# Your Favorite Philosopher



## AnOminous (Feb 18, 2018)

If you have Deep Thoughts, you should have one, right?

I think Kierkegaard is mine.


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## UselessRubberKeyboard (Feb 18, 2018)

I read Foucauld once.  Actually, 'once' is a lie - I had to read each paragraph three times before it made any sense.

Our resident philosocorgi, @Peace and Harmony , should be top of any Kiwi's list.


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## Peace and Harmony (Feb 18, 2018)

Alex Jones disciple here


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## Salt Water Taffy (Feb 18, 2018)

Kiwi Farms is a philosophy gold mine. You'll learn more from the Deep Thoughts section than in any book.


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## HolocaustDenier (Feb 18, 2018)

Milton Friedman, not a philosopher perse but murica should start listening to him again and stop watching michael moore movies.


Spoiler



https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LtRb9lWhFY4


Darío Salas Sommer, chilean philosopher. i like his thoughts on the existence of a objective human morality


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## Dirt McGirt (Feb 18, 2018)

Diogenes


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## Rand /pol/ (Feb 18, 2018)

Dr. Otis Eugene "Gene" Ray, DCub (Doctorate of Cubism)


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## carltondanks (Feb 18, 2018)

cr1tikal


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## IV 445 (Feb 18, 2018)

I ascended the 9001 steps to High Kiwifar

There I was greeted by Master @CatParty.

He taught me the three words of power:

“lol calm down”


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## Star Wormwood (Feb 18, 2018)

Spoiler



Although if I'm not shitposting, prolly the existentialists that weren't whiny pussies. Growth from conflict type shit.


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## AnOminous (Feb 18, 2018)

Hortator said:


> I ascended the 9001 steps to High Kiwifar
> 
> There I was rested by Master @CatParty.
> 
> ...



Wisest words ever spoken on the Farms.


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## drtoboggan (Feb 18, 2018)

Nietzsche.


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## Peace and Harmony (Feb 18, 2018)

drtoboggan said:


> Nietzsche.


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## Milk Mage (Feb 18, 2018)

Diogenes. No question about it


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## Cato (Feb 18, 2018)

There was a time I was a fan of Kant's deontological ethics, but truth be told I can't remember too much of them anymore and the world has beaten me down enough that I'm not the idealistic and philosophically-minded young man I once was (I'm more utilitarian now than I used to be, although I wasn't that impressed with Mill back when I actually read him). On the metaphysical front I was partial to Locke's empiricism, and it still largely makes sense to me.

I always found Nietzsche's maxims specifically to be awesome, and still do, though.


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## ICametoLurk (Feb 18, 2018)

lol spooks


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## Bassomatic (Feb 18, 2018)

Dirt McGirt said:


> Diogenes


My nigger. un irocially  I think he's by far one of the wisest people ever, the first ever long troll and used to shit over the greats of his time like Socrates just for the lulz and still be right. He doesn't get the credit he should. In a lot of ways he showed an innocence of hedonism. He did a lot of good in his life, helped people spread learning and lived how he wants. When ever I feel down I don't know what happened on Game of Thrones or shit like that I think, well I'd still be me jerking off in a barrel and I'm a good person so fuck em it's a TV show I don't care about.


drtoboggan said:


> Nietzsche.


Love his work, I always leaned toward his ideals even before I knew about him. It's such a cool feeling when someone knows how to say what you think, but well not sound like an idiot.


ICametoLurk said:


> lol spooks


I wish I could rate this nice meme. I do enjoy some of Max's thoughts though, he's well worth a read.


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## DumbDosh (Feb 18, 2018)

Dick Masterson


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## The Fifth Waltz (Feb 18, 2018)

Jaden Smith.


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## CWCchange (Feb 18, 2018)

Harry Potter and the P̶h̶i̶l̶o̶s̶o̶p̶h̶e̶r̶'̶s̶ Sorcerer's Stone.


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## Sperglord Dante (Feb 18, 2018)

What little we know about Zeno and Diogenes is amazing. But if we're talking about a modern day philosopher


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## BoingBoingBoi (Feb 18, 2018)

Zhuangzi


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## jewelry investor (Feb 18, 2018)

Mike Tyson.


