Tom Morris

Philosophy For Dummies

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Philosophy at its best is an activity more than a body of knowledge. In an ancient sense, done right, it is a healing art. It’s intellectual self-defense. It’s a form of therapy. But it’s also much more. Philosophy is map-making for the soul, cartography for the human journey. It’s an important navigational tool for life that too many modern people try to do without. Philosophy For Dummies is for anyone who has ever entertained a question about life and this world. In a conversational tone, the book's author – a modern-day scholar and lecturer – brings the greatest wisdom of the past into the challenges that we face now. This refreshingly different guide explains philosophical fundamentals and explores some of the strangest and deepest questions ever posed to human beings, such as
How do we know anything? What does the word good mean? Are we ever really free? Do human beings have souls? Is there life after death? Is there a God? Is happiness really possible in our world? This book is chock full of all those questions you may have long wanted to think about and talk with someone about, but have never had the time or opportunity to tackle head on. Philosophy For Dummies invites you to discuss the issues you find in the guide, share perspectives, and compare thoughts and feelings with someone you respect. You'll find lots of material to mull over with your friends or spouse, including thoughts on
When to doubt, and when to doubt our doubts The universal demand for evidence and proof The four dimensions of human experience Arguments for materialism Fear of the process of dying Prayers and small miracles Moral justification for allowing evil The ancient philosopher Socrates (fifth century, B.C.) thought that, when it comes to the Ultimate Questions, we all start off as dummies. But if we are humbly aware of how little we actually know, then we can really begin to learn. Philosophy For Dummies will put you on the path to wising up as you steer through the experience called life.
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Quotes

  • b3922366560has quoted6 years ago
    Imagine that you are locked in a small one-room building. You have contact with the outside world through only one window. You can see what’s going on outside by looking out the window. It is open and also allows you both to hear passing street noises and to smell flowers right outside the building. You can also feel the cool breezes of the early morning air outdoors. Now imagine that someone comes along and closes the window, nailing it shut. Your ability to hear the sounds and smell the aromas in the outside world has suddenly been eliminated. You can no longer feel the cool breezes blowing outside. But you can still see out.
    Now imagine that someone outside slathers black paint all over the window and nails boards tightly over its casing. Your ability to see outside has been eliminated. Each bit of change to the window has eliminated one or more ranges of your experience of the outside world. As long as you remain in that building, you will be unable to see, hear, smell, or feel what is going on outside. But if the door is suddenly unlocked, and you can leave the building, you will no longer depend on that window for your access to the outside world. You will be able to perceive directly what is going on around you, without need of that now damaged and useless window.
    This is an analogy for life and death. While we are “locked” in the body, we depend on the brain, and its connected sensory organs, as our window on the world. When this window is altered and damaged in various ways, our experience of the world is diminished and depleted in corresponding ways. But at death, the door is unlocked, and we leave the building. Then, we no longer depend on the state of the building, or its window, for our access to outside reality. The building at that point can be totally destroyed, and we are free of its constraints. How do we know that this is not an insightful analogy for the impact of death on human experience? It at least blocks the force of The Brain Damage Argument and depletes it of its otherwise straightfoward persuasiveness.
  • Ian Copplehas quoted6 years ago
    Do not believe hastily.
    — Ovid
  • Ian Copplehas quoted6 years ago
    The standard philosophical analysis of knowledge presents it as nothing more, or less, than properly justified true belief

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