New to Philosophy

[Sano]

I think that a way one could study philosophy is very similar to the way one usually broadens their musical horizon - usually they start with something they like, then search for another similar bands/composers, and if they like them, start listening to their other music, and so on. Start with something you like (or maybe with something simple, like the Meditations on the First Philosophy by Descartes), and then start reading philosophers from which the author draws upon, later philosophers that agree with him, and/or philosophers which criticised the book. If you like any of those, read their other works, then repeat the process ad infinitum.

I guess it depends on your interpretation of 'philosophy'. If you think evidenceless metaphysical mumbo jumbo counts as philosophy, then yeah, you don't need scientific literacy for that (:

Hey, "evidenceless metaphysical mumbo jumbo" makes up half of philosophy, and even saying that metaphysics is mumbo jumpo is to make a metaphysical assertion, so... :P

Also, since when is scientific literacy necessary to read Kierkegaard or Sartre or, going back in time, the Socratic dialogues? Philosophy isn't science.

P.S.: Although I do view science as a very specific kind of doing philosophy. Most people are very surprised when I say that.

[Dodo25]

Good point about music.

Also, since when is scientific literacy necessary to read Kierkegaard or Sartre or, going back in time, the Socratic dialogues? Philosophy isn't science..

But that's not the important question. The important question is SHOULD we even read these people if they aren't even aware of certain scientific results?

As for Plato, the answer is yes, altough his lack of knowledge makes him tedious to read on many topics. As for Kierkegaard or Sartre, oh well, do we really need them? Time is precious. (:

P.S.: Although I do view science as a very specific kind of doing philosophy. Most people are very surprised when I say that.

Indeed, science is a branch of philosophy. The ancient Greeks had no distinction for natural science and philosophy.

[Sano]

But that's not the important question. The important question is SHOULD we even read these people if they aren't even aware of certain scientific results?

As for Plato, the answer is yes, altough his lack of knowledge makes him tedious to read on many topics. As for Kierkegaard or Sartre, oh well, do we really need them? Time is precious. (:

It depends, I think. If one feels that history is important, then the history of philoophy might also be. After all, the most studied philosophers nowadays are the ones considered to be the leading thinkers of their time; what they say often tells us something about our past as a whole. Also, one day I heard a philosophy teacher say that a philosopher is like a DJ because he often "remixes" already known ideas and styles in order to create something new. If that's true, then learning the most we can about past philosophers may broaden our views in order to be more creative.

As for time being precious, do we actually even need to read philosophy? After all, there are a lot of people which live very well without reading it. Also, I also think they (Kierkegaard and Sartre) are very important in that they both lived in times where the world as we know it was beginning to take shape, and they both dealt with how someone in such a weird, cold world could live. Thus I cannot say that they aren't important or irrelevant.

[Nietzsche]

Depends on what type of philosophy you are into.


If ethical dilemmas interest you, find the "Ethics" book from the "Teach Yourself" series.

If you want existentialism, check out Nietzsche ( atheist ), Kierkegaard (Christian), or Camu (he doesn't label himself existentalist though)


If the God debates interest you, check out Richard Dawkins... Walter Kaufmann's Critique of Philosophy is great. EDIT: For the theist side, studying St. Thomas Aquinas's arguments are a must. Also Carl Sagan's The Varieties of Scientific Experience are great if you want a non-confrontational discussion about religion from an agnostic, though the book isn't just about the god debates. Theist, Strong Atheist, or Weak Atheist/Agnostic, whatever, its a good read.

Look for the "pop culture and philosophy books" and see if any interest you. That was my intro to philosophy really.

I wouldn't start with the source texts of anything by an author I don't specifically mention though. Generally a book about an author or set of ideas is best to start out with. PM if you have any specific questions.

[country doctor]

the doc's suggestion? begin w/ plato...after a thorough digestion process, move on to nietzsche...

you can thank the doc later...

ROAR!

[mal4mac]

... do we actually even need to read philosophy? After all, there are a lot of people which live very well without reading it.

I think you only need to read philosophy if you are bothered by a problem with which philosophy might help. For instance, if you are a Christian beginning to doubt his beliefs Dawkins' "The God Delusion" and Bertrand Russell's "Why I am not a Christian" might be good reads. The latter confirmed me in my atheism when I was about 12, and I've been happy with my atheism ever since. Dawkins bolstered by lack of belief, and he's a bracing read. Now I don't feel a great need to read much else on the topic.

