Concerning Human Understanding

First published in 1958 Concerning Human Understanding treats the chief problems of philosophy. Professor Banerjee’s intention is ‘to separate philosophic thought from effects of sophistication and intellectual pride to which philosophical enquiry is usually prone’. The book pursues a line of thought which calls for the replacement of certain old beliefs that are still dominant in philosophical circles, suggests the need for a fresh enquiry into some of the problems of philosophy and brings into prominence others which have generally escaped the serious attention of philosophers in modern times. It offers a restatement of the problems of knowledge, attempts a solution of the conflict between science and philosophy and handles the baffling problem: ‘is metaphysics possible?’

In particular this book deals with the problem of religion in its bearing upon the future of civilization and finds the solution in an outlook on life opposed to the surrender of man to Institution and Power and founded upon the feeling of obligation regarded as ‘the most human of the forces that deserve to govern the world of human affairs and to shape the destiny of man’. This is a must read for students of philosophy.