I've tried reading philosophy and I can never seem to finish the book I start. I tried reading an anthology(Blackwell, I think) of philosophers where it had a bunch of different philosophers with brief writings of their works and I just didn't understand it. I then tried reading one of John Locke's essays and I didn't get that, either. Am I starting at the wrong point or am I just not intelligent enough to grasp what's being said?
Philosophy is a difficult subject. I don't think there is any getting around that. It is (mostly) highly abstract, and there is (often) a lot of specialized terminology involved.
Some philosophers are more accessible than others. Plato, I think, is a good starting point. Nietzsche is also quite readable.
As with most scholarly subjects, a problem I always run into is that philosophers are constantly referring to the works of other philosophers. It's almost as if, in order to read philosophy, you need to already know philosophy!
The best place to start, probably, is with an introductory course taught by a really inspiring teacher...
Philosophy is a ridiculously easy subject made complicated by Harvard hypnotized corpses that need to feed their flame and chain their identity to the "fact" they "know" something others don't.
In otherwords, upper class white men like to be read by other upper class white men.
I would recommend reading J. Krishnamurti, especially his book "Beginnings of Learning". He writes, or rather dictates as all of his works were spoken and recorded by others, to be read/heard by the masses, by anyone. He still strikes a core, and frankly after you've read a good deal by him John Locke becomes obsolete.
I would also recommend reading Tarthang Tulku. This is a bit denser but works on a visual basis, it inspires strong imagery and, if you give it time, will wield great results. It'll rock your world.
I'd also recommend reading Christopher S. Hyatt. He's a very intelligent man with a crystal clear vision of how ot get what we wants to get accross to you. A little more biased than the previous two, and therefore slightly jaded, but he's also fabulously aware of his own faults. He will also call you an ape with down syndrome and insult the fact you're insulted by it.
So... philosophy is... retarded. Most of htese people, despite all they've read, fail to apply the therums they so hearlessandfully argue ot their own lives, and therefore are no better or worse off than you, better or worse here relative to the happiness and adaptaility of the individual.
when i first started reading philosophy i'd a dictionary next to me and my nose was in it constantly. its time consuming, but when you dont know a word ya gotta look that sh** up.
keep at it and re-read whole chapters if you don't get it. i find it helpful to replace euphemisms and shiny words with basic ones. for instance: determinism = fate
Start with the greeks. Start with Platon, everything else is a "footnote" to him.
Kant is the most difficult to understand if you ask me. Many people think that. Nietzsche and couple other germans (Hegel, Marx etc) are a bit easier. The french are also easy to grasp and understand. The brits is a bit different. I think Hume is a bit difficult, meanwhile Locke and Bentham is easier.
Last edited by Saladin; 01-10-2009 at 07:54 PM.
Always do that, wild ducks do. They shoot to the bottom as deep as they can get, sir — and bite themselves fast in the tangle and seaweed — and all the devil's own mess that grows down there. And they never come up again. - The Wild Duck, Henrik Ibsen.
Aristotle is damn difficult to understand I would think, especially ethics. The most difficult though, I would wager, has to be Derrida.
It's really hard and you need to ease yourself into it. No point torturing yourself with books you can't understand. Start with easier explanatory texts and eventually (it shouldn't really take that long) you'll feel ready for bigger challenges.
Don't know if they're available where you are, but the 'Introducing...' series of illustrated books, formerly 'For beginners' is a good way to start. The explanations, even of incredibly difficult thinkers such as Derrida and Kant, are incredibly clear and you can read them in an afternoon or less.
Other than that, get a good dictionary of philosophy such as the Oxford Dictionary of Philosophy. The entries on major thinkers are essentially short essays, all completely cross-referenced so it's easy to check absolutely every term you don't understand. I read mine like I do any other book, except for all the jumping around to check terms, but it's invaluable as a reference book too.
