The new edition of this celebrated anthology surveys the Western philosophical tradition from its origins in ancient Greece to the work of today’s leading philosophers*Western Philosophy: An Anthology *provides an authoritative guided tour through the great tradition of Western philosophical thought. The seminal writings of the great philosophers along with more recent readings of contemporary interest are explored in 144 substantial and carefully chosen extracts, ...

Descartes's Meditations on First Philosophy remains one of the most widely studied works of Western philosophy. This volume is a refreshed and updated edition of John Cottingham's bestselling 1996 edition, based on his translation in the acclaimed three-volume Cambridge edition of The Philosophical Writings of Descartes. It presents the complete text of Descartes's central metaphysical masterpiece, the Meditations, in clear, readable modern English, and it offers the reader additional mate...

How our beliefs about the soul have developed through the ages, and why an understanding of it still matters todayThe concept of the soul has been a recurring area of exploration since ancient times. What do we mean when we talk about finding our soul, how do we know we have one, and does it hold any relevance in today’s scientifically and technologically dominated society? From Socrates and Augustine to Darwin and Freud, In Search of the Soul takes reader...

From an early age Gareth has loved to draw and that passion continues to this day. It's something he still can't believe he gets to do for a living. He's worked on a wide range of projects from greeting cards, editorial illustration and children's books. When he's not working, Gareth enjoys football, gaming and movies.Why do we exist? Is there a God? What's the point of it all? These are some of the questions that all thinking people ask at some point in their live...

The book brings together fourteen essays from the work of John Cottingham on moral philosophy and the philosophy of religion spanning the past fifteen years. The papers are closely related in so far as they all deal with the perennial moral and spiritual challenges of human existence, and the search for meaning and value in human life. As well as being thematically linked, they also share a common style and methodology, illustrating the distinctive goal that has increasingly informed the a...

Religious belief is not just about abstract intellectual argument; it also impinges on all aspects of human life. John Cottingham's Philosophy of Religion opens up fresh perspectives on the philosophy of religion, arguing that the detached neutrality of much of contemporary philosophizing may be counterproductive - hardening us against the receptivity required for certain kinds of important evidence to become salient. This book covers all the traditional areas of the subject, including the...

***'***The reading of all good books is like a conversation with the finest minds of past centuries.' Descartes'It is not enough to have a good mind. The main thing is to use it well.'Descartes is often called the father of modern philosophy. He was certainly one of the most important figures in the emergence of modern philosophy and science and his work and ideas have resonated through the centuries. His best known statem...

The question 'What is the meaning of life?' is one of the most fascinating, oldest and most difficult questions human beings have ever posed themselves. In an increasingly secularized culture, it remains a question to which we are ineluctably and powerfully drawn.Drawing skillfully on a wealth of thinkers, writers and scientists from Augustine, Descartes, Freud and Camus, to Spinoza, Pascal, Darwin, and Wittgenstein, On the Meaning of Life breathes new vitality into one of ...

In Why Believe? (Continuum) Professor John Cottingham argued that every human being possesses impulses and aspirations for which religious belief offers a home.His new book, How to Believe is concerned not so much with why we should believe as with what leads a person to become a believer. Cottingham challenges believers and non-believers alike to think afresh about the need to change their lives and about what such change might involve.Ma...

'I realized it was necessary to demolish everything and start again right from the foundations, if I wanted to establish anything in the sciences that was stable and likely to last.' Ren� DescartesRevered as the 'father of modern philosophy', Descartes is one of the most influential philosophers of all time, but his ideas are also highly controversial and have been subjected to intense criticism by present-day philosophers. John Cottingham examines Descartes's remarkable attempt to...

Sir Anthony Kenny is one of the most distinguished and prolific philosophers of our time. In the wide range and historical breadth of his interests, he has influenced many parts of the philosophical landscape, especially in the philosophy of mind and the theory of human action and responsibility. In contrast to many of his contemporaries, who have played down philosophy's debt to its past, Kenny's work has always been rooted in the great tradition of Western philosophical inquiry. Mind...

These two 1985 volumes provide a translation of the philosophical works of Descartes, based on the best available Latin and French texts. They are intended to replace the only reasonably comprehensive selection of his works in English, by Haldane and Ross, first published in 1911. All the works included in that edition are translated here, together with a number of additional texts crucial for an understanding of Cartesian philosophy, including important material from Descartes' scientific...