Epicureanism at the Origins of Modernity

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Author :
Publisher : OUP Oxford
ISBN 13 : 0191553522
Total Pages : 318 pages
Book Rating : 4.1/5 (915 download)

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Book Synopsis Epicureanism at the Origins of Modernity by : Catherine Wilson

Download or read book Epicureanism at the Origins of Modernity written by Catherine Wilson and published by OUP Oxford. This book was released on 2008-06-19 with total page 318 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: This landmark study examines the role played by the rediscovery of the writings of the ancient atomists, Epicurus and Lucretius, in the articulation of the major philosophical systems of the seventeenth century, and, more broadly, their influence on the evolution of natural science and moral and political philosophy. The target of sustained and trenchant philosophical criticism by Cicero, and of opprobrium by the Christian Fathers of the early Church, for its unflinching commitment to the absence of divine supervision and the finitude of life, the Epicurean philosophy surfaced again in the period of the Scientific Revolution, when it displaced scholastic Aristotelianism. Both modern social contract theory and utilitarianism in ethics were grounded in its tenets. Catherine Wilson shows how the distinctive Epicurean image of the natural and social worlds took hold in philosophy, and how it is an acknowledged, and often unacknowledged presence in the writings of Descartes, Gassendi, Hobbes, Boyle, Locke, Leibniz, Berkeley. With chapters devoted to Epicurean physics and cosmology, the corpuscularian or "mechanical" philosophy, the question of the mortality of the soul, the grounds of political authority, the contested nature of the experimental philosophy, sensuality, curiosity, and the role of pleasure and utility in ethics, the author makes a persuasive case for the significance of materialism in seventeenth-century philosophy without underestimating the depth and significance of the opposition to it, and for its continued importance in the contemporary world. Lucretius's great poem, On the Nature of Things, supplies the frame of reference for this deeply-researched inquiry into the origins of modern philosophy. .

Epicureanism

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Author :
Publisher : Oxford University Press
ISBN 13 : 019968832X
Total Pages : 161 pages
Book Rating : 4.1/5 (996 download)

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Book Synopsis Epicureanism by : Catherine Wilson

Download or read book Epicureanism written by Catherine Wilson and published by Oxford University Press. This book was released on 2015 with total page 161 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: This very short introudction corrects the prevalent view of Epicureanism that often conjures up ideas of tasty delights and hedonism. Wilson explains the philosophical and scientific ideas of Epicurus and his followers and the legacy of Epicureanism on later European thought.

Machiavelli and Epicureanism

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Author :
Publisher : Lexington Books
ISBN 13 : 0739177117
Total Pages : 227 pages
Book Rating : 4.7/5 (391 download)

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Book Synopsis Machiavelli and Epicureanism by : Robert J. Roecklein

Download or read book Machiavelli and Epicureanism written by Robert J. Roecklein and published by Lexington Books. This book was released on 2012-10-05 with total page 227 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: This book investigates the influence of Epicurean physics on the argument developed in Machiavelli’s Discourses on Livy. Towards this end, the full philosophical history and origins of atomist philosophy are investigated during the first three chapters. Plato’s critique of the atomist philosophy, from his dialogue the Parmenides, is a part of that investigation. In fact, Plato provides a refutation of the atomist philosophy in the Parmenides. A significant amount of scholarship has been accomplished that demonstrates the currents of Lucretian atomism in Machiavelli’s Florence. Evidence is supplied as to Machiavelli’s exposure to the Lucretian text, and the book then proceeds to investigate the transformational arguments of the Discourses On Livy itself. Machiavelli’s Discourses are saturated with terminology that is borrowed from physics: ‘materia’ (Matter), ‘corpo’ (body), ‘forma’ (form), ‘accidente’ (accident). English translators have usually employed some theory as to which tradition of physics Machiavelli is relying upon, in order to conduct their translations. By borrowing the terminology of Lucretian physics, Machiavelli becomes able to conceive of the people in a political society as something less than human: as ‘matter’ or materia without form. In my analysis of Machiavelli’s deployment of the concepts from Lucretian physics, it is attempted to unveil the brutality that is inherent in Machiavelli’s new definitions of the elements of politics, and the general hostility of his political science to the Aristotelian concept of the human being as political animal. The classical physics of Aristotle, which Machiavelli has rejected for a model, indicates the forward looking momentum of natural beings. For Aristotle, nature intends human political society as the arena for human fulfillment. In Aristotelian physics, nature aims at an end in generation, i.e. at a culmination of the natural being in its proper condition of excellence. For human beings, this is justice, the quality of relationships that makes happiness possible. In Machiavelli, a new politicized physics is revealed. In Machiavelli’s model, the human beings of formed matter are repeatedly sent, through new institutions and methods of government, ‘back to their beginnings’, i.e. to a condition of isolation, destitution, injury, and pain. The last chapter of the book concludes with an examination of the particular institutions and methods that Machiavelli holds out to us for employment, if his new vision of a republic is to be realized.

