icicleie's Full Review: Philip Stokes - Philosophy: 100 Essential Thinkers
The author of “Philosophy, 100 Essential Thinkers”, Philip Stokes, chooses to open the book with a quote from Shakespeare’s Hamlet;-
“There are more things in heaven and earth, Horatio, than are dreamt of in your philosophy”
Stokes uses this quote as a spring-board to briefly discuss his general take on the meaning of philosophy, mentioning that he believes it to constitute the search for those things in ‘heaven and earth’ not currently represented in human knowledge or understanding.
Using a chronological approach & a list of twenty-two ‘categories’ of philosopher (eg-The Presocratics, The Rationalists, The Existentialists etc), Stokes organizes his one hundred philosophers. Each philosopher (even the more famous and influential ones) gets a two page chunk of the book, one page being completely filled with a black & white photograph or drawing of the wo/man in question. Personally, I would have preferred to have had a more thorough discussion of theory but I do appreciate that this book is meant to be somewhat of a novelty book – even with two pages for each philosopher, a person seriously interested in any one in particular would need to do a bit of further research.
The time frame spans from around 600 years BC with Thales of Miletus (accredited by Stokes as being “the first natural scientist and analytical philosopher in Western intellectual society”) to as recent as 2000 with W.V.O. Quine, the man who saw Science as the “final arbiter of the truth”. As would be expected, all the big cheeses are included in the pile – Plato, Socrates, Aristotle, etc. Only ever reading a single page on these great men in a ‘compilation book’ would probably be an insult to their work, however.
Of those who Stokes considers the hundred greatest philosophers of all time, just two are women – Mary Wollstonecraft and Simone De Bevoir. A striking imbalance but not unexpected given cultural conditions over the centuries. I mulled over a few other reasons why the sphere of thinking might have had such a disproportionate amount of men (or at least Stokes's list!), but I'll be the first to admit that sexist generalizations are best left as passing thoughts than as concrete ideas!
What is quite ironic is that Wollstonecraft was very interested in campaigning for the rights of not just women but for those of men too! I can only call this extremely virtuous in an era in which the rights of men were so far advanced. In theory, it seems she wanted optimal and equal rights for both genders, so that the human race would represent the perfect twinning of masculine and feminine. Even so, she later earned the title of the ‘hyena in petticoats’ when she called more loudly for advances in women’s rights, abolition of the monarchy and dissolution of the church’s power. While Wollstonecraft might have analyzed society, it doesn’t seem that she tackled any of the ‘big questions’. That said, in a book that relies so heavily on synopsis, only the issues that the person in question tackled most ferociously can be detailed.
The descriptions of the philosophers are thus relatively brief and to the point. This format is actually the book’s greatest downfall – trying to cover 100 philosophers in one book will never leave enough scope to elaborate and fully explain their work and beliefs. The author (thankfully) leaves out much of the ‘day to day’ information such as where they were educated, who they married etc, but even still, there is not enough scope to deal with the theories. In truth, I found myself wishing I had a book of theories, rather than a book of philosophers – a book that would have sections on ‘theories to do with music’, ‘theories to do with possible realms beyond human perception’ and so forth. I would recommend that you search for such a book rather than buy this one – the information on a particular topic is fragmented simply because of the chosen format.
I suppose you could say that the book is presented and written in almost boring encyclopedia style – very factual and direct – with little or no input from the person who compiled the information. Stokes never uses his own voice anywhere but in the introduction. The book finishes off with a glossary for those many times when you’ll probably need a recap of the general meanings of Empiricism, or Scholasticism, or Utilitarianism.
Overall, although this a book that summarizes the lives of some great and less great philosophers, it isn’t exactly a light read that you can read a giant chunk of while sitting down with a coffee. I’ve had this book for months now, and I digested it in stages, taking two to four philosophers per sitting and thinking about what they had to say. Don't expect all 100 of the philosophers to have had fascinating ideas either! If you’re looking to get somebody a book on the basic theories of philosophy, I’d definitely recommend you look further than this book and this review.
Epinions.com periodically updates pricing and product information from third-party sources, so some information may be slightly out-of-date. You should confirm all information before relying on it.
- Add to My Yahoo!: 
- Add to Google Homepage: 
© 1999-2009 Shopping.com, Inc.