Roy Sorensen’s Cabinet of Philosophical Curiosities A Collection of Puzzles, Oddities, Riddles and Dilemmas is a interesting take on philosophy, by investigating paradoxes and problems. Apparently the original inspiration was Ian Stewart’s Professor Stewart’s Cabinet of Mathematical Curiosities, and like many puzzle books, can be read as a series or worked on individually.

This was a fun approach to philosophical conundrums and has an interesting historical aspect as well, with stories about Voltaire, Eck, Carroll and more. It features a number of essays as well as discussions along with the puzzles. While this is probably too advanced for younger readers, it’s one for anyone interested in the solving-aspects of philosophy. 

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Alain Stephen has taken an interesting approach with This Book Will Make You Think — because many of us would have heard philosophical quotes, probably out of context most of the time, and wondered about their significance, influence and meaning. 

While it primarily focuses upon the most popular philosophers (which, as you might guess, are male), the introductory section and index are really useful and detailed, and it covers pretty much every major quote from “The unexamined life is not worth living” to “I think therefore I am” to “You can discover more about a person in an hour of play than in a year of conversation”. It’s not a particularly heavy-going book in that regard, and is more of a dip-into than read at length text, but certainly one for the teens-and-over who are after a basic explanatory book. 

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“The construction and payoff of jokes and the construction and payoff of philosophical concepts are made out of the same stuff. They tease the mind in the same ways…philosophy and jokes proceed from the same impulse: to confound our sense of the way things are, to flip our worlds upside down, and to ferret out hidden, often uncomfortable, truths about life. What the philosopher calls an insight, the gagster calls a zinger.”

Plato and a Platypus Walk Into a Bar: Understanding Philosophy Through Jokes by Daniel Klein and Thomas Cathcart is a light and enjoyable read, taking an approach I never thought of before — explaining philosophical concepts through humour. There’s a lot of groan-worthy examples throughout, but the range of topics is pretty impressive and as a different kind of introduction, it’s one that I found a pleasant surprise. I’d recommend this one less as a study text, but certainly as a great present for anyone interested in getting a start on the subject, who also has a sense of humour.“My grandfather knew the exact time of the exact day of the exact year that he would die.”“Wow, what an evolved soul! How did it come to him?”“The judge told him.”

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Jeremy Stangroom’s Philosophy — Little Book of Big Ideas is useful summary text of a number of ideas and philosophers, with the selections made demonstrating a good range for a short book. As a part of a series, it’s following the trend of the others, with about one or two pages for each section, and while brief, has an interesting scope. The author launched The Philosophers’ Magazine with his colleague, Dr Julian Baggini in 1997 and now publishes the journal Think, on behalf of the Royal Institute of Philosophy.

One particular feature of the book is the investigation of philosophical arguments, and while only a handful of these are unpacked, it doesn’t neglect the more recent thinkers Dewey, Piaget, Kohlberg and Chomsky. It’s a neat overview and certainly one I’d recommend as an introductory text.

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Today’s episode is the revision on reviews from the past week — you can support the 365DaysOfPhilosophy podcast by visiting www.patreon.com/kyliesturgess and review previous episodes at www.365daysofphilosophy.com.

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Music from Jukedeck — create your own at http://jukedeck.com.

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Celebrated since 2002, World Philosophy Day emphasises the enduring value of philosophy for the development of human thought, throughout different cultures and individuals. UNESCO first established the date to encourage critical questioning, leading to international action and meaningful lives.

The 2005 General Conference encouraged the idea that philosophy, particularly for young people “is a discipline that encourages critical and independent thought and is capable of working towards a better understanding of the world and promoting tolerance and peace”.

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Primarily known for his work on philosophy of the mind, Daniel Dennet has investigated on a wide range of topics including free will, science and religion and evolution. In addition, he challenges the ideas of philosophical zombies as an unworkable notion, a hypothesis that still gains much debate today.

In his book Consciousness Explained, he proposes a materialistic theory of the mind that challenges many previous ideas about what constitutes mind and brain. The notion of the Cartesian theatre is unpacked and he suggests as an alternative approach with “parallel, multitrack processes of interpretations and elaboration of of sensory inputs”, incorporating neuroscientific findings.

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Albert Camus was a prolific writer, being a journalist, philosopher, essayist, playwright and novelist. Two of his non-fiction books investigated the works of other contemporary philosophers, Nietzsche, Sartre and Kierkegaard and investigated an ‘absurdist philosophy’ of life. 

His best-known works include The Stranger and The Plague, and investigated the indifferent universe and the human need for meaning and hope. Like the Greek legend of Sisyphus, the struggles that humans face are tremendous, but there is meaning in the toil that is given as punishment by the gods. He was awarded the Nobel Prize in Literature and his works continue to have an influence in both fiction and non-fiction.

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An influencer on not only philosophical thought but social sciences, Michel Foucault was a French historian. He’s primarily known for his work in post-structuralism, postmodernism and deconstructionism. Since the 1960s, his work investigated the ‘archaeology’ and ‘genealogy’ of knowledge, on whether objective knowledge or universal reason exists, and what if it doesn’t.

Early in his career, Foucault studied Marxism and existentialism, but within his works like The History of Madness and The Archeology of Knowledge, he questioned whether there were standards of truth or falsity, outside of culturally created frameworks of language. To the end of his life he reflected on the relationship of power and knowledge and whether forces in history limited human freedom.

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Analyse the following debate and identify how well the debate unfolds — are there any fallacies involved, and what are they?

BORIS: Graffiti isn’t art; damaging property is a crime and it’s a blight on the city. Let’s face it, art belongs on a stage or a gallery, otherwise it isn’t art. 

DORIS: If this kind of art was legal, then perhaps we would have less snobs like you and better art! Artists should be allowed to express their art without being censored by their choice of canvas and way of communicating their ideas. 

BORIS: I don’t care what you think — you’re just want to make excuses for law-breakers and if we had your way, burglers would have free reign over our streets. If I see something like this, I’m going to paint it over and report the creator to the police. We already limit sales of spray cans and this is why! 

DORIS: I don’t think I’d paint it over, because isn’t that doing vandalism on top of vandalism if it isn’t your wall in the first place? If someone did something good, then maybe they could be encouraged to do work where it is acceptable to the public — just look at Banksy, aren’t they famous now?

Put in your answers in the comments, further analysis available tomorrow on Patreon.com/kyliesturgess.

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