Trouble reading philosophy.

[Infinitefox]

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?

[curlyqlink]

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...

[0=2]

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.

[billyjack]

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

[Saladin]

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.

[JBI]

Aristotle is damn difficult to understand I would think, especially ethics. The most difficult though, I would wager, has to be Derrida.

[blp]

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.

[Saladin]

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.

[blp]

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.

[Silas Thorne]

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. :)

[Jeremiah Jazzz]

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.

[mayneverhave]

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.

[mayneverhave]

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.

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.

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.

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.

[Jozanny]

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.;)

[blp]

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 (http://www.women-philosophers.com/).

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.

[blp]

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.

This is a tempting way of dismissing writing that's beyond our ken. At its logical extreme, the argument depends on a notion of perfect intelligibility, available to all, outside of which writers can be said to be bad. If this had any validity, children who've barely learned to read would be within their rights dismissing Dickens and Tolstoy as bad.

Kant occasionally gives way to unnecessary repetition, but, in the main, he's difficult because his subject matter is. The difficulty lies in a large measure in the subtleties of the distinctions his concepts force him to discuss: the differences between analytic and synthetic judgments for instance. He wants to be understood and is painstaking about explaining his terminology, but, in the end, it's just tough to keep it all in your head.

Derrida, like his equally daunting contemporary Deleuze, writes very beautifully at times. It seems appropriate, given the subjectivity of my view, to quote him discussing aesthetic judgment (discussing Kant, as it happens):


The frame fits badly. The difficulty can be felt from the first paragraph of the book, from the "first moment of the judgment of taste considered from the point of view of quality." "The judgment of taste is aesthetic": in this single case, not foreseen by the analytic of concepts and judgments in the other Critique, the judgment is not a "knowledge-judgment." Hence it does not come under the transcendental logic whose board has been brought in.
The violence of the framing multiplies. It begins by enclosing the theory of the aesthetic in a theory of the beautiful, the latter in a theory of taste and the theory of taste in a theory of judgment. These are decision which could be called external: the delimitation has enormous consequences, but a certain internal coherence can be saved at this cost. The same does not apply for another gesture of framing which, by introducing the bord, does violence to the inside of the system and twists its proper articulations out of shape. This must therefore be the gesture of primary interest to us if we are seeking a rigorously effective grip.

I didn't understand this at all when I first read it ten years ago. I understand it only a little better now that I know something about Kant. With or without understanding, I'd find it hard to designate it 'bad', however.

[Jozanny]

Aristotle is damn difficult to understand I would think, especially ethics. The most difficult though, I would wager, has to be Derrida.

My problem with this, JBI, is if Derrida was about the anxiety of meaning and disruption of textual authority, where does this lead? My online friend Parr, who moderates a philosophy of science and linguistics group, calls metaphysics a 2000 year old failure, and I think what he means by this is we are no better off understanding the nature of being today than we were in Plato's era--but all one can basically conclude from Derrida is that language is a conceit. Even if that conclusion is inescapable, language is the tool that makes us human--probably why his influence has significantly waned in the 20 years since the authorities I read have cited him.

[JBI]

My problem with this, JBI, is if Derrida was about the anxiety of meaning and disruption of textual authority, where does this lead? My online friend Parr, who moderates a philosophy of science and linguistics group, calls metaphysics a 2000 year old failure, and I think what he means by this is we are no better off understanding the nature of being today than we were in Plato's era--but all one can basically conclude from Derrida is that language is a conceit. Even if that conclusion is inescapable, language is the tool that makes us human--probably why his influence has significantly waned in the 20 years since the authorities I read have cited him.

Still though, he continues to be the driving force behind humanist scholarship, particularly literary criticism, and the views on history.

[mayneverhave]

My problem with this, JBI, is if Derrida was about the anxiety of meaning and disruption of textual authority, where does this lead? My online friend Parr, who moderates a philosophy of science and linguistics group, calls metaphysics a 2000 year old failure, and I think what he means by this is we are no better off understanding the nature of being today than we were in Plato's era--but all one can basically conclude from Derrida is that language is a conceit. Even if that conclusion is inescapable, language is the tool that makes us human--probably why his influence has significantly waned in the 20 years since the authorities I read have cited him.

I'd agree with your friend. I'm very wary of metaphysics. Empiricism may have its difficulties - as made evident by Hume - but it seems to me that any system that involves something supersensitive and unknowable by rational scientific thinking is more artistic/creative than philosophical. By this I mean such nonsense as Plato's ideas and Hegel's soul of the world, and whatever.