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## AnOminous (Feb 18, 2018)

How about Schopenhauer?  Yeah, he was a huge dick and nearly a complete asshole and you'd probably throw him out a window if you had to listen to his bullshit for a couple hours, but he had some points.


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## Ruin (Feb 19, 2018)

Immanuel Kant


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## Real_Liberian (Feb 19, 2018)

I like Albert Camus. If I'm honest with myself, I don't have the attention span necessary to untangle long philosophical texts. It's better for me when a philosopher represents his ideas in the form of a story, a novel. Camus's _The Plague _is my favourite of these kinds of story.


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## Jaded Optimist (Feb 19, 2018)

Slavoj Zizek.  Only because he is a lolcow.

This song is made from his quotes


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## MarvinTheParanoidAndroid (Feb 19, 2018)

Nietzsche.

What? Who else were you expecting.


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## Old Wizard (Feb 19, 2018)

I'd say Epicurus/epicureanism, by far.  That's sort of the philosophy I grew up with.

For any of you who aren't familiar with what that is, it's essentially this:


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## Positron (Feb 19, 2018)

David Hume.  His skepticism, especially partaining social, cultural and moral matters, is refreshing in moderate doses.  Although _pace_ Hume I won't take skepticism to such extreme and declare we are never able to predict anything.



Old Wizard said:


> I'd say Epicurus/epicureanism, by far.  That's sort of the philosophy I grew up with.


I read in a side note that Epicureans advised against getting involved with poor people, because their troubles are many and they drag you down.  I cannot find the source to confirm it but I totally agree!


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## jewelry investor (Feb 19, 2018)

A Name But Backwards said:


> Slavoj Zizek.  Only because he is a lolcow.
> 
> This song is made from his quotes


I D E O L O G Y


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## Deadwaste (Feb 22, 2018)

diogenes best philosopher and best cynic


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## AnOminous (Feb 22, 2018)

Deadwaste said:


> diogenes best philosopher and best cynic



I suspect Heraclitus would have been one of my favorites if anything he wrote besides fragments had survived.


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## temeluchus (Feb 23, 2018)

I have a real soft spot for Nietzsche.

The guy was an ace psychiatrist, appreciated the positives of religion despite talking about its failures, was an atheist whilst being very honest about it's problems and after all that very funny, optimistic and easy to read.

It would have been great to get him and Kierkegaard in the same room.


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## c-no (Feb 23, 2018)

Learning of philosophy, I'm split on a few people.

Far as the ones I like so far, I may as well say Aquinas at least in how he tries to propose what evil is, even though there are no doubt other systems and such that dismantle his definition of evil. Another I like (and also currently reading on) is Aristotle. Nietzsche is one I want to get into, at least in understanding him more.


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## Bassomatic (Feb 23, 2018)

c-no said:


> Learning of philosophy, I'm split on a few people.
> 
> Far as the ones I like so far, I may as well say Aquinas at least in how he tries to propose what evil is, even though there are no doubt other systems and such that dismantle his definition of evil. Another I like (and also currently reading on) is Aristotle. Nietzsche is one I want to get into, at least in understanding him more.


What is so cool about the art of Philosophy is, you can learn so much more from  what you disagree with.

In regards to say politics econ, you may feel X and someone can expand your view points. You can be smart as fuck, and be say, pro gun control or anti universal health care. There's data you can back with. After X point if you are smart it's conformation bias to hear it and you can shoot down most disagreements.

Philosophy, you HAVE to listen you have to learn. And it's ideals, no one matches up. It's such a blessing and I know where I sit and in ways you read  things you disagree with and unlike say gov/spiritual shit, I feel I learned reading Marx, but say a Marxist like Sanders I got nothing from. I openly disagree with communism.

So yea take it all in.


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## AnOminous (Feb 23, 2018)

temeluchus said:


> I have a real soft spot for Nietzsche.
> 
> The guy was an ace psychiatrist, appreciated the positives of religion despite talking about its failures, was an atheist whilst being very honest about it's problems and after all that very funny, optimistic and easy to read.
> 
> It would have been great to get him and Kierkegaard in the same room.



