Social Philosophy

In this beautifully written and brilliantly reasoned collection of essays, Ayn Rand throws new light on the nature of art and its purpose in human life. Once again, she demonstrates her bold originality and her refusal to let conventional ideas define her sense of the truth. Rand eloquently asserts that one cannot create art without infusing it with one's own value judgments and personal philosophy - even an attempt to withhold moral overtones only results in a deterministic or naturalistic message.

From periwigs and knee breeches to the 24-hour news cycle and presidential tweets, the fascinating and colorful stories of the 45 incumbents are a powerful lens through which to view US history and get insight into the present. Taking listeners on a fact-filled journey through two centuries, this book examines how each individual obtained their dream (or nightmare) position, what they stood for (or against), achieved (or didn't), and how their actions affected the country - for better or worse.

Aristotle's Nicomachean Ethics is one of the greatest guides to human flourishing ever written, but its length and style have left many readers languishing. How to Flourish is a colloquial new translation by Susan Sauve Meyer that makes Aristotle's timeless insights about how to lead a good life more engaging and accessible than ever before.

Marxism is a term that many people freely use, but few seem to grasp its implications. Sowell's book is the antidote to this problem. He writes in a fluid and easy-to-follow manner, leading the listener through the Marxian scheme of ideas. Along the way, he shatters some existing interpretations of Marx-interpretations that have developed through repetition rather than through scholarship.

Suppose I were to begin by saying that I had fallen in love with a color.... Since 2009, when it first published, to today, Bluets has drawn scores of readers and listeners with its surprising insights into the emotional depths that make us most human - via 240 short pieces, at once lyrical and philosophical, on the color blue. This new edition celebrates Maggie Nelson’s uncompromising vision, inviting longtime fans and newcomers alike to experience and share in an indispensable work that continues to disrupt the literary landscape.

Stepping effortlessly from myth to cutting-edge science, Mutants gives a brilliant narrative account of our genetic code and the captivating people whose bodies have revealed it - a French convent girl who found herself changing sex at puberty; children who, echoing Homer's Cyclops, are born with a single eye in the middle of their foreheads; a village of long-lived Croatian dwarves; one family, whose bodies were entirely covered with hair, was kept at the Burmese royal court for four generations and gave Darwin one of his keenest insights into heredity.

In Native American DNA, Kim TallBear shows how DNA testing is a powerful - and problematic - scientific process that is useful in determining close biological relatives. But tribal membership is a legal category that has developed in dependence on certain social understandings and historical contexts, a set of concepts that entangles genetic information in a web of family relations, reservation histories, tribal rules, and government regulations.

Novelist John Gardner's thesis in On Moral Fiction is simple: "True art is by its nature moral." It is also an audacious statement, as Gardner asserts an inherent value in life and in art. Since the book's first publication, the passion behind Gardner's assertion has both provoked and inspired fans. In examining the work of his peers, Gardner analyzes what has gone wrong, in his view, in modern art and literature, and how shortcomings in artistic criticism have contributed to the problem.

Repulsive and yet strangely attractive, the gimmick is a form that can be found virtually everywhere in capitalism. It comes in many guises: a musical hook, a financial strategy, a striptease, a novel of ideas. Above all, acclaimed theorist Sianne Ngai argues, the gimmick strikes us both as working too little (a labor-saving trick) and as working too hard (a strained effort to get our attention).

Discover Simone Weil’s Profound Masterpiece: L’Enracinement Are you searching for a book that delves deeply into the human condition, community, and the essence of belonging? Simone Weil’s L’Enracinement (The Need for Roots) is a timeless classic that speaks directly to the challenges of modern life, offering a profound exploration of the human need for connection and rootedness in a fragmented world. Written during the turmoil of World War II, Weil’s work is a manifesto for rebuilding a society founded on justice, equality, and a true understanding of human dignity. With ...

The Progressive Era witnessed the nation's most convulsive upheaval, a time of radicalism far beyond the Revolution or anything since. In response to the birth of modern America, one small group of middle-class Americans seized control of the nation and attempted to remake society from bottom to top. They accomplished an astonishing range of triumphs, yet the progressive movement collapsed as the war came to an end amid race riots, strikes, high inflation, and a frenzied Red scare.

This urgent and eye-opening book makes the case that protecting humanity's future is the central challenge of our time. If all goes well, human history is just beginning. Our species could survive for billions of years - enough time to end disease, poverty, and injustice, and to flourish in ways unimaginable today. But this vast future is at risk. With the advent of nuclear weapons, humanity entered a new age, where we face existential catastrophes - those from which we could never come back.

Is it really human nature to stab one another in the back in our climb up the corporate ladder? Competitive, selfish behavior is often explained away as instinctive, thanks to evolution and "survival of the fittest", but in fact, humans are equally hard-wired for empathy. Using research from the fields of anthropology, psychology, animal behavior, and neuroscience, Frans de Waal brilliantly argues that humans are group animals.

An updated and revised edition of the controversial classic - now more relevant than ever - argues that boys are the ones languishing socially and academically, resulting in staggering social and economic costs. After two major waves of feminism and decades of policy reform, women have made massive strides in education. Today they outperform men in nearly every measure of social, academic, and vocational well-being. Christina Hoff Sommers contends that it's time to take a hard look at present-day realities and recognize that boys need help.

Let's take stock of young America. Compared to previous generations, American youth have more schooling (college enrollments have never been higher); more money ($100 a week in disposable income); more leisure time (five hours a day); and more news and information (Internet, The Daily Show, RSS feeds). What do they do with all that time and money? They download, upload, IM, post, chat, and network. (Nine of their top ten sites are for social networking.) They watch television and play video games (2 to 4 hours per day).

On February 1, 2003, Columbia disintegrated on reentry before the nation's eyes, and all seven astronauts aboard were lost. Author Mike Leinbach was a key leader in the search and recovery effort as NASA, FEMA, the FBI, the US Forest Service, and dozens more federal, state, and local agencies combed an area of rural east Texas the size of Rhode Island for every piece of the shuttle and her crew they could find. Assisted by hundreds of volunteers, it would become the largest ground search operation in US history.

One of the most significant books ever written by a head of state, the Meditations are a collection of philosophical thoughts by the Emperor Marcus Aurelius (121 - 180 ce). Covering issues such as duty, forgiveness, brotherhood, strength in adversity and the best way to approach life and death, the Meditations have inspired thinkers, poets and politicians since their first publication more than 500 years ago. Today, the book stands as one of the great guides and companions - a cornerstone of Western thought.

A far-reaching exploration of the idea of creation in Western thought, literature, religion, and history, this volume can fairly be called a magnum opus. He reflects on the different ways we have of talking about beginnings, on the "core-tiredness" that pervades our end-of-the-millennium spirit, and on the changing grammar of our discussions about the end of Western art and culture.

In this book, Emrys Westacott examines why, for more than two millennia, so many philosophers and people with a reputation for wisdom have been advocating frugality and simple living as the key to the good life. He also looks at why most people have ignored them, but argues that, in a world facing environmental crisis, it may finally be time to listen to the advocates of a simpler way of life.

Written before Alexander the Great was born, this Chinese treatise on war has become one of the most influential works on the subject. Read widely in the east since its appearance 2,500 years ago, The Art of War first came to the west with a French Jesuit in 1782. It has been studied by generals from Napoleon to Rommel, and it is still required reading in most military academies of the world.