Peter Catapano

This long (700 pages) book comprises 133 articles that were published in the New York Times as installments in "The Stone," a series of philosophical arguments. The collection does a good job of covering modern philosophy in an accessible manor. However, it is not an easy read, and there are sometimes references to early philosophers with an assumption that the reader is familiar with their arguments and history. I dropped this rating to three stars when the book jumped the shark with three anti-gun screeds that had little to nothing to do with any philosophy, but were just the same old arguments that everyone (on both sides of the issue) has heard a thousand times. There was no philosophical thinking or discussion in these articles, nor any hint of discussion of both sides of the issue. They really put a dent in the quality of writing that had been very good up to that point in the book. (No, I'm not a crusading NRA member, just someone who would like to have seen both sides of the issue discussed.)

(Note: I received this ARC from the publisher through a Goodreads giveaway.)… (mais)

A wonderful always edifying, often moving, collection of articles originally published by the New York Times in its Disability Series. Each piece covers some aspect of being disabled. What does a morning look like for a person with paraplegia? After you have been hospitalized for severe mental illness, how does that change your worklife and the way you are perceived by colleagues? How do you sustain a marriage and parenting when your spouse becomes your caretaker after diagnosis of a progressive degenerative illness? What is it like to have an invisible disability that is easy for people to disregard or scoff at? When you have a genetic disability how does that impact your decision to procreate (and what does it say about your life if tests show that a child will have that disability and parents chose to terminate for that reason?) Why does everyone seem to think people with disabilities are (or should be) inspirational when they are just living their lives? Those issues and many more are covered here. I learned so much from the opportunity to listen to these honest eye-opening articles, and the writing is uniformly excellent. As with any collection some of these pieces work better than others, but it's the New York Times so you can bet on a certain standard of quality. Recommended to all.… (mais)