List of publications in philosophy
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Western philosophy
Dialogues of Plato
- Author: Plato
- Publication data: 427 BC – c. 347 BC; The Collected Dialogues of Plato (Bollingen Series LXXI), edited by Edith Hamilton and Huntington Cairns, 1961.
- Online version: plato-dialogues.org (http://plato-dialogues.org/links.htm)
- Description: These classic dialogues are sometime considered to be the beginning of philosophy. The dialog had impact in various other ares. Plato's Republic deals with political philosophy (presented, stylistically, via the concept of a Utopia), ethics, and his theory of universals (the 'forms')--among other things.
- Importance: Topic creator, Breakthrough, Influence, Introduction
- Author: René Descartes
- Description: A defining book in the rationalist tradition. Defines the "proper" method for uncovering truth.
- Importance: Topic creator, Influence
Meditations on First Philosophy
- Author: René Descartes
- Description: A book primarily aimed at refuting radical skepticism.
- Importance: Topic creator, Influence
An Enquiry Concerning Human Understanding
- Author: David Hume
- Description: A book on epistemology which defines the empiricist tradition and is sometimes considered an early version of naturalism.
- Importance: Topic creator, Influence
- Author: Immanuel Kant
- Description: The Critique of Pure Reason is an attempt to answer two questions: "What do we know?" and "How do we know it?"
- Importance: Topic creator, Influence
Continental philosophy
Analytical philosophy
Tractatus Logico-Philosophicus (a.k.a. The Tractatus)
- Author: Ludwig Wittgenstein
- Description: An important work in logical positivism.
- Importance: Influence
From a Logical Point of View
- Author: W.V.O. Quine
- Publication data: From A Logical Point of View, Second Edition. Cambridge: Harvard University Press, 1980.
- Description: Contains many of Quine's very influential essays, including his widely read "Two Dogmas of Empiricism"
- Importance: Topic creator, Influence
The Rise of Scientific Philosophy
- Author: Hans Reichenbach
- Publication data: The Rise of Scientific Philosophy. Berkeley: University of California Press, 1964.
- Description: An introduction of scientifically informed philosophy, describes results and differences with prior philosophical methods
- Importance: Introduction
Chinese philosophy
Four Books
- Author: Mencius, Zisi, Confucius, Zeng Zi
- Publication data: 371 BC – c. 289 BC ??
- Online version: English translations by Charles Muller: Great Learning (http://www.hm.tyg.jp/~acmuller/contao/greatlearning.htm); Analects (http://www.hm.tyg.jp/~acmuller/contao/analects.htm); Doctrine of the Mean (http://www.hm.tyg.jp/~acmuller/contao/docofmean.htm); Mencius (http://www.hm.tyg.jp/~acmuller/contao/mencius.htm)
- Description: The Four Books, or the Four Classics, are the Chinese classic texts selected by Zhu Xi in the Song dynasty to serve as an introduction to Chinese philosophy and Confucianism. They are:
- the Great Learning
- the Analects of Confucius
- the Doctrine of the Mean
- the Mencius
- Importance: Topic creator, Breakthrough, Influence, Introduction
Tao Te Ching
- Author: Lao Zi
- Publication data: approximately 600 BC ??
- Online version: English translation by Charles Muller: [1] (http://www.hm.tyg.jp/~acmuller/contao/daodejing.html)
- Description: The Tao Te Ching, a short and obscure book, is one of the most influential on Chinese philosophy and religion, especially through Taoism, but also through Buddhism, because this Indian religion shared many Taoist words and concepts before developing into Chinese Buddhism.
- Importance: Topic creator, Breakthrough, Influence, Introduction
Buddhist philosophy
Ethics
Hindu philosophy
Indian philosophy
Jewish philosophy
Logic and Philosophy of logic
- See also List of publications in mathematics
- Authors: Bertrand Russell and Alfred North Whitehead
- Publication data: 1910-1913
- Description: It is an attempt to derive all mathematical truths from a well-defined set of axioms and inference rules in symbolic logic. The questions remained whether a contradiction could be derived from the Principia's axioms, and whether there exists a mathematical statement which could neither be proven nor disproven in the system. These questions were settled, in a rather disappointing way, by Gödel's incompleteness theorem in 1931.