If you feel that life lacks meaning because you'll be dead in short order then "Confessions of a Philosopher" by Brian Magee is a good place to start. I don't, so I found Magee went on too much about this for me - but it's also a good general introduction to philosophy, so give it a go if you want an overview of *all* philosophy (not just moral philosophy...)

If you don't have any outstanding problems, then read for pleasure. Why do anything else? Some (very few) philosophers are fun to read (Nietzsche, Russell, ...), and I guess they provide a 'higher pleasure' than watching repeats of Fawlty Towers. But Dickens and Tolstoy, for me, provide more 'higher pleasure' than any philosopher, while competing with Fawlty Towers in the 'simple pleasure' stakes.

[Sano]

I think you only need to read philosophy if you are bothered by a problem with which philosophy might help. For instance, if you are a Christian beginning to doubt his beliefs Dawkins' "The God Delusion" and Bertrand Russell's "Why I am not a Christian" might be good reads. The latter confirmed me in my atheism when I was about 12, and I've been happy with my atheism ever since. Dawkins bolstered by lack of belief, and he's a bracing read. Now I don't feel a great need to read much else on the topic.

I don't think I agree with that. If you are doubting something you should read both arguments against and in favor of. And there are quite a number of arguments for the existence of god, both old and new. Also, even being an agnostic myself, I find the notion that atheism (or agnosticism) involves "having no beliefs" very strange. Sure, you don't believe in one thing - god - but then if you think that the statement "god is real" is false, and if you think that doesn't make sense, then you'd have a whole lot of beliefs about astronomy, geology, biology, etc. How? Let me explain. Everywhere around the world, all of this was first explained by religion - then came science, and had to work very hard to establish new paradigms. It wouldn't make much sense to be an atheist in the modern sense of the world in, let's say, 1300AD - if you didn't believe in god, back then, you couldn't even explain why stars moved in the night sky. Well, of course things are different today - but, at least if you are a "Dawkinsonian" atheist, you'd still would have to express a belief that the scientific method is our best shot at understanding the world (and why, you'd even have to believe in "truth", and that itself is very problematic).

If you don't have any outstanding problems, then read for pleasure. Why do anything else? Some (very few) philosophers are fun to read (Nietzsche, Russell, ...), and I guess they provide a 'higher pleasure' than watching repeats of Fawlty Towers. But Dickens and Tolstoy, for me, provide more 'higher pleasure' than any philosopher, while competing with Fawlty Towers in the 'simple pleasure' stakes.

Well, I also find Descartes to be a rather good read, specially he doesn't use a lot of difficult terms like later philosophers. Also, the line between literature and philosophy is very hard to define, since more often than not there's a good amount of philosophy in most good books, and there are a lot of philosophers who wrote about literature or even simple wrote literature (like Sartre).

[Dodo25]

I don't think I agree with that. If you are doubting something you should read both arguments against and in favor of. And there are quite a number of arguments for the existence of god, both old and new. Also, even being an agnostic myself, I find the notion that atheism (or agnosticism) involves "having no beliefs" very strange. Sure, you don't believe in one thing - god - but then if you think that the statement "god is real" is false, and if you think that doesn't make sense, then you'd have a whole lot of beliefs about astronomy, geology, biology, etc. How? Let me explain. Everywhere around the world, all of this was first explained by religion - then came science, and had to work very hard to establish new paradigms. It wouldn't make much sense to be an atheist in the modern sense of the world in, let's say, 1300AD - if you didn't believe in god, back then, you couldn't even explain why stars moved in the night sky. Well, of course things are different today - but, at least if you are a "Dawkinsonian" atheist, you'd still would have to express a belief that the scientific method is our best shot at understanding the world (and why, you'd even have to believe in "truth", and that itself is very problematic).

Not really the topic here, but anyway:

The case is crystal clear, no argument for god is even remotely convincing (so far, I'm willing to listen if anyone comes up with something new). And atheism really doesn't involve any beliefs, it's simply the absence of a belief in god. And as a side note, labeling yourself 'agnostic' doesn't really make sense, because a) mosts atheists are 'agnostic atheists', meaning they don't claim to have absolute knowledge, and b) by saying you're an agnostic, you make it sound like you think the possibility whether god exists is about 50%, so you're not even confident enough to take a position. Unless that actually is your view, in which case I'm of course wondering whether you think the possibility of Narnia being in someone's wardrobe is about 50% too for you, and if not, what difference there is between god and Narnia, if both aren't supported by evidence.

