Reviews for Introducing Philosophy

The average rating for Introducing Philosophy based on 2 reviews is 2 stars.

Review # 1 was written on 2019-11-12 00:00:00 JOHN RIGOR No. I mean... just no.

Review # 2 was written on 2011-08-03 00:00:00 John Stepp This book I fear is not very objective. In any introduction to philosophy this small, the focus may be seen by the space given to certain lines of thought. The ancient Greek philosophers, with their belief in order and unity, are treated in this book as a curiosity and only certain elements of their philosophy, that help demonstrate modern philosophy, are presented. The great Aristotle, whose ideas held sway for most of the second millenium, is given very little space compared with the nineteenth century philosophers. Christianity is credited with turning philosophy into theology, when Aristotle had already united theology to metaphysics centuries earlier. The great bishop Augustine finds barely a place and Thomas of Aquino, the great scholastic philosopher and theologian, gets not more than that, although his ideas are still mainstream in current philosophy. But, now, humanism gets a hefty chunk of space and, once Descartes is mentioned, the book blooms forth. Then we may see where the author is coming from. This book isolates theology from philosophy, which I consider an error, but which is quite normal from modern 'Enlightened' philosophers, who can't trust anything more than what their eyes can see. Kant finds a lot of space in his book, but his theory of a noumenal world is quickly put down. Hegel's idea of the one 'Spirit' that guides all reality and human reason when finally revealed is also dismissed quickly. I like the presentation in this book, with the line art-work and speech bubbles. The highlighting of names and concepts makes it a good way to remember certain ideas and persons. This is a decent introduction to the major players, but is not thoroughly balanced. Get a larger book if you can.