Review of 'The Quest For A Moral Compass A Global History Of Ethics' on 'Goodreads'
2 stars
I was swithering between 2 and 3 stars for this - some parts are great and some feel like filler. The ‘Global History’ part is a misnomer; most of the book exclusively focuses on Europe and post-colonial USA with the occasional mention of parts of Asia. The philosophies of the peoples of the Americas, Africa and Oceania are entirely ignored. Malik justifies this at the end by pretty much saying nobody outside of America and Europe has thought much of interest in the last couple of thousand years. This is absurd. I enjoyed ‘How the World Thinks’ by Julian Baggini much more.
There’s a lot of interest around the development of Western philosophy so I still felt like I got something from reading it. I would have preferred less of the ‘born in 1872 to a middle class family in Berlin’ type details and perhaps more of the way moral …
I was swithering between 2 and 3 stars for this - some parts are great and some feel like filler. The ‘Global History’ part is a misnomer; most of the book exclusively focuses on Europe and post-colonial USA with the occasional mention of parts of Asia. The philosophies of the peoples of the Americas, Africa and Oceania are entirely ignored. Malik justifies this at the end by pretty much saying nobody outside of America and Europe has thought much of interest in the last couple of thousand years. This is absurd. I enjoyed ‘How the World Thinks’ by Julian Baggini much more.
There’s a lot of interest around the development of Western philosophy so I still felt like I got something from reading it. I would have preferred less of the ‘born in 1872 to a middle class family in Berlin’ type details and perhaps more of the way moral philosophy has influenced action (no mention of things like the universal declaration of human rights for example, nothing on Nussbaum or Sen), but that’s personal preference. I think I need to go and read a history of human rights thinking instead!
