants, whatever their origin and upbringing, to find a common denominator for them to be able to exchange ideas and mutually enrich each other on its basis. In what follows I shall try to sketch a perspective from which this could, in my opinion, be theoretically grounded.Four PositionsDefoort has identified four possible points of view on the problem of whether classical Chinese thought could or should be called 'philosophy,' which could be summarized as follows.1. Chinese classical thought is not philosophy, because it does not satisfy the conditions of philosophy as it is generally and traditionally understood in the West.2. Chinese classical thought is philosophy, because it reveals the necessary characteristics if analyzed with the help of an appropriate (Western-type) observation language.3. Chinese classical thought can be called philosophy, but only if we redefine philosophy in order to accommodate some of its nontypical or clearly deviant features.4. Chinese classical thought should not be called philosophy, because philosophy is a culturally closed Western phenomenon with a limited scope and incapable of understanding fundamentally different modes of thought. [End Page 618]If we dismiss the birthright variety of the first position, we could label it essentialist, and its weakest point is certainly that Western philosophy has not remained unchanged during the course of history. It is highly doubtful that Socrates, Diogenes, scholastics, Nietzsche, and Gareth Evans could all be members of the same set if the same strict criteria were applied to all periods and all cultural settings in the same way, and, as Defoort herself stresses,3 the fact that seventeenth-century Jesuits (the basis of whose original worldview, we should think, was much farther from the Chinese than ours) had no problem in calling Chinese thought philosophy should show us that the paradigm shift of the thing called 'philosophy' has occurred in the West and is, so to speak, our problem and not theirs.Now, it is also possible that in some circles even some prominent names in the Western tradition do not qualify as real philosophers, in the sense in which Hegel was treated by Bertrand Russell4 and Heidegger was dismissed by Alfred Ayer5 in their respective histories of philosophy (while they nevertheless felt compelled to include chapters or passages on them). A definition of philosophy that puts forward such criteria that a considerable number of thinkers would have to remain outside its borders should be labeled sectarian-and it can still be met, even if ever less often, in some analytical schools of philosophy. It is my conviction, however, that in our globalizing world any definition that would leave non-European philosophy outside the borders of 'philosophy proper' should be considered sectarian in nature. The main problem that I have with Defoort's family model6 is precisely that in it the head of the family, who makes the decisions as to who can be adopted and who cannot, is always Western, and the... (shrink)

The most enduring philosophical concepts are prereflective. They are firmly founded in primitive experience. By their use the most improbable of our philosophical fancies acquires plausibility: for however much what we say might seem a free construction, do we not see the same features and the same process, attenuated perhaps but real, before our eyes?

This paper discusses the positions held by two opposing camps—the traditionalists and the positivists regarding the presence or absence of ethics in Indian philosophy. It subsequently offers a way ahead of the impasse where I consider some inputs inherent in the method of dialogue in pre-modern Indian philosophy for imagining an ethics of and ethics for plurality. Such an ethics, I argue, cannot be imagined without involving the category of ‘Other,’ which has otherwise remained elusive in (...) the Indian philosophical debates. The diverse nature of Indian societies demands Other-centric ethics to assess and evaluate the enduring moral crisis pervading contemporary times. (shrink)

This paper bases on a (great!) wrongful act which was made to Greek philosophy, and especially to the pre-Socratic one: the unilateral abatement of thestudies to those of cosmological nature. The big mutation would take place in Socrates’ time, who by the anthropology of the discourse takes philosophy to a theory of knowledge, through a program which would be perfected by Plato and especially by Aristotle. This is a point of view co-substantial to history of philosophy, which (...) some times risks to charge in an alethic (good/bad) way a paradigm based on false discussions. Pre-Socratics were not only preoccupied by ontology, or even cosmology, as well as Aristotle was not a radical empirist. In the economy of thought the nuances are more important than a classification often made for our epistemological comfort. (shrink)

