fav philosopher and why? oh, and merry christmas :)

>>716442514
and why Kierkegaard?

>>716442381
Kant, has three great minds behind the occidental thought Plato, Christ and kant, Kant is the closest to us.

It's scary actualy, the idea that a person's thoughts are able to traverse the centuries and dictate how we see the world, makes you realize how weak, vulnerable civilization is, reminds me of George Orwell's 1984.

>>716442514
my nigga

>>716442879
im not >>716442514 but i find fideism really compelling, along with most of what he said about religion

>>716442381
Fuck this, I'm drunk. I'd say Plato, Descartes and Nietzsche. Yes, that's three. Again, I'm drunk. Merry christmas to you all from a frenchman.

>>716442381
American, and not a eurofag, so I'll assume you're talking about favorite sorcerer, not philosopher.

Gandalf the Gray.

>>716444386
Oh, I forgot to explain why. I love Plato for his righteousness. To be able to be so faithful to your master that you devote your life to accomplish what you feel he couldn't, is something that amazes me. He seems... calm. I like being calm.

>>716444386
haha merry christmas you fucking frog. from a drunk Englishman (OP)

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Marcus Aurelius, because I've never felt better than when I decided to actually work at something.

>>716442381
Socrates and Diogenes

The stories we have of Socrates' are rich with meaning and serve as much better proverbs to live by than anything in most religious texts. The humble pursuit of truth through criticism of the self and the world around the self is an exceptionally good goal to live ones life by.

Diogenes was basically Socrates if he gave no fucks and let the world burn.

Jayden Smith.

>>716444386
I'd say Descartes because he's honest. That bastard is an honest man. Ce cavalier français qui partit d'un si bon pas, Péguy said. Everytime I wonder why I can't figure out something, Descartes reminds me that I'm deluded by all that is dark in me. Clarity. I'd say Descartes because he's clear.

>>716444653
fuck dude, fellow englishman here. it's 4 am and idk about you but i've got a busy as fuck day tomorrow.

>>716442381
Epicurus.

First guy we have on record getting that level of shit serious right, presenting humanity with a better path, then civilization taking the shitty goddamn fork in the road instead anyway, because savage apes are a shit species that can't be fucked to improve, and plunged us into 2000+ years of misery and stink we still haven't grown out of.

Possibly the worst turning point humanity ever failed to make.

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Voltaire. For his humor, mostly.

>>716445049
Meh, seeing family in the afternoon. Nothing else going on apart from that

>>716445097
Also, anon, he did not like shellfish.

Fuck sushi.

>>716445100
But I am German.
Have you seen our "humor"?

>>716444386
And finally, I'd say Nietzsche because I'm a frenchman. I believe in Christ, who was born this very night, many a century ago. German people... disgust me. Nietzsche was one of them who showed what monstruous thing christianity became between their hand. His anger and his despair help me understand what is wrong in my country, which couldn't stop Germany. Remember our Lord and Saviour, people. Or just keep drinking, like me! Merrey christmas!

>>716445309

I thought "Candide" was funny.

>>716445217
there is sushi without shellfish
but yea fuck rice niggers and their dumbass need to eat nasty shit

>>716445373
>I believe in Christ, who was born this very night

Nope

>>716445609
yep

>>716445373
>I like Nietzsche because I'm Christian

lol wut you must be drunk you fucking loon

Also your savior was not a historical person and the Bible is an evil book

>>716445647
nope

>>716445097
idk people got carried away and went full hedonist
f

>>716445639
>>716445714
And here we see Christian logic being deployed in a typical fashion.

>>716442381
Alan watts.

It feels like a pretty philosophy noob answer but I love the grand universe spins on reality he offers without being actually religious or spiritual, because while i love higher abstract thinkinf and being part of a bigger thing, im also not a huge fan of the supernatural. So his views suit me extremely well.

The story of the dream: where he points out if given infinite lives you could choose out entirely for yourself, you would eventually choose the life you live now.

The whole universe and how you really are it. The same way waves crashing on a beach is something the entire ocean does
Is the way you are something the whole universe is doing...


Also pretty appealing that, being 20th century and all, we can hear and see him in recordings and video.

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>>716442381
mother
fuckin
diogenes

>>716445647
i have yet to meet an atheist who would deny the mere existence of Christ
he was just as much a person as George Washington, Winston Churchill, or indeed any of the philosophers mentioned in this thread

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Timothy speed levitch
Makes me feel cozy

>>716446017
No need to feel ashamed about your answer. I greatly enjoy Watts. His ideas are calming and comforting and he more or less speaks entirely in gorgeous Taoist prose. Of all the thinkers in that generic trippy subgroup of philosophers his thoughts are indeed some of the more valid.

