This textbook does a nice job at collecting selections from major philosophers and more recent articles from philosophy journals.  It has 17 selections from historical sources, and 11 setting out work by contemporary philosophers, and comes in at 272 pages, at a good price compared to other philosophy textbooks.  The pieces in the historical section are well chosen and straightforward, from Plato's Republic, Aristotle's Nichomachean Ethics, from Seneca's On the Happy Life, and so on.  Maybe the most original choice is Hume's essay "The Sceptic."  The other section shows much more originality in its choices, setting up four debates: is happiness the same as pleasure; is happiness a form of satisfaction; is happiness more than satisfaction, and does a happy life have to be a virtuous life?  The articles, by authors such as Richard Kraut and Julia Annas, are technical but should be comprehensible by well prepared undergraduates.  Obviously, it would have been possible to choose different topics and different papers, but this is an interesting selection.  It would be possible to use this text in an introductory philosophy course, but it would need to be with well prepared students.  This might be a better suited to a more advanced class, supplemented with other material to take the course in whatever direction one would like.  One way to do this would be to select works by psychologists on the nature of happiness, to complement the selection of philosophers.  Alternatively, one could add some more general background readings to explain the ideas of the philosophers, to fill out a general introduction to philosophy.  Happiness would be an excellent text to use in a number of courses. 

© 2008 Christian Perring

Christian Perring, Associate Professor of Philosophy, Dowling College, New York.