C.S. Lewis’s 1943 The Abolition of Man is a set of three essays that encapsulate some of the most important elements of good critical thinking. Lewis considers a weighty topic, moral philosophy – and more precisely how we teach it, and where morality comes from. As critics and enthusiasts for Lewis’s work alike have noted, though, he was not a philosopher as such, but a professor of literature. And rather than presenting novel or original ideas, the essays’ true qualities lie in the ways in which they evaluate and judge the arguments of prior philosophers, and how they construct a coherent, highly persuasive argument for Lewis’s own point of view. Lewis takes issue with textbooks and philosophies that argue for (or imply) that all morals and moral judgments are relative. He deploys evaluative skills to point out the weaknesses in such arguments and then sets out for his readers the kind of moral future such relativism could lead to. This hard-hitting evaluation, in turn, provides a solid base upon which to construct a well-argued counter-proposal, that moral laws can be absolute, and stem from objective, universal values. Persuasive and enthralling, The Abolition of Man showcases reasoning at its best.

Beginning with a clear account of the historical setting for The Abolition of Man and its place within C.S. Lewis' corpus of writing, Contemporary Perspectives on C. S. Lewis' The Abolition of Man: History, Philosophy, Education and Science assesses and appraises Lewis' seminal lectures, providing a thorough analysis of the themes and subjects that are raised. Chapters focus on the major areas of thought including: philosophy, natural law, education, literature, politics, theology, science, biotechnology and the connection between the Ransom Trilogy. Drawing on Lewis' central ideas, they tackle questions such as, is The Abolition of Man hostile to scientific inquiry? Does Lewis provide an adequate rational defense of natural moral law? Do the lectures address the philosophical questions of the 21st century as Lewis sought to provide answers to philosophical questions of the 20th century? Dealing with themes across multiple areas of human inquiry, the authors bring expertise from their respective fields to bear on the core issues raised in Lewis' lectures. The result is an interdisciplinary approach that offers the first comprehensive scholarly treatment of The Abolition of Man, one of the most debated of Lewis' works.

The Abolition of Man is one of C.S. Lewis’s most important and influential works. In three weighty lectures, given at the height of the Second World War, Lewis defends the objectivity of value, pointing to the universal moral law that all great philosophical and religious traditions have recognized. This critical edition, prepared by Michael Ward, helps readers get the most out of Lewis’s classic work with an introduction placing the book in the context of his life and times; a fully annotated version of the text; a commentary on key passages; and a set of questions for group discussion or individual reflection. Scholarly, detailed, yet accessible, it is the must-have version of an essential volume.

C.S. Lewis sets out to persuade his audience of the importance and relevance of universal values such as courage and honor in contemporary society. This critical edition, prepared by Michael Ward, helps readers get the most out of Lewis's work with an introduction placing the book in the context of his life and times; a fully annotated version of the text; a commentary on key passages; and a set of questions for group discussion or individual reflection.

C.S. Lewis's 1943 The Abolition of Man is subtitled 'Reflections on Education With Special Reference to the Teaching of English in the Upper Forms of Schools.' It is a book about the power of education to shape the minds of individuals and improve society (or harm it, if badly done), and it covers everything from the scientific worldview at the time to philosophical arguments about right and wrong. Writing for a general audience, Lewis condemns the contemporary trend for teaching children that values are subjective, stressing instead that, for human society to flourish, people should understand that morality is, in fact, objective, and that a universal moral law exists.

