Jean-Jacques Rousseau has a claim to be ranked above even Karl Marx as the political philosopher who has most influenced everyday life. His much-read philosophy of education alone would qualify him for a high place, but his political theory is even more important: decisions affecting millions of people were made based on the reading of certain lines of the Social Contract. Yet while politicians and scholars have studied this book for 250 years, almost no agreement exists on how to interpret its central concept: freedom. Rousseau's theory of freedom has led him to be called everything from the greatest prophet of individual liberty to the designer of the first totalitarian state. This book offers a new, unifying interpretation of the theory of freedom in the Social Contract. Simpson gives a careful analysis of Rousseau's theory of the social pact, and then examines the kinds of freedom that it brings about, showing how Rousseau's individualist and collectivist aspects fit into a larger and logically coherent theory of human liberty. Simpson's book not only helps us to understand one of the pre-eminent political minds of the 18th century, but also brings us into closer conversation with those he influenced, who have done so much to shape our world. And in light of the interest in contemporary contractualist philosophers like Rawls, Scanlon, and Gauthier, readers will find it worthwhile to return to the thinker who offers one of the most radical, profound, and insightful theories of the social contract ever devised.

Since the nineteenth century, moral philosophy in the Western world has been dominated by utilitarianism, Kantianism, and relativism. Only a few philosophers have been able to escape from this Procrustean bed. Foremost among these few is Nicolai Hartmann (1882-1950). Together with Henri Bergson and Martin Heidegger, Hartmann was instrumental in restoring metaphysics. Hartmann's metaphysics differs markedly from that of both Bergson and Heidegger, in his indebtedness to Plato.

In 1926, Hartmann published a massive treatise, "Ethik," which was translated into English by Stanton Coit and published as "Ethics" in 1932. "Ethics" is probably the most outstanding treatise on moral philosophy in the twentieth century. The central concept of the book is "value." Drawing upon the pre-modern view of ethics, Hartmann maintains that values are objectively given, part and parcel of the order of being. We cannot invent values, we can merely discover them.

The first part of "Ethics" is concerned with the structure of ethical phenomena and criticizes utilitarianism, Kantianism, and relativism as misleading approaches. After some introductory thoughts concerning the competence of practical philosophy, Hartmann discusses the essence of moral values, including their absoluteness and ideal being, and the essence of the "ought." Hartmann is both controversial and compelling. He provides a moral philosophy that rejects the subjectivism of the ruling approaches, without taking recourse to older theological notions on the foundation of the ethical. In sum: Hartmann's Ethics constitutes an impressive and preeminent contribution to moral philosophy.

John Stuart Mill's thought has been central in works discussing the relationship between liberalism and nationality and in shaping liberal attitudes towards nationality. This book provides a thorough study of Mill's ideas, and aims to clarify some of the misconceptions surrounding his writings on nationalism. The book examines notions of 'liberal nationalism', the importance of race, national character and politics, international relations, self-determination, and foreign policy. Varouxakis' comprehensive work is an important contribution to scholarship in the history of political thought and intellectual history, as well as contributing to the current debates regarding nationhood, nationalism, patriotism, and the meaning of 'Englishness'.

eBook available with sample pages: 0203164156

Best known for having declared the death of God, Nietzsche was a thinker thoroughly absorbed in the Christian tradition in which he was born and raised. Yet while the atheist Nietzsche is well known, the pious Nietzsche is seldom recognised and rarely understood.Redeeming Nietzsche examines the residual theologian in the most vociferous of atheists.
Fraser demonstrates that although Nietzsche rejected God, he remained obsessed with the question of human salvation. Examining his accounts of art, truth, morality and eternity, Nietzsche's thought is revealed to be a series of experiments in redemption.

In this clear, critical examination of the ideas of one of the greatest and most influential of modern philosophers, M.J. Inwood makes Hegel's arguments fully accessible. He reconstructs Hegel's thought throughout the book by arguing with him, considering Hegel's system as a whole and examining the wide range of problems that it was designed to solve - metaphysical, epistemological, theological and political.
Inwood concentrates especially on the logical and metaphysical ideas which underpin the system and which supply the key to understanding much of what is obscure in Hegel's thought. He examines Hegel's arguments and restates his views precisely and clearly. He also conveys the impressive unity of Hegel's system and its links with the thought of such philosophers as Aristotle, Spinoza and Kant.

