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Ask HN: Learn Philosophy The Hard Way

5 pointsekm210 comments

I am interested in learning all of the classics in Philosophy whether western or non western ,ancient and modern as a long-term project.Any suggestions how or where i should start?

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I like this book: http://www.amazon.com/Introduction-Philosophy-James-White/dp...

It has a collection of smaller readings so you don't get bored and/or get confused getting through a 500 page tome on your first go. The subjects covered are fairly interesting (epistemology, philosophy of mind, etc.), gathering material from a mix of time periods.

A problem with a book like that is that it doesn't have commentary built-in, so if you misread something and run with it, you might not realize it in the future, if ever. I used the above book in a class, which allowed me to bounce ideas off of other students and, of course, the professor. Consider getting a book more along the lines of a textbook when you're starting out so that you have readings along with commentary by a person knowledgeable in the subject.

Oh, and the Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy is useful: http://plato.stanford.edu/

Start with Nietzsche or Plato. (Easy reading) Avoid Kant for now. (Hard reading) I'd recommend an overview-type book first, try Archetypes of Wisdom, or even the audiobook series Giants of Philosophy.

http://www.amazon.com/Archetypes-Wisdom-Introduction-Douglas...

http://www.amazon.com/Giants-Philosophy-Series-Audio-Classic...

Also, working chronologically is probably a good idea. You'll get to see how ideas have developed (and stayed the same) over the ages.

Source: philosophy major.

I have cleared all of Plato's Dialogues and i am currently interested in a decent map of all other original works.

I might get some flack for this, but, honestly, read Ayn Rand's classic novel, "Atlas Shrugs" because its epistemology (theory about how we know things) is very much from Aristotle and Nietzsche (by her own description of her influences). I don't 100% always agree with her politics, but in terms of basic philosophical ideas, her work is a fun and easy way to get acquainted with mainstream classic Western philosophy. Again, not to get into politics, but if you want an easy way to understand a lot of what Aristotle was saying, her novel "Atlas Shrugged" really draws on these basic ideas (Law of Non-Contradiction, and so on).

One suggestion is to try and first familiarize yourself with the different types of philosophy. Philosophy is a pretty broad topic, so find something that is interesting to you (such as metaphysics, epistemology, ethics, etc..) and then read the relevant philosophical works. A great resource to get a general overview of many philosophical concepts is the Stanford encyclopedia of philosophy: http://plato.stanford.edu/

I try to re-read "Perpetual peace" from Kant, as I had to go through that book while I was student. I think it has some deep insight, so it's a book I'd recommand, even though it's not the easiest one to read.

For Western philosophy, you should read Copleston's History of Philosophy. It's probably the most comprehensive treatment of western philosophy out there.

Copleston is a good reference, but it's not a substitute for reading the original works, particularly given his (understandable) bias toward reconciling the history of Western philosophy with Roman Catholic theology; e.g.

"his [Giordano Bruno's] condemnation for heresy was perfectly understandable, whatever one may think of the physical treatment meted out to him. His ultimate fate has, of course, led some writers to attribute to him a greater philosophic importance than he possesses."

Furthermore, Copleston ignores non-western philosophical thought entirely.

No, it's not a substitute - it's an aggregation, or survey if you will. At 11 volumes, it's still quite lengthy. Telling someone to read everything ever written by an author mentioned in Copleston is on the order of casually suggesting they get a Ph. D - it's an insane amount of work.

And of course it ignores non-western philosophical thought: it's right in the title. You wouldn't get up in arms over a jQuery book completely ignoring C++ calling conventions.

Start by reading philosophy. That's where to begin.

What matters is finding something accessible and interesting.

So long as it isn't Ayn Rand.

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