Derek Parfit (1942–2017) is the most famous philosopher most people have never heard of. Widely regarded as one of the greatest moral thinkers of the past hundred years, Parfit was anything but a public intellectual. Yet his ideas have shaped the way philosophers think about things that affect us all: equality, altruism, what we owe to future generations, and even what it means to be a person. In Parfit, David Edmonds presents the first biography of an intriguing, obsessive, and eccentric genius
Believing that we should be less concerned with ourselves and more with the common good, Parfit dedicated himself to the pursuit of philosophical progress to an extraordinary degree. He always wore gray trousers and a white shirt so as not to lose precious time picking out clothes, he varied his diet as little as possible, and he had only one serious non-philosophical interest: taking photos of Oxford, Venice, and St. Petersburg. In the latter half of his life, he single-mindedly devoted himself to a desperate attempt to rescue secular morality—morality without God—by arguing that it has an objective, rational basis. For Parfit, the stakes could scarcely have been higher. If he couldn’t demonstrate that there are objective facts about right and wrong, he believed his life was futile, and all our lives were meaningless.
Connecting Parfit’s work and life and offering a clear introduction to his profound and challenging ideas, Parfit is a powerful portrait of an extraordinary thinker who continues to have a remarkable influence on the world of ideas.

Derek

Kevin Kelly is a writer, editor, and speaker who has had a diverse career exploring the intersection of technology, culture, and business.
In the early days of the internet, Kelly co-founded Wired magazine in 1993 and served as its Executive Editor until 1999. He helped to shape the magazine's coverage of technology and digital culture, and his writing and editing helped to establish Wired as a leading voice in the field.
After leaving Wired, Kelly continued to write and speak about technology and its impact on society. He has written several books, including "Out of Control: The New Biology of Machines, Social Systems, &amp; the Economic World" and "What Technology Wants," which explore how technology shapes our world and our future.
In recent years, Kelly has been a sought-after speaker and advisor on technology and its impact on society. He has spoken at conferences and events worldwide and advised companies and organizations on navigating the rapidly changing technological landscape. Kelly is also a co-founder of the All Species Foundation, a non-profit organization dedicated to cataloging and identifying every living species on earth. The Long Now Foundation focuses on long-term thinking and responsibility.
Overall, Kelly's career has been dedicated to understanding how technology shapes our world and helping others understand and navigate those changes.

Kevin

Matthew Ball is the CEO of Epyllion, a diversified holding company which makes angel investments, provides advisory services, and produces television, films, and video games.&nbsp;
Ball is also a Venture Partner at Makers Fund, Senior Advisor to KKR, Senior Advisor to McKinsey &amp; Company, and sits on the board of numerous start-ups. His first book, “The Metaverse and How it Will Revolutionize Everything”, was published in July 2022 and became an instant national and international bestseller. Ball is also an “Occasional Contributor” to The Economist, holds bylines at Bloomberg, The New York Times, and the Wall Street Journal, and wrote the August 8, 2022 cover story for Time Magazine.
Epyllion’s start-up portfolio includes Genvid Technologies, The Athletic, Dapper Labs, Polygon, Antenna, Dave’s Hot Chicken, Parrot Analytics, Pushkin Industries, Blaseball, Headspace, Mirror.XYZ, One More Multiverse, LivingCities.XYZ, LightForge Games, Noodle Cat Games, RSTLSS, and many other unannounced companies.
Epyllion is the majority shareholder in Ball Metaverse Research Partners, which provides the Index behind the world’s largest gaming and/or Metaverse-themed ETF, the Roundhill Ball Metaverse ETF, which can be found on the New York Stock Exchange (Ticker: METV), and was also the largest sector ETF launch of 2021. Epyllion is also a co-founding partner in the Ball Multicoin Bitwise Metaverse Index Fund, the world’s largest crypto-focused thematic Metaverse fund.
Epyllion Entertainment produced Rival Peak and The Walking Dead: The Last Mile, and is producing a large TV adaptation of a globally popular video game franchise, as well as games set in various comicbook, video game shooter, and video game horror franchises.
Ball was previously the Head of Strategy for Amazon Studios, and an executive at The Chernin Group’s Otter Media and Accenture. In the 2000s, he was a full-time wildfire fighter in Canada.

