history

I fell in love with this book as soon as I read the excerpt on the back of it. I became so involved in the book that i read it just a few hours! Dokey's use of detail effectively brought the story to life.I fell in love with charactors and thier world as if i were tking part in the action. It had me cheering for Kit and Bold Will till the end. When i had finnished the book, I immediately had to get my hads on the sequel, "Charlotte:Heart of Hope". Once again Dokey delivers a heartwarming novel of adventure and love. This irresitable spirit is again successfully reflected in "Stephanie:Heart of Gold" and "Carrie:Heart of Courage", the final two books of the series. After finishing the entire series for the third time, I began to wonder. What would the next generations of Kelly women be like? What adventure will they embark on next? And ultimately, what keepsake would they tuck away into the fine hope chest, telling of thier legacy.

My cousin gave me the first two books in this series. For some reason i read Charlotte first. It was so great, i couldn't imagine how Katherine could be better. But it turns out i couldn't put Katherine down. It's got to be the best book i've ever read! So if you enjoy history, romance, and adventure, then Katherine is THE book to read! So what are you waiting for? Pick up the book and READ IT!!! Hope you enjoy it as much as i did!

This is by far the most amazing book i have ever read. The way that she will risk anything for her loved one really touched my heart. I am still waiting for the other books to arrive. I hope that it will be just as good as this book. This book shows courage and shows that someone doesn't have to be another person to be accepted. There will always be someone that will accept you as who you are.

If you like to read about the incredible world of Arctic exploration, this is a book you must read! Pierre Berton covers almost 100 years of man's effort to discover the Northwest Passage and the North Pole. Although it is a long read (over 600 pages) the author's wonderful storytelling style keeps you eagerly turning page after page. Each account seems to have been well researched and the facts are there for the reader to absorb. It is amazing to read how poorly the British were prepared for Arctic travel, how they refused to learn from the native people, yet how much they achieved in spite of their attitude. This book has a good message for us all. We can learn from others! Those explorers who did so, were a lot more successful in the long run. The book ends with Peary and Cook's claim to the North Pole. It is quite an account of two men who were more consumed with their image rather than the truth. Who was the greatest of the bunch? You'll have fun picking your winner. I vote for Roald Amundsen! This is a great book!

Years ago I had read an article about the discovery and autopsy of the remains of three seamen from the Franklin expedition. I was so taken by the arctic story recapitulated for that article that when I discovered Ice Blink I read it greedily, becoming a fan of arctic exploration. That find lead me to the current book, The Arctic Grail by Canadian historian Pierre Berton.

In reading Berton's book, one can hardly fail to notice the fact that most of the search for the Northwest Passage, which occupied many adventurous souls for the better part of the 19th Century, was conducted: 1) by Franklin expeditions, 2) in search of survivors of the last Franklin expedition, 3) in search of information as to the fate of the members of the last Franklin expedition, and 4) in search of relics and journals that might come from the last Franklin expedition. It also becomes apparent that almost every venture into that frozen land led to tragedy and often death. It seems that very little was learned either through the experiences of the survivors of the various expeditions or from the lifestyle of the natives of the area. One is amazed that after the disasters that followed each undertaking, yet another venture would be proposed, despite the loss of life and the evident uselessness of the pass itself. Each expedition met with nightmarish experiences, many of the men dying of starvation and exposure, and while the officers might receive promotion in rank and recognition in the history books for their discoveries, the enlisted men who did most of the work got little more than an increase in pay if they lived to get it.

Of the rush to the North Pole, all that can be honestly said is that the notoriety of superhuman effort and of the attainment of nearly impossible goals inspired some pretty disgraceful behavior on behalf of a number of, particularly American, explorers. It becomes obvious that the chicanery of ambitious men looking to make a fortune as celebrities did not start in the last half of the 20th century. Both Cook and Peary seemed driven men whose egos could sustain the possible blight of fraudulent claims disputed by the records but not of public failure. What is sad, particularly in the latter case, is that the actual attainments of the discoverer were pretty amazing as it was. No one since has achieved quite so much under the same conditions. While others have been to the pole successfully, it required air dropped supplies and a flight in or out of the area.

