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If you want to learn about philosophy, I highly recommend Russel's History of Western Philosophy. It's usually frowned upon and recommended to avoid for Philosophy students exactly for the same reasons I think it's one of the best books ever written:

It doesn't shy away of critique and dispute, as it was written by a practicing philosopher (who still values objectivity and holds to high standards of reasoning). The language is wonderful and historical bits to set the context are great.

I also recommend Anthony Gottlieb's "The Dream Of Reason" and "The Dream of Enlightenment", as the second and third book (if you liked the first one). They are more recent and sometimes expand on some things Russel deemed of lesser importance. Again, exceptionally well written.

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I'm going to be the lone naysayer here, and recommend against Russell's book.

Russell is an eloquent, entertaining, and engaging writer. I used to be a huge Russell fan myself when I was young, and back then I would have recommended his book too.

But then I actually studied philosophy and realized how myopic, limited, and biased Russell was outside his areas of specialty (Analytic philosophy, math, and logic).

Yes, you'd get an overview of (some of) Western philosophy from his book, but it'd be really biased, and that's the wrong foot to start you learning of philosophy from.

Much better, in my view, to just start reading the Socratic dialogues yourself, as part of an intro to philosophy class, instead of being fed regurgitated, abridged, predigested knowledge by someone with an agenda.

My view on Russell extends to many of the other recommendations elsewhere in this thread of books by other authors who've written overviews of philosophy from an Analytic perspective. They might have more up-to-date views than Russell did (who was born in 1872 and wrote his book in 1946), but they tend to share his limitations.

Not the lone naysayer! I’m still a huge Russell fan, but my advice on his History of Western Philosophy is avoid like the plague until you know enough to read it with a very critical eye.

I think the real danger is that he’s such a pleasant, engaging, clear, logically compelling writer. And especially so to folks of a mathematical, analytical bent - like probably most HN readers. And then you remember that this book was written by an Englishman in 1946. You know, right after the worst war in the history of the world, in which Germany was the central antagonist. Of course he’s going to totally misinterpret Hegel, Nietzsche, and a whole bunch of other thinkers.

I'm still a huge Russell fan myself, but more for his political activism and style of popular writing than for his philosophy.

I've found his actual philosophical writing pretty impenetrable. Have you ever read On Denoting? For me that was every bit as hard to understand as the most difficult of Continental writings.

> It's usually frowned upon and recommended to avoid for Philosophy students exactly for the same reasons I think it's one of the best books ever written:

> It doesn't shy away of critique and dispute

This is nonsense. wittgenstein and nietzsche are highly regarded within philosophy departments, and they both criticize philosophy to the point of turning their backs on philosophy. russell is just not a very careful scholar of history, philosophy, or the history of philosophy.

This is nonsense. Wittgenstein and Nietzsche didn't write anything that could be mistaken for a textbook you could learn your HoP 101 with.

What you say about factual shortcoming is just one of the reasons, not the main one by any means, at least from my experience.

Then what's your point? actual undergrad philosophy textbooks don't "shy away of critique and dispute" either. is your complaint that russell's idiosyncratic views are not foregrounded enough to your liking?

Russell's History of Western Philosophy is a terrific book. It's quite long, but for good reason.

While I do second the recommendation, I wouldn't make that your first introduction to the subject, unless you already know you are interested and committed. Most people really enjoy some aspect and finding that aspect at a high level is important IMHO. If you dive too deep on non-interesting topics, you may get bored of the whole thing.

If you're interested in my advice for getting started, I detailed it here a few years ago: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=16936240

I've done a lot of learning about philosophy and the book that keeps coming up, from people that I highly respect, is Russell's book, check out the wiki on it [1].

Regardless, based on summaries that I've read, I wish I started with this book since it gives a solid understanding of western philosophy.

[1] - https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/A_History_of_Western_Philosoph...

Reading this book is like reading Gibbon as a first book about Roman history. Please don’t do it.

If you want a better history of western philosophy, I would recommend Anthony Kenny’s A New History of Western Philosophy.

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