What Makes a Philosopher Great?: Thirteen Arguments for Twelve Philosophers

Stephen Hetherington

Nov 2017 · Routledge

Ebook

282

Pages

Eligible

Ratings and reviews aren’t verified Learn More

About this ebook

This book is inspired by a single powerful question. What is it to be great as a philosopher? No single grand answer is presumed to be possible; instead, rewardingly close studies of philosophical greatness are developed. This is a scholarly yet accessible volume, blending metaphilosophy with the long history of philosophy and traversing centuries and continents. The result is a series of case studies by accomplished scholars, each chapter trying to understand and convey a particular philosopher’s greatness:

Lloyd P. Gerson on Plato

Karyn Lai on Zhuangzi

David Bronstein on Aristotle

Jonardon Ganeri on Buddhaghosa

Jeffrey Hause on Aquinas

Gary Hatfield on Descartes

Karen Detlefsen on du Châtelet

Don Garrett on Hume

Allen Wood on Kant (as a moral philosopher)

Nicholas F. Stang on Kant (as a metaphysician)

Ken Gemes on Nietzsche

Cheryl Misak on Peirce

David Macarthur on Wittgenstein

This also serves a larger philosophical purpose. Might we gain increased clarity about what philosophy is in the first place? After all, in practice we individuate philosophy partly through its greatest practitioners’ greatest contributions.

The book does not discuss every philosopher who has been regarded as great. The point is not to offer a definitive list of The Great Philosophers, but, rather, to learn something about what great philosophy is and might be, from illuminated examples of past greatness.

About the author

Stephen Hetherington is Professor of Philosophy at the University of New South Wales. His publications include Epistemology’s Paradox (1992), Good Knowledge, Bad Knowledge (2001), How to Know (2011), and Knowledge and the Gettier Problem (2016).

Rate this ebook

Tell us what you think.

Reading information

Smartphones and tablets

Install the Google Play Books app for Android and iPad/iPhone. It syncs automatically with your account and allows you to read online or offline wherever you are.

Laptops and computers

You can listen to audiobooks purchased on Google Play using your computer's web browser.

eReaders and other devices

To read on e-ink devices like Kobo eReaders, you'll need to download a file and transfer it to your device. Follow the detailed Help Center instructions to transfer the files to supported eReaders.

Report illegal content