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A review by wwatts1734
The Story of Philosophy: The Lives and Opinions of the Greater Philosophers by Will Durant
3.0
I had high hopes for the "Story of Philosophy". I enjoyed the bits of pieces of Will Durant's multi-volume world history that I have read, so I was excited to see that he had written a history of philosophy. I was even more intrigued when I learned that Durant was actually a philosopher by training. But this history of philosophy did not live up to my expectations.
There were several problems with the "Story of Philosophy". The first problem is that Durant completely bypasses all of history from Aristotle, who lived around 300 BC, until Spinoza who lived around 1600 AD. Not only is that 1900 years of history that were completely ignored, but Durant also skipped over the Stoics, the Neo-Platonists, the early Christian philosophers such as Augustine and Origen, and the Medieval philosophy of the Schoolmen, as well as Maimonides and Avicenna. Perhaps Durant did not see any value in delving into the philosophy of these schools, but in ignoring them he has left a huge hole in his story.
Another problem with the "Story" is that Durant's analysis of modern philosophy, which is about 80% of his focus, deals only with the "Enlightenment" philosophers. These are the philosophers who regard only those things that can be physically verified with the senses, ie they are materialists. Not all philosophers in the West since 1600 were materialists, but in "Story of Philosophy" Durant only mentions the materialists. While he goes into great depth about Herbert Spenser and Bertrand Russell, for example, he completely ignores Pascal and Maritain.
Finally, Durant completely ignores non-Western philosophy. Since Durant is a Westerner I would not expect that he would spend a tremendous amount of time discussing the Muslim and Chinese philosophers, for example, it is not unreasonable to expect that he would at least mention the great Muslim and Chinese philosophers. He does not.
So here you have it. The "Story of Philosophy" is a great overview of Modern, Western and Materialist philosophy. If that sounds good for you then have at it. In my view, this focus is entirely too narrow.
There were several problems with the "Story of Philosophy". The first problem is that Durant completely bypasses all of history from Aristotle, who lived around 300 BC, until Spinoza who lived around 1600 AD. Not only is that 1900 years of history that were completely ignored, but Durant also skipped over the Stoics, the Neo-Platonists, the early Christian philosophers such as Augustine and Origen, and the Medieval philosophy of the Schoolmen, as well as Maimonides and Avicenna. Perhaps Durant did not see any value in delving into the philosophy of these schools, but in ignoring them he has left a huge hole in his story.
Another problem with the "Story" is that Durant's analysis of modern philosophy, which is about 80% of his focus, deals only with the "Enlightenment" philosophers. These are the philosophers who regard only those things that can be physically verified with the senses, ie they are materialists. Not all philosophers in the West since 1600 were materialists, but in "Story of Philosophy" Durant only mentions the materialists. While he goes into great depth about Herbert Spenser and Bertrand Russell, for example, he completely ignores Pascal and Maritain.
Finally, Durant completely ignores non-Western philosophy. Since Durant is a Westerner I would not expect that he would spend a tremendous amount of time discussing the Muslim and Chinese philosophers, for example, it is not unreasonable to expect that he would at least mention the great Muslim and Chinese philosophers. He does not.
So here you have it. The "Story of Philosophy" is a great overview of Modern, Western and Materialist philosophy. If that sounds good for you then have at it. In my view, this focus is entirely too narrow.