Philosophy in 40 Ideas: Lessons for life

by The School of Life, Alain de Botton (Editor)

Overview

A thought-provoking introduction to philosophy through 40 key ideas.

This book artfully draws together forty of the greatest and most useful ideas found in philosophy, taking us on a journey around key concepts from both Eastern and Western cultures.

Exploring relevant issues like work, love, anxiety, self-knowledge, and happiness, this essential guide reminds us of the wit, humanity, and relevance of great philosophers including Nietzsche, Heidegger, Confucius, Lao Tzu, and Buddha.

• PHILOSOPHY FOR EVERYDAY LIFE
• 40 KEY CONCEPTS presented in short, poetic chapters.
• ANCIENT WISDOM, CONTEMPORARY APPLICATION explains how philosophy is still applicable today.
• FULLY ILLUSTRATED THROUGHOUT

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9781912891580
Publisher:	The School of Life
Publication date:	10/29/2020
Sold by:	Barnes & Noble
Format:	eBook
File size:	9 MB

About the Author

The School of Life is a global organization helping people lead more fulfilled lives. Through our range of books, gifts and stationery we aim to prompt more thoughtful natures and help everyone to find fulfillment.

The School of Life is a resource for exploring self-knowledge, relationships, work, socializing, finding calm, and enjoying culture through content, community, and conversation. You can find us online, in stores and in welcoming spaces around the world offering classes, events, and one-to-one therapy sessions.

The School of Life is a rapidly growing global brand, with over 7 million YouTube subscribers, 389,000 Facebook followers, 174,000 Instagram followers and 166,000 Twitter followers.

The School of Life Press brings together the thinking and ideas of the School of Life creative team under the direction of series editor, Alain de Botton. Their books share a coherent, curated message that speaks with one voice: calm, reassuring, and sane.

The School of Life is a global organization helping people lead more fulfilled lives. Through our range of books, gifts and stationery we aim to prompt more thoughtful natures and help everyone to find fulfillment. The School of Life is a resource for exploring self-knowledge, relationships, work, socializing, finding calm, and enjoying culture through content, community, and conversation. You can find us online, in stores and in welcoming spaces around the world offering classes, events, and one-to-one therapy sessions.

The School of Life is a rapidly growing global brand, with over 5 million YouTube subscribers, 343,000 Facebook followers, 183,000 Instagram followers and 160,000 Twitter followers.

The School of Life Press brings together the thinking and ideas of the School of Life creative team under the direction of series editor, Alain de Botton. Their books share a coherent, curated message that speaks with one voice: calm, reassuring, and sane.

Read an Excerpt

4. Democracy

DEMOCRACY IS A BEAUTIFUL IDEA everyone’s vote is equal, whatever their income or education. It feels wicked to say anything against it. Yet democracy is obviously a touch unreasonable – and the Greek philosophers knew it. Plato said so most clearly in The Republic: it is impossible that every person’s view can be equally astute. A democratic vote is like the captain of a ship having to consult every passenger about the best course to chart through an approaching storm. For admirable reasons, we are committed to a political system that is problematic. According to Plato, the solution should be intense universal education to foster wisdom in everyone. We cannot allow everyone to vote until everyone has learnt to think. Till then, we need to laugh at the tragi-comic nature of our predicament. There will be a lot of erratic choices. The Ancient Greek philosophers – whom we mistakenly believe all loved democracy – had a clear-eyed view of the many problems that might crop up. After all, they invented the word ‘demagogue’ to describe a political leader who, in a democracy, sweeps into power by collecting votes through appeals to the lower passions rather than to higher reason.

30. Bamboo as wisdom

EAST ASIA HAS BEEN CALLED the Bamboo Civilisation, not merely because bamboo has been widely used in daily life, but also because its symbolic qualities have been described and celebrated for hundreds of years in the philosophy of Daoism. Bamboo is classified as a grass rather than a tree, yet it is tall and strong enough to create groves and forests. Unlike a tree trunk, the stems of bamboo are hollow, but its inner emptiness is a source of its vigour. It bends in storms, sometimes almost to the ground, but then springs back resiliently. We should, says Lao Tzu, ‘become as bamboo is’. The greatest painter of bamboo was the Daoist poet, artist and philosopher Zheng Xie of the Qing Dynasty. Zheng Xie is said to have painted 800 pictures of bamboo forests, seeing in them a perfect model of how a wise person might behave. Beside one pen and ink drawing of bamboo, he wrote in elegant script: ‘Hold fast to the mountain, take root in a broken-up bluff, grow stronger after tribulations, and withstand the buffeting wind from all directions.’ It was a message addressed to bamboo but meant, of course, for all of us.

Table of Contents

1. Know yourself
2. Philo-sophia
3. Eudaimonia
4. Democracy
5. Eros and philia
6. ‘What need is there to weep over parts of life? The whole of it calls for tears’
7. Peccatum originale
8. ‘Kings and philosophers shit, and so do ladies’
9. ‘All our unhappiness comes from our inability to sit alone in our room’
10. Sub specie aeternitatis
11. Machiavellianism
12. Aus so krummem Holze, als woraus der Mensch gemacht ist, kann nichts ganz Gerades gezimmert werden. [‘Out of the crooked timber of humanity, no straight thing was ever made.’]
13. The Hegelian dialectic of history
14. ‘God is dead’
15. The Sublime
16. The Wealth of Nations
17. Existential Angst
18. Bad faith
19. The Myth of Sisyphus
20. Being and Time
21. The Vinegar-Tasters
22. Zhōng/Loyalty
23. The Five Virtues
24. The life of Confucius
25. Life is suffering
26. Mettā/Benevolence
27. Guanyin
28. Wu Wei/Not making an effort
29. Water as wisdom
30. Bamboo as wisdom
31. Kintsugi/Hope in brokenness
32. Wabi sabi/Loving the imperfect
33. Gongshi/Spirit stones
34. Yinshi/A recluse
35. Ikebana/Flower arranging
36. Tea ceremony
37. Haiku
38. Gravel raking
39. Mono No Aware/The pathos of things
40. Shufa/Calligraphy