Matt

Stewart Brand is an American writer best known as the editor of the Whole Earth Catalog. He founded several organizations, including The WELL, the Global Business Network, and the Long Now Foundation. He is the author of several books, most recently Whole Earth Discipline: An Ecopragmatist Manifesto.
Brand was born in Rockford, Illinois, and attended Phillips Exeter Academy in New Hampshire. He studied biology at Stanford University, graduating in 1960. As a soldier in the U.S. Army, he was a parachutist and taught infantry skills; he later expressed that his military experience had fostered his competence in organizing. A civilian again in 1962, he studied design at San Francisco Art Institute, photography at San Francisco State College, and participated in a legitimate scientific study of then-legal LSD in Menlo Park, California. In 1966, he married mathematician Lois Jennings, an Ottawa Native American.
Brand has lived in California since the 1960s. He and his second wife live on Mirene, a 64-foot (20 m)-long working tugboat. Built-in 1912, the boat is moored in a former shipyard in Sausalito, California. In addition, he works in Mary Heartline, a grounded fishing boat about 100 yards (90 meters) away. One of his favorite items is a table on which Otis Redding is said to have written "(Sittin' On) The Dock of the Bay." (Brand acquired it from an antique dealer in Sausalito.)
By the mid-1960s, Brand became associated with New York multimedia group USCO and Bay Area author Ken Kesey and his "Merry Pranksters." Brand co-produced the Trips Festival, an early effort involving rock music and light shows, in San Francisco with Kesey and Ramón Sender Barayón. This was one of the first venues at which the Grateful Dead performed in San Francisco. About 10,000 hippies attended, and Haight-Ashbury soon emerged as a community. Tom Wolfe describes Brand in his 1968 book, The Electric Kool-Aid Acid Test.
The Whole Earth Catalog implied an ideal of human progress that depended on decentralized, personal, and liberating technological development—so‑called "soft technology." However, in 2005 he criticized aspects of the international environmental ideology he had helped to develop. He wrote an article called "Environmental Heresies" in the May 2005 issue of the MIT Technology Review, in which he describes what he considers necessary changes to environmentalism. He suggested, among other things, that environmentalists embrace nuclear power and genetically modified organisms as technologies with more promise than risk.
Brand later developed these ideas into a book and published the Whole Earth Discipline: An Ecopragmatist Manifesto in 2009. The book examines how urbanization, nuclear power, genetic engineering, geoengineering, and wildlife restoration can be powerful tools in humanity's ongoing fight against global warming. In a 2019 interview, Brand described his perspective as "post-libertarian," indicating that when the Whole Earth Catalog was being written, he did not fully understand the significance of the government's role in developing technology and engineering. In his environmental position, he self-describes as an "Eco-pragmatist."

Stewart

Thomas Nagel is an American philosopher. He is a University Professor of Philosophy and Law Emeritus at New York University, where he taught from 1980 to 2016. His main areas of philosophical interest are legal, political, and ethical. Nagel is known for his critique of material reductionist accounts of the mind, particularly in his essay "What Is It Like to Be a Bat?" (1974), and for his contributions to liberal moral and political theory in The Possibility of Altruism (1970) and subsequent writings.&nbsp;
He continued the critique of reductionism in Mind and Cosmos (2012), arguing against the neo-Darwinian view of the emergence of consciousness. Nagel was born on July 4, 1937, in Belgrade, Yugoslavia (now Serbia), to German Jewish refugees Carolyn (Baer) and Walter Nagel. He arrived in the US in 1939 and was raised in and around New York. He had no religious upbringing but regarded himself as a Jew.
Nagel received a Bachelor of Arts degree in philosophy from Cornell University in 1958, where he was a member of the Telluride House and was introduced to the philosophy of Ludwig Wittgenstein. He then attended the University of Oxford on a Fulbright Scholarship and received a Bachelor of Philosophy degree in 1960; there, he studied with J. L. Austin and Paul Grice. He received his Doctor of Philosophy degree in philosophy from Harvard University in 1963. At Harvard, Nagel studied under John Rawls, whom Nagel later called "the most important political philosopher of the twentieth century."
Nagel taught at the University of California, Berkeley (from 1963 to 1966) and at Princeton University (from 1966 to 1980), where he trained many well-known philosophers, including Susan Wolf, Shelly Kagan, and Samuel Scheffler, the last of whom is now his colleague at New York University.
Nagel is a fellow of the American Academy of Arts and Sciences and a corresponding fellow of the British Academy. In 2006, he was elected to the American Philosophical Society. He has held a fellowship from the Guggenheim Foundation, the National Science Foundation, and the National Endowment for the Humanities. In 2008, he was awarded a Rolf Schock Prize for his work in philosophy, the Balzan prize, and the honorary degree of Doctor of Letters from the University of Oxford.