Among actual texts, Plato is indeed a fairly good place to start, partly because he sets the terms for so much of what follows, partly because a lot of it's relatively easy. Other books that aren't too difficult include Descartes' Meditations on First Philosophy, Berkeley's Three Dialogues, Schopenhauer's On The Suffering in the World and Nietzsche books such as Twilight of the Idols and The Antichrist.
Other than that, be wary of anyone who wants to be overly prescriptive about telling you which philosophers are 'good' especially if they're suggesting you can ignore everything else. I don't agree with everything I've recommended above. The point is to get enough of an overview to be able to judge for yourself.
I just want to add more to blb post.
Spinoza`s "Ethics" is also good place to start on when it comes to rationalists (rationalism). You should also check out " The Concept of Anxiety" by Kierkegaard (christian existentialism). Of Nietzsches books - "Thus Spoke Zarathustra", is definitely most difficult to understand.
Regarding Plato check out - "Apology", "Menon" and "The Republic".
I haven`t actually read anything of Derrida. But Kant on the other hand., after 3 years and i still only understand few of his ideas and concepts.
Always do that, wild ducks do. They shoot to the bottom as deep as they can get, sir — and bite themselves fast in the tangle and seaweed — and all the devil's own mess that grows down there. And they never come up again. - The Wild Duck, Henrik Ibsen.
Wow, Spinoza's Ethics? Really, Saladin? I've read about half of that and I found it super hard. The best bit for me was the Appendix at the end of the first section, where he suddenly lets fly at all the people who believe things without having any rational basis for it. That's fun and quite easy, but the rest is full of very intricate logic and difficult terminology.
And regarding philosophy, don't disregard the philosophies of non-Western traditions, although many textbooks on philosophy do.
Confucius is also a good place to start.
Kant and Derrida are known as difficult philosophers because they're bad writers! Nietzsche and the like are beautifully crafted writers which makes them easier to comprehend.
I AM THE BOY
THAT CAN ENJOY
INVISIBILITY.
German metaphysicians like Hegel, Kant, and Heidegger tend to be very difficult because they tend to veer so much to the abstract that it is almost impossible to deduce what they are saying. Carnap wrote an easy (I forget the name of which, but it was highly enjoyable) on Heidegger's metaphysics that analyzed the philosopher's various use of the word "being", "spirit", etc. that it appeared Heidegger wasn't really saying anything at all.
Some philosophers are bad writers, but good philosophers. I hear Leibniz is quite boring, along with Spinoza, but both are philosophers of merit. Others are both good writers and philosophers. Plato, as much as he apparently dislikes poets, has a keen dramatic sense to his philosophical writings. Descartes also apparently wrote with quite a wonderful style.
I would attribute Neitzsche's relative ease with the fact that he wasn't an academic philosopher in the sense of Hume, Leibniz, etc. He was primarily concerned with ethics and politics. His greatest work is largely fiction in Thus Spoke Zarathustra. Nonacademic philosophers like Rousseau make appeals that are largely emotional and personal. While this style might be more accessible, and while it's easier to merely say, as Pascal did, that "you cannot prove God's existence, you merely feel it in your heart", really has no place in philosophy.
If you interested in learning more, and coming to a better understanding of philosophy, it helps to get an overview to help you realize that history (at least human history, and the history of ideas) is indeed finite - there are distinct periods and phases that can help you organize thoughts and their relationships in your head. Personally, since I like Bertrand Russell, I read his "History of Western Philosophy". Russell's style is quite accessible, he's often very humorous, and very knowledgable. Criticism laid against his book is that it generalizes certain philosophers or periods, but I would attribute that to the book's slim length (slightly over 800 pages). I recommend it.
Last edited by mayneverhave; 01-10-2009 at 11:49 PM.
