The Modern Intellectual Tradition: From Descartes to Derrida

By: Lawrence Cahoone, The Great Courses

Narrated by: Lawrence Cahoone

What is reality? Ask yourself whether you can actually know the answer, much less be sure that you can know it, and you've begun to grapple with the metaphysical and epistemological quandaries that have occupied, teased, and tormented modern philosophy's greatest intellects since the dawn of modern science and a century before the Enlightenment.

These 36 lectures are the perfect introduction to the basics of modern and contemporary Western approaches to the philosophies of both reality (metaphysics) and knowledge (epistemology), right through the end of the 20th century. Led by Professor Cahoone, you'll partake in an engaging intellectual journey that encompasses prominent figures from all the major traditions of Western philosophy.

You'll explore the ideas behind modern philosophy's most important movements, including dualism, rationalism, empiricism, idealism, existentialism, and postmodernism. You'll plunge into the thought of some of philosophy's most important thinkers, including Descartes, Locke, Spinoza, Hume, Kant, Hegel, Peirce, Nietzsche, James, Wittgenstein, Heidegger, Rorty, and Derrida, learning how many of them were in fact considered radicals, their views appreciated far less in their own era than in later ones.

And you'll gain a clear sense of how each of these movements and thinkers fits into philosophy's broader progression, often pushing philosophy in dramatically new directions right up to the present day, as well as how philosophy is intimately related to a multitude of other disciplines.

PLEASE NOTE: When you purchase this title, the accompanying reference material will be available in your Library section along with the audio.

©2010 The Teaching Company, LLC (P)2010 The Great Courses

Excellent Great Course!

While I have always enjoyed intellectual history, I have not always had the background or the ability to understand philosophical concepts, theories, philosophers or schools of philosophy in spite of my interest. In my undergraduate and graduate college years, I was exposed to many of the early modern philosophers such as John Locke, the Enlightenment philosophers, David Hume, John Stuart Mill (a favorite) then later Huserl and phenomenology, which was difficult for me to grasp. I tried Sartre and Camus and felt that I had a limited understanding of existentialism. However, I was in over my head with Bertram Russell, and much later, Derrida and Deconstruction mystified me. So, it was with some trepidation that I decided to listen to this extensive survey course on modern philosophy.

Professor Cahoone is excellent. He has an enormous understanding of and ability to communicate the subject matter. The course chapters were about 30 minutes in length, and I was amazed at how much information he was able to discuss in that time. Also, the organization of the material was excellent. The chapters flowed one into the next. There was continuity of information that linked the concepts of one philosopher or school of philosophy to the next in historical time and development. If I struggled with the material, and the material was often very challenging, I still connected with the philosopher and the context of the ideas enough to know that i would relisten to the material. I was not so overwhelmed that I wanted stop the course. In fact, I am beginning my second listen.

The ideas presented in this course are important. They have had or will have great impact on society, politics, and history. It is important to me to have a much better understanding of them. It isn't so much whether I agree or disagree with a philosopher or a concept. These ideas are impacting my life now and will impact future lives. I am grateful to have found a course that will help me continue my effort to understand them. It is well worth the investment of my time and energy.

Outstanding overview of modern philosophy

Prof. Cahoone’s mastery of the work of an incredible range of philosophers is amazing. He presents their work clearly, giving each the fairest, most complete airing the time constraints allow and connecting what comes next to what came before so the listener can follow the many lines of thought. A pro makes what’s difficult seem easy, and Prof. Cahoone by this measure is a real pro.

Brilliant

Cahoone covers the enormity of complex and conflicting ideas in modern philosophy, all the while ensuring that the listener understands what each philosopher was saying. He always takes the time to define the philosophical and scientific jargon before diving into deep waters. Then, once he have fully dived in, he emerges to unpack the intricacies of the argument. I wish I had him as a philosophy professor in my younger days as an undergraduate.

Effective summary of Philosophy throughout history

What did you love best about The Modern Intellectual Tradition: From Descartes to Derrida?

It was precisely the kind of overview I wanted to see in regards to the evolution of philosophy . I also thought Professor Cahoone's insight and commentaries were fair and objective. The material presented for each aspect of history is concise. I pretty much enjoyed every aspect of the presentation and delivery of the content.

What did you like best about this story?

This book really gave me a great feel and general understanding for each of the major philosophical movement. I love how the course was able to effectively fit a major philosophical figure and school of thought into "one" lecture. As you process each lecture you can get a macro feel of how each school of thought is evolving with the times.

Have you listened to any of Professor Lawrence Cahoone’s other performances before? How does this one compare?

Yes, the author had a laser like quality in presenting relevant aspect of the material and philosophy to the reader. In addition, he presented fair commentaries near the end of each lecture that gave each lecture a personal touch.

Was this a book you wanted to listen to all in one sitting?

I was a little bit worried that it was going to be a boring "lecture" based on some of the concerns from other people's review. However, from start to finish, I enjoyed everything Cahoone had to say. He does have a professorial tone, but I think it's appropriate for the material. Overall, I don't really have anything to bring in the form of a critique about the narrator's performance.

Any additional comments?

I love this book and highly recommend it. If you love philosophy and want to understand both the classical and modern thinkers/philosophers, then this is right up your alley. I have personally tried to tackle reading Aristotle, Descartes, Locke, Nietzsche, Rorty all on their own and found the summary and insight from this course extremely effective.

Accessible overview of Western philosophy

I found this overview to be entirely accessible and enjoyable. The lecturer does a wonderful job making concepts easy to understand and does a great job tying the concepts together.

So enlightening!

I learned a lot more from this course than reading Russell's History. Highly enjoyable and recommended without reservation.

Learn to answer the big three questions

This is by far one of the best lectures I've ever heard. I'm not a philosopher. I avoided thinking most of my life. I made a mistake about a year ago and read Heidegger's "Being and Time". That completely hooked me. Now, I just have to understand our universe and our place in it.

What is the order within the universe, what is our purpose and why are we here ('the three big questions"). These (or some variation of these) are the three questions that drive me and makes me want to stay alive. As for my reason for being it is to learn as much about the world as I can and this lecture series does that for me better than almost any book or Great Course has.

The professor makes the point that he is only going to look at the Modern Philosophers who added to the field by adding on or subtracting from the other philosophers who came before them and thought differently from the others. This lecture series is a constant exchange of ideas from brilliant thinkers from across a 400 year dialog among respectful friends who all had a unique perspective of some kind to add to the discussion.

He covered Heidegger over two lectures. He gave the best graphic I've come across in order to explain him (it's available on the attached pdf and I would recommend grabbing it while you can). He makes the point that Heidegger starts with things (Being) but will ultimately end with time (past, present, and future) as if he really all along meant to start with time. Cool stuff.

He does start the lecture series with Aristotle and the scholastic school of thought. The great battle that constantly roams the hallways of the world is the conflict between the sophisticated sophists and their putting humans as the "measure of all things" and the absolutist who have their universal, necessary and certain view point of the world. There is no right answer. The world is underdetermined. The facts we have are always adequately explainable by multiple theories. See his lecture on William Van Orman Quine for further explication.

The world is determined by our biological, historical and current context. The weight we impute to those three determine how we see the world. The focus of the lecture series is not the "philosophy of science", but those concepts lurk with in this lecture series.

I really loved this lecture series and would strongly recommend it to anyone, but be prepared to be overwhelmed by all the great thinkers covered and to be inspired to read some of the primary sources cited in this series. One needs to start some where with learning critical thinking and understanding why we are here, what our purpose is and what is the order (ontology, foundation, archetypes, forms, ideals, pick your favorite substitute for 'order') of the universe.

I'd even say that if one can master the ideas presented with in this lecture series (which I have not and know I'll have to listen to it multiple times before I even start to understand) one will be able to understand the "three big questions" and realize how most of what surrounds us is crap and only acts as a distraction against what our authentic selves should be learning and understanding. Our greatest virtue is our higher thought. Our distractions are necessary because we must survive, get along with others and enjoy life, but we should only use those distractions in order to re energize ourselves and learn to enjoy life more fully.

This professor is very good at explaining complicated ideas. Yes, complicated ideas are still complicated when they are explained as best as they can be and I won't lie sometimes I would get lost. Though, don't let that stand in the way of trying this lecture series.

(I had bought the audible before I had signed up for the reasonably priced Great Course Plus on line with video. I watched this course instead of listened to it. So technically this review is for the video version not the audio version. I'm glad I watched it instead of just listen to it. There were many visuals and the Professor did an incredibly good job with hand motions, facial expressions and the like. This is one of the few audible courses or book where I got a lot more out of it by watching instead of just listening. Let that be a warning and a recommendation to sign up to The Great Courses).

Great In-depth Overview

Anything that sets out to cover the history of modern philosophy in 18hrs is bound to encounter skepticism, but here we have a professor who not only understands how to teach, but understands how to communicate some of the most interesting, and most complex, theories developed in modern philosophy. You will naturally need to listen to these lectures over and over and over again, but you will undoubtedly leave each session with a greater and more comprehensive understanding of the subject than you had upon purchasing this audiobook. (That may be an overarching statement; essentially: great purchase, great audiobook).

Excellent Book

Great Book. learnt a lot. the author is very clear in his presentation. loved it.

An Ambitious Undertsking

Dr. Cahoone does an excellent job explaining and synthesizing an enormous range of philosophical history / everyone who takes this course will come away with a better understanding of modern and postmodernism and will be better equipped to continue their own exploration and investigation / philosophy means the love not mastery of knowledge/ the exploratory unbiased nature of the course fulfills that goal