Freedom and Limits is a defense of the value of freedom in the context of human finitude. A contribution to the American tradition of philosophy, it focuses attention on moral problems as we encounter them in daily life, where the search for perfection and the incessant drive to meet obligations make it difficult to attain satisfaction. The book argues that uniformity is unproductive: Human natures are varied and changeable, making the effort to impose a unitary good on everyone futile. Moreover, we don’t need to strive for more than what is good enough: Finite achievements should be adequate to satisfy finite people.
The ultimate aim of the book is to reclaim the role of philosophy as a guide to life. In doing so, it presents discussions of such important philosophers as Fichte, Hegel, Peirce, Dewey, James, and, above all, Santayana.
- Cover
- Contents
- List of Abbreviations
- Acknowledgments
- Introduction
- Prologue: The Personal Value and Social Usefulness of Philosophy
- PART I: MIND AND REALITY
- 1 The Impotent Mind
- 2 Santayana’s Philosophy of Mind
- 3 Fichte’s Idealism
- 4 Peirce, Santayana, and the Large Facts
- 5 The Transcendence of Materialism and Idealism in American Thought
- 6 Primitive Naturalism
- PART II: SELF AND SOCIETY
- 7 Two Views of Happiness in Mill
- 8 Questions of Life and Death
- 9 On Selling Organs
- 10 A Community of Psyches: Santayana on Society
- 11 The Cost of Community
- 12 Public Benefit, Private Cost
- 13 Leaving Others Alone
- PART III: PLURALISM AND CHOICE-INCLUSIVE FACTS
- 14 Relativism and Its Benefits
- 15 The Element of Choice in Criteria of Death
- 16 Human Natures
- 17 Persons and Different Kinds of Persons
- 18 Grand Dreams of Perfect People
- 19 Philosophical Pluralism
- PART IV: MEANINGFUL LIVING
- 20 To Have and to Be
- 21 Drugs: The Fallacy of Avoidable Consequences
- 22 Loving Life
- 23 Aristotle and Dewey on the Rat Race
- 24 Improving Life
- 25 Stoic Pragmatism
- 26 Pragmatism and Death
- PART V: HUMAN ADVANCE AND FINITE OBLIGATION
- 27 The Relevance of Philosophy to Life
- 28 Both Better Off and Better: Moral Progress Amid Continuing Carnage
- 29 Education in the Twenty-First Century (with Shirley M. Lachs)
- 30 Learning About Possibility
- 31 Moral Holidays
- 32 Good Enough
- Epilogue: Physician Assisted Suicide
- Notes
- Further Reading
- Index
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