Politics is often characterized as the "art of compromise"--the implication being that compromise is desirable and that insight, imagination, discipline, and skill are all necessary for a satisfactory and successful compromise. Compromise in ethics, however, is quite another matter: there, it is usually regarded as a sign of weakness or lack of integrity. From Socrates and Sir Thomas More to Gandhi, Elizabeth Cady Stanton, and Martin Luther King, Jr., we revere these men and women not only for the nature of their convictions but also for their unwavering refusal to compromise.

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Academic philosophy has become so technical and inbred that it often fails to connect with the questions and concerns of educated nonspecialists. Martin Benjamin aims to bridge this gap. Presupposing little or no formal background, Philosophy & This Actual World addresses general questions of knowledge, reality, mind, will, and ethics, as well as more specific questions about moral pluralism, assisted suicide, the nature of death, and life's meaning. At the same time, it incorporates the advances of academic philosophers like Wittgenstein, Rorty, Putnam, and Rawls, making it equally as...