The Limits of Reason and Other Papers

THE LIMITS OF REASON AND OTHER PAPERS is a collection of papers contributed to journals and talks given at seminars. They are selected with an eye concerned not with some narrowly specialized or technical topic, but with matters of more general interest. The first two papers deal with the nature of western philosophy in relation to Indian philosophy and a postmodern concept of philosophy. Four papers, though about Plato, are still concerned with subjects of perennial interest - the nature of law and the rule of law, justice, the state, and totalitarianism. A short paper shows that, though there is evil in the world, there is no problem of evil. While 'My Station and Its Duties' expounds the Idealist theory about one's ethics or one's personal morality, 'Beyond Morality' critically examines the concept of Moksa. 'Pictures of Reality' transports the reader to an altogether different world: Wittgenstein on meaning and truth. The papers are strictly philosophical in the analytical tradition, without appealing to non-philosophical considerations or employing any nebulous or fashionable jargon. SHERYAR OOKERJEE has been associated with philosophy since his undergraduate years at Wilson College, Mumbai. He was the Telang Gold Medalist at the M.A. in 1949, joined the staff of Wilson College and retired 36 years later as Head of the Department of Philosophy. Ookerjee's doctoral thesis was on Bradley's Logic. He has published two books: Human Reason and Its Enemies and Plato and the Arthasastra. From 2004 to 2006 he was the National Research Fellow of the Indian Council of Philosophical Research. In 2001 he was invited to lecture on Bradley, Plato and political philosophy at City College of the City University of New York.