[Saladin]

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.

It`s of course not one of the easier ones, but to get a insight on rationalism its a good book to start with. And my impression after re-reading that book several times is that i get a great deal of what he is trying to say.

Yeah, the last part is hilarious, but it explains how this man and his ideas were "hated" by others. He were also a victim for ex-communication and labelled as an apostate.

[Saladin]

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. :)

Avicenna, Averroes, Al-Ghazali, Al-Kindi and Ibn Arabi are few muslim/asian philosophers which have influenced many western thinkers. Both Avicenna and Averroes influenced Descartes, Leibniz and Spinoza. Meanwhile Ibn Arabis and the sufi concept of wahdat ul-wujood looks familiar with Spinozas "causa sui" concept.

Unfortunately many western textbooks disregards the eastern thinkers.

[blp]

Yeah, the last part is hilarious, but it explains how this man and his ideas were "hated" by others. He were also a victim for ex-communication and labelled as an apostate.

Yeah, and I sort of love him for it. Among history's rebels, he seems to have been, by all accounts, one of the most modest, principled and good-natured.

[blp]

My problem with this, JBI, is if Derrida was about the anxiety of meaning and disruption of textual authority, where does this lead? My online friend Parr, who moderates a philosophy of science and linguistics group, calls metaphysics a 2000 year old failure, and I think what he means by this is we are no better off understanding the nature of being today than we were in Plato's era--but all one can basically conclude from Derrida is that language is a conceit. Even if that conclusion is inescapable, language is the tool that makes us human--probably why his influence has significantly waned in the 20 years since the authorities I read have cited him.

I'm going to do my best to answer this. Can't promise I'm completely right, but this is how I understand this:

Derrida's relentless undermining of meaning can indeed make one feel pretty hopeless. It's hard not to separate him and the poststructuralists in general from the rise of the free market and the purported triumph of capitalism because he seems to represent the moment where radical intellectualism finally disappeared up its own rhetorical fundament, theorising itself out of any possibility of being, in a Sartrean sense, engaged and opposed to the dominant order.

Still, the question of where this 'leads' may point a way out of the impasse. If Derrida has a political intent, it might very well be to remove, like a tumour, the notion that it's possible for metaphysics to lead anywhere. Where had it led us before? From Hegel's dialectics, via Marx, to the Stalinist gulags. Christopher Hitchens claims that there is an implicit religiosity in extreme forms of political ideology such as Stalinism and he's right in the sense that Stalinism justified everything it did, right up to the murder of millions, according to a metaphysical logic that was supposed to guarantee a glorious final outcome.

So, by the middle of the twentieth century, as the fallacy of this became tragically apparent, leftish thinkers found themselves in crisis - and first structuralism, then poststructuralism, were a response to this, rejecting the teleological false certainty that promised an accurate prediction of the future (if we just follow this creed, everything will ultimately turn out for the best) as insupportable. 'Events, dear boy', as, I think, British Prime Minister Harold MacMillan said.

So the radical left, bereft of its millenarian programme, sort of atrophies and then all that seems to remain is the 'normal state of affairs': capitalism. The Soviet Union even packs up and goes capitalist itself, with a major nudge from the IMF. All of this seems to flow into the spaces vacated by the radical left like an undammed stream, as if the true way of the world can finally find its own level. But, aha, one of the spaces that stream comes to occupy is the metaphysical notion of teleological certainty: Francis Fukuyama appears with his own, anti-Marxist version of dialectical materialism to claim that capitalism and democracy, not communism, are the true end of history, the total system that, if followed religiously, will finally deliver the best possible outcome for the greatest possible number. Free market thinkers even started to invoke crypto-religious ideas: Adam Smith's Invisible Hand, supposed to ensure (eventually... have faith!) the fairest possible division of resources without state intervention. Once again, events, dear boy, seem to have intervened to make a mockery of this - and cast in doubt notions of the normal state of affairs. Brecht: 'We must never mistake what is common for what is natural.'

Where does that leave us? Possibly wiser but sadder, but possibly, if we can finally give up our messianic certainties, freer to act as we need to to suit each situation.

