Sexual Desire: A Philosophical InvestigationA&C Black, 5. märts 2006 - 448 pages A dazzling treatise, as erudite and eloquent as Simone de Beauvoir's The Second Sex and considerably more sound in its conclusion - TLS "He is an eloquent and practised writer" - The Independent (UK) When John desires Mary or Mary desires John, what does either of them want? What is meant by innocence, passion, love and arousal, desire, perversion and shame? These are just a few of the questions Roger Scruton addresses in this thought-provoking intellectual adventure. Beginning from purely philosophical premises, and ranging over human life, art and institutions, he surveys the entire field of sexuality; equally dissatisfied with puritanism and permissiveness, he argues for a radical break with recent theories. Upholding traditional morality - though in terms that may shock many of its practitioners - his argument gravitates to that which is candid, serene and consoling in the experience of sexual love. |
From inside the book
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... pleasure ' ? Or should we be engaged in an exercise of ' phenomenology ' , trying to give a specification of ' what it is like ' that will fit the sexual experiences of those who have them ? Or again , should we be attempting to locate ...
... pleasure . For sexual pleasure is not simply the pleasure of ' obtaining what you desire ' - on the contrary , it is precisely a part of what you desire . And it is undeniable that similar physiological effects , and similar sensations ...
... pleasure . And the pleasure has nothing to do with any ' pleasurable sensation ' located in the mouth or on the cheek , hand or brow . Such localised pleasures have little significance beside the act of attention with which the kiss is ...
... pleasure which expresses itself , and the further pleasure which is anticipated , in the kiss of desire ? Non - intentional pleasures ( ' pleasures of sensation ' ) share the defining properties of sensation : they are located in the ...
... pleasure . She feels a pleasurable sensation - a host of pleasurable sensations -- which happen to be caused by ... pleasure , that they are a kind of object of pleasure . Thus , in the normal case of sexual arousal , the physical ...
Contents
1 | |
16 | |
36 | |
4 Desire | 59 |
5 The individual object | 94 |
6 Sexual phenomena | 138 |
7 The science of sex | 180 |
8 Love | 213 |
11 Sexual morality | 322 |
12 The politics of sex | 348 |
Epilogue | 362 |
Appendix 1 The first person | 364 |
Appendix 2 Intentionality | 377 |
Notes | 392 |
Index of Names | 419 |
Index of Subjects | 424 |