LoveKnowledge : the life of philosophy from Socrates to Derrida

What is the love that turns into knowledge and how is the knowledge we seek already a form of love? Reading key texts from Socrates to Derrida, this book addresses the fundamental tension between love and knowledge that informs the history of Western philosophy. __LoveKnowledge__ returns to the long tradition of philosophy as an exercise not only of the mind but also of the soul, asking whether philosophy can shape and inform our lives and communities. Since its inception, philosophy has struggled to perfect individual understanding through discussion and dialogue based in personal, poetic, or dramatic investigation. The positions of such philosophers as Socrates, Spinoza, Rousseau, Nietzsche, Foucault, and Derrida differ in almost every respect, yet these thinkers all share a common method of practicing philosophy—not as a detached, intellectual discipline, but as a worldly art. What is the love that turns into knowledge and how is the knowledge we seek already a form of love? Reading key texts from Socrates to Derrida, this book addresses the fundamental tension between love and knowledge that informs the history of Western philosophy. __LoveKnowledge__ returns to the long tradition of philosophy as an exercise not only of the mind but also of the soul, asking whether philosophy can shape and inform our lives and communities. Since its inception, philosophy has been more than an abstract search for truth or body of knowledge. It perfects one's understanding by means of discussion and dialogue and personal, poetic, or dramatic investigation. Philosophers such as Socrates, Spinoza, Rousseau, Nietzsche, Foucault, and Derrida differ in almost every respect, yet they share a common method of practicing philosophy?not as a detached, intellectual discipline, but as a worldly art.Reading key philosophical texts from classical Greece to the present day, Roy Brand explores the fundamental role of passion, desire, and love in Since its inception, philosophy has been more than an abstract search for truth or body of knowledge. It perfects one's understanding by means of discussion and dialogue and personal, poetic, or dramatic investigation. Philosophers such as Socrates, Spinoza, Rousseau, Nietzsche, Foucault, and Derrida differ in almost every respect, yet they share a common method of practicing philosophy not as a detached, intellectual discipline, but as a worldly art. Reading key philosophical texts from classical Greece to the present day, Roy Brand explores the fundamental role of passion, desire Content: Undoing knowledge: Socrates of the apology -- The logic of desire: Socrates of the symposium -- Under a certain form of eternity: Spinoza's ethics -- Communicating solitude: Rousseau's reveries of the solitary walker -- How we become what we are: Nietzsche's Genealogy of morals -- Becoming other: Foucault's history of sexuality -- Derrida's "here I am".