Philosophy cover with an ancient weathered stone impossible triangle on a white background

BY MICHAEL BRENNDOERFER

Philosophy

Thinking About Life and the World: A Journey Through Philosophy’s Greatest Ideas

The book spans 4 volumes. Read in order, or browse the contents to find the topic you need.

16 chapters
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Read Philosophy free online

What makes a life go well? What can we know? When is political authority justified? The book brings philosophical works and arguments into a reading sequence built around these questions. Each chapter focuses on a particular text, explains its argument, and considers the objections it invites.

Explore the book’s 4 volumes

Philosophy is organised into 4 volumes. Each volume covers a subject, divided into parts and chapters. Read from the beginning, or choose the volume you need.

16 published chapters · Free to read online

Start at chapter one

Part I

The Good Life

13 chapters
01Virtue and flourishingAristotle's Nicomachean Ethics. What makes a whole life go well, and how does character contribute?20 min
02Character, ritual, and relationshipsConfucius's Analects: Ren, Li, and the Exemplary Person. How do relationships and repeated practices shape a good person?Coming soon
03The beginnings of moral characterMencius: The Innate Goodness of Human Nature. What capacities in human beings make moral development possible?Coming soon
04Pleasure and the limits of desireEpicurus's Letter to Menoeceus: Core Epicurean Ethics. Which pleasures are worth pursuing, and what makes a desire troublesome?Coming soon
05Judgment and what we can controlEpictetus's Discourses and Enchiridion: Stoic Ethics in Practice. How should we respond to circumstances we cannot choose?Coming soon
06Practicing a philosophy of lifeMarcus Aurelius's Meditations: Philosophy as Lived Practice. What changes when philosophical reflection becomes a daily practice?Coming soon
07Action without forcingLaozi's Daodejing: The Ineffable Dao and Wu Wei. When does trying harder interfere with acting well?Coming soon
08Attention, conduct, and sufferingThe Dhammapada: Gateway to Buddhist Ethics. How are habits of mind connected to the way we treat others?Coming soon
09Action, duty, and attachmentThe Bhagavad Gita: Karma, Jnana, and Bhakti Yoga. How can a person act responsibly without being governed by attachment to results?Coming soon
10Love and what we find valuablePlato's Symposium: Love and Diotima's Ladder of Beauty. What can desire teach us about beauty and a good life?Coming soon
11Love, persuasion, and the soulPlato's Phaedrus: The Tripartite Soul and Divine Madness. What distinguishes guidance of a soul from manipulation?Coming soon
12Virtue, practices, and traditionsMacIntyre's After Virtue: Recovering Aristotelian Ethics. How do shared practices give virtues their point?Coming soon
13Human nature and goodnessFoot's Natural Goodness: Grounding Virtue in Human Nature. Can facts about human life help explain moral evaluation?Coming soon

Part II

Moral Reasons

14 chapters
14Duty and the categorical imperativeKant's Groundwork of the Metaphysics of Morals. What makes a moral requirement binding regardless of what we happen to want?20 min
15Freedom and practical reasonKant's Critique of Practical Reason: Moral Law and Freedom. How are moral responsibility and freedom connected?Coming soon
16Sentiment and moral judgmentHume's Enquiry Concerning the Principles of Morals. What roles do feeling and reason play in approving an action?19 min17Happiness and consequencesMill's Utilitarianism. How should the effects of an action on everyone concerned enter moral judgment?14 min
18Conflicting dutiesRoss's The Right and the Good: Prima Facie Duties. How can several duties matter when they point toward different actions?Coming soon
19What we mean by goodMoore's Principia Ethica: The Birth of Modern Metaethics. Can goodness be defined through another property?Coming soon
20The challenge to objective valuesMackie's Ethics: Inventing Right and Wrong. What would have to exist for moral judgments to be objectively true?Coming soon
21The problem with moral obligationAnscombe's Modern Moral Philosophy: The Virtue Ethics Revival. What happens to the language of moral obligation when its background changes?Coming soon
22Justification to other peopleScanlon's What We Owe to Each Other: Contractualist Ethics. Which principles could people reasonably reject?Coming soon
23Agreement between moral theoriesParfit's On What Matters: Unifying Moral Philosophy. How far can rival accounts of moral reasons converge?Coming soon
24Reasons, identity, and future peopleParfit's Reasons and Persons: Revolutionary Ethics and Identity. How do identity and time affect what we owe to ourselves and others?Coming soon
25Care and moral understandingGilligan's In a Different Voice: Care Ethics and Moral Development. What can an emphasis on relationships reveal about moral reasoning?Coming soon
26Care as a relationshipNoddings's Caring: A Feminine Approach to Ethics. What does responsibility require within a particular caring relationship?Coming soon
27Responsibility for another personLevinas's Totality and Infinity: Ethics as First Philosophy. Can our encounter with another person come before our theories about them?Coming soon

