I'm a philosophy virgin

[reasonvemotion]

I have a headache already......

Now that is something you keep to yourself.

Love it!

[artisticsolution]

Perhaps I should start with Neitzsche before I am "contaminated"by the rest then read Russell to find out what Neitzche is arguing about. Thanks for your support everyone. I have a headache already.

I find Nietzsche to be more of your 'disgruntled' type of philosopher...lol.

I also think people have more of a chance to become "contaminated" by him...I guess ya have to read him to find out. Even Arising said he was "contaminated" in a way by mentioning he became melancholy (or something to that effect) after reading him.

Personally, if you want to start with the existentialists...why don't you start with the first one... Kierkegaard. He says basically similar things as Nietzsche but he kinda serves it 'on the rocks' with a tad of humor. He's hilarious in a weird way. But if you like your philosophers straight up...perhaps Nietzsche is your man.

[Arising_uk]

...
Perhaps I should start with Neitzsche before I am "contaminated"by the rest then read Russell to find out what Neitzche is arguing about. Thanks for your support everyone. I have a headache already.

Nah! Tell you what, you want a real headache? Instead of the overviews do it this way, its roughly what an old hons degree course does.

Do the Greeks(500 odd years BC), Aristotle and Plato(Socrates) and maybe the Romans first, then the Scholastics(approx, 12th to the 16thC)(Aquinas, Duns Scotus, Anslem, Ockham) then the Continental Rationalists(approx 17th & 18thC), Descartes, Spinoza, Leibniz, then the British Empiricists(approx the same time), Locke, Berkeley, Hume, then you can start on the Germans, the 19thC, Kant first(as he's the daddy and tried to combine Continental Rationalistism and British Empiricism), then the German Idealists(who reacted against Kant), Hegel, Fichte and Schelling, then(at last) the Existentialists, Kierkegaard(who reacted against Hegal, et al), Nietzsche and Sartre(although he's 20thC). Then the biggy, 20thC and the Analytic School and the Logical Positivists, Russell, Ayer, Frege, Wittgenstein, G. E. Moore, Reichenbach, Schlick, Neurath, Hahn and Carnap. The backlash, Quine, Popper, Kuhn, J. L. Austin, Strawson, Putnam, and Rorty.

After that theres the Phenomenologists(although no-ones still sure quite what this is yet), Husserl, Heidegger and Merleau-Ponty.

Then theres the bloody Marxists!

Phew! Of course theres shit-loads of authors I've missed out in each group and many would argue about my groupings but I think if you do this lot you'll get a good idea of whats been going on in Philosophy since 500 years before 'Christ'. I've pretty much listed what could be called the canon of Philosophy but only up to the early 20thC.

Oh! Don't forget to study Aristotles Logic and then find some introductory books on Formal and Symbolic Logic as this is pretty much the only thing that Philosophy can truly call its own.

You could also do it by category(see this forums ones) or by philosophical schools of thought and find what interests you but I'll leave that to someone else to list.

Keep the neurofen handy and happy reading.
p.s.
To those I've missed and off the top of my head, Newton, Hobbes, Boden, Paine, Machiavelli, Camus, Bacon, Feyerabend, Lakatos, Anscombe, Marx and Engels, Midgley, Darwin, Warnock, Rand, Haack, Luxemburg, Churchland, on and on ...

[reasonvemotion]

Still want to lose your virginity?

[tillingborn]

Hello richardtod
Rene Descartes is often described as the father of modern philosophy, his Meditations and Discourse on Method are usually bound together in a single volume. As well as being hugely influential, it is a very accessible and mercifully short read. My advice would be to start there.

[Bernard]

Nietzsche hardly regarded himself a philosopher, so I don't know why we should. He was a philologist by training and regarded himself as such. You canonise him a philosopher like you canonise Francis of Assissi a saint, but this in the end just a way of classifying and placing into storage. There is of course philosophy in Nietzsche's work, but if you go to him primarily for a philosophy you will see and receive only headaches.

What Nietzsche was and still is is a man of knowledge and tremendous will.

Its only in relatively recent times that philosophy became a professional university career option. The same is happening with art via the contemporary (contemptuous) art scene.

[rantal]

...
Perhaps I should start with Neitzsche before I am "contaminated"by the rest then read Russell to find out what Neitzche is arguing about. Thanks for your support everyone. I have a headache already.

Nah! Tell you what, you want a real headache? Instead of the overviews do it this way, its roughly what an old hons degree course does.