Nietzsche has been ridiculously hated.  At least in modern life, he is seen as virtually nihilism personified, despite mostly detesting it and ignoring that the "Last Man" he posited was actually more or less an SJW, and SJWs are the ultimate result of nihilism.

Then there's the fact that he's blamed for Nazis, whom he would have despised, and that's largely thanks to his horrible useless cunt of a sister.

The Last Man is what you're looking at when you see a tweet with some absolute faggot making some infuriating scream face while holding up a Nintendo Switch or some other consumer product.  A subhuman piece of garbage who has sacrificed everything meaningful in his life, and maybe even enjoyed being cucked, and replaced any desire for individuality or creativity for some piece of shit sold to every idiot on the planet.


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## temeluchus (Feb 23, 2018)

AnOminous said:


> Nietzsche has been ridiculously hated.  At least in modern life, he is seen as virtually nihilism personified, despite mostly detesting it and ignoring that the "Last Man" he posited was actually more or less an SJW, and SJWs are the ultimate result of nihilism.



He’s also real example of quote mining out of context, a good example being “god is dead” with edgelords who never bothered to read it in context not realising Nietzsche was, if anything, mourning the death of god and discussing its consequences whilst the religious in the past have reacted in a knee jerk fashion to those words again out of context.

I agree, the SJW is a spiteful nihilistic last man (last troon?) wielding slave morality as a club.


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## SeaPancake (Feb 23, 2018)

I take bits and pieces from different philosophers, and honestly my preference towards certain philosophers is rooted in my love of history and progress. Philosophers who proposed new ideas or concepts that very much greatly challenged religious traditions, selfishness, and prejudices during their time are stellar in my book. That and if their philosophies offer some sort of comfort to assuage my existential crises.

David Hume, Diderot, John Stuart Mill, Epicurus, Simone de Beauvoir, Jean Paul Sartre, Friedrich Nietzsche, Karl Popper.


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## D. Sweatshirt (Feb 24, 2018)

Still my all-time favorite, even if he's not really a straight-up philosopher.



Spoiler: Runner-Up


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## DoctorJimmyRay (Feb 24, 2018)

I've always loved Camus and Nietzsche. The Plague is easily my favorite novel. I just started reading Kierkegaard and absolutely hate that it took me this long to pick him up. 

Ayn Rand's works are a pretty good read if you can look past all that Atlas Shrugged/Fountainhead trash. 

On a side note, one of my favorite parts about Nietzsche is watching slapfights over how "wrong" Kaufmann translations supposedly are.


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## Israel (Mar 19, 2018)

Iliusha.


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## Captain_Asshole (Mar 25, 2018)

Tommy Wisseau.






His wisdom is limitless.


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## Elwood P. Dowd (Mar 25, 2018)

Torn between Schopenhauer and Locke. And I'd never admit to it in public, but some of what Oswald Spengler has to say resonates with me. Once you work through the rambling nonsense.

If I had to pick one, I suppose Schopenhauer would be it.  He wins simply by virtue of the fact that he has yet to be discovered this century by a cringelord like Sargon of Akkad, nor used by Nazis and neo-Nutzis the way Spengler has.


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## GreenJacket (Mar 29, 2018)

Max Stirner:
Created an ideology based on selfishness and got a-logged by Marx.


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## Positron (Mar 31, 2018)

GreenJacket said:


> Max Stirner:
> Created an ideology based on selfishness and got a-logged by Marx.


The philosophy of selfishness was already developed by the Chinese philosopher Yang Zhu in 400BC.  He was also some kind of proto-Libertarian and hence was completely at odds with the Confucian tradition with its emphasis on discipline and hierarchy.  Mencius called him an animal.  Very little of his writings survived, yet he was reputed to have a lot of followers in his heyday.


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## Varg Did Nothing Wrong (Mar 31, 2018)

I've always been a fan of the Stoics.


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## Dr. Kaufman (Mar 31, 2018)

Chanakya is pretty underrated, mostly because his works were only rediscovered just over 100 years ago. Think an Indian Aristotle, with a hint of well-intentioned Machiavellian thinking, and you have a decent picture.


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## Arctic (Mar 31, 2018)

Hot take: Existentialism is trash. Can anyone tell me how Nietzsche's ideas are any different from blind power-worship?


