Zara Bain - Philosophy: A Crash Course: Become An Instant Expert

Just as no single state, country, or empire has the monopoly over thought, no single person has the monopoly over any one theory or argument. The standard histories of philosophy tend to focus on canonical figures and their big ideas. Ren Descartes, for example, is credited with the Cogito (I think, therefore I am): hes seen to be the sole creator of this supposedly groundbreaking argument. But, as many historians of early modern philosophy will tell you, Descartess work appears much less radical when situated in its proper historical contextand sole authorship becomes much less certain when we consider his discussions with fellow thinkers like Marin Mersenne and Elisabeth of Bohemia. Of course, Descartes was the one to write the ideas downin his Discourse on Method (1637) and the Meditations (1641)but does that mean that theyre his? It may interest you to know that Ibn Sina wrote down some strikingly similar thoughts in his Book of Healing (1027) a good 600 years prior, even though he is given considerably less attention in the European tradition.

In this book, were trying to resist the standard heroic genius narrative. Ideas tend to be had by lots of people in conversation. The lone figure, sat hunched at the top of their ivory tower, pulling thoughts out of the ether, is an unhelpful myth. Ideas dont spontaneously come into existence in isolation from a context. They occur in relation to other ideas, had by other people. And even when a particularly novel thinker does come along, they are (if were being honest) very rarely heroes. All the figures named in these pages have their issues. Sometimes theyre big issues. Aristotle owned slaves. Descartes performed vivisections. David Hume was racist. Frantz Fanon was sexist. There are, we think, no real philosophical heroes.

Its because of our concerns about heroes and geniuses that weve tried to emphasize the collaborative nature of philosophy, showcasing as much as we can the way that thinkers thoughts become intertwined. Simone de Beauvoir worked with Jean-Paul Sartre. Iris Murdoch with Philippa Foot. Charles W. Mills with Carole Pateman. Their work is the product of inspiration, endless discussions, back-and-forths, written and spoken. Its this discursive side of philosophy that weve tried to capture in the writing of this book, too. Its not an accident that this text is coauthored, and the books production has been a matter of talking rather than sitting in isolation, scratching a single furrowed brow (and, we hope, is all the better for it!).