[Silas Thorne]

Avicenna, Averroes, Al-Ghazali, Al-Kindi and Ibn Arabi are few muslim/asian philosophers which have influenced many western thinkers. Both Avicenna and Averroes influenced Descartes, Leibniz and Spinoza. Meanwhile Ibn Arabis and the sufi concept of wahdat ul-wujood looks familiar with Spinozas "causa sui" concept.

Unfortunately many western textbooks disregards the eastern thinkers.

Completely agree with you. I have often seen books on the history of philosophy which do not include non-European perspectives. Why don't we know about these great Muslim philosophers through their own philosophical perspectives and have to view them through what others have taken from their ideas?
If a person studies history, they can study any kind of history so long as they can get the information and there are experts around them in this area. But from what I've seen in university departments, if you study philosophy, you often limit yourself to a Euro-centric discipline which stems from the Greek tradition.
Unfortunately I can't discourse on Leibnitz, Spinoza, Kant or others, but I know a little about the ancient Chinese tradtions of philosophy (and rhetoric).

[Etienne]

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.

A philistine recommending new age gurus...


The main problem with people approaching philosophy is that it is set within a tradition. This tradition has created a terminology that is specialized, some words used in philosophy do not refer to the same thing as "ordinary speech". Also many philosophical problems have deep philosophical roots, and so concepts have been created which cannot necessarily be grasped in a certain text if one do not have an explanation. Philosophers have not written for the general public (in general) but for philosophers. So one could not expect to take any philosopher, and with just text in hand and with barely or no previous philosophical knowledge in hand, understand.


Kant and Derrida are known as difficult philosophers because they're bad writers!

Sigh... Kant, is actually a very clear writer, in my opinion, and it has more to do with the richness of the subject he writes about and the difficulty of the subject than writing skill.

I mean people expect to take Kant and read him like a novel, do you also take mathematics manuals and expect to read them like novels and them blame the author for his bad writing because you did not understand?


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.

The title of the essay is "The Elimination of Metaphysics through the Logical Analysis of Language" (I don't like the term Elimination of the English translation, better, and more in line with the original title would be overcoming, which is very different). Keep in mind however, that it is not a definitive opinion on the matter that Carnap had, it is an analysis by a philosopher in the middle of a circle (and a movement - positivism) that was, in it's root empiricist, and greatly influenced by Wittgenstein Tractatus (which Wittgenstein himself later found flawed). It is part of the great dialogue of philosophy (and a great essay I might add), but one should never take anything as definitive, especially in such matters as metaphysics.

[jon1jt]

I recommend Sri Aurobindo's The Life Divine. That book'll knock your socks off.

[weltanschauung]

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?

well dude, you definetly should start at level 1 and then go up the scale as preparation is obtained. it definetly is a good idea to start with greek philosophy, because its really simply worded. then you go middle ages, modern age and for sure you can then start some hegel kierkegaard sartre and foucault. try that and see if it works :P

[Abs]

Perhaps you should take a look at what I've recently got for my bathroom reading, Introducing Philosophy (http://www.amazon.com/Introducing-Philosophy-2nd-Introducing-Totem/dp/1840460539).
There are others in the Introducing field that focus on particular philosophers but I thought I'd take a look at this first. :)

[Etienne]

well dude, you definetly should start at level 1 and then go up the scale as preparation is obtained. it definetly is a good idea to start with greek philosophy, because its really simply worded. then you go middle ages, modern age and for sure you can then start some hegel kierkegaard sartre and foucault. try that and see if it works :P

Greek philosophy simple-worded? Gasp... have you ever read Aristotle?

Actually you should go through companion books a lot and read in a certain order. Books with only extracts from some philosophers is a good suggestion as well. Aristotle, if you are interested in philosophy as a whole, is fundamental. However don't expect to take Aristotle's Metaphysics and understand it by yourself. I've had university courses on Aristotle, and not only was it very hard to understand even with the help of a very good teacher, but I would need many more courses too. But what matters the most is being acquainted with a certain terminology and concepts, to have a better understanding of philosophy in general.

[dramasnot6]

I find that doing research on the philosopher and his historical context before reading them is very beneficial. Preparatory reading has always helped my understanding of philosophical essays. And of course, all good reading is re-reading. I find that putting down a text for a few hours or a day and coming back to it after some mental digestion can also be very helpful.
Do not feel intimidated by new words and unfamiliar terms,either. If you do some research beforehand and look things up regularly you will find it to be easier than you think.

[TheFifthElement]

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?