>>716446118
>except there are many accounts of George Washington and many more accounts of Winston Churchill.
Yet there is no single account for Jesus Christ ever existing
>and there were dozens of recorded scholars in the region at the time yet none of them ever made a single record of Jesus

Also the letter J wasn't a part of our language until the 14th century.

>>716446118
Most atheists are not historians. That's why Dawkins backed off on his claim about the historicity of Christ, he didn't actually know because his field is evolutionary biology.

However Richard Carrier is scholar of ancient history and does have the training and knowledge to make that judgement. Here is his argument, see for yourself if you find it convincing. I did.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WUYRoYl7i6U

>>716446118
Heres one.

I dont outright deny it but i also dont accept it.

Not a whole lot of real hard evidence of his existence. The best we have is that someone, quite obviously created a huge splash in the dawn of the common era. But whether it was a teacher and a leader who truly walked the earth claiming to be the son of God, a roman authour who created a fictional character that was extremely widely talked about and led to a broken telephone belief, or a king who needed to unify all of europe (like.. Say.. Justinian of byzantium.) who fused pagan rituals together and placed a man at the center everyone could relate to, and rewrote history to make it seem like he existed, ts up in the air, mang.

Real actual evidence of Yeshwah's existence would not surprise me. Fact is, the only sources ive ever seen claiming proof are strictly christian sources.

And yet people like muhammed are well documented historical figures.

Just to me, if he was real, there should.be no debate or controversy. He should be like plato socrates or muhammed. Clear cut historical evidence of his existence.

>>716442381
Schopenhauer because he wasn't afraid to take a good hard look at the ugliness of this existence and he had the honesty not to sugar coat it with a saccharine lie.

>>716446484
i find what Jesus' name was secondary to my faith i new and understand that his name is a product of modern language.
I have no desire to debate the mere existence of God with a stranger on the internet, but claiming that there is no historical legitimacy to the existence of Jesus of Nazareth is ignorant from a historical, not religious perspective

>>716447200
see>>716446624
The ignorant thing is to repeat the same, debunked arguments about Jesus of Nazareth being a real person. The evidence just isn't there, even when using the most relaxed standards possible in the field of history. Only apologists continue to perpetuate that old myth and since most actual historians are busy doing work in their field instead of taking on religious ignorance, it goes unchallenged.

>>716445100
Voltaire and Sartre are the two best of all time - though Plato was foundational

Candide: ou l'optimisme
&
Les Mouches
>the flies

are the two best books ever written, though Sartre has some pretty great other ones, like Huis Clos
>No Exit

Hard to pick one, but The Flies probably has more depth. The criticism of religion, from the anti-placebo of "original sin" to "once a man knows he is free, no god can touch him" and the freedom of the will, Sartre stacks layer upon layer

>But I love the ending of Candide, and its implications for life

>>716447113
>And yet people like muhammed are well documented historical figures.
>Just to me, if he was real, there should.be no debate or controversy. He should be like plato socrates or muhammed. Clear cut historical evidence of his existence.

EXACTLY

By the standards we using for literally every other historical figure we are positive actually existed, Jesus does not meet the criteria for legitimate historicity. Christians want special rules for Christ because they cannot fathom their savior not being a real historical person.

>>716447200
I would argue the contrary saying that there is any historical legitimacy to the existence of Jesus of Nazareth is ignorant from any perspective seeing as there is not a single piece of evidence that shows him ever existing.

Conversely I could say there was a farmer that became a prince and brought wealth and fortune to the people of Nazareth and even raised lions, he later became known as the great gazoo. This story has the same amount of legitimacy as Jesus of Nazareth because there is also no evidence to back it up. You can't prove Jesus was ever real any more than you can prove the great gazoo never existed.

Plato was overrated and an elitist. Plato's Republic was a dictatorship and people who admire him and his backwards philosophy hate humanity and freedom.

>>716445422
Candide is satirical, but I wouldn't call it "funny"

I like that 1) it destroys the idea of an all-powerful and all-beneficent god, but 2) makes the point of "why does any of this shit matter?" Like twitter and general social media shit - who gives a fuck? You can spend all your time on that, but it doesn't matter unless other dumbasses buy into it too

Giorgio Agamben or Byung-Chul Han... "modern" philosophers are awesome too.