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## Gus (Apr 2, 2018)

Epictetus, whose thought was not entirely original, but had been reflected from those before him (as Zeno, Cleanthes, and Chrysippus), then carried, and left as discourses. The style of delivery has affected me like nothing else in that school, and the Enchiridion was the text that convinced me that I could devote myself to studying anything in the first place.


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## Teri-Teri (Apr 6, 2018)

Diogenes and Nietzsche, but mostly Diogenes

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-A3IlRATIsI


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## 2 litre soda (Apr 6, 2018)

Arctic said:


> Hot take: Existentialism is trash. Can anyone tell me how Nietzsche's ideas are any different from blind power-worship?



Nietzsche is about coming to terms with life. 

Ideally, you would live your life so that, if you had to live if over and over again, Groundhog Day style, you would be perfectly happy.

Acquiring power for its own sake is a fools errand. Using what power you possess to make yourself content, really content, rather than coming up with a lot of bull shit excuses (I'm too fat, no one likes me, the church won't let me...) or projecting your happiness onto other things (I'd be happy if I owned an x-box, if that girl loved me, if I was the president...), is hard as fuck.

There's more to it than that, but that's the cigarette break phone posting version.


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## Yop Yop (Apr 6, 2018)

Chris-Chan


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## Nihilist Lord (Apr 7, 2018)

Probably Max Striner and Nietzsche.


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## kinglordsupreme19 (Apr 15, 2018)

In the past century: Nelson Goodman (for the New Riddle of Induction), Trenton Merricks (for formulating a viable eliminativist mereology), Jonathan Haidt (debatable as to whether it's philosophy, but I consider moral foundations theory to be truly a game-changer), and Peter Gärdenfors (barely anybody knows about him, but his theory of 'conceptual space' as the representationalist medium is a powerful tool that's allowed me to integrate the findings of the other three into a holistic theory).

My favourite of all time: Hobbes (for Leviathan), with the next-favourite being Plato (for breadth of work combined with a strong literary component).

Diogenes is an inspiration, but since he left no coherent body of work I always saw him more as a performance artist (Sam Hyde is a proto Diogenes).


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## PantsFreeZone (Apr 16, 2018)

Jack Handey.

"Sometimes I wonder if I'm patriotic enough. Yes, I want to kill people, but on both sides."

"I hope that after I die, people will say of me: 'That guy sure owed me a lot of money.'"

"I can picture in my mind a world without war, a world without hate. And I can picture us attacking that world, because they'd never expect it."


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## buttonsmasher (Apr 17, 2018)

Mises


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## Wallace (Apr 17, 2018)

Any love for Voltaire?


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## kinglordsupreme19 (Apr 17, 2018)

Wallace said:


> Any love for Voltaire?



Very fun writer and commentator, but I don't think he can be considered a philosopher in the way you can consider Locke, Hobbes, or Rousseau to be philosophers. He doesn't leave behind a corpus of work aside from some of his letters where he makes a concerted epistemological, metaphysical, political, or moral argument.


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## Replicant Sasquatch (Apr 19, 2018)

Diogenes, because he figured out life is just a fucking game and decided to stop playing.


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## AtrocityVoyeur (Apr 19, 2018)

kinglordsupreme19 said:


> Jonathan Haidt (debatable as to whether it's philosophy, but I consider moral foundations theory to be truly a game-changer


Agreed. It's a massive game-changer. What keeps Haidt out of the spotlight is his modesty... the revolutionary nature of his approach to emotions and morality, even the way people explain things to one another, could potentially put him in Jordan Peterson territory of influence but he lacks the ego to present himself that way. Having said that he gets very deep in his books and I am sure there are people who are moved to reconsider their basic premises by reading him. But he isn't going to pick up a cult of Messiah worshippers.


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## Peace and Harmony (Apr 20, 2018)

Jon Haidt is ma boi. He's also pretty busy running Heterodox Academy and trying to re-institutionalise free speech and general sanity back to the American college campus instead of just bitching about it.


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## RichardMongler (May 2, 2018)

Of the Greeks, I gotta say Heraclitus and Plato's work resonated with me the most. Even as a philosophy major, I shamefully admit I haven't studied enough the Hellenistics to have a formal opinion on them. 

