Vote for your favourite philosopher!

[Bii]

Seriously superficial thread here, but it's interesting that for a philosophy section we don't talk about philosophers very much. As I'm starting the thread I get to pick the philosopher's so if you don't like any of them...well, start your own thread!

All Western philosophers because I don't know enough (yet) about Eastern philosophers.

My personal fave has to be Bertrand Russell. His philosophy is very accessible, he writes well, expresses his ideas well, and has just the right blend of logic and pragmatism to make perfect sense to me. Just reading "The Problems of Philosophy" and it's very enlightening. When I've fully digested it I hope to add a bit more to the Knowledge v Belief thread as he has some very interesting views on that.

So, which is your favourite philosopher, and why?

[Taliesin]

Plato is old, pessimistic about democracy and viewed Sparta as quite a model society. We don't support his ideas too.
Descartes is interesting, at least to a mathematician. However, We don't like extreme rationalism.
Kant- urghhhh. Essential german philosophy. German is a language of heavy words. We're a bit afraid of Kant.
We don't know almost anything at all about Russell, sadly.
And for Sartre - haven't read him, but on some real-life matters he misunderstood some stuff very hardly - no repressions in Soviet Union for they are impossible in a socialist state, our donkey. We prefer Camus to him.
So yes, we have eliminated all of them.
However, where are pre-Socratics? Socrates? Aristotle? Spinoza? Locke? Hume? Berkeley? Kierkegaard? Camus? Freud? Wittgenstein? There are more options you can enter, you know so why so few of them?

[Virgil]

Yeah, where's Aristotle?

[Bii]

As I'm starting the thread I get to pick the philosopher's so if you don't like any of them...well, start your own thread!

There's your answer!

Taliesin - you need to read Russell. He is a most excellent philosopher.

[Lote-Tree]

You know very few philosophers.... :-(

Where Socrates?

[Bii]

You know very few philosophers.... :-(

I'm offended you think so little of me.

Actually I'm not sure I 'know' any philosophers, on the basis that most of them are dead. For the purpose of a poll you can only have a maximum of 10. I opted for 5. You may ask why but does it matter? Why that 5 and not a different 5? Let's face it, I could have posted a completely different list and still no doubt someone would be unhappy with that.

Where Socrates?

Socrates, last time I checked, was dead. Other than that, he didn't make the list.

[Nossa]

I'm offended you think so little of me.

Actually I'm not sure I 'know' any philosophers, on the basis that most of them are dead. For the purpose of a poll you can only have a maximum of 10. I opted for 5. You may ask why but does it matter? Why that 5 and not a different 5? Let's face it, I could have posted a completely different list and still no doubt someone would be unhappy with that.



Socrates, last time I checked, was dead. Other than that, he didn't make the list.

I don't quite get the 'Socrates was dead' part...Who's alive in your list anyways?!
And to solve it, you could have simply just asked the question without making a poll...You can't just limit 'our' choices according to whom you see as important. This way, you're asking us to either agree or disagree on your list, or else, make our own threads!
Oh and one more thing...to 'know' a philosophy or a philosopher..is to know thier ideas and what they stood for...not to know them 'personally'...don't take it with its literal meaning

[Lote-Tree]

I'm offended you think so little of me.

Sorry I did not mean to offend you.
I take back that sentence.

What I meat to say is that there is a long list of philosophers why pick so few?

Sorry :-(

And nay I don't think very little of you at all. I think highly of you.

[hyperborean]

I voted for Sartre.

[kiobe]

Democritus (Greek: Δημόκριτος) was a pre-Socratic Greek philosopher (born at Abdera in Thrace around 460 BC).[1][2] Democritus was a student of Leucippus and co-originator of the belief that all matter is made up of various imperishable, indivisible elements which he called atoma (sg. atomon) or "indivisible units", from which we get the English word atom. It is virtually impossible to tell which of these ideas were unique to Democritus and which are attributable to Leucippus.

[Bii]

I don't quite get the 'Socrates was dead' part...Who's alive in your list anyways?!

Oh and one more thing...to 'know' a philosophy or a philosopher..is to know thier ideas and what they stood for...not to know them 'personally'...don't take it with its literal meaning

I was being literal. It was a tongue in cheek response.

You can't just limit 'our' choices according to whom you see as important.This way, you're asking us to either agree or disagree on your list, or else, make our own threads!

Actually I can, and as you can see, I did.

I never said I thought any of them were important. It was a random selection. Glad to see it's caused so much debate already.

[Nossa]

I was being literal. It was a tongue in cheek response.



Actually I can, and as you can see, I did.

I never said I thought any of them were important. It was a random selection. Glad to see it's caused so much debate already.

Well...I still think you shouldn't have limited them...lol
And yeah, we debate about everything...even if the thread is about philosophy and we're talking about a whole different thing

[dramasnot6]

My favorite out of the list...it's hard, because I appreciate aspects of several of their philosophies.I have always been most take by Sartre I suppose...

[Bii]

Sorry I did not mean to offend you.
I take back that sentence.

What I meat to say is that there is a long list of philosophers why pick so few?

Sorry :-(

And nay I don't think very little of you at all. I think highly of you.

No offence taken, honestly, it was a bit tongue in cheek (as is the whole thread). My apologies & thank you for your kind words.

[Turk]

Plato is old, pessimistic about democracy and viewed Sparta as quite a model society.

So what if he's pessimistic about democracy. Today it's clear democracy is not good.

I also think this is very little list for vote. I also don't think Russell is a philosopher in a way, although he wrote books about philosophical subjects.

My vote would go to Mawlana Jalal-ad Din Rumi.