Part III

Freedom, Meaning, and Mortality

10 chapters
28Choosing a way of lifeKierkegaard's Either/Or: Aesthetic and Ethical Existence. What distinguishes a life organized around possibilities from one shaped by commitment?Coming soon
29Freedom and responsibilitySartre's Existentialism Is a Humanism. What follows if a person must take responsibility for becoming who they are?18 min
30Living with the absurdCamus's The Myth of Sisyphus: Absurdism and Revolt. How can a person live when the world does not supply the meaning they seek?Coming soon
31Creating valuesNietzsche's Thus Spoke Zarathustra: The Death of God and the Übermensch. What does it mean to take responsibility for the values one lives by?Coming soon
32Questioning moral certaintyNietzsche's Beyond Good and Evil: Perspectivism and the Critique of Philosophy. What assumptions shape a philosopher's claims about truth and value?Coming soon
33How moral values acquire a historyNietzsche's On the Genealogy of Morals: The Origins of Good and Evil. What can the origins of a moral judgment reveal about its authority?Coming soon
34Desire and dissatisfactionSchopenhauer's The World as Will and Representation: Pessimistic Metaphysics. Why might the satisfaction of desire fail to settle the problem of suffering?Coming soon
35Memory, self-examination, and timeAugustine's Confessions: Philosophical Autobiography and Time. What can reflection on a particular life reveal about the self and time?Coming soon
36Fortune and what remains valuableBoethius's Consolation of Philosophy: Fortune and Divine Providence. What can sustain a life when status and security disappear?Coming soon
37Philosophy and deathPlato's Phaedo: Philosophy as Preparation for Death. How does a philosopher's account of the soul affect the way they face death?19 min
Volume 1 · 37 chapters

Part IV

Faith and Reason

13 chapters
38Thinking about a necessary beingAnselm's Proslogion: The Ontological Argument. Can an argument move from a concept of God to a claim about existence?Coming soon
39Natural theology and natural lawAquinas's Summa Theologica: The Five Ways and Natural Law. What can reason establish about God and human conduct?Coming soon
40The limits of philosophical demonstrationAl-Ghazali's Incoherence of the Philosophers: Critique of Aristotelianism. Which claims about God and the world can philosophers justify?Coming soon
41Philosophy and scriptural interpretationAverroes's Decisive Treatise: Philosophy and Religion Reconciled. How can philosophical inquiry relate to religious interpretation?Coming soon
42Reason, scripture, and the limits of languageMaimonides's Guide for the Perplexed: Reconciling Aristotle and Torah. How should we speak about God without treating God as an ordinary object?Coming soon
43Belief, uncertainty, and commitmentPascal's Pensées: The Wager and Human Condition. How should uncertainty affect a decision about religious commitment?Coming soon
44Examining arguments from designHume's Dialogues Concerning Natural Religion: Critique of Design Arguments. What can observations of the world establish about its supposed designer?Coming soon
45Faith and ethical judgmentKierkegaard's Fear and Trembling: Faith and the Teleological Suspension of the Ethical. What makes the relation between faith and ordinary ethical justification difficult?Coming soon
46Freedom and the problem of evilPlantinga's God, Freedom, and Evil: The Free Will Defense. Are belief in God and the existence of evil logically compatible?Coming soon
47Warrant and religious beliefPlantinga's Warranted Christian Belief: Reformed Epistemology. Must a religious belief rest on an argument to count as warranted?Coming soon
48Evidence and a cumulative case for GodSwinburne's The Existence of God: Bayesian Theism. How might several considerations combine in an argument for God's existence?Coming soon
49Assessing the case for theismMackie's The Miracle of Theism: The Case Against God. How strong are the arguments offered for belief in God?Coming soon
50Divine love and nonbeliefSchellenberg's Divine Hiddenness and Human Reason. What does reasonable nonbelief suggest about the idea of a loving God?Coming soon

