Bertrand Russell
A courageous attack on the Subject-Object distinction.
Category: Erudition
Influential reading
QED
Richard Feynman
The cutest presentation of quantum electrodynamics.
Heart of the Hunter
Laurens van der Post
The creation story of yester-year’s San people.
Gödel’s Proof
Ernest Nagel & James Newman
Wow. ‘Now who would have thought of that?’
Ethics since 1900
Mary Warnock (1977)
Mary sequentially covers (1) G.E. Moore’s anti-naturalism; (2) Prichard & Ross’ ‘Intuitionism’; (3) Ayer’s logical positivist approach (‘Emotivism’); and (4) later development by Stevenson and Nowell-Smith, including the latter’s Janus Principle; (5) moral psychology in general; and finishes with (6) a wonderful overview of Sartre’s Existentialism. An unmissable overview to Ethics before its entanglement with Political Philosophy. Newcomers will want to familiarize themselves with Utilitarianism first.
Cosmopolitanism
Kwame Anthony Appiah
Appiah’s rather simplistic case is economically naïve, and shallow in places. Still, I think it largely succeeds in attaining what it sets out to do, and is worth reading – although the lack of depth will be frustrating to some.
A Survey of Metaphysics
E.J. Lowe
A cute and simple overview of the landscape.
Sexual Behavior in the Human Male
Alfred Kinsey (1953)
The classic study.
Sexual Behavior in the Human Female
Alfred Kinsey (1953)
The classic study.
The Lost World of the Kalahari
Laurens van der Post
Laurens’ stirring account of his mid-century exploration of the Kalahari Desert in search of the mythical San peoples.