Comprehensive and authoritative, this dictionary provides wide-ranging and lively coverage of not only Western philosophical traditions, but also themes from Chinese, Indian, Islamic, and Jewish philosophy.

A useful and illustrated reference to nautical terms with more than 2500 alphabetical entries, often cross-referenced.

The language and concepts of philosophy explained.

This is a book about the big questions in life: knowledge, consciousness, fate, God, truth, goodness, justice. It is for anyone who believes there are big questions out there, but does not know how to approach them. Think sets out to explain what they are and why they are important. Simon Blackburn begins by putting forward a convincing case for the study of philosophy and goes on to give the reader a sense of how the great historical figures such as Descartes, Hume, Kant, and Wittgenstein have approached its central themes. Each chapter explains a major issue, and gives the reader a self-contained guide through the problems that philosophers have studied. The large scope of topics covered range from scepticism, the self, mond and body, and freedom to ethics and the arguments surrounding the existence of God. Lively and approachable, this book is ideal for all those who want to learn how the basic techniques of thinking shape our existence.

This best-selling dictionary contains over 1,700 entries on all aspects of politics. Written by a leading team of political scientists, it embraces the whole multi-disciplinary specturm of political theory including political thinkers, history, institutions, and concepts, as well as notable current affairs that have shaped attitudes to politics. An appendix contains timelines listing the principal office-holders of a range of countries including the UK, Canada, the USA, Australia, New Zealand, Russia, and China. Fully revised and updated for the 3rd edition, the dictionary includes a wealth of new material in areas such as international relations, political science, political economy, and methodologies, as well as a chronology of key political theorists. It also boasts entry-level web links that don't go out of date. These can be accessed via a regularly checked and updated companion website, ensuring that the links remain relevent, and any dead links are replaced or removed. The dictionary has international coverage and will prove invaluable to students and academics studying politics and related disciplines, as well as politicians, journalists, and the general reader seeking clarification of political terms.

This is the leading, full-scale comprehensive dictionary of philosophical terms and thinkers to appear in English in more than half a century. Written by a team of more than 550 experts and now widely translated, it contains approximately 5,000 entries ranging from short definitions to longer articles. It is designed to facilitate the understanding of philosophy at all levels and in all fields. Key features of this third edition: • 500 new entries covering Eastern as well as Western philosophy, and covering individual countries such as China, France, Germany, Italy, and Spain • Increased coverage of such growing fields as ethics and philosophy of mind • More than 100 new intellectual portraits of leading contemporary thinkers • Wider coverage of Continental philosophy • Dozens of new technical concepts in cognitive science and other areas • Enhanced cross-referencing to add context and increase understanding • Expansions in both text and index to facilitate research and browsing

First published in 1976, the Dictionary of Philosophy has established itself as the best available text of its kind, explaining often unfamiliar, complicated and diverse terminology. Thoroughly revised and expanded, this fourth edition provides authoritative and rigorous definitions of a broad range of philosophical concepts. Concentrating on the Western philosophical tradition, The Routledge Dictionary of Philosophy offers an illuminating and informed introduction to the central issues, ideas and perspectives in core fields such as metaphysics, epistemology, and logic. It includes concise biographical entries for more than one hundred major philosophers, from Plato and Aristotle through to contemporary figures such as Dummett, McDowell, Parfit and Singer. All major entries are followed by helpful suggestions for further reading, including web links, and contain extensive cross-referencing to aid access and comprehension. This edition also features a brand new guide to the most useful philosophy sites on the internet. The Routledge Dictionary of Philosophy is an invaluable and up-to-date resource for all students of philosophy.

When it comes to the vagaries of language in American politics, its uses and abuses, its absurdities and ever-shifting nuances, its power to confound, obscure, and occasionally to inspire, William Safire is the language maven we most readily turn to for clarity, guidance, and penetrating, sometimes lacerating, wit. Safire's Political Dictionary is a stem-to-stern updating and expansion of the Language of Politics, which was first published in 1968 and last revised in 1993, long before such terms as Hanging Chads, 9/11 and the War on Terror became part of our everyday vocabulary. Nearly every entry in that renowned work has been revised and updated and scores of completely new entries have been added to produce an indispensable guide to the political language being used and abused in America today. Safire's definitions--discursive, historically aware, and often anecdotal--bring a savvy perspective to our colorful political lingo. Indeed, a Safire definition often reads like a mini-essay in political history, and readers will come away not only with a fuller understanding of particular words but also a richer knowledge of how politics works, and fails to work, in America. From Axis of Evil, Blame Game, Bridge to Nowhere, Triangulation, and Compassionate Conservatism to Islamofascism, Netroots, Earmark, Wingnuts and Moonbats, Slam Dunk, Doughnut Hole, and many others, this language maven explains the origin of each term, how and by whom and for what purposes it has been used or twisted, as well as its perceived and real significance. For anyone who wants to cut through the verbal haze that surrounds so much of American political discourse, Safire's Political Dictionary offers a work of scholarship, wit, insiderhood and resolute bipartisanship.

What is a moonbow? What does it mean when someone absquatulates? Over 400 words to amaze, confuse and inspiring budding wordsmiths (and adults!).

The author of the highly popular book Think, which Time magazine hailed as "the one book every smart person should read to understand, and even enjoy, the key questions of philosophy," Simon Blackburn is that rara avis--an eminent thinker who is able to explain philosophy to the general reader. Now Blackburn offers a tour de force exploration of what he calls "the most exciting and engaging issue in the whole of philosophy"--the age-old war over truth. The front lines of this war are well defined. On one side are those who believe in plain, unvarnished facts, rock-solid truths that can be found through reason and objectivity--that science leads to truth, for instance. Their opponents mock this idea. They see the dark forces of language, culture, power, gender, class, ideology and desire--all subverting our perceptions of the world, and clouding our judgement with false notions of absolute truth. Beginning with an early skirmish in the war--when Socrates confronted the sophists in ancient Athens--Blackburn offers a penetrating look at the longstanding battle these two groups have waged, examining the philosophical battles fought by Plato, Protagoras, William James, David Hume, Hans-Georg Gadamer, Jacques Derrida, Michel Foucault, Richard Rorty, and many others, with a particularly fascinating look at Nietzsche. Among the questions Blackburn considers are: is science mere opinion, can historians understand another historical period, and indeed can one culture ever truly understand another. Blackburn concludes that both sides have merit, and that neither has exclusive ownership of truth. What is important is that, whichever side we embrace, we should know where we stand and what is to be said for our opponents.