Epicureanism at the Origins of Modernity

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Author :
Publisher : OUP Oxford
ISBN 13 : 0191608157
Total Pages : 318 pages
Book Rating : 4.1/5 (916 download)

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Book Synopsis Epicureanism at the Origins of Modernity by : Catherine Wilson

Download or read book Epicureanism at the Origins of Modernity written by Catherine Wilson and published by OUP Oxford. This book was released on 2008-06-19 with total page 318 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: This landmark study examines the role played by the rediscovery of the writings of the ancient atomists, Epicurus and Lucretius, in the articulation of the major philosophical systems of the seventeenth century, and, more broadly, their influence on the evolution of natural science and moral and political philosophy. The target of sustained and trenchant philosophical criticism by Cicero, and of opprobrium by the Christian Fathers of the early Church, for its unflinching commitment to the absence of divine supervision and the finitude of life, the Epicurean philosophy surfaced again in the period of the Scientific Revolution, when it displaced scholastic Aristotelianism. Both modern social contract theory and utilitarianism in ethics were grounded in its tenets. Catherine Wilson shows how the distinctive Epicurean image of the natural and social worlds took hold in philosophy, and how it is an acknowledged, and often unacknowledged presence in the writings of Descartes, Gassendi, Hobbes, Boyle, Locke, Leibniz, Berkeley. With chapters devoted to Epicurean physics and cosmology, the corpuscularian or "mechanical" philosophy, the question of the mortality of the soul, the grounds of political authority, the contested nature of the experimental philosophy, sensuality, curiosity, and the role of pleasure and utility in ethics, the author makes a persuasive case for the significance of materialism in seventeenth-century philosophy without underestimating the depth and significance of the opposition to it, and for its continued importance in the contemporary world. Lucretius's great poem, On the Nature of Things, supplies the frame of reference for this deeply-researched inquiry into the origins of modern philosophy. .

Epicurus in the Enlightenment

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Author :
Publisher :
ISBN 13 :
Total Pages : 280 pages
Book Rating : 4.F/5 ( download)

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Book Synopsis Epicurus in the Enlightenment by : Neven Leddy

Download or read book Epicurus in the Enlightenment written by Neven Leddy and published by . This book was released on 2009 with total page 280 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Eighteenth-century Epicureanism is often viewed as radical, anti-religious and politically dangerous. But to what extent does this simplify the ancient philosophy and underestimate its significance in Enlightenment writing? Through a pan-European analysis of Enlightenment centres from Scotland to Russia via the Netherlands, France and Germany, contributors argue that elements of classical Epicureanism were appropriated by radical and conservative writers alike. They move beyond literature and political theory to examine the application of Epicurean ideas in domains as diverse as physics, natural law, and the philosophy of language, drawing on the work of both major figures (Diderot, Hélvetius, Smith and Hume) and of lesser-known but equally influential thinkers (Johann Jacob Schmauss and Dmitrii Anichkov). This unique collaboration, bringing together historians, philosophers, political scientists and literary scholars, provides rich and varied insights into the different strategic uses of Epicureanism in the eighteenth century.

The Oxford Handbook of Philosophy in Early Modern Europe

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Author :
Publisher : Oxford University Press, USA
ISBN 13 : 019955613X
Total Pages : 610 pages
Book Rating : 4.1/5 (995 download)

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Book Synopsis The Oxford Handbook of Philosophy in Early Modern Europe by : Desmond M. Clarke

Download or read book The Oxford Handbook of Philosophy in Early Modern Europe written by Desmond M. Clarke and published by Oxford University Press, USA. This book was released on 2011-01-27 with total page 610 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: A team of leading scholars survey the development of philosophy in the period of extraordinary intellectual change from the mid-16th century to the early 18th century. They cover metaphysics and natural philosophy; the mind, the passions, and aesthetics; epistemology, logic, mathematics, and language; ethics and political philosophy; and religion.

