Philosophy for Beginners (A Writers & Readers beginners documentary comic book) [Illustrated] (Paperback)

Of course, much of what is considered 'philosophy' outside of the Western framework is often more of a spirituality or mystical task than one that is properly philosophical. On the other hand, Osborne tries to define philosophy in the first few pages, with the help of Plato, Gramsci, Marx, and Russell, and comes to a sort of non-conclusion. Osborne's sense of humour, well established in this book, starts here, by his play with the idea that whereas Plato though philosophers should rule the world to set everything to rights, other philosophers speak of the meaninglessness of everything, which would leave one with no content or ideas, which would make ruling rather difficult.

One of the drawbacks of this text is that it does not have the time or space to go in much depth on any of the topics represented. This is more or less a who's who of philosophy, giving some basic outlines of their thinking and showing in broad strokes the general trends of philosophy over time. I cannot really speak to how I would understand philosophy using this as an early text, as I came to it after some considerable philosophical education, but my impression is that it might leave a rather thin understanding in many areas.

Fortunately, Osborne provides a bibliography, both of basic survey texts and of more advanced primary texts and studies. I'd like to see more done with this. Osborne does often refer to the primary texts in the narrative stories of the philosophers so that readers will become acquainted with them. Hopefully this will prove a motivation for further reading.

There is a subtle (occasionally not-so-subtle) anti-Christian and anti-religious bias in the book. When discussing the fate of Hypatia, a deplorable event no matter who carried it out, he ascribes the blame not to the particular people involved, but with an off-the-cuff remark slams the whole of Christianity. Similarly, he offers Bertrand Russell's quote about philosophy being a no-man's land between theology and science, embattled from each side; odd how many theologians feel theology is embattled between science and philosophy -- I did note as well that there are no pointedly anti-scientific jabs the way there are against religion.

This is a rather minor criticism, however, and probably one that most people wouldn't notice too greatly. It is true that the church and freedom of inquiry has not always been synonymous (to say the least) but there are better ways of approaching the issue.

The presentation is an attempt, largely successful, to render into an interesting format a topic that frightens or bores many people today. Why is philosophy irrelevant to most? Again, this is a good question, asked at the beginning, and difficult to answer. This probably needs to answered by each reader for herself or himself; hopefully the reader will make it all the way through the book. It also asks the question, how can you tell if someone is a philosopher. Of course, you can always accept the answer of Gramsci -- we all are, to a certain degree.

I've read several books in the 'For Beginners' series. They are often used in graduate and undergraduate classes to help people ease their way into difficult subjects. This, as a history of philosophy, is a fairly good text.