Μελέτες & Φιλοσοφία

FROM THE AUTHOR OF THE NUMBER ONE BESTSELLER SAPIENS Sapiens showed us where we came from. Homo Deus shows us where we're going. War is obsolete. You are more likely to commit suicide than be killed in conflict. Famine is disappearing. You are at more risk of obesity than starvation. Death is just a technical problem. Equality is out - but immortality is in. What does our future hold[unk] Yuval Noah Harari, author of the bestselling phenomenon Sapiens envisions a not-too-distant world in which we face a new set of challenges. Homo Deus explores the projects, dreams and nightmares that will shape the twenty-first century - from overcoming death to creating artificial life. It asks the fundamental questions: Where do we go from here[unk] And how will we protect this fragile world from our own destructive powers[unk] 'Homo Deus will shock you. It will entertain you. Above all, it will make you think in ways you had not thought before' Daniel Kahneman, author of Thinking Fast, and Slow

If recent history has taught us anything, it's that sometimes the best guide to leadership is the negative example. But that insight is hardly new. Nearly 2,000 years ago, Suetonius wrote Lives of the Caesars, perhaps the greatest negative leadership book of all time. He was ideally suited to write about terrible political leaders; after all, he was also the author of Famous Prostitutes and Words of Insult, both sadly lost. In How to Be a Bad Emperor, Josiah Osgood provides crisp new translations of Suetonius's briskly paced, darkly comic biographies of the Roman emperors Julius Caesar, Tiberius, Caligula, and Nero. Entertaining and shocking, the stories of these ancient anti-role models show how power inflames leaders' worst tendencies, causing almost incalculable damage.

'To keep children clean is something that should never be attempted. It cannot be done.''The mere provision of the vegetable is not sufficient; it must be actually eaten.''If there is room enough for somersaults, the child can be satisfied.'Many books of advice for new parents were published during the 1920s and 30s, influenced by the growth of developmental psychology and aimed at the aspirant middle classes who were taking a more hands-on role in the raising of their offspring. This compendium brings together nuggets from the best of these titles in one handy volume. Chapters include good - and bad - behaviour, meals and mealtimes, dress and deportment, children's parties and playtime and storytelling, with sections on the all-important saying 'No!' and good bedtime habits. Illustrated with charming contemporary line drawings, this little book is full of no-nonsense, old-fashioned parenting advice: a gem of a guide for anyone new to the hardest job in the world.

The art of being a good wife is not an easy one. This little guide was written for the middle classes of the 1930s who were reading one of the first modern self-help books. Illustrated with contemporary line-drawings, it contains advice by turns delightfully arcane and timelessly true, for example:It is a wife's duty to look her best. If you don't tidy yourself up, when you have done the bulk of the day's work, don't be surprised if your husband begins to compare you unfavourably with the typist at the office. Don't forget that a wife can always set the standard of behaviour for the home. If she allows laxities of dress or conversation at the table she will soon find that they become a fixed procedure. Don't forget that very true remark that while face powder may catch a man, baking powder is the stuff to hold him. Don't criticise the food at your own table when you are entertaining and especially refrain from doing so before the servants. After all is said and done, husbands are not terribly difficult to manage.

What are the secrets to a contented life? One of Rome’s greatest and most influential poets, Horace (65–8 BCE) has been cherished by readers for more than two thousand years not only for his wit, style, and reflections on Roman society, but also for his wisdom about how to live a good life―above all else, a life of contentment in a world of materialistic excess and personal pressures. In How to Be Content, Stephen Harrison, a leading authority on the poet, provides fresh, contemporary translations of poems from across Horace’s works that continue to offer important lessons about the good life, friendship, love, and death.

How to get on well with people, how to deal with violence, how to adjust to losing someone you love? How to live?

This question obsessed Renaissance nobleman Michel Eyquem de Montaigne (1533-92), who wrote free-roaming explorations of his thought and experience, unlike anything written before. Into these essays he put whatever was in his head: his tastes in wine and food, his childhood memories, the way his dog's ears twitched when it was dreaming, events in the appalling civil wars raging around him. The Essays was an instant bestseller, and over four hundred years later, readers still come to him in search of companionship, wisdom and entertainment - and in search of themselves.

This first full biography of Montaigne in English for nearly fifty years relates the story of his life by way of the questions he posed and the answers he explored.