In lieu of an abstract, here is a brief excerpt of the content:BOOK REVIEWS 293 graphies, which put the individual thinkers and their works into their proper doctrinal context, are very welcome. Noack tries to be, and is, fair. We saw that he even tries to find a common ground between phenomenological and analytical philosophy. He does not reject the latter at the outset. He is objective within the limits of his philosophical upbringing and his historical background. MAx RIESZR (...) New YorIc City Martin Heidegger and the Pre-Socratics. An Introduction to His Thought. By George Joseph Seidel, O. S. B. (Lincoln: University of Nebraska Press, 1964. Pp. x + 169.) Seidel's book, Martin Heidegger and the Pre-Soeratics, is a carefully documented explication of Heidegger's interpretations of Parnmnides and Heraclitus. Beyond this it attempts and in large measure succeeds in giving an account of tteidegger's understanding of the western philosophical tradition as originated and at the same time fatefully misled by the Greeks. Seidel intends his study to be an introduction to Heidegger's thought. For purposes of evaluation I will divide my remarks into three major categories: (1) Seidel's work as an introduction to Heidegger's philosophy, (2) Seidel's work as an account of Heidegger's philosophy, and (3) the value of the work to the historian of philosophy and to the philosopher. Seidel's rejections of various al~rnative approaches to Heidegger's thought are somewhat contrived and not terribly convincing, which brings into question the author's claim tt~at Heidegger is approached least prejudicially through his interpretations of the presocratics. There are I think even more compelling reasons for rejecting Seidel's claim. In fact, there are strong reasons for rejecting his approach. I shall deal with them shortly. The author rejects an approach to Heidegger through Heidegger's Kantbuch (Kant und das Problem der Metaphysilc) because of the difficulty involved in disentangling Kant's views, Heidegger's interpretation of Kant's views, and Heidegger's own views as revealed in these interpretations. The same difficulty, however, pertains with respect to YIeidegger's interpretations of Parmenides and Heraclitus, though I suspect classical scholars will react with no small degree of indignation to the suggestion that Heidegger's interpretations of these thinkers are not easily distinguishable from what they actually said. To give but one more example, Seidel rejects an approach to tIeidegger through Hegel on the grounds that the similarities holding between the two thinkers tends to blind one to their essential differences. Now if this were truly the case, and I seriously doubt that it is, it is a very sad commentary on the capacities of historians and scholars of German philosophy. Leaving aside the fact that the reasons offered for the purpose of eliminating various alternative approaches to tteidegger are dubious, let us consider Seidel's own approach. There are at least two strong reasons for rejecting it. To begin with, it is indispensable to an understanding of Heidegger's "conversations" with past thinkers that his views on the nature of the history of philosophy be grasped. This in turn involves a commentator in that nest. of problems which center in and around I]eidegger's understanding of the nature of history. This leads one back ultimately to a discussion of Heidegger's conception of time and of temporality, for it is temporality that grounds and makes intelligible historicity and with it those sets of happenings which come to be understood as historical. Heidegger makes clear in Sein und Zeit that a proper understanding of time is necessary not only for the articulation of Being, but that it is the indespensable horizon in terms of which a phenomenological destruction--and, one might add, understanding--of the history of ontology is possible. Now Seidel is by no means unaware of this, but nonetheless he fails to give us any more than a sketchy account of Heidegger's understanding of time and temporality, and he gives us little more information with respect to history and historicity. The information he does give--at least in the case of history--is accurate enough, but it lacks that amplification and care for detail that would permit us a comprehension of the nature and significance of Heidegger... (shrink)

In this paper I venture to examine from several different (but related) perspectives the ambivalent significance of practice in Greek thought. On the one hand, philosophical culture (vita contemplative or theoria) evolves in stark opposition to political culture (vita activa). On the other hand, philosophy in the era of post-Socratic schools takes the form of a spiritual practice (askesis) oriented on the conversion or transformation of the soul of a pupil, and quite often is defined as a preparation for (...) social life (both in the ethical and political aspect). I discuss the Greek problem of anthropocentrism in the context of the critical opposition of bios theoretikos and bios politikos, special attention being paid to the internal tension between theoria (and its self-understanding) and philosophical practise as present in the schools. It is not my intention to deny the distance which separates theoria from praxis. Nevertheless, my objective is to bring out the ambivalence of the notion of theoretical contemplation in the context of Platonic dialectics. Near the end of the paper, I suggest – alluding to Nietzsche's judgment of the relation between post-Socratic and pre-Socratic philosophy – that one should approach with caution two very tempting visions of Greek philosophy. The one is the idea of alleged primacy of the practical over the theoretical in Greek philosophy. The other is the myth of the "primordial practise of the ancient sages", characterized in metaphysical terms. (shrink)

This book is a complete translation of the fragments of the pre-Socratic philosophers given in the fifth edition of Diels, Fragmente der Vorsokratiker.