The Great Ideas: A Lexicon of Western Thought

I have more than 2,000 books in my library, and I cherish none more than this great compendium of Western intellectual thought.The book has 102 chapters, covering every imaginable topic under the sun: such as Justice, War, Peace, Liberty, Freedom, Sin, the World, Intellect, Knowledge, and dozens more. Each chapter is about five pages, two columns each, of dense thought expressed throughout the ages -- from Plato through James, from Homer through Tolstoy, from Copernicus through Einstein -- highlighting the best that ever has been imagined or thought.The author synthesizes the great and important ideas arising over the eras, taking no sides, but expositing the different and divergent ideas these great thinkers committed to writing for posterity's benefit. It's like reading the whole library of the Great Books of Western Civilization in a thematic, rather than, serialized, manner.I've grown accustomed to reading a chapter a day, and then rereading these chapters as ideas pop up in other contexts. In these chapters I find such disparate sages as Jane Austin, Chaucer, Shakespeare, Aquinas, Descartes, Aristotle, Darwin, and everyone else who has something to contribute. This tome is truly encyclopeadic and catholic in scope and reference.If I had the time and the means, I would read these original sources for myself and develop a card catalogue of the massive resources for the mere pleasure of knowledge for its own sake. But as time doesn't permit such a rigorous endeavor, I find Adler's synthesis to be the next best thing.This book will be a great resource for the whole family, especially adults and adolescents just beginning their studies. It will be of great value to those of college-level, where many students are bereft of these great ideas, cast aside for more "politically correct" authors and ideas. This book is a suitable bromide against the myopia of modernity and its tendencies toward nihilism. Above all, it is the best that has ever been thought or said.

"Great Ideas" explains every important idea/concept in history. It is the place to start in your journey to understand the universe and humanity in it. If you only read one book in your life this should be it. If you learn and put this knowledge to use, then you can change the world or add to the collective intelligence of humanity. Adler is the best at explaining these ideas in the global, historical, and eternal context. Do you want to jumpstart your enjoyment and ability to appreciate mathematics? Then you just have to read that chapter in this book for mathematics. Are you curious about what humanity has been thinking when it comes to the idea of space and time? Start here. This book in combination with "The complete idiot's guid to theories of the universe" will enable you to understand reality and your ideal function in it. You have the tools to dream and realize dreams of the most ideal and passionate kind. Check out my other reviews and things to learn more about how to become a great influential hero for humanity.

In 1955 my sister sold me her unread set of Great Books of the Western World and I carried them around all the places I lived until I turned them over to my son about ten years ago. I missed having easy access to Mortimer J. Adler's astonishingly clear essays on the 101 "great ideas" that he had divided all human knowledge into, and that's where this one-volume edition comes in. Sometimes I just want to review a summary of what the great thinkers thought about something and I can thumb to the appropriate essay and wham, there is is an introduction to Love or Space or Democracy and I don't have to keep a shelf of 54 volumes of Great Books, most of which I won't be reading anyhow. So, I highly recommend Adler's "Lexicon of Western Thought," these 101 introductory essays that never cease to amaze me.

I was looking for brief, simple synopses or explanations of the thinking and trends in all of European history. What this book in fact is is a very detailed account of these ideas. An absolute masterpiece for what it IS. For what I believed it to be, nearly useless. Perhaps too 'high brow' for me - though I am in no way stupid or even ignorant, measured either subjectively OR objectively. This type of material is outside of my area of interest, which is why I sought a survey style book on the 'Great Ideas.'

What a treasure trove! I am getting a "classical education" late in life, and this book is part of the cornerstone of that endeavor. Simply wrapping my mind around these great ideas each day has given me an explosion of new interests, things to talk about, issues to pursue. This may prove to be one of the most paradigm-shifting books I have ever read.

Greatest collections of essays ever written on the great ideals of mankind. Concise, extremely erudite, written by Mortimer J., without question a modern Thomist. Highly recommended, and if you read it completely, will be remembered as an accomplishment of a lifetime.

Shipped fast, cover is a little worn, but this is an absolute treasure

Good quality book like new, fast shipping

amazing. great. worth every penny. should be required reading for every citizen of the world.