• _db
    3.6k
    The Oxford Handbook of Philosophy of Mind. Got this baby for a bargain. Original price was $150, I got it for $40. Best book on philosophy of mind I've ever read.
  • S
    11.7k
    Marx's 'Das Kapital' For Beginners by Michael Wayne.
  • Agustino
    11.2k
    Philosophical Melancholy and Delirium: Hume's Pathology of Philosophy - Donald Livingston

    Very powerful book, take a look people!
  • WhiskeyWhiskers
    155
    How to be a conservative - Roger Scruton

    A book that would have been better titled, What is a conservative? Not nearly as full of 'oughtification' as the title suggests, it is a very sincere, humble, and honourable explanation of where conservative principles come from. Roger Scruton builds conservatism from the ground up by starting out of with simple facts of human nature and the human condition, and somehow, remarkably, ends with a well-rounded and coherent view of the proper function of government and the nature of civil society. He does this by admitting that there is in fact a degree of truth in each of the rivals of conservatism (titling each chapter, 'The Truth In' Nationalism, Socialism, Capitalism, Liberalism, Multiculturalism, Environmentalism, and Internationalism), then drawing these truths out and employing them as principles of the conservative philosophy itself. But in doing this he also at the same time sets out to expose the falsehoods of each of them by showing the limits of their truth, how in their fullest forms they go too far thereby losing their truth along the way and hence end up creating an unjust society and government (for example, the answer to the problems of socialism is not 'more socialism'). He argues that we must show restraint and be 'conservative' (see what I did there?) when employing each of the political tendencies of human nature, lest we lose each truth and replace it with it's falsehood.
  • Streetlight
    9.1k
    Anthony WIlden - System and Structure: Essays in Communication and Exchange
    Emanuele Coccia - Sensible Life: A Micro-Ontology of the Image
  • anonymous66
    626
    There seemed to be such hype surrounding Dennett when I read that book that I felt I must not understand it and that I was missing something. I felt vindicated when I later discovered that many felt it as unpersuasive as I did.Hanover
    I get the sense that Dennett is more of a New Atheist evangelist/apologist than a legitimate philosopher.

    I do like his thoughts on free-will. But, I think Alfred Mele is better.
  • anonymous66
    626
    I just finished Pierre Hadot's Philosophy as a Way of Life, and will soon start his book The Inner Citadel.

    I'm also reading:
    Ten Philosophical Mistakes- Adler
    Montaigne's Essays
    Selected readings by Cicero
    Working and Thinking on the Waterfront: A Journal, June 1958 to May 1959 - Eric Hoffer

    I've been reading bits and pieces of these books over the last few months...- so, I'm not sure if I'd call it "close reading".
    Fear and Trembling - Kierkegaard
    A History of Western Philosophy - Russell
    Reason and Persuasion: Three Dialogues by Plato - John Holbo
    The True Believer - Eric Hoffer
    The Righteous Mind - Haidt
  • Streetlight
    9.1k
    Arkady Plotnitsky - In The Shadow of Hegel: Complementarity, History, and the Unconscious
  • Wayfarer
    22.6k
    The Unintended Reformation: How a Religious Revolution Secularized Society
    by Brad S. Gregory https://amzn.com/0674088050
  • shmik
    207
    I never thought I'd say this again, I've been making my way through the CPR. I've encountered too many Kant and Hegel references recently that I feel I need to read Hegel (never wanted to) and refresh Kant before doing that.

    It's extremely different going through it the second time (first was about 5 years ago and I misinterpreted it almost completely). The biggest difference is knowing the terminology, Kant himself never gives good or even any explanation for a lot of the terms he uses.

    I disagree with the view that Kant is a bad writer. When you know the terms a lot of the CPR flows quite well. So far it's actually been very enjoyable much more than the secondary literature on Nietzsche and Deleuze that I've been reading lately.

