[close] Upheavals of Thought is a big book in every sense of the word. It is a 700-page, deep-thinking, and far-ranging argument that emotions should be central to ethical thinking. From infancy on, we must find our way in the world, but, writes Martha C. Nussbaum, "without the intelligence of emotions, we have little hope." Nussbaum is Ernst Freund Distinguished Professor of Law and Ethics at the University of Chicago and an academic of tremendous scope. Here she immerses the reader in moral philosophy, anthropology, child psychology, music, classical thought, religion, and literature with a likable intelligence that makes her one of the most important thinkers alive today. Upheavals of Thought reminds us that the tangle of human emotions is an aid, not an impediment, and that cold objectivity, without the barometer of emotion, deprives us of our moral compass. --Eric de Place [close]