Recommendations on philosophy books?

Question

I have a book that gives a brief history on the lives of different philosophers, what ideas they are known for, and notable works. I also have a book that gives a summary of different ideas in ethics, logic, and metaphysics. The books are just introductions to philosophy. I'd like to read something more specific with more material, but I don't know where to start. Suggestions?

Answer 1

A good option: Philosophy for Dummies, Tom Morris; reasons: he is an outstanding professor of philosophy; the book has the main ideas of Western philosophy, organized into chapters with plenty of original reading suggestions at the end of each chapter. Hence, you find the best of the source material, in matrices of personal interest.

Answer 2

Emmanuel Kant



Pure reason



(I was joking by the way I don't read but this Kant guy describes as much as he can with reasoning alone which is boring but interesting)

Answer 3

The Stranger

Answer 4

I would recommend an essential set of 2 books to read, called The Great Ideas of the Western World. (Doesn't the title give you a hint?) The books are also called the Syntopicon. You can look them up in the library computer either way.



You can only get it in a library because it's part of a $2000 set of books of 66 books; or I got mine used, cheap, at a book store. (The 2 books, not the big set! Get yours in a book store to carry with you, or you can actually find them online cheaply. I got mine for $5 each, in a used book store.



Those two books will give you literally hundreds of more 'must-read' choices. They are arranged by alphabetical subjects (103 of them), not by the philosophers names. The chapters are short--about 12 pages--but you will be fascinated beyond belief by things men said that you never knew.



The best way to learn 'real philosophy' is to step back and take a grand, wide view that quickly outlines a topic. Otherwise you might start with Plato (for an example) but not catch the connection between his "Forms" and Aristotle's "essene" or Kant's Noumena. So you read the Syntopicon and the connection is made for you

Answer 5

Essay Concerning Human Understanding by John Locke

Answer 6

These are very specific and not general philosophy books at all:



Man's Search for Meaning by Viktor Frankl

The Tao of Pooh by Benjamin Hoff

Candide by Voltaire

A Brief History of Decay by E. M. Cioran

Creation by Gore Vidal



Books to read if you want to stay ignorant and bored:

Critique of Pure Reason by Emmanuel Kant

Principia Mathematica by Russell and Whitehead

Fear and Trembling by Soren Kierkegaard

The Social Contract by Jean-Jacques Rousseau

or

Leviathan by Thomas Hobbes

Also anything by Albert Camus.