One doesn't need to be able to explain things god used to explain in order to not believe. Before Darwin wrote 'Origin of Species', Hume pointed out that 'God' isn't an explanation. Even children ask the question 'who created god', clearly noticing the problem. I'll never understand how people can be satisfied with god as an explanation.

And Plato noticed thousands of years ago that god isn't needed for morality either. If 'good' is what god says is good, then he might as well have said that torturing children is good. If god has other criteria for telling what is 'good', then so do we.

Darwin made it possible to be an 'intellectually fulfilled' atheist, but even before, believing in god just didn't make sense. It's better to admit 'I DONT KNOW' instead of just ascribing everything you don't know to something that is even more difficult to explain than the thing you were wondering about in the first place.

'Belief' in the scientific method? Yes. 'Faith' in the scientific method? Hell no. Belief can be based on evidence, faith isn't. The scientific record has an outstanding track record. Logic and rationality is needed for even having a discussion, so not accepting them would disqualify you anyway. And there's nothing really problematic about 'truth', some postmodernists just like to think there is.

Since we're off topic, that's all I'm saying here, if you want a more detailed discussion I suggest you open a new thread and start with some good arguments.

[mal4mac]

I don't think I agree with that. If you are doubting something you should read both arguments against and in favor of.

I went to a fairly trditional UK school with morning assembly and compulsory RE lessons, i had enogh arguments for!

In any case, Russell and Dawkins are both very good at stating the "for" argument before destroying it.

You can't read all books for and against, so when would you stop?

I stop when I lose interest, which, in this case, is when I don't have a problem. God is not a problem for me, I don't belive in him,and I'm happy with that. So instead of reading *another* boring book of religious philosophy I read Dickens or listen to Mozart ... life is better that way ... for me...

Well, I also find Descartes to be a rather good read, specially he doesn't use a lot of difficult terms like later philosophers. Also, the line between literature and philosophy is very hard to define, since more often than not there's a good amount of philosophy in most good books, and there are a lot of philosophers who wrote about literature or even simple wrote literature (like Sartre).

I've read Descartes, he's one of the easier ones to read (certainly!), but I much prefer reading Dickens, or Hardy, or Zola..., or a hundred other novelists.

I think Descartes' argument for God is daft and don't really care that much about the mind-body problem or Cartesian philosophy of physics (any more). His writing style certainly isn't enough to have me wanting to read more of him. Montaigne is far superior - I would re-read him...

Sartre's nausea is a good read, but Being & Nothingness is something I gave up on very quickly... I might read other novels by Sartre.

[ralfyman]

Maybe Russell's History of Western Philosophy.

[Cunninglinguist]

Not really the topic here, but anyway:

The case is crystal clear, no argument for god is even remotely convincing (so far, I'm willing to listen if anyone comes up with something new). And atheism really doesn't involve any beliefs, it's simply the absence of a belief in god. And as a side note, labeling yourself 'agnostic' doesn't really make sense, because a) mosts atheists are 'agnostic atheists', meaning they don't claim to have absolute knowledge, and b) by saying you're an agnostic, you make it sound like you think the possibility whether god exists is about 50%, so you're not even confident enough to take a position. Unless that actually is your view, in which case I'm of course wondering whether you think the possibility of Narnia being in someone's wardrobe is about 50% too for you, and if not, what difference there is between god and Narnia, if both aren't supported by evidence.

One doesn't need to be able to explain things god used to explain in order to not believe. Before Darwin wrote 'Origin of Species', Hume pointed out that 'God' isn't an explanation. Even children ask the question 'who created god', clearly noticing the problem. I'll never understand how people can be satisfied with god as an explanation.

And Plato noticed thousands of years ago that god isn't needed for morality either. If 'good' is what god says is good, then he might as well have said that torturing children is good. If god has other criteria for telling what is 'good', then so do we.

Darwin made it possible to be an 'intellectually fulfilled' atheist, but even before, believing in god just didn't make sense. It's better to admit 'I DONT KNOW' instead of just ascribing everything you don't know to something that is even more difficult to explain than the thing you were wondering about in the first place.

'Belief' in the scientific method? Yes. 'Faith' in the scientific method? Hell no. Belief can be based on evidence, faith isn't. The scientific record has an outstanding track record. Logic and rationality is needed for even having a discussion, so not accepting them would disqualify you anyway. And there's nothing really problematic about 'truth', some postmodernists just like to think there is.