While Nietzsche's works and ideas are relevant across the many branches of philosophy, the themes of contest and conflict have been mostly overlooked. Conflict and Contest in Nietzsche's Philosophy redresses this situation, arguing for the importance of these issues throughout Nietzsche's work. The volume has three key lines of inquiry: Nietzsche's ontology of conflict; Nietzsche's conception of the agon; and Nietzsche's warrior-philosophy. Under these three umbrellas is a collection of insightful and provocative essays considering, among other topics, Nietzsche's understanding of resistance; his engagement with classical thinkers alongside his contemporaries, including Jacob Burckhardt; his views on language, metaphor and aphorism; and war, revolt and terror. In bringing together such topics, Conflict and Contest in Nietzsche's Philosophy seeks to correct the one-sided tendencies within the existing literature to read simply 'hard' and 'soft' analyses of conflict. Written by scholars across the Anglophone and the European traditions, within and beyond philosophy, this collection emphasises the entire problematic of conflict in Nietzsche's thought and its relation to his philosophical and literary practice.

This book bears witness to the current reawakening of interest in Reid's philosophy. It first examines Reid's negative attack on the Way of Ideas, and finds him to be a devastating critic of his predecessors. Turning to the positive part of Reid's programme, the author then develops a fresh interpretation of Reid as an anticipator of present-day 'reliabilism'.
Throughout the book, Reid is presented as a powerful thinker with much to say to philosophers in the twenty-first century. The book will be of interest not only to Reid scholars and historians of philosophy, but also to specialists and students in contemporary epistemology.

eBook available with sample pages: 0203166205

With a new introduction by Alan Sica. Giambattista Vico (1668-1744) is often regarded as the beleaguered, neglected genius of pre-Enlightenment Naples. His work-though known to Herder, Coleridge, Matthew Arnold, and Michelet-widely and deeply appreciated only during the twentieth century. Although Vico may be best known for the use James Joyce made of his theories in Finnegans Wake, Croce's insightful analysis of Vico's ideas played a large role in alerting readers to his unique voice. Croce's volume preceded Joyce's creation of "Mr. John Baptister Vickar" by a quarter century. During the last 25 years Vico's ideas about history, language, anti-Cartesian epistemology, and rhetoric have begun to receive the recognition their admirers have long claimed they deserve. Increasing numbers of publications appear annually which bear the stamp of Vico's thinking. Even if he is not yet so renowned as some of his contemporaries, such as Locke, Voltaire, or Montesquieu, there are good reasons to believe that in the future he will be equally honored as a cultural theorist. As a theorist of historical process and its language, there is no more innovative voice than his until the twentieth century-which explains in part why such figures as Joyce and R.G. Collingwood freely drew on Vico's work, particularly his New Science, while creating their own. If Vico was Naples' most brilliant, if uncelebrated, citizen prior to the Enlightenment taking hold in Southern Italy, then Croce (1866-1952) is surely the city's most important thinker of modern times, and the single indispensable Italian philosopher since Vico's death. When a genius of Croce's interpretative prowess, evaluates the work of another, it is inevitable that an explosive mixture will result. A great virtue of this book is its fusion of Croce's unique brand of idealism and aesthetic philosophy with Vico's epistemological, ethical, and historical theories. If Vico's theory of cyclical changes in history, the corsi e ricorsi, remains fruitful, it might be argued that Croce's evaluation of his countryman' ideas represented the next turn of the philosophical wheel toward enlightenment.

Examining the significance of Kant's account of "rational faith," this study argues that he profoundly revises his account of the human will and the moral philosophy of it in his later religious writings.

This book highlights Kant's fundamental contrast between the mechanistic and dynamical conceptions of matter, which is central to his views about the foundations of physics, and is best understood in terms of the contrast between objects of sensibility and things in themselves.

Addresses the nature of the influence of the European Enlightenment on the beliefs and practice of the Protestant missionaries who went to Asia and Africa from the mid-eighteenth century onwards, particularly British missions and the formative role of the Scottish Enlightenment on their thinking.

