1. Introduction
2. Antireductionism and the Natural Order
3. Consciousness
4. Cognition
5. Value
6. Conclusion
Thomas Nagel is University Professor in the Department of
Philosophy and the School of Law at New York University. His books
include The Possibility of Altruism, The View from Nowhere, and
What Does It All Mean?: A Very Short Introduction to Philosophy. He
is a Fellow of the American Academy of Arts and Sciences and a
Corresponding Fellow of the British Academy. In 2008, he was
awarded the Rolf Schock Prize in Logic and
Philosophy and the Balzan Prize in Moral Philosophy.
"If evolutionary biology redraws its boundaries as this book says
it must, then the dialogue between theology and science will be
considerably altered." --Anglican Theological Review
"[This] troublemaking book has sparked the most exciting
disputation in many years... I like Nagel's mind and I like Nagel's
cosmos. He thinks strictly but not imperiously, and in grateful
view of the full tremendousness of existence." -- Leon Wieseltier,
The New Republic
"A sharp, lucidly argued challenge to today's scientific
worldview." -- Jim Holt, The Wall Street Journal
"Starts with a boldly discerning look at that strange creature,
mankind, and comes to some remarkable speculations about who we are
and what our place is in the universe... The very beauty of Nagel's
theory - its power to inspire imagination - counts in its favor."
-- Richard Brody, The New Yorker
"An intense philosophical takedown of Neo-Darwinism and scientific
materialism. It's a brave and contrarian book. Reminds me of
Wittgenstein's remark: 'Even if all our scientific questions are
answered, our problem is still not touched at all.'" -- E.L.
Doctorow, The New York Times Book Review
"Nagel's arguments against reductionism should give those who are
in search of a reductionist physical 'theory of everything' pause
for thought... The book serves as a challenging invitation to
ponder the limits of science and as a reminder of the astonishing
puzzle of consciousness." -- Science
"Mind and Cosmos, weighing in at 128 closely argued pages, is
hardly a barn-burning polemic. But in his cool style Mr. Nagel
extends his ideas about consciousness into a sweeping critique of
the modern scientific worldview." -- The New York Times
"His important new book is a brief but powerful assault on
materialist naturalism... [Nagel has] performed an important
service with his withering critical examination of some of the most
common and oppressive dogmas of our age." -- The New Republic
"[This] short, tightly argued, exacting new book is a work of
considerable courage and importance." -- National Review
" Provocative... Reflects the efforts of a fiercely independent
mind." -- H. Allen Orr, The New York Review of Books
"[Nagel] is an avowed nonbeliever, but regularly enrages the New
Atheist crowd because he is determined to leave open a space... for
the incomprehensible, for the numinous... and writes very honestly
about that." -- James Wood
"This short book is packed like a neutron star. I found myself
underlining so much that I had to highlight some underlining with
further underlining and flag up this underlining in turn. Mind and
Cosmos is a brave intervention." -- Raymond Tallis, The New
Atlantis
"Challenging and intentionally disruptive... Unless one is a
scientific Whig, one must strongly suspect that something someday
will indeed succeed [contemporary science]. Nagel's Mind and Cosmos
does not build a road to that destination, but it is much to have
gestured toward a gap in the hills through which a road might
someday run." -- The Los Angeles Review of Books
"A model of carefulness, sobriety and reason... Reading Nagel feels
like opening the door on to a tidy, sunny room that you didn't know
existed." -- The Guardian
"Fascinating... [A] call for revolution." -- Alva Noe, NPR's
13.7
"The book's wider questions -- its awe-inspiring questions -- turn
outward to address the uncanny cognizability of the universe around
us.... He's simply doing the old-fashioned Socratic work of gadfly,
probing for gaps in what science thinks it knows." -- Louis B.
Jones, The Threepenny Review
"[Attacks] the hidden hypocrisies of many reductionists,
secularists, and those who wish to have it both ways on religious
modes of thinking ... Fully recognizes the absurdities (my word,
not his) of dualism, and thinks them through carefully and
honestly."--Tyler Cowen, Marginal Revolution
"Mind and Cosmos is a mind-provoking, challenging, and enjoying
read which carries the mark of Nagel's unique blend of originality,
elegance, and intellectual honesty." --Philosophical Psychology
"Mind and Cosmos is...extraordinarily ambitious. Nagel proposes not
merely a new explanation for the origin of life and consciousness,
but a new type of explanation: 'natural teleology.'" -- Inference:
International Review of Science
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