Hume's Dialogues Concerning Natural Religion
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Narrated by:
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Albert A. Anderson
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Liselotte Anderson
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By:
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David Hume
About this listen
David Hume's Dialogues Concerning Natural Religion had not yet been published when he died in 1776. Even though the manuscript was mostly written during the 1750s, it did not appear until 1779. The subject itself was too delicate and controversial, and Hume's dialectical examination of religious knowledge was especially provocative. What should we teach young people about religion? The characters Demea, Cleanthes, and Philo passionately present and defend three sharply different answers to that question.
Demea opens the dialogue with a position derived from René Descartes and Father Malebranche - God's nature is a mystery, but God's existence can be proved logically. Cleanthes attacks that view, both because it leads to mysticism and because it attempts the impossible task of trying to establish existence on the basis of pure reason, without appeal to sense experience. As an alternative, he offers a proof of both God's existence and God's nature based on the same kind of scientific reasoning established by Copernicus, Galileo, and Newton.
Taking a skeptical approach, Philo presents a series of arguments that question any attempt to use reason as a basis for religious faith. He suggests that human beings might be better off without religion. The dialogue ends without agreement among the characters, justifying Hume's choice of dialogue as the literary style for this topic.
Born in Scotland, Hume challenges much of the philosophy that prevailed in Europe and England in the 17th and 18th century. He was especially critical of the rationalism developed by René Descartes and his followers. Although he wrote a number of influential essays (including "A Treatise of Human Nature" and "Inquiry Concerning Human Understanding"), his dialogues are especially well suited for the topic of religion. As his character Pamphilus says: "Any philosophical question that is so obscure and uncertain that human reason can reach no agreement about it, if it is treated at all, seems to lead us naturally to the style of dialogue."
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- Narrated by: Ray Childs
- Length: 48 mins
- Unabridged
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A dialogue between Socrates and Meno probes the subject of ethics. Can goodness be taught? If it can, then we should be able to find teachers capable of instructing others about what is good and bad, right and wrong, or just and unjust.
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Why Incomplete?
- By Nelson Alexander on 08-27-16
By: Plato
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The Wisdom of Life, Counsels and Maxims
- By: Arthur Schopenhauer
- Narrated by: David Rintoul
- Length: 9 hrs and 22 mins
- Unabridged
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'The two foes of human happiness are pain and boredom.' Arthur Schopenhauer (1788-1860) was one of the most influential philosophers of the 19th century because his humanistic, atheistic, if pessimistic views chimed with a new secularism that was emerging from a Western society dominated by religion. Despite his rather forbidding image (and a few outdated views), he is one of the most approachable German philosophers, and this is certainly evident in these two key works, The Wisdom of Life and Counsels and Maxims.
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depressingly hopeful
- By Sebastian huerta on 06-22-17
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The Dream of Reason, New Edition
- A History of Western Philosophy from the Greeks to the Renaissance
- By: Anthony Gottlieb
- Narrated by: Anthony Gottlieb
- Length: 19 hrs and 11 mins
- Unabridged
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Already a classic, this landmark study of early Western thought now appears in a new edition with expanded coverage of the Middle Ages. Author Anthony Gottlieb looks afresh at the writings of the great thinkers, questions much of conventional wisdom, and explains his findings with unbridled brilliance and clarity. From the pre-Socratic philosophers through the celebrated days of Socrates, Plato, and Aristotle, up to Renaissance visionaries like Erasmus and Bacon, philosophy emerges here as a phenomenon unconfined by any one discipline.
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Bias spoils the work.
- By MC on 08-21-20
By: Anthony Gottlieb
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Utilitarianism
- By: John Stuart Mill
- Narrated by: Fleet Cooper
- Length: 3 hrs and 6 mins
- Unabridged
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This expanded edition of John Stuart Mill's Utilitarianism includes the text of his 1868 speech to the British House of Commons defending the use of capital punishment in cases of aggravated murder. The speech is significant both because its topic remains timely and because its arguments illustrate the applicability of the principle of utility to questions of large-scale social policy.
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A dramatic reading of JSM's 'Utilitarianism'
- By Darwin8u on 12-24-12
By: John Stuart Mill
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The Story of Philosophy
- The Lives and Opinions of the Greater Philosophers
- By: Will Durant
- Narrated by: Grover Gardner
- Length: 19 hrs and 27 mins
- Unabridged
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Durant lucidly describes the philosophical systems of such world-famous “monarchs of the mind” as Plato, Aristotle, Francis Bacon, Spinoza, Kant, Voltaire, and Nietzsche. Along with their ideas, he offers their flesh-and-blood biographies, placing their thoughts within their own time and place and elucidating their influence on our modern intellectual heritage. This book is packed with wisdom and wit.
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Fantastic and insightful book
- By ESK on 01-25-13
By: Will Durant
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Miracles
- By: C. S. Lewis
- Narrated by: Julian Rhind-Tutt
- Length: 7 hrs and 23 mins
- Unabridged
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"The central miracle asserted by Christians is the Incarnation. They say that God became Man. Every other miracle prepares the way for this, or results from this." This is the key statement of Miracles, in which C. S. Lewis shows that a Christian must not only accept but rejoice in miracles as a testimony of the unique personal involvement of God in his creation.
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sound, shrewd, well articulated, and well read.
- By Andrew on 09-17-15
By: C. S. Lewis
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The Enlightenment
- And Why It Still Matters
- By: Anthony Pagden
- Narrated by: Robert Blumenfeld
- Length: 16 hrs and 24 mins
- Unabridged
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One of our most renowned and brilliant historians takes a fresh look at the revolutionary intellectual movement that laid the foundation for the modern world. Liberty and equality. Human rights. Freedom of thought and expression. Belief in reason and progress. The value of scientific inquiry. These are just some of the ideas that were conceived and developed during the Enlightenment, and which changed forever the intellectual landscape of the Western world.
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A thorough political tract rather than history
- By Jacobus on 03-08-14
By: Anthony Pagden
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Between Past and Future
- Eight Exercises in Political Thought
- By: Hannah Arendt
- Narrated by: Bernadette Dunne
- Length: 11 hrs and 58 mins
- Unabridged
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Hannah Arendt's insightful observations of the modern world, based on a profound knowledge of the past, constitute an impassioned contribution to political philosophy. In Between Past and Future, Arendt describes the perplexing crises modern society faces as a result of the loss of meaning of the traditional key words of politics: justice, reason, responsibility, virtue, and glory. Through a series of eight exercises, she shows how we can redistill the vital essence of these concepts and use them to regain a frame of reference for the future.
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Just stunning
- By Peter Stephens on 02-26-18
By: Hannah Arendt
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The Gay Science (The Joyful Wisdom)
- By: Friedrich Nietzsche
- Narrated by: Michael Lunts
- Length: 10 hrs and 55 mins
- Unabridged
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The Gay Science (The Joyful Wisdom) is one of Nietzsche's greatest books. His wonderfully fertile mind roams over mankind, his thoughts, his emotions, his behaviour and his weaknesses with remarkable clarity, with insight - but also with humour!In this work are 383 separate paragraphs, some short, some long, but all singular observations - the epitome of his famous aphoristic style. 'Morality is the herd instinct in the individual.'
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I am now a full-fledged fan of Nietzsche
- By RS on 02-24-18