English Philosophy

Acclaimed author Karen Swallow Prior takes fans on a guided tour through works of great literature both ancient and modern, exploring 12 virtues that philosophers and theologians throughout history have identified as most essential for good character and the good life. In reintroducing ancient virtues that are as relevant and essential today as ever, Prior draws on the best classical and Christian thinkers, including Aristotle, Aquinas, and Augustine.

We all get dressed. But how often do we pause to think about the place of clothes in our world? What unconscious thoughts do we express when we dress every day? Can a philosophy of living be wrapped up in a winter coat? Can we see a handbag not just as an object, but as an idea? Dressed is the thinking person’s book about clothes. Ranging freely from suits to shoes, from Marx’s coat to Madame X’s gown, philosopher Shahidha Bari unveils the hidden power of what we wear, addressing the deepest questions of who we are and how we choose to face the world.

This brilliantly conceived book is based on a lecture course given by Dr. Leonard Peikoff in 1976 entitled, "The Philosophy of Objectivism". The lectures were attended by Ayn Rand, who helped prepare them and who also joined Peikoff in answering questions.

Everyone has heard of DNA. But by itself, DNA is just an inert blueprint for life. It is the ribosome - an enormous molecular machine made up of a million atoms - that makes DNA come to life, turning our genetic code into proteins and therefore into us. Gene Machine is an insider account of the race for the structure of the ribosome, a fundamental discovery that both advances our knowledge of all life and could lead to the development of better antibiotics against life-threatening diseases.

In the late 1930s, legendary financier, philanthropist, and society figure Alfred Lee Loomis gathered the most visionary scientific minds of the 20th century at his state-of-the-art laboratory in Tuxedo Park, New York. He established a top-secret defense laboratory at MIT and personally bankrolled pioneering research into new, high-powered radar detection systems that helped defeat the German Air Force and U-boats. With Ernest Lawrence, he pushed Franklin Delano Roosevelt to fund research in nuclear fission, which led to the development of the atomic bomb.

Discover the timeless works of Aristotle, one of the most influential philosophers, whose insights continue to shape modern thought. The Complete Aristotle Collection is your gateway to the teachings that have endured for over two millennia.

Death is a subject obscured by fear and denial. When we do think of dying, we are more often concerned with how to avoid the pain and suffering that may accompany our death than we are with really confronting the meaning of death and how to approach it. Sushila Blackman places death - and life - in a truer perspective, by telling us of others who have left this world with dignity.

In this landmark 1984 work on free will, Daniel Dennett makes a case for compatibilism. His aim, as he writes in the preface to this new edition, was a cleanup job, "saving everything that mattered about the everyday concept of free will while jettisoning the impediments". In Elbow Room, Dennett argues that the varieties of free will worth wanting - those that underwrite moral and artistic responsibility - are not threatened by advances in science but distinguished, explained, and justified in detail.

If you’re seeking deeper love, friendship, or community, The Magic of Tiny Moments offers a transcendent path to high-trust, meaningful connection. In a world where we're lonelier than ever before, artist and researcher Jared Matthew Weiss has uncovered the hidden architecture of human connection. Drawing from behavioral science, neuroscience, and psychology, plus his groundbreaking research spanning 26 countries and 10,000 participants, Weiss offers a simple solution to cultivating better relationships.

A professor emeritus of philosophy at Princeton University, Harry G. Frankfurt penned a surprise smash hit with his New York Times best seller On Bullshit, which insightfully and wittily captured the human capacity for, and tendency toward, BS. Now he examines the other side of the coin with this equally entertaining and provocative follow-up.

A thrilling exploration of how Carl Jung found the equation for realizing the divine through personal consciousness. In 1951, Carl Jung published what he considered the highest synthesis and exposition of the transformation of Self and the discovery of the divine in one of his latest and most difficult works, Aion. The equation’s complexity and uncharacteristic elements of mysticism have caused it to fall by the wayside in traditional Jungian and psychological analysis. No major work has tackled this fascinating concept until now.

Because We Say So presents more than 30 concise, forceful commentaries on US politics and global power. Written between 2011 and 2015, Noam Chomsky's arguments forge a persuasive counternarrative to official accounts of US politics and policies during global crisis.

Despite advances in health care, infectious microbes continue to be a formidable adversary to scientists and doctors. Vaccines and antibiotics, the mainstays of modern medicine, have not been able to conquer infectious microbes because of their amazing ability to adapt, evolve, and spread to new places. Terrorism aside, one of the greatest dangers from infectious disease we face today is from a massive outbreak of drug-resistant microbes.

For more than half a century, physicists and astronomers engaged in heated dispute over the possibility of black holes in the universe. The weirdly alien notion of a space-time abyss from which nothing escapes - not even light - seemed to confound all logic. This engrossing audiobook tells the story of the fierce black hole debates and the contributions of Einstein, Hawking, and other leading thinkers who completely altered our view of the universe.

In this very thought-provoking work, Dr. Murphy covers many of the deepest issues of life (and death) that perplex the mind. The author's lucid, matter-of-fact writing style should be very helpful with the truth student's understanding of many of the seemingly abstract concepts put forward by Thomas Toward in his lectures on mental science. This audiobook is a must for all serious students of metaphysics and spiritual science.

Some people bounce back in response to setbacks; others break. We often think that these responses are hardwired, but fortunately this is not the case. Stoicism offers us an alternative approach. Plumbing the wisdom of one of the most popular and successful schools of thought from ancient Rome, philosopher William B. Irvine teaches us to turn any challenge on its head. The Stoic Challenge, then, is the ultimate guide to improving your quality of life through tactics developed by ancient Stoics, from Marcus Aurelius and Seneca to Epictetus.

The cosmopolitan political tradition in Western thought begins with the Greek Cynic Diogenes, who, when asked where he came from, responded that he was a citizen of the world. Rather than declaring his lineage, city, social class, or gender, he defined himself as a human being, implicitly asserting the equal worth of all human beings. Nussbaum pursues this "noble but flawed" vision of world citizenship as it finds expression in figures of Greco-Roman antiquity, Hugo Grotius in the 17th century, Adam Smith during the 18th century, and various contemporary thinkers.

Griffins, cyclopes, monsters, and giants - these fabulous creatures of classical mythology continue to live in the modern imagination through the vivid accounts that have come down to us from the ancient Greeks and Romans. But what if these beings were more than merely fictions? Through careful research and meticulous documentation, Adrienne Mayor convincingly shows that many of the giants and monsters of myth did have a basis in fact - in the enormous bones of long-extinct species that were once abundant in the lands of the Greeks and Romans.

In 1656, after being excommunicated from Amsterdam's Portuguese-Jewish community for "abominable heresies" and "monstrous deeds", the young Baruch Spinoza abandoned his family's import business to dedicate his life to philosophy. He quickly became notorious across Europe for his views on God, the Bible, and miracles, as well as for his uncompromising defense of free thought. Yet the radicalism of Spinoza's views has long obscured that his primary reason for turning to philosophy was to answer one of humanity's most urgent questions....

Nobody needs to be told there isn’t enough time. Whether we’re starting our own business, or trying to write a novel during our lunch break, or staring down a pile of deadlines as we’re planning a vacation, we’re obsessed with our lengthening to-do lists, overfilled inboxes, work-life balance, and ceaseless struggle against distraction. We’re deluged with advice on becoming more productive and efficient and life hacks to optimize our days.