Who is your favorite philosopher / intellectual / societal influencer or commentator?

[Zopiclone bandit]

Which agenda?
I think is a common misconception to think the Frankfurt school are the ones who have built the woke agenda and woke points of view, you can read Erich Fromm, Horkheimer or even Marcuse and you won't find any of that comtemporary popular leftist crap.
Their analysis of how Power uses different cultural aspects to enslave the mind and create a mainstream current of political interpretation is very well done.
The thing I dislike and I consider rotten in their theory is the typical jewish psychoanalitic atheist POV about sex/family which I consider completely misguided. It's very obviously based on the stupid/simplistic/obsessive Freud's interpretation of sex and Engels interpretation of the role of family as a reactionary cell.

I stand corrected.

 

[Electrum1]

 

[Mjäll]

Off the top of my head, recently enjoyed Ian McGilchrist who has an interesting analysis of brain hemisphere imbalance and its involvement in modern pathology.

I'm not in the habit of reading books currently, so i haven't read his books. The point can be gathered easily from youtube. If i were to write a book i think i would write a book making the case for books being an obsolete medium.

 

[AbbeyLee]

Jung, McKenna, Watts, Nietzsche, Camus, Kafka, Cioran, etc.

I think we discussed Jordan Peterson losing his shit lol.

I've been consistently paying attention to Russell Brand's daily commentary on current events lately..

 

[skipjames]

Jesus , which to me is way more than a philosopher-intellectual-social commentator
anyway, Favourite Philosophers ever :Saint Thomas Aquinas , Pascal, Wittgenstein, Rene Girard
Contemporary Philosophers I like : Ed Feser , William Lane Craig, Peter Hacker, Graham Oppy (atheist differently from the people I have mentioned here so far, but the nicest smartest atheist around, differently from the 'New Atheists " like Sam Harris, Dawkins etc)
As a writer who is also a social commentator, I like Michel Houellebecq and the few fellow Catholics who have the balls to say that the War on Drugs is BOLLOCKS like this guy https://www.fff.org/2014/06/24/catholics-libertarians-and-the-drug-war/

in terms of ..:
understanding the world and human history, best philosophical POV: Heidegger
getting how deep and complex human nature is: Cioran, Nietzsche, Schopenhauer
most creative philosopher, best guy to get inspiration from and look into the future: Deleuze
best philosophical system, creating a rational framework to make sense of the world: Spinoza, Hegel
best ethics: Jesus from Nazareth, Epictetus, Seneca, Pascal, Socrates
better marxist/materialistic point of view: Guy Debord, Raoul Vaneigem
most radical and vanguardist politics: Tiqqun, some aspects of Frankfurt School of Critical Theory
Best psychologists: C. G. Jung, L. Wittgenstein
most fun: Terence Mckenna

Interesting list, never considered Wittgenstein a psychologist stricto senso. I still consider Heidegger one of the most overrated philosophers ever

 

[AbbeyLee]

Note the lack of females in our lists.. Not surprising.

 

[skipjames]

Note the lack of females in our lists.. Not surprising.

I wanted to add G. E.M Anscombe but there were too many Catholics in my post already

 

[AbbeyLee]

I wanted to add G. E.M Anscombe but there were too many Catholics in my post already

I had to wrack my brain and thought The Madonna/Mary, but I don't know much about Catholicism. I know a fair bit about Greek/Roman myth and that the feminine gradually disappeared from religion, with The Madonna being the last representation.

I failed to mention Joseph Campbell in my list but he talks about this..

 

[wareika]

Behold Plato's Man
His famous quote to Alexander The Great has been used by me several times when talking to a woman who liked me but was obsessed with her looks & had that terrible"Love Island" logic upon life.

Never mind all those hashtags of "WWJD" What would Jesus do, all you need is "WWDD" as in What would Diogenes do?

"...he defaced the currency, which he took to mean social customs" Haha bloody superb.

#2 is the Chinese genius Zhuangzi

I didn't know anything of Diogenes til now. But the vid reminded me of the chinese sage 'who lived in a bucket'.

His famous quote to Alexander The Great has been used by me several times when talking to a woman who liked me but was obsessed with her looks & had that terrible"Love Island" logic upon life

Too perfect.

 

[wareika]

Totally agree. Difficult to argue that overpopulation + 'ethnic chaos' are precursors to an active erosion of democracy. And hinders to some extent, the deeper long-term benefits of multi-racial-cultural overlap in our species.

I often think about the federated model as an enlightened alternative to national borders where we nevertheless have the same dwindling lack of choices.
I think federalism is the word. Basically a collection of autonomous mini-republics or zones where people can choose to live as they wish. That could be along philial/ethnic lines, or religious, gender. Anything. Pro-drug, no-drug etc.

