Who's your favorite philosopher?

[Mouthwash]

ayn rand is among my least favorite philosophers. Her main thesis is that selfishness and greed are virtues which i think is absurd.

Boo-hoo!

 

[Mouthwash]

in any civilized society, it is morally reprehensible for some to live in extravagant wealth whilst others live in poverty.

Spoiler :

moreover, that is no where near the end of randism.

Boo-hoo-hoo!

 

[Mouthwash]

It's a tie between Nietzsche and Kierkegaard, they're both passionately crazy. I love passionately being crazy.



Yyyeah. That's not her ideas originally, and her moral metaphysics remind me of the thought systems I created when I was like 15 and knew nothing about anything. It's a surprise she never grew out of it, I guess she was stubborn and/or stupid. She was reductionist about an all right (although imo wrong) tradition and demeaned it into all kind of wrong things. If you support what she does, read something proper, such as Smith or the Austrian school.

And it doesn't surprise me you'd claim her "philosophy" (and I can't stress those quotation marks enough) is the best since Aristotle, because I think that she hasn't read anything but. She doesn't refer to anything prior to her in her works (basic academic tradition you know, to show you know your poop), hasn't written an actual book on her "philosophy" but rather vague construed arguments based on wrong metaphors in a novel and a few crappy articles. She didn't even understand capitalist corporate design; none of her metaphors in any way applied to the real world because of this. Her love for the "ingenious entrepreneur" should look to criticize corporations, not the state. But she doesn't criticize corporations. In any of her works. Therefore she's an idiot with a loud mouth, talking about capitalism in a juvenile way that only a state-hating perspectiveless migrated writer from Soviet Russia could bring. Yes, she understands the worst a state could become. That blinded her to practically every other rational piece of knowledge she could attain about the state.

Marx is studied because he made a scientific tome about capitalism (making everyone understand what it is better) and because his materialist history tradition is actually really good at explaining things idealist history can't.

I don't get why you're bringing Marx up though. I forget, did the poster you replied to talk about Marx?

EDIT: And most importantly to me, her understanding of the humanities is laughable and shows how little she knows about anything when she proclaims stuff about it.

I would have preferred a critique of Objectivism itself (specifically the rejection of altruism as a moral doctrine) but at least this is something. Congratulations on being the only person here to even try and argue rather than making appeals to emotion. I don't really like Rand- I only said that to provoke genuine discussion, which is incredibly rare on these forums.

 

[Angst]

Wow, you caught me. Damn you.

I'd say Rand provokes a lot of discussion, really. It's just that it provokes too much - Most people are just tired of dismissing her.

 

[SS-18 ICBM]

Double-posting with a non-response is also not a good way to provoke genuine discussion on this forum.

 

[Leoreth]

Yeah, we've talked about Rand mutliple times since we have Randians stirring up the forum in regular intervals. Don't expect people to be too enthusiastic to write essays about her.

In general, your expectations in this thread may be a little too high. In essence, your goal seems to be to discuss ALL THE PHILOSOPHERS, but that's usually not how you start a debate. People don't write philosophical critiques in response to a simple question like that, especially here in the Tavern. Maybe it's a better idea to pick one philosopher (but please don't pick Rand) and stir up some controversy, even if it's not your actual opinion. I'm sure this will attract more discussion.

 

[King Kalmah]

Tell me Nietzsche sucks and you might not get me to shut up....

 

[_random_]

God, Nietzche was such a stupid hack, right, Kalmah?

 

[madviking]

Boo-hoo-hoo!

It's basic Utilitarianism, bro. Unless you have a miraculous argument against Utilitarianism then I cannot take your arguments, or Randism, seriously.

 

[Arakhor]

I think Isaac Newton is without equal as a natural philosopher. I mean, inventing a new branch of mathematics to advance physics and astronomy? Quite sublime.

Well, Leibnitz might disagree, but otherwise I concur absolutely.

 

[Borachio]

Emmanuel Kant

and his twin brother,

Spoiler :

Emmanuel Couldn't.

My least favourite is Thoreau. I mean I admire his minimalism, obviously, but to live the simple life in a wood, while taking his washing home to his mother takes the biscuit. Or was it a bag of beans? I forget.

 

[Arakhor]

Spoiler :

Not Emmanuel Kan?

 

[Borachio]

Spoiler :

You're thinking of Emmanuel Khan. Who wasn't a philospher at all. But a plumber from Milton Keynes.

But it's an easy mistake to make.

 

[lovett]

Contemporary favorites: David Chalmers, Daniel Dennett, Owen Flanagan, Eddy Nahmias, Thomas Scanlon. Not gonna explain why.

Chalmers and Dennett?

At least one of them must be making errors which it will take effort for their descendants to unravel.

 

[NedimNapoleon]

Desiderius Erasmus

 

[Angst]

Erasmus Montanus

 

[sophie]

There's this old guy on the corner of the block my house is on who I'm particularly fond of.

 

[WindFish]

My least favourite philosopher is Ayn Rand because for her work to be viable, it means sacrificing the rights of the majority for the minority that may or may not have actually worked up to the top.

I'm split over Hayek because hes like Ayn except he insists that there be a safety net for the unemployed.

Keynes is pretty cool because he recognised that a recession is majority a psychological condition rather than pure economics.

 

[Crezth]

Boo-hoo!

Boo-hoo-hoo!

Spoken like a true brainless sycophant.

 

[rugbyLEAGUEfan]

Spoken like a true brainless sycophant.

Boo-hoo