Throughout the entire book one is confronted with a sense of a major lack of real respect for nature by so-called civilized man. It is tempting to see this attitude as a peculiarly 20th (now 21st) century phenomenon, but it seems to have had a good start in the 19th century. The hubris that makes modern man feel that he can tame nature with his various gadgets may just be part and parcel of human nature. Maybe it's just wishful thinking.

One of the particularly distressing aspects of the explorers accounts is of the callous treatment of the native population and of the total marginalization of their contributions. It's apparent from Berton's book that the safe return of many explorers was due largely to help from the Eskimos. I think a thorough narrative of Arctic exploration from their point of view-both their own conquest of the area and their take on the European and American explorations-might make very interesting reading indeed!

All in all the book is well written and well researched. It would definitely appeal to anyone with an interest in history, in man against nature, in man in nature, in geography, ethnography, and 19th Century culture. Anyone with a reading level of 6th grade or above should be able to comprehend it, and it might make interesting reading especially for young men.

This is one of the few books detailing the entire quest for the Northwest passage and North Pole, a quest which spanned almost a century. Beginning in 1818 after the end of the Napoleonic wars the oversized British Navy was sent on trips to ferret out the Northwest passage. The original man responsible for this was Mr. Barrow at the Admiralty. This portion of the books mirrors and serves as the backbone for Fergus Flemings 'Barrows Boys' which is a similar excellent account.

This fantastic volume goes onto describe Amundsons navigation of the passage and the mapping of the northwest territories as well as bear Lake and Slave Lake. The final chapters sum up the quest for the North Pole and the expeditions from all sides that set out to conquer the top of the world. Nansans voyage from northern Norway is detailed very well.

This is an excellent account and if you can find this book it is a very good read, full of adventure, suspense and containing many good maps of each voyage.

The specific edition I am reviewing is the Heffner addition which is a 300 page abridgement. I also own an unabridged edition but I have only read Heffner cover to cover. What is amazing about de Toqueville is how uncanny many of his observations are over a century and a half later. He accurately predicted in 1844 that the world's two great powers would be the United States and Russia. He aptly pointed out that Americans are a people who join associations and he is so right 156 years later. Although there are both religious extremists on both ends, ie fundamentalists and atheists, he was dead on that, as a whole, we are a religious society but that our religious views are moderate. De Toqueville shows how American characteristics evolved from democracy as opposed to the highly class structered societies of Europe. From de Tocqueville, it could have been predicted that pop culture, such as rock music etc, would develop in America because the lack of an aristocracy causes a less cultured taste in the arts. In a thousand and one different ways, I found myself marveling at how dead on de Toqueville was. Most controversially, those who argue that we have lost our liberties to a welfare state might well find support in de Toqueville. Here, 100 years before the New Deal, he forsaw that a strong central government would take away our liberties but in a manner much more benign than in a totalitarian government. There are certain liberties that Americans would willingly sacrifice for the common good. Critics of 20th century liberalism in the US might well point to this as an uncanny observation. By reading "Democracy in America," the reader understands what makes Americans tick. De Toquville was an astute observer of who we are as a people and should be read by all educated Americans.

I want to note that there are several editions of this great work and in deciding which to buy, be aware that each has a different translator. I feel Heffner's translation is slightly stilted but, he did such a wonderful job in editing this abridgement that it, nontheless, deserves 5 stars.

So many aspects of the deepest and most shallow in America are laid bare by a Frenchman who came to The States in 1835 to find for himself whether individuality, freedom and liberty could survive the dangers of equality and democracy. "[The nation] depends on [its people to determine] whether the principle of equality is to lead them to servitude or knowledge, to freedom or barbarism..." writes de Tocqueville. Perhaps, contrary to modern thought, only an outsider can so accurately assess a people. But de Tocqueville is eminently balanced, overall in favor (in my opinion) of what he saw, and thus dismissed in France upon his return.