>>716447689
that's pretty specious and ignorant

the premise of The Republic is that you can only have freedom when it's well-regulated. if people are truly "free," it will naturally devolve into a dictatorship of the most powerful. Think of what places in the world have the most "freedom" in a basic sense. Somalia is probably the most "free" place on earth, since there's not really a good government. Or maybe Afghanistan. All that happens is a dictatorship of the majority in the end - or at least of the plurality/those who are the toughest. And the you have no freedom - like Burma or North Korea, where the central government couldn't hold, until it was replaced by a military dictatorship

Nietzsche. Fun to read. Heavy shit. Gets at the psyche of the religious and the weak while not being a demeaning dick, just honest. He's empowering. Thus Spake Zarathustra is some of the more interesting shit I've ever read too. Layered and complex, lots of abstract metaphor and symbolism tied into near little parabalish stories. And it's easy to get angry at him but you know he's right. But life takes a variety to make sense of it all, he just happens to be my favorite, not necessity the best....whatever that would mean.

>>716448009
have you read Atlas Shrugged? Ayn Rand is pretty much the reincarnation of Nietzsche, applied to a general setting instead of being primarily abstracts

>>716448004
spoken like a true fascist

>>716447200
First I want to thank you guys for not shitting down my throat for the typo
>>716447679
As far I understand a vast majority of the scholarly community (including atheists) agree that to some degree, whether it be embellished or not that Jesus was a real person. Even Robert Price admitted that the claim that Jesus never lived ran counter to most scholars. Beyond this, I am sure that there are many historical people who have almost no records of their lives from the time that they lived, but that does not mean that I deny the life of Pliny the Elder or Narmer.

>>716448004
The problem with that is that it implies someone must know better than the rest and be in a position to "regulate" freedom. I don't think a human being has ever existed who I would trust with that position. Point to me the society that has not allowed its hierarchies of power to descend into corruption and decadence.

>>716448197
>spoken like someone with legitimate education

in order to have freedom, you need some regulation

Look at 2007 and how the US economy collapsed. Financial institutions weren't well-regulated, and not only did they do risky shit, but they fucked a lot of people over on purpose.
>give out home loans to people who can't afford them
>they pay for awhile
>they run out of money
>you take their house, and keep their money
>profit!

the most "free" the US has ever been was during the late nineteenth century. as railroads expanded, they fucked over workers pretty hard - and there ended up being armed insurrections against railroad companies because of how pissed people got. you had a relatively huge amount of people getting maimed and killed, in professions from mining to clothes-making to construction. people lived in squalor while people like Rockefeller and Harriman became millionaires - today, they'd probably be trillionaires with inflation.

tl;dr you can't have freedom without making measures to stop some from taking the freedom of others

>>716448609
>tl;dr you can't have freedom without making measures to stop some from taking the freedom of others

At which point you create and empower a new class of people intent on abusing the freedom of others and the cycle is renewed.

Hierarchies are fucked. Period.

>>716448305
>a vast majority of the people who have opinions are wrong
>there are bunches of people who have no records or accounts
What I'm saying is there is no evidence of Jesus's existence. Period.
there is none, no physical evidence and no first or secondhand accounts of his presence at any time in history.
Doesn't mean he didn't exist. It means that he exists just as much as the great gazoo.

>>716448569
name a democracy that hasn't had that...
>and isn't a shit country

>half of Europe is still a constitutional monarchy
>1% in the US rules the country
>Switzerland is basically a gigantic bank
>countries like France and Germany are becoming piles of shit, full of cucks dominated by their Muslim conquerors

>>716448796
That's why you have philosophers who rule according to developed principles. Granted, any human society will always have the weakness of being run by humans. If I had to choose three places to live in all of history, it'd be 1) modern China, 2) late-Lenin-era USSR, or 3) pre-WW2 Germany

>>716448845
My point exactly. Hierarchies are fucked, whether imposed or democratic. The government will inevitably become a tool of the oppressor. Abolish states. Form communes.

>>716448167
I have. And the funny thing is I disagree with the selfish elitist approach to society but I can see it as almost a natural law. ...at least a state we all exist in that has a sort of ebb and flow. And like I said, it is easy to get mad at them. I do say fuck Ayn Rand because I want people to be prosocial and good but I suppose maybe that's my weakness gleaming through. It's an interesting thing. ..does it make one powerful to use their advantages whether innate or circumstantial to exploit others for personal gain? Or is their power in empowering others? Which of these would ultimately lead to one's own demise? I think I know which, and if I'm wrong it could come at the cost of myself. But to follow the other I run the same risks.

