Wiley Blackwell, 2018 | Order from Amazon
Marvel Comics legends Stan Lee and Steve Ditko first introduced Doctor Stephen Strange to the world in 1963—and his spellbinding adventures have wowed comic book fans ever since. Over fifty years later, the brilliant neurosurgeon-turned-Sorcerer Supreme has finally travelled from the pages of comics to the big screen, introducing a new generation of fans to his mind-bending mysticism and self-sacrificing heroics. In Doctor Strange and Philosophy, Mark D. White takes readers on a tour through some of the most interesting and unusual philosophical questions which surround Stephen Strange and his place in the Marvel Universe.
Essays from two-dozen Philosophers Supreme illuminate how essential philosophical concepts, including existentialism, epistemology, metaphysics, and ethics, relate to the world of Doctor Strange. Fans will find answers to all their Strange questions: How does Doctor Strange reconcile his beliefs in science and magic? What does his astral self say about the relationship between mind and body? Why is he always so alone? And what does he mean when he says we’re just “tiny momentary specks within an indifferent universe”—and why was he wrong?
You won’t need the Eye of Agamotto to comprehend all that is wise within. Doctor Strange and Philosophy offers comic book fans and philosophers alike the chance to dive deeper into the world of one of Marvel’s most mystical superheroes.
NEW! Check out my appearance on the Podcast Supreme discussing Doctor Strange: The Oath, the subject of my chapter in the book:
CONTENTS
Part I “You’re Just Another Tiny, Momentary Speck within an Indifferent Universe”
1 Bargaining with Eternity and Numbering One’s Days: Medicine, Nietzsche, and Doctor Strange
George A. Dunn
2 Death Gives Meaning to Life: Martin Heidegger Meets Stephen Strange
Sander H. Lee
3 “Time Will Tell How Much I Love You”: A Nietzschean Übermensch’s Issues with Love and Friendship
Skye C. Cleary
4 Existentialism, Nihilism, and the Meaning of Life for Doctor Strange
Paul DiGeorgio
Part II “Forget Everything That You Think You Know”
5 “Through an Orb Darkly”: Doctor Strange and the Journey to Knowledge
Armond Boudreaux
6 Forbidden Knowledge and Strange Virtues: It’s Not What You Know, It’s How You Know It
Tuomas W. Manninen
7 Doctor Strange, Socratic Hero?
Chad William Timm
8 Are We All “Looking at the World Through a Keyhole”?: Knowledge, Ignorance, and Bias
Carina Pape
9 Stephen Strange vs. Ayn Rand: A Doesn’t Always Equal A
Edwardo Pérez
Part III “Reality Is One of Many”
10 Astral Bodies and Cartesian Souls: Mind‐Body Dualism in Doctor Strange
Dean A. Kowalski
11 Scientists, Metaphysicians, and Sorcerers Supreme
Sarah K. Donovan and Nicholas Richardson
12 “This Is Time”: Setting Time in Doctor Strange by Henri Bergson’s Clock
Corey Latta
Part IV “A Man Looking at the World Through a Keyhole”
13 A Strange Case of a Paradigm Shift
Brendan Shea
14 Doctor Strange, the Multiverse, and the Measurement Problem
Philipp Berghofer
15 The Strange World of Paradox: Science and Belief in Kamar‐Taj
Matthew William Brake
Part V “It’s Not About You”
16 The Otherworldly Burden of Being the Sorcerer Supreme
Mark D. White
17 The Ancient One and the Problem of Dirty Hands
Michael Lyons
18 They Also Serve Who Only Stand and Wong
Daniel P. Malloy
19 Doctor Strange, Master of the Medical and Martial Arts
Bruce Wright and E. Paul Zehr
Part VI “I’ve Come to Bargain”
20 Is Dormammu Evil?: St. Augustine and the Dark Dimension
Andrew T. Vink
21 Doctor Strange and Leo Tolstoy: Brothers in Nonviolence?
Konstantin Pavliouts
22 Doctor Strange, Moral Responsibility, and the God Question
Christopher P. Klofft