    Bernstein lectures on Kant have been nice entertainment whilst driving.
  • S
    11.7k
    The Ragged Trousered Philanthropists by Robert Tressell.
  • Streetlight
    9.1k
    Karen Barad - Meeting the Universe Halfway: Quantum Physics and the Entanglement of Matter and Meaning (rereading)
    Vicki Kirby - Quantum Anthropologies: Life at Large
  • bert1
    2k
    Loud Hands, a collection of bits and pieces by autistic self-advocates, including the famous one by Jim Sinclair Don't Mourn for Us
  • Hoo
    415
    I got Bukowski's Women off the shelf. It's still great.
  • The Great Whatever
    2.2k
    Language, Truth & Logic - A. J. Ayer
    Syntactic Structures - Noam Chomsky
    Word and Object - W. V. O. Quine
    Aspects of the Theory of Syntax - Noam Chomsky
    The Atoms of Language - Mark Baker
    Categorial Grammar: Logical Syntax, Semantics, and Processing - Glyn Morrill
  • Streetlight
    9.1k
    Gilles Deleuze and Felix Guattari - What Is Philosophy?
    Jeffrey A. Bell - Deleuze and Guattari's What is Philosophy?: A Critical Introduction and Guide
    Eric Alliez - The Signature of the World: What is Deleuze and Guattari's Philosophy?

    Prep for a course I'm doing on WIP.
  • Michael
    15.6k
    I'm You're currently reading this.
  • Baden
    16.3k
    I actually clicked on that. Damn you. ;)
  • Michael
    15.6k
    Edited for accuracy.
  • andrewk
    2.1k
    Aaarrrgh. Now the site will get stuck in an infinite regress, crash, get buggy and end up an electronic wasteland like The Other Place.
  • Michael
    15.6k
    Now I want to change my name over there to Mad Max.
  • S
    11.7k
    British Labour Leaders edited by Charles Clarke & Toby James.

    I keep reading a bit from one book and then jump to the next. Anyone else do that? I should stick to one and finish it.
  • Hoo
    415
    I just bought a old copy of The Writings of Saint Paul. I'm not a believer, but I like the metaphysical Christ as a resonant symbol. The incarnation myth is profound.
    But we preach Christ crucified, unto the Jews a stumblingblock, and unto the Greeks foolishness; — Paul
    So there's a creative misreading of Paul as presenting a third option, between (as symbols) the Jews and the Greeks.
    There's also some anarchism, etc. in this:
    Christ is the end of the law. — Paul
    And so on.
  • Agustino
    11.2k
    There's also some anarchism, etc. in this:
    Christ is the end of the law.
    — Paul
    And so on.
    Hoo
    :D Not really no - that means Christ is the TELOS (goal, but often translated as end) of the law. Not the abnegation of it, but the fulfilment of it. Christ can never be opposed to the law.

    I've just finished this wonderful article! Finally something I can agree with politically!
    http://plato.stanford.edu/entries/conservatism/
  • Hoo
    415

    Actually I just read about that ambiguity. I think goal and end are both appropriate for my purposes, since I see the Law in its evolving manifestations as rungs on the ladder. But the ladder is thrown away. Of course this (for me) is "creative misreading." Or rather it doesn't matter what Paul meant. As I see it this Christ idea or personality is as radical as it gets, transcending any tradition that contingently lights it up in one's mind.

    I like some aspects of conservatism. But I just want to clarify again what I see as a separation between religion at its height and politics.
  • Agustino
    11.2k
    That it transcends may be so - but the notion of Freedom (what you term Christ) without Law is incoherent for me.
  • Hoo
    415

    The law of custom, imposed by force, will always be with us. And, yes, that creates the space of individual freedom. But I'm thinking something more along these lines: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Antinomianism
  • Agustino
    11.2k
    But I'm thinking something more along these lines: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/AntinomianismHoo
    That is incoherent to me. Whether they follow the law of Moses is precisely the verification for whether they are saved. Someone who no longer lives in sin, does not live by breaking the Law.
  • Hoo
    415

    It's OK if you disagree. This kind of disagreement is thousands of years old by now. Paul happened to be a Jew, but (as I understand it) he took mystery cults for the other half of his blended Christianity. The divine man who dies and is resurrected is ancient, as I understand it.

    Just found this quote:
    "Pre-messianically, our destinies are divided. Now to the Christian, the Jew is the incomprehensibly obdurate man who declines to see what has happened; and to the Jew, the Christian is the incomprehensibly daring man who affirms in an unredeemed world that its redemption has been accomplished. This is a gulf which no human power can bridge."
    Buber
  • The Great Whatever
    2.2k
    David Lewis - Convention: A Philosophical Study

    I sort of want to read all of Lewis' stuff, if only to see how one so sensible could have gone so mad.
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