He notes an American addiction to the practical rather than theoretical, a pragmatic concern, not for the lofty and perfect, but the quick and useful, with relentless ambition, feverish activity and unending quests for devices and shortcuts. Resulting from a requirement for survival on the frontier, these observations are the good, bad and ugly of our modern selves; Resourceful technocrats expanding comfort, health, safety or wealth by anyone with ingenuity and persistence; Our exchange of youth for old age in the workplace, improving our standard of living at the expense of our quality of life; America's shallow nature of thought, sealed up in sound-bites.

De Tocqueville finds in the sacred name of majority, a tyranny over the mind of Americans as oppressive and formidable as any other tyranny - arguably more so by virtue of its acceptance. Where monarchs failed to control thought, democracy succeeds. Opinion polls our politicians subscribe to have a power of conformity. "I know of no country in which there is so little independence of mind and real freedom of discussion as in America," he writes. "It is as if the natural bond which unites the opinions of man to his tastes, and his actions to his principles is now broken..."

Of literature and art we see why so much pulp crowds the bookshelf and bamboozles fill our galleries; "Style will frequently be fantastic, incorrect, overburdened and loose - almost always vehement and bold. Authors will aim at rapidity of execution more than at perfection of detail... The object of authors will be to astonish rather than to please, to stir the passions more than charm the taste."

A fascinating evolution of perception - of self and state - unfolds as the democratization of education, property ownership and the vote expands. Wiping away the trappings of privilege transforms the serfdom mindset. We see the perception of opinion as both scoffed when originating in individuals other than ourselves, and, conversely, the worship of opinion as a manifestation of majority rule. Americans, once lionizing the intrepid individual, instead took a turn to having most pride in their sameness. Armed with this understanding, today we see each group define itself by its signals - body language, speech cadence and inflection, vocabulary and dress. Today our youth have surfer speech, rap speech, gangster dress, the hooker look. Business embraces managerese, like "due diligence", "proactive", "right sizing", "leveraging assets to meet market demands". Politicians use the word "clearly" so often that what they mean is not clear. Every group has its code words, actions and look. A time consuming process of investigating the revealed character of individuals is exchanged for quicker, simpler signs.

The climax is reached with de Tocqueville's troubling "either or"; "We must understand what is wanted of society and its government. Do you wish to give a certain elevation of the human mind and teach it to regard the things of this world with generous feelings, to inspire men with a scorn of mere temporal advantages, to form and nourish strong convictions and keep alive a spirit of honorable devotedness? Is it your object to refine the habits, embellish the manners and cultivate the arts, to promote the love of poetry, beauty and glory?... If you believe such to be the principle object of society, avoid the government of democracy, for it would not lead you with certainty to the goal.

"But if you hold it expedient to divert the moral and intellectual activity of man to the production of comfort and promotion of general well being; if a clear understanding be more profitable to a man than genius; if your object be not to stimulate the virtues of heroism, but the habits of peace; if you had rather witness vices and crimes and are content to meet with fewer noble deeds, provided offences be diminished in the same proportion; if, instead of living in the midst of a brilliant society you are contented to have prosperity around you... to ensure the greatest enjoyment and to avoid the most misery... then establish democratic institutions."

This is one of the best novels of the 19th century. Most people do not recognize the significance of this book, however its relevance to modern literature cannot be emphasized more. Ironically, this book has apparently
gained quite a following among political scientists, historians, and pediatric endocrinologists, however this is only because of a misinterpretation. Many believe De Tocqueville to have been what he claims to have been, a gentleman, statesman, diplomat, and liaision for France to the United States. De Tocqueville was none of the above, in fact he was a petty criminal from Marseille who was arrested in 1832 for stealing horseshoes from a prominent businessman's steed. While in jail he was mixed up with political prisoners from a recent revolt and sent to Martinique to serve a sentance of 5 years hard labor. Unfortunately, De Tocqueville had a hot temper and allegedly killed an Arawak Indian in a fight, and being that this was the last known Arawak Indian on the island was sentanced to life in prison. It was here that he met a young Victor Hugo, a criminal justice student studying colonial jail system and theory, who De Tocqueville befriended. Hugo taught him to write, which Alexis did to pass the time and to allay his growing madness. Upon his death, guards found thousands of pages of text stuffed under his soiled mattress, some of which we now know to be Democracy In America. It was part of a larger epic about a French diplomat named Arnaud Venilas who wrote political treatises and sold them to British merchants to feed his opium addiction.
I wholeheartedly disagree with the modern interpretation of this work and hope that eventually this mini story will be put back into the Venilas context as De Tocqueville had originally intended.

