Philosophy Books

We ask our philosophy editor Nigel Warburton to recommend five of the most notable new books in his specialist area at the end of every year. In 2024, his nominations for the best philosophy books of 2024 include an introduction to the work of Karl Marx, a study of sentience in animals, and an examination of suicide through the work of the Greek tragedians.

How should we live? What is the nature of reality? Should pro golfers be allowed to use carts? British philosopher Nigel Warburton sets us off down the road of philosophical enquiry with an intriguing list of introductory philosophy books.

Over the past decade our philosophy editor, Nigel Warburton, has been interviewing philosophers asking them to recommend the best philosophy books. After hundreds of interviews, this is our list of the books that have come up again and again. It reveals if not the best philosophy books ever written, at least a collection of very important and influential books.

Do you know your straw man arguments from your weasel words? Nigel Warburton, Five Books philosophy editor and author of Thinking from A to Z, selects some of the best books on critical thinking—and explains how they will help us make better-informed decisions and construct more valid arguments.

The genre of philosophical biography is flourishing, as we pay attention not only to what philosophers said and wrote but also to how they lived and the intellectual context in which they developed their ideas. Nigel Warburton, our philosophy editor, picks out some of the best philosophy books of the year, from the man who lived in a storage jar in 5th century Athens to the latest contributions of cognitive science to our understanding of how we experience the world. Read more philosophy book recommendations on Five Books

The study of philosophy in the Western world is often parochial, and limited to the study of the Anglo-European tradition. It's time to widen our focus, advises the author and philosopher Bryan Van Norden. Here he selects five foundational texts of philosophical traditions worldwide.

Can philosophy change your life? Yes, says bestselling author Eric Weiner, though partly by making it more complicated. Here, he picks five works of life-changing philosophy, from Epictetus to Jacob Needleman, a professor (emeritus) at San Francisco State University.

Even if you've never studied philosophy, it's nice to be able to read a few books and get a sense of what it's all about. Here, we asked our philosophy editor, Nigel Warburton, to talk us through five key works of Western philosophy—many of them in the public domain and available for free as ebooks—and explain why, despite one or two odd conclusions or quirky writing styles, they've played such an important role in expanding our understanding of the world.

The skills of a philosopher and those of a novelist are often in tension, but they have much to learn from each other, says novelist and philosopher Rebecca Newberger Goldstein. She chooses her favourite philosophical novels.

Today, we think of scientists and philosophers as distinct, but it wasn't always this way. Back when the Royal Society was founded in the 1660s, figures like Newton, Descartes and Boyle all thought of themselves as ‘natural philosophers’. Justin E. H. Smith, professor of philosophy at the Université de Paris, introduces us to what he sees as the real history of philosophy.