Infinitefox, you might want to start with Bertrand Russell's History of Western Philosophy http://www.amazon.co.uk/History-Western-Philosophy-Routledge-Classics/dp/0415325056/ref=sr_1_2?ie=UTF8&s=books&qid=1231766880&sr=8-2

Russell was a philosopher in his own right, but this particular book gives an overview of the development of Western philosophy from the Ancient Greeks up to Russell's predecessors (Kant, Nietzsche, Schopenhauer). It's really clearly written; Russell focuses on the key ideas of each philisopher and also explores their philisophy looking at the pros and cons, in his opinion. From there you can pick which philosophers you're more interested in and read some more of their work.

I found that, in the absence of a teacher, the key to developing a philosophical understanding was not to rush into it and expect too much. As has been mentioned, philosophy has it's own language and is constructed, to a point, with ideas built on ideas. If it takes someone 3-4 years to do a philosophy degree then you need to pace yourself with that sort of timescale in mind. Spend a few months on a philosopher and only when you feel comfortable move on. A teacher helps, certainly, as they are able to guide you on how to think about the message but you can do this yourself if you just take your time and let your mind absorb, and then question, what you've read.

Good luck with your reading.

[Lust Hogg]

I do not think that you are necessarily intellectually disadvantaged because you find philosophy, difficult, boring, and sometimes disengaging. I studied philosophy for four years and the various emotions listed above were perennially present in that period. Philosophy is most certainly challenging, but it is certainly an admirable and valuable pursuit. Take your time with it. Recommendations... well stay away from contemporary analytic philosophy such as Strawson, Davidson, some older stuff such as Frege and Wittgenstein. Not because of any lack of valuable content, but for sheer difficulty in light of your lack of experience with philosophy. As mentioned by others, the Greeks are accessible and quite particularly important considering they were instrumental in forming most theoretical positions which have in the last couple thousand years been expounded and repudiated by just about everyone. A few Essays, rather than lengthy treatises to consider.... Hume "of Liberty and Necessity" (free will and determinism) Thomas Nagel "What it Feels Like to be a Bat"( philosophy of Mind) George Berkley "Three Dialogues From Hylas and Philonous" ... just to name a few, Good luck

[zado_k]

Infinitefox, you might want to start with Bertrand Russell's History of Western Philosophy http://www.amazon.co.uk/History-Western-Philosophy-Routledge-Classics/dp/0415325056/ref=sr_1_2?ie=UTF8&s=books&qid=1231766880&sr=8-2

Heartily seconded!

There are two connected subjects involved here - philosophy and the history of philosophy. Some people think they should be conflated others that they are distinct. Russel believes they are distinct but nonetheless his history is a good way into some common philosophical ideas. He's a very good, very clear writer. Be aware however this his views on the history of philosophy and his interpretation of earlier philosophers are not always the most mainstream!

As to which philosophers are difficult and which not, I can only say that I have found that those that seem simple often get difficult the more you reflect on what they say and that those who seem difficult to begin with often turn out to be expressing perennial and simple ideas. What you will succeed with depends a lot on your prior interests and knowledge. I very much enjoyed John Passmore's One Hundred Years of Philosophy but I'm a maths geek and the formality of the some of the questions and arguments didn't phase me. On the other hand, I found Peter Singer's Practical Ethics which was strongly recommended to me, infuriatingly difficult and frustrating. A chacun son gout!

Peace and loving kindness

[0=2]

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.

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.

Obviously, fighting fire with fire feeds the flame, and destruction is the PRIMARY name of the game. Toxick magician...

Anyway, for the most part the terms coined in WESTERN PHILOSOPHY bear much semblance really simple explanations of why things are the way they are that have existed since before science. You are right however, my bone to pick is not with all "philosophy", but with western philosophy in particular.

It's boring, secular, and always fails to include itself in it's thesis'. This leads to a large group of children who assume their assumptions hold more weight than anything else. The fact of the matter is... things are. Your perception matters little to anyone but you, and why should it?

So when you have a group of white men questioning the ways of hte universe and then publishing rebuttals of others explanations on the grounds of some "universal logic" it quickly accumulates into what we have right now...

An aristocratic elite composed of BORED DOGS.

Now my with my comment on class I was refering more ot social strata. Whether or not one is BORN impoverish matters little to his work, it's whether or not he writes to be read by those impoverished. Please, tell me the enlightenment was for the people, and please, tell me Utopia was written to be read by those it would "benefit". It's really quite a joke.

