The Tasks of Philosophy: Selected Essays

How should we respond when some of our basic beliefs are put into question? What makes a human body distinctively human? Why is truth an important good? These are among the questions explored in this collection of essays by Alasdair MacIntyre, one of the most creative and influential philosophers working today. Ten of MacIntyre’s most influential essays written over almost thirty years are collected together here for the first time. They range over such topics as the issues raised by different types of relativism, what it is about human beings that cannot be understood by the natural sciences, the relationship between the ends of life and the ends of philosophical writing, and the relationship of moral philosophy to contemporary social practice. They will appeal to a wide range of readers across philosophy and especially in moral philosophy, political philosophy, and theology.

• Alasdair MacIntyre is widely regarded as one of the world’s greatest living philosophers • Ten of MacIntyre’s most influential essays, written over nearly thirty years, published in one volume for the first time • The first of two volumes of the philosopher’s classic works on moral and political philosophy plus theology

Introduction; Part I. Defining a Philosophical Stance: 1. Epistemological crises, dramatic narrative and the philosophy of science; 2. Colors, cultures, and practices; 3. Moral relativism, truth and justification; 4. Hegel on faces and skulls; 5. What is a human body?; 6. Moral philosophy and contemporary social practice: what holds them apart?; Part II. The Ends of Philosophical Enquiry: 7. The ends of life, the ends of philosophical writing; 8. First principles, final ends and contemporary philosophical issues; 9. Philosophy recalled to its tasks: a Thomistic reading of Fides et Ratio; 10. Truth as a good: a reflection on Fides et Ratio.