The Best Philosophy Books 2025

1. Search for a Method (Paperback)

From one of the 20th century's most profound philosophers and writers, comes a thought provoking essay that seeks to reconcile Marxism with existentialism. Exploring the complicated relationship the two philosophical schools of thought have with one another, Sartre supposes that the two are in fact compatible and complimentary towards one another, with poignant analysis and reasoning. An important work of modern philosophy, Search for a Method has a major influence on the current perceptions of existentialism and Marxism. "This is the most important philosophical work by Sartre to be translated since Being and Nothingness."--James Collings, America

From one of the 20th century’s most profound philosophers and writers, comes a thought provoking essay that seeks to reconcile Marxism with existentialism. Exploring the complicated relationship the two philosophical schools of thought have with one another, Sartre supposes that the two are in fact compatible and complimentary towards one another, with poignant analysis and reasoning. An important work of modern philosophy, Search for a Method has a major influence on the current perceptions of existentialism and Marxism. “This is the most important philosophical work by Sartre to be translated since Being and Nothingness.”—James Collings, America

2. Reconstruction in Philosophy (Paperback)

Written shortly after the shattering effects of World War I, this volume initiated the author's experimental concept of pragmatic humanism. This revised, enlarged edition features Dewey's informative introduction.

"A modern classic. Dewey's lectures have lost none of their vigor … The historical approach, which underlay the central argument, is beautifully exemplified in his treatments of the origin of philosophy." — Philosophy and Phenomenological Research. "It was with this book that Dewey fully launched his campaign for experimental philosophy." — The New Republic. Written shortly after the shattering effects of World War I, John Dewey's Reconstruction in Philosophy offers an insightful introduction to the concept of pragmatic humanism. The eminent philosopher presents persuasive arguments against traditional philosophical constructs, suggesting their basis in self-justification; instead, he proposes an examination of core values in terms of their ultimate effects on the self and others. Dewey's experimental philosophy represented a significant departure from its predecessor, utilitarianism, and it was received with both outrage and acclaim for daring to mingle ethics and science. Delivered in 1919 as a series of lectures at Tokyo's Imperial University of Japan, Dewey's landmark work appears here in an enlarged edition that features an informative introduction by the author, written more than 25 years after the book's initial publication.

3. Towards Justice and Virtue: A Constructive Account of Practical Reasoning, (Paperback)

Towards Justice and Virtue challenges the rivalry between those who advocate only abstract, universal principles of justice and those who commend only the particularities of virtuous lives. Onora O'Neill traces this impasse to defects in underlying conceptions of reasoning about action. She proposes and vindicates an alternative, more modest, account of ethical reasoning, a reasoned way of answering the question "who counts?", and constructs a linked account of the principles that are basic for moving toward just institutions and virtuous lives.

Towards Justice and Virtue: A Constructive Account of Practical Reasoning, (Paperback) Author: Cambridge University Press ISBN: 9780521485593 Format: Paperback Publication Date: 1996-08-28 Page Count: 244

4. The Fundamentals of Ethics (Paperback) 9780195320862

ISBN: 9780195320862 ISBN10: 0195320867 Contributors: Shafer-Landau, Russ,

In The Fundamentals of Ethics, author Russ Shafer-Landau employs a uniquely engaging writing style to introduce students to the essential ideas of moral philosophy. Offering more comprehensive coverage of the good life, normative ethics, and metaethics than any other text of its kind, this book also addresses issues that are often omitted from other texts, such as the doctrine of doing and allowing, the doctrine of double effect, ethical particularism, the desire-satisfaction theory of well-being, and moral error theory. Shafer-Landau carefully reconstructs and analyzes dozens of arguments in depth, at a level that is understandable to students with no prior philosophical background. Ideal for courses in introductory ethics and contemporary moral problems, this book can be used as a stand-alone text or with the author's companion reader, The Ethical Life: FundamentalReadings in Ethics and Moral Problems, which offers original readings exploring the topics covered in The Fundamentals of Ethics.

5. Derrida (Paperback)

Jacques Derrida (born 1930) is undoubtedly the single most influential figure in current Anglo-American literary theory. Yet many scholars and students, not to mention general readers, would be hard put to give an account of Derrida's own writings. In this admirably clear and intelligent introduction, Christopher Norris demonstrates that Derrida's texts should be understood as belonging more to philosophy than to literature. Norris explains the significance of Derrida's writing on texts in the Western philosophical tradition, from Plato to Kant, Hegel, and Husserl, placing him squarely within that tradition. He also discusses some of the reasons for the massive institutional resistance that has so far prevented philosophers from engaging seriously with Derrida's work. This book will be welcomed by readers in search of an introduction to Derrida's work that neither underrates its difficulties nor invests his ideas with a kind of protective mystique.

Derrida (Paperback)

6. Pre-Owned Ethics in Sport - 2nd Edition (Hardcover) by Dr. William Morgan

Ethics in Sport

Ethics in Sport - 2nd Edition