Favorite Philosopher

[chezlaw]

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Many western philosophy departments focus on analytic philosophy. Nietzsche,while a great writer, is a far cry from this rigorous style.

The lack of courses devoted to him is not because they have not been exposed to him. His work simply doesn't fit in their view of the correct way to do philosophy.

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That makes even more sense.

Thanks

chez

[Sharkey]

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There is no more noble purpose than pursuing that which makes you happy.

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Why would the happiness you experience be more worthy a purpose for you than the happiness experienced by someone else?

[snowden719]

neck and neck between Kant and Hume

[Warren Whitmore]

Ayn Rand. She changed my life in many ways. If I had to pin point the most important though it would be from believing in Democracy as leading to an ideal utopia to Objectivity. A rather huge differenc.

[evolvedForm]

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Right now, Nietzsche and its not close. Wittgenstein would have to be second and I'd have to give a lot of credit to Plato/Socrates because for the last 2500 years we've all been foot noting them.

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So many mention Nietzsche and in the UK you can do a philosphy degree without ever coming across him. At Birkbeck which is very well respected for Philosophy, Nietzsche is a small part of an realtively obscure optional unit.

chez

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Not to intentionally call you out, but I just found this on the Birkbeck website, under the doctorate philosophy programme.



<font color="blue">
The School of Philosophy offers research-based teaching, with a core commitment to analytical philosophy, and a wide range of interests in the history of philosophy (notably Greek, early modern including Spinoza, and Nietzsche).
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Link

And it's not just here, but in most of the schools I've researched that courses on Nietzsche are offered, including my own. These include Australian, English, and American universities.

edit: chez, perhaps you are right - I didn't see that you mentioned Nietzsche is only a small part, which could very well be true, judging that small description.

[Zapp]

Jonathan Edwards, mainly because (apologies to evolvedForm) he "speak[s] directly to the most important human questions." He is widely acknowledged (arguably) as the greatest philosopher America has ever produced. And how much better can you get than to be a great philosopher and a sound theologian all rolled up into one?

[chezlaw]

[ QUOTE ]
[ QUOTE ]
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Right now, Nietzsche and its not close. Wittgenstein would have to be second and I'd have to give a lot of credit to Plato/Socrates because for the last 2500 years we've all been foot noting them.

[/ QUOTE ]
So many mention Nietzsche and in the UK you can do a philosphy degree without ever coming across him. At Birkbeck which is very well respected for Philosophy, Nietzsche is a small part of an realtively obscure optional unit.

chez

[/ QUOTE ]

Not to intentionally call you out, but I just found this on the Birkbeck website, under the doctorate philosophy programme.



<font color="blue">
The School of Philosophy offers research-based teaching, with a core commitment to analytical philosophy, and a wide range of interests in the history of philosophy (notably Greek, early modern including Spinoza, and Nietzsche).
</font>

Link

And it's not just here, but in most of the schools I've researched that courses on Nietzsche are offered, including my own. These include Australian, English, and American universities.

[/ QUOTE ]
syllabus
Nietzsche is only covered in the optional unit Nineteenth Century German Philosophers.

By degree level I meant undergraduate degree.

chez

[AceofSpades]

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Nietzsche. The greatest combination of insight, prose, sarcasm, elegance, thoughtfulness, understanding of human nature, etc., all rolled into one neurotic figure.

"I know my fate. One day there will be associated with my name the recollection of something frightful, of a crisis like no other before on earth, of the profoundest collision of conscience, of a decision evoked against everything that until then had been believed in, demanded, sanctified. I am not a man. I am dynamite."

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If I was going to read one book on/by him what would you recommend?

[RJT]

Don’t put Descartes Beauvoir the horse.

(I think “the horse” is also supposed to be substituted with the name of another philosopher. It has been a long time since I heard this one and I forget the whole joke. This is the punch line.)

[evolvedForm]

One book? Either 'Genealogy of Morals' or 'The Gay Science.' But whatever you do, keep this in mind. Nietzsche is extremely easy to misunderstand and he contradicts himself quite often (for a reason). He himself warned about reading his works too quickly.