Bravo! If you are tired of the superficial coverage of the Elian Gonzalez case, and would like to enter a realm where it is possible to examine what seems like a sensational personal story of another era in light of history, religion, global politics, 19th century journalistic excesses, and family rights, read this book. The other customer and editorial reviews explain quite well what the facts of the book are. So I'll just add my voice to the others here and say that it is an amazing book, one that combines incredible historic detail with literary interest. It's uncanny how, in the midst of the Gonzalez drama, I accidentally discovered this book about an Italian Jewish boy, kidnapped by the Catholic Church in 1858 at the age of six. Read it for itself, or for the opportunity it provides to think deeply about current events. A page turner.

David I. Kertzer has written a wonderful account of a pivotal event in Italian, Jewish and Catholic history. The Kidnapping of Edgardo Mortara tells the story of the 1858 kidnapping of a six year old Jewish boy secretly baptized while a baby by a Catholic servant in the home. From this horrifying personal incident for this Jewish family the panorama of the story grows very large indeed, taking into account the Pope, the governments of Europe, and the forces for the unification of Italy. The author does a superb job of making all of this understandable to the reader. He also never allows the epic scope of the book to overwhelm the family as the centre of all of this controversy. The Mortaras hold a special place in this tragedy as they deserve and the lives lived by Jewish families, such as theirs, in Italy is vividly presented. It is a shocking book, yet very illuminating and well written. Highly recommended.

Rarely have i read a book that moved me as much as this one. Kertzer's account of the kidnapping of a jewish child from his family by the church is told with an eloquence and sensitivity that is truly extraordinary. This is a sad story. What could be worse than having your child stolen from you and there being absolutely nothing you can do about it. I felt a real anger that only progressed as the book went on. Kertzer brings forth the pain of Edgardo's father as he tries in vain to save his son. There is no excuse for what happened to Edgardo, but his was not a solitary or isolated story. It is important for people to know that this happened, jews, catholics, everyone. I highly reccomend this book.

The first book of the the "Williamsburg Series" I ever read was "Ever After", tucked away with other of my mother's books. I fell in love with the characters and England at the age of 12. After finishing the book I hied to the library and one by one picked up the other books in the series which were still available in the 1960's. During the 70's I visited Williamsburg three times, reliving the area through Ms. Thane's books. My greatest joy was having my oldest son choose the College of William and Mary for his undergraduate degree. The highlight of my literary life occurred when I discovered the bookstore in Williamsburg carried all of Ms. Thane's books, which were all purchased immediately. I have read and reread these books for over 30 years and now I am so pleased to have my daughter experience them. The Days, Spragues, Campions, and their worlds gave me and my son an incredible lust for history, both American and English. I still get a lump in my throat every time I see, hear, read, etc. anything about Williamsburg. Anyone who intends to visit the area should be introduced to these books before they go (although I do have to admit that these books are "chick stuff"!)

I first found the novel Yankee Stranger,the second book in the Williamsburg series, on the bottom shelf of a small town library. I was 13 at the time. I went home and curled up on my bed for a slow summer day read. I didn't not move for a solid eight hours. I was captured by the excellent history and charactization in that work. My mother asked what in the world I was reading. I told her the best book I've ever read. I was wrong. There are several books,all by Elswyth Thane,and each and everyone of them are the best. I read these books eight years ago. I still remeber the charaters I came to love. This book is the first book in a series that will lovingly haunt you for the rest of your life. Its awsome scenery and its family of characters will endure in your heart forever. Its more than a romance its an experience of times, places, and people that you will love for a lifetime.

Reading this book is like peeking into the lives of its characters. I felt as if I got to know real individuals rather than the inventions of the author. She deftly reveals more and more about each character - I was left truly caring about what happened to them. I could have read it in one evening but instead, I spread it over three days - this gave me time to think about the individuals and what I thought would happen next. It is a truly memorable book - one that my friends and family are lining up to share - I have a wait list for individuals who want to borrow my book!

