A critique of Kant's philosophy revealing that the relationship between his Analytic and Dialectic is more complicated than supposed (something we thought utterly impossible). Kerszberg (philosophy, Pennsylvania State U.) dives into the Kantian universe and finds the black holes of the philosophers cosmological principle, transcendental time, the doubled illusion, the reversals of reversal oscillating between givenness and nothingness to, suggests the author, the confusion of his successors Maimon, Fichte, Schelling, and Hegel with whom we sympathize. Annotation copyright by Book News, Inc., Portland, OR

This ambitious book presents a comprehensive new 'macro-monetary' interpretation of Marx’s logical method in Capital, based on substantial textual evidence, which emphasises two main points: (1) Marx’s theory is primarily a macroeconomic theory of the total surplus-value produced in the economy as a whole; and (2) Marx’s theory is a monetary theory from beginning to end and the circuit of money capital – M - C - M’ – is the logical framework of Marx’s theory. It follows from this 'macro-monetary' interpretation that, contrary to the prevailing view, there is no 'transformation problem' in Marx’s theory; i.e., Marx did not 'fail to transform the inputs of constant capital and variable capital' in his theory of prices of production in Part 2 of Volume III.

Presents an original and rigorous of the entire project of Kantian critique, demonstrating the essential role that cosmology plays in Kant and those he influenced. "Most pivotal in this book is Kerszberg's nuanced account of the relationship between the antinomies of pure reason and the foundations of critique itself. On Kerszberg's reading, the relationship between Kant's Analytic and Dialectic is much more complicated than anyone has recognized. On the basis of his discoveries, Kerszberg is able to clarify the stakes involved in Kant's resistance to the sorts of moves by his immediate successors (Maimon, Fichte, Schelling, Hegel) as well as to offer a powerful alternative to the Heideggerian reading of Kant. Along the way he offers compelling evidence against many of the standard readings of Kant's philosophy of science, frequently by situating Kant's texts in the context of early modern debates. Throughout, Kerszberg's scholarship is impeccable. The entire book is brilliant". -- Andrew Cutrofello, Loyola University, Chicago "This book concerns the essential role that the issue of cosmology plays both in Kant's thought and in those (especially in continental thought, Husserl and Heidegger) that Kant has affected. Both Husserl and Heidegger, still the most important thinkers in twentieth-century continental thought, briefly (but unsystematically) explored these topics for which now, thanks to Pierre Kerszberg, we have the details. His point is that Kant's project remains both more complicated and more fertile than either of these thinkers grasped, to the detriment of their own general philosophical positions". -- Stephen H. Watson, University of Notre Dame

Emmanuel Levinas' Totality and Infinity is a monumental work of phenomenological enquiry that goes on to assert the centrality of ethics to philosophical thought. This Reader's Guide provides a detailed explanation of the work, breaking down the occasionally intimidating but always inspirational content of Totality and Infinity for non-specialist readers, unpacking the complexities of Levinas' thought with clarity and rigour. Ideal for students coming to Levinas for the first time, the book offers essential guidance, outlining key themes, approaches to reading the text, the reception, and influence of the work, and recommends secondary reading materials.

By virtue of the originality and depth of its thought, Emmanuel Levinas’s masterpiece, Totality and Infinity: An Essay on Exteriority, is destined to endure as one of the great works of philosophy. It is an essential text for understanding Levinas’s discussion of “the Other,” yet it is known as a “difficult” book. Modeled after Norman Kemp Smith’s commentary on Kant’s Critique of Pure Reason, Levinas’s Existential Analytic guides both new and experienced readers through Levinas’s text. James R. Mensch explicates Levinas’s arguments and shows their historical referents, particularly with regard to Heidegger, Husserl, and Derrida. Students using this book alongside Totality and Infinity will be able to follow its arguments and grasp the subtle phenomenological analyses that fill it.

The master of literary theory takes on the master of the detective novel Raymond Chandler, a dazzling stylist and portrayer of American life, holds a unique place in literary history, straddling both pulp fiction and modernism. With The Big Sleep, published in 1939, he left an indelible imprint on the detective novel. Fredric Jameson offers an interpretation of Chandler’s work that reconstructs both the context in which it was written and the social world or totality it projects. Chandler’s invariable setting, Los Angeles, appears both as a microcosm of the United States and a prefiguration of its future: a megalopolis uniquely distributed by an unpromising nature into a variety of distinct neighborhoods and private worlds. But this essentially urban and spatial work seems also to be drawn towards a vacuum, an absence that is nothing other than death. With Chandler, the thriller genre becomes metaphysical.

The kingdom of heaven, global climate meltdown and international networks of terror, the beloved who completes us, and the virtual cybervillage all have something in common. As products of our imagination, symbolic expressions of totality like these orient individual and collective life. Both panacea and poison, our dreams of totality power religious beliefs, sociopolitical programs such as capitalism and globalism, psychology's narratives of wholeness, even our ideas about individual and cultural health. When dreams of totality go bad, and they often do--becoming totalitarian or fundamentalist--they are more destructive than any plague or natural disaster. Dreams of Totality explores images of wholeness in cultures from ancient civilizations through today. It explains why symbols of totality appear without fail in response to chaos and distress, how they subsequently entomb us, and then eventually deconstruct as disenfranchised elements of psyche and society press for inclusion. Today, unmoored dreams of totality like globalization and the virtual Web community are taking over our collective imagination at the same time we are being exploited by a surfeit of image-industry spin. But as this book explains, we can't go backward into malignant nostalgia for a time when the gods spoke as one, take refuge in fractured fundamentalisms, nor should we succumb to a casual relationship to truth. Rather, preserving the creative function of dreaming of totality while at the same time loosening its often-deadening grip--an Rx for taking the medicine of totality when there's nothing at the center--is crucial as we try to cultivate an ethic of responsibility and integrity toward one another on a global scale.