- Importance: Influence
Gödel's incompleteness theorem
- Author: Kurt Gödel
- Publication data: "Über formal unentscheidbare Sätze der Principia Mathematica und verwandter Systeme". Monatshefte für Mathematik und Physik, vol. 38 (1931).
- Online version: Online version (http://home.ddc.net/ygg/etext/godel/)
- Description: In mathematical logic, Gödel's incompleteness theorems are two celebrated theorems proved by Kurt Gödel in 1930.
- Importance: Breakthrough, Influence
Political philosophy
- Author: Plato
- Decription: A dialog of Plato describing the perfect state ruled by philosopher kings.
- Importance: Topic creator
- Author: Thomas Hobbes
- Publication data: 1651
- Description: Defends the absolute monarch by appealing to individual self interest.
- Importance: Influence
- Author: John Stuart Mill
- Publication data: 1859
- Description: Provides a utilitarian justification for some individual rights.
- Importance: Influence
- Author: John Rawls
- Publication data: A Theory of Justice, Revised Edition. Cambridge: The Belknap Press, 1971, 1999.
- Description: Uses a thought experiment known as the original position to define justice as fairness. Discusses justice as it pertains to political institutions.
- Importance: Influence
Philosophy of science
The Structure of Scientific Revolutions
- Author: Thomas Samuel Kuhn.
- Publication data: The Structure of Scientific Revolutions, Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1962.
- Online version: Summary of book by the author (http://www.emory.edu/EDUCATION/mfp/kuhnsyn.html)
- Description: Sets forward the theory that science undergoes paradigm shifts rather than a linear accumulation of truth. Often cited as justification for late 20th-century skepticism towards scientific progress.
- Importance: Breakthrough, Impact, Influence
The Scientific Image
- Author: Bas C. van Fraassen
- Publication data:' The Scientific Image. Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1980.
- Description: Introduces a brand of scientifc anti-realism or instrumentalism called constructive empiricism.
- Importance: Impact
- Author: Paul Feyerabend.
- Publication data: Against Method: Outline of an Anarchistic Theory of Knowledge. London: Humanities Press, 1975.
- Description: Controversially argues that the scientific method was more of a hinderance for gaining knowledge than a boon. Seen as most radical of the attacks on logical positivism.
- Importance: Breakthrough, Impact
- Author: Karl Popper.
- Publication data: The Logic of Scientific Discovery. New York: Basic Books, 1959.
- Description: Sets forward logical positivist assessment of science, establishes criterion of falsification.
- Importance: Breakthrough, Impact, Influence
Philosophy of biology
The Nature of Selection
- Author: Elliot Sober
- Description: Discusses may different controversies in the philosophy of biology. Also describes natural selection as a theory of forces.
- Importance: Influence
What is Life?
- Author: Erwin Schrödinger
- Publication data: What is life? The physical aspect of the living cell. New York: The Macmillan Company, 1945.
- Online version: Available as Word DOC (http://home.att.net/~p.caimi/schrodinger.html)
- Description: Physicist Schrödinger encouraged biologists to think about life from a physical and chemical point of view, opening up the idea of molecular biology.
- Importance: Influence
Philosophy of mathematics
Philosophy of physics
Philosophy of social science
Philosophy of education
Philosophy of law
- Author: H.L.A. Hart
- Publication data: The Concept of Law, Second Edition. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1994.
- Description: A book which clearly articulates a legal postivist view of law.
- Importance: Influence
Law's Empire
- Authory: Ronald Dworkin
- Publication data: Law's Empire. Cambridge: The Belknap Press, 1986.
- Description: Suggests a new theory of jurisprudence which has had substantial effect on the practice of law in the U.S..
- Importance: Influence