{"title":"Books by Todd May","description":null,"products":[{"product_id":"9780226840109","title":"A Fragile Life – Accepting Our Vulnerability","description":"Offering a guide on how to positively engage suffering, Todd May ultimately lays out a new way of thinking about how we exist in the world, one that reassures us that our suffering, rather than a failure of physical or psychological resilience, is a powerful and essential part of life itself It is perhaps our noblest cause, and certainly one of our oldest: to end suffering. Think of the Buddha, Chuang Tzu, or Marcus Aurelius: stoically composed figures impervious to the torments of the wider world, living their lives in complete serenity—and teaching us how to do the same. After all, isn’t a life free from suffering the ideal? Isn’t it what so many of us seek? Absolutely not, argues Todd May in this provocative but compassionate book. In a moving examination of life and the trials that beset it, he shows that our fragility, our ability to suffer, is actually one of the most important aspects of our humanity.                May starts with a simple but hard truth: suffering is inevitable. At the most basic level, we suffer physically—a sprained ankle or a bad back. But we also suffer insults and indifference. We suffer from overburdened schedules and unforeseen circumstances, from moral dilemmas and emotional heartaches. Even just thinking about our own mortality—the fact that we only live one life—can lead us to tremendous suffering. No wonder philosophies such as Buddhism, Taosim, Stoicism, and even Epicureanism—all of which counsel us to rise above these plights—have had appeal over the centuries. May highlights the tremendous value of these philosophies and the ways they can guide us toward better lives, but he also exposes a major drawback to their tenets: such invulnerability is too emotionally disengaged from the world, leading us to place too great a distance between ourselves and our experience. Rather than seeking absolute immunity, he argues most of us just want to hurt less and learn how to embrace and accept what suffering we do endure in a meaningful way.","brand":"Gardners","offers":[{"title":"Default Title","offer_id":56227872702837,"sku":"9780226840109","price":18.0,"currency_code":"GBP","in_stock":true}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/0612\/7193\/3106\/files\/9780226840109_6a3605e0-895e-4915-92ee-4b09f3bccf71.jpg?v=1786012493"},{"product_id":"9780226786346","title":"A Decent Life – Morality for the Rest of Us","description":"You’re probably never going to be a saint. Even so, let’s face it: you could be a better person. We all could. But what does that mean for you?   In a world full of suffering and deprivation, it’s easy to despair—and it’s also easy to judge ourselves for not doing more. Even if we gave away everything we own and devoted ourselves to good works, it wouldn’t solve all the world’s problems. It would make them better, though. So is that what we have to do? Is anything less a moral failure? Can we lead a fundamentally decent life without taking such drastic steps?   Todd May has answers. He’s not the sort of philosopher who tells us we have to be model citizens who display perfect ethics in every decision we make. He’s realistic: he understands that living up to ideals is a constant struggle. In A Decent Life, May leads readers through the traditional philosophical bases of a number of arguments about what ethics asks of us, then he develops a more reasonable and achievable way of thinking about them, one that shows us how we can use philosophical insights to participate in the complicated world around us. He explores how we should approach the many relationships in our lives—with friends, family, animals, people in need—through the use of a more forgiving, if no less fundamentally serious, moral compass. With humor, insight, and a lively and accessible style, May opens a discussion about how we can, realistically, lead the good life that we aspire to.      A philosophy of goodness that leaves it all but unattainable is ultimately self-defeating. Instead, Todd May stands at the forefront of a new wave of philosophy that sensibly reframes our morals and redefines what it means to live a decent life.","brand":"Gardners","offers":[{"title":"Default Title","offer_id":56227930603893,"sku":"9780226786346","price":20.0,"currency_code":"GBP","in_stock":true}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/0612\/7193\/3106\/files\/9780226786346_c768f0ba-6a5f-4f97-90af-cfcf6eef2f1a.jpg?v=1786012788"},{"product_id":"9781844651641","title":"Death","description":"\u003cp\u003eThe fact that we will die, and that our death can come at any time, pervades the entirety of our living. There are many ways to think about and deal with death. Among those ways, however, a good number of them are attempts to escape its grip.