The Still Center: A Philosophy for Our Time
About this ebook
Prof. Burton Porter examines our present attitudes and values, and offers signposts for a successful life. Some are consistent with our current direction; others are at variance with contemporary trends. But with full, 21st-century awareness, the author points to dimensions of human beings that can be realized to create a fulfilling existence.
In so doing, he introduces readers to a wealth of poetic and literary perspectives and delivers a clear explication of a wide range of traditions in moral theory and ethics.
Writing in a clear, concise way, the author invites everyone to consider how to set today’s values and sensibilities into a broader framework of thought, and to ponder how to construct a satisfying, worthy self in the midst of chaotic social changes. Along the way he quickly introduces many of the major trends of Western philosophy, great thinkers from the Ancient Greeks to today. The book shows readers how to see the relevance today of pragmatism, formalism, relativism, postmodernism, logic and sophistry, and realism vs. idealism, and modern classics such as Mills and Hume.
About the author
Burton Porter holds a Ph.D. from St. Andrews University, Scotland, which includes graduate study at Oxford University. He has taught at the University of Maryland (European Division), Drexel University, and Mount Holyoke College, and is currently Professor of Philosophy at Western New England University in Springfield, Massachusetts.
Prof. Porter has published twelve books in print: The Great Perhaps: God As a Question (Rowman and Littlefield), What the Tortoise Taught Us (Rowman and Littlefield), The Head and the Heart (Humanities Books), Philosophy Through Fiction and Film (Prentice Hall), The Voice of Reason (Oxford University Press), The Good Life (Rowman and Littlefield, 5/ed), Religion and Reason (St. Martin's Press), Philosophy Through Film (Sloan Publications), Personal Philosophy (Harcourt Brace), Reasons for Living (Macmillan Publishing), Philosophy, A Literary and Conceptual Approach (Harcourt Brace), Deity and Morality (Allen and Unwin, and Routledge). He also has published five titles as eBooks: The Moebius Strip, Lab Rats, The Gadfly, Forbidden Knowledge, and Black Swans and White Tigers. He has published numerous book reviews and papers.