Pilgrim's Progress is without a doubt one of the true classics of time--an allegory that has remained a best seller years after its introduction.

My first introduction to Pilgrim's Progress was as a child in parochial school. I had to do a book report on it in 5th grade and ended up reading numerous times for various projects throughout grade school.

The reader follows the main character--aptly named "Christian"--on his journey to the Celestial City.

Along the way, Christian passes through the many trials of life, symbolized by intruiging characters and places along the way. An early temptation is the "City of Destruction", which Christian narrowly escapes with his life. The various characters are perhaps the most fascinating portion of the book--Pliable, Giant Despair, Talkative, Faithful, Evangelist, and numerous others provide the reader with a continual picture of the various forces at work to distract (or perhaps, encourage)Christian on his ultimate mission.

Of course, the theology (for those of the Christian faith) of Pilgrim's Progress is a constant source of debate, the book is nonetheless a classic of great English writing.

It's not a quick read--that's for sure--however, I certainly would recommend that one read it in its original form. Don't distort the beauty of the old English language with a modern translation.

A letter to Marvin Minsky about this book:

I urge you tolook at a remarkable book by the English Puritain John Bunyan(1628-1688), "The Pilgrim's Progress", which is one of the great evangelical Christian classics, though clearly that is not why it interests me and should interest you (although I AM interested in the puzzle that is the religious sense, which even the irreligious feel, and this book can give remarkable insight into that as well).

Rather its fascination lies in the pilgrimage it depicts, or in the fact that human traits, vices, virtues, &c are PERSONIFIED as particular individuals who are their living and speaking epitome, and who are encountered along the way in revealing situations.

Bunyan's hero is appropriately named Christian. Someone once wrote that "Christian's journey is timeless as he travels from the City of Destruction to the Celestial City, meeting such characters as Pliable, Talkative, Giant Despair, Evangelist, Worldly-Wiseman, Faithful, Ignorance and Hopeful."

At first this personification is merely amusing, even a bit annoying (as caricatures or truly stereotypical people can be); but after a while I found myself enthralled because I realized that the effect of this odd literary device was to give unmatched insight into the nature of such traits. The force of the whole thing comes from the fact that one journeys about in - literally INSIDE of - what is both a comprehensive and finite moral and psychological landscape (a "psycho-topography"), very much as though one were INSIDE the human mind and your "Society of the Mind" was embodied in the set of actors. This is more or less the opposite or an inversion of the 'real world' of real people, who merely SHARE those attributes or of whom the attributes are merely PIECES; in "Pilgrim's Progress", by contrast, the attributes are confined in their occurrence to the actors who are their entire, unique, pure, and active embodiment, and humanness, to be recognized at all, has to be rederived or mentally reconstructed from the essential types.

The effect, for me, was something like experiencing a multidimensional scaling map that depicts the space of the set of human personality types, by being injected directly - mentally and bodily - into it by means of virtual reality technology.

So Bunyan's book has something of the interest to a psychologist, neuroscientist, or philosopher that Edwin Abbot's "Flatland" has to a mathematician.

I don't mean to overpraise "Pilgrim's Progress", of course; it was written for theological rather than scientific purposes, and has conspicuous limitations for that reason. But its interest to a student of the mind who looks at it at from the right point of view can be profound.

- Patrick Gunkel

This book is a true classic. John Bunyan spins a wonderful tale of the spiritual walk to heaven. The language may be a bit hard and it won't be that easy of a read, but it is definately worth the while!

It is spiritually edifying and also quite captivating.

A must read!!!

Those who are hard-core Tolkien fans will revel in the lore found in this book. Though at first I found these books rather difficult to read, I have come to absolutely love them. The two volume Book of Lost Tales gives much information on the creation of Middle Earth and some of the important events that happened in the first age. In the Book of Lost Tales 2, a page has been included from Tolkien's original manuscripts. Seeing that made me appreciate all the work that Christopher Tolkien went to even more. I am very grateful to him for making all these stories available to Tolkien fans. Probably the thing I like best about reading these books is that I now understand the vague references to history that are included in The Lord of the Rings and The Hobbit.

