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Index
Title
Introduction
About This Book
Conventions Used in This Book
What You’re Not to Read
Foolish Assumptions
How This Book Is Organized
Icons Used in This Book
Where to Go from Here
Part I : What Is Philosophy, Anyway?
Chapter 1: Great Thinkers, Deep Thoughts
A Few Nuts Spice the Cake
Socrates on the Examination that Counts
The Questions We’ll Ask
Chapter 2: Philosophy as an Activity
Outward Bound for the Mind
Mapping Our Way Forward
The Extreme Power of Belief
Chapter 3: The Love of Wisdom
The Triple-A Skill Set of Philosophy
Wisdom Rules
The Socratic Quest for Wisdom
Part II : How Do We Know Anything?
Chapter 4: Belief, Truth, and Knowledge
Our Beliefs about Belief
The Importance of Belief
The Ideal of Knowledge
Chapter 5: The Challenge of Skepticism
The Ancient Art of Doubt
Incredible Questions We Cannot Answer
Doubting Your Doubts
Where Do We Go from Here?
Chapter 6: The Amazing Reality of Basic Beliefs
The Foundations of Knowledge
The Principle of Belief Conservation
William James on Precursive Faith
Leaps of Faith
Part III : What Is the Good?
Chapter 7: What Is Good?
A Basic Approach to Ethics and Morality
Defining the Good in the Context of Life
Three Views on Evaluative Language
Teleological Target Practice
Chapter 8: Happiness, Excellence, and the Good Life
Memo to the Modern World
The Idea of Good: A Short Course in Options
Four Dimensions of Human Experience
The Ultimate Context of Good
Chapter 9: Ethical Rules and Moral Character
Commandments, Rules, and Loopholes
Character, Wisdom, and Virtue
Can Goodness Be Taught?
Part IV : Are We Ever Really Free?
Chapter 10: Fate, Destiny, and You
The Importance of Free Will
Foreseeing the Future: The Theological Challenge to Freedom
What Will Be Will Be: The Logical Challenge to Freedom
Robots and Cosmic Puppetry: The Scientific Challenge to Freedom
Chapter 11: Standard Views of Freedom
God, Logic, and Free Will
The Modern Scientific Challenge
Chapter 12: Just Do It: Human Agency in the World
Some Wisdom about Freedom
The Big Picture
How to Be an Agent and Get More than 15 Percent
Part V : The Incredible, Invisible You
Chapter 13: What Is a Person?
Guitars, Ghosts, and People
Glimpses of the Mind
Philosophical Views of the Person
The Contenders
Narrowing the Options
Chapter 14: The Case for Materialism
The Positive Arguments
The Negative Arguments
A Verdict on the Materialist Case
Chapter 15: The Case for Dualism
The Natural Belief in Dualism
I’m a Soul Man
Part VI : What’s the Deal with Death?
Chapter 16: From Dust to Dust: Fear and the Void
The Final Exit and the Four Fears
Chapter 17: Philosophical Consolations on Death
Don’t Worry, Be Happy
Materialist Conceptions of “Immortality”
Chapter 18: Is There Life After Death?
Philosophical Doubts and Denials
Arguments for Survival
The Light at the End of the Tunnel
Part VII : Is There a God?
Chapter 19: Two World Views
The Lost Beach Ball
The Great Divide
The Great Debate
Chapter 20: Theistic Visions
The Ontological Argument
Cosmology and God
A Designer Universe?
Religious Experience
Chapter 21: The Problem of Evil
Expectations of Theism
The Argument from Evil
The Great Theodicies
The Element of Mystery
Part VIII : The Meaning of Life
Chapter 22: What Is the Meaning of Life?
The Questions We Can Ask
Meaning and This World
God and Meaning
Chapter 23: Pascal’s Wager: Betting Your Life
Blaise Pascal: Philosopher-Genius
The Wager
Criticisms of the Wager
Choosing a World View Right for You
Chapter 24: Success and Happiness in Life
What is Enough? The Race for More
True Success
The Universal Conditions of Success
A Concluding Note on Happiness
Part IX : The Part of Tens
Chapter 25: Ten Great Philosophers
Socrates
Plato
Aristotle
Saint Thomas Aquinas
William of Ockham
René Descartes
Immanuel Kant
G.W.F. Hegel
S¨oren Kierkegaard
Bertrand Russell
Chapter 26: Ten Great Questions
Is Philosophy Practical?
Can We Ever Really Know Anything?
Is There Ultimately an Objectivity to Ethics?
Who Am I?
Is Happiness Really Possible in Our World?
Is There, After All, a God?
What Is the Good Life?
Why Is So Much Suffering in the World?
If a Tree Falls in the Forest....
Bishop Berkeley speaks
What’s Stronger in Human Life, Rationality or Irrationality?
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