>>716449028
Lenin and Mao are about the closest things in modern history to philosopher kings. Going back further, you have people like Frederick the Great, Louis XIV, and Marcus Aurelius.
>as close as humans will get to philosopher kings
>they just sucked at leaving successors as good as themselves. Mao is about the only exception on that list

>>716449017
Which is why I called Plato and his supporters fascistic. As I literally just said, find me the man with the character sufficient to be mankind's guardian and censor. But actually don't, because even if he existed I would not bow to him. No gods no masters. You either have the mentality of a slave or ambitions to be the master of others. In either case stay the fuck off my lawn.

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The Žiž, because it's all about our unethical relationship to the death drive and anxiety politics.

diotima

>>716448832
But I mean (and I recognize this as a cop out) you would have to be just a little cynical to dismiss the incredibly unprecedented impact that whatever truth there is or was behind the idea of Jesus
IDK I think this discussion just comes down to a person's appetite for truth. The evidence that I see for Jesus' existence, is simply not compelling enough to convince you, just as the evidence for the great gazoo is not compelling enough for me.

>>716449141
>I want people to be prosocial and good but I suppose maybe that's my weakness gleaming through
pretty much. that's why sociopaths are dramatically more successful than normal people

the whole point of a "philosopher king" is that their own personal ambitions are subservient to the public good. that's why Plato speaks about the tripartite soul: your desires and spirited-ness must drive you, but be guided by your logical brain

>>716449192
>You either have the mentality of a slave or ambitions to be the master of others
not understanding what a "leader" is

No Albert Camus?

>>716449186

"Had Mao died in 1956, his achievements would have been immortal. Had he died in 1966, he would still have been a great man but flawed. But he died in 1976. Alas, what can one say?"

>>716449449
Certainly not fucking Lenin or Chairman Mao.

>>716449596
that his philosophy still guides what will soon be the most powerful country in the world, built on the foundation he laid out

>>716449402
Too bad the philosopher king is a fictitious creature and the tripartite soul a pipe dream. Even if one such individual existed, even if somehow such an incorruptible individual managed to find their way to the helm of even a moderately important nation, it would be only a short matter of time before they would be undone either from within or without by lesser men. This is all besides the point that such philosophies of hero-worship and hyphenated freedoms is indeed quite characteristically unfree.

>>716449596
>>716449736

The Tiananmen Square protests were probably one of the greatest things that's ever happened for a country. In the end, there was a sort of agreement between the people and the government: accept our rule when it comes to policy/military affairs/international relations, and you'll get a booming economy. It essentially made the government into philosopher kings: able to rule as needed, but providing a good life for the people. that sort of agreement is still in place in China

>>716449736
A foundation built on the graves of tens of millions of Chinese
I mean Chinese history pretty much just cycles of millions of peopling dying in fairness

>>716450064
>but providing a good life for the people. that sort of agreement is still in place in China

Debatable. Also utilitarian to an unsettling degree. And please just call the Philosopher King what it actually is, a dictator.

>>716450239
yea i am not sure why you guys are calling a genocidal egoist with admittedly impressive logistical talents a philosopher king

>>716450064
>A good life for the people

Really? You actually believe that? Chinese society is as stratified by class and marred by poverty, pollution and political repression as the United States. If this was the deal the Chinese people made, it would seem that history has shown that they dun goofed.

>>716450126
so? sometimes it's necessary to cull the population. it's the same reason people cut their grass

>>716450239
the difference between a philosopher king and a dictator is that the former is ultimately subservient to the public good. people like Mussolini or Kim Jong Fat have fucked over their countries pretty bad. People like Mao, Lenin - or FDR, to give a more abstract example - made their country pretty fucking great

Deleuze because he opened the doors to equality and non binary thought

Diogenes.
Dogs R rad

>>716450378
>as stratified by class and marred by poverty, pollution and political repression as the United States

Honestly, I'd much rather live in China. There, the "lower class" are ignorant farmers. In the US, it's lazy people who spend their whole lives on welfare. The main difference is that in China, the hard-working people don't prop up the worthless pieces of trash, and enable them to keep mooching

>>716450401
yea man those I bet those peasants were thrilled that they starved to death knowing that the shitty steel they made was going to all be wasted when they starved to death

Sun Tzu because his advice is tried and true.

