Category: This webpage

We probably need guides to choosing introductory philosophy textbooks of other types too (Maureen Linker suggests).  Some of the central problems facing CT instructors also plague general introductory philosophy courses and courses introducing ethics: the great range and overwhelming number of textbooks.

There is a bit of a difference given the general lack of training of philosophers in CT by contrast to the general training in ethics and the breadth of the discipline usually required of instructors for courses in those subjects.  At some point I hope that the academy (and maybe even philosophy) will produce people better trained to teach critical thinking.  One must dream! (The image at the top of this webpage is “hope” from the Stanford Cathedral.)

Some sort of consumer guide to these textbooks would still be valuable for CT instructors trained in the field, I think, and would be valuable now for ethics and introductory philosophy.  Instructors trained in a field probably don’t need so much to have the virtues of different contents and approaches broken down, but they might benefit from a database listing the different content and practical features of the available textbooks.

That sort of overview what I plan to develop for CT² next summer.  Publishers and authors are welcome to send me copies of texts so that I may include them.  See my contact page.  I will analyze the content of as many philosophy CT books as I can get my hands on.