Do the Greeks(500 odd years BC), Aristotle and Plato(Socrates) and maybe the Romans first, then the Scholastics(approx, 12th to the 16thC)(Aquinas, Duns Scotus, Anslem, Ockham) then the Continental Rationalists(approx 17th & 18thC), Descartes, Spinoza, Leibniz, then the British Empiricists(approx the same time), Locke, Berkeley, Hume, then you can start on the Germans, the 19thC, Kant first(as he's the daddy and tried to combine Continental Rationalistism and British Empiricism), then the German Idealists(who reacted against Kant), Hegel, Fichte and Schelling, then(at last) the Existentialists, Kierkegaard(who reacted against Hegal, et al), Nietzsche and Sartre(although he's 20thC). Then the biggy, 20thC and the Analytic School and the Logical Positivists, Russell, Ayer, Frege, Wittgenstein, G. E. Moore, Reichenbach, Schlick, Neurath, Hahn and Rudolf Carnap. The backlash, Quine, Popper, Kuhn, J. L. Austin, Strawson, Putnam, and Rorty.

Nietzsche is more than an existentialist and Russel and both the early and later Wittgenstein are not Logical Positivists nor is Moore. Frege, Russel, Moore and the early Wittgenstein are better regarded as analytic philosophers, the beginning of the English school and the later Wittgenstein is a linguistic philsopher

After that theres the Phenomenologists(although no-ones still sure quite what this is yet), Husserl, Heidegger and Merleau-Ponty.

Phenomenology may be understood as reduction of experience to only pre-conceptual experience, to borrow an expression from philosophy of mind, though the terminology it uses is different

Then theres the bloody Marxists!

May, myself included do not regard Marxists as philosophers.

Philosophy of science and mind should also be included here, Popper, Kuhn and Lakatos, Ryle, Dennet, Hutto

All the best, rantal

Phew! Of course theres shit-loads of authors I've missed out in each group and many would argue about my groupings but I think if you do this lot you'll get a good idea of whats been going on in Philosophy since 500 years before 'Christ'. I've pretty much listed what could be called the canon of Philosophy but only up to the early 20thC.

Oh! Don't forget to study Aristotles Logic and then find some introductory books on Formal and Symbolic Logic as this is pretty much the only thing that Philosophy can truly call its own.

You could also do it by category(see this forums ones) or by philosophical schools of thought and find what interests you but I'll leave that to someone else to list.

Keep the neurofen handy and happy reading.
p.s.
To those I've missed and off the top of my head, Newton, Hobbes, Boden, Paine, Machiavelli, Camus, Bacon, Feyerabend, Lakatos, Anscombe, Marx and Engels, Midgley, Darwin, Warnock, Rand, Haack, Luxemburg, Churchland, on and on ...

[rantal]

Nietzsche hardly regarded himself a philosopher, so I don't know why we should. He was a philologist by training and regarded himself as such. You canonise him a philosopher like you canonise Francis of Assissi a saint, but this in the end just a way of classifying and placing into storage. There is of course philosophy in Nietzsche's work, but if you go to him primarily for a philosophy you will see and receive only headaches.

What Nietzsche was and still is is a man of knowledge and tremendous will.

Its only in relatively recent times that philosophy became a professional university career option. The same is happening with art via the contemporary (contemptuous) art scene.

Don't be taken in by Nietzsche's qualification and claim not to be a philosopher, that is something he said to a purpose but philosopher he was all right

all the best, rantal

[Arising_uk]

Nietzsche is more than an existentialist and Russel and both the early and later Wittgenstein are not Logical Positivists nor is Moore. Frege, Russel, Moore and the early Wittgenstein are better regarded as analytic philosophers, the beginning of the English school and the later Wittgenstein is a linguistic philsopher

See the bit where I said "The Analytic School and the Logical Positivists"?

Phenomenology may be understood as reduction of experience to only pre-conceptual experience, to borrow an expression from philosophy of mind, though the terminology it uses is different

Maybe, like I said, its up for discussion. I prefer to understand it as the search for a description of subjective experience that most can agree with from being the subjective experiencer. Your description leaves open the problem of describing such a thing and how to go about having it.

May, myself included do not regard Marxists as philosophers.

And yet they changed the world. Historical Materialism still seems to explain social relations and the times better than many other current ideas.

Philosophy of science and mind should also be included here, Popper, Kuhn and Lakatos, Ryle, Dennet, Hutto

Oh! Dennet and Ryle, forgot them but like I said, to many to mention although I did mention the first three. If you wish to do it by philosophical category you're welcome to list them for richardtod.

[Arising_uk]

Its only in relatively recent times that philosophy became a professional university career option. The same is happening with art via the contemporary (contemptuous) art scene.

Its only in recent times that the hoi poloi have even been given the option of an education.