Part V

Knowledge and Doubt

12 chapters
51Learning and inquiryPlato's Meno: Recollection and the Paradox of Learning. How can inquiry begin when we do not yet know what we are looking for?Coming soon
52What knowledge requiresPlato's Theaetetus: What Is Knowledge?. Why might perception or true belief be insufficient for knowledge?20 min
53Suspending judgmentSextus Empiricus's Outlines of Pyrrhonism: Ancient Skepticism. What reasons might a skeptic have for withholding assent?Coming soon
54Doubt and certaintyDescartes' Meditations on First Philosophy: The Radical Quest for Certainty. What can remain secure when familiar beliefs are called into question?18 min55Experience and the limits of understandingLocke's Essay Concerning Human Understanding: The Mind as Blank Slate. Where do our ideas come from, and what can they enable us to know?15 min
56Experience, causation, and inductionHume's Enquiry Concerning Human Understanding: Causation and Induction. What justifies expecting the future to resemble the past?Coming soon
57The conditions of experienceKant's Critique of Pure Reason: Transcendental Idealism. What must be contributed by our way of knowing for experience to be possible?Coming soon
58Revising a system of beliefsQuine's Two Dogmas of Empiricism: Attacking the Analytic/Synthetic Distinction. How sharply can we separate truths of meaning from truths about the world?Coming soon
59True belief and epistemic luckGettier's Is Justified True Belief Knowledge?: The Three-Page Revolution. Can a justified true belief still fail to count as knowledge?Coming soon
60Taking knowledge as a starting pointWilliamson's Knowledge and Its Limits: Knowledge-First Epistemology. What changes if knowledge is not analyzed into more basic components?Coming soon
61Trust, credibility, and injusticeFricker's Epistemic Injustice: Prejudice and the Capacity to Know. How can someone be wronged specifically as a knower?Coming soon
62Perspective and the limits of certaintyZhuangzi's Inner Chapters: Butterfly Dreams and Perspectivalism. How do changes in perspective unsettle our confidence in familiar distinctions?Coming soon

Part VI

Being, Change, and Possibility

17 chapters
63Testing the theory of formsPlato's Parmenides: Self-Criticism of the Theory of Forms. What difficulties arise when forms are meant to explain the things that share them?Coming soon
64Being, difference, and falsehoodPlato's Sophist: Non-Being and False Statement. How can we make sense of a false statement without treating it as nothing?Coming soon
65Change, motion, and explanationAristotle's Physics: Change, Motion, Time, and Causation. What does an explanation of change need to account for?Coming soon
66Substance and what it means to beAristotle's Metaphysics: Being, Substance, and the Unmoved Mover. What are the basic subjects of our claims about reality?Coming soon
67A world of atoms and voidLucretius's On the Nature of Things: Epicurean Physics in Verse. How can a material account of nature change our fears and expectations?Coming soon
68Unity and the manyPlotinus's Enneads: Founding Neoplatonism. How might a theory explain the relation between ultimate unity and diverse beings?Coming soon
69Self and ultimate realityThe Principal Upanishads: Brahman-Atman Identity. How do these texts explore the relation between self and the ground of reality?Coming soon
70Dependence and emptinessNāgārjuna's Mūlamadhyamakakārikā: Emptiness and the Middle Way. What follows when things lack independent, self-sufficient existence?Coming soon
71Substance, nature, and necessitySpinoza's Ethics: Substance Monism and Geometric Method. What changes if everything that exists belongs to one substance?Coming soon
72Individuals and a rational orderLeibniz's Discourse on Metaphysics: Substance and Divine Perfection. How can an individual belong to an intelligible account of the whole world?Coming soon
73Simple substances and a complex worldLeibniz's Monadology: Simple Substances and Pre-Established Harmony. How could a world be explained through substances without physical parts?Coming soon
74Universals and economical explanationOckham's Philosophical Writings: Nominalism and Parsimony. What kinds of entities do our explanations require us to accept?Coming soon
75Experience and changing forms of understandingHegel's Phenomenology of Spirit: Consciousness and Absolute Knowledge. How can a form of understanding expose its own limits?Coming soon
76Thinking through categoriesHegel's Science of Logic: Pure Thought Thinking Itself. How might categories of thought generate problems that require their revision?Coming soon
77Difference without a prior identityDeleuze's Difference and Repetition: Philosophy of Pure Difference. What changes when difference is treated as basic rather than derivative?Coming soon
78The reality of possible worldsLewis's On the Plurality of Worlds: Modal Realism. What would it mean for other possible worlds to be real?Coming soon
79Questions within and about a frameworkCarnap's Empiricism, Semantics, and Ontology: Internal vs External Questions. When is a dispute about what exists really a dispute about a linguistic framework?Coming soon
Volume 2 · 42 chapters