Thomas

Jocko Willink is an American retired Navy Seal officer, author, podcaster, and public speaker. He is best known for his involvement in the Battle of Ramadi, his success in the Navy SEALs, and his leadership philosophy, which is based on discipline, hard work, and respect for others.
Willink was born in Easton, Pennsylvania, on September 8, 1971. He joined the Navy in 1990 and, after graduating from Basic Underwater Demolition/SEAL (BUD/S) training, was assigned to SEAL Team 3. During his service in the Navy, Willink completed multiple deployments to Iraq and Afghanistan and was eventually assigned to Task Unit Bruiser, the most decorated special operations unit of the Iraq War. During the Battle of Ramadi, Willink and his team helped to clear the city of insurgent forces, and their exemplary performance earned them the Navy Cross.
Willink retired from the Navy in 2010 and soon after began to share his leadership philosophy. He has authored several books, including Extreme Ownership, Leadership Strategy and Tactics, and Way of the Warrior Kid, as well as co-hosting the popular podcast Jocko Podcast.
Willink is also a respected public speaker, giving talks all over the world on topics such as leadership, discipline, and team building. He is a sought-after keynote speaker for both corporate and military events.
Willink is an advocate for physical and mental fitness, often speaking about the importance of proper nutrition and exercise. He also encourages people to push themselves and strive to become the best versions of themselves.
Willink is a highly respected figure in the military and business worlds, and his words have been an inspiration to many. His leadership philosophy is one that emphasizes discipline, hard work, and respect for others, and these values are ones that have served him well throughout his career.

Jocko

Cal Newport is an American computer scientist, author, and assistant professor of computer science at Georgetown University. He is best known for his work in the field of digital minimalism and his bestselling books on the topic, including "Digital Minimalism: Choosing a Focused Life in a Noisy World," and "Deep Work: Rules for Focused Success in a Distracted World."
Newport received his Bachelor's degree in Computer Science from Dartmouth College and his Ph.D. in Computer Science from MIT. His research focuses on the theory of distributed algorithms and networks, and he has published numerous papers in top-tier computer science journals.
In addition to his work in computer science, Newport has also gained attention for his writing on the topic of digital minimalism, which he defines as a "philosophy of technology use in which you focus your online time on a small number of carefully selected and optimized activities that strongly support things you value, and then happily miss out on everything else." He argues that by embracing this philosophy, people can lead more fulfilling and meaningful lives, free from digital devices' constant distractions and interruptions.
In "Deep Work," Newport argues that the ability to focus on a task for long periods of time without distraction is becoming increasingly valuable in a world where technology is constantly vying for our attention. He suggests that by developing the ability to focus deeply on a task, we can achieve great success in our careers and personal lives.
Newport's books have been praised for their practical advice and clear writing style and have been widely reviewed and covered in the media. He is also a popular speaker and has given talks on digital minimalism and deep work at various conferences and events.
Overall, Cal Newport is a respected computer scientist, author, and educator, known for his work in the fields of digital minimalism and deep work and his bestselling books on these topics. He is a leading voice in the conversation around the impact of technology on our lives and how to use it in a more meaningful and fulfilling way.

Michael J. Meade D.H.L. (born January 16, 1944) is an American author, mythologist, storyteller, and was a figure in the Men's Movement of the 1980s. Having distanced himself from the Men's Movement, he continues to publish and teach to a broader audience. His essays have appeared in To Be A Man, Tending the Fire, Wingspan, Walking Swiftly, and The Rag and Bone Shop of the Heart. The latter is an anthology of poetry, which he edited with Robert Bly and James Hillman.&nbsp;
His book Men and the Water of Life: Initiation and the Tempering of Men was published in 1993 by HarperSanFrancisco. He is the author of the books The Water of Life, The World Behind the World, Fate and Destiny, the Two Agreements in Life, and Why the World Doesn't End, Tales of Renewal in Times of Change. He frequently contributes essays to Huffington Post, and Sun Magazine. Meade uses story and mythology as a means of discovery for others to find their inner wisdom and inherent gifts, and he is among those interviewed in the documentary Mythic Journeys, focused on other leading figures as per above Robert Bly and James Hillman, and other leading figures of the Men's Movement.
Michael J. Meade is the founder of the Mosaic Multicultural Foundation, a Seattle-based non-profit dedicated to education and culture. The focus of his current work is to bring healing through story and mythology to disaffected populations from many sectors of modern culture. He frequently works with at-risk youth, homeless populations, returning veterans, prisoners, and youth involved in gang life.&nbsp;
Meade leads day-long workshops and residential retreats aimed at healing and personal growth. He collaborates in this multicultural work with figures such as Luis J. Rodriguez and Jack Kornfield. He is adjunct faculty in depth psychology at Pacifica Graduate Institute, where his honorary degree comes from and often teaches programs on mythology and depth psychology, having earned a B.A. from Saint John's University.