The Book of Lost Tales 2 is a fantastic continuation to the first, taking place right where it left off this book goes in deeper than the first. The Book of Lost Tales includes 6 tales that where apart of the first but explains it with greater detail. This book was edited by Christopher Tolkien, the author's(J.R.R. Tolkien) son. All of the six stories include many notes that help you with the story, and 4 of them include a commentary that Christopher Tolkien wrote. I found the commentary and notes to be very helpful and enjoyable although he refers a lot to The Simarillion so one who has not read that might not understand some of it, and infact the stories that are in The Book of Lost Tales 2 are briefly in The Simarillion, which is also a very wonderful book. These books can be at sometimes a little difficult to read given the ammount of detail and information that they give you, sometimes it is hard to organize all of it but as you read on more things fall into place.

I highly recommend this book, although suggest reading The Simarllion before hand, J.R.R. Tolkien's fantasy world is quite enjoyable and his writings are full of detail. I also found the appendix and index of words quite useful and very nice to have, it tells you where all the names come from and have referances to where you can find them in this book and others. If you have read Lord of The Rings then you will find referances that are from this book and also The Simarillion that you did not get before.

Overall I thought this book was very enjoyable, although some what tedious at some points, and I recommend it to all fantasy and Lord of The Ring fans.

"The Book of Lost Tales 2" includes several tales which will be a classic part of "The Silmarillion", yet all of these are in a cruder, more rudimentary form, than what readers have seen in the latter work. Among the most important changes is depicted in the early version of the tale of Beren and Luthien, here entitled "The Tale of Tinuviel", where Beren was conceived first by Tolkien as a gnome, not a man. There is also an extensive recounting of "The Fall of Gondolin", the Elvish refuge from Morgoth, not seen in "The Silmarillion". This is an important book for both scholars and fans of Tolkien, since his son Christopher provides excellent commentary and related material (e. g. poetry) in which he compares and contrasts the stories in this volume with their later versions in "The Silmarillion". So if you not read "The Silmarillion", I strongly recommend doing so before reading this book.

I am the wife of a Vietnam Vet. I have read hundreds of books about War written by the men and women who were there. Though all of their stories are deserving of great respect some stand out like the North Star on a black night. "Guns Up" by Johnnie M. Clark is one of these outstanding books. This book takes you to war in Vietnam and it doesn't let you come back the same person. Read it.

I have read GUNS UP! several times and keep returning to it. I have read several accounts of Vietnam, but I keep returning to this one. The way that Mr. Clark is able to take his readers through the gamet of emotions and glories of comradeship felt by Marines in Vietnam makes this book a tribute to the men who fought and died when their country called - whether they believed in the war that they were called upon to fight or not, they were truly "forever faithful".

This is an incredible read. I was given GUNS UP in paper back several years ago and just couldn't put it down. I made the big mistake of letting a friend borrow it. I never saw it again. That book got passed around and I just lost count of who had it last. I finally found a hard back of it and didn't tell anyone that I had it.

This book inspires heartfelt testimony. My own experience is that it liberates. Wittgenstein introduces a method that's fitted to the questions he treats, so that anyone who is bothered by the same questions can finally get a decent grip on them. The questions I mean are the usual philosophical ones: what is value? what is a fact? what is logic? what makes a thing what it is? what is essence? what is explanation? what is thinking? and so on. But (and this is a clue to his method) the basic question among all of these is about meaning: what is it, what conditions it, and what is the relationship between meaning and world (it turns out to be intimate).

