Feline Philosophy: Cats and the Meaning of Life. 2nd Ed.
John Gray
Translated from English by I. Kushnareva. Moscow: Gaidar Institute Press, 2025. – 136 p. – (Logos Magazine Library).
ISBN 978-5-93255-683-2
Montaigne wrote: "When I play with my cat, who knows if she is not more amused by me than I am by her!" We have no evidence that people ever actually "domesticated" cats. Rather, at some point cats realized that people could be useful to them. In this book, John Gray tries to understand the philosophical and moral problems of the very strange connections between people and these remarkable animals. Drawing on centuries of philosophical scholarship – from Montaigne to Schopenhauer – he examines the relationship we have with this most unusual of ‘pets’.
The book is based on a deep appreciation for cats as perhaps the only species that helps us – in our profound loneliness in the world – to understand our own animal nature.
ISBN 978-5-93255-683-2
Montaigne wrote: "When I play with my cat, who knows if she is not more amused by me than I am by her!" We have no evidence that people ever actually "domesticated" cats. Rather, at some point cats realized that people could be useful to them. In this book, John Gray tries to understand the philosophical and moral problems of the very strange connections between people and these remarkable animals. Drawing on centuries of philosophical scholarship – from Montaigne to Schopenhauer – he examines the relationship we have with this most unusual of ‘pets’.
The book is based on a deep appreciation for cats as perhaps the only species that helps us – in our profound loneliness in the world – to understand our own animal nature.