The Form of Things: Essays of Life, Ideas and Liberty in the 21st Century

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Overview

"Grief and loneliness, depression, despair and failure—those things . . . are the common human lot at least at times in all our lives." Yet it is philosophy which, while not providing an answer to these problems, can enable people to prepare for them, and create strategies with which to deal with them. This is the fifth in a series of essay miscellanies from foremost philosopher A. C. Grayling, reflecting upon the form of the world and its multiplicity. He argues that it is only through reflecting upon the world, reading, thinking, questioning, enjoying, that one can inculcate understanding, tolerance, and the courage to live one's life. The essays are grouped by theme into reflections upon life and the standards people
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Overview

"Grief and loneliness, depression, despair and failure—those things . . . are the common human lot at least at times in all our lives." Yet it is philosophy which, while not providing an answer to these problems, can enable people to prepare for them, and create strategies with which to deal with them. This is the fifth in a series of essay miscellanies from foremost philosopher A. C. Grayling, reflecting upon the form of the world and its multiplicity. He argues that it is only through reflecting upon the world, reading, thinking, questioning, enjoying, that one can inculcate understanding, tolerance, and the courage to live one's life. The essays are grouped by theme into reflections upon life and the standards people live by, including vivid polemics and perceptive pieces on significant thinkers, contemporary rights, and liberties issues. This book brilliantly articulates the philosophical debate and reflection that is needed to prepare for life in the 21st century.

Product Details

  • ISBN-13: 9780753822234
  • Publisher: Orion Publishing Group, Limited
  • Publication date: 1/1/2008
  • Pages: 224
  • Sales rank: 1,230,097
  • Product dimensions: 5.10 (w) x 7.70 (h) x 0.60 (d)

Meet the Author

A. C. Grayling teaches philosophy at the University of London, writes a weekly column for the Guardian, and frequently contributes to The New York Times Book Review, among other publications. He is the author of many philosophy books, including The Heart of Things; Life, Sex, and Ideas; Meditations for the Humanist; The Mystery of Things; and The Reason of Things.

Table of Contents


Acknowledgements     viii
Preface     ix
Reflections
Aiming for the good     3
The beautiful and the good     9
Beauty     11
Colour     14
Dance     16
Funerals     20
Hate     22
Hedonism     24
Unfashionableness     26
Montreux     28
The death of civilisations     31
Time     35
Voyaging     38
Wah-Wah     40
Language purity, language change     43
Questions of language     49
Long life     52
Sympathy     55
The history of knowledge and ignorance     62
Perfect numbers: a fragment of a tale     75
Polemics
Answering critics     81
Biotechnology and policy     85
Moral outrage     87
Science and modern times     89
New Age religion     95
Divorce     99
Self-education     103
Face transplants     106
Faith schools     112
Fox-hunting     114
God and the European Constitution     117
Humanism and religion     121
Precept and example     125
Private China     128
Science and faith before Darwin     132
Sexually transmitted diseases     135
The responsibilities of the writer     138
The role of the intellectual     143
'Third World Literature'     145
People
Charles Darwin     151
Henry Fielding     154
George Moore     157
Kuhn and Popper     161
Mark Rothko's The Artist's Reality     164
Rochester and the libertines     167
Laurence Sterne     175
Lawrence Durrell     178
Russell on happiness     181
Voltaire's Candide, or optimism     186
Vermeer's 'Girl interrupted'     192
Horace Walpole     195
Rights and Liberties
Introduction     201
Free speech     203
Terrorism and 'incitement to religious hatred'     206
In freedom's name: the case against identity cards     212

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