Michael

Francis George Steiner was a Franco-American literary critic, essayist, philosopher, novelist, and educator. He wrote extensively about the relationship between language, literature, and society and the impact of the Holocaust. An article in The Guardian described Steiner as a "polyglot and polymath." Among his admirers, Steiner is ranked "among the great minds in today's literary world." English novelist A. S. Byatt described him as a "late, late, late Renaissance man ... a European metaphysician with an instinct for the driving ideas of our time".
Harriet Harvey-Wood, a former literature director of the British Council, described him as a "magnificent lecturer – prophetic and doom-laden [who would] turn up with half a page of scribbled notes and never refer to them." Steiner was a Professor of English and Comparative Literature at the University of Geneva (1974–94), Professor of Comparative Literature and Fellow at the University of Oxford (1994–95), Professor of Poetry at Harvard University (2001–02), and an Extraordinary Fellow of Churchill College, Cambridge.
George Steiner was born in 1929 in Paris to Viennese Jewish parents Else (née Franzos) and Frederick Georg Steiner. He had an elder sister, Ruth Lilian, who was born in Vienna in 1922. Else Steiner was a Viennese grande dame. Frederick Steiner had been a senior lawyer at Austria's central bank, the Oesterreichische Nationalbank; he was an investment banker in Paris.
Five years before Steiner's birth, his father had moved his family from Austria to France to escape the growing threat of anti-Semitism. He believed Jews were "endangered guests wherever they went" and taught his children languages. Steiner grew up with three mother tongues: German, English, and French; his mother was multilingual and would often "begin a sentence in one language and end it in another."
When he was six years old, his father, who believed in the importance of classical education, taught him to read the Iliad in original Greek. His mother, for whom "self-pity was nauseating," helped Steiner overcome a handicap he had been born with, a withered right arm. Instead of allowing him to become left-handed, she insisted he uses his right hand as an able-bodied person would. Steiner's first formal education took place at the Lycée Janson-de-Sailly in Paris.&nbsp;
In 1940, during World War II, Steiner's father was in New York City on an economic mission for the French government when the Germans were preparing to invade France. He got permission from his family to travel to New York. Steiner, his mother, and his sister Lilian left by ship from Genoa. Within a month of their move, the Nazis occupied Paris, and of the many Jewish children in Steiner's class at school, he was one of only two who survived the war.
Again, his father's insight saved his family, making Steiner feel like a survivor and profoundly influenced his later writings. "My whole life has been about death, remembering, and the Holocaust." Steiner became a "grateful wanderer," saying, "Trees have roots, and I have legs; I owe my life to that." He spent the rest of his school years at the Lycée Français de New York in Manhattan and became a United States citizen in 1944.
After high school, Steiner went to the University of Chicago after high school, where he studied literature, mathematics, and physics and obtained a BA in 1948. This was followed by an MA degree from Harvard University in 1950. He then attended Balliol College, Oxford, on a Rhodes Scholarship.
After his doctoral thesis at Oxford, a draft of The Death of Tragedy (later published by Faber and Faber), was rejected, Steiner took time off from his studies to teach English at Williams College and to work as the lead writer for the London-based weekly publication The Economist between 1952 and 1956. During this time, he met Zara Shakow, a New Yorker of Lithuanian descent. She had also studied at Harvard, and they met in London at the suggestion of their former professors.&nbsp;
"The professors had had a bet ... that we would get married if we ever met." They married in 1955 when he received his DPhil from Oxford University. They have a son, David Steiner (who served as New York State's Commissioner of Education from 2009 to 2011), and a daughter, Deborah Steiner (Professor of Classics at Columbia University). He last lived in Cambridge, England. Zara Steiner died on 13 February 2020, ten days after her husband.

