Ryan Patrick’s Reviews > Soccer and Philosophy: Beautiful Thoughts on the Beautiful Game > Status Update

Chapter 20 - "Tell me How You Play and I'll Tell You Who You Are" - The title is a quote from Eduardo Galeano, and the chapter has little that might be called 'philosophy' in it. It is all merely a reflection on mythmaking in football related to regional identities--the Basques, Barcelona, Hungary, and Dynamo Kiev in particular.

Chapter 19 - "Villa till I Die!" - Uses the Ship of Theseus metaphor to explore the nature of a football club, like Aston Villa, applying Baker's 'constitution' theory to resolve the dilemma.

Chapter 18 - Playing the Derby - Not sure how this made it into the volume. There's no real philosophy here, and only a shallow bit of sociology in an article explaining the passions of the derby game to the, presumably, already initiated (which I assume for the intended audience).

Chapter 17 - The Evolution of the Football Fan and the Way of Virtue - Being a football fan can fulfill certain identifiable needs for a healthy life, mentally, socially, and even physically.

Chapter 15 - Embellishing the Ugly Side of the Beautiful Game - That was the most bizarre chapter from any of the '... and Philosophy" series I have ever read; not necessarily bad, just bizarre.

Chapter 10 - He Had to Bring Him Down! - Is it possible to commit a philosophically good foul? Yes, but only in a very limited situation.

Chapter 8 - What's Luck Got to Do with It? - A classic example of how academics can analyze ANYTHING! And at first, it seems really interesting. Yet by the end, we see that it is also a classic example of how academics can OVER-analyze anything, even to death. And end up saying almost nothing interesting.

Chapter 6 - Can Robots Play Soccer? - How would you have to tweak the rules of soccer to ensure a "real" soccer match between robots and humans? Intriguing...

Chapter 5 - Plato and the Greatness of the Game - The author attempts to teach Platonic thinking through soccer: first, he uses "the soccer player Form" to show why Pele and Maradona were 'great' soccer players, then he uses the four cardinal virtues to explain why Beckenbauer and Zidane were (usually) 'great' soccer players.

Chapter 3 (Nietzsche's Arsenal): Makes a case for Nietzsche choosing Wenger's Arsenal as his favorite team.