Oxford Handbook of Epicurus and Epicureanism

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Author :
Publisher : Oxford Handbooks
ISBN 13 : 0199744211
Total Pages : 848 pages
Book Rating : 4.1/5 (997 download)

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Book Synopsis Oxford Handbook of Epicurus and Epicureanism by : Phillip Mitsis

Download or read book Oxford Handbook of Epicurus and Epicureanism written by Phillip Mitsis and published by Oxford Handbooks. This book was released on 2020 with total page 848 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: This volume offers authoritative discussions of all aspects of the philosophy of Epicurus (340-271 BCE) and then traces Epicurean influences throughout the Western tradition. It is an unmatched resource for those wishing to deepen their knowledge of Epicureanism's powerful arguments about death, happiness, and the nature of the material world.

Metaethics from a First Person Standpoint

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Author :
Publisher : Open Book Publishers
ISBN 13 : 1783742011
Total Pages : 128 pages
Book Rating : 4.7/5 (837 download)

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Book Synopsis Metaethics from a First Person Standpoint by : Catherine Wilson

Download or read book Metaethics from a First Person Standpoint written by Catherine Wilson and published by Open Book Publishers. This book was released on 2016-01-18 with total page 128 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Metaethics from a First Person Standpoint addresses in a novel format the major topics and themes of contemporary metaethics, the study of the analysis of moral thought and judgement. Metathetics is less concerned with what practices are right or wrong than with what we mean by ‘right’ and ‘wrong.’ Looking at a wide spectrum of topics including moral language, realism and anti-realism, reasons and motives, relativism, and moral progress, this book engages students and general readers in order to enhance their understanding of morality and moral discourse as cultural practices. Catherine Wilson innovatively employs a first-person narrator to report step-by-step an individual’s reflections, beginning from a position of radical scepticism, on the possibility of objective moral knowledge. The reader is invited to follow along with this reasoning, and to challenge or agree with each major point. Incrementally, the narrator is led to certain definite conclusions about ‘oughts’ and norms in connection with self-interest, prudence, social norms, and finally morality. Scepticism is overcome, and the narrator arrives at a good understanding of how moral knowledge and moral progress are possible, though frequently long in coming. Accessibly written, Metaethics from a First Person Standpoint presupposes no prior training in philosophy and is a must-read for philosophers, students and general readers interested in gaining a better understanding of morality as a personal philosophical quest.

Tending the Epicurean Garden

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Author :
Publisher : Humanist Press
ISBN 13 : 0931779529
Total Pages : 158 pages
Book Rating : 4.9/5 (317 download)

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Book Synopsis Tending the Epicurean Garden by : Hiram Crespo

Download or read book Tending the Epicurean Garden written by Hiram Crespo and published by Humanist Press. This book was released on 2014-09-30 with total page 158 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Be Smart About Being Happy Gods may exist, but they’re too far removed to care about humans. So our best purpose in life is not to please gods, but to be happy. Which is not as easy as it sounds, since short-term pleasures and selfishness create longer-term misery. Thus taught Epicurus, 2,300 years ago. Hiram Crespo brings the Epicurean passion for maximum happiness into the modern age with this practical guidebook. Step one in what Crespo calls the “hedonic calculus” is to rein in desires, so they become easier to satisfy – just the opposite of the luxurious indulgence so often incorrectly associated with Epicureanism. From there, he offers a blizzard of ideas, from healthy recipes that stimulate natural “feel-good” chemicals in the brain to the journaling of positive events, even on a bad day. The highest attainable happiness, though, is communing with friends – it just doesn’t get any better than that. Being smart about being happy means using the best knowledge and tools available. Tending the Epicurean Garden is an excellent place to start.

Introduction to Modernity

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Author :
Publisher : Verso Books
ISBN 13 : 1844677834
Total Pages : 417 pages
Book Rating : 4.8/5 (446 download)

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Book Synopsis Introduction to Modernity by : Henri Lefebvre

Download or read book Introduction to Modernity written by Henri Lefebvre and published by Verso Books. This book was released on 2012-01-16 with total page 417 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Originally published in 1962, when Lefebvre was beginning his career as a lecturer in sociology at the University of Strasbourg, it established his position in the vanguard of a movement which was to culminate in the events of May 1968. A classic analysis of the modern world using Marxist dialectic, it is a book which supersedes the conventional divisions between academic disciplines. With dazzling skill, Lefebvre moves from philosophy to sociology, from literature to history, to present a profound analysis of the social, political and cultural forces at work in France and the world in the aftermath of Stalin’s death—an analysis in which the contours of our own “postmodernity” appear with startling clarity.

