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The Humane Perspective: Philosophical Reflections on Human Nature, the Search for Meaning, and the Role of Religion

Online ISBN:
9780198918943
Print ISBN:
9780198918912
Publisher:
Oxford University Press
Book

The Humane Perspective: Philosophical Reflections on Human Nature, the Search for Meaning, and the Role of Religion

John Cottingham
John Cottingham

Professor Emeritus of Philosophy

Honorary Fellow

University of Reading
,
UK
St John’s College, Oxford
,
UK
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Published online:
10 June 2024
Published in print:
11 July 2024
Online ISBN:
9780198918943
Print ISBN:
9780198918912
Publisher:
Oxford University Press

Abstract

This book brings together fourteen essays from the work of John Cottingham on moral philosophy and philosophy of religion spanning the past fifteen years. The chapters are closely related in so far as they all deal with the perennial challenges of human existence—the drive to understand the world we live in, the limits of scientific inquiry, the search for a good and meaningful life, and the human quest for transcendence. As well as being thematically linked, they share a common style and methodology, illustrating the distinctive goal that has informed the author’s work in recent years, that of promoting a more ‘humane’ conception of philosophizing. While in no way discarding the technical tools of the professional philosopher such as abstract argumentation and analysis, whose value is unquestionable, this approach is notable for drawing on the full range of resources available to the human mind, including those that depend on literary, poetic, imaginative, aesthetic, and emotional modes of awareness. In contrast to the model of the philosopher as a kind of detached scrutineer, the essays exemplify the belief that there is also a distinctive and valuable kind of philosophical understanding that requires a more involved and engaged stance. The topics dealt with fall broadly within the familiar domains of moral philosophy and philosophy of religion, but the reflections offered on these areas of human thought and practice always aim to be sensitive to how morality and religion actually operate in the lives of the human beings involved.

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