For English philosophers, Thomas Hobbes and John Locke are both neck and neck.

Of the Continentals, Arthur Schopenhauer and Friedrich Nietzsche were my two favorites. 

The only Anarchists whose written work I enjoyed are Max Stirner, Albert Camus and Theodore Kaczynski. 

Other odd favorites, including writers: Edmund Burke, Robert Nozick, Louis-Ferdinand Céline, Oswald Spengler, Ernst Jünger, Gustave Le Bon, H.L. Mencken, Jim Goad


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## Pozzingmyfilthyneghole (May 2, 2018)

Joseph Campbell a.k.a Carl Jung without the Teutonic crap. Hollywood copy-pasted his ideas, thus opening up Pandora's box of hack frauds.


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## DrunkJoe (May 3, 2018)

Does Kayne count now?  He kind of killed the internent last 2 weeks or so with his words of wisdom.  

I will go with nietzsche though.


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## Soew (May 15, 2018)

strongly recommend Peter Sloterdijk to any of the other Nietzsche fans in this thread. he's the philosopher i've been enjoying the most recently and reading a contemporary philosopher is always a nice change of pace.


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## Joan Nyan (May 16, 2018)

I have Michael Knowles's completely blank book _Reasons to Vote for Democrats: A Comprehensive Guide _on my shelf directly next to Aristotle, Mill, and Kant, and it's certainly my favorite.


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## MuckFlingingApe (May 8, 2019)

Peter Sloterdijk is where you end up if you draw a straight line from Nietzsche through Heidegger to the 21stC.


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## Ruin (May 8, 2019)

Kant


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## Sprig of Parsley (May 8, 2019)

I would say calling Frederic Bastiat a "philosopher" is an insult to Mr. Bastiat, but he certainly had philosophies, so it might count.  I think Jon Haidt is criminally underappreciated as one of the few people I've seen who understands that shit is fucked in certain ways right now and really needs to be unfucked.

I can find myself agreeing with things Nietzsche said, and Schopenhauer said things I nominally agree with.  I must admit I don't really give the field a whole lot of thought.


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## Recoil (May 8, 2019)

Terrence McKenna.


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## Guts Gets Some (May 8, 2019)

Derek Savage.













But for real


Spoiler



I was being serious, how dare you think otherwise


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## PL 001 (May 8, 2019)

Epicurus


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## StyrofoamFridge (May 8, 2019)

Epicurus


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## Splendid (May 8, 2019)

Soren Kierkgaard


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## Gaius Caesar (May 8, 2019)

Marcus Aurelius and Lao Tzu.


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## Slap47 (May 8, 2019)

Bit of a newbie when it comes to actual hard philosophy so I'll use a very loose definition.

Sun Tzu - His book is basic but it has lessons that are important. The Art of War is common sense. Only fight battles after you've rigged everything to your advantage and make sure you're fighting an unavoidable battle that will actually contribute to a strategic victory. Even today we're going to war without thinking and not winning.

Confucious - Its odd how Asian civilizations took his lessons and did the exact opposite in his name... Flexibility? Nah. Meritocracy? What?

Christopher Hitchens - I disagreed with him alot but he actively pursued the truth and was smart as a whip.

Locke - The writer that defined the 18th and 19th centuries.

General Patton



Shaftie said:


> Dick Masterson



Unironically this.


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## The Great Chandler (Apr 11, 2022)

Pretty much any philosopher who don't overcomplicate their views nor try to depress you (I'm looking at you Schopenhauer) and especially don't treat their works like dogma.

Just simple, chill, and honest. Only a handful of philosophers get this right (or close to it).


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## Mayor Adam West (Apr 11, 2022)

Might've posted this already but St. Thomas Aquinas.


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## Unarmed Gunman (Apr 11, 2022)

*Mike Tyson*

_“Everyone has a plan ’till they get punched in the mouth.”

“I wish one of you guys had children, so I could kick them in their fucking head or stomp on their testicles so you could feel my pain, because that’s the pain I have waking up every day.”

“I may like, fornicate more than other people, it’s just who I am. I sacrifice so much of my life, can I at least get laid, you know what I mean? I’ve been robbed of most of my money, can I at least get a blow job?”

