The Uses of Pessimism: And the Danger of False Hope

The Uses of Pessimism: And the Danger of False Hope

by Roger Scruton
The Uses of Pessimism: And the Danger of False Hope

The Uses of Pessimism: And the Danger of False Hope

by Roger Scruton

Paperback(New Edition)

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Overview

Optimism is fundamental to the human spirit and has sparked innovation across the centuries, but does it have a dark side? Renowned philosopher and author Roger Scruton argues that unchecked optimism can be dangerous—and that real happiness hinges on a healthy pessimism that recognizes the limitations of human beings.

The Uses of Pessimism is a far-reaching yet concise assessment of how pessimism can compensate for the fallacies generic to the optimistic mind-set and enable us to live with our own imperfection. Spanning from ancient Greece to the current economic crisis, the book persuasively concludes that optimists and idealists have courted disaster by overlooking the hard truths of human nature and by adopting naïve expectations about what can be changed. Scruton demonstrates how many optimism-fueled advances, from the railway to the Internet, reflect a careless pursuit of mastery that is at odds with—and often undermines—the limited happiness that is the best we can obtain. He urges us to see pessimism not as dark and fatalistic, but as a hopeful point-of-view that favors a balanced appraisal of society and human nature as opposed to utopian wishful thinking. Ultimately, pessimism helps focus our energies on the one reform we can truly master: bettering ourselves.

In the rigorous but lively style that is his trademark, Scruton throws down the gauntlet to readers, challenging everyone to reevaluate their assumptions about the meaning of pessimism. The Uses of Pessimism breaks down the fallacies surrounding the optimist's perpetually sunny worldview, offering a voice of wisdom with which to rein in hopes that might otherwise ruin us.

Product Details

ISBN-13: 9780199968978
Publisher: Oxford University Press
Publication date: 03/01/2013
Edition description: New Edition
Pages: 240
Sales rank: 927,364
Product dimensions: 6.20(w) x 9.10(h) x 1.30(d)

About the Author

Roger Scruton is Resident Fellow at the American Enterprise Institute, and Visiting Professor of Philosophy at Oxford University. He is the author of more than 30 books, including Beauty and Death-Devoted Heart: Sex and the Sacred in Wagner's Tristan and Isolde.

Table of Contents

PrefaceONE. The First-Person FutureTWO. The Best Case FallacyTHREE. The Born Free FallacyFOUR. The Utopian FallacyFIVE. The Zero Sum FallacySIX. The Planning FallacySEVEN. The Moving Spirit FallacyEIGHT. The Aggregation FallacyNINE. Defences against the TruthTEN. Our Tribal PastELEVEN. Our Civil PresentTWELVE. Our Human Future
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