George

Plato was an ancient Greek philosopher born in Athens during the Classical period in Ancient Greece. In Athens, Plato founded the Academy, a philosophical school where he taught philosophical doctrines that would later become known as Platonism. Plato (or Platon) was a pen name derived from his nickname given to him by his wrestling coach – allegedly a reference to his physical broadness.&nbsp;
According to Alexander of Miletus, quoted by Diogenes of Sinope, his actual name was Aristocles, son of Ariston, of the deme Collytus (Collytus being a district of Athens). Plato was an innovator of the written dialogue and dialectic forms in philosophy. He raised problems for what later became all the major areas of both theoretical philosophy and practical philosophy. His most famous contribution is the Theory of forms, where he presents a solution to the problem of universals.&nbsp;
He is also the namesake of Platonic love and the Platonic solids. His own most decisive philosophical influences are usually thought to have been, along with Socrates, the pre-Socratics Pythagoras, Heraclitus, and Parmenides. However, few of his predecessors' works remain extant, and much of what we know about these figures today derives from Plato himself.
Along with his teacher, Socrates, and his student, Aristotle, Plato is a central figure in the history of philosophy. Unlike the work of nearly all of his contemporaries, Plato's entire body of work is believed to have survived intact for over 2,400 years. Although their popularity has fluctuated, Plato's works have consistently been read and studied. Through Neoplatonism, Plato also greatly influenced both Christian and Islamic philosophy.&nbsp;
In modern times, Alfred North Whitehead famously said: "the safest general characterization of the European philosophical tradition is that it consists of a series of footnotes to Plato." Little is known about Plato's early life and education. He belonged to an aristocratic and influential family. The exact time and place of Plato's birth are unknown. According to ancient sources, most modern scholars believe he was born in Athens or Aegina between 428 and 423 BC.
Plato gives little biographical information about himself in his works but often refers to some of his relatives with great precision, including his brothers Adeimantus and Glaucon, who debate with Socrates in the Republic. These and other references enable us to reconstruct Plato's family tree. Plato may have traveled in Italy, Sicily, Egypt, and Cyrene, but at the age of forty, Plato founded a school of philosophy in Athens, the Academy, on a plot of land in the Grove of Hecademus or Academus, named after Academus, an Attic hero in Greek mythology.&nbsp;
The Academy operated until Lucius Cornelius Sulla destroyed it in 84 BC. Many philosophers studied at the Academy, the most prominent one being Aristotle. According to Diogenes Laërtius, throughout his later life, Plato became entangled with the politics of the city of Syracuse, where he attempted to replace the tyrant Dionysius with Dionysius's brother-in-law, Dion of Syracuse, who Plato had recruited as one of his followers, but the tyrant himself turned against Plato.&nbsp;
After Dionysius's death, according to Plato's Seventh Letter, Dion requested Plato return to Syracuse to tutor Dionysius II, who seemed to accept Plato's teachings, but eventually became suspicious of their motives, expelling Dion and holding Plato against his will. Eventually, Plato left Syracuse. And Dion would return to overthrow Dionysius and rule Syracuse before being usurped by Calippus, a fellow disciple of Plato.&nbsp;
A variety of sources have given accounts of Plato's death. One story, based on a mutilated manuscript, suggests Plato died in his bed whilst a young Thracian girl played the flute to him. Another tradition suggests Plato died at a wedding feast. The account is based on Diogenes Laërtius's reference to an account by Hermippus, a third-century Alexandrian. According to Tertullian, Plato simply died in his sleep.

Plato

Nassim Nicholas Taleb is a Lebanese-American essayist, scholar, statistician, and former trader and risk analyst whose work focuses on problems of randomness, probability, and uncertainty. He is the author of several books, including "The Black Swan: The Impact of the Highly Improbable," which was published in 2007 and became a bestseller.
Taleb is a former trader and risk analyst and has worked as a professor of risk engineering at New York University's Tandon School of Engineering. He has a background in mathematics, statistics, and computer science and has published numerous papers in academic journals on topics related to randomness and uncertainty.
Taleb's main area of research is the study of "black swans," which he defines as rare events that have a large impact and are typically not predictable. He argues that traditional risk assessment methods, such as using historical data to predict future events, are inadequate because they fail to consider the possibility of black swan events.
Taleb is also known for his criticism of the concept of "normalcy" in statistics and his skepticism of the use of mathematical models in finance and economics. He has argued that the assumptions made in these models are often unrealistic and can lead to dangerous oversimplifications.
In addition to his work in academia, Taleb is also a public intellectual and has written several books for a general audience. His books have been widely discussed and debated in the media and have been translated into multiple languages.
Taleb is a strong advocate for antifragility, a concept he has developed and popularized in his books. Antifragility is the property of a system or entity that improves when subjected to volatility, shocks, stressors, or disorder and doesn't just remain indifferent to them.
Taleb's writing style is often characterized as provocative and contrarian, and he is known for his strong opinions on a wide range of topics. His work has been influential in the fields of economics, finance, and risk management and has also been discussed in the broader cultural and intellectual conversation.

