Description
Have you ever wondered about why some people are jerks? Asked whether your driverless car should kill you so that others may live? Found a robot adorable? Considered the ethics of professional ethicists? Reflected on the philosophy of hair? In this engaging, entertaining, and enlightening book, Eric Schwitzgebel turns a philosopher's eye on these and other burning questions. In a series of quirky and accessible short pieces that cover a mind-boggling variety of philosophical topics, Schwitzgebel offers incisive takes on matters both small (the consciousness of garden snails) and large (time, space, and causation).
A common theme might be the ragged edge of the human intellect, where moral or philosophical reflection begins to turn against itself, lost among doubts and improbable conclusions. The history of philosophy is humbling when we see how badly wrong previous thinkers have been, despite their intellectual skills and confidence. (See, for example, "Kant on Killing Bastards, Masturbation, Organ Donation, Homosexuality, Tyrants, Wives, and Servants.") Some of the texts resist thematic categorization--thoughts on the philosophical implications of dreidels, the diminishing offensiveness of the most profane profanity, and fatherly optimism--but are no less interesting.
Schwitzgebel has selected these pieces from the more than one thousand that have appeared since 2006 in various publications and on his popular blog, The Splintered Mind, revising and updating them for this book. Philosophy has never been this much fun.
Author: Eric Schwitzgebel
Publisher: MIT Press
Published: 11/10/2020
Pages: 384
Binding Type: Paperback
Weight: 0.83lbs
Size: 7.60h x 5.00w x 1.00d
ISBN13: 9780262539593
ISBN10: 0262539594
BISAC Categories:
- Philosophy | Mind & Body
- Psychology | Cognitive Psychology & Cognition
About the Author
Eric Schwitzgebel is Professor in the Department of Philosophy at the University of California, Riverside, where he has taught since 1997. His areas of expertise include: Philosophy of Mind, Experimental Philosophy, Moral Psychology, Epistemology. He is the author or editor of five previous books, including two from MITP: Perplexities of Consciousness (2011) and Describing Inner Experience? (2007).