A couple of "warnings": Wittgenstein is not a philosopher who likes jargon, in fact the tendency to jargon cuts directly against his philosophical point that language is just fine the way it is. But he can be weirdly hard to read anyway and very smart people walk away from him bewildered all the time. Mostly (I think) that's because the questions are uniquely "close to us" and Wittgenstein's approach is totally unlike familiar approaches to problem-solving (in science, math, politics, car mechanics, etc.) It's as though we are used to inspecting things at arm's length but what's at issue in these questions changes at arm's length, the problem is only right at our noses. So he takes another approach which you'll have to see first-hand - what he himself called his "new method". Now every rule must have an exception, and that brings me to the second point. Actually Wittgenstein does rely on some technical vocabulary - nothing far-out, but it can present an obstacle to deeper reading. Words like "sense", "reference", "assertion", "truth-value", "concept", and "object" stem from logic and the theory of meaning as Frege developed them. To go more deeply into PI, a person would have to read - or somehow be comfortable with ideas from - at least two of Frege's articles: "On Sense and Reference" and "On Concept and Object" [collected in The Frege Reader, Beaney ed.]. These articles are practically the fountainhead of analytic philosophy and also clear, precisely written, and intensely brilliant. More to the point, they contain many of Wittgenstein's insights in germinal form, and many of Wittgenstein's most significant moves are implicit or explicit criticisms of Frege. So to really get to the bottom of PI you'll probably need to read Frege.

Anyway, the bottom line is: if you've come this far, it's for you.

Philosophical Investigations is a classical work in the history of philosophy. It is a book which holds a position similar to that of Kant's Critique of Pure Reason, Plato's Meno and Heidegger's Sein und Zeit.

Let's take a look at Wittgenstein's investigations. I have presented Wittgenstein's life in my review of Ray Monk's Wittgenstein biography, let me here focus more on his philosophy.

Wittgenstein starts with a quote from St Augustine. Augustine belived that the principal function of language is to refer to external reality, he believed that all words function similar to names and according to Wittgenstein he seems to have held the view language is learned through ostensive defintions. Wittgenstein, however, rejects this referentialist view of language, believing that language is far more complex than what Augustine thought. Language is an activity, or connected to a number of activitites, which Wittgenstein called language-games. Language-games have different puprposes, not all of them are centered around refering. There are many contexts for using words and many kinds of speach acts. While the logical positivists believed that the meaning of a statement was its method of verification, and Frege believed in two different entities (Sinn and Bedeutung), Wittgenstein rejects these views. According to this thinker from Vienna, meaning is use, and to understand a linguistic expression is to master how to use it and the accompanying techniques, not mereley to understand the verification principle, grasping some Platonic/Fregian entity or have some sense impression in one's head (Locke).

Language is behaviour, practive give the words their sense according to Wittgenstein. This also relates to the private language argument, presented in paragraphs 199ff. Wittgenstein argues that the rules of language must be public and behavioral. It is not, as some like Peter Winch or Kripke have thought, an argument for the principle social nature of language, but for the behavioral aspect of rule-following. Mental terms, according to LW, cannot enter into the language without intimately being connected to overt behavioral patterns. Thus the mentalism of Hume and Locke is rejected, and Wittgenstein shows how knowledge must be more than just access to private sense data. There goes Russell, the British aristocratic sensualists and the Cartesian idea of priveleged access. Sometimes Wittgenstein may seem like a Marxist: it is the practical part of human life that provides that basis for our thoughts and rationality. Being a rational creature, according to Wittgenstein, is not what the rationalist Descartes thought or the empiricists thought; you cannot isolate the intellect or private sensations, because human rationality is based on practical and concrete, physical behavioral patterns.

Througout the investigations Wittgenstein tries to challenge many of the positions held by previous philosophers. He once said that he didn't write for philosophers, but I do think that knowledge of the history of philosophy sheds light over his investigations. he said that WHAT he said would be simple, but understanding WHY he said it, would be difficult.

But even though you are not a professional philosopher, you may receive vital inputs from Wittgenstein. If you can grasp the essence of his ideas of language-games, rule-following, form of life, anti-mentalism and conceptual therapy, you will have knowledge of some of his key ideas ideas.

If you supply your reading of Philosophical Investigations with Ray Monk's marvellous "Ludwig Wittgenstein. The Duty of Genius" you can understand the horizon of this great thinker. Also important, are Baker and Hacker's books on Wittgenstein.

