The most recommended Aristotle books

Like for Aristotle, this is no easy read, but Augustine must be credited with planting in the clearest and most dramatic way the central doubt: cannot we want and do something merely for the sake of the evil or wrong we would commit?

His story of the pear theft is bound to leave an impression on anyone, regardless of one’s religious background. Later Christian philosophers will try to get around Augustine’s doubts, with more or less success.

While this draws on many earlier works and is somewhat influenced by romantic ideas of the time (in 1894) it contains much which you would struggle to find elsewhere unless you had access to a huge academic library.

The author gives his personal opinion on the reference material to a large extent, but he is quite explicit in that regard, so even though it is very dated, the reader is well aware of what is stated as pure fact and what is his own interpretation.

An essential work for those with an interest in the Irish form of Druidism and Paganism, which offers a unique insight and perspective long before the Druid revival reached Ireland.

A renowned historian of science, Clagett carries the story of Greek science forward all the way to the sixth century CE—a span of 1200 years. From that point in time, Greek science passed into the hands of Islamic scholars who advanced it further, especially the mathematical sciences.

This book is not, like ours, organized chronologically and developmentally but according to modern scientific domains—biology and medicine, mathematics, physics, and astronomy. And it focuses on specific scientific inquiries, while we focus on more general and fundamental things like ontology (what exists), cosmology (the overall structure of the universe), the laws of nature, and the drivers of change and motion.

This book is thus a complement to ours in its wide historical sweep and in what it highlights.

Do you know Alexander Kluge? If you don’t, it’s high time for you to learn more about this brilliant German storyteller, filmmaker, and essayist. He was influenced by thinkers like Adorno and Benjamin and has been a crucial part of the European intellectual scene for the last generation. Leslie Adelson is the best American guide for this exciting task. The central question of her book is: What is the meaning of hope in our catastrophic time? And how does one think, write, and talk about the future as a challenging dimension of time? Interpreting and guiding us through Kluge’s radical narrative and essayistic prose also enables Adelson to discuss the possibility of hope as a collective historical concept.  

Peter Garnsey was my PhD supervisor and he is a generous soul with a love of big topics. This book gives an overview of the many ways in which the ancients thought about slavery. It is true that there was no Roman abolition movement, but many ancient writers thought deeply about slavery and the issues involved. Sometimes they justified it, other times they criticised it, but throughout slavery was seen as unavoidable. The Christians called their God “dominus” just as slaves would have done their master.

Have you ever noticed that we use active metaphors for stock market gains (“the markets have climbed”) but passive metaphors for losses (“markets have tumbled”)? Have you wondered if this can legitimize the expectation that stock market gains are earned, while losses are then simply the result of forces beyond traders’ control?

Both law and economics claim to be value-neutral and prefer clear language, but both are “drenched” in metaphor and Geary unpicks some of the key metaphors here in forensic detail. Many of these metaphors are now so taken for granted that we no longer notice them. But they have a powerful role in shaping how we understand and respond to economic and legal concepts.

This book is perhaps aimed more at specialist scholars but I wanted to suggest it nonetheless because it does such a good job of getting across three important points about medieval philosophy. First, it is not about theology but physics so shows the thematic range of medieval philosophy. Second, it is mostly about works by philosophers who are anonymous: Trifogli talks about commentaries on Aristotle with no names attached to them. It turns out there are many, many such works and they tend to be overlooked even though they are innovative, simply because we have no name to put to the ideas. Third, it’s clear throughout the book that these commentators were responding to philosophers from the Islamic world, especially Ibn Rushd (Averroes). So it illustrates the relevance of cross-cultural contacts for medieval thought.

Reuben Hersh is responsible for a revolution in the way we look at mathematics. His main idea is very simple: mathematics is something that is created by human beings. Isn’t that obvious, you say? Not if you believe that mathematics is there even before life itself, that it is built into the nature of reality in some way. In philosophy, this view is called Platonism. Hersh had the radical but obvious idea that if we want to understand what mathematics is we should look at what mathematicians actually do when they create mathematics. Like all great ideas it can be stated very simply but the implications are enormous.  His ideas are what got me started writing my own books about math and science.

Whatever those deep questions are that you have, somebody’s already thought about them, and this masterwork of a book will show you that you’re not alone. In fact, you’re thinking and feeling the same way women and men did a couple thousand years ago – and some very wise individuals have thought through what you’re thinking through. This book will change your life and your mind. You have to be patient, but it’s worth it. Read three pages (no more) a day, every day. Plan on sticking with this for more than a year, then do so. Use a highlighter for a bookmark. It changed me. It’ll change you, too.

I love tracing things back to their roots. Rhetoric was the first discipline devoted to the study of language, and this was the first book written on that subject. Although it’s over 2,000 years old, many of Aristotle’s insights floor me with their timely relevance. 

Aristotle was the first to explain how language creates emotional effects and how negative emotions especially prompt us to act. Because it feels as though emotions well up inside our bodies, we feel that what stirs them must be real. Negative emotions are particularly persuasive in this regard because, Aristotle observed, we enjoy feeling them.

It’s fascinating to me that Aristotle discovered what brain science has discovered only recently: We’re negativity junkies, and the way we talk can change the way we feel.