Ethics & Morality

Amoral, cunning, ruthless, and instructive, this piercing work distills 3,000 years of the history of power into 48 well-explicated laws....

It’s a belief that unites the left and right, psychologists and philosophers, writers and historians.... 

Written in Greek by an intellectual Roman emperor without any intention of publication, the Meditations of Marcus Aurelius offer a wide range of fascinating spiritual reflections and exercises developed as the leader struggled to understand himself and make sense of the universe....

Few ancient works have been as influential as the Meditations of Marcus Aurelius. Filled with wisdom, practical guidance and profound understanding of human behaviour, it remains one of the greatest works of spiritual and ethical reflection ever written....

Experience the world of a curious boy, a greedy mole, a wary fox and a wise horse who find themselves together in sometimes difficult terrain, sharing their greatest fears and biggest discoveries about vulnerability, kindness, hope, friendship and love.... 

From the New York Times best-selling author of The Black Swan, a bold new work that challenges many of our long-held beliefs about risk and reward, politics and religion....

In The Righteous Mind, social psychologist Jonathan Haidt explores the origins of our divisions and points the way forward to mutual understanding....

One of the great fears many of us face is that despite all our effort and striving, we will discover at the end that we have wasted our life....

Do you feel as though something is missing in your life? Do you often feel like your emotions get the best of you? Do you run into trouble within relationships with people at home, at work, in a business, or whatever because you feel like you need to control the situation? Find out more....

Every time we eat, we have the power to radically transform the world we live in....

The story of philosophy is an epic tale: an exploration of the ideas, views and teachings of some of the most creative minds known to humanity....

As it was in Anna Karenina, Madame Bovary, and Othello, so it is in life....

Shame is a powerful and sometimes useful tool. But as best-selling author Cathy O'Neil argues in this revelatory book, shaming has taken a new and dangerous turn....

The world tells us that we should pursue our self-interest: career wins, high status, nice things. These are the goals of our first mountain. But at some point in our lives we might find that we're not interested in what other people tell us to want....

Being a stoic means embracing positivity and self-control through the ability to accept the uncertainty of outcomes. With this stoicism guide, the beginner stoic will learn how to take charge of their emotions on the path to sustained happiness and satisfaction....

Seeing self-possession as the key to an existence lived 'in accordance with nature', the Stoic philosophy called for the restraint of animal instincts and the importance of upright ethical ideals and virtuous living....

Life is hard, messy and complex; our friends will probably let us down; most of what has got us here is blind luck and a series of false starts.... 

Considering the role of justice in our society and our lives, Michael Sandel reveals how an understanding of philosophy can help to make sense of politics, religion, morality - and our own convictions....

A reflection on the human need for reflective thoughts, stillness, silence and the ‘very natural spiritual dimension’ that often gets drowned out by surface life and its overload, You Matter encourages people to think more deeply about the phenomenon of existence....

Beyond Good and Evil confirmed Nietzsche's position as the towering European philosopher of his age.... 

Robert B. Reich makes a powerful case for the expansion of America’s moral imagination. Rooting his argument in common sense and everyday reality, he demonstrates that a common good constitutes the very essence of any society or nation....

Challenging, with several powerful arguments, some of our deepest beliefs about rationality, morality, and personal identity, Parfit claims that we have a false view about our own nature. It is often rational to act against our own best interests, he argues....

There is a myth in our culture that to find meaning, you have to travel to a distant monastery or wade through dusty volumes to figure out life's great secret....

Sam Harris has discovered that most people, from secular scientists to religious fundamentalists, agree on one point....

Roger Scruton seeks to assess the basis of national sentiment and loyalty at a time when the United Kingdom must redefine its position in the world....

From nineteenth-century abolitionism to Black Lives Matter today, progressive social movements have been at the forefront of social change. Yet it is seldom recognized that such movements have not only engaged in political action but also posed crucial philosophical questions about the meaning of justice and about how the demands of justice can be met. Michele Moody-Adams argues that anyone who is concerned with the theory or the practice of justice—or both—must ask what can be learned from social movements. 

This booklet contains arguments regarding the original evil of mankind: the concept of division. Intended for use by realists who wish to see the world changed into something better, it has everything that a thinker may need in order to see the road ahead toward a better tomorrow.

Are humans the only dreamers on Earth? What goes on in the minds of animals when they sleep? When Animals Dream brings together behavioral and neuroscientific research on animal sleep with philosophical theories of dreaming. It shows that dreams provide an invaluable window into the cognitive and emotional lives of nonhuman animals, giving us access to a seemingly inaccessible realm of animal experience. The book carries profound implications for debates about animal cognition, animal ethics, and animal rights, challenging us to regard animals as beings who matter.

