A Beginner's Guide to Reality

A Beginner's Guide to Reality is an introduction to philosophy for people who don't read philosophy. Jim Baggott's sources range from Aristotle to The Matrix. He examines the major developments in Western philosophical thought on the nature of reality, at each of three levels - social, perceptual and physical. (Do money, colour, or photons exist?) The book systematically investigates these levels, peeling away the assumptions we make about those parts of reality that we take for granted.

Jim Baggott worked as an academic and in the oil industry for 11 years before setting up his own independent management consultancy practice. He was awarded the Marlow Medal by the Royal Society of Chemistry in 1989 and a Glaxo Science Writer's prize in 1992. His previous books include Beyond Measure: Modern Physics, Philosophy and the Meaning of Quantum Theory, The Meaning of Quantum Theory: a Guide for Students of Chemistry and Physics and Perfect Symmetry: The Accidental Discovery of Buckminsterfullerene.