Part VII

Mind, Self, and Experience

13 chapters
80Soul and the capacities of living thingsAristotle's De Anima: Soul, Perception, and Intellect. How are perception and thought related to the organization of a living body?Coming soon
81Mind and category mistakesRyle's The Concept of Mind: The Ghost in the Machine. What might be mistaken about picturing a mind as something hidden inside a body?Coming soon
82Mental roles and the world beyond the mindPutnam's Functionalism and Semantic Externalism. Can a mental state be identified by what it does, and what helps determine its content?Coming soon
83The subjective character of experienceNagel's What Is It Like to Be a Bat?: The Problem of Consciousness. What could an objective description miss about having an experience?Coming soon
84Computation and understandingSearle's Chinese Room Argument: Against Strong AI. Would following a program be enough to understand a language?Coming soon
85Explaining consciousness without a central observerDennett's Consciousness Explained: The Eliminativist Challenge. What changes when we question the idea of a single inner place where experience happens?Coming soon
86The problem of conscious experienceChalmers's The Conscious Mind: The Hard Problem of Consciousness. Why might an explanation of cognitive functions leave a further question about experience?Coming soon
87Beginning phenomenological inquiryHusserl's Cartesian Meditations: Accessible Transcendental Phenomenology. What can reflection on experience disclose about subjectivity and other people?Coming soon
88Bracketing and the structure of experienceHusserl's Ideas I: The Epoché and Transcendental Phenomenology. What changes when inquiry suspends ordinary assumptions about the world?Coming soon
89Intentionality and the objects of thoughtHusserl's Logical Investigations: The Birth of Phenomenology. How can an act of consciousness be directed toward something?Coming soon
90Being in the worldHeidegger's Being and Time: Waking Up to Your Own Existence. What becomes visible when human existence is studied through its everyday involvement?19 min
91Perception through a lived bodyMerleau-Ponty's Phenomenology of Perception: The Lived Body. How does bodily activity shape the world we perceive?Coming soon
92Consciousness, freedom, and bad faithSartre's Being and Nothingness: Existentialist Ontology. How can a person evade the freedom involved in their own situation?Coming soon

Part VIII

Logic, Language, and Interpretation

17 chapters
93Making inference explicitFrege's Begriffsschrift: The Invention of Modern Logic. How can a formal notation reveal the structure of an argument?Coming soon
94What numbers areFrege's Foundations of Arithmetic: The Logicist Program. What would justify treating arithmetic as a branch of logic?Coming soon
95The project of grounding mathematics in logicRussell and Whitehead's Principia Mathematica: Logic and Mathematics. How far can mathematical reasoning be reconstructed from logical principles?Coming soon
96The limits of formal proofGödel's Incompleteness Theorems: The Limits of Formal Systems. What limits can a sufficiently expressive formal system have?Coming soon
97Reasoning about necessity and possibilityKripke's Semantical Considerations on Modal Logic: Possible Worlds Semantics. How can possible-world models clarify modal claims?Coming soon
98Meaning and referenceFrege's On Sense and Reference: The Foundation of Philosophy of Language. How can two expressions refer to the same thing while differing in cognitive significance?Coming soon
99Descriptions and logical formRussell's On Denoting: The Theory of Definite Descriptions. What is a statement with a definite description actually asserting?Coming soon
100Language, world, and logical formWittgenstein's Tractatus Logico-Philosophicus: The Picture Theory of Meaning. What relationship between propositions and reality would make representation possible?Coming soon
101Meaning through useWittgenstein's Philosophical Investigations: Language Games and Private Language. What do ordinary uses of words reveal about philosophical problems?Coming soon
102Doing things by speakingAustin's How to Do Things with Words: Speech Act Theory. What actions can a person perform through an utterance?Coming soon
103What speakers implyGrice's Logic and Conversation: Conversational Implicature. How can a speaker communicate more than the words literally say?Coming soon
104Truth and understanding a speakerDavidson's Inquiries into Truth and Interpretation: Truth-Conditional Semantics. How might a theory of truth help explain linguistic interpretation?Coming soon
105Translation and its indeterminacyQuine's Word and Object: Indeterminacy of Translation. What could observable linguistic behavior leave unsettled about meaning?Coming soon
106Names and necessityKripke's Naming and Necessity: Rigid Designation and Essentialism. How do names work across claims about what might have been?Coming soon
107Understanding within a traditionGadamer's Truth and Method: Philosophical Hermeneutics. How do inherited assumptions participate in interpretation?Coming soon
108Structure and the limits of a centerDerrida's Writing and Difference: Structure, Sign, and Play. What assumptions organize a structure and its interpretation?Coming soon
109Writing and the idea of an original meaningDerrida's Of Grammatology: Deconstruction and Différance. What happens when writing is treated as more than a secondary copy of speech?Coming soon

