I want to start reading philosophy, and I'm always told

>>7648527
Plato. Alternatively philosophy introductions. I recommend Peter Kreeft's The Platonic Tradition.

Read this: http://plato.stanford.edu/entries/presocratics/#Mil

Then go to Plato.

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>>7648527
don't fall for the greeks meme, start with the analytics lad

milesian is usually the starting with their motion and change and stuff

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If you want to go in hard, go with this order:

The First Philosophers: The Presocratics and the Sophists
The Complete Works of Plato
The Complete Works of Aristotle

Or,

The Stanford Article on the Presocratics and the Sophists

Euthyphro, Apology, Crito, Phaedo, Ion, Meno, Symposium, Republic, Timaeus

The Organon, Physics, Metaphysics, Ethics, Politics, Rhetoric, Poetics

>>7648659
>The First Philosophers: The Presocratics and the Sophists

Honestly I don't know why this book is suggested around /lit/ so much, Burnet's and Guthrie's books about the Presocratics are much better.

>>7649007
Either way there's really not that much conceptual depth to be found in the Presocratics as a whole, you can read the stanford link above and you're not be missing much, MAYBE Parmenides and Heraclitus deserves a little more attention but that's it.

>>7649007
Maybe because not everyone has access to a university library or is willing to spend £100 on books about the Presocratics

>>7649016
You shouldn't spend money you don't have on Presocratcs though. See >>7649013


If you are short on money might as well buy Plato.

Start with Plato if you MUST start with the Greeks.

Fuck the Presocratics.

>>7649027
I was saying that as a reason why people would buy the Oxford book, it's far cheaper.

>>7649063
Ok.

>>7649013
>there's really not that much conceptual depth to be found in the Presocratics as a whole
>wew lad
though I agree if you read the superficial books treating the Presocratics as "natural philosophers" it's a waste of time.

>>7649104
What I mean is that even though there are, obviously, concepts explicitly written by them (such as the principle of identity of Parmenides or the objective dialectic and motion of Heraclitus) they are not developed further, they stop at those determinations as they are in themselves and not as a systematic philosophy, which is the role of Plato and Aristotle. The notion of subjectivity is also not present yet.

If you're interested in the history of philosophy, start with Thales

If you're only interested in relevant philosophy, just start with Plato

>>7649129
This is not to detract anything from them mind you, for what they done they must remembered as heroes of philosophy and absolutely necessary as a beginning, however much archaic are their thoughts.

>>7648574
Don't do this, start with Hume, then more Hume, then you can dabble in some Desecartes, then just find your own way around, a lot of people go for Kant next.

>>7649143
You should probably read Plato and TeaTotle just to save face thoe.

>>7648527

Thales.

>>7649143
>not reading Aquinas or Augustine
>Hume before Descartes
>Kant before Spinoza
Huh

>>7649178
>not reading Aquinas or Augustine
Not needed, most modern readers will find them boring, save for later.

>Hume before Descartes
Hume is much easier to get into than Desecartes, remember, we're recommending this to someone who has never read philosophy, it is very easy to put off these people, reading Hume lets them know there are modern philosophers out there they might find rational.

>Kant before Spinoza
I never mentioned Spinoza, whut?

And if you read Prologomena, I don't think you need anything more than Hume and Desecartes to get a good amount of fun out of CoPR

So I do not need to read the iliad and odissey, just fell for the meme?

>>7649291
You don't need to. The Iliad and Odyssey are part of "Start with the Greeks", as they are both works of Ancient Greek literature.

>>7649291
you don't need to, but you should, they're great books.

I will say that, when I read Aristotle, I also read Eastern philosophers like Zhuangzi and Nagarjuna who were working parallel to Aristotle's precursors. It requites some knowledge of prior concepts like svabhava, for instance, but I think it's definitely helpful!

I also recommend Sextus, as well as Middle Eastern philosophers like Ibn Sina and Al-Ghazali.

>>7649340
I am halfway through The Iliad, enjoying it.

There is a really good /lit/ doc about Western philosophy.

I was making my way through it but I lost the link. Does anyone have it?

>>7649410
https://docs.google.com/document/d/1y8_RRaZW5X3xwztjZ4p0XeRplqebYwpmuNNpaN_TkgM/pub

>>7649159

>Thales

He was literally an autistic stemfag that paid no mind to the meta and first principles. He wasn't really a philosopher, just an intermediate between that and a mystic.

From Russell's Problems of Philosophy -

The student who wishes to acquire an elementary knowledge of philosophy will find it easier and more profitable to read some of the works of the great philosophers that to attempt to derive an all-round view from handbooks. The following are specially recommended:

Plato, Republic
Descartes, Meditations
Spinoza, Ethics
Leibniz, The Monadology
Berkeley, Three Dialogues between Hylas and Philonous
Hume, Enquiry concerning Human Understanding
Kant, Prolegomena to any Future Metaphysics

u could do much worse than this list as a starting point. Problems of Philosophy is a good place to start as well

Read an introduction book of philosophy and go from there. An introduction book will help you find who you like and then you can read more on them.