Nassim Nicholas

Marcus Valerius Martialis, known in English as Martial, was a Latin poet from present-day Spain, best known for his twelve books of Epigrams, published in Rome between 86 and 103 C.E. Martial is considered the father of the modern epigram; his short, witty poems—1,561 in all—provide a brief, vivid, and often extraordinarily humorous portrait of members of the Roman populace.&nbsp;
Martial wrote a number of epigrams for emperors, generals, and heroes, among others, but what perhaps marks him as the most innovative epigrammatist in ancient history is that he also frequently took ordinary people as his subjects. Martial wrote epigrams on slaves and senators alike, and his work surveys and satirizes every level of the Roman social strata.&nbsp;
Martial's epigrams, with their brevity and wit, have often fared better in translation and over the centuries than the dense epics and lyrics of his fellow ancient Romans. He remains one of the most enduringly popular of all Latin poets, and he is credited, to this day, as one of the most influential satirical poets of all time.

Marcus Valerius

Miyamoto Musashi, also known as Shinmen Takezō, Miyamoto Bennosuke, or, by his Buddhist name, Niten Dōraku, was an expert Japanese swordsman and rōnin. Musashi, as he was often simply known, became renowned through stories of his excellent and unique double-bladed swordsmanship and undefeated record in his 60 duels. He was the founder of the Hyōhō Niten Ichi-ryū or Niten-ryū style of swordsmanship and, in his final years, authored The Book of Five Rings (五輪の書 Go Rin No Sho), a book on strategy, tactics, and philosophy that is still studied today.&nbsp;

Miyamoto

Ryan Holiday is an American author, marketer, media strategist, and entrepreneur. He is the author of several bestselling books, including his most recent, Perennial Seller, as well as popular titles such as The Obstacle Is the Way, Ego Is the Enemy, Conspiracy, and Growth Hacker Marketing. Holiday has written for the New York Times, Forbes, the Wall Street Journal, and other publications. He has also been featured in Time, The New Yorker, and The Washington Post.
Holiday is the founder of Brass Check, a creative consulting agency that specializes in marketing, media strategy, and creative consulting. He has worked with some of the world’s most successful authors, entrepreneurs, and public figures, including Tony Robbins, Tim Ferriss, Robert Greene, and Tucker Max. His clients also include media companies such as VICE, MTV, and Complex. He has also served as a consultant to brands such as American Apparel, Google, and Gillette.
As an author, Holiday has written nine books, three of which have become New York Times bestsellers. His books focus on topics such as personal and professional development, marketing, and media strategy. His most recent book, Perennial Seller, is a guide to creating and sustaining success in business, publishing, and life.
As a media strategist and consultant, Holiday has helped launch and reinvigorate several brands and campaigns. His work spans from creating marketing campaigns for startups and Fortune 500 companies to working as a creative consultant for media companies and major brands.
Holiday's work has been featured in major publications, including the New York Times, The Wall Street Journal, Fast Company, and The Washington Post. He has also appeared on television shows such as the Colbert Report, Late Night with Jimmy Fallon, The Today Show, and podcasts such as the Tim Ferriss Show and the Joe Rogan Experience.&nbsp;
In addition to his work as an author, media strategist, and consultant, Holiday is a frequent public speaker. He has been a keynote speaker at events such as SXSW, the World Business Forum, and the Inc. 5000 Conference. He also teaches marketing and media strategy classes at the University of California, Berkeley.
Holiday is passionate about helping others achieve their goals and dreams. He has created several online courses and resources to help entrepreneurs, creatives, and marketers better understand the media landscape, marketing, and creative strategies. He also serves as the Managing Director of the media startup, Contently and is an adviser to several startups and companies. He is also a mentor to many aspiring entrepreneurs and creators.