Part IX

Science and Explanation

6 chapters
110Meaning and verificationAyer's Language, Truth and Logic: Logical Positivism. What would a verification criterion allow us to count as a meaningful claim?Coming soon
111Testing and falsificationPopper's Logic of Scientific Discovery: Falsificationism. What distinguishes exposing a theory to a test from collecting confirmations?Coming soon
112Normal science and conceptual changeKuhn's Structure of Scientific Revolutions: Paradigms and Normal Science. How can a change in a scientific framework alter the problems researchers pursue?Coming soon
113Evaluating a research programmeLakatos's Methodology of Scientific Research Programmes. How should a sequence of related theories be assessed over time?Coming soon
114The limits of a universal scientific methodFeyerabend's Against Method: Epistemological Anarchism. Can one set of methodological rules accommodate how inquiry develops?Coming soon
115Evidence and scientific realismvan Fraassen's The Scientific Image: Constructive Empiricism. What does accepting a scientific theory commit us to believing?Coming soon
Volume 3 · 36 chapters

Part X

Justice and Political Authority

11 chapters
116Justice in a person and a cityPlato's Republic: The Architecture of Justice. How are accounts of a just person and a just political order connected?21 min117Citizenship and a shared lifeAristotle's Politics: The Art of Living Together. What is a political community for, and who gets to participate?20 min118Security and sovereign authorityHobbes' Leviathan: The Monster That Keeps Us Safe. What could justify giving a sovereign the power to enforce peace?19 min119Rights, consent, and resistanceLocke's Two Treatises of Government. What makes political power legitimate, and when may it be resisted?22 min120Freedom under a common lawRousseau's Social Contract: How We Became Slaves. How can political obligation be reconciled with freedom?16 min
121Fair terms of cooperationRawls's A Theory of Justice: The Original Position and Fairness. Which principles would people choose without knowing their place in society?Coming soon
122Entitlement and the limits of the stateNozick's Anarchy, State, and Utopia: Libertarian Justice. What limits do individual rights place on redistribution and state action?Coming soon
123Community and the person who choosesSandel's Liberalism and the Limits of Justice: Communitarian Critique. What might an account of justice miss about belonging and identity?Coming soon
124Difference and structural injusticeYoung's Justice and the Politics of Difference: Five Faces of Oppression. What does injustice involve beyond an unequal distribution of goods?Coming soon
125Comparing actual injusticesSen's The Idea of Justice: Beyond Ideal Theory. How can judgments about better and worse conditions guide reform?Coming soon
126The conditions of a human lifeNussbaum's Capability Approach: Human Development and Justice. Which opportunities should a just society secure for each person?Coming soon

