What the Tortoise Taught Us: The Story of Philosophy

219 Pages·2010·1.3 MB·English

by  Burton Porter

What the Tortoise Taught Us
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What the Tortoise Taught Us
The Story of Philosophy
Burton F. Porter
ROWMAN & LITTLEFIELD PUBLISHERS, INC.
Lanham (cid:129) Boulder (cid:129) New York (cid:129) Toronto (cid:129) Plymouth, UK
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Published by Rowman & Littlefield Publishers, Inc.
A wholly owned subsidiary of The Rowman & Littlefield Publishing Group, Inc.
4501 Forbes Boulevard, Suite 200, Lanham, Maryland 20706
http://www.rowmanlittlefield.com
Estover Road, Plymouth PL6 7PY, United Kingdom
Copyright © 2011 by Burton F. Porter
All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced in any form or by any
electronic or mechanical means, including information storage and retrieval systems,
without written permission from the publisher, except by a reviewer who may quote
passages in a review.
British Library Cataloguing in Publication Information Available
Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data
Porter, Burton Frederick.
What the tortoise taught us : the story of philosophy / Burton Porter.
p. cm.
Includes bibliographical references and index.
ISBN 978-1-4422-0551-2 (cloth : alk. paper) — ISBN 978-1-4422-0553-6 (electronic)
1. Philosophy—History. I. Title.
B74.P67 2011
190—dc22
2010019909
(cid:2) ™
The paper used in this publication meets the minimum requirements of
American National Standard for Information Sciences—Permanence of Paper
for Printed Library Materials, ANSI/NISO Z39.48-1992.
Printed in the United States of America
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For Barbara, Mark, Sarah, and Ana,
who are most precious to me, and to all who
relish the teachings of the tortoise
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Contents
List of Illustrations ix
Chapter 1 The Beginning of Reflection 1
Glimpses of Light: Ancient Philosophy 1
The Unexamined Life Is Not Worth Living:
Socrates 13
Chapter 2 Being Governed by the Mind: Rational Thought 25
Learning Is Recollection: Plato 25
The Path of Moderation: Aristotle 37
Accept What You Cannot Change: The Stoics 45
Chapter 3 Religious Faith: The Philosophy of Religion 57
The Glorification of God: St. Thomas Aquinas 58
Love One Another: Christian Agape 69
Chapter 4 Personal Identity and Human Nature: Metaphysics 81
I Think, Therefore I Am: René Descartes 81
Beasts, Angels, and Machines: Hobbes and
Rousseau 95
vii
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viii (cid:2) Contents
Chapter 5 How Things Seem and What They Are:
Epistemology 109
Thinking Makes It So: Bishop Berkeley 113
Seeing Is Believing: David Hume 120
Chapter 6 The Purpose of Living: Ethics 131
Doing the Right Thing: Immanuel Kant 131
The Greatest Happiness Principle:
John Stuart Mill 142
Investing Life with Meaning: Jean-Paul Sartre 152
Chapter 7 Contemporary Trends 161
Fiddling with Words While the World Burns:
Linguistic Philosophy 162
The Voices of Women: Feminist Perspectives 168
Current Moral Issues: Abortion and Racism 177
Notes 191
Selected Bibliography 195
Index 201
About the Author 205
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List of Illustrations
Figure 1.1. B ust of Socrates (National Archaeological Museum in
Athens). 2
Figure 2.1. S chool of Athens, by Raphael, 1509 (Vatican). 26
Figure 3.1. The so-called Flammarion woodcut, an anonymous
wood engraving of the heavens that first appeared in
the work of French astronomer Camille Flammarion,
1888. 57
Figure 3.2. Saint Thomas Aquinas, by Carlo Crivelli, 1476
(National Gallery, London). 59
Figure 4.1. René Descartes, 1596-1650. Engraving by W. Holl
after painting by Franz Hals. (Courtesy of the Library
of Congress) 82
Figure 5.1. Portrait of David Hume, by Allan Ramsay, 1766
(Scottish National Portrait Gallery, Edinburgh). 110
Figure 6.1. Immanuel Kant, black-and-white reproduction of
eighteenth-century portrait. 132
Figure 7.1. Mary Wollstonecraft, photograph of a stipple
engraving by James Heath, ca. 1797, after a painting
by John Opie. (Courtesy of the Library of Congress) 161
ix
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