And while I'm on the topic of enlightenment, it appears many of you are stuck in that archaic age of drought. No, the enlightnment was not a push "forward" but rather a desperate attempt created by the mainstreaming of alchemical beliefs into "science" to get Europe up to date with the rest of the world, particularily the Middle East and the Far East, both of whom are primarily responsible for this so called "enlightenment".

It's a joke folks, get beyond out and over.

[Lust Hogg]

Mr math guy, the real joke is your explicit disdain for an area of thought which quite evidently has incurred irreparable damage upon your serenity. You give a fractured, incomplete,repudiation of philosophy without ever critiquing anything which is in itself philosophical. Fear and aggression are emotions which are suggestive of fear. Maybe i am wrong, but your rather aggressive language towards philosophy seems to confirm what is already explicitly revealed in your some-what odd methods of argumentation, simply, you just don't understand it. Most sensible individuals do not rely upon emotionally charged, unsubstantiated claims to confirm some point or validate their claims. They do so dispassionately, with a logically succinct structure. They certainly do not make vague historical generalizations about thinkers they know nothing about. If you think philosophy is a joke, prove it to me. Maybe it is, just demonstrate why.

[0=2]

Once again this depends on the area of philosophy.

It does not trouble my serenity, merely allows another vehicle for which me to achieve serenity by. However my quarrels with the assumptions of mainstreamed philosophy are a suggestion of betterment, or progress, and a rather grandiose estimate of ones own worth in the world, effects included. This creates, unfortunately, a dogmatic approach to questioning the world that takes the subjective questioner out of the... question. We don't bother attempting to digest the idea that the conception that allows for the understanding of the world may indded be the very conception that creates the world, and therefore absolutism is inherently... nonabsolute.

Therefore the mental structures that originally questioned and probed the fractalian moments we inhabit now serve to sever our understanding of it. it has made hypocrisy and mockey of itself.

Once again, this is a generalization, but Spinoza, Voltaire, Hobbes, Hume, Locke, Socrates and yes, all you rationalist nihilist's favorite, dear Nietzche all suffer from this obsessant fascination with absolutism and the clingy secularism implied with it. How do we begin to forget we are a product of infinite randomness and, according to our own theories on relativitity, therefore no larger smaller bigger greater older younger than any other notion of "being" we permit?

In short, again, it is a

JOKE!

and if it weren't you people wouldn't be such funny guys.

[Etienne]

0=2, you are obviously missing the real point of philosophy, and are judging it from your own personal viewpoint, therefore including yourself in your own criticism. And what is your point with secularism? Is this it? Are you simply a frustrated theist? Besides could you name me philosophers you have actually read? Have you ever seriously studied philosophy without this boorish preconception in mind? Do you realize that many of these thoughts are very old (who would take the pineal gland theory seriously anymore?) but their interest lies on two level which are reasonings behind the substance of the thought and also knowledge of the history of thought. Who cares if people don't use chariots anymore, does this mean that chariots are just a degenerated invention made by bored dogs?

The thing I've learnt the most, I believe, from ancient or simply older philosophers, is to realize how many preconceptions we take for granted as axioms, but which, in the end, might not be so obvious and things might be in fact much more complex. Studying the history of thought is the best way to deconstruct current thought and be able to have a better critical eye on it.

End of rant.

[blp]

yes, all you rationalist nihilist's favorite, dear Nietzche


Nietzsche a nihilist?



But for me - though I never liked Friedrich Nietzsche - if there is a definition that really fits, it is Nietzsche's old opposition between active and passive nihilism. Active nihilism, in the sense of wanting nothing itself, is this active self-destruction which would be precisely the passion of the real - the idea that, in order to live fully and authentically, you must engage in self-destruction. On the other hand, there is passive nihilism, what Nietzsche called 'The last man' - just living a stupid, self-satisfied life without great passions. http://www.spiked-online.com/Articles/00000002D2C4.htm

Note that neither type of nihilism is being promoted. Nietzsche considered nihilism a sort of sin of resentfulness.

I'm also having trouble making sense of your characterisation of western philosophy as follows:


secular, and always fails to include itself in it's thesis'.

Most western philosophers up to about the nineteenth century believed in God and defended their belief philosophically. Kant's philosophy, beginning from the point of wondering how philosophical knowledge could be possible to us at all, would seem to 'include itself in its thesis'. Some significant recent philosophy also echoes your critique of enlightenment values and very definitely includes philosophy in its theses, doing a lot to undermine its traditional premises.

