Want to know about books on philosophy for beginners? Well you have landed on the right article.
Enter you Have you ever randomly thought to yourself - what if you weren’t here?
What if you were a butterfly dreaming to be human? You still might be a butterfly and reading this article in your dreams.
Well, this is what the great Daoist philosopher Chuang Tzu once thought.
Philosophy, or as it translates to “love for wisdom”, intends to answer fundamental questions like 'what is a person?
What is the nature of reality?' 'What is even the truth?' But why should one read philosophy, to begin with?
Philosophy contributes significantly to the educational enterprise by requiring intellectual activity. Since the topics philosophy aims to solve are abstract, it usually necessitates more reflection than action.
Also, because logic and reason are the foundations of philosophy, reading literature on the subject can help you become a better thinker and improve your reasoning ability.
Here is a collection of the best philosophy books for beginners:
Books On Philosophy For Beginners
1. The Philosophy Book: Big Ideas Simply Explained
The Philosophy Book delves into the history and concepts of philosophy, demystifying a subject that can be intimidating.
Are René Descartes', Mary Wollstonecraft's, John Locke's, and Thomas Hobbes' theories still valid today?
The Philosophy Book delves into the works and thoughts of over a hundred of history's most influential thinkers, bringing you on a trip from Ancient Greece to the present day.
Examine feminism, rationalism, idealism, existentialism, and other major philosophical movements.
The Philosophy Book uses innovative pictures that burst off the page alongside imaginative typography to break down complex concepts from Socrates to Confucius and Julia Kristeva.
It cuts through the fog of academics and unravels complex theories to demonstrate how our social, political, and ethical beliefs are formed.
The information in The Philosophy Book is organized by periods, innovative thinkers, methods, and philosophical approaches. And it is one of the best philosophy books to read.
Features
2. A Very Short Introduction series
Through readings from Plato, Hume, Descartes, Hegel, Darwin, and Buddhist literature, Philosophy:
A Very Short Introduction examines essential ideas in ethics, knowledge, and the self.
We are all philosophers to some extent. Almost everyone spends their lives according to some set of values.
The majority of us like a broad image of the world.
Philosophy – which is primarily thought of as an academic subject – simply implies being reflective. It's difficult to avoid philosophy.
Is philosophy even worthwhile? What is the relationship between the many branches of philosophy? How should we live? What exactly is there? What evidence do we have?
These are a few of the many questions that one would come across while reading this book.
3. Sophie’s world
Sophie Amundsen is fourteen years old and lives in Norway.
She enrols in an odd philosophy correspondence course.
Every day, a letter with a few questions arrives in the inbox, followed by a package containing written pages outlining the ideas of a philosopher who dealt with the issues posed by the inquiries.
Sophie discovers later that the philosopher who is instructing her is Alberto Knox, despite her initial ignorance.
His dog Hermes delivers her packages. Alberto first tells Sophie that philosophy is highly important in life and that we are not truly alive unless we question and analyze our basic existence.
Along with Sophie, the readers get to learn many important philosophical values as well.
4. Philosophy 101
Aristotle and Heidegger to free will and metaphysics.
So, whether you're trying to figure out what makes existentialism click or what makes Voltaire tick, Philosophy 101 provides all the answers—even the ones you didn't know you needed.
5. The problems of philosophy
The Problems of Philosophy develops an epistemological framework and a debate on truth.
Bertrand Russell employs an analytical method to distinguish between our perceptions of reality.
In the beginning, he uses Cartesian radical doubt to focus on our understanding of the physical universe.
He claims to have specific views about the table in his room and wants to know if his beliefs are true and, if so, what kind of object the table is.
He reasoned that the table is made up of matter and that there is a way for him to learn about it. When you look at the table, you'll notice something: an oval spot of brown.
He refers to this as a "sense-datum." The book talks about philosophy in a very interesting way and deserves a read.
6. How Philosophy works: the concepts visually explained
This book is the ultimate introduction to the history of philosophy.
By demystifying the fundamental ideas of the world's greatest philosophers and studying all of the most important disciplines of philosophical thinking,
the book has been written with a unique visual style.
To clarify essential concepts regarding the nature of reality, How Philosophy Works uses vivid infographics and jargon-free prose.
The book offers the ideas and theories of significant philosophical traditions and philosophers - from Plato and Socrates to Nietzsche and Wittgenstein to Kant.
In a fresh, easy-to-understand approach this book covers everything - ethics, epistemology and phenomenology.
7. Meditations on first philosophy by Descartes
René Descartes' philosophical essay was first published in Latin in the year 1641.
Méditations Métaphysiques was published in 1647 as a French translation (supervised by Descartes) by the Duke of Luynes.
The book is divided into six meditations in which Descartes rejects any belief in things that are not certain and then attempts to establish what may be known with certainty.
He composed the meditations as though he had meditated for six days, referring to the previous one as "yesterday" in each one.
(Descartes started working on the Meditations in 1639.) It is widely read today and is one of the most significant philosophical writings ever written.
8. Think - a compelling introduction to philosophy
Think is a solid framework for investigating the most basic ideas in philosophy.
It comprehends how famous philosophers have approached the questions that have forced themselves most powerfully on human consciousness.
The author of the best-selling Oxford Dictionary of Philosophy - Simon Blackburn - starts by establishing a compelling case for philosophy's relevance,
and then goes on to show how major historical thinkers like Plato, Hume, Kant, Descartes, and others handled its central subjects.
Blackburn explores the essence of human reflection and how we think or can think about knowledge, fate, ethics, and other topics in a lively and accessible manner.
God, reason, and truth are all aspects of one's identity. Each chapter delves into a key topic and provides the reader with a self-contained tour of the philosophers' research.
9. A little history of philosophy
Questions regarding the nature of reality and how we should live are at the heart of philosophy.
These were Socrates' concerns - as he spent his days in the old Athenian marketplace - asking difficult questions and alarming the people he encountered by demonstrating how little they truly understood.
Nigel Warburton introduces the main philosophers in Western philosophy and analyses their most compelling ideas about the world and how to live in it in this fascinating book.
Susannah Willcox would have benefited from a wider range of ideas outside of the dead-white-male Western philosophical canon.
10. Morality: An Introduction to Ethics
Bernard Williams's outstanding essay on morality tackles the challenges of writing moral philosophy and provides a lively alternative to more systematic interpretations that appear to leave all the vital concerns off the page.
Williams explores the essence of 'goodness' in connection to responsibilities and choice, roles, norms, and human nature, explaining, analyzing,
And distinguishing several significant perspectives from the completely amoral to ideas of subjective or relative morality, examining their consistency.
The final chapters explore what morality is all about, going beyond happiness to other human goals and aspirations.
This is a reprint of a moral philosophy classic with a fresh foreword by the author.
11. Beyond good and evil
Beyond Good and Evil provides a thorough examination of Nietzsche's mature philosophy.
There are 296 aphorisms in the book, ranging in length from a few sentences to a few pages.
The aphorisms are divided into nine chapters, each of which is bookended by a preface and a poem.
While each aphorism can be read independently, there is a linear flow between aphorisms inside chapters and from one chapter to the next.
Nonetheless, each aphorism expresses a unique point of view, and even the chapter summaries leave a lot out.
Their dogmatism is contrasted by Nietzsche with the "free spirit" who is not bound by any one point of view.
He expects that future philosophers would be distinguished by an experimental approach, eager to test any hypothesis and follow any argument to its conclusion.
12. At the Existentialist Café
Sarah Bakewell's book At the Existentialist Café:
Freedom, Being, and Apricot Cocktails was published in 2016 and discusses the philosophy and history of the twentieth-century movement existentialism.
Bakewell's non-fiction work is divided into fourteen chapters that recount the lives of important existentialists.
She mostly writes in the third person, but she does occasionally move to the first person to express her personal existentialism experience.
It's a collaboration between Jean-Paul Sartre, Simone de Beauvoir, Maurice Merleau-Ponty, Albert Camus, Karl Jaspers, Martin Heidegger, and a half-dozen other European writers and philosophers.
They epitomized the existentialist and phenomenology movements in twentieth-century philosophy.
13. Plato: Five dialogues
Enter your text Based on what we know about Socrates, we can conclude that he had a lasting influence on a small group of his followers who were closely involved with his life and teachings.
Socrates' name has been respected for generations, and he is considered to be one of the greatest instructors of all time.
Five dialogues are particularly crucial to the trial and death of Socrates.
They are the Euthyphro, Apology, Crito, Critocracy, and the Phaedo.
An attempt is made in the Euthyphro to answer the question - "What is piety?" It is especially relevant to Socrates' trial because he had been accused of impiety and was about to be prosecuted for a crime that no one seemed to comprehend.
14. Paradoxes by Mark Sainsbury
A paradox is an unsatisfactory result produced from apparently acceptable premises by seemingly acceptable logic.
Many paradoxes present major philosophical issues and are linked to philosophical crises and revolutionary developments.
The third edition of this fascinating book has been expanded and reworked to include Zeno's paradoxical argument that the runner can never overtake the tortoise,
A new chapter on moral paradoxes, belief paradoxes, and - most difficult of all - truth paradoxes.
The discussion is straightforward, but it tackles complex and challenging issues. It is supported by helpful questions that assist the reader to interact with the points.
The end product is not only a solution to paradoxes but also a great introduction to philosophical thinking.
15. Mortal Questions
Mortal Questions by Thomas Nagel delves into some fundamental questions about the meaning, nature, and value of human existence.
Personal identity, consciousness, freedom, and value are discussed about mortality, sexual behaviour, social inequality, war, and political power.
Conclusion
The philosophical study improves a person's problem-solving abilities. It aids in the examination of concepts, definitions, arguments, and issues.
It also improves our ability to organize thoughts and issues, deal with value questions, and extract the most important information from enormous amounts of data.
With the overall goal of challenging our assumptions about our lives and delving into the nuances of why we believe the way we do and how we choose to act.
From Plato to Nietzsche, the above-mentioned list of books on philosophy is the ones that a beginner should look at.
I hope you liked our article on books on philosophy for beginners, if you have any comments or suggestions do share them in the comments below.
Frequently Asked Questions (FAQs)
Q. Who are the easiest philosophers to read?
Ans. Plato, Bertrand Russell, and Epictetus are considered some of the easiest philosophers in terms of grasping what they have said. This is partly because Plato can be considered an experience that would last a lifetime. The well-written History of philosophy by Russell is often considered a go-to for beginner philosophers or philosophy enthusiasts.
Q. Best philosophy books 21 Century?
Ans. Free will by Sam Harris, Against Empathy by Paul Bloom, and Nudities by Giorgio Agamben can easily be considered the top three 21st-century philosophy books.