“These pigeons have been living with each other for 10 or 15 years, but when I throw feed down, they kill each other to get it..."_

If you can't find wisdom in each of these, to be used as guidance in your life, then are you even human?


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## El Goblina (Apr 11, 2022)

CS Peirce. His triadic ontology is very useful, and the way it couples to his semeotic theory is actually philosophy being useful and inspiring. If you want a philosopher who will give you tools to view reality in new ways, I don't know of anyone anywhere near as prolific.

Gary North (RIP) wrote a tome on what is effectively his philosophy of historiography, "The Biblical Structure of History". Like all of his later work, it is freely available on his website. https://www.garynorth.com/TheBiblicalStructureOfHistory.pdf



> In this book, I explain the nature of the intellectual warfare between two irreconcilable theories of history and two traditions of writing about history. The first is the Christian concept of history. The second is humanism’s concept of history. Both groups have adopted similar organizational categories for understanding history, but their presuppositions are radically opposed. I discuss this conflict of visions in terms of the rivalry between the kingdom of God and the kingdom of man. I show why you and generations of Christians before you have been deliberately misinformed about the history of Western civilization.


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## Lemmingwise (Apr 12, 2022)

Slap47 said:


> Even today we're going to war without thinking and not winning.


If it's any consellation, the architects of this war will certainly come out ahead.



Bassomatic said:


> My nigger. un irocially  I think he's by far one of the wisest people ever, the first ever long troll and used to shit over the greats of his time like Socrates just for the lulz and still be right. He doesn't get the credit he should. In a lot of ways he showed an innocence of hedonism. He did a lot of good in his life, helped people spread learning and lived how he wants. When ever I feel down I don't know what happened on Game of Thrones or shit like that I think, well I'd still be me jerking off in a barrel and I'm a good person so fuck em it's a TV show I don't care about.


Diogenes was a degenerate that would have a lolcow page. People love to laugh at his inane behaviour from a distance, but if you went to the theater, one of the few ways of entertainment and he sat next  to you, masturbating again, it'd be annoying and disgusting. He was also a cheat, who had been banished for debasement of currency.


But he was a funny lad. When captured by pirates and asked his trade, he said that his only trade was to govern men so he could be sold to someone who needs a master.

When near death, asked for how he wished to die, he said to throw him out of the city walls so wild animals could feast on his body. Won't you mind? No, just give me a stick to chase them away. How will you use the stick without being conscious? How will I mind if I'm not conscious?

----

That said, a couple of years back I went through some of the classics. I didn't find a single thing of value in plato's writing, but aristotle had so many things that were immediately applicable to things I was thinking about. I can see why even muslims called him "the great teacher" and it's a shame most of his work has been lost in time.

And to throw an unusual philosopher in the mix, morihei ueshiba was a big influemce as well, who wrote the art of peace (as counterpart to sun tzu's art of war). He was a soldier and then martial artist in life who created aikido.

The fundamental flaw of aikido has always seemed to me, that it makes the most sense to learn for a retiring warrior of some sort, rather than as the first fighting style. Many of the essential ways of pacifying violence make the most sense if violence is already known by the practitioner.


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## AnOminous (Apr 12, 2022)

I think Kaczynski would probably qualify as a political philosopher and actually said a fair amount of things that made sense.  He's not going to win any prizes as a prose stylist, but his writing, while workmanlike, carries his thoughts well.


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## Unarmed Gunman (Apr 12, 2022)

AnOminous said:


> I think Kaczynski would probably qualify as a political philosopher and actually said a fair amount of things that made sense.  He's not going to win any prizes as a prose stylist, but his writing, while workmanlike, carries his thoughts well.



It's funny, I remember downloading his manifesto like 20 years ago and gave up reading part way through because they were the obvious ramblings of a madman, who had no idea how people would respond to the things he was warning about.

Then I read his writings again a couple of years ago and holy shit....dude actually nailed it. Reading him now and it all makes sense, but that fucker saw it coming decades ago and we didn't listen.

Free Downloads of his work here.


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## Ughubughughughughughghlug (Apr 13, 2022)

I like Hegel because I heard a really simple summary of his idealism and thought it sounded like the half-baked philosophy I've worked out in my head. So clearly Hegel must be right.


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