[coberst]

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?

I am a retired engineer with an MA in philosophy that I acquired along the way. I once asked a professor of philosophy "what is philosophy about". He said that philosophy "is a radically critical self-consciousness".

It was thirty years later before I began to understand what he was saying.

I consider CT (Critical Thinking) to be philosophy lite. I think that the best way to approach philosophy is to first study CT.


CT is an acronym for Critical Thinking. Everybody considers themselves to be a critical thinker. That is why we need to differentiate among different levels of critical thinking.

Most people fall in the category that I call Reagan thinkers—trust but verify. Then there are those who have taken the basic college course taught by the philosophy dept that I call Logic 101. This is a credit course that teaches the basic principles of reasoning. Of course, a person need not take the college course and can learn the matter on their own effort, but I suspect few do that.

The third level I call CT (Critical Thinking). CT includes the knowledge of Logic 101 and also the knowledge that focuses upon the intellectual character and attitude of critical thinking. It includes knowledge regarding the ego and social centric forces that impede rational thinking.

Most decisions we have to make are judgment calls. A judgment call is made when we must make a decision when there is no “true” or “false” answers. When we make a judgment call our decision is bad, good, or better.

Many factors are involved: there are the available facts, assumptions, skills, knowledge, and especially personal experience and attitude. I think that the two most important elements in the mix are personal experience and attitude.

When we study math we learn how to use various algorithms to facilitate our skill in dealing with quantities. If we never studied math we could deal with quantity on a primary level but our quantifying ability would be minimal. Likewise with making judgments; if we study the art and science of good judgment we can make better decisions and if we never study the art and science of judgment our decision ability will remain minimal.

I am convinced that a fundamental problem we have in this country (USA) is that our citizens have never learned the art and science of good judgment. Before the recent introduction of CT into our schools and colleges our young people have been taught primarily what to think and not how to think. All of us graduated with insufficient comprehension of the knowledge, skills, and attitude necessary for the formulation of good judgment. The result of this inability to make good judgment is evident and is dangerous.

I am primarily interested in the judgment that adults exercise in regard to public issues. Of course, any improvement in judgment generally will affect both personal and community matters.

To put the matter into a nut shell:
1. Normal men and women can significantly improve their ability to make judgments.
2. CT is the domain of knowledge that delineates the knowledge, skills, and intellectual character demanded for good judgment.
3. CT has been introduced into our schools and colleges slowly in the last two or three decades.
4. Few of today’s adults were ever taught CT.
5. I suspect that at least another two generations will pass before our society reaps significant rewards resulting from teaching CT to our children.
6. Can our democracy survive that long?
7. I think that every effort must be made to convince today’s adults that they need to study and learn CT on their own. I am not suggesting that adults find a teacher but I am suggesting that adults become self-actualizing learners.
8. I am convinced that learning the art and science of Critical Thinking is an important step toward becoming a better citizen in today’s democratic society.


Perhaps you are not familiar with CT. I first encountered the concept about five years ago. The following are a few Internet sites that will familiarize you with the matter.

http://www.freeinquiry.com/critical-notes.html

http://64.233.161.104/search?q=cache:mkodBBrpMg0J:www.criticalthinking.o rg/TGS_files/SAM-CT_competencies_2005.pdf+critical+thinking+multi-logical&hl=en&gl=us&ct=clnk&cd=11

http://www.chss.montclair.edu/inquiry/fall95/weinste.html

http://www.criticalthinking.org/resources/articles/glossary.shtml

http://www.doit.gmu.edu/inventio/past/display_past.asp?pID=spring03&sID=eslava

[0=2]

0=2, you are obviously missing the real point of philosophy, and are judging it from your own personal viewpoint, therefore including yourself in your own criticism. And what is your point with secularism? Is this it? Are you simply a frustrated theist? Besides could you name me philosophers you have actually read? Have you ever seriously studied philosophy without this boorish preconception in mind? Do you realize that many of these thoughts are very old (who would take the pineal gland theory seriously anymore?) but their interest lies on two level which are reasonings behind the substance of the thought and also knowledge of the history of thought. Who cares if people don't use chariots anymore, does this mean that chariots are just a degenerated invention made by bored dogs?