This thread helped me realize that Plato is the bedrock of classical conservative philosophy. The school of thought which says that a nation is an organism unto itself with its own rights, and the people that populate it but organs with obligations to their betters and lowers. An illiberal philosophy that stands in contrast to the ideals of the Enlightenment and thankfully one we've mostly moved past.

>>716450586
en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Culling

>>716450401
FDR didn't make the US great, the US's people made FDR great. Great leaders are lifted to greatness by the people below them, who organize and build institutions and participate in society. No one person has ever built a nation to greatness alone. Stop fetishizing power.

>>716450583
You forgot the ruling class, the bureaucrats and party officials who live opulently while their countrymen toil in the rice field and in sweatshops, suffocating on the smog and dying in the firing squads. Your view of China is as idealistic as it is unrealistic, I say this as a communist.

>>716450668
Yea, we should all be like the Duetschcucks who can't even sing their full national anthem because people might think it's too aggressive, or Sweden where they invite Muslims to rape their women

>>716450583
It is kind of funny how you expect it to be the other way around given how self righteous both countries are about being "communist" and "capitalist"
tbh America seems to have a more efficient meritocracy, though they could be the bourgeoisie indoctrination talking

>>716450935
Neat strawman you've constructed there, fascist. Maybe someone who actually believes that will come along and argue with you.

>>716451035
>>716450935
o shit the /pol/ jackasses are swarming in

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>>716450511
>>716450668

>>716451035
>i don't like it, so it's a strawman argument

Those are the implications of the kind of shit you talk about. When you have this liberal-paradise bullshit, look at what happens to a country. Germany is pretty fucked if AfD doesn't win next year. France is going down the drain pretty rapidly. Sweden is becoming shitty. Look at the US - California has driven itself into bankruptcy, and would be a fucking shithole if it weren't for the Hollywood and tourism money that rolls into the big areas

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>>716442381
My friend has a philosophy degree. He's pretty cool. Never liked the dead ones.

Does that count?

Merry Christmas, everyone.

>>716451249
It would take me a while to explain exactly why your entire point is false. Mainly, the premise of your argument is that the ideals of the Enlightenment are the root cause of the problems you've described. This is false. The root cause is neoliberalism.

>>716451462
I think freedom is like alcohol. You drink a good amount, and you have a good time. You drink all there is, you pass out, throw up, and choke on your vomit.

>>716442381

Thomas Jefferson

>>716451462
But could it not be said with some merit that neoliberalism to some degree came out of ideas founded during the enlightenment?

>>716451792
are you enjoying 7th grade and learning about the Presidents?

>>716451590
Well there are different types of freedom. Too much negative freedom without enough positive freedom to balance it out and you basically tear the social contract asunder. What we are seeing is the result of an unmitigated torrent of negative freedom, further empowering the powerful, and a clamping down on positive freedom, making the powerless anxious and restless. The powerful loot with reckless abandon while the powerless fall back into baser tribalistic tendencies as our entire global system and way of life teeters on the edge of collapse.

>>716449456
I got you covered Anon. Camus is great.

I am trying to get more knowledgable on the topic of philosophy, as silly and futile as it may be, because I've always been somewhat interested in it.

I have read a bunch of Camus' work and also have Nietzsche and Sartre lined up because from what I could tell they were similar in their topics. Who else should I read to get a broader understanding of all this? I don't mind disagreeing with it - that comes from opinions, which aren't inherently wrong.

Hook me up, Anons.

>>716451825
Yes it could be said. The ideals of the Enlightenment have their problems, and these problems are all pretty much perfectly distilled in the ideology of neoliberalism. But I still would prefer the Enlightenment to classical conservatism any day. I rather like having rights. I don't think the problem is with the rights we currently recognize, but rather with the rights we do not.

>>716452145
yea i would say that some retards got carried away by their boners for Smith and through the ensuing fever, we got the alt right as an immune response

>>716451883
you sound like quite the pleb, but you're essentially just making my point... that, or you're completely retarded

if you mean positive/negative in the sense that you should have "good" freedoms and not have "harmful" freedoms - that's basically what I've been saying. the point of philosopher kings is to provide the ideal balance of freedom, which allows the state to run as well as possible

if you meant it in the sense that "positive freedom" is the ability to do things, you have no point.

the latter half of your point though is essentially what I was describing - that when you have unlimited freedom, you end up with oligarchies where some - the rich, the powerful, the military, etc. - fuck over everyone else. that will always happen when you have too much freedom. everything from the Praetorian Guard ruling Rome to Putin's kleptocracy

>>716451869
Most of America's most influential philosophers have been political leaders and indeed Presidents. Jefferson is actually one of the better in terms of his ideas. He wanted to create an democratic, egalitarian society of educated citizen-farmers. Pretty good plan if a bit idealistic.

