The Passion of the Western Mind
Understanding the Ideas that Have Shaped Our World View

For a book that describes itself as one the encompasses the Ideas that Have Shaped Our World View, there was very little mention of the roles women played. I took a class with the author, and when we brought up the invisibility of women in history, and in his book, he became defensive and told us we......more

This was a very interesting book about cultural philosophy. 95% of the book is a survey from Plato to Postmodernism. In the last 5% of the book, Tarnas uses the entire trajectory of western thought to present his reflections regarding the direction in which culture may be headed. Although my compreh......more

The subject matter is fascinating. I can't say the same thing for Tarnas' writing style, however. Tarnas seems to think his book is a game of Scrabble. But you don't win points with readers when you employ unnecessary extended metaphors every other page, write the same thing over and over in differe......more

Though this book was written in 1991, it still serves as an excellent analysis of the paralysis of the modern world. Richard Tarnas is primarily focused on philosophers and philosophy, but a glance at the present political situation reveals how strong the connection is between the loss of a common p......more

Nine-tenths or so of this book is a very conventional, albeit prolix, survey of the history of philosophical thinking in the West from the pre-Socratics to the present. As a brief introduction to the history of ideas it is to be recommended. Even the wordy repetitiveness of Tarnas' exposition may fu......more