A Short History of Modern Philosophy
From Descartes to Wittgenstein

A superbly engaging summary of Western philosophy, starting from a brief recap of post-Hellenistic thought (Scruton comes to the defense of the medieval scholastics, showing how their work pre-empted many recent ideas) and then getting into depth from Descartes onwards, culminating in Wittgenstein a......more

It is possible that readers may stumble upon this title and think it is an accessible primer of philosophy starting sometime in the late 19th century. However, that would be quite an errant inference. First, the scope of the work is selectively circumscribed. Scruton dedicates quite a bit of time to......more

I found this much more useful to read than the Bertrand Russel book.......more

Quite a useful introduction to recent philosophical thought. It certainly recapitulates systems of some major philosophers in a more penetrating manner than the largely superficial overview of Russell’s History. That said, what it provides in depth it sacrifices in both scope and accessibility, so p......more

Roger Scruton is a man of strong opinions who manages to understand other opinions while not necessarily sharing them Modern philosophy is a little out of my field, aside from a couple undergraduate classes in modern philosophy, Hume, Kant, Neitzsche and Kierkegaard (many years ago), I have always fo......more