Thomas Paine was also a badass.

>>716452409
Most of middle school football's star players are running backs. Doesn't mean those kids are the best players in the country, and could run past an NFL defense...

in other words, "America's most influential philosophers" suck compared to the rest of the world. Rand is the best, and she was born in Russia

>>716452399
Obviously I was using the term positive freedom as the ability to do things, that's what it means in this context I assumed you'd realize that but clearly I assumed too much of you.

The situation we have is unlimited negative freedom and very little positive freedom, that is my point. This point seems to have flown above your head, which is a shame but that doesn't mean that I don't actually have one.

>>716452572
trololol

Stefan Molyneux, brought me alot of understanding in my life

>>716452656
>Obviously I was using the term positive freedom as the ability to do things, that's what it means in this context I assumed you'd realize that but clearly I assumed too much of you.
oh, sorry. in that case, you're retarded and your point sucks.

>>716452769
Great rebuttal.

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>>716452818
"negative freedom" is a moronic concept. it's just another way of calling people apathetic - since they're either apathetic, or negative freedom is irrelevant. The only ways it matters are things like "freedom to abstain from religious practice" or things that only have a tangential relevance.

>>716452895
Yeah, his concept of mechanical vs organic solidarity in societies was pretty valid in my book even if he got their respective stability backwards.

Nietzsche, because fuck everything and everybody, especially God.

>>716452895
I read some Durkheim, but I'd call him a founding father of sociology more so than I'd call him a philosopher. While all great men of his time were partially philosophers, I don't think he contributed that much in that regard.

I've read Division of Labor and On Suicide, which are great books - but I wouldn't really call them philosophy books.

>>716453031
I think you don't understand the terms. Negative freedom is people's freedom from interference in their lives from the state. The Bill of Rights is mostly a list of negative freedoms Americans have. Positive freedom refers to people's rights to things, things like food and healthcare and education. We have a lot of negative freedom, at least in the economy, and very little positive freedom. This is the crux of the issue.

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I like all of the objectivist philosophers, i.e. the only ones who expanded knowledge of metaphysics, epistemology, ontology, moral philosophy, etc. instead of making up hazy bullshit.

>Aristotle
>St. Thomas Aquinas
>Ayn Rand

>>716453463
The objectivist's notion of the individual is shallow and, for all practical purposes, useless.

>>716453284
Most of the Bill of Rights is either irrelevant or used in some fucked-up way. The First Amendment is the only one that really matters
>which includes freedom of religion, as I mentioned, although it unfortunately doesn't provide freedom FROM religion, and in many ways, it's not even enforced - some states technically bar atheists from public office

The Fifth Amendment has some good use, but it often enables criminals - the same as the Fourth The only thing you really need to bar is torture for confessions - but even that is pushed to the side for non-Americans/terrorists. The eighth amendment is good, but is stretched too far - we need an express lane for the death penalty, not obstruction

You don't really have to worry about troops being billeted in your house anymore. The right to bear arms is a fucking shitfest. Speedy trials are a fucking joke. Etc. Even those aren't really "negative freedoms" - they just set up how the government operates, and create a lot of illogical repercussions when they play out in practice

>>716453463
>St. Thomas Aquinas
>Ayn Rand
You don't know anything about [at least] one of those people...

>Christian monk
>Atheist 1%-er

>>716454211
Ok. I'm not really sure what most of your post is responding to, but ok.

The Bill of Rights explicitly limits what the government may do in its interactions with the citizen. This is the definition of a negative freedom, so your last point is just plain wrong. It can both be a negative freedom as well as a dictate on how the government will operate.

Never once did I make a value judgement about whether the Bill of Rights was good or not in my post, I simply used it as an example. I'm sorry that this, too, has flown over your head.

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>>716442381
epictetus.

based philosophy on "shit happens, don't be a bitch about it"

pic related. it's a bitch.

>>716454302
nah he's just got an extremely compartmentalized worldview. Like most Christians. Follow Christ's word except in regards to how we treat each other, in that specific instance its free market all the way baby! Pretty common position in Murica.

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>>716454302
If pointing out that Ayn Rand and Thomas Aquinas had very different lives and religions constitutes some great insight to you, I'll go out on a limb and guess you have brain damage.

Okay. Here is why anybody who says Plato is a fucking dumbass.

His allegory of the cave is the most "LOVE ME SEMPAI" piece of shit theory that was ever made.