This is a sweeping generlization. Philosophical language, although sometimes difficult, is often necessary - similiar to the jargon used in computer technology, or automotive work. In philosophical enquiry, its often necessary to speak exactly, in a scientific, intellectual language. Its purpose isn't to stroke the philosopher's ego, but to come as close as possible to reaching attainable truth in writing.Originally Posted by 0=2
As for philosophers belonging to a certain class of people: this is often not the case. Quite a few philosophers were middle-class, or poor. Some were vagabonds. Think about it this way: the practice of philosophy requires leisure time. The poor, hungry man doesn't think of philosophy, he thinks of food.
As for your last paragraph. You must realize that your criticism of philosophy is a philosophical one - there are no values of better or worse in human behaivor. In order to build that thesis, to come to that conclusion, requires intellectual argument. To put it simply: thought. By simply dismissing philosophy as retarded is intellectually backwards.
Some very good posts here, and I think it is a truism, in the modern era, to get good explanatory texts on the likes of Kant and geniuses like Wittgenstein. I do not understand everything about the great minds, and Heidegger's phenomenology is extremely difficult, from my limited grasp of it, let alone grasping counter-arguments to it, but I have readily admitted, that, though I am a smart girl, I will never encompass the modern theories with full cognizance. I am not going to live that long.
Still, old giants in structuralism (I think Levi-Strauss was primarily structuralist in his approach) made me appreciate the powerful appeal of Kantian universalism, and Foucault makes me appreciate its opposite, and so I decide to master one thing at a time. I want to understand Foucault as fully as I can, and from there we'll see.
I am too issue oriented in my writing, and too concrete as a poet, to master much beyond the basics in certain areas. I think Nietzsche is difficult precisely because he likes to speak in aphorisms and thunder like a prophet. Foucault picks clear examples to make his point, and works outward from those examples.
mayneverhave: you had a good rebuttal; I decided earlier to decline to try.
Well said, mayneverhave, and thank you.
Like jozanny, I thought about taking 0=2 on directly, but decided to let it be. On reflection, I'd add
The twentieth century French philosopher Deleuze argues that, far from philosophers being privileged, we are all philosophers since we all use concepts to understand the world, life etc.; it's just that some of us are not very good at it. In this schema, to take an active decision not to engage with the activity is to take the apparently perverse decision to do something unavoidable badly, like obstructing one's breath or trying to swallow one's food without chewing; certainly, pace mayneverhave, a philosophical decision. Less controversially, one can't really make a statement about it without participating in an inherently philosophical debate about the merits of philosophy.
Of course we don't all have time to philosophise, so those who do could be said, if they want to do it, to be privileged in a way, though, as one learns from philosophy, words like this tend to require qualification: you could argue that anyone with a highschool eduction is privileged; or anyone with a telephone for that matter. But, to sidestep the pedantic wrangle, 0=2, I think we know what you meant and it wasn't those particular scions of privilege you intended to attack. Philosophy is not necessarily or traditionally the preserve of the most privileged. Spinoza worked as a lens grinder throughout his short life (and may have died as a result of the glass dust he breathed in). Kant, believed by many to be the greatest philosopher of the last 300 years, was a saddlemaker's son. Furthermore, philosophical argument has, repeatedly throughout its history, served to undermine established order. You can see it throughout the dialogues of Socrates, who was eventually executed by the Athenian state for his troubles; the history of modern philosophy from Descartes on is, in part, the history of Europe's gradual and painstaking extrication from the overwhelming dominance of Christian belief. Philosophy was also essential to the new forms of egalitarian political system that began to come into play during the eighteenth and nineteenth century, firmly putting an end to monarchy in France and its sovereignty in America. These liberation movements required a rationale, you know and it came from philosophers like Tom Paine, Rousseau and Kant, to name just a few.
Contrary to your assertion, not all philosophers are men. See Hannah Arendt, Julia Kristeva, Helene Cixous, Simone de Beauvoir, Mary Wollstonecraft, Héloïse and, well, all the people listed here.
All white? Frantz Fanon and Edward Said spring to mind from the twentieth century. Princeton academic Cornel West is, today, one of the US's most well-known thinkers. Angela Y Davis, a black woman, is too.
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