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The Great Ideas of Philosophy, 2nd Edition cover art

The Great Ideas of Philosophy, 2nd Edition

By: Daniel N. Robinson,The Great Courses
Narrated by: Daniel N. Robinson
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Summary

Grasp the important ideas that have served as the backbone of philosophy across the ages with this extraordinary 60-lecture series. This is your opportunity to explore the enormous range of philosophical perspectives and ponder the most important and enduring of human questions - without spending your life poring over dense philosophical texts.

Professor Robinson guides you through more than 2,000 years of philosophical thinking and gives you a coherent, comprehensive, and beautifully articulated introduction to the great conversation of philosophy. Every lecture contains substance that can change your view of the world and its history.

You'll journey from the early philosophical ideas of Socrates, Plato, and Aristotle; chart the origins of Christian philosophy and investigate the Islamic scholars who preserved and extended Greek thought during the Middle Ages; and venture through Enlightenment contributions to philosophy, from Francis Bacon to Locke, Hume, Kant, Mill, and Adam Smith.

Then shift your attention to the modern era, where you see groundbreaking ideas like psychoanalysis, pragmatism, and nihilism, as well as the collision between the inherently social understanding of meaning created by Wittgenstein, the vastly different estimation of human thought developed by the code-breaking genius Alan Turing, and the subtle response to him made by the American philosopher John Searle.

While the lectures cover an enormous range of key thinkers and ideas, they always focus on the most important ideas. The result is a course that gives you everything you need to finally grasp humanity's exciting philosophical history - without years of intense academic study and piles of dense reading.

PLEASE NOTE: When you purchase this title, the accompanying reference material will be available in your Library section along with the audio.

©2004 The Teaching Company, LLC (P)2004 The Great Courses

What listeners say about The Great Ideas of Philosophy, 2nd Edition

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Religion tainted

It always turns my stomach when academics take advantage of knowledge to disseminate blatantly biased propaganda. Here we have religion (of the Christian brand) and Monarchical ideology in a smooth-talking name-dropping somewhat arrogant teacher of philosophy. The other negative reviews give specific details of the same things that shocked me when I listened to this course. Fortunately I got fed up half-way, before reaching the outrageous and dogmatic last class (a pitch for God).

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41 people found this helpful

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Well presented introduction to philosophy

Would you recommend this audiobook to a friend? If so, why?

The book covers philosophy from the start of civilisation to modern times - with some thematic discussions at the end. It is largely focused on western ideas, although there were passing references to eastern thought, particularly early on. So a really good overall introduction, best supplemented with supporting reading. It tackles some difficult concepts and does, at times, require work from the listener (ie. full concentration and time to digest ideas): I repeated some parts 2 or 3 times to get the full meaning. Overall very stimulating and largely enjoyable.

What about Professor Daniel N. Robinson’s performance did you like?

The American lecturer had a pleasant and warm tone, clearly and naturally spoken, with a few endearing tics such as saying "do you see?" at the end of some particularly complex example or explanation - or to emphasise a point. As the lectures developed it was interesting to build a picture of his personal perspectives - on some challenging issues, which is not to say that arguments were not presented in the round.

Did you have an emotional reaction to this book? Did it make you laugh or cry?

These lectures were stimulating and had the impact of returning me to other books to further develop my understanding.

Any additional comments?

There was a lot crammed in - most of the major figures of philosophy are touched on. Also a focus on some ideas not normally treated as "philosophical" eg. USA constitution and Freud. An excellent initial overview.

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29 people found this helpful

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What a great idea!

Fabulous romp through history and it's formative ideas. The reader is interesting to listen to, has a great grasp of the subject and witty to boot.

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14 people found this helpful

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Terrible pitch for Christianity.

What a terrible pitch for the pagan religion of Christianity. Thought it was a book on Philosophy.

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12 people found this helpful

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Irrelevant

Instead of talking about the subject matter, the narrator speaks lot about the gossips surrounding the life of philosophers of that time, focusing mostly on how they lived, where they lived, what they liked/disliked, whom they befriended, etc. Author also uses unnecessary eloquency to mask the true purpose of the lectures - theorizing the key findings of those philosophers in a systematic way, so they can be conveyed to the general audience in most comprehensive and organized fashion.

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11 people found this helpful

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Masterful, Enthralling, Enlightening

Dr. Robinson is a remarkable lecturer, a brilliant storyteller, and a skilled logician. It's taken me a month to traverse all 60 lectures, but it was well worth the effort in my estimation. 30 days to consume a lifetime of wisdom is a good bargain. More importantly, it's great to know that at least one man cares enough about The West to make sure we all remember what makes it worth caring about.

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    3 out of 5 stars

A very opinionated presentation

The course is interesting but definitely not beginner-friendly. Sometimes the lecturer seems more interested in showing off his deep knowledge of different authors, works, and archaic terms than actually explaining in simple terms the meaning and the message of the philosopher in question.
Often you have the feeling he expects you to already have extensive knowledge of the subject that he's only going to supplement with his commentary.

The other sad note is the profoundly conservative, Cristian, Jesus-riddled skewed point-of-view that Prof Robinson is not afraid of pouring all over every single topic like gravy on Sunday roast.

Lecturer's Opinions Spoiler alert:
- Abortion is homicide (Kant, a 1700s author, says so)
- Suicide is homicide (Saint Augustin says so, so it must be true!)
- Euthanasia... wanna guess? You got it, Homicide.

So yeah... if you want a neutral, honest, laical, point of view, maybe try something else.

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10 people found this helpful

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Comprehensive introduction to philosophy

Many of the great ideas are covered in this book. But you will need to explore each topic separately for more insight.

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8 people found this helpful

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    5 out of 5 stars
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Philosophy taught wonderfully

Truly inspiring lectures.
Professor Robinson took you in a journey through philosophy like never before.
Amazing !!!

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6 people found this helpful

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An excellent overview... Highly Recommended

This is an intelligent and accessible summary of philosophy which I will listen to again and again .

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6 people found this helpful