Hello,
I'm a senior finishing up a CS degree. I dipped my toes into philosophy a little bit as a freshman, but never delved very deeply into it. I now have a renewed interest in it (I don't really know what I want anymore, I figure philosophy might have the answers), but I'm kind of lost on where to begin. I downloaded "Philosophy: A Very Short Introduction" and found online copies of "On Liberty", "Treatise of Human Nature", "Beyond Good and Evil", and "Existentialism as Humanism".
Are these good books to start my journey? Anything that should be added? Note: I'm not looking to learn the history of philosophy, so I'm not very interested in works like Plato
>>7450694
plato still, honestly. it's more interesting than you might think. plenty of food for thought in those pages.
>>7450694
>I'm not very interested in works like Plato
You should be. There's a reason we still teach the Greeks
>>7450694
You need to get at least a basic understanding of the Greeks and German Idealists. I wish I did when I began my journey into philosophy.
> "Beyond Good and Evil"
You can't just jump into Nietzsche like that. If you do, you will most likely come away from it with the wrong ideas. Also, start with Twilight of the Idols, not BG&E.
>>7450694
Plato's Republic will blow your fucking mind. I implore you to start with it
>>7450845
>starting with the Republic
No. Start with the pre-Socratics, then some Dialogues and the Apology, and then get to the Republic.
read the fucking sticky you cunt
>>7450694
>I want to delve into philosophy
>I don't like Plato
top kek
Do you guys know what "not interested" means?
>>7450816
Thanks. I'll try a bit of both and see which one I find more interesting
>>7450849
>Start with the pre-Socratics
don't be retarded ffs
>>7450707
>>7450845
>>7450860
Plato was a hack who characterized all who opposed his view of reality as blind cave dwellers and believed an ideal society would be ruled by people exactly like him. His political acumen is more impressive than his philosophy.
>>7450694
Ignore all the anons recommending specific works or pushing that "start with the Greeks" meme
However, if you're not interested in the history of philosophy then you're starting with the wrong attitude. That oft quoted "Those who do not learn history are doomed to repeat it." is never more true as within the confines of philosophy. I can't count the number of times somebody has presented what they believe to be a novel and revolutionary concept only to have the prof tell them that Xenophanes beat them by about 2500 years. You don't need to read entire works by the historically significant authors, but a general understanding of their work and their role in Philosophy as a whole is very important. At the very least I'd recommend a skimming of Stanford Encyclopedia articles, if only because Philosophy is an ongoing process and anyone who's looking to learn from it should be familiar with where it's been.
I'd say that once you have a decent understanding of the history from the pre-Socratics onward you should just jump in wherever interests you. At the end of the day you're not going to want to read tens of thousands of pages just so you can eventually understand Wittgenstein, especially not if you're coming into this as a hobby more than a profession.
tl;dr Get a general overview of the history of philosophy and then jump in wherever interests you.
Starting with the Greeks is recommended for an authoritative understanding of the field but then againPlato was a hackand reading shit you don't like just to understand shit you think you might like (don't fool yourself into associating the aesthetic value of philosophy with the actual process of reading philosophy) is pretty pseud tbqh
>>7450869
Thank you. I agree Plato seems to have gotten a lot of stuff wrong, and I'm more reading philosophy to improve myself and my understanding of the world. Not to become a master of philosophy. Any single book you can recommend that covers the pre Socratics? Or should I just go with the Stanford encyclopedia?
>>7450869
>Plato was a hack who characterized all who opposed his view of reality as blind cave dwellers and believed an ideal society would be ruled by people exactly like him.
>i'm fucking retarded and have no idea what i'm talking about
>>7450694
Isn't burning the Klapistan Dollar illegal?
>>7450877
I would say skimming the stanford article on the pre-socratics (http://plato.stanford.edu/entries/presocratics/) should give you a decent starting point, maybe find a timeline of philosophical schools of thought to guide your research. Like I said, don't waste your time delving into philosophers that don't directly interest you, once you find someone that does (Leibniz was that man for me) then your general understanding of the history will come into play and any further necessary connections can be found within a couple of degrees of separation (i.e. If you want to understand Leibniz it's generally a good idea to have a good grasp of Descartes, Spinoza and the Empiricists).
Godspeed anon, you're in for one hell of a ride.Don't forget to enjoy the journey
>>7450888
His epistemology and metaphysics are so disconnected from reality that they're laughable. Any and all merit his philosophy may have had has been expounded upon and improved in every possible way. His political writings are all that continue to be relevant, and only tangentially. If you seriously believe Plato has anything revolutionary to say then I guarantee you're just coming back from your community college intro to Phil class.
Aristotle is better in every way, shape andform
>>7450927
>Godspeed anon, you're in for one hell of a ride. Don't forget to enjoy the journey
I hope so anon, I really do. Everything has seemed so uninteresting for so long. Thank you for your guidance
>>7450907
It's Mathemagical anon
He lights the dollar on fire but, thanks to a chemical bath negatively charged with takyons and trumpohms, instead of it burning it is immediately invested into high interest penny stocks who's return will be used to stimulate the local economy.
Are you even familiar with Americanmagic and dread?
>>7450694
>(I don't really know what I want anymore, I figure philosophy might have the answers)
Fool, philosophy doesn't have the answers. You will only become more confused. The only thing philosophy can show you is how little you know.
>>7450949
This is true
But it's also incredibly pessimistic.
Philosophy is a panacea for the mind and soul. It cannot bring you higher, but it can make you well.
>>7450949
That's fine. I'd rather be confused by interesting ideas than feeling empty
>>7450863
You're welcome. You also might want to check out the Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy. It might come in handy when you encounter passages you don't understand.
