Philosophy audiobooks

Precious Human Life

By: Arnaud Maitland

Narrated by: Michael Toms

Length: 57 minutes

Abridged: No

Author and lifelong practitioner of Tibetan Buddhism, Arnaud Maitland, reveals how grief over the loss of his mother deepened his ability to apply the Buddhist teachings in his own life. Read more

Der Prophet

By: Khalil Gibran

Length: 1 hour 10 minutes

Abridged: No

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Philosophy: Who Needs It

By: Ayn Rand

Narrated by: Lloyd James

Length: 10 hours 49 minutes

Abridged: No

Who needs philosophy? Ayn Rand’s answer: Everyone.This collection of essays was the last work planned by Ayn Rand before her death in 1982. In it, she summarizes her view of philosophy and deals with a broad spectrum of topics. According to Ayn Rand, the choice we make is not whether to have a philosophy but which one to have: a rational,... Read more

The Consolations of Philosophy

By: Alain de Botton

Narrated by: Simon Vance

Length: 6 hours 3 minutes

Abridged: No

Alain de Botton has performed a stunning feat: he has transformed arcane philosophy into something accessible and entertaining, useful and kind. Drawing on the work of six of the world’s most brilliant thinkers, de Botton has arranged a panoply of wisdom to guide us through our most common problems.From the frustration of misplacing your keys to... Read more

Status Anxiety

By: Alain de Botton

Narrated by: Simon Vance

Length: 6 hours 24 minutes

Abridged: No

Anyone who's ever lost sleep over an unreturned phone call or the neighbor's Lexus had better read Alain de Botton's irresistibly clear-headed book—immediately. For in its pages, a master explicator of our civilization and its discontents turns his attention to the insatiable quest for status, a quest that has less to do with material comfort... Read more

The Interpretation of Dreams

By: Sigmund Freud

Narrated by: Simon Vance

Length: 17 hours 48 minutes

Abridged: No

Sigmund Freud’s landmark work The Interpretation of Dreams forever changed the way we think about our dreams. It is here that Freud made many of his most important discoveries about the subconscious mind, as he explored why we dream, what we dream, and what our dreams mean. What does it symbolize when we fly in our dreams? When we fall?Freud’s... Read more

Pensées

By: Blaise Pascal

Narrated by: William Sutherland

Length: 12 hours 51 minutes

Abridged: No

Compiled after his death in 1662, Pascal's"pens├®es" (thoughts) are his ideas for a book in defense of faith in a rational world. These fragments give evidence of a profoundly original thinker who had resolved the conflict between his scientific mind and his heart-felt faith.The book begins with an analysis of the difference between mathematical... Read more

Politics

By: Aristotle

Narrated by: Bernard Mayes

Length: 9 hours 48 minutes

Abridged: No

“How can men best live together?” Twenty-three centuries after its compilation, Politics still has much to contribute to this central question of political science. Aristotle’s thorough and carefully argued analysis covers a huge range of political issues in the effort to establish which types of constitution are best, both ideally and in... Read more

The Nicomachean Ethics

By: Aristotle

Narrated by: Wanda McCaddon

Length: 8 hours 44 minutes

Abridged: No

Named for Aristotle's son, Nicomachus, who was the first to edit this work, The Nicomachean Ethics plays a prominent role in defining Aristotelian ethics. In the ten books of this work, Aristotle explains the good life for man: the life of happiness.For Aristotle, happiness exists when the soul is in accordance with virtue. Virtue exists in a... Read more

The Prince

By: Niccolò Machiavelli

Narrated by: John Lescault

Length: 4 hours 31 minutes

Abridged: No

Here is the world's most famous master plan for seizing and holding power. Astonishing in its candor, The Prince is a disturbingly realistic and prophetic work on what it takes to be a prince, a king, a president.When, in 1512, Machiavelli was removed from his post in his beloved Florence, he resolved to set down a treatise on leadership that... Read more

The Art of Being

By: Erich Fromm

Narrated by: Raymond Todd

Length: 4 hours 43 minutes

Abridged: No

This classic work by psychologist and social philosopher Eric Fromm builds upon his previous popular book, To Have or to Be? In The Art of Being, Fromm teaches us to avoid the tantalizing illusions of our consumer-driven world by learning to function as a whole person from a state of inner completeness or being. The transition from an identity... Read more

Consider the Lobster (A Story from Consider the Lobster) - Abridged

By: David Foster Wallace

Narrated by: David Foster Wallace

Length: 3 hours 48 minutes

Abridged: Yes

Do lobsters feel pain? Did Franz Kafka have a funny bone? What is John Updike's deal, anyway? And what happens when adult video starlets meet their fans in person?

David Foster Wallace answers these questions and more in essays that are also enthralling narrative adventures. Whether covering the three-ring circus of John McCain's 2000... Read more

La danse - Abridged

By: Oriah Mountain Dreamer

Narrated by: Sophie Stanké

Length: 1 hour 19 minutes

Abridged: Yes

Vivez au rythme de votre vraie nature. Dans La Danse, l'auteur Oriah Mountain Dreamer développe avec éloquence la sagesse de son best-seller L'Invitation et nous propose des moyens de découvrir l'essence de notre nature spirituelle véritable. La Danse est rempli de récits émouvants qui illustrent comment nous pouvons découvrir les cadeaux qui... Read more

Galileo's Daughter - Abridged

By: Dava Sobel

Narrated by: Fritz Weaver

Length: 5 hours 11 minutes

Abridged: Yes

Galileo Galilei was the foremost scientist of his day. Though he never left Italy, his inventions and discoveries were heralded around the world. His telescopes allowed him to reveal the heavens and enforce the astounding argument that the earth moves around the sun. For this belief, he was brought before the Holy Office of the Inquisition,... Read more

Was ist Aufklärung

By: Immanuel Kant

Narrated by: Uwe Neumann

Length: 24 minutes

Abridged: No

Die "Beantwortung der Frage: Was ist Aufklärung?" ist zu einem Kerntext der deutschen Philosophie geworden. Er ist durch höchste Klarheit der Sprache geprägt, die den Leser und Hörer führen, aber nicht verführen will. Kant nutzt seine zum Zeitpunkt der Veröffentlichung anerkannte Autorität, um das wichtigste Anliegen der Aufklärung darzulegen.... Read more

Original Self

By: Thomas Moore

Narrated by: Thomas Moore

Length: 3 hours 55 minutes

Abridged: No

According to Thomas Moore, people today have lost the deep, direct, and vivid sense of what it means to live with passion and originality.  Moore believes that beneath the many thick layers of indoctrination about who we are and who we should be lies an original self, a person who came into this world full of possibility and destined for a... Read more

Care of the Soul - Abridged

By: Thomas Moore

Narrated by: Peter Thomas

Length: 3 hours 3 minutes

Abridged: Yes

#1 New York Times Bestseller • More than 1.5 Million Copies SoldThomas Moore's now classic work provides a powerful spiritual message for our troubled times.In Care of the Soul readers are presented with a revolutionary approach to thinking about daily life—everyday activities, events, problems and creative opportunities—and a therapeutic... Read more

Aristoteles - Abridged

By: Fritz Mauthner

Narrated by: Michael Kommant

Length: 2 hours 30 minutes

Abridged: Yes

Fritz Mauthner, der große Sprachkritiker zeigt hier, dass das Lebenswerk des berühmtesten Philosophen, der Stolz zweier Jahrtausende, nicht mehr als ein Gesellschaftsspiel war. Er nennt Aristoteles einen Denker ohne schöpferische Kraft und bescheinigt ihm keine philosophische Persönlichkeit gewesen zu sein... Read more

Platon und seine Lebensanschauung - Abridged

By: Rudolf Eucken

Narrated by: Michael Kommant

Length: 1 hour 19 minutes

Abridged: Yes

Plato bildet die Höhe der gesamten griechischen Geistesarbeit, indem in ihm ihre beiden Hauptrichtungen, das Erkenntnisverlangen und der Gestaltungstrieb, das wissenschaftliche und das künstlerische Streben, sich miteinander verbinden und durcheinander steigern. Seine Lebensanschauung hat den eigentümlichen Typus des grie-chischen Idealismus... Read more

Immanuel Kant: Die moralische Welt und das Reich des Schönen - Abridged

By: Rudolf Eucken

Narrated by: Michael Kommant

Length: 1 hour 7 minutes

Abridged: Yes

Es dauerte eine Weile, bis Kants Zeitumgebung erkannte, wie sehr seine Leistung ihrem eigenen Streben entgegen-kam. Aber als sie es erkannte, da fielen ihm weiteste Kreise mit heller Begeisterung zu und folgten den von ihm eröffneten Bahnen. Denn sein Werk schien das sie beseelende Verlangen nach Freiheit erst recht zu begründen und abschließend... Read more

Le bonheur, désespérément - Abridged

By: André Comte-Sponville

Narrated by: André Comte-Sponville

Length: 1 hour 48 minutes

Abridged: Yes

"Qu'est-ce que je serais heureux si j'étais heureux !" Cette formule de Woody Allen dit peut-être l'essentiel : que nous sommes séparés du bonheur par l'espérance même qui le poursuit. La sagesse serait au contraire de vivre pour de bon, au lieu d'espérer vivre. C'est où l'on rencontre les leçons d'Epicure, des stoïciens, de Spinoza, ou, en... Read more

Identität - Abridged

By: Wilhelm Vossenkuhl

Narrated by: Wilhelm Vossenkuhl

Length: 1 hour 2 minutes

Abridged: Yes

Prof. Dr. Wilhelm Vossenkuhl ist Inhaber des Lehrstuhls I für Philosophie an der Ludwig-Maximilians-Universität in München. Er beschäftigt sich in dieser Folge der Reihe "uni-auditorium" mit der Frage "Wer bin ich?" Mit dieser Frage beschäftigten wir uns meistens dann, wenn es uns besonders schwer fällt, darauf zu antworten. Wie können wir... Read more

Sternstunden der Philosophie - Abridged

By: Otto Böhmer

Narrated by: Achim Höppner & Anja Buczkowsky

Length: 4 hours 7 minutes

Abridged: Yes

Bei Pascal war es eine Eingebung wie durch "Feuer", bei Schopenhauer der Anblick von Galeerensklaven, bei Wittgenstein ein Theaterstück, bei Heidegger ein Feldweg. Diese kleine Geschichte der "Erweckungserlebnisse" großer Denker von Platon bis Heidegger ist zugleich eine kurzweilige Einführung in Grundgedanken der abendländischen... Read more

Das neue Weltbild des Physikers Burkhard Heim - Abridged

By: Burkhard Heim

Narrated by: Detlef Kügow

Length: 4 hours 37 minutes

Abridged: Yes

Englische Zeitungen sahen in ihm den "neuen Einstein". "Steht den Deutschen ein neues Weltbild bevor?" fragte der Stern 1957 in einem Artikel über den fast blinden und tauben sowie Handlosen Physiker Burkhard Heim. Es sieht so aus, als könnte die Frage heute mit "ja" beantwortet werden. Heim vollendet Einsteins Ansätze zu einer einheitlichen... Read more