In 63 BC, frustrated by his failure to be elected leader of the Roman Republic, the aristocrat Catiline tried to topple its elected government. Backed by corrupt elites and poor, alienated Romans, he fled Rome while his associates plotted to burn the city and murder its leading politicians. The attempted coup culminated with the unmasking of the conspirators in the Senate, a stormy debate that led to their execution, and the defeat of Catiline and his legions in battle. In How to Stop a Conspiracy, Josiah Osgood presents a brisk, modern new translation of the definitive account of these events, Sallust’s The War with Catiline―a brief, powerful book that has influenced how generations of readers, including America’s founders, have thought about coups and political conspiracies.

In a taut, jaw-dropping narrative, Sallust pleasurably combines juicy details about Catiline and his louche associates with highly quotable moral judgments and a wrenching description of the widespread social misery they exploited. Along the way, we get unforgettable portraits of the bitter and haunted Catiline, who was sympathetic to the plight of Romans yet willing to destroy Rome; his archenemy Cicero, who thwarts the conspiracy; and Julius Caesar, who defends the conspirators and is accused of being one of them.

As politics slides toward impulsivity, and outrage bests rationality, how can philosophy help us critically engage with the world?How to Think Like A Philosopher is a revelatory exploration of the methods, tenets and attitudes of thought that guide philosophy, and how they can be applied to our own lives. Drawing on decades of enquiry and a huge range of interviews, Julian Baggini identifies twelve key principles that promote incisive thinking. Pay attention; question everything; seek clarity, not certainty: these are just a few of philosophy's guiding maxims which can be applied to everything from understanding the impact of climate change to correctly appraising our own temperaments.

Both a fresh introduction to philosophy covering canonical and contemporary philosophers, and an essential, practical guide to good thinking, How to Think Like a Philosopher shows us the way to a more humane, balanced and rational approach to thinking, to politics, and to life.

We are living through a period of unprecedented uncertainty and upheaval in both our personal and professional lives. So it should come as a surprise to exactly no one that trust, human connection, and mental well-being are all on the decline.

This may seem like no laughing matter. Yet, the research shows that humor and laughter are among the most valuable tools we have at our disposal for strengthening bonds and relationships, diffusing stress and tension, boosting resilience, and performing when the stakes are high.

That's why Jennifer Aaker and Naomi Bagdonas teach the popular course Humor: Serious Business at the Stanford Graduate School of Business, where they help some of the world's most hard-driving, blazer-wearing business minds infuse more humor and levity into their work and lives.

In Humor, Seriously, they draw on findings by behavioral scientists, world-class comedians, and inspiring business leaders to reveal how humor works and--more important--how you can use more of it, better.

Aaker and Bagdonas unpack the theory and application of humor: what makes something funny, how to mine your life for material, and simple ways to identify and leverage your unique humor style. They show how to use humor to rebuild vital connections; appear more confident, competent, and authentic at work; and foster cultures where levity and creativity can thrive.

President Dwight David Eisenhower once said, "A sense of humor is part of the art of leadership, of getting along with people, of getting things done." If Dwight David Eisenhower, the second least naturally funny president (after Franklin Pierce), thought humor was necessary to win wars, build highways, and warn against the military-industrial complex, then you might consider learning it too.

In the wake of globalization, cultural forms of expression have become increasingly detached from their places of origin, circulating in a hyper-domain of culture where there is no real difference anymore between indigenous and foreign, near and far, the familiar and the exotic. Heterogeneous cultural contents are brought together side by side, like the fusion food that makes free use of all that the hypercultural pool of spices, ingredients and ways of preparing food has to offer. Culture is becoming un-bound, un-restricted, un-ravelled: a hyperculture. It is a profoundly rhizomatic culture of intense hybridization, fusion and co-appropriation. Today we have all become hypercultural tourists, even in our 'own' culture, to which we do not even belong anymore. Hypercultural tourists travel in the hyperspace of events, a space of cultural sightseeing. They experience culture as cul-tour. Drawing on thinkers from Hegel and Heidegger to Bauman and Homi Bhabha to examine the characteristics of our contemporary hyperculture, Han poses the question: should we welcome the human of the future as the hypercultural tourist, smiling serenely, or should we aspire to a different way of being in the world?