I always come back to it. Since central government of any kind is so easily chewed through by corruption, its probably the closest thing to democracy.

I think it was in a Neal Stephenson book, the Diamond Age maybe. But i think some of the anarchists promoted it for a long time.

 

[Jabberwocky]

Evelyn Waugh, Somerset Maugham, EM Foerster, Graham Greene, Kinsley Amis, P.G. Wodehouse (excuse me), and Bruce Chatwin.

 

[Neuroborean]

Jesus , which to me is way more than a philosopher-intellectual-social commentator
anyway, Favourite Philosophers ever :Saint Thomas Aquinas , Pascal, Wittgenstein, Rene Girard
Contemporary Philosophers I like : Ed Feser , William Lane Craig, Peter Hacker, Graham Oppy (atheist differently from the people I have mentioned here so far, but the nicest smartest atheist around, differently from the 'New Atheists " like Sam Harris, Dawkins etc)
As a writer who is also a social commentator, I like Michel Houellebecq and the few fellow Catholics who have the balls to say that the War on Drugs is BOLLOCKS like this guy https://www.fff.org/2014/06/24/catholics-libertarians-and-the-drug-war/

Interesting list, never considered Wittgenstein a psychologist stricto senso. I still consider Heidegger one of the most overrated philosophers ever

nah, he is not really overrated at all, most people don't get what he does, because you need to read him very carefully and extensively, once you get how he reads Nietzsche and Kant it's easier to get into him.

 

[Neuroborean]

Jesus , which to me is way more than a philosopher-intellectual-social commentator
anyway, Favourite Philosophers ever :Saint Thomas Aquinas , Pascal, Wittgenstein, Rene Girard
Contemporary Philosophers I like : Ed Feser , William Lane Craig, Peter Hacker, Graham Oppy (atheist differently from the people I have mentioned here so far, but the nicest smartest atheist around, differently from the 'New Atheists " like Sam Harris, Dawkins etc)
As a writer who is also a social commentator, I like Michel Houellebecq and the few fellow Catholics who have the balls to say that the War on Drugs is BOLLOCKS like this guy https://www.fff.org/2014/06/24/catholics-libertarians-and-the-drug-war/

Interesting list, never considered Wittgenstein a psychologist stricto senso. I still consider Heidegger one of the most overrated philosophers ever t/

Oh by the way...
I also considered Wittgenstein a philosopher, but eventually is a bit like how Nietzsche speak about himself sometimes as a psychologist, not as a philosopher.
In the case of Wittgenstein is even more a psychologist since what psychology should be is a strict science of how mind/logic works, and that's what psychology is supposed to be, eventually, and is what Wittgenstein does, in an amazing and incredibly rich way, thinking about the nature of language and its historical display.

What it's difficult to limit is where philosophy starts and where psychology ends. I think that limit/frontier is impossible to set in a definite way basically because as we are speculative beings, human evolution and psychology/biology/neurological evolution go hand in hand, so it would be reductionist to try to close a definite frontier between those dimensions of conscioussness (I consider sciences and arts dimensions of conscioussness).

 

[Neuroborean]

Totally agree. Difficult to argue that overpopulation + 'ethnic chaos' are precursors to an active erosion of democracy. And hinders to some extent, the deeper long-term benefits of multi-racial-cultural overlap in our species.

I often think about the federated model as an enlightened alternative to national borders where we nevertheless have the same dwindling lack of choices.
I think federalism is the word. Basically a collection of autonomous mini-republics or zones where people can choose to live as they wish. That could be along philial/ethnic lines, or religious, gender. Anything. Pro-drug, no-drug etc.

I always come back to it. Since central government of any kind is so easily chewed through by corruption, its probably the closest thing to democracy.

I think it was in a Neal Stephenson book, the Diamond Age maybe. But i think some of the anarchists promoted it for a long time.

They perfectly know how that works, and that it works ...
is funny how people consider far-fetched that the Illuminati still acts as a organized group, considering that they existed and were "banned"...

I think erosion of democracy/set of a corporative totalitarian state is the real objective of Kalergi plan, not exactly destroying white people but eroding its democratic culture and cultural roots that allow us to be the "standard" of democratic civilization (though I know some people would deny this...)

 

[Neuroborean]

Gurdjieff, Ouspensky & the Fourth Way school.

what would you recommend of this?
he wrote quite a lot isn't it?
I don't know where to start when it's related with esoteric knowledge since I consider it quite confusing for the most part

 

[skipjames]

nah, he is not really overrated at all, most people don't get what he does, because you need to read him very carefully and extensively, once you get how he reads Nietzsche and Kant it's easier to get into him

Here´s the thing don t like of "continental " philosophy more generally, the lack of clarity. Kant can be boring AF but at least is clear, Nietzsche... used to love him now I consider him more a writer-polemicist than a "proper philosopