• Profile half-length photograph of a man facing to the left wearing a dark jacket and tie, holding a cigarette in his hand, with a white handkerchief in his jacket breast pocket. The man has a prominent straight nose, slicked back hair and his tie forms a slight arch from the knot. In the background, on the left side of the image, there is another half-length frontal portrait of a man. He has white hair, also wears a jacket and tie, is looking to the right, and is smiling.
A cropped photo of the cover Theory of the Object

Preview: Theory of the Object by Thomas Nail

Enjoy a preview of the first page from Thomas Nail’s new book Theory of the Object. We live in an age of objects. Today there are more objects and more kinds of objects than ever before in human history, and…

The world of Spinoza's Theological–Political Treatise

The world of Spinoza’s Theological–Political Treatise

By Dan Taylor Baruch Spinoza’s Theological–Political Treatise, published anonymously in 1670, quickly turned Europe upside-down. Dismissed by one contemporary as a book ‘forged in hell by the Devil himself’, it argued that for societies to endure conflict and flourish, they…

Detail 'Rechnender Greis' painting by Paul Klee, showing a man's face.

A History of Distributed Cognition

Distributed cognition – the idea that cognition or the mind extends across brain, body and world – is not a term that rolls off the tongue. Nevertheless, distributed cognition describes a fundamental aspect of being human. Examples of distributed cognition…

Wonder was eclipsed by the Sublime in paintings such as The Great Day of His Wrath

Rediscovering the Wonder of Philosophy

Wonder is largely absent as a topic of concern to contemporary philosophers. Yet ancient philosophers saw it as the source of what was distinctive in their way of thinking. Plato and Aristotle thought that it was the stirrings of wonder…