I need some advice, I want to read philosophy, but I wonder if there's like a select your own adventure sort of deal...

I need some advice, I want to read philosophy, but I wonder if there's like a select your own adventure sort of deal, where you just read chronologically from "the greeks"

or do you just read the latest works you're interested in?

for example I'm fascinated by dialectical materialism right now from watching too many zizek memes and jokes

am I supposed to start reading works about materialism and idealism and work from there and follow the train of ideeas and understand everything, or is the overview that I've read about these ideeas and the history of their interpretation the common sense way of exploring these philosofies, before reading modern books looking back at them and interpreting them for me

basically, am I just a lazy hedonist that needs to recognize the value of reading everything from plato-s republic to present day, do i need to explore all of "must-read" philosophy?

im into the republic right now

The unlikeable people here tell you to read in chronological order because you "need" the foundation of old.

I think it's nonsense. You can use a smart phone without ever knowing that rotary phones and party lines ever existed.

Just read what you want, but watch the very thick onslaught of sad and desperate responses to this post.

I've just finished reading The History of Philosophy by Will Durant and would recommend it or something like it as an intro to phil

the thing is I want to read philosophy properly and explore all kinds, but I have no ideea how to go about doing that, do you just pick something or are there big and old philosophies that I as a layman am completely unaware of

thanks, will check it out

Continental philosophy tends to reference earlier Works quite a lot though, so often it's hard to understand unless you have at least a basic foundation in older texts. I do essentially agree with what you're saying though, in that you don't need an extremely deep knowledge of everything from the Greeks forward to understand, for example, deconstruction, but it helps if you know the broad outline of what preceeded it.

Agreed. The people claiming to start with the greeks here are idiots who started with the greeks and want to justify their miserable time spent by making is a social norm.

Read easier works by whomever you want. Specially if you have a general knowledge of the history of ideas. Zizek has some books which are easier than others. Read an introduction to some tough nuts if you want as Lacan.

I second that book. Though it's called The Story of Philosophy by Will Durant. He covers the Greeks to the present in a wonderful writing style.

philosophy is hard to get into so wide readings for a while is better than jumping into a long treatise that's some sort of foundation for something. I recommend an anthology anytime someone asks this question, so look for one that includes what you're looking for. Zizek does reference a lot of older philosophers though so you might be better off reading him and marx at the same time for example but that's probably not even necessary.

For Zizek, I recommend 'Violence'. Some of his other books do require a lot of background knowledge.

noted

Anybody notice whenever somebody wants to get into philosophy there's a rush of people recommending continental shit instead of what's actually taught?

Try doing whatever the fuck you want, retard.

the question is, do I trully want what I think I want? and so on

No. Read Plato's concept of justice you mongol.

no one wants to be the 'pleb' who recommends something from a philo 101 course

>no one wants to be the 'pleb' who recommends something from a philo 101 course
user your in a Zizek thread, you cant get more basic bitch than that.

whoosh!
Thirding Story of Philosophy by Durant. Covers near everything (but not the modern guys - it's an old book). You can then decide who you want to read further.
And you should read Zizek - he knows his shit.

I will advise you that if a certain main work of author is hard for you, just read some of his shorter ones. With Kant you can read his Anthropology lectures and Battle of the Faculties to get a decent grasp of his main project, without being bored.

Irrelevant.

>user your in a Zizek thread, you cant get more basic bitch than that.

Someone is wrong on lit, quelle surprise.

user, just because you attend a shit tier yuropoor university doesn't mean the rest of Veeky Forums does.

I reading Continental and analytic philosophy at a good UK university. Mainly Kant and Hegel in the later years. The analytic philosophy was a mere introductory stage of the simple arts of symbolic logic and basic epistemology and moral philosophy; as you progress you grow into superior European philosophy. I'm studying Hegel's philosophy of right, logic and phenomenology at the moment.

Show me where there is anything worthwhile in analytic philosophy. All I can find are rudimentary abstract 'positions' and wholly dead thinking.

Want to know how I can tell your German?

He does know his shit. The funny thing is that he's very clear and fluent despite the unfortunate and involuntary accent, but he knows 6 languages and can write and speak incredibly well.

Go ahead.

Yeah, his ticks and lisp throw people and make him an easy target for lulz. It's a damned shame, because he makes some very good points.
But people just see a weird fat guy who can't sit still and snuffles a lot.