Finally, a word on interpretation. Burton Dreben once had a seminar at the University of Oslo, where he said that if you don't know Frege and Russell, you won't understand Wittgenstein. I completely agree with Dreben that Wittgenstein was much inspired by the philosophers and logicians Frege and Russell. However, one should understand that Wittgenstein was deeply fascinated by poetry, religion and existential questions. Among his favourite writers were Dostoyevsky, Tolstoy and Kierkegaard. When this is taken into account, one can understand Wittgenstein in depth. Wittgenstein was a thinker with great analytical abilities, but never forget that he had a poetic soul. "I am not a religious man, but I cannot help seeing everything from a religious point of view" he once said to one of his friends. The ideas he had on language-games, forms of life and rule-following should be seen in light of some of the profound and important questions a religious man or an existentialist may ask himself.

A useful way of understanding the later Wittgenstein is to take him as a rhetorician. That is, by taking him as saying that understanding in general is analogous to going up to someone and having a conversation, one may grasp that understanding involves a triangulation between the speaker, the audience, and the world, which last is comprised of these conversations or language games.

As the meaning of the speaker's utterance is inseparable from how the audience takes this utterance, so the world is inseparable from utterances in general, for utterances are the very effects the world has caused.
So,I hear you speak in the way that I do because I have expectations about what you're going to say. Indeed, because I can test my expectations of what I think you're going to say against the actual outcome of what you did say, the concept of "mistake" thereby becomes meaningful. Whenever the concept of "mistake" is meaningful in this manner, I escape a would-be private world wherein other minds are merely the projection of my own ego.
I'm adjusting my expectations of what's coming next even as you speak. Moreover, you have expectations about how I'm going to take what you say. However, if you hear me respond in a way that surprises you, you may want to make an adjustment in the way that you're speaking to me so that you modify my expectations. Perhaps then I'll better know what to expect next. You, after all, expect me to hear you in the way you intend, and when my response indicates otherwise (by surprising you),you'll want to make sure that I understand how you wish me to proceed. In this way, we create,a posteriori, a means of understanding rather than depend on some reservoir of meaning that exists beforehand, in a priori relation to our utterances.
The better I understand either you or the world, the further I should be able to proceed without great surprises. A surprise on my part,however, indicates that perhaps I should reconsider something that I thought I had grasped earlier. In light of the unexpected, my earlier response may prove less useful now--on its basis, I did not anticipate this.
No response is ever truly wrong, though, for each was at least useful at some point along the way, and, taken together, each makes up the object of our ongoing discourse. However, those reponses that prove most useful are those that, by minimizing surprises, let me know how to go on.

After reading Lost Rights, I couldn't wait to read this book. This book is an outstanding follow-up, with more insight into the evolution of government power. I would recommend this book to anyone interested in political science, philosophy, law, or really just interested on how the world works. If every American read this book, the Democrats and the Republicans would be relegated to third-party status practically overnight. The government is one thing if nothing else- coercive power over the individual. Upon that understanding we should make one thing clear: that the more power that is given back to the individual, the better we shall be able to live our own lives without a "nanny state" to watch behind our backs to make sure we don't do something "wrong", like ingest politically incorrect substances. It is in this spirit that I give this book my highest praise. It is worth every penny.

...Freedom In Chains is a hard hitting book that explains thedifference between democracy and liberty and how statist politiciansand intellectuals have perverted the definition on liberty. Instead of the right to be left alone and doing what one pleases so long as no one else's rights are interfered with, statists have twisted it into something else. Government declares that there is a crisis or unmet need that requires taxation or intrusive laws that decrease our freedom in the guise of taking care of us. If you are a libertarian, Bovard's Freedom In Chains will remind you why you are one, if you are not a libertarian, it will hard not to become one after reading this book. It will really make you think hard about the role of the state and its citizens.

If you still labor under the delusion that the United States Government is here for your benefit, read this book. Mr. Bovard puts paid to that myth. Americans are now subject to such an unrealistic array of laws and statutes that every one of us is ripe for picking by some bureucrat looking to "get his numbers up". America has truly gone from a government "for the people" to one "against the people". Our constitutional protections are not worth the paper they are written on. If you manage to go through life without running afoul of some government functionary, you are indeed a luck individual. Read this book