Febvre asked this core question in The Problem of Unbelief: “Could sixteenth-century people hold religious views that were not those of official, Church-sanctioned Christianity, or could they simply not believe at all?” The answer informed a wider debate on modern history, particularly modern French history. Did the religious attitudes of the Enlightenment and the twentieth century—notably secularism and atheism—first take root in the sixteenth century? Could the spirit of scientific and rational inquiry of the twentieth century have begun with the rejection of God and Christianity by men such as Rabelais, writing in his allegorical novel Gargantua and Pantagruel – the work most often cited as a proto-"atheist" text prior to Febvre's study? The debate hinged on some key differences of interpretation. Was Rabelais mocking the structures of the Christian Church (in which case he might be anticlerical)? Was he mocking the Bible scriptures or Church doctrines (in which case he might be anti-Christian)? Or was he mocking the very idea of God’s existence (in which case he might be an atheist)? The other great contribution that Febvre made to the study of history can be found not so much in the fine detail of this work as in the additions that he made to the historian's toolkit. In this sense, Febvre was highly creative; indeed it can be argued that he ranks among the most creative of all historians. He sought to move the study of history itself beyond its traditional focus on documentary records, arguing instead that close analysis of language could open up a gateway into the ways in which people actually thought, and to their subconscious minds. This concept, the focus on "mentalities," is core to the hugely influential approach of the Annales group of historians, and it enabled a switch in the focus of much historical inquiry, away from the study of elites and their deeds and towards new forms of broader social history. Febvre also used techniques and models drawn from anthropology and sociology to create new ways of framing and answering questions, further extending the range of problems that could be addressed by historians. Working together with colleagues such as Marc Bloch, his understanding of what constituted evidence and of the meanings that could be attributed to it, radically redefined what history is – and what it should aspire to be.

Ludwig Von Mises’s 1912 contribution to the theory of monetary policy and the current prevailing consensus in modern economic liberalism, The Theory of Money and Credit, was a milestone achievement. The author’s familiarity with the historical literature on banking and credit allows him to present a coherent theoretical structure that links private exchange between individuals, business and banks to condition the markets affecting money and credit. Through its wider influence on liberal thinkers and politicians, the Theory of Money and Credit has become a classic reference for those seeking to understand the advance of economic liberalism since the 20th century.

Edmund Burke’s 1791 Reflections on the Revolution in France is a strong example of how the thinking skills of analysis and reasoning can support even the most rhetorical of arguments. Often cited as the foundational work of modern conservative political thought, Burke’s Reflections is a sustained argument against the French Revolution. Though Burke is in many ways not interested in rational close analysis of the arguments in favour of the revolution, he points out a crucial flaw in revolutionary thought, upon which he builds his argument. For Burke, that flaw was the sheer threat that revolution poses to life, property and society. Sceptical about the utopian urge to utterly reconstruct society in line with rational principles, Burke argued strongly for conservative progress: a continual slow refinement of government and political theory, which could move forward without completely overturning the old structures of state and society. Old state institutions, he reasoned, might not be perfect, but they work well enough to keep things ticking along. Any change made to improve them, therefore, should be slow, not revolutionary. While `Burke’s arguments are deliberately not reasoned in the ‘rational’ style of those who supported the revolution, they show persuasive reasoning at its very best.

Thomas Robert Malthus’ 1798 Essay on the Principle of Population helped change the direction of economics, politics, and the natural sciences with its reasoning and problem solving. The central topic of the essay was the idea, extremely prevalent in the 18th and 19th centuries, that human society was in some way perfectible. According to many thinkers of the time, mankind was on a course of steady improvement with advances set to continuously improve society and life for all. Malthus was a skeptic on this point, and, in a clear example of the skill of reasoning, set about constructing and marshalling a strong argument for a less optimistic view. Central to his argument were the laws of population growth and their relationship to growth in agricultural production; in his view the former would always outstrip the latter. This provided a strong argument that society was limited by finite resources – a closely reasoned argument that continues to influence economists, politicians and scientists today, as well as environmental movements. While Malthus’ proposed solutions have been less influential, they remain an excellent example of problem solving, offering a range of answers to the problem of population growth and finite resources.

Herrnstein & Murray's The Bell Curve is a deeply controversial text that raises serious issues about the stakes involved in reasoning and interpretation. The authors’ central contention is that intelligence is the primary factor determining social outcomes for individuals – and that it is a better predictor of achievement than income, background or socioeconomic status. One of the major issues raised by the book was its discussion of 'racial differences in intelligence,' and its contention that there is a link between the low observed test scores and social outcomes for African-Americans and their lack of social attainment. While the authors produce and interpret a great deal of data to back up their contentions, they ultimately fail to tackle the problem that neither 'intelligence' nor 'race' have widely accepted definitions in biology, anthropology or sociology. In consequence, the book it has been termed both ‘racist’ and ‘pseudoscientific’ thanks to what its critics see as both its faulty reasoning and its uncautious interpretation of evidence. The debate continues to this day, with academics on both sides engaged in fierce arguments over what can be argued from the data that Herrnstein and Murray used.