Part XI

Power, History, and Social Criticism

11 chapters
127Class and political conflictMarx's Communist Manifesto: Historical Materialism Accessible. How can class relations organize an account of social change?Coming soon
128Commodities, labor, and accumulationMarx's Capital: Critique of Political Economy. What social relationships can be obscured by ordinary market exchange?Coming soon
129Labor, work, and actionArendt's The Human Condition: Labor, Work, and Action. Why distinguish maintaining life, making a world, and acting with others?Coming soon
130Understanding totalitarian dominationArendt's The Origins of Totalitarianism: Understanding Political Evil. What forms of domination require a different political explanation?Coming soon
131Becoming the otherBeauvoir's The Second Sex: Woman as Other. How can a social order make one group appear secondary or derivative?Coming soon
132Discipline and the organization of conductFoucault's Discipline and Punish: Power and the Panopticon. How can institutions produce particular kinds of subjects through routine practices?Coming soon
133Power, discourse, and sexualityFoucault's History of Sexuality: Biopower and the Construction of Sex. How can speaking about sexuality participate in the exercise of power?Coming soon
134Reason and dominationHorkheimer and Adorno's Dialectic of Enlightenment: Reason and Domination. How can projects of emancipation become implicated in domination?Coming soon
135Communication and social coordinationHabermas's Theory of Communicative Action: Reason and Society. How does reaching an understanding differ from strategically influencing someone?Coming soon
136Desire and social productionDeleuze and Guattari's Anti-Oedipus: Capitalism and Schizophrenia. How might desire be understood through social arrangements rather than a private family drama?Coming soon
137Progress and the claims of the pastBenjamin's Theses on the Philosophy of History. What does a story of historical progress leave out?Coming soon

Part XII

Art, Beauty, and Interpretation

5 chapters
138Beauty and reflective judgmentKant's Critique of Judgment: Aesthetics and Teleology. How can a judgment of beauty claim something beyond a private preference?Coming soon
139Art and its historical formsHegel's Lectures on Aesthetics: Art and the Philosophy of History. How might art's role change within an account of historical development?Coming soon
140Art and reproductionBenjamin's The Work of Art in the Age of Mechanical Reproduction. What changes when an artwork can be reproduced and encountered in new settings?Coming soon
141Autonomy and social criticismAdorno's Aesthetic Theory: Autonomous Art and Critique. How can art belong to a society while resisting some of its demands?14 min
142What makes something a work of artDanto's The Transfiguration of the Commonplace: What Makes Art Art?. How can visually similar objects differ in their status as art?Coming soon
Volume 4 · 27 chapters

More about the book

The twelve parts move from the good life and moral reasoning to freedom, faith, knowledge, and reality. We then turn to mind, language, and science before examining justice, social criticism, and art. You can follow the sequence or begin with a question that interests you.

The collection draws on several philosophical traditions, including ancient Greek, Indian, Chinese, Islamic, and modern European thought. It reflects the texts in this collection rather than attempting a complete history of philosophy. Difficult works have a place alongside more accessible starting points.

This book is in progress. Published chapters are free to read; the full table of contents also shows the chapters still being written. Four reading groups organize the larger project: Living Well, Belief and Reality, Mind, Meaning, and Science, and Society and Art.

Reader verdict

5.0

out of 5

12 five-star reader reviews

Genuine feedback, with names abbreviated for privacy.