Since we're off topic, that's all I'm saying here, if you want a more detailed discussion I suggest you open a new thread and start with some good arguments.

I'm sorry, but there are quite a few things wrong with this post. For one you seem to be equivocating on the definition of "agnostic." You assume (in one place) that it can be boiled down to a belief in probability, likewise can atheism, and hence the concept of "agnostic atheist" would make no sense, since they would be mutually exclusive belief systems. Moreover, the whole idea of boiling it down to beliefs in probability is pathetically Dawkinsion and misleading. Most agnostics would not pretend they know the probability at all ... the fact that Dawkins thinks they do demonstrates how ignorant he really is ... and that he maintains this idea belies any claim of an "agnostic atheist" since, saying that you think there is, say, a 99% chance that god doesn't exist makes a quite positive and theoretical claim about the nature of God, and dismisses God on those accounts, instead of practical ones.

Science is wracked by the same absurdities as religion. The religious will maintain that God always was and will be. Some scientists will maintain the exact same thing about the nature of energy. Tell me how the claim latter make has more merit than the former? But in any case, who created energy? Who created time and space? Why does time travel forward? If there are a billion possible realities why this one? In the end, it is usually reconciled as a fundamental absurdity ... or the children are usually with a good licking.

Also, where is the evidence that your evidence is significant, and where is the evidence for that evidence? At some point your "belief" is reduced to "faith" in a certain (set of) article(s) of evidence. Moreover, the theist doesn't unequivocally dismiss logic or rationality ... Aquinas couldn't make his arguments otherwise. Science and the emphasis on evidence are not the necessary (logical) consequences of logicality. Logic is simply the negative form of the truth; in other words, if something follows the logical form we can accept its conclusion as following from its premises. But since there can never be a test for positive truth (for if there were, we'd have to subject it to itself, which would render its validity based on a circular, and thus untrustable, argument) we can never with any apodictic certainty know if our premises are true. But what makes men 'assume' science or religion is that these belief systems tend to make them happier.

And there's nothing really problematic about 'truth', some postmodernists just like to think there is. ... where is the "truth" and argument in this? This sounds more like a dogma. For the reason above expounded, the range of things which have universal validity is fairly small. It applies to math, some logical principles, the existence of space and time, and perhaps some other rules (such as cause and effect) ... though some of these things are only "true" in so far as we need to presume them before we can proceed in our some of our inferential affairs, while sensibility itself does not necessitate them. A good example of this is cause and effect, where our capacity to experience does not exclude the metaphysical doctrine of preestablished harmony; however, we must deny the belief if we are to proceed in many of our (scientific) inferential affairs. This type of "truth" is contrasted with, for example, space and time, which must exist in order for experience to occur.

[Dodo25]

Cunninglinguist, I responded to your post in the following thread: http://www.online-literature.com/for...75#post1035275

Anyone interested is welcome to follow and join there.

[Ubercritter]

A lot of the users above seem to be trying to sell you a system of philosophy rather than just recommending general introductions so you can understand what philosophy is; Evangelists are to be found everywhere.

If you want a general introduction the best one that has been suggested so far is Bertrand Russell's “A History of Western philosophy” which is an expansive and well-written book (Russell is known for his concise and enjoyable writing style), though, it is heavily bias and seems to only deal with a few philosophical problems; it is expansive in the amount of philosophers but lacking in its amount of philosophical themes.

Instead, I would recommend “Philosophy: The Basics” by Nigel Warburton and it's companion piece “Philosophy: Basic Readings” which has a lot of good essays by well established philosophers and other academics. Oh, and try Russels “Problems of Philosophy”

I hope I have been helpful.

[Panglossian]

I would recommend The Waste Books by Georg Lichtenberg. His insightful aphorisms were admired by many great thinkers such as Schopenhauer, Nietzsche, Feud, Wittgenstein, Tolstoy. Not serious philosophy by any means, but lots of wisdom and clever humour.

[YesNo]

Instead, I would recommend “Philosophy: The Basics” by Nigel Warburton and it's companion piece “Philosophy: Basic Readings” which has a lot of good essays by well established philosophers and other academics.

I was able to find Philosophy Bites by Nigel Warburton and David Edmonds in the library and it led me to their web site where you can listen to about 150 interviews of philosophers on various topics. This might be as good a place to start as any.

http://philosophybites.com/past_programmes.html