One of the most widely adopted texts in the field, Philosophy: The Power of Ideas offers a topical introduction to philosophy within an overarching historical framework. The goal of the authors is to make philosophy understandable while not oversimplifying the material, showing that philosophy contains powerful ideas that affect the lives of real people.
1. Powerful Ideas / What is Philosophy? / Misconceptions about Philosophy / The Tools of Philosophy: Argument and Logic / The Divisions of Philosophy / The Benefits of Philosophy /
PART I. METAPHYSICS AND EPISTEMOLOGY: EXISTENCE AND KNOWLEDGE
2. The Pre-Socratics
The Milesians / Pythagoras / Heraclitus and Parmenides / Empedocles and Anaxagoras / The Atomists /
3. Socrates, Plato
Socrates / Plato /
Selection 3.1: Plato, Republic /
Selection 3.2: Plato, Meno /
4. Aristotle
What Is It to Be? / Aristotle and the Theory of Forms / Pure Actuality / Essence and Existence / Ten Basic Categories / The Three Souls / Aristotle's Theory of Knowledge / Logic /
Selection 4.1: Aristotle, Metaphysics
5. Philosophers of the Hellenistic and Christian Eras
Metaphysics in the Roman Empire / The Middle Ages and Aquinas /
Selection 5.1: St. Augustine, Confessions /
6. The Rise of Modern Metaphysics and Epistemology
Descartes and Dualism / Hobbes and Materialism / The Alternative Views of Conway, Spinoza, and Leibniz / The Idealism of Locke and Berkeley /
Selection 6.1: René Descartes, Meditations on First Philosophy /
Selection 6.2 George Berkeley, Treatise Concerning the Principles of Human Knowledge /
7. The Eighteenth and Nineteenth Centuries
David Hume / Immanuel Kant / The Nineteenth Century /
Selection 7.1: David Hume, An Enquiry Concerning Human Understanding /
Selection 7.2: Immanuel Kant, Critique of Pure Reason /
Selection 7.3: Georg Hegel, The Philosophy of History /
Selection 7.4: Arthur Schopenhauer, The World As Will and Representation /
8. The Continental Tradition
Existentialism / Two Existentialists / Phenomenology /
Selection 8.1: Jean-Paul Sartre, Existentialism and Humanism /
Selection 8.2: Albert Camus, The Myth of Sisyphus /
9. The Pragmatic and Analytic Traditions
Pragmatism / Analytic Philosophy / The Philosophy of the Mind /
Selection 9.1: A. J. Ayer, The Elimination of Metaphysics /
Selection 9.2: J. J. C. Smart, Sensations and Brain Processes /
Selection 9.3: Richard Rorty, Objectivity, Relativism, and Truth /
PART II. MORAL AND POLITICAL PHILOSOPHY
10. Moral Philosophy
Skepticism, Relativism, and Subjectivism / Egoism / Hedonism / The Five Main Ethical Frameworks / The Early Greeks / Epicureanism and Stoicism / Christianizing Ethics / Hobbes and Hume / Kant / The Utilitarians / Friedrich Nietzsche /
Selection 10.1: Plato, Gorgias /
Selection 10.2: Epicurus, Epicurus to Menoeceus /
Selection 10.3: Epictetus, The Encheiridion /
Selection 10.4: Immanuel Kant, Foundations of the Metaphysics of Morals /
Selection 10.5: John Stuart Mill, Utilitarianism /
Selection 10.6: Friedrich Nietzsche, Beyond Good and Evil /
11. Political Philosophy
Plato and Aristotle / Natural Law Theory and Contractarian Theory / Two Other Contractarian Theorists / American Constitutional Theory / Classic Liberalism and Marxism /
Selection 11.1: Thomas Hobbes, Leviathan /
Selection 11.2: John Stuart Mill, On Liberty /
Selection 11.3: Karl Marx and Friedrich Engels, Communist Manifesto /
12. Recent Moral and Political Philosophy
G. E. Moore / Normative Ethics and Metaethics / W. D. Ross / Emotivism and Beyond / John Rawls, A Contemporary Liberal / Robert Nozick's Libertarianism / Communitarian Responses to Rawls / Herbert Marcuse, A Contemporary Marxist / "Isms" /
Selection 12.1: James Rachels, Killing and Starving to Death /
Selection 12.2: John Rawls, A Theory of Justice /
Selection 12.3: Robert Nozick, Anarchy, State, and Utopia /
PART III. PHILOSOPHY OF RELIGION: REASON AND FAITH
13. Philosophy and Belief in God
Two Christian Greats / Mysticism / Seventeenth-Century Perspectives / Eighteenth-Century Perspectives / Nineteenth-Century Perspectives / Twentieth-Century Perspectives /
Selection 13.1: St. Anselm, Proslogion /
Selection 13.2: St. Thomas Aquinas, Summa Theologica /
Selection 13.3: Friedrich Nietzsche, The Gay Science /
Selection 13.4: Antony Flew, Theology and Falsification /
Selection 13.5: Mary Daly, After the Death of God the Father /
PART IV. OTHER VOICES
14. Feminist Philosphy
The First Wave / The Second Wave /
Selection 14.1: Mary Wollstonecraft, A Vindication of the Rights of Women /
Selection 14.2: Simone de Beavoir, The Second Sex /
Selection 14.3: Marielouise Janssen-Jurreit, Sexism: The Male Monopoly on History and Thought /
Selection 14.4: Sandra Harding, Should the History and Philosophy of Science Be X-Rated? /
Selection 14.5: Susan Moller Okin, Justice, Gender, and the Family /
Selection 14.6: Karen J. Warren, The Power and the Promise of Ecological Feminism /
15. An Era of Suspicion
Jürgen Habermas / Michel Foucault / Structuralism versus Deconstruction / Richard Rorty /
Selection 15.1: Michel Foucault, The History of Sexuality /
Selection 15.2: Michel Foucault, Madness and Civilization /
Selection 15.3: Jürgen Habermas, Toward a Rational Society / Selection 15.4: Richard Rorty, Philosophy and Social Hope /
16. Eastern Influences
Hinduism / Buddhism / Taoism / Conficianism / Zen Buddhism in China and Japan / The Philosophy of the Samurai (c. 1100-1900) /
Selection 16.1: Confucius, Analects /
Selection 16.2: Buddha, The Eightfold Path /
17. Post-Colonial Thought
Historical Background / Africa / The Americas / South Asia /
Selection 17.1: Léopold Sédar Senghor, On African Socialism /
Selection 17.2: Martin Luther King, Jr., The Sword that Heals /
Selection 17.3: Carlos Astrada, Existentialism and the Crisis of Philosophy /
Selection 17.4: Francisco Miró Quesada, Man without Theory /
Selection 17.5: Sonia Saldivar-Hull, Feminism on the Border: From Gender Politics to Geopolitics /
Selection 17.6: Mohandas K. Gandhi, Satyagraha /
Selection 17.7: Rabindranath Tagore, Towards Universal Man
