The author of the bestselling "Oxford Dictionary of Philosophy" offers a coherent, non-intimidating introduction to the challenging and fascinating landscape of Western philosophy.

• PART ONE: Setting the Scene


• 1: Descartes's Demon


• PART TWO: Beginning to Think about Ourselves


• 2: Consciousness, Zombies, and Permutants


• 3: Freedom, Determinism, Fate


• 4: The Conscious Self


• PART THREE: Beginning to Think about the Way Things Are


• 5: Good God?


• 6: Wrestling with Idealism


• 7: Why do Things Keep on Keeping On?


• 8: The Arts of Intellectual Hygiene


• PART FOUR: Beginning to Think About What to Do


• 9: Behaving Well


• 10: Pulling Together

Simon Blackburn is the Edna J. Koury Distinguished Professor of Philosophy at the University of North Carolina, Chapel Hill. He was a Fellow and Tutor at Pembroke College, Oxford, from 1969 to 1990. His books for OUP are Spreading the Word (1984), Essays in Quasi-Realism (1993), The Oxford Dictionary of Philosophy (hbk 1994, pbk 1996), and Ruling Passions (1998). He edited the journal Mind from 1984 to 1990.