I'm not studying philosophy. Is there anything I should read before I tackle this book? Do I stand a chance of understanding at least the gist of it without a few years of study under my belt? I've always seen it as one of the behemoths of philosophical works so I'm a bit intimidated, but I want to try anyway. Should I also read Critique Of Practical Reason or is that one not as essential? Any advise?
>inb4startwiththegreeks
I've read Aristotle's Metaphysics, if it helps.
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I literally read Thus Spoke Zarathustra in my sophomore year of high school because my teacher said I'd like it. You'll be fine. Just don't try to read through it like a novel. If you're not taking your time and seriously asking yourself "what does it mean", you're not doing it right.
Read rationalists like Descartes and Leibniz.
Read empiricists like Hume and Locke.
...
>Descartes
I've read his Discourse on the Method. Will that help? I tried getting my hands on Leibniz's Monadology but couldn't find a copy. Locke strikes me as a bit of a bore, though.
Or he can read those after and then return to pic related. If he's trying to learn anything instead of just taking baby steps to understand bigger and bigger books, anyway.
That one wasn't exactly helpful
Aristotle's metaphysics is harder than the critique. The hardest part of the critique is managing kants over explanations and repetitions, usually he confuses you by making you think he has moved on but is actually re explaining something in a differently tortured prose. If you spent a few days doing nothing except thinking about the questions:
Is it possible to add knowledge independent of experience? What would constitute knowledge of that nature?
How do we know math? What is geometry? How can we add large numbers?
How would I define space to someone who can't understand what it is? How does space come to me? Do I know it? What about for time?
What exactly is an intuition?
What does it mean that my brain connects two events without my conscious choice? What is the internal logical structure of consciousness?
What is a judgement and what precedes them?
It would go a long to helping you.
>Locke strickes me as a bit of a bore
And you want to read Kant's Critiques? lol
Kant's Critiques are next level philosophy, they're as hard as they get. Even in university they don't make you study more than 3-4 pages per day, and on those 3 pages there are enough informations to write 10 essais.
It's long, it's badly written (even in Native German) and it's extremely complex. You should approach it when reading Locke is a cakewalk (because that's what it is, compared to Kant).
Anyway, first thing first, read Kant's logic. It is absolutely essential to understand everything that comes after. It's about 150 pages long, and it requires costant dedication and the consultation of secondary source. Treat it as boot training for his Critiques.
What's the fucking point of jumping right into CoPR with no experience of philosophy? What do you think you'll get out of it? Like would you get anything out of auditing a calc 2 course if you don't even know how to do linear algebra?
>What's the fucking point of jumping right into CoPR with no experience of philosophy?
Fun (also I didn't say I have no experience on philosophy, just that I'm not a uni student)
>What do you think you'll get out of it?
Fun and interesting ideas
>Aristotle's metaphysics is harder than the critique
You think so? I guess my main concern here is tricks of language then.
>read Kant's logic
I'll see to it
>Fun
Sorry if we don't derive fun from the same places, but reading Spinoza's Ethics and the four books by Nietzsche I've read has been some of the most fun I've had regarding literature (wish I could say the same about Plato)
>Fun
You still son't know the feeling of having studied Kant for 6 months and still have 250 pages left (which will take you more than a year).
Studying Kant is a struggle, and navigating his system becomes fun only once you have studied it, which will take you years of misery.
I have time
You know Veeky Forums is having an off day when people start claiming that you can read Kant without even Hume first.
>6 months and still have 250 pages left (which will take you more than a year).
Kant finishes you, you don't finish Kant
>user why are you punching that rock over and over can't you just get a chisel or
>FUN I'M DOING IT CAUSE IT'S FUN CAN'T A GUY DO WHAT HE WANTS
Any particular work by Hume I should read before tackling the colossus?
>WHAT DO YOU MEAN PEOPLE ENJOY THINGS THAT I DON'T
Also, start with the Greeks.
>cataract surgery
I lol'd
hey, thanks for this
>tfw you use the exact argument that the post you're replying to is mocking
point being?
YOU CAN'T GET INTO KANT WITHOUT YEARS AND YEARS OF HARD WORK AND STUDY LIKE I DID, OP, HOW DARE YOU
>Spinoza's Ethics
>Fun
Ew
>an exponentially increasingly complex explanation of EVERYTHING that starts so simple you don't notice how deep you've gone into the theological rabbit hole
>the Ulysses to Euclid's Elements
>not fun
You're dead inside
It gives me that really funny feeling when you read it a second time and the words start to look different
Why didn't I start earlier with the Greeks? Plato is actually pleasant to read and Greek stoics are way more interesting than their Roman watered down copies
>Plato is actually pleasant to read
Have we been reading different Platos?