So there's these dudes in a cave tied up and see shadow puppets of the world. This is all they know so they think its the real world. Eventually one escapes and sees the beauty of the real world, not the shadows. He's freaked out but gets used to it. Eventually he goes and tells his friends but they don't believe him and shun him.

Sounds great right?

Well lets see, Socrates was shunned for having views the Greeks thought crazy.

Plato just wrote how his non-penetrative butt-buddy saw the world for what it is and he's so great and his dick is just the most delicious

>>716454435
So your point is that there's too much negative freedom, but you don't want philosopher kings to be able to have a freer hand to provide positive freedoms through good governance...?

seems like you're undermining your own point

ITT: College kids googling 'philosophers' and trying to pick up an 'edgy one'.

>>716453191
you never even read Nietzsche, haven't you?

My boy Machiavelli

>>716454797
Good governance is governance by the governed. You empower people to rule themselves, not some grand leader whom you place all your faith into. The point is that nobody is good enough to rule on high and by building up the authority of an individual and the institutions and mechanisms they would use all you do is guarantee that tyranny will inevitably overtake society. The state is the means by which the powerful maintain their positions. As I've said earlier, abolish power, abolish political hierarchy entirely even. Form communes, co-ops, etc.

>>716455418
The Prince was a satire, Machiavelli wrote it because he was bitter about the loss of his beloved Republic of Florence.

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any Spinozafags here? His only faults were being a Jew and not being a moral realist.

>>716455467
unless you have a place like Switzerland where you spend every waking hour doing nothing but voting, you need representative government

either you advocate anarchy, which ultimately devolves into oligarchic tyranny, or you simply debate who is best suited to govern. and the close the governors are to philosopher kings, the better.

your only real point seems to be the idea of bad people ruling in any form of government - which is the entire meaning of what a philosopher king is - someone who rules justly, and in the interest of the state as a whole. the only reason to limit their power is because they're an inferior ruler, who doesn't obey that premise...

>>716455620
then it's the most goddam serious satire ever written, not to mention how many people based their 20th century facist regimes on a satire.

>>716456045
My point is there is no such thing as a philosopher king and never will be unless we build and program one ourselves. I'm advocating anarcho-communism of a sort, yes.

Nietzsche because as far as I've read him I didn't find anything that I disagree with (except his thoughts on Wagner... I like Wagner's music and i think it's pretty good, even if he sounds french lol).

>>716456101
It was a satire of fascistic rulers and their methods, so that's unsurprising.

>>716455945
those are pretty serious faults, anon.

people think the only way to limit a philosopher king would be through the political process. But a better way would be through culture. Also, you want to set up a system where the monarch and the commoners are on the same side in a constant struggle agaisnt the aristocracy. In such a system, the monarch is more likely to respect the commoners' rights, and the commoners are more likely to adore the king. But you can't remove the nobles altogether because then the conflict would be between the king and the commoners.

>>716456898
his fellow Jews didn't like him, at least not at the time, and his philosophy can be pretty easily modified to include an element of moral realism.

>>716457172
Not being a moral realist isn't a deal breaker. Recognizing that all ideas lack implicit meaning or value doesn't mean one can't say that some are preferable to others anyway.

>>716456250
>anarcho-communism
so... despotism after a few years?

>claims such a ruler isn't possible
>proposes a system that rapidly devolves

the closest viable system of anarcho-communism is China... They give the people a lot of freedom, as long as it doesn't threaten the government's rule. They may be a bit heavy-handed on some censorship, but it's holding their society together very well.

>>716457414
and that's what Spinoza did, and his criteria was how useful an idea was to man. I don't necessarily agree with that, but it's not even that big a part of his thought. The irony with his Ethics is that his ethical philosophy is the least developed part of it.

>>716457719
I view China as the opposite of a good philosopher kingdom. The Party gives the people an illusion of democratic political control while giving them very few freedoms. While an ideal philosopher king gives his people many freedoms but gives them no control over himself.

>>716457719
This conversation is over. You think freedom is impossible without a dictator. You think there is something natural about hierarchy, as though our species hadn't lived most of its existence in a more or less communistic way and indeed hierarchy itself is the aberration. You think China is paradise, probably the oddest thing about your argument. I think freedom is only complete when we dispense of dictators entirely. This is going in circles. Happy holidays, anon, I hope one day you can see the need dispense with the need for saviors, masters and unfreedom.