Ryan

Titus Lucretius Carus was a Roman poet and philosopher. His only known work is the philosophical poem De rerum natura, a didactic work about the tenets and philosophy of Epicureanism, which usually is translated into English as On the Nature of Things—and somewhat less often as On the Nature of the Universe. Lucretius has been credited with originating the concept of the three-age system that was formalized in 1836 by C. J. Thomsen.
Very little is known about Lucretius's life; the only certainty is that he was either a friend or client of Gaius Memmius, to whom the poem was addressed and dedicated. De rerum natura greatly influenced the Augustan poets, particularly Virgil (in his Aeneid and Georgics, and to a lesser extent in the Eclogues) and Horace. The work was almost lost during the Middle Ages but was rediscovered in 1417 in a monastery in Germany by Poggio Bracciolini.&nbsp;
It played an important role both in the development of atomism (Lucretius was an important influence on Pierre Gassendi) and the efforts of various figures of the Enlightenment era to construct a new Christian humanism. Lucretius's scientific poem On the Nature of Things (c. 60 BC) describes the Brownian motion of dust particles in verses 113–140 from Book II. He uses this as proof of the existence of atoms.
Virtually nothing is known about the life of Lucretius, and there is an insufficient basis for a confident assertion of the dates of Lucretius's birth or death in other sources. Another yet briefer note is found in the Chronicon of Donatus's pupil, Jerome. Writing four centuries after Lucretius's death, he enters under the 171st Olympiad: "Titus Lucretius the poet is born." If Jerome is accurate about Lucretius's age when he died, then it may be concluded that he was born in 99 or 98 BC. Less specific estimates place the birth of Lucretius in the 90s BC and his death in the 50s BC in agreement with the poem's many allusions to the tumultuous state of political affairs in Rome and its civil strife.
Lucretius probably was a member of the aristocratic gens Lucretia, and his work shows an intimate knowledge of the luxurious lifestyle in Rome. Lucretius's love of the countryside invites speculation that he inhabited family-owned rural estates, as did many wealthy Roman families. He was certainly expensively educated with a mastery of Latin, Greek, literature, and philosophy.
A brief biographical note is found in Aelius Donatus's Life of Virgil, which seems to be derived from an earlier work by Suetonius. The note reads: "The first years of his life Virgil spent in Cremona until the assumption of his toga virilis on his 17th birthday (when the same two men held the consulate as when he was born), and it so happened that on the very same day, Lucretius the poet passed away." However, although Lucretius lived and died around the time that Virgil and Cicero flourished, this testimony's information is internally inconsistent. If Virgil was born in 70 BC, his 17th birthday would be in 53.&nbsp;
The two consuls of 70 BC, Pompey and Crassus stood together as consuls again in 55, not 53. Another yet briefer note is found in the Chronicon of Donatus's pupil, Jerome. Writing four centuries after Lucretius's death, Jerome contends in the aforementioned Chronicon that Lucretius "was driven mad by a love potion, and when, during the intervals of his insanity, he had written a number of books, which Cicero later amended, he killed himself by his own hand in the 44th year of his life."&nbsp;
The claim that he was driven mad by a love potion, although defended by such scholars as Reale and Catan, is often dismissed as the result of historical confusion or anti-Epicurean bias. In some accounts, the administration of the toxic aphrodisiac is attributed to his wife, Lucilia. Regardless, Jerome's image of Lucretius as a lovesick, mad poet significantly influenced modern scholarship until quite recently. However, it is now accepted that such a report is inaccurate.

Lucretius

Sam Harris is an American neuroscientist, philosopher, and author. He is the founder and CEO of Project Reason, a non-profit organization that promotes science and secularism. Harris is known for his critiques of religious faith and his promotion of scientific rationality and secular humanism. He has written several books, including "The End of Faith," "Letter to a Christian Nation," "The Moral Landscape," "Free Will," and "Waking Up: A Guide to Spirituality Without Religion." Harris is also a frequent speaker and commentator on neuroscience, philosophy, and religion issues.
Sam Harris hosts a podcast called "Making Sense," produced by his non-profit organization, Project Reason. The podcast features Harris having in-depth conversations with various guests, including scientists, scholars, authors, and other public figures. Topics of discussion on the podcast include science, philosophy, politics, and current events. The podcast is released weekly, and episodes can be found on various platforms such as iTunes, Spotify, and YouTube. The podcast has been running since 2013 and has been well-received by listeners for its in-depth and thought-provoking conversations.
Harris has written extensively on neuroscience and its implications for understanding the nature of consciousness, free will, and morality. In addition, he is known for his work on the neural basis of belief and emotion and his critiques of traditional religious and spiritual beliefs.
Project Reason is a non-profit organization that promotes scientific understanding and critical thinking on issues related to religion, morality, and politics. It provides a forum for open and rational discussion of these topics and works to combat the influence of dogmatism and superstition in public life. Some of the activities of Project Reason include public lectures, debates, discussions with experts in various fields, and the production of multimedia content such as podcasts, videos, and articles. Harris' organization also provides educational resources and materials for educators and students.

Ludwig

Ludwig Wittgenstein's Tractatus Logico-Philosophicus (1921) was the only philosophical work published during his lifetime. In short, numbered paragraphs of extreme brilliance, it captured the imagination of a generation of philosophers.&nbsp;
Logic was something Wittgenstein used to conquer reality, which he saw as both elusive and unobtainable. After stating that "what can be said at all can be said clearly," he famously summarized the book in this way: "What we cannot talk about we must pass over in silence."&nbsp;
David Pears and Brian McGuinness received high praise for their meticulous translation from German into English."

