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Book synopsis

Ulrich Steinvorth offers a fresh analysis and critique of rationality as a defining element in Western thinking. Steinvorth argues that Descartes' understanding of the self offers a more plausible and realistic alternative to the prevailing understanding of the self formed by the Lockean conception and utilitarianism. When freed from Cartesian dualism, such a conceptualization enables us to distinguish between self and subject. Moreover, it enables us to understand why individualism – one of the hallmarks of modernity in the West – became a universal ideal to be granted to every member of society; how acceptance of this notion could peak in the seventeenth century; and why it is now in decline, though not irreversibly so. Most importantly, the Cartesian concept of the self presents a way of saving modernity from the dangers that it now encounters.

Book details

Book category Books in English Humanities Philosophy Social & political philosophy

• Full title: Rethinking the Western Understanding of the Self
• Author: Ulrich Steinvorth
• Language: English
• Binding: Paperback
• Number of pages: 232
• EAN: 9780521757072
• ISBN: 052175707X
• ID: 02042060
• Publisher: Cambridge University Press
• Weight: 314 g
• Dimensions: 227 × 151 × 15 mm
• Date of publishing: 22. June 2009

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