Pursuits of Wisdom

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Publisher : Princeton University Press
ISBN 13 : 069115970X
Total Pages : 458 pages
Book Rating : 4.6/5 (911 download)

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Book Synopsis Pursuits of Wisdom by : John M. Cooper

Download or read book Pursuits of Wisdom written by John M. Cooper and published by Princeton University Press. This book was released on 2013-08-25 with total page 458 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: This is a major reinterpretation of ancient philosophy that recovers the long Greek and Roman tradition of philosophy as a complete way of life--and not simply an intellectual discipline. Distinguished philosopher John Cooper traces how, for many ancient thinkers, philosophy was not just to be studied or even used to solve particular practical problems. Rather, philosophy--not just ethics but even logic and physical theory--was literally to be lived. Yet there was great disagreement about how to live philosophically: philosophy was not one but many, mutually opposed, ways of life. Examining this tradition from its establishment by Socrates in the fifth century BCE through Plotinus in the third century CE and the eclipse of pagan philosophy by Christianity, Pursuits of Wisdom examines six central philosophies of living--Socratic, Aristotelian, Stoic, Epicurean, Skeptic, and the Platonist life of late antiquity. The book describes the shared assumptions that allowed these thinkers to conceive of their philosophies as ways of life, as well as the distinctive ideas that led them to widely different conclusions about the best human life. Clearing up many common misperceptions and simplifications, Cooper explains in detail the Socratic devotion to philosophical discussion about human nature, human life, and human good; the Aristotelian focus on the true place of humans within the total system of the natural world; the Stoic commitment to dutifully accepting Zeus's plans; the Epicurean pursuit of pleasure through tranquil activities that exercise perception, thought, and feeling; the Skeptical eschewal of all critical reasoning in forming their beliefs; and, finally, the late Platonist emphasis on spiritual concerns and the eternal realm of Being. Pursuits of Wisdom is essential reading for anyone interested in understanding what the great philosophers of antiquity thought was the true purpose of philosophy--and of life.

Principal Doctrines

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Author :
Publisher : Lulu.com
ISBN 13 : 1387275275
Total Pages : 45 pages
Book Rating : 4.3/5 (872 download)

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Book Synopsis Principal Doctrines by : Epicurus

Download or read book Principal Doctrines written by Epicurus and published by Lulu.com. This book was released on 2017-10-05 with total page 45 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Epicurus posited a materialistic physics, in which pleasure, by which he meant freedom from pain, is the highest good. Serenity, the harmony of mind and body, is best achieved, through virtue and simple living.

Nietzsche and the Becoming of Life

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Publisher : Fordham University Press
ISBN 13 : 0823262898
Total Pages : 422 pages
Book Rating : 4.8/5 (232 download)

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Book Synopsis Nietzsche and the Becoming of Life by : Vanessa Lemm

Download or read book Nietzsche and the Becoming of Life written by Vanessa Lemm and published by Fordham University Press. This book was released on 2014-10-15 with total page 422 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Throughout his writing career Nietzsche advocated the affirmation of earthly life as a way to counteract nihilism and asceticism. This volume takes stock of the complexities and wide-ranging perspectives that Nietzsche brings to bear on the problem of life’s becoming on Earth by engaging various interpretative paradigms reaching from existentialist to Darwinist readings of Nietzsche. In an age in which the biological sciences claim to have unlocked the deepest secrets and codes of life, the essays in this volume propose a more skeptical view. Life is both what is closest and what is furthest from us, because life experiments through us as much as we experiment with it, because life keeps our thinking and our habits always moving, in a state of recurring nomadism. Nietzsche’s philosophy is perhaps the clearest expression of the antinomy contained in the idea of “studying” life and in the Socratic ideal of an “examined” life and remains a deep source of wisdom about living.

The Theological Origins of Modernity

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Author :
Publisher : ReadHowYouWant.com
ISBN 13 : 1459606124
Total Pages : 762 pages
Book Rating : 4.4/5 (596 download)

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Book Synopsis The Theological Origins of Modernity by : Michael Allen Gillespie

Download or read book The Theological Origins of Modernity written by Michael Allen Gillespie and published by ReadHowYouWant.com. This book was released on 2010-10-21 with total page 762 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Taking as his starting point the collapse of the medieval world, Gillespie argues that from the very beginning moderns sought not to eliminate religion but to support a new view of religion and its place in human life- and that they did so not out of hostility but in order to sustain certain religious beliefs. He goes on to explore the ideas of such figures as William of Ockham, Petrarch, Erasmus, Luther, Descartes, and Hobbes, showing that modernity is best understood as the result of a series of attempts to formulate a new and coherent metaphysics or theology.