Reid Hoffman is a venture capitalist and entrepreneur. He co-founded LinkedIn, a business-oriented social networking service, and was an executive at PayPal, an online payment company. Hoffman is also a partner at Greylock Partners, a venture capital firm. In addition, he is a board member or advisor to several technology companies and is the host of the podcast "Masters of Scale."
Reid Hoffman is also an author; he has written two books, The Startup of You: Adapt to the Future, Invest in Yourself, and Transform Your Career and Blitzscaling: The Lightning-Fast Path to Building Massively Valuable Companies. In "The Startup of You," Hoffman writes about how to create a career and life adaptable to change and position oneself to take advantage of new opportunities.
In "Blitzscaling," Hoffman shares his experiences as an entrepreneur and venture capitalist and provides insights on how to scale a business quickly while maintaining a solid company culture and sustainable growth. Both books have been well-received by critics and praised for giving practical advice for entrepreneurs and career-minded individuals.
Reid Hoffman co-founded LinkedIn in 2002 and served as its Executive Chairman until Microsoft acquired the company in 2016. Under Hoffman's leadership, LinkedIn became one of the most popular social media platforms for professionals, with over 700 million members as of 2021.
He was also instrumental in the company's initial public offering (IPO) in 2011 and its growth and expansion in the following years. He has also been recognized for his role in developing LinkedIn as a pioneer in social networking for professionals and for his contributions to the technology industry as an entrepreneur and venture capitalist.

Reid

Brian Randolph Greene is an American theoretical physicist, mathematician, and string theorist. He has been a professor at Columbia University since 1996 and chairman of the World Science Festival since co-founding it in 2008. Greene has worked on mirror symmetry, relating two different Calabi–Yau manifolds.

Brian

Bertrand Russell

G.E. Moore

Rudolf Carnap

Friedrich Waismann

Frank P. Ramsey

In Tractatus Logico-Philosophicus, Ludwig Wittgenstein suggests that the world is made up of facts, not things. He argues that our understanding of the world comes from the logical relationships between these facts. So, if you're interested in exploring the nature of reality, this book is a must-read.

The World as Facts

Wittgenstein proposes that language is a picture of reality. He believes that words represent objects in the world, and sentences represent facts. This means that the structure of our language reflects the structure of the world. If you're curious about the connection between language and reality, you should definitely check out this book.

Language and Reality

One of the key takeaways from Tractatus Logico-Philosophicus is that there are limits to what can be said meaningfully. Wittgenstein argues that we can only talk about things that can be experienced. Anything beyond that, like metaphysical or ethical questions, are beyond the scope of language. If you're intrigued by the boundaries of language, this book will give you a lot to think about.

Limits of Language

Wittgenstein sees logic as the underlying structure of the world. He believes that the logical structure of facts determines the possibilities of how things can be in the world. If you're interested in the role of logic in understanding the world, you'll find this book fascinating.

Logic and the World

In Tractatus Logico-Philosophicus, Wittgenstein views philosophy not as a theory, but as an activity. He sees the role of philosophy as clarifying our thoughts and eliminating confusion. So, if you're looking for a fresh perspective on philosophy, this book is worth a look.

Philosophy as Clarification

Tractatus Logico-Philosophicus

Ludwig Josef Johann Wittgenstein (Ph.D., Trinity College, Cambridge University, 1929) was an Austrian-British philosopher who worked primarily on logic, the philosophy of mathematics, the philosophy of mind, and the philosophy of language.
Described by Bertrand Russell as "the most perfect example I have ever known of genius as traditionally conceived, passionate, profound, intense, and dominating," he helped inspire two of the twentieth century's principal philosophical movements: the Vienna Circle and Oxford ordinary language philosophy.&nbsp;
According to an end-of-the-century poll, professional philosophers in Canada and the U.S. rank both his Tractatus Logico-Philosophicus and Philosophical Investigations among the top five most important books in twentieth-century philosophy, the latter standing out as "...the one crossover masterpiece in twentieth-century philosophy, appealing across diverse specializations and philosophical orientations".&nbsp;
Wittgenstein's influence has been felt in nearly every field of the humanities and social sciences, yet there are widely diverging interpretations of his thought.

Discover the Best Books Written by Ludwig Wittgenstein

Best author’s book

Tractatus Logico-Philosophicus

Written books

Tractatus Logico-Philosophicus

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