The thing I've learnt the most, I believe, from ancient or simply older philosophers, is to realize how many preconceptions we take for granted as axioms, but which, in the end, might not be so obvious and things might be in fact much more complex. Studying the history of thought is the best way to deconstruct current thought and be able to have a better critical eye on it.

End of rant.

Oh yes, I mustn't be well read enough. Excuse me.

See that logic alone... oh man someone somewhere must be reading this and laughing at what I'm seeing.

Yes, see my point, or rather a section of said point, was that we view these people, Socrates Voltaire Spinoza Grant Hume, the whole goddamn lot as DISCOVERING SOMETHING.

Now, without touching the statement many a scholar would make, that statement being the Renaissance was NOT birthed from a return to Greek philosophy but rather an integration of Islam and eastern mysticism into the occult undercurrent pre-existing in Europe... whoops, tapped that ****, without even mentioning that we get to a Eurocentrized idea of what makes a thought VALID as a philosophy.

Now to me philosophy and psychology appear to be one, they both deal with the state of man as we find him today, and the causes of this(Sri Auribindo can go **** himself for just this once), and as such any advanced psychological process is akin to a philosophical process. Of course most philosophers let their ideas rot in their heads, or rather most people coined "philosophers" by the culture under question.

Ideas presented by, oh let's say...

kant(because he was so judiciously brought up by a reason hungry wolf), the idea of things in and of themselves being unknown and your reaction with that thing being as much a part of you as a part o the thing itself, and that spilling over into our interpretation of the "isness" of a given object and hte qualities we project onto it, though truly our own,

...Do you guys think that was NEW when Kant wrote it? Those are the foundations of our most archaic beliefs. Taoism, Babylonian mythology, Aztec and Maya mythologies Hinduism, Taoism, occult practices world wide, on and on and on...

The idea of the atom presented by the ancient greeks. The idea of spirit being the foundation of the atom(this has only recently been addressed by modern science), the idea of localism and non-local relativity and the intrinsic values properties to both sides... blah blah blah

on and on. These concepts, these ideas deemed "revolutionary" by a European "intellectual elite". It's a joke. None of this is new. NONE of it. Europe is simply lagging behind the rest of the world.

Nevermind all these philosophers who think it MATTERS that they've "found" something. Who think they find a "truth". All of these "laws" are simply networks of symbols created from an assumption we turned into a "rational process", so your method of "finding" or "discovering" your "truth" is no more valid than any other. You used the same tools as everyone else and come out as "better"? No... because you still die.

So reading philosophy is not important and answers only as much as you will allow it to. You can find as much divinity in a Big Mac.

(See that? For those of you watching at home this is a perfect example of how to make three points from one and return to none. Remember, noosphere is a SPHERE and as such all points are equidistant from the same center.)

[blp]

What's the matter, 0=2? Which western philosopher abused you when you were a kid? It sort of seems you have read around in the subject, even if it was only enough secondary sources to give a doubtful precis of chapter 1 of The Critique of Pure Reason, so I'm mystified as to why you'd be so intent on warning total novices off completely. Even if you think it's all junk, why so hysterically reluctant to let people make their minds up for themselves? Regarding those of us who've read a bit of it, you seem to think you're debating a bunch of slack-jawed acolytes who think they're being handed the unvarnished word of God. It seems impossible for you to comprehend the idea that some of us might be interested in points of view we don't necessarily agree with.




Nevermind all these philosophers who think it MATTERS that they've "found" something. Who think they find a "truth". All of these "laws" are simply networks of symbols created from an assumption we turned into a "rational process", so your method of "finding" or "discovering" your "truth" is no more valid than any other. You used the same tools as everyone else and come out as "better"? No... because you still die.

Jeez, louise. Now who's the nihilist?

[0=2]

...Disregard all of philosophy? I believe I've been noting philosophy I view as helpful to the individuals condition since the beginning. Everything is, and should be, used by the psyche as a weapon fo sorts, to enabl the self to continue as happily as possible. Philosophy included, but to assume that any of these tools used to gain personal sanity are any more "true" simply isn't plausible, And the only reason you find it so is because a series of random variables that contain you and your action... this includes thought.

Because al is random no one instance is necessarily more "thruthful" or closer to a "right".

Now admiring a persons belief as an AESTHETIC VALUE makes complete sense, why take it as anything different? But to assume that your personal aesthetics are greater than anothers, or that they were birthed from a "progressive" train of thought, is ridiculousand illogical according to your own logic.