Meet the community
“I am enjoying reading your writings. I appreciate the effort you put into it. I want to drop a note of thanks. Thank you!”
Krishnan S.Researcher
“I would like to thank you for your work. Specifically, the chapter: 'LIME Explainability: Complete Guide to Local Interpretable Model-Agnostic Explanations' was extremely helpful for me in understanding LIME and communicating to colleagues. Your work is inspiring and valuable. Thank you for doing it.”
Will G.Data Scientist
“I just came across your website where your books are available for free to read. Thank you so much for making this available to the public. This will help a lot of people.”
Vikas C.AI/ML Engineer
“I found your book Language AI Handbook's explanations of Transformer architectures and production deployment strategies to be exceptionally clear and insightful”
San Z.Researcher
“Your writing feels like a treasure trove of great material. So, thank you for compiling everything on your website!”
Griffin P.Quantitative Researcher
“Really appreciate the way you have explained the concepts. Simple to understand, yet builds up knowledge exponentially, all while reinforcing it with examples repeatedly. I've read the last two chapters `74.Self-attention & 75.Q,K,V` and I've to admit, my concepts have never been clearer. You really are doing an amazing job breaking down maths and complex concepts like a story!”
Muhammad H.AI/ML Engineer
“Thank you Michael. It's top!”
David X.Data Scientist
“I read a few of your blogs on NLP and oh WOW, they really are something, now I exactly know how all of the terms Entropy, Cross-entropy and how it is connected to Perplexity, will definitely read more of your blogs.”
Kanishk K.Reader
“I came across your collection of online handbooks covering quantitative finance, AI, and machine learning. I wanted to reach out and thank you for making such high-quality material openly available. They are incredibly helpful for my CFA Level II review and for brushing up ahead of ML interviews.”
Karim Z.Reader
“Thanks so much for establishing such an amazing community. I appreciate the opportunity to be a learner and a contributor to the community.”
Cyrille L.AI/ML Engineer
“Thanks for putting cool stuff out into the world.”
Charlie B.Applied AI
“I came across one of your books, Language AI Handbook, and man, I'm loving it. I've read many books but have never found such a comprehensive book on large models that covers everything from start to finish with such depth.”
Uon L.Reader
Read all 12 reader reviews
“I would like to thank you for your work. Specifically, the chapter: 'LIME Explainability: Complete Guide to Local Interpretable Model-Agnostic Explanations' was extremely helpful for me in understanding LIME and communicating to colleagues. Your work is inspiring and valuable. Thank you for doing it.”
Will G.Data Scientist
“Really appreciate the way you have explained the concepts. Simple to understand, yet builds up knowledge exponentially, all while reinforcing it with examples repeatedly. I've read the last two chapters `74.Self-attention & 75.Q,K,V` and I've to admit, my concepts have never been clearer. You really are doing an amazing job breaking down maths and complex concepts like a story!”
Muhammad H.AI/ML Engineer
“Thanks so much for establishing such an amazing community. I appreciate the opportunity to be a learner and a contributor to the community.”
Cyrille L.AI/ML Engineer
“I just came across your website where your books are available for free to read. Thank you so much for making this available to the public. This will help a lot of people.”
Vikas C.AI/ML Engineer
“I am enjoying reading your writings. I appreciate the effort you put into it. I want to drop a note of thanks. Thank you!”
Krishnan S.Researcher
“Thank you Michael. It's top!”
David X.Data Scientist
“Thanks for putting cool stuff out into the world.”
Charlie B.Applied AI
“I found your book Language AI Handbook's explanations of Transformer architectures and production deployment strategies to be exceptionally clear and insightful”
San Z.Researcher
“Your writing feels like a treasure trove of great material. So, thank you for compiling everything on your website!”
Griffin P.Quantitative Researcher
“I came across your collection of online handbooks covering quantitative finance, AI, and machine learning. I wanted to reach out and thank you for making such high-quality material openly available. They are incredibly helpful for my CFA Level II review and for brushing up ahead of ML interviews.”
Karim Z.Reader
“I read a few of your blogs on NLP and oh WOW, they really are something, now I exactly know how all of the terms Entropy, Cross-entropy and how it is connected to Perplexity, will definitely read more of your blogs.”
Kanishk K.Reader
“I came across one of your books, Language AI Handbook, and man, I'm loving it. I've read many books but have never found such a comprehensive book on large models that covers everything from start to finish with such depth.”
Uon L.Reader

Author and edition details

About the author and this edition

Michael Brenndoerfer, author of Philosophy

Michael Brenndoerfer

Michael has spent more than a decade working across software engineering, data, AI, and business. He writes to understand difficult ideas more deeply and to share what he learns in a clear, practical way.

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@book{brenndoerfer2026philosophyhandbook, author = {Michael Brenndoerfer}, title = {Philosophy}, year = {2026}, url = {https://mbrenndoerfer.com/books/philosophy-handbook}, publisher = {mbrenndoerfer.com}, note = {Accessed: 2026-10-22} }
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Michael Brenndoerfer (2026). Philosophy. Retrieved from https://mbrenndoerfer.com/books/philosophy-handbook
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Michael Brenndoerfer. "Philosophy." Accessed October 22, 2026. https://mbrenndoerfer.com/books/philosophy-handbook.
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Michael Brenndoerfer (2026) 'Philosophy'. Available at: https://mbrenndoerfer.com/books/philosophy-handbook (Accessed: October 22, 2026).
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Michael Brenndoerfer (2026). Philosophy. https://mbrenndoerfer.com/books/philosophy-handbook