The story of philosophy by Will Durant is what I would recommend

>>7649574
I love this list. I would, however, urge Aristotle (for obvious reasons) and Augustine (for his assertions that we see corporeal bodies, not representations) to be added.

Why didn't you include Aristotle?

>>7649342
Al-Ghazali actually destroyed Islamic philosophy. He was an anti-philosopher.

>>7649759

i bet you eat pasta with ketchup

>>7649789
You don't know what I said

>>7649758
it isn't my list.....

>>7650541
Yeah, I realize I misread that. I wonder why he doesn't include Aristotle...

>>7649213
>Descartes putting off people
I don't get most philosophy, but I read the Discourse on the Method when I was about 16, and understood and loved every bit of it.

>>7651422
Maybe not Desecartes, but I can imagine some very, very, new folk getting put off by Plato, definitely.

Using 4chan lingo, many of these people, at least the ones I see in person are quite fedora tier, so they would be quick to dismiss Plato for not being an atheist (I don't even jest).

This is why I say Hume is very good on the modern skeptics pallet.

>>7649178
>he fell for the chronological progression of thought meme

>>7648527
Anthony J. Greeks is a favourite of mine

>>7648659
I don't think it is really neccessary to read all o Plato. Hacket'ss book is like 1800 pages long and some dialogues seem like a fun read but not paramount towards philosophical discussion. For example, there isn't really a need to read Lysis if you're going to read the Symposium. I mean, Lysis is a hilarious read, but it is not essential to have read it, imo.

>>7649032
>fuck the presocratics
>not realising the vast amount of influence Protagoras had on Platonic thought

Tbh, atleast read Heraclitus, Zeno, and Protagoras.

Though I have to admit that the book on pre-socratics usually recommended by /lit/ is almost entirely a book concerning pre-socratic cosmological thought.

>>7649291
It is essential to have read the Iliad and Odyssey. So much of great literature and philosophy can be traced back to Homer. You would miss so much if you have not become familair with Homer, Aeschylus, Hesiod, Sophocles, Euripides etc etc. I would strongly advice to have read it. Regardless, if you don't you will have to read it some time in your life if you want to be serious about philosophy and literature.

>>7652405
That's why it's on go in hard, the average fella doesn't need to read Cratylus (unless he's interested in linguistics).

>>7652413
>Zeno but not Parmenides

>>7649574
>No Aristotle

Russel truly was a hack

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Best book about the Pre-socratics coming through: mostly ancient commentaries (Plutarch, Aristotle, Aetius &c) about them and all (available) texts of the philosophers; bullshit modern academic commentaries kept to a minimum.

There is a scanned pdf available on libgen if you are poor like me.

>>7652796
If you think you're the kind of person that will eventually side with the anlaytics then don't start with the greeks god damnit.

>>7652810
>If you think you're the kind of person
>the kind of person

This is a field of study, not Facebook.

>>7652428
I'd love to see research done into the average IQs of analytic v. continental philosophers.

>>7652424
You can if you're into culture and shit, for the philosophy? Fuuck that, ignore it completely.
If you want to be serious about philosophy it's not needed. If you want to be serious about philosophy AND literature, maybe then you'll have to go back to them.
I think they're too much for newcomers.

>>7652413
>Heraclitus, Zeno, and Protagoras.
Alright, these aren't too bad for a beginner but they are not the best.

>not realising the vast amount of influence Protagoras had on Platonic thought

Western Philosophy is not a footnote to Plato, he's a pioneering genius who started it all but that doesn't mean we have to start with him if we have better options available.

>>7649129
>all this shade on Thales
I bet you talk about the economy like it's a wild pokemon too

>>7652821
Are you insulting my vocabulary or my categorization of people based on what I conceive as distinct interests?

Also:
>scanned pdf available

I understand it's a need and damn are philosophical texts expensive but, out of curiosity, how do you folks read philosophy on pdfs and ebooks?

Maybe it's because I don't get points very well but I constant have to refer back to marked passages anytime I wonder if a dude's making a contradiction, or is saying something different than what he was saying before without explaining his transition, or things such as that.

It's really slow to do this on a pdf, having a hard copy makes segmenting the thoughts along the books much easier doesn't it?

>>7652844
I'm saying that whatever you 'like' or in whatever way you define yourself, all this is irrelevant for the the matter in hand.

>>7652844
As for the pdfs, it's a necessity and limitation imposed by economic and geographic (South American) reasons.

>>7652853
Most philosophers who were previously mathematicians are largely analytics.

Do you honestly think your preferences in other fields of study and what you believe you life will not have a bearing on what strain of philosophy you eventually end up enjoying?

>>7652864
How geographic? Is it harder to get books in some countries than others? I figured it was more or less the same everywhere ever since online shopping.

>>7652893
The are some things you have to read at least once whether you like it or not, as a necessary background. Let this be the end of it.

>>7652924
there are*