Extreme Philosophy

Philosophy’s value and power are greatly diminished when it operates within a too closely confined professional space. Extreme Philosophy serves as an antidote to the increasing narrowness of the field. It offers readers twenty internationally acclaimed philosophers who highlight and defend odd, extreme, or ‘mad’ ideas.

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Philosophy’s value and power are greatly diminished when it operates within a too closely confined professional space. Extreme Philosophy: Bold Ideas and a Spirit of Progress serves as an antidote to the increasing narrowness of the field. It offers readers–including students and general readers–twenty internationally acclaimed philosophers who highlight and defend odd, extreme, or ‘mad’ ideas. The resulting conjectures are often provocative and bold, but always clear and accessible.

Ideas discussed in the book, include:



propaganda need not be irrational
science need not be rational
extremism need not be bad
tax evasion need not be immoral
anarchy need not be uninviting
democracy need not remain as it generally is
humans might have immaterial souls
human minds might have all-but-unlimited powers
knowing might be nothing beyond being correct
space and time might not be ‘out there’ in reality
value might be the foundational part of reality
value might differ in an infinitely repeating reality
reality is One
reality is vague

In brief, the volume pursues adventures in philosophy. This spirit of philosophical risk-taking and openness to new, ‘large’ ideas were vital to philosophy’s ancient origins, and they may also be fertile ground today for philosophical progress.