This Very Short Introduction to hermeneutics demonstrates the central role of interpretation in our daily lives. By considering the historic developments in hermeneutic theory as well as its contemporary relevance, Zimmermann explains how humans continue to draw knowledge from the world around them.

We are frequently confronted with arguments. Arguments are attempts to persuade us - to influence our beliefs and actions - by giving us reasons to believe this or that. Critical Thinking: A Concise Guide will equip students with the concepts and techniques used in the identification, analysis and assessment of arguments whatever the subject matter or context.

Through precise and accessible discussion, this book provides the tools to become a successful critical thinker, one who can act and b...

The study of Islamic philosophy has entered a new and exciting phase in the last few years. Both the received canon of Islamic philosophers and the narrative of the course of Islamic philosophy are in the process of being radically questioned and revised. Most twentieth-century Western scholarship on Arabic or Islamic philosophy has focused on the period from the ninth century to the twelfth.

It is a measure of the transformation that is currently underway in thefield that, unlike other refer...

Although dour in appearance and formidable in reputation, Friedrich Nietzsche was an ardent practitioner of the art of poetry &; called in 12th-century Provencal "the gay science." This volume, which Nietzsche referred to as "the most personal of all my books," features the largest collection of his poetry that he ever chose to publish. It also offers an extensive and sophisticated treatment of the philosophical themes and views most central to his thinking, as well as the ideas that proved m...

Introduces classical Arabic philosophers through substantial selections from key works in each of the fields - including logic, philosophy of science, natural philosophy, metaphysics, ethics, and politics - to which they made contributions. It provides introduction situating the works within their historical, cultural, and philosophical contexts.

Suitable for the teaching of medieval philosophy, this title features judicious selections and translations based on critical editions.

Pontius Pilate is one of the most enigmatic figures in Christian theology. The only non-Christian to be named in the Nicene Creed, he is presented as a cruel colonial overseer in secular accounts, as a conflicted judge convinced of Jesus's innocence in the Gospels, and as either a pious Christian or a virtual demon in later Christian writings. This book takes Pilate's role in the trial of Jesus as a starting point for investigating the function of legal judgment in Western society and the way...

Written between 1945 and 1947, the essays in Sense and Non-Sense provide an excellent introduction to Merleau-Ponty's thought. They summarize his previous insights and exhibit their widest range of application-in aesthetics, ethics, politics, and the sciences of man. Each essay opens new perspectives to man's search for reason.

This Element offers a brief overview of Buddhist thought and modern scholarly approaches to its diverse forms of moral reflection. It then explores two of the most prominent philosophers from the main strands of the Indian Buddhist tradition - Buddhaghosa and Santideva - in a comparative fashion.

Originally delivered as a lecture in Paris in 1945, "Existentialism and Humanism" is Sartre's seminal defence of his original doctrine of existentialism and a plan for its practical application to everyday human life.