What is the je-ne-sais-quoi? How-if at all-can it be put into words? In addressing these questions, Richard Scholar offers the first full-length study of the je-ne-sais-quoi and its fortunes in early modern Europe. He describes the rise and fall of the expression as a noun and as a topic of debate, examines its cluster of meanings, and uncovers the scattered traces of its 'pre-history'. The je-ne-sais-quoi is often assumed to belong purely to the realm of the literary, but in the early modern period it serves to articulate problems of knowledge in natural philosophy, the passions, and culture, and for that reason it is approached here from an interdisciplinary perspective. Placing major figures of the period such as Montaigne, Shakespeare, Descartes, Corneille, and Pascal alongside some of their lesser-known contemporaries, Scholar argues that the je-ne-sais-quoi serves above all to capture first-person encounters with a 'certain something' that is as difficult to explain as its effects are intense. When early modern writers use the expression in this way, he suggests, they give literary form to an experience that twenty-first-century readers may recognize as something like their own.

The arguments advanced in the second chapter of On Liberty (1859) have become the touchstone for practically every discussion of freedom of speech, yet the broader development of John Stuart Mill's ideas concerning intellectual liberty has generally been neglected. This work attempts to fill that lacuna by looking beyond On Liberty, in order to understand the evolution of Mill's ideas concerning freedom of thought and discussion.

eBook available with sample pages: 0203164873

This book is a systematic and historical exploration of the philosophical significance of grammar. In the first half of the twentieth century, and in particular in the writings of Frege, Husserl, Russell, Carnap and Wittgenstein, there was sustained philosophical reflection on the nature of grammar, and on the relevance of grammar to metaphysics, logic and science.

eBook available with sample pages: 0203208501

George Berkeley is one of the most prominent philosophers of the eighteenth century. His Principles of Human Knowledge has become a focal point in the understanding of empiricist thought and the development of eighteenth century philosophy.
This volume introduces and assesses:
* Berkeley's life and the background to the Principles
* The ideas and text in the Principles
* Berkeley's continuing importance to philosophy.


eBook available with sample pages: 0203358538

This original reassessment of Descartes' work reinserts it in its contemporary ethical and theological context. Davies explores the notion of intellectual virtue in the context of Descartes' overall inquiry and argues for a new approach to Descartes' ideas of scepticism and the sciences. The book also offers fresh interpretations of key passages of the Meditations.

eBook available with sample pages: 0203420632

David Hume was the most important British philosopher of the eighteenth century. His Dialogues Concerning Natural Religion is a classic text in the philosophy of religion.
Hume on Religion introduces and asseses:
*Hume's life and the background to the Dialogues *the ideas and text of Dialogues *Hume's continuing importance to philosophy.

eBook available with sample pages: 0203182057

John Locke (1632-1704) is perhaps the greatest philosopher in the English language. A political activist in a revolutionary age, Locke's prolific correspondence opens up the cultural, social, intellectual, and political worlds of the later Stuart era. Spanning half a century, the letters trace the transition from Puritanism to the Enlightenment. A man of insatiable curiosity, Locke's letters encompass science (his correspondents include Isaac Newton and Robert Boyle), education, travel, religion, and the birth of the British empire.

Series Information:
Studies in Ethics

In this long-awaited volume, David B. Allison argues for a "generous" approach to Nietzsche's writings, and then provides comprehensive analyses of Nietzsche's The Birth of Tragedy, The Gay Science, On the Genealogy of Morals, and Thus Spoke Zarathustra. Unique among other books on Nietzsche, Allison's text includes individual chapters devoted to Nietzsche's principal works. Historically-oriented and continentally-informed, Allison's readings draw on French and German thinkers, such as Heidegger, Battaille, Derrida, Birault, and Deleuze, while the author explicitly resists the use of jargon that frequently characterizes those approaches. Reading the New Nietzsche is an outstanding resource for those reading Nietzsche for the first time as well as for those who wish to know him better.

In this long-awaited volume, David B. Allison argues for a 'generous' approach to Nietzsche's writings, and then provides comprehensive analyses of Nietzsche's The Birth of Tragedy, The Gay Science, On the Genealogy of Morals, and Thus Spoke Zarathustra. Unique among other books on Nietzsche, Allison's text includes individual chapters devoted to Nietzsche's principal works. Historically-oriented and continentally-informed, Allison's readings draw on French and German thinkers, such as Heidegger, Battaille, Derrida, Birault, and Deleuze, while the author explicitly resists the use of jargon that frequently characterizes those approaches. Reading the New Nietzsche is an outstanding resource for those reading Nietzsche for the first time as well as for those who wish to know him better.

