good picks. :hatsoff:
Who are your favorite philosophers?
- Thread starter Spud Crowley
- Start date
good picks. :hatsoff:
I'm certainly entertained. Is there anyone you actually like? I appreciate Machiavelli for "The Prince" and its relevancy today. Not much has changed. I like Marx's writing, but I certainly don't want class warfare or Communism.:dunno:
I have that Foucault/Chomsky debate in paperback. I believe it took place in Norway. Is it sad or laughable to think that that kind of thing would never come close to being broadcast on American television today..:weeping:
sure, there are plenty of people i like and can get something out of. but you know, to get in my t-mobile fave 5 you have to be special. i was being facetious with my mock critique of baudrillard, nietzsche, diogenes, zhuangzi, and zerzan. i think they are great and it would behoove us to pay attention to them. i am also fond of bodhidharma, john trudell, paul shepard and various pantheistic heretics of the middle ages whose names elude me. martin heidegger was pretty cool too, except for his Nazism.
yeah, television is a wasteland of vicarious apathy.
charles manson and ted kaczynski ain't too bad either, but i don't expect to get any sympathy by talking about "evil maniacs." :eek:
Well, I must disagree with the Marquis on his ideas of rape and some of abuse of prostitutes and servants. Indeed that is much of what had him jailed so often. But of course if not for all his time in prison/asylum he would not have had time for all of his writing and very little of his thought process would be available to us today.
What I always find intriguing about him is his idea of the "pursuit of pleasure" being paramount. His views on freedom I feel were somewhat ahead of their time, and he was persecuted for it. Most of all, his writings I feel are devilishly pleasurable reading. Sure, some of it is disgusting, but when I picture this man fulfilling his pursuits of pleasure by writing about what he could not do (due to his imprisonment), it makes for a beautiful picture and an open door to one of the most fascinating minds ever known.
As for Hobbes, what I like in particular about him is set out in his Leviathan. His ideas of a strong central government still live on today. I believe the only reason that he was pro-monarchy was because of the time he lived in. I feel he would approve of democracies today as there can still be a strong centralized government. His ideas on the populace giving up rights in return for protection from the government looks awfully similar to the post 9/11 US. He even said that abuses of power are par for the course. Now I don't agree that those should be the case, but it is interesting how his philosophy lives on. Plus, I always liked Hobbes since he was kind of a jack-of-all-trades and was easy for me to understand. But of course that's a shit reason to like someone's philosophy...lol
As for Rand, I find her to be a pleasant and inspiring read. I agree with her positions on individual rights, rejection of religion and indeed capitalism. Interestingly, she would differ with Hobbes on ideas of personal rights and government, but I think there are grains of truth to what they both had to say. I don't think there is anything wrong with her being a "propagandist" for capitalism. It may not work perfectly here in the US, but it could be a hell of a lot worse.
By the way, Spud. I appreciate you criticizing your own philosophers as well. It adds a touch of class to this interesting thread. :thumbsup:
to borrow terminology from malcolm x, i'm sure plenty of "house ******s" said the same thing in the 18th and 19th centuries.
Thomas Paine and John Locke do it for me. Used to be into Karl Marx like a lot of us may have been during our freshman years in college, but not anymore.
Carneades (c214-129BC). Was the leading Greek philosopher of his time and he eventually became the head of the New Academy. He had the reputation of a virtuoso dialectician who could argue equally persuasively for quite opposing points of view.
S
sputnikgirl
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There's a multi-quote feature...learn to use it, and quit post count spamming.
How did Plato, Socrates, and Descarte screw up the world? Broad, generalized statements don't constitute an argument.
If you think that is the extent of Machiavelli, then you obviously haven't read him very carefully. If you think Chomsky is weak...then look at your beloved Foucault. If he can't find a historical fact to support his argument, he makes one up....that's the mark of a great philosopher
At least Chomsky supports his argument with events that actually occurred...Foucault is off in la la land the majority of the time.No wonder you have to argue philosophy on a porn board...your generalizations would get you laughed out of any philosophy classroom or serious academic discussion.
There's a multi-quote feature...learn to use it, and quit post count spamming.
How did Plato, Socrates, and Descarte screw up the world? Broad, generalized statements don't constitute an argument.
If you think that is the extent of Machiavelli, then you obviously haven't read him very carefully. If you think Chomsky is weak...then look at your beloved Foucault. If he can't find a historical fact to support his argument, he makes one up....that's the mark of a great philosopher
No wonder you have to argue philosophy on a porn board...your generalizations would get you laughed out of any philosophy classroom or serious academic discussion.
i agree with nietzsche's critique of plato/socrates. they created a rationalized foundation for otherworldy speculation as well as the solidification and expansion of slavery, government and division of labor. i am against all these things. descartes is just one among a long line of modernist philosophers who furthered the separation of humanity from nature through a detached rationalism. it's all right there in heidegger. read nietzsche for plato/socrates and heidegger for descartes, although heidegger also covers the ancients. carolyn merchants The Death of Nature is a good eco-feminist book that covers some of this stuff too. There are many writers from various different critical perspectives who identiy plato/socrates and descartes as some of the key culprits in creating and/or solidifying fucked up shit.
i don't care about the intricate details of machiavelli. i read the prince and my impression was that this guy is just a pro-state jerkoff who was like an advisor to the hierarchy on how to control people. am i wrong? foucault is hardly "beloved" to me. i mentioned earlier i liked Discipline and Punish. that it. some of his other stuff is ok, but nothing great from my perspective. i've heard the accusation before that he made some things up. i don't know and i don't really care. if you care to provide some evidence of this, go ahead. i think the debate between him and chomsky speaks for itself in terms of who got the better of who intellectually.
i'm not too fond of classrooms and academic settings. fragmentation through specialization which induces a narcotic like state of turbidity is not for me. some of the greatest philosophers never had anything to do with universities, or if they did they were largely outsiders.
Eric Lindros
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H.L. Mencken
Jim Morrison
Neil Young
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Sig Hansen
Jim Morrison
Neil Young
Beavis
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Nietzsche, Sartre, Kant.
jedi007gotham
Closed Account
Idk.. but I have the Simpsons and StarWars one and they are a lot more intellectual than I expected.... not as good as the primary sources mind you, but not bad
as far as my favorite philosophers:
Does jesus count? If so, then Christ
John Locke, Plato, David Hume, Adam Smith, Edmund Burke, Bernard Mandeville, Thomas Hobbes, the Founders (if you count Declaration of Independence, Constitution and or Federalist papers as philosophical), Niccolo Machiaveli, Fredrich Hayek, Friedrich Neitzsche (although I don't agree with a word he says)
Ones I don't like:
Jean Jacques Rousseau (nothing more than asking for a leftwing dictatorship), Karl Marx, Aristotle, and Sartre, Camus,etc.
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all I have to say is fuck shit piss tits cocksucker motherfucker cunt.
From what I gather Camus attitude is that you are damned if you do and damned if you don't. so you should either enjoy life or kill yourself.
My main beef with Rand is that she was a believer in Manifest Destiny.
Also Descartes was a racist.
Spud, what do you think of Derrick Jensen? Not much of a philosopher and not really very original either, but I like the guy, he's a decent writer.
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