Descartes's works are often treated as a unified, unchanging whole. But in Descartes's Changing Mind, Peter Machamer and J. E. McGuire argue that the philosopher's views, particularly in natural philosophy, actually change radically between his early and later works--and that any interpretation of Descartes must take account of these changes. The first comprehensive study of the most significant of these shifts, this book also provides a new picture of the development of Cartesian...

An invaluable introduction to the leading French intellectual of the twentieth centuryThe Wisdom of Sartre offers key excerpts from the eloquent French writer, playwright, and philosopher's masterpiece, Being and Nothingness. From this collection, readers will discover the strongest themes in his early philosophical work: an ontological account of what it means to be human, and the role of perception, knowledge, and consciousness in the practical ...

Revisit one of the most important pillars in modern philosophy with this new English translation—the first in more than 60 years—of Jean-Paul Sartre’s seminal treatise on existentialism. “This is a philosophy to be reckoned with, both for its own intrinsic power and as a profound symptom of our time” (The New York Times).In 1943, Jean-Paul Sartre published his masterpiece, Being and Nothingness, and laid the foundation of his legacy as one of the ...

Of all the works of the man claimed by many as the father of modern philosophy, the MEDITATIONS, first published in 1641, must surely be Rene Descartes' masterpiece. This volume consists of not only a new translation of the original Latin text and the expanded objections and replies, but also includes selected correspondence and other metaphysical writings from the period 1641-49.

Insight is Bernard Lonergan's masterwork. It aim is nothing less than insight into insight itself, a comprehensive view of knowledge and understanding, and to state what one needs to understand and how one proceeds to understand it.In Lonergan's own words: 'Thoroughly understand what it is to understand, and not only will you understand the broad lines of all there is to be understood but also you will possess a fixed base, and invariant pattern, opening upon all further d...

The complete transformation which philosophical thought in Germany has undergone in the last twenty-five years and the higher standpoint reached by spirit in its awareness of itself, have had but little influence as yet on the structure of logic. That which, prior to this period, was called metaphysics has been, so to speak, extirpated root and branch and has vanished from the ranks of the sciences. The ontology, rational psychology, cosmology, yes even natural theology, of former times-wh...

First published in France in 1936 as a journal article, The Transcendence of the Ego was one of Jean-Paul Sartre's earliest philosophical publications. When it appeared, Sartre was still largely unknown, working as a school teacher in provincial France and struggling to find a publisher for his most famous fictional work, Nausea.The Transcendence of the Ego is the outcome of Sartre's intense engagement with the philosophy of Edmund Husserl, the founder of...

An "excellent translation" of an essential text by the author of Being and Time, in which he continues his pioneering work in phenomenology ( Times Literary Supplement, UK).A lecture course that Martin Heidegger gave in 1927, The Basic Problems of Phenomenology continues and extends explorations begun in Being and Time. In this text, Heidegger provides the general outline of his thinking about the fundamental problems of philosophy, which he treats...

The knowledge of Mind is the highest and hardest, just because it is the most ‘concrete’ of sciences. The significance of that ‘absolute’ commandment, Know thyself — whether we look at it in itself or under the historical circumstances of its first utterance — is not to promote mere self-knowledge in respect of the particular capacities, character, propensities, and foibles of the single self. The knowledge it commands means that of man’s genuine reality — of what is essentially and ultima...

When it is taught today, metaphysics is often presented as a fragmented view of philosophy that ignores the fundamental issues of its classical precedents. Eschewing these postmodern approaches, W. Norris Clarke finds an integrated vision of reality in the wisdom of Aquinas and here offers a contemporary version of systematic metaphysics in the Thomistic tradition. The One and the Many presents metaphysics as an integrated whole which draws on Aquinas' themes, structure, and insig...

This collection of essays is a compilation of the thought and work of W. Norris Clarke, S.J., a philosopher inspired by the Thomistic tradition, who in 45 years of teaching and writing has delved into many of the central problems of perennial philosophy and made a significant contribution to the ongoing history of American Thomism.The essays presented here reflect an internal unity-each essay deliberately building on the positions put forth in the preceding ones-as they progress sy...

In this remarkable work, Gilles Deleuze, the renowned French philosopher, reflects on one of the thinkers of the past who most influenced his own sweeping reconfiguration of the tasks of philosophy. For Deleuze, Spinoza, along with Nietzsche and Lucretius, conceived of philosophy as an enterprise of liberation and radical demystification. He locates in Spinoza “a set of affects, a kinetic determination, an impulse” and makes Spinoza into “an encounter, a passion.”Expressionism ...