Concepts and Categories: Philosophical Essays – Second Edition 2nd Edition by Isaiah Berlin (PDF)

Description

The goal of philosophy is always the same, to assist men to understand themselves and thus to operate in the open, not wildly in the dark.–Isaiah Berlin This volume of Isaiah Berlin’s essays presents the sweep of his contributions to philosophy from his early participation in the debates surrounding logical positivism to his later work, which more evidently reflects his life-long interest in political theory, the history of ideas, and the philosophy of history. Here Berlin describes his view of the nature of philosophy, and of its main task: to uncover the various models and presuppositions–the concepts and categories–that men bring to their existence and that help form that existence. Throughout, his writing is informed by his intense consciousness of the plurality of values, the nature of historical understanding, and of the fragility of human freedom in the face of rigid dogma. This new edition adds a number of previously uncollected pieces that throw further light on Berlin’s central philosophical concerns, and a revealing exchange of letters with the editor and Bernard Williams about the genesis of the book.

User’s Reviews

Reviews from Amazon users which were colected at the time this book was published on the website:

⭐I haven’t finalized my conclusions about the book, but i do think lit is worth the read.

⭐This book is very useful in showing how Berlin came to believe the understanding of the history of ideas as vital to our present understanding of ourselves-perhaps more important philosophy itself.

⭐I’m not able to evaluate the philosophy. One reason is that I don’t have enough background. Another reason is that the writing is so atrocious that it’s hard to make sense of the essays. I’ve copied below the third sentence of the essay “Verification”:”The thesis which I shall try to establish is that the principle of verifiability or verification, after playing a decisive role in the history of modern philosophy, by clearing up confusions, exposing major errors and indicating what were and what were not questions proper for philosophers to ask, which has enabled it to exercise in our day a function not unlike that which Kant’s critical method performed for his generation, cannot, for all that, be accepted as a final criterion of empirical significance, since such acceptance leads to wholly untenable consequences.”Mr. Simmons, my high school English teacher, would have wept.

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