Dismissing the notion that the two camps are ideologically opposed and thus incompatible, these essays demonstrate an exciting new scholarship that confidently mixes the empiricism of Enlightenment thought with a strong postmodernist scepticism, painting a subtler and richer historical canvas.

Contents:
Introduction
Mechanics and Cosmology
1. Descartes and the natural philosophy of the Coimbra commentaries Dennis Des Chene
2. Descartes' debt to Beeckman: inspiration, cooperation, conflict Klaas Van Berkel
3. The foundational role of hydrostatics and statics in Descartes' natural philosophy Stephen Gaukroger
4. Force, determination and impact Peter MaLaughlin
5. A different Descartes: Descartes' programme for a mathematical physics in his correspondence Daniel Garber
6. Casual powers and occasionalism from Descartes to Malebranche Desmond Clarje
7. Modelling nature: Descartes versus Reigus Theo Verbeek
8. The influence of Cartesian cosmology in England Peter Harrison
Method, Optics, and the Role of Experiment
9. NeoAristotle and method: between Zabarella and Descartes Timothy Reiss
10. Figuring things out: figurate problem-solving in the early Descartes Dennis Sepper
11. The theory of the rainbow Jean-Robert Armogathe
12. Descartes' opticien: the construction of the law of refraction and the manufacture of its physical rationales, 1618-1629 John A. Schuster
13. A 'science for honnêteshommes': La Recherche de la Vérité and the deconstruction of experimental knowledge Alberto Guillermo Ranea
14. Descartes, experiments, and a first generation Cartesian, Jacques Rohault Trevor McLaughlin
15. Cartesian physiology Annie Bitbol-Hesperies
16. The resources of a mechanist physiology and the problem of goal-directed processes Stephen Gaukroger
17. Bêtes machines Katherine Morris
18. Descartes' cardiology and its reception in English physiology Peter Anstey
Imagination and Representation
19. Descartes' theory of imagination and perspectival art Betsy Newell Decyk
20. From sparks of truth to the glow of possibility Peter Schouls
21. Descartes' theory of visual spatial perception Celia Wolf-Devine
22. Symposium on Descartes on perceptual cognition. Introduction John Sutton
Descartes and Formal Signs David Behan
Descartes' startling doctrine of the reverse sign relation Peter Slezak
Bibliography

Contents:
Preface Acknowledgments 1. Technology and Aggregate Demand in J. S. Mill's Economic System 2. The Role of Fixed Technical Coefficients in the Evolution of the Wages-Fund Controversy 3. Ricardianism, J. S, Mill and the Neo-Classical Challenge 4. On John Stuart Mill's Defence of Ricardian Economics 5. William Whewell and John Stuart Mill on the Methodology of Political Economy 6. `Dynamic Equilibrium' with Constant Wages: J. S. Mill's Malthusian Analysis of the Secular Wage Path 7. J .S. Mill on `Derived Demand' and the Wage-Fund Theory Recantation 8. Exogenous Factors and Classical Economics 9. The Relevance of John Stuart Mill; Some Implications for Modern Economics 10. John Stuart Mill as Economic Theorist 11. Commentary on `John Stuart Mill Interpretation Since Schumpeter' 12. John Stuart Mill's Methods in Principle and Practice: A Review of the Evidence (with Sandra Peart) 13. On J. S. Mill's Defence of Ricardo's Proportionality Theorum: A Longfield Connection?

Offers a reading of some of the lesser known and less lucid aspects of Kantian thought. Diane Morgan focuses her investigation on a reappraisal of Kant's writings on architecture, monarchy and faith in progress. Throughout her study Morgan challenges the widely held view of Kant as the exponent of concrete and rigid rationality and argues that his airtight "architectonic" mode of reasoning, which Kant identified in "The Critique of Pure Reason", overlooks certain topics which destabilize it. Themes such as temporary forms of architecture, like landscape gardening; examples which undermine the autonomy of the Kantian subject, for example freemasonry; and the concept of radical evil suggest that Kant's thought was capable of accommodating troubling and subversive themes. Morgan's discussion arrives at a perspective on Kant whereby he is no longer to be regarded as a concrete rationalist but as a daring thinker, not afraid to entertain ideas highly threatening to his own system and to the humanistic legacy of the Enlightenment.