You can read and understand every philosophy book if you have some basic idea of what philosophy is and has been since it's begining, if your a correctly anotated edition of the book and (this is the most important step) if you are not a brainlet
But you should really start with the greeks, not even memeing
sophie's world
It's garbage, don't bother. Enlightenment philosophy is literally the worst possible philosophy. It's so bad it made Schopenhauer autistic. He literally became autistic by reading too much Kant and realizing how fucking awful he is.
>what philosophy is and has been since it's begining
Well this is a bit troublesome, isn't it? I've had limited experience with philosophy (though, I'd like to think, above mere dilettante levels), and a big deal throughout its history has been defining what it is and what's its purpose.
>you should really start with the greeks, not even memeing
As mentioned, I've read Aristotle's Metaphysics and Plato's main dialogues (at least I reckon they're the main ones). I've read other greeks but I doubt they're relevant to understanding Kant (like Epicurus for example). What other greek text should I add to this admittedly thin corpus?
I like it, though. Guess I'm AuTiStIc ¯\_(ツ)_/¯
Do you have any actually useful advise or are you just here for the shitpostin'? It's alright if it's the latter.
>Enlightenment philosophy is literally the worst possible philosophy
Medieval christian neoplatonism/neoaristotelianism is even worse
Well in a sense yes, except if you also read yours in French. I nonetheless found most of his dialogues to be pretty fluid and refreshing to read given the topics covered, like some half-serious theater plays starring Socrates in the role of himself controlling debates with self-righteous pseuds and being an inquisitive dick to anyone
>except if you also read yours in French.
Not french, but a romance language nonetheless. I found his dialogues tepid and cumbersome. Also it really, really bothers me how necessary Plato thought adding one or two lines by other characters openly praising how fucking awesome Socrates is every time he says anything at all.
Socrates- I think that water is p. cool, dontcha think?
Some other dude- Without a doubt! Such a statement is a thing of beauty and genius!
Second dude- No one could have said it better, O wise and sexy Socrates!
Third dude (possibly Alcibiades)- FUCK ME SOCRATES
Of course the content and the ideas are interesting, but they're far, far more interesting than the prose itself.
>useful
A U T I S M
No, unfortunately not. It's horrible heresy but it is nothing compared to Enlightenment deism.
>I have nothing of value to say whatsoever
So I take it you're here for the shitpostin' then. Thanks for the bump though
>I literally read Thus Spoke Zarathustra in my sophomore year of high school
Because that totally compares with the Critique of Pure Reason
Yr right, it's more difficult.
>not fantasizing about sucking Socrates' wisdom out of his dick even before reading platonic dialogues
I must disagree: while I also quickly learned to skip through the "ohhhh socrates ur so smart" lines, I paid more attention to the not-so-subtle indications about MC Socrates dictating the tempo of the conversation. For example when in the Protagoras, Socrates as a character manages to gather every sophist around in the same spot of the scene and then casually dismisses their opinions, especially Prodicos who basically gets told "lmao i don't care" when asked about the meaning of 'fear' and 'fright'; or during the Gorgias where he repeatedly requires his opponents to speak more concisely before spouting entire monologs; or in another dialogue - I can't remember which one - where he threatens to leave the debate if his opponent does not speak the way he wants him to.
This sort of things are about as much enjoyable as the content in itself. There sure is a lot to write about the Idea of Good and Justice, but writing it in some sort of unpretentious play about homosexual Greeks bantering among lads is a well-appreciated bonus.
Well I mean, I don't regret having read the dialogues I've read, and probably will add a few more to my repertoire in the future, but overall the experience of reading these texts that are held at dizzingly high esteem by basically the whole western school of thought was, to be blunt, underwhelming
As a recent thread pointed it out, Plato is held in high regard thanks to the sheer impact of his ideas and their diverse interpretations on Western civilization throughout its history. Some analytic cunt might say that the history of an idea has no relation to the idea itself, but reading about the thoughts of a Greek fag about the nature of Man and his values that were deemed important enough to be read and commented for millenias can't hurt.
Thread in question for reference warosu.org
There's a book called "The Rationalists" that contains Descartes, Spinoza and Leibniz. There's also one called "The Empiricists" with Locke, Berkeley and Hume.
I can't tell if this is bait or not
Writing doesn't have to be stodgy and boring to be insightful.
I agree. Kinda wonder how that's related to the post you quoted, but still.
Read transcendental aesthetic and skip the rest
Kant was actually responding to Hume's radical empiricism.
Read "An Enquiry Concerning Human Understanding". You'll have fun with Hume, he was a very clear thinker.
Duly noted, though I already jotted that one down from following this (I was the one asking for clarification in the second-to-last posts