Ars Vitae

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Publisher : University of Notre Dame Pess
ISBN 13 : 0268108919
Total Pages : 567 pages
Book Rating : 4.2/5 (681 download)

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Book Synopsis Ars Vitae by : Elisabeth Lasch-Quinn

Download or read book Ars Vitae written by Elisabeth Lasch-Quinn and published by University of Notre Dame Pess. This book was released on 2020-10-15 with total page 567 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Despite the flood of self-help guides and our current therapeutic culture, feelings of alienation and spiritual longing continue to grip modern society. In this book, Elisabeth Lasch-Quinn offers a fresh solution: a return to classic philosophy and the cultivation of an inner life. The ancient Roman philosopher Cicero wrote that philosophy is ars vitae, the art of living. Today, signs of stress and duress point to a full-fledged crisis for individuals and communities while current modes of making sense of our lives prove inadequate. Yet, in this time of alienation and spiritual longing, we can glimpse signs of a renewed interest in ancient approaches to the art of living. In this ambitious and timely book, Elisabeth Lasch-Quinn engages both general readers and scholars on the topic of well-being. She examines the reappearance of ancient philosophical thought in contemporary American culture, probing whether new stirrings of Gnosticism, Stoicism, Epicureanism, Cynicism, and Platonism present a true alternative to our current therapeutic culture of self-help and consumerism, which elevates the self’s needs and desires yet fails to deliver on its promises of happiness and healing. Do the ancient philosophies represent a counter-tradition to today’s culture, auguring a new cultural vibrancy, or do they merely solidify a modern way of life that has little use for inwardness—the cultivation of an inner life—stemming from those older traditions? Tracing the contours of this cultural resurgence and exploring a range of sources, from scholarship to self-help manuals, films, and other artifacts of popular culture, this book sees the different schools as organically interrelated and asks whether, taken together, they can point us in important new directions. Ars Vitae sounds a clarion call to take back philosophy as part of our everyday lives. It proposes a way to do so, sifting through the ruins of long-forgotten and recent history alike for any shards helpful in piecing together the coherence of a moral framework that allows us ways to move forward toward the life we want and need.

Passion of the Western Mind

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Author :
Publisher : Ballantine Books
ISBN 13 : 0307804526
Total Pages : 560 pages
Book Rating : 4.3/5 (78 download)

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Book Synopsis Passion of the Western Mind by : Richard Tarnas

Download or read book Passion of the Western Mind written by Richard Tarnas and published by Ballantine Books. This book was released on 2011-10-19 with total page 560 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: "[This] magnificent critical survey, with its inherent respect for both the 'Westt's mainstream high culture' and the 'radically changing world' of the 1990s, offers a new breakthrough for lay and scholarly readers alike....Allows readers to grasp the big picture of Western culture for the first time." SAN FRANCISCO CHRONICLE Here are the great minds of Western civilization and their pivotal ideas, from Plato to Hegel, from Augustine to Nietzsche, from Copernicus to Freud. Richard Tarnas performs the near-miracle of describing profound philosophical concepts simply but without simplifying them. Ten years in the making and already hailed as a classic, THE PASSION OF THE WESERN MIND is truly a complete liberal education in a single volume.

Modernity and Its Discontents

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Publisher : Yale University Press
ISBN 13 : 0300220987
Total Pages : 417 pages
Book Rating : 4.3/5 (2 download)

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Book Synopsis Modernity and Its Discontents by : Steven B. Smith

Download or read book Modernity and Its Discontents written by Steven B. Smith and published by Yale University Press. This book was released on 2016-08-09 with total page 417 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Steven B. Smith examines the concept of modernity, not as the end product of historical developments but as a state of mind. He explores modernism as a source of both pride and anxiety, suggesting that its most distinctive characteristics are the self-criticisms and doubts that accompany social and political progress. Providing profiles of the modern project’s most powerful defenders and critics—from Machiavelli and Spinoza to Saul Bellow and Isaiah Berlin—this provocative work of philosophy and political science offers a novel perspective on what it means to be modern and why discontent and sometimes radical rejection are its inevitable by-products.