In Defence of Wonder and Other Philosophical Reflections

ISBN-13: 9781844655250 / Angielski / Miękka / 2012 / 256 str.

Raymond Tallis

Opis

"What comes across, on almost every page, are Tallis' enthusiasms for both philosophy and - even greater - for writing itself. And for once the back-cover puffery, where we are told of his 'verve, insight and wit, ' most definitely hits the mark." - Christopher Belshaw, Times Higher "This collection of essays supplies what has been wanting for some time: an introduction, for the non-specialist reader, that gives some indication of the breadth and depth of Tallis's work. Tallis is not just a polymath, but a most congenial thinker with whom to exercise one's intellect." - The Guardian "A profound, entertaining and engaging collection." - Church Times In these lively and provocative essays, philosopher, polymath and all-round intellectual heavyweight, Raymond Tallis debunks commonplace truths, exposes woolly thinking and pulls the rug from beneath a wide range of commentator whether scientist, theologian, philosopher or pundit. Tallis takes to task much of contemporary science and philosophy, arguing that they are guilty of taking us down ever narrowing conduits of problem solving that only invite ever more complex responses and in doing so have lost sight of wonder - the metaphysical intoxication that first gave birth to philosophy 2,500 years ago. Tallis tackles some meaty topics - memory, time, language, truth, fiction, consciousness - but always with his characteristic verve, insight and wit. These essays showcase Tallis's skill for getting to the heart of the matter and challenging us to see, and wonder, in different ways. Wonder is the proper state of humankind, and as these essays show it has no more forceful a champion than Raymond Tallis.

Spis treści

Acknowledgments; Overture; Chapter 1 George Moore’s Hands: Scepticism about Philosophy; Chapter 2 Zhuangzi and that Bloody Butterfly; Chapter 3 Rescuing Truth; Chapter 4 Just a Little Tune I Found in My Mouth; Chapter 5 A Smile at Waterloo Station: On the True Mystery of Memory; Chapter 6 The Myth of Time Travel; Chapter 7 Time, Tense and Physics: The Theory of Everything but …; Chapter 8 Seeing Time; Chapter 9 Call No Event Future Until it is Past; Chapter 10 On (Almost) Nothing: Concerning Spatial Points; Chapter 11 An Introduction to Incontinental Philosophy; Chapter 12 Biological Reasons for Being Cheerful?; Chapter 13 The Soup and the Scaffolding; Chapter 14 Don’t Tell Him, Pike!; Chapter 15 Okey Doke; Chapter 16 The Professor of Data-Lean Generalizations; Chapter 17 “I Kid You Not”: Knowingness and Other Shallows; Chapter 18 My Bald Head: The Ethics of Hair-Splitting; Chapter 19 Getting Consciousness to Speak Itself: The Great Unmet Challenge of Realistic Fiction; Chapter 20 Reader, I Sh***ed Him: Reflections on the Decline of the Asterisk; Chapter 21 Ian McEwan’s Saturday: Does Implausibility Matter?; Chapter 22 Literature, Philosophy and Medicine: On Anton Chekhov’s “Ward No. 6”; Chapter 23 The Mystery and the Paradox of Scientific Medicine; Chapter 24 Enhancing Humanity; Chapter 25 On Not Choosing the Alternative: Reflections on Living Longer; Chapter 26 Making Use of Death; Chapter 27 Why I am an Atheist; Coda;

O autorze

Raymond Tallis