>>716458184
>You think there is something natural about hierarchy, as though our species hadn't lived most of its existence in a more or less communistic way and indeed hierarchy itself is the aberration.

nah that's a lie, prehistoric hunter gatherer life was shit if you weren't the alpha

>>716458333
It was shit because we lacked mastery over nature. It is possible for us, today, to use our technology to build a communistic society so efficient, sustainable and free of hardship that it would free the energies of mankind to do truly remarkable things. At the very least we could dispense with much of the misery and toil that we subject ourselves to in order to keep the sick old man of capitalism alive.

>>716458588
tbh capitalism has created abundance that has reduced material (though not spiritual and cultural) human suffering to its lowest level in a long long time. I'm not even a free market cuck and even I have to recognize that.

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like of women but more as an edgy joke then something i take for realz

>>716458849
It has built material wealth and technology, certainly, but reduced material suffering? It has more accurately outsourced the suffering of a privileged few to far flung places as well as to the future. On this second point, I elaborate by saying that our planet's environmental problems will spell doom for potentially billions of people and much of this stems from capitalist externalizing costs onto the environment. We buy our pleasure with the blood and suffering of future generations as well as the toil of those unlucky enough to be born outside the west. Ultimately, with capitalism, for one to have and enjoy another must have not and suffer.

>>716458133
...huh? where exactly is there an illusion of democratic political control? the Party runs the state. they just provide economic prosperity, and a good life for those who contribute to the Common Good. It's not about picking out one specific individual and measuring the system based on how free that person is - it's about how well the state is run, and how prosperous it is.

>>716459387
Disturbingly utilitarian. Take your logic to the extreme and we would be justified in beheading one person if it would slightly decrease the discomfort of fifty others.

Also conservative. The state is not a person, the state does not have rights. People have rights.

You creep me out.

>>716459575
Look at Africa. Pretty much all of it was better off under colonial rule than it is now. Except for Egypt, who are pretty much Middle Eastern, the whole continent has pretty much gone to shit.

Africans are a lot worse-off now that they're "free." If I made a list of the 20-worst countries to live in, they would all be in Africa.

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my favorite philosopher is killopius, who once said "kill OP."

I like Heraclitus. He's very "Eastern" for a Hellenic philosopher, I guess because he's pre-Socratic and also he lived in Ephesus which helped. I dig his hippy-dippy parable nonsense. Makes me feel good. παντα ρει.

>>716460180
>Implying Africa is monolithically shit
>Implying all African countries had identical experiences with colonialism and decolonization (compare Ghana to Congo)
>Implying de facto colonialism ever really ended
>Implying Africa's problems are not, at least in many instances, products of colonialism's legacy
>Implying the rest of its problems aren't the same problems every other country embedded into global capitalism suffers from

Lots of bullshit in this argument, man.

>>716460860
aside from oil-rich capital cities, Africa is pretty much "monolithically shit"

I'm not arguing their experiences under colonialism are identical - but that, for pretty much all of them, they were better off under colonialism, either before or after

I assume your point is that oil-, diamond-, etc.- rich despots collaborate with the West? They only way there's still "de facto colonialism" is that their countries are such shitholes they depend on foreign aid to not die

colonialism caused problems, but overall, it made their lives a whole lot better

Africa has way worse problems than any other continent. Even rice-paddy Asian farmers are better off than starving-in-a-ditch-without-water Africans

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>>716460860
>global capitalism
>colonialism's legacy

Judaic horseshit.

>>716461208
I don't dispute that colonialism brought investment, infrastructure, and technology to areas of Africa that lacked them prior. Please don't dispute that much of the political and cultural turmoil in Africa today results from way in which Europeans divided up the continent, exploited ethnic tensions, and generally looted the continent of its natural wealth. In many instances, though not all, the way they decolonized directly created the problems that countries still suffer from today. Congo is the most obvious example, but as another less obvious example conflict diamonds wouldn't be a thing if not for De Beers privatizing Africa's mineral wealth and creating a market for it in the west. It is far less rosy than you would like to portray.

>>716461976
>Africa kicks out Europeans
>Europeans say "Ok, fuck you guys"
>AWW, THEY DIDN'T LEAVE A GOING AWAY PRESENT!!!

Africa is free now. If they want to reconfigure their continent, they can. But they fucked things up so badly that they are nothing but a sea of despots.

Maybe they shouldn't have risen up and kicked out the hand that fed them...

- that argument sounds like the 3rd-wave feminists who say "beautiful at every size" then complain men don't want their fat asses. You can't kick out Europeans and then bitch about how the Europeans left.