- Hardcover: 256 pages
- Publisher: W&N; 1st Edition edition (14 Sep 2006)
- Language English
- ISBN-10: 0297851675
- ISBN-13: 978-0297851677
- Product Dimensions: 19.8 x 13.8 x 2.8 cm
- Average Customer Review: 3.5 out of 5 stars See all reviews (2 customer reviews)
- Amazon Bestsellers Rank: 568,937 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)
The Form of Things: Essays on Life, Ideas and Liberty
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Product Description
Review
"Grayling has that wonderful gift that all good teachers have, the ability to simplify" Herald
--This text refers to the
Paperback
edition.
Product Description
'Grief and loneliness, depression, despair and failure - those things... are the common human lot at least at times in all our lives'. Yet it is philosophy which, while not providing an answer to these problems, can enable us to prepare for them, and create strategies with which to deal with them. It is only through reflecting upon the world around us, reading, thinking, questioning, enjoying, that we can inculcate understanding, tolerance and importantly the courage to live our lives. It is our responsibility to live such 'considered lives' and to realise that we are authors of a narrative that can be shaped and controlled. This is the fifth in a series of essay miscellanies from our foremost philosopher A.C. Grayling, reflecting upon the form of our world and its multiplicity. The essays are grouped by theme into reflections upon life and the standards we live by, including vivid polemics and perceptive pieces on significant thinkers, contemporary rights and liberties issues. This book brilliantly articulates the philosophical debate and reflection that is needed to prepare us for life in the twenty-first century.
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Customer Reviews
Most Helpful Customer Reviews
15 of 19 people found the following review helpful
Format:Hardcover
As with the previous books in this series, this one sees Grayling eloquently applying philosophy to everyday life in an extremely readable and jargon-free manner. It's perfect for flicking through, either on a reasonably long bus journey or curled up on the sofa at home, with each short - but insightful - essay guaranteed to give you something to ponder or cause you to see the subject in a slightly different light.
Grayling is not simply a detached on-looker; a strong sense of humanistic ethics runs throughout his work, he repeatedly praises the emotions and arts which make life so interesting, while treating the abstract ideas and concepts which seek to cheapen human life (mainly, but not exclusively, religion) with scorn.
In short: warm, intelligent, insightful.
Grayling is not simply a detached on-looker; a strong sense of humanistic ethics runs throughout his work, he repeatedly praises the emotions and arts which make life so interesting, while treating the abstract ideas and concepts which seek to cheapen human life (mainly, but not exclusively, religion) with scorn.
In short: warm, intelligent, insightful.
2 of 15 people found the following review helpful
Format:Paperback
Grayling writes smugly, from what he clearly imagines to be a great height, downwards in the direction of what he equally clearly sees as his lowly and benighted readers. I spent an hour leafing through this yesterday and took away little more than a vague and amused impression that he was trying to patronise me. The fact that I agree with him about most things only made it worse: with friends like this, suddenly my enemies look a lot more dangerous.
Yuck.
Yuck.
Most Helpful Customer Reviews on Amazon.com (beta)
Amazon.com:
2 reviews
0 of 2 people found the following review helpful
The unlikely vIctory of the Iroquois against their Indian enemies
3 Feb 2011
Format:Paperback|Amazon Verified Purchase
This remains an important book of 181 pages with an extensive bibliography and index. It covers the years 1535-1687 with the stated purpose to examine how, regardless of being significantly outnumbered and completely surrounded by hostile tribes with many of these tribes having European allies (France, Sweden, Colony of Maryland), the Iroquois will so throughly and completely defeat their neighboring Indian enemies to become "the dominant power in their region until" the American War for Independence.
Part of the author's purpose is to address what he considers the misplaced notion of attributing this astounding Iroquois military success to the "magical" Iroquois Confederation, an alleged inherent warlike disposition or a superior intellect. In this, he appears to be addressing earlier theories as to the reasons for Iroquois success. He may overstate his case regarding the lack of contribution from the Iroquois political institutions. The author does not overstate the Iroquois success, however. He demonstrates the Iroquois failures through the mid-1600s, their rapid (but limited) success thereafter, their lack of military success against non-neighboring tribes, and their inability to maintain an expansive empire.
The author appears to have a through knowledge of the primary (primarily Jesuit Relations and Colonial Documents of New York) and secondary (Parkman et el) sources and interacts with them throughout the book.
A problem with this book (1940 edition-3rd printing 1967) is some inconsistant dates used. On Pg 68 the author has the "Neutral and Erie Wars of 1660-65" and Pg 97-98 states the Neutrals were defeated in 1651 and the Erie defeated in 1654 (both tribes being dispersed and effectively destroyed as tribal units).
The author does argue for an economic motive (the fur trade) fueling the conflict between the Iroquois and their enemies. He also suggests that this economic motive was a positive factor in maintaining peace within the Iroquois confederacy itself. To suggest that economic motivation for war has been discredited or that the author has underlying "marxist concepts (sic)" appears completely unfounded. The author acknowledges that the European-Indian trade is monopolistic and mercantile in nature (government controlled economies). Prices are fixed, competition does not (for the most part) exist, there is no "Free Market Capitalism" here. This is not a book about economics but a book about the reasons for the unlikely Iroquois victory over their neighbors.
Part of the author's purpose is to address what he considers the misplaced notion of attributing this astounding Iroquois military success to the "magical" Iroquois Confederation, an alleged inherent warlike disposition or a superior intellect. In this, he appears to be addressing earlier theories as to the reasons for Iroquois success. He may overstate his case regarding the lack of contribution from the Iroquois political institutions. The author does not overstate the Iroquois success, however. He demonstrates the Iroquois failures through the mid-1600s, their rapid (but limited) success thereafter, their lack of military success against non-neighboring tribes, and their inability to maintain an expansive empire.
The author appears to have a through knowledge of the primary (primarily Jesuit Relations and Colonial Documents of New York) and secondary (Parkman et el) sources and interacts with them throughout the book.
A problem with this book (1940 edition-3rd printing 1967) is some inconsistant dates used. On Pg 68 the author has the "Neutral and Erie Wars of 1660-65" and Pg 97-98 states the Neutrals were defeated in 1651 and the Erie defeated in 1654 (both tribes being dispersed and effectively destroyed as tribal units).
The author does argue for an economic motive (the fur trade) fueling the conflict between the Iroquois and their enemies. He also suggests that this economic motive was a positive factor in maintaining peace within the Iroquois confederacy itself. To suggest that economic motivation for war has been discredited or that the author has underlying "marxist concepts (sic)" appears completely unfounded. The author acknowledges that the European-Indian trade is monopolistic and mercantile in nature (government controlled economies). Prices are fixed, competition does not (for the most part) exist, there is no "Free Market Capitalism" here. This is not a book about economics but a book about the reasons for the unlikely Iroquois victory over their neighbors.
2 of 16 people found the following review helpful
Obsolete theory
28 Jun 2006
Format:Hardcover
This book was seminal in its time as the first to propose that trade relations were the ultimate cause of the wars fought among the Eastern Woodland tribes of North America in the 17th century. This theory, based primarily on marxist concepts of trade being a fundamentally evil activity at the source of many conflicts, has been largely discredited today.
For a better overview of this subject, check out the Iroquois Wars I & II, available from Amazon.com, which offer excerpts from the primary sources themselves and tell a much different story from Mr. Hunt's faulty interpretation.
For a better overview of this subject, check out the Iroquois Wars I & II, available from Amazon.com, which offer excerpts from the primary sources themselves and tell a much different story from Mr. Hunt's faulty interpretation.
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