History heads north : the intellectual impact of Protestantism The 'Indian' mind : ideas in the new world The mental horizon of Christopher Columbus The arrival of the secular : capitalism, humanism, individualism The spread of learning and the rise of accuracy 'Half-way between God and Man' : the techniques of papal thought-control The great hinge of history : European accelerationĪquinas to Jefferson : the attack on authority, the idea of the secular and the birth of modern individualism The near-death of the book, the birth of Christian artįalsafah and al-Jabr in Baghdad and ToledoĬhina's scholar-elite, Lixue and the culture of the brush Pagans and Christians, Mediterranean and Germanic traditions Law, Latin, literacy and the liberal arts The origins of science, philosophy and the humanitiesĪlexandria, occident and orient in the year 0 Sacrifice, soul, saviour : 'the spiritual breakthrough' Isaiah to Zhu Xi : the romance of the soul The birth of the gods, the evolution of house and home The emergence of language and the conquest of cold Lucy to Gilgamesh : the evolution of imagination Ideas is a seminal work.Introduction : the most important ideas in history - some candidates Aristotle jostles with Aquinas, Ptolemy with Photius, Kalidasa with Zhu Xi, Beethoven with Strindberg, Jefferson with Freud. In the course of this commanding narrative, Watson reveals the linkages down the ages in the ideas of many apparently disparate philosophers, astronomers, religious leaders, biologists, inventors, poets, jurists, and scores of others. He shows how the discovery of the New World changed forever the way that we think, and why Chinese creativity faded after the Middle Ages. He explains how ideas about time evolved, how numbers were conceived, how science, medicine, sociology, economics, and capitalism came into being. He describes the invention of writing, early ideas about law, why sacrifice and the soul have proved so enduring in religion. Watson explores the first languages and the first words, the birth of the gods, the origins of art, the profound intellectual consequences of money.

Then, in a broad sweep, the book moves forward to consider not the battles and treaties of kings and prime ministers, emperors and generals, but the most important ideas we have evolved, by which we live and which separate us from other animals. The narrative begins nearly two million years ago with the invention of hand-axes and explores how some of our most cherished notions might have originated before humans had language.

In this hugely ambitious and stimulating book, Peter Watson describes the history of ideas, from deep antiquity to the present day, leading to a new way of understanding our world and ourselves.

Ideas a history peter watson