The Study of Human Nature: A Reader

by Leslie Forster Stevenson (Editor)

Now in a new edition, this exceptional anthology provides an introduction to a wide variety of views on human nature. Drawing from diverse cultures over three millennia, Leslie Stevenson has chosen selections ranging from ancient religious texts to contemporary theories based on evolutionary science. An ideal companion to the editor's recent book, Ten Theories of Human Nature, 3/e (OUP, 1998), this interdisciplinary reader can also be used independently.
The Study of Human Nature, 2/e offers substantial selections illustrating the ten perspectives discussed in Ten Theories of Human Nature, 4/e --The Bible, Hinduism, Confucianism, Plato, Kant, Marx, Freud, Sartre, B.F. Skinner's behaviorism, and Konrad Lorenz's ethological diagnosis of human aggression. The Islamic tradition is represented by a selection from the 20th-century Iranian philosopher Ayatullah Murtaza Mutahhari. The 17th- and 18th-century philosophers Descartes, Hobbes, Hume, Rousseau, and Kant are also represented. Selections from Rousseau, J.S. Mill, and Nancy Holmstrom discuss alleged differences between women and men, and a paper by Henry Bracken deals with racial issues. Examples from E.O. Wilson's sociobiology and his critics are also included, together with material from Chomsky and from recent evolutionary psychology.
This new edition includes more substantial selections from the Hindu, Confucian, and Christian traditions and provides more accessible extracts from Marx, Sartre, and Lorenz. An excellent reader for introductory courses in philosophy, religious studies, human nature, and intellectual history, The Study of Human Nature, 2/e, is also an essential resource for anyone interested in ancient, modern, and contemporary perspectives on human nature.

Genres: Philosophy, Psychology, Nonfiction

336 pages, Paperback

First published January 1, 1981

Reviews

[Werner Fourie · Rating 3 out of 5]

Stevenson provides great excerpts from leading thinkers that have shaped many a worldview.

[Tinquerbelle]

Selections from:
1) Old Testament; anonymous
2) Upanishads; anonymous
3) Buddhist Scriptures; Conze, Edward (tr.)
4) Chinese Philosophy in Classical Times; Hughes, E.R. (tr.)
5) New Testament; anonymous
6) Phaedo/Republic/Phaedrus; Plato
7) De Rerum Natura; Lucretius
8) de Anima/Nichomachean Ethics; Aristotle
9) Discourse on Method; Descartes, Rene
10) Leviathan; Hobbes, Thomas
11) Ethics; Spinoza, Baruch
12) Sermons; Butler, Joseph
13) Treatise of Human Nature/Enquiry Concerning Human Understanding; Hume, David
14) A System of Logic; Mill, John Stuart
15) Rules of Sociological Method; Durkheim, Emile
16) Economic and Philosophical Manuscripts/Towards a Critique of Hegel's Philosophy of Right/The German Ideology; Marx, Karl
17) The Question of Lay Analysis; Freud, Sigmund
18) Behaviorism; Watson, J.B.
19) Science and Human Behavior; Skinner, B.F.
20) Part and Parcel in Animal and Human Societies; Lorenz, Konrad
21) Language and Mind; Chomsky, Noam
22) On Human Nature; Wilson, E.O.
23) Being and Nothingness; Sartre, Jean-Paul
24) Thought and Action; Hampshire, Stuart
25) Mind-Body, not a Pseudo-Problem; Feigl, Herbert
26) Philosophy of Psychology; Davidson, Donald
27) Knowledge and Human Interests; Habermas, Jurgen

[Brian · Rating 1 out of 5]

What I'm teaching from (partly) this spring.