In On Decline, Potter surveys the current problems and likely future of Western civilization (spoiler: it’s not great). Economic stagnation and the slowing of scientific innovation. Falling birth rates and environmental degradation. The devastating effects of cultural nostalgia and the havoc wreaked by social media on public discourse. Most acutely, the various failures of Western governments in their responses to the COVID-19 pandemic. If the legacy of the Enlightenment and its virtues—reason, logic, science, evidence—has run its course, how and why has it happened?

Mathematician and philosopher Bertrand Russell was prompted to write and publish Why Men Fight (in 1917) as he and the world were experiencing the Great War. Russell shares his thoughts on how to end war - not just between states, but also between classes and individuals.

Why It’s OK to Ignore Politics argues that you’re under no obligation to be politically active. Freiman addresses new objections to political abstention as well as some old chestnuts ("But what if everyone stopped voting?"). He also synthesizes recent empirical work showing how our political motivations distort our choices and reasoning. Because participating in politics is not an effective way to do good, Freiman argues that we actually have a moral duty to disengage from politics and instead take direct action to make the world a better place. 

The author offers wisdom gleaned from many years of experience in spiritual and organizational environments. Do you have questions about life? Does your family think you question too much—or even “think” too much? Have you ever had a discussion about ethics and religion? Have you ever said or thought that, while you are ethical, you’re not so sure about your friends and relatives? If so, then Ethics Without Scripture will help you in your search.

In Lectures on Ancient Philosophy, Manly P. Hall expands on the philosophical, metaphysical, and cosmological themes introduced in his classic work, The Secret Teachings of All Ages. Hall wrote this volume as a companion to his earlier work, intending it for those wishing to delve more deeply into the esoteric philosophies and ideas that undergird the Secret Teachings. Particular attention is paid to Neoplatonism, ancient Christianity, Rosicrucian and Freemasonic traditions, ancient mysteries, pagan rites and symbols, and Pythagorean mathematics. 

As consumers of art, and especially as fans, we have a host of tricky moral question to navigate: do the moral lives of artists affect the aesthetic quality of their work? In Drawing the Line, Erich Hatala Matthes argues that it doesn't matter whether we can separate the art from the artist, because we shouldn't. Matthes argues both that the lives of artists can play an important role in shaping our moral and aesthetic relationship to the artworks that we love and that these same artworks offer us powerful resources for grappling with the immorality of their creators. 

During my Scholarly Writing course in law school over the summer (2021), I was "free-writing" on this topic to see if this would be my topic for my paper—instead, I had a conversation with myself, and this is the end result!

Who has not found themselves scrolling endlessly on screens and wondered: Am I living or distracting myself from living? In Emergency, Break Glass adapts Friedrich Nietzsche’s passionate quest for meaning into a world overwhelmed by “content.” Written long before the advent of smartphones, Nietzsche’s aphoristic philosophy advocated a fierce mastery of attention, a strict information diet, and a powerful connection to the natural world. 

Do you want to find the path to a meaningful and happy life? Have you heard about Stoicism, and do you want to learn more about it? Being a stoic implies embracing positivity through accepting the uncertainty of results and self-control. You will learn how to take charge of your feelings on the path to sustained happiness and fulfillment with the help of this manual. This easy-to-navigate guide to Stoicism gives you the necessary emotional tools to let go of the things you can't control and find joy in what you have.

Say 'philosopher', and someone grand, old and bearded might come to mind. But, as philosophy professor Scott Hershovitz shows in this delightful debut, some of the best philosophers in the world are better described as nasty, brutish and short—that is to say, they're children. Children make wonderful philosophers because they constantly question things that grown-ups take for granted, test theories about the people around them and try to work out the way the world works. 

Now for the first time, listeners will be granted access to five decades of Robert M. Pirsig’s personal writings in this posthumous collection that illuminates his thinking to an unprecedented degree. Skillfully edited and introduced by Wendy Pirsig, Robert’s wife of over 40 years, the collection includes previously unpublished texts, speeches, letters, interviews, and private notes (including from Pirsig’s time in the mental hospital), as well as key excerpts from Zen and the Art of the Motorcycle Maintenance and his second book, Lila.

The best conversations between friends, family and acquaintances are the ones that touch on real issues. Whether these conversations occur in the lecture theatre, meetings or around the dinner table, ethical quandaries make for a great topic of conversation—and usually a heated debate! From the infamous, ethical questions are always intriguing and ask us to pause and consider: what would you have done? What’s the context? Is there one right answer? And ultimately—can ethics guide us to better answers to all these questions?