/lit/ - Literature

>>12375251
Yeah, reading through Aristotle's Metaphysics.
Usually I back primary texts with secondary literature when it's too dry or I struggle with it.
Hume wasn't bad, Kant is more of a drag.
Spinoza and Descartes are enjoyable.
Aquinas was the worst so far.

Philosophy is boring (and has yielded no real answers about anything). Given the immense investment of time and effort it takes to even scratch the surface of it, it's really not worthwhile.

The only reason to read this centuries-old tedium is if you find it interesting. Same way you would only study art history if you found it interesting. No one's gonna convince you an incredibly time-consuming and dull hobby is worth doing other than yourself.

That's not to knock people who do find old philosophy interesting--good for them. But most people are never going to find it interesting even if they try to force themselves to.

>>12375293
I agree.
And while we are at it, the 2 works of philosophy so far that I REALLY enjoyed a lot reading are aristotle's nicomachean ethics and posterior analytics. What philosophers/works will enjoy based on this? (have only read plato and aristotle's politics and poetics aside the two mentioned)

>>12375251
Are you reading the Treatise ? Try the later, shorter works. Young Hume used to be as boring as the authors he would criticize.

It is the curse of a brainlet to be bored of wisdom

>>12375410
I don't think it's because I'm a brainlet. It isn't the case with Hume, but with philosophers such as Descartes, I'm typically turned off when I read some argument or another from them that is false or otherwise clearly logically lacking. The lost credibility causes me to lose interest and my mind wanders. With Hume's Enquiries, it's that the majority of the insights (and I know how this sounds) seem to be too easily understandable. It's just dull. With Spinoza (Ethics), I found a lot of the content to be fairly challenging, and efficiently phrased. With Hume I think there's just too much dwelling on things that, perhaps as a result of his popularity, are now very basic ways of thinking in math and sciences learned in the west. I won't rule out that I'm retarded though.

>>12375293
It doesnt help that philosophers build their ideas on top of previous works. Not only do you have to start with the greeks, but you have to continue in chronological order.

>>12375566
Oh look it's Mr. Cultural Osmosis Jones, he stands above these silly philosophers and their lacking logicks.

>>12375566
Utterly banal post.

>>12375589
Nice discussion retard. Convince me why I should care about the trademark argument

>>12375566
This is you:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=U3yKxvW9yNA

>>12375566
>The lost credibility causes me to lose interest and my mind wanders.
>I found a loophole to stop reading but pretend I got it
>score!
why do you even bother?

>>12375625
I'm not trying to claim superiority to Descartes or any other famous philosopher, but if you don't read philosophers from hundreds of years ago and detect aspects of their writings that are outdated or absurd, then fuck off. Are these arguments still relevant in the development of Western thought? Of course they are. That's why I'm fucking reading them. It's just not where my interest lies and I've tried to explain that I'm only reading them so I can understand better the things that I am interested in when I get to them.

>>12375251
I want to like Hume, I really do, but he simply is no Scriblerian, nor Shandean; his writing thus reads ill-fashioned, boring, not much better off than Locke. I did have a similar experience as you with Espinosa: quite readable indeed, even if one isn't crazy on the proofs and scholia; Descartes is all right, be it but for his brevity; and I though Hobbes, at least once got a-going, quite palatable as well. Cunt is shite tho'.

>>12375251
Why read these antiquated brainlets firsthand? Just read their wikipedia article and read contemporary shit lmao.

>>12375566
descartes pwned awsome style!

>>12375251
That whole period is really dry to me other than Pascal.

Ancients are based, medievals are neat if you can get passed Jesus talk, then you get Des “what if everything was like math??” Cartes, then Kant and Hegel for people who like pain, then back to interesting with Kierkegaard.

>>12375394
Aristotle’s Rhetoric or Cicero’s On the Ends could be interesting for you; if you want something closer to the present try Nee-Chee and his Genealogy of Murals.

>>12375566
>>12375658
Good posts anon, at least you're honest. Ignore the ones attacking you, who do nothing but cheer for whichever person the establishments have favored. Just be true to yourself, and come to whatever opinions you do, /lit/elitists be damned.