Did you forget there's only like 9 continental programs in the entire UK when you made that post?

He's also very polite and serious about his writing, teaching, his work. People are shallow to just think 'wow. That funny East European, what a crazy guy', there's also a weird racism against balkan people.

read vedic literature. predates greeks by a thousand years at least and solved descartes and humes problems before they figured out their wording.

top picks.
-sri isopanisad.
-bhagavata purana (the bbt version has purports beneath each of the 18,000 verses so it's a comprehensive guide)
-bhagavad gita as it is (intro course)

>dialectical materialism

No, it failed, dont lose your time

>predates greeks by a thousand years at least
That's not true, but there is some good wisdom in there. The gita is the biggie, and likely the easiest introduction, but it's pretty opaque on first reading...if you dive into early indian thought, expect to swim for a long long time before you start to see a hint of the opposite shore.........

>there's also a weird racism against balkan people.
Especially americans aren't aware of this. Zizek talks about his experience with american and european students: americans are drowned in identity politics and insist on him being a racist, sexist proto-fascist while with european students he can make racist jokes no problem

4. Durant.

But you could also use some philosophy textbooks if you want to. The point is to get a general idea of some developments and get used to some basic terminology.

You CAN read whatever you want to after that, but do note that you'll always miss some stuff. Whether you know a lot or not, there's always room for misunderstanding. And this will grow if you do not know the earlier examples. But more important is to keep reading. If you feel like you won't actually get far in the chronological order, read whoever you wish. If somebody is really hard, you can always read some introductions to them. You learn philosophy by reading and thinking and applying it, so the important thing is to keep doing that, more so than doing it in the "right" order -Captain Obvious

It depends on where you live, though... Our schools teach a lot of exactly this stuff. There are whole courses dedicated to learning to read Hegel's phenomenology of spirit and shit.

There are also many Europeans who think he is a proto-fascist, especially if you look at leftist activists. Some respect his theory and use some of it but still think he is a piece of shit for his positions on correctness, refugees, etc. I honestly think that Zizek can be a bit lazy in his political commentaries: it isn't that they're not right, more like that in the current situation, they mostly serve the "right wing populist" position.

Yes, organizing the refugee stuff better with army of whatever would be cool, but is that a realistic approach for helping them? If he talks about solutions like that while also talking about how Europe has the right to protect their way of life etc, who does that serve?

Europe has no need to help them, there's no moral obligation whatsoever with them. It's clear that two or more radically different cultures can't live in the same space without trouble.

Check out the student's guide to Marx on marxists.org

Also read up on what historical materialism actually is

But that isn't Zizek's position!

He clearly thinks that EUrope has a moral obligation to help them. But he dresses it in such unrealistic terms.

Still, its not like the liberal left has anything better to offer. "Open borders!" chants are exactly what Orwell described when he said this: that every revolutionary opinion draws part of its strength from a secret conviction that nothing can be changed.

It is a safe position. It will not happen. If it would, it would be horrible, and the liberal left knows it, at least secretly. Yet it still gives one the moral higher ground.

>It depends on where you live, though... Our schools teach a lot of exactly this stuff. There are whole courses dedicated to learning to read Hegel's phenomenology of spirit and shit.

They teach continental philosophy on the continent? spooky.

I think the point being made on Veeky Forums was we don't really have any interest in academic philosophy and tilt widely to critical theory and political science but in anglo academic philosophy writing about zizek outside his early work or god forbid Derrida would get you literally laughed out of the department.

Quine and Frege are their equivalent of "must-read" philosophy.

READ

WHAT

YOU

ARE

INTERESTED

IN


dont listen to this fucking board, this is what every single professional philosopher will tell you. go on /r/askphilosophy, where real PROFESSIONAL PHILOSOPHERS are, instead of asking a bunch of 19 yr olds who dont even read

...

>askphilosophy
>Is having no values really the only logical action?
real PROFESSIONAL PHILOSOPHERS huh

The chronological thing only works till ~ the end of the 19th century. There are certain key works you need to be familiar, but you don't need to be familiar with everything before. If you are reading about materialism and idealism you should be familiar with Hegel, Kant, Marx, but you don't have to have read every single one of Plato's dialogues etc. My best advice would be to read the core texts, and then before you get into anything specific ask for the essentials pertinent to that field/thinker/work

Bump.