So read if you will, but assuming that it gifts you some higher intellect is... retarded, and makes you all fish ready to be abolished by the overwhelming current of air always lingering overhead...

death. You will all still die.

Have fun, I will.

[blp]

Have fun, I will.

That's nice, dear.

[0=2]

That's weak. A weak way out. You come in here with a point, and it gets shredded. This is where logic eats itself. This is where the godheads fail their own game. lesson is? Don't make games you can lose.

[blp]

That's weak. A weak way out. You come in here with a point, and it gets shredded. This is where logic eats itself. This is where the godheads fail their own game. lesson is? Don't make games you can lose.

You want a game you can't lose? Have you tried solitaire?

I don't claim to understand all of philosophy as you seem to and I don't even claim to have the ammo to take down all of your points. Some may be perfectly valid for all I know. I don't mind being weak from time to time either, oh ubermensch, Hulk Hogan, Sgt. Rock, whoever you are, but there's no point playing games I can't win at all, like trying to communicate with ranting monomaniacs who don't really pay attention. You patently didn't understand the point of my post, which was not to accuse you of rejecting philosophy completely, but to ask why you didn't want people reading western philosophy in particular. I'm not going to beat myself up to get my point across to someone who seems more interested in proving his or her lofty, contemptuous and unimpeachable superiority than having an honest debate.

[mono]

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?
My advice: do not dive right into philosophy. I have seen far too many individuals burn themselves out on philosophy by jumping right into deep end of the pool, attempting to read Descartes, Kant, Locke, Berkeley, Nietzsche, Plato, pre-Socratics, and co. Instead of picking up the first copy of Being and Nothingness by Sartre, try some of the commentary books, as some of the 'second-hand' philosophy can have a lot to say, too. I would even think it safe to say that Joseph Campbell, Paul Woodruff, Leonard Shlain, and James Carse have taught me things about philosophy that I would have never learned myself from its original sources.
Shorter philosophical essays can create some ease on your brain, too - that way, your cerebral cortex does not have to fully envelope the hundreds of pages of The Republic. A few notable essayists: Ralph Waldo Emerson, Henry David Thoreau, Michel de Montaigne, and David Hume had some shorter works, as well.
Lastly, fiction can contain immense quantities of philosophy. Fyodor Dostoevsky instructs a lot on existentialism, Albert Camus and Franz Kafka on absurdism and ethics, Herman Melville on virtually everything, and Leo Tolstoy on spirituality.
Good luck!

[Etienne]

Oh yes, I mustn't be well read enough. Excuse me.

Well that or you didn't understand things correctly I guess...

[0=2]

You want a game you can't lose? Have you tried solitaire?

I don't claim to understand all of philosophy as you seem to and I don't even claim to have the ammo to take down all of your points. Some may be perfectly valid for all I know. I don't mind being weak from time to time either, oh ubermensch, Hulk Hogan, Sgt. Rock, whoever you are, but there's no point playing games I can't win at all, like trying to communicate with ranting monomaniacs who don't really pay attention. You patently didn't understand the point of my post, which was not to accuse you of rejecting philosophy completely, but to ask why you didn't want people reading western philosophy in particular. I'm not going to beat myself up to get my point across to someone who seems more interested in proving his or her lofty, contemptuous and unimpeachable superiority than having an honest debate.

Right, because you have something BETTER to do with your life than play games...

See, I love philosophy, because like everything else we create, use, perpetuat,e and solidify realities terms on, it eats itself after a short while. Please, the forums purpose is argument. There's nothing outside this "game" this win lose mentality to this place. You didn't come to reach understanding or "discuss", and if you did that's quite terriby sad considering the sheer lack of original thought in this place. It's regurgitation matched with regurgitation. We're covered in our own bile constantly...

And you expect me to take it seriously?

"Correctly"? I didn't understand "correctly"? Yes, my interpretation must carry soe intrinsic "wrongness" for it to bear different results than yours.

I think the fact that such chaos can spawn in this regurgitorium of used up vortices and corpulant thought is pretty, and funny, and pretty funny...

But I don't take myself seriously for engaging in it. You people probably shouldn't either.

[blp]

But I don't take myself seriously for engaging in it. You people probably shouldn't either.

No, I'd say not. The only real problem I have with what you say here is the gap between theory and practice. You do seem to be taking it seriously, even to the point of shrilly arguing against positions no one's actually taken. If it's all a game, why aren't you more playful? Why are you treating it like a war?