\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003eIn this book, Todd May seeks to confront death in its power. He considers the possibility that our mortal deaths are the end of us, and asks what this might mean for our living. What lessons can we draw from our mortality? And how might we live as creatures who die, and who know we are going to die?\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003eIn answering these questions, May brings together two divergent perspectives on death. The first holds that death is not an evil, or at least that immortality would be far worse than dying. The second holds that death is indeed an evil, and that there is no escaping that fact. May shows that if we are to live with death, we need to hold these two perspectives together. Their convergence yields both a beauty and a tragedy to our living that are inextricably entwined.Drawing on the thoughts of many philosophers and writers - ancient and modern - as well as his own experience, May puts forward a particular view of how we might think about and, more importantly, live our lives in view of the inescapability of our dying. In the end, he argues, it is precisely the contingency of our lives that must be grasped and which must be folded into the hours or years that remain to each of us, so that we can live each moment as though it were at once a link to an uncertain future and yet perhaps the only link we have left.\u003c\/p\u003e","brand":"Gardners","offers":[{"title":"Default Title","offer_id":56308140638581,"sku":"9781844651641","price":43.99,"currency_code":"GBP","in_stock":true}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/0612\/7193\/3106\/files\/9781844651641_f0917277-076d-4fb0-bae3-5cc0cd0068e3.jpg?v=1786028190"},{"product_id":"9780593798720","title":"Should We Go Extinct?","description":"\u003cb\u003eShould we bring new humans into the world? Or would it be better off without us? A renowned philosopher and advisor to NBC’s \u003ci\u003eThe Good Place\u003c\/i\u003e offers a thoughtful exploration of humanity’s future—or lack thereof.\u003c\/b\u003e\u003cbr\u003e \u003cbr\u003e\u003cb\u003e“For more than five years, Todd May was my philosophical advisor. I heartily recommend that he be yours as well. (It helps that he’s quite funny.)”—Michael Schur, from the Introduction\u003c\/b\u003e\u003cbr\u003e \u003cbr\u003eThese days it’s harder than ever to watch TV, scroll social media, or even just sit at home looking out of the window without contemplating the question at the heart of philosopher Todd May’s \u003ci\u003eShould We Go Extinct? \u003c\/i\u003eFacing climate destruction and the revived specter of nuclear annihilation even as humans continue to cause untold suffering to our fellow creatures on planet Earth, we are forced each day to contemplate whether the world would be better off in our absence.\u003cbr\u003e \u003cbr\u003eIn this timely, fascinating examination, May, a renowned philosopher and advisor to the acclaimed TV show \u003ci\u003eThe Good Place\u003c\/i\u003e, reasons both for and against the continuation of our species, trying to help us understand how and whether, the positive and negative tallies of the human ledger are comparable, and what conclusions we might draw about ourselves and our future from doing so. He discusses the value that only humans can bring to the world and to one another as well as the goods, like art and music, that would be lost were we no longer here. On the other side of the ledger, he walks us through the suffering we cause to nature and the non-human world, seeking to understand whether it’s possible to justify such suffering against our merits and if not, what changes we could make to reduce the harm we cause. \u003cbr\u003e \u003cbr\u003eIn this moment of rising pessimism about the future, and as many people wonder whether they should bring children into such a dark and difficult world, the questions May tackles in \u003ci\u003eShould We Go Extinct?\u003c\/i\u003e are hardly theoretical. As he explores the complexities involved with changes such as an end to factory farming, curbing scientific testing of animals, reducing the human population, and seeking to develop empathy with our fellow creatures, May sketches a powerful framework for establishing our responsibilities as a species and gives hope that we might one day find universal agreement that the answer to his title question should be \u003ci\u003eNo\u003c\/i\u003e.","brand":"Gardners","offers":[{"title":"Default Title","offer_id":56311831626101,"sku":"9780593798720","price":19.99,"currency_code":"GBP","in_stock":true}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/0612\/7193\/3106\/files\/9780593798720_52913faa-c4ae-43eb-a5be-488735382287.jpg?v=1786014869"}],"url":"https:\/\/backstory.london\/collections\/author-todd-may.oembed","provider":"Backstory","version":"1.0","type":"link"}