Nietzsche wrote upon Ethics and Morals, Metaphysics and Philosophy of Mind, that makes him a philosopher. He also gave lectures upon the subject, does that make him contemptuous?

[rantal]

Nietzsche is more than an existentialist and Russel and both the early and later Wittgenstein are not Logical Positivists nor is Moore. Frege, Russel, Moore and the early Wittgenstein are better regarded as analytic philosophers, the beginning of the English school and the later Wittgenstein is a linguistic philsopher

See the bit where I said "The Analytic School and the Logical Positivists"?

Well ok, but I was keen to point that out as sometimes the early Wittgenstein is mistaken for a logical positive as indeed the Vienna circle did!

Phenomenology may be understood as reduction of experience to only pre-conceptual experience, to borrow an expression from philosophy of mind, though the terminology it uses is different

Maybe, like I said, its up for discussion. I prefer to understand it as the search for a description of subjective experience that most can agree with from being the subjective experiencer. Your description leaves open the problem of describing such a thing and how to go about having it.

I think there is a problem with you view, (I make no claim to be an expert on phenomenology and speak mostly from a Hursellian perspective), that phenomenological reduction seeks to strip any subjective participation as well as any objective concepts away from the experience

May, myself included do not regard Marxists as philosophers.

And yet they changed the world. Historical Materialism still seems to explain social relations and the times better than many other current ideas.

Whilst Marxism offers valuable insights into social relations it is going to far to say it is the best explanation, in my opinion

Philosophy of science and mind should also be included here, Popper, Kuhn and Lakatos, Ryle, Dennet, Hutto

Oh! Dennet and Ryle, forgot them but like I said, to many to mention although I did mention the first three. If you wish to do it by philosophical category you're welcome to list them for richardtod.

No, I pretty much liked your classification, though perhaps Heraclitus should have been included in the Greeks and perhaps Fodor, Searle in mind, Rawls and Nausbaum in ethics, Oh and very importantly, Nancy Cartwright science

We do need to add a few extra categories though

Scottish realism Ried, Stewart, Furgeson,

Pragmatism, Pierce, James and Dewy

and Sellar in Critical realism

all the best, rantal

[Bernard]

Its only in relatively recent times that philosophy became a professional university career option. The same is happening with art via the contemporary (contemptuous) art scene.

Its only in recent times that the hoi poloi have even been given the option of an education.

Nietzsche wrote upon Ethics and Morals, Metaphysics and Philosophy of Mind, that makes him a philosopher. He also gave lectures upon the subject, does that make him contemptuous?

His struggle with exactly this sense of contempt is one of his hall marks. Have you missed the meaning of the übermensch perhaps?

[Arising_uk]

His struggle with exactly this sense of contempt is one of his hall marks. Have you missed the meaning of the übermensch perhaps?

But he was selective with it as he liked the Greeks and Hindus and was not above lecturing himself. Idle readers and writers I'll give you but I fail to understand how that does not make him a philosopher.

I have various understandings of "übermensch" none very clear and I doubt anyone has as he's fairly unclear about it himself. My preferred one is atheist and I am one.

[Bernard]

I am an atheist in pretty much the same sense as Nietzsche was, though I do believe in the infinite activity of infinite numbers of living things. It's an apprehension I can hook into that demands all of my sinew keep pace with. That activity I understand as God. It is living and out there. It's existence is as fundamental and functional to life as breathing is to our biology.

Nietszche from his youth knew himself to be a creative spirit first I think. His exploration of music for example was quite broad. His entrance into academia was a necessary evil, but he applied himself assiduously to scholarly activities. Was it a way of honouring his Parents?
He writes of philosophy and philosophers mostly as an outside observer - from the übermensch place if you like. He can bring nothing new or groundbreaking to it from that position though, which would not be the case were he properly broiled in it. We could call him a good philosopher as e could many a man but he was a long way from genius or greatness in that sense. Like Michelangelo he was a monumental figure but if you take a hard eye to his work there are too many serious transgressions in his craft and art to afford him any sort of high accolade as a philosopher. He knew the ropes well but was a distracted climber. He came into philosophy raw and left it raw.

If he did aspire to be an "artistic Socrates" what is that? It's not necessarily either philosopher or artist. It's Zarathustra, who lives and dances an uber-philosophy, giving birth not to a new philosophy or the rejuvenation of an old. Sorry, but as Nietszche's creative leaning would have left it with us: he gives birth to a dancing star.

[richardtod]

Still want to lose your virginity?

Sod it! I think I'll take up fishing instead.

The posts here have been great. I have a much better understanding of the height of the mountain and it's terrain. Although daunted I am not put off. Rather, I am more infected by the enthusiasm reflected in the posts above and, after all is said and done, all I have to do is read a few books.