From business to philosophy

One of the books I ordered yesterday was Peter Goldie's On Personality. I am always interested in books on personality, but what makes this book particularly interesting to me is that Goldie is a philosopher, not a psychologist. Although I have already got the book (I ordered a Kindle version), I probably won’t be reading it until many months later. All I can say about the book now is that it looks very interesting. According to the "Product Description" on amazon.com, Goldie questions our practice of relying on personality to describe, judge, understand, explain, and predict others as well as ourselves. And one reviewer says "the style is delightful, the non-philosophical works called on eclectic and quite fascinating ... the humour engaging ... the sub-headings excellent signposts and the chapters beautifully balanced".

It's not just Goldie's book that is interesting; Goldie himself is interesting too. He turned to philosophy in 1990 after a 25-year career in business (see this), and is currently Samuel Hall Chair and Head of Philosophy at the University of Manchester. So when he began to study philosophy, he was probably over forty years old. From business to philosophy, what a change, and that late! His DPhil thesis, by the way, was supervised by Bernard Williams, one of my most favorite philosophers.