>>7450863
Interest and Taste deeply intertwine. Yours indicate a need for revision.
>>7450869
>Plato was a hack.
Surely then they'll read YOU in the year 4400?
>>7451063
Not interested. Feel free to get me interested if you are passionate about something you think I'm gonna miss out on
>>7450869
>>7451078
Probably not, as I said if Plato was good at anything it was as a politician and rhetorician, neither of which I am.
>>7450694
Try "Aquinas" by Ed Feser.
>>7451149
No thanks. I don't care what the Catholics believed 1000 years ago. Especially if it was demons, wizards, astrology, etc. >>>/his/393181
>>7451154
>St Thomas Aquinas, one of the greatest logicians and theologians the world has ever seen
>demons, wizards, astrology etc
He managed to synthesize Christian dogma with Aristotelianism, he wasn't playing dungeons and dragons with his bible study group
Like it or not Christian philosophy is some of the most influential and well though out the world has ever seen and if you're snubbing it because your dad beat you with a bible when you were a kid then you're essentially throwing away literally thousands of years of scholarship.
>>7451178
Again, I don't care what the Catholics believe since I'm not a Catholic. I'm not interested in the nuances of their religion. I'm not interested in Aquinas or his demonology. Sorry this upsets your Catholic feelings.
>>7451191
Not even Catholic
He was a monumental figure of great importance, even if he did write garbage (which he didn't, his logically consistent and sophisticated conception of our relation to the absolute can still be read to today) then you'd at least need to know a general overview of his thought in order to interact with his anti-thetical figures and eventually those who synthesise his school of thought with their own.
Try to bite the bullet and put the fedora away, the man was incredibly intelligent and there's a reason he's taken so seriously in academic circles.
>>7450927
>>7450939
>>7450877
>>7450869
>plato was a hack
>start with the standford encyclopedia, not the greeks
I didn't get on /lit/ today to have my sides explode from laughter
>>7451154
If that's what you think medieval philosophy is about then you really ought to study it. I sat in on a grad seminar on medieval logic at UCLA that had one of the best contemporary philosophers of language sitting in because he found it so relevant to modern issues in philosophy. Frankly the view that "they were all just a bunch of superstitious hacks" is very quickly becoming very passé. Try reading something like "The Principles of Nature" and still tell me he's not a serious philosopher.
Yes, Aquinas believed in demons and angels, but in fact even his philosophy there is very grounded in real philosophy. Here for instance is a different passage about angels:
>The angels have not bodies naturally united to them. For whatever belongs to any nature as an accident is not found universally in that nature; thus, for instance, to have wings, because it is not of the essence of an animal, does not belong to every animal. Now since to understand is not the act of a body, nor of any corporeal energy, as will be shown later (75, 2), it follows that to have a body united to it is not of the nature of an intellectual substance, as such; but it is accidental to some intellectual substance on account of something else. Even so it belongs to the human soul to be united to a body, because it is imperfect and exists potentially in the genus of intellectual substances, not having the fulness of knowledge in its own nature, but acquiring it from sensible things through the bodily senses, as will be explained later on (84, 6; 89, 1). Now whenever we find something imperfect in any genus we must presuppose something perfect in that genus. Therefore in the intellectual nature there are some perfectly intellectual substances, which do not need to acquire knowledge from sensible things. Consequently not all intellectual substances are united to bodies; but some are quite separated from bodies, and these we call angels.
Now there's a lot there that's hard to understand if you aren't familiar with medieval language (which is why I recommended starting with Feser) but hopefully you can at least tell that he's not just chanting incantations or something.
>>7451207
>Not even Catholic
>Only recommendation is Feser's Aquinas
>Immediately calls me a fedora
>keeps pushing it even though I've said multiple times I'm not interested
>calls his demonology and study of wizards "logically consistent and sophisticated"
Whatever man, I'm done discussing it.
>>7451191
You don't seem to get it. Even people who aren't Catholic, or don't believe in God, still find Aquinas interesting and relevant. If you can't be a little open minded about these things then philosophy really isn't for you.
>>7451223
My main problem with him is when he says something like this
>Some have asserted that witchcraft is nothing in the world but an imagining of men who ascribed to spells those natural effects the causes of which are hidden. But this is contrary to the authority of holy men
I simply don't care what the authority of holy men say.
>>7451225
Seems about right for a STEM guy
I'm sorry science has ruined thousands of years of philosophical insight for you.
>>7451235
What he said was factually correct. He didn't say that it being contrary to what holy men said proves that it's false.
Look, you're talking about a work of theology, meaning that some of the things in it are going to be based on premises of faith. He talks about that very issue in the very first question of the Summa. There's still plenty of philosophy he did that isn't based on any faith-based reasoning. If you want something that doesn't talk about revelation read his "Commentary on Aristotle's Metaphysics."
>>7451256
>Look, you're talking about a work of theology, meaning that some of the things in it are going to be based on premises of faith
Hence the core reason I am not interested in Aquinas. I'm not even interested in Aristotle. Did you even read the OP?
>>7450694
Kant, Nietzsche, Stirner, Spinoza, Schopenhauer
Now get out of here
>>7451277
Wow, you sure helped a lot just name dropping a random selection of philosophers and then withdrawing.
>>7451277
Is there any purpose to reading pre-moderns like Kant and Spinoza except to have a better understand of the history of ideas?
>>7450927
his metaphysics is so disconnected from reality is because he lived in fucking ancient greece you autistic pleb
>>7452126
Then how was Aristotle so rooted in reality and how did he not suffer from the same delusions?
>>7452132
>Ancient Greece
>somehow not a part of reality
He was disconnected from reality because he was one bourgeoisie motherfucker
>>7452137
>thinking the past existed
