There have been many hundreds of books written about humanity from ancient times to the present day, trying to describe and understand who we are in relationship to each other and the universe in which we find ourselves. Many involve asking such questions as: Is there such an entity as God? Is there such a thing as human nature? Do we have free will? What is the best type of economy and society? Quite a few of the authors claim to have found the answers and attempted to get their solutions...

'Engaging, smart and wise, Mini-Philosophy is a diverse taster menu of ideas on life, the mind and the world. Nutritious, bite-sized portions of philosophy that whet the appetite for more' - David Mitchell, author of Cloud Atlas and The Bone ClocksWhy do people enjoy watching scary movies? Should we bet on the existence of God? Why is pleasure better than pain? And when is a duck not a duck?Mini Philosophy is a fascinating journey into wha...

An apparently contradictory yet radically urgent collection of texts tracing the genealogy of a controversial current in contemporary philosophy.Accelerationism is the name of a contemporary political heresy: the insistence that the only radical political response to capitalism is not to protest, disrupt, critique, or détourne it, but to accelerate and exacerbate its uprooting, alienating, decoding, abstractive tendencies.#Accelerate presents a gen...

Like fast food, fast science is quickly prepared, not particularly good, and it clogs up the system. Efforts to tackle our most pressing issues have been stymied by conflict within the scientific community and mixed messages symptomatic of a rushed approach. What is more, scientific research is being shaped by the bubbles and crashes associated with economic speculation and the market. A focus on conformism, competitiveness, opportunism and flexibility has made it extremely difficult to pr...

Belief: surely it’s a relic from the past, a hangover from a superstitious age that is totally out of sync with today’s rational, science-led culture?'A timely, often bracing and always highly stimulating book.' Tom Holland, author of Dominion and co-host of The Rest is HistoryIn today’s science-driven, rational world, belief is dismissed as an artefact of a bygone era – something absurd at best, harmful at worst. The prev...

Originally broadcast on CBC Radio's Ideas as a series of interviews, Jacques Ellul's first-person approach here makes his ideas accessible to readers looking for new ways of understanding our society, and also gives unique new insight into Ellul's life, his work, and the origins and development of his beliefs and theories. Jacques Ellul, historian, theologian, and sociologist, was one of the foremost and widely known contemporary critics of modern technological society.

With a new Introduction by the author'An elegant and sane little book. – The New StatesmanMyths, as Mary Midgley argues in this powerful book, are everywhere. In political thought they sit at the heart of theories of human nature and the social contract; in economics in the pursuit of self interest; and in science the idea of human beings as machines, which originates in the seventeenth century, is a today a potent force. Far from being the opposite of science, how...

The new edition of this authoritative introduction to the philosophy of technology includes recent developments in the subject, while retaining the range and depth of its selection of seminal contributions and its much-admired editorial commentary.Remains the most comprehensive anthology on the philosophy of technology availableIncludes editors' insightful section introductions and critical summaries for each selectionRevised and updated t...

Does the science of evolution really prove that life, humanity, and the universe as a whole are meaningless accidents? On the contrary, as science has increasingly shown how everything in the universe is subject to evolution—including matter, life, and human culture—these very facts reveal that the process of evolution is unmistakably progressive. As we come to see how evolution has progressed throughout our cosmology, biology, and human culture, this reveals evolution’s purpose—to grow to...

No doubt the 21st century will continue to surprise us, but the battle for the soul of humanity appears to be quickening. Do we have what it takes to save ourselves from ourselves? The internet has fundamentally changed our experience of shared life, for good and bad. The spiritual and ecological exhaustion of modernity is watched and discussed in a public realm mostly controlled by private interests, where our attention is easily hijacked and vulnerable to manipulation. There is joy and h...

The eleven short, linked essays in Morality by Design represent a culmination of two decades of research and writing on the topic of moral realism. Wade Rowland first introduces readers to the basic ideas of leading moral thinkers from Plato to Leibniz to Putnam, and then explores the subject through today’s political, economic and environmental conundrums. The collection presents a strong argument against postmodern moral relativism and the idea that only science can claim a body...

The digital revolution entails that all important aspects of our existence fundamentally change: How we see the world and how we see ourselves, how we think, how we work, how we relate to and communicate with each other, and what is even possible to imagine. Everything is set in motion, which means that Philosophy must also set itself in motion. It must philosophize about its own movement, and even about movement as such. The history of who we are, where we come from, and where we are goin...