The World as Idea: A Conceptual History (Routledge Studies in Social and Political Thought)

Cover
Half Title
Series Information
Title Page
Copyright Page
Table of Contents
Introduction
	“My” World
	The Origins of “The World”
	The Varieties of Fate
	Human and Humanity
	Varieties of Existence
	Planet Earth
	Our Earth
		Life on Earth
		Humanity on Earth
	My Perspective on The World
	Notes
1 The World and Its History
	The Historical Periodization of the World
		Ancient, Medieval, Modern, and Postmodern Worlds
	The Cosmos and the World
		Cosmogony and Cosmology
		Some Asian Theories of the Universe and World
	Myths of the World
		Myths of Life, Death, and Their Meanings
		Myths of Creation
		Mythos, Nous, and Logos
	Mythos and Logos in Presocratic Greek Thought
		Heraclitus
		Xenophanes
		Parmenides
		Pythagoras and the Pythagoreans
		Empedocles
		Anaxagoras
		Atomistic Materialism: Leucippus, Democritus, Epicurus, and Lucretius
		The Sophists
	Socrates’ World
		The Socratic Problem: Who Was Socrates?
			Socratic Definitions, Ethics, and Politics
			Socrates’ Trial, Death, and Political Philosophy
			Socratic “Ignorance” and Virtues
		The Post-Socratic World
	Plato: The Form(s) of a Better World
		Platonic Discourse
		The Two Worlds in Plato’s Thought
		Plato’s Cosmos
		Plato’s Politics of Human Nature
	Aristotle’s World
		Aristotle’s Philosophy and Methodology
		Aristotle’s Natural Philosophy
		The Aristotelian Cosmos
		The Eternity of the World
		The Soul According to Aristotle
		Aristotelian Ethics and Political Theory
		Aristotle and Plato
		Aristotle’s Influence
	The Stoics
		The Stoic Universe
		The Stoic God
		Stoic Fate and Freedom
	The Neoplatonists
		The Neoplatonic Universe, Mind, and Soul
		Neoplatonism’s Influence
	Philosophical, Cosmological, and Theological Interlude
		Cosmological Arguments in Theology
		Logos in Early Christianity
	St. Augustine
		Creation and Time
	Aquinas and Medieval Scholasticism
		Aquinas and Aristotle
		The Material and Metaphysical Worlds, From Nature to Divinity in Aquinas
		The Enduring Influence of Aquinas’s Worldview
	Medieval Islamic and Jewish Worldviews
		Avicenna
		Averroes
		Maimonides
	From the Cosmos to the World
	Notes
2 From the Existence of the World to Our Existence in This World: The Creation of the Modern Universe
	From the Heliocentric Universe to the Modern Universe
	The Copernican Universe
	The Mechanical Universe of Sir Isaac Newton
	Newton’s Legacy
	The World and the Mind According to René Descartes
		The Cartesian Cosmos
		Cartesian Actual and Possible, Old and New, Worlds
		Descartes and Cartesianism
	God’s Design for “The Best of All Possible Worlds”
		The God-Permeated Universe of Baruch Spinoza
	Leibniz and the “Best of All Possible Worlds”
		The “Best of All Possible Worlds”
		The Fate of an Idea
	Kant’s Conceptual Worlds
		Kant’s Metaphysical and Epistemological Worlds
		Kant’s Moral Worlds
		Knowing and Having the World: Kant’s Anthropocentric Anthropology
		Human Nature in the Historical and Political Worlds
		Kant’s Philosophical History of the World
		Toward a Peaceful World?
		Kant’s Worlds and the Worlds to Come
		Kant’s Impact on the World to Come
	Hegel: The History of the World Is the World’s Court of Judgment
		Hegel’s Metaphysical World as Appearance and Essence (As “In- and For-Itself”)
		Hegel’s Historical and Political Worlds
		The Philosophical World’s Judgments of Hegel’s Worldview
	Schopenhauer’s World as Will and Representation
		From Nothingness, Through Misery, and Back to Nothingness
		Schopenhauer’s Worldly Influence
	Søren Kierkegaard’s Existential World
		Kierkegaard’s Singular Literary and Paradoxically Absurd Worlds
	Friedrich Nietzsche’s Life-World
		Nietzsche’s Life’s Work
		Nietzsche’s Textual Worlds
		Nietzsche’s Anti-Philosophical Hammer Pummels the “Idols of the World”
		The World Is the Will to Power, and We Have Created It!
		Nietzsche’s Aestheticization of the World?
		The Riddle of the World and the Puzzle of Nietzsche’s Inner World
	Notes
3 Existential and Phenomenological Words and Worlds
	Husserl’s Phenomenological Worlds
		Phenomenological Worlds as Bracketed, Intended, and Constituted
		Husserl’s Natural and Arithmetical Worlds
		Husserl’s Transcendental and Transcendent Worlds
		Husserl’s World as a Whole, as Form, as a Concept, and as a Community of Incarnate Egos
		Husserl’s Lifeworld and Environmental World
		The Non-Being Or Annihilation of the World According to Husserl
	Martin Heidegger’s Being-In-This-World
		Heidegger’s Life- and Political Worlds
		Heidegger’s Philosophical Being-In-The-World
		The World in Being-And-Time
		Heidegger’s Post-Being-And-Time Worlds
		Heidegger’s Continuing Virtual Being-In-This-World
	Jean-Paul Sartre’s Engagement With the World
		Sartre’s World of Words
		From Nausea to Being and Nothingness
		Sartre’s Post-War World, Words, and Deeds
		The World Without Sartre?
	The World Made Flesh
		Merleau-Ponty’s Perceptual and Political Worlds
		Merleau-Ponty’s Life-World
		The Incarnate Subject in the Perceptual World
		The Body, My Body, My Place in the World
		From the Philosophical to the Political World
		The Tragic Contingencies of the Political and Historical Worlds
		The World Without and Beyond Merleau-Ponty
	Notes
4 Talking About the World: Ludwig Wittgenstein’s Language of the World
	Wittgenstein’s Life (Leben) and World (Welt)
	The World (Die Welt) in Wittgenstein’s Works and Worldview (Weltanschauung)
	Words and Worlds in Wittgenstein’s Post-Tractatus Works
	Wittgenstein: Logical Existentialist? Liberator? Mystic? Or as Enigmatic as the World?
	The Possible Worlds, and Words, of David K. Lewis
	David Chalmers on Constructing the World
	Derrida’s World Deconstruction/Destruction
		De(con)structing Deconstruction
		Vive La Différance?
		Signifying Logocentrism and Erasing the Privileged Metaphysics of Presence
		The Origin, and Play, of the Real and the Ideal World
		So What Is “World” According to Derrida (And Heidegger)?
		The Annihilation of the World and the End of the World—For Derrida—and for Us?
	Notes
A Conclusion Without an End, or an End Without a Conclusion?
	Some Ideas About the “World as Idea”
	The Long-Term Future of the Earth
	The End of This World as We Know It?
		Human Extinction?
		Existential and Global Catastrophic Risks
		Global Pandemics
		Is Omnicide a “Blessing” or a “Curse?”
	Some Possible Future Scenarios
		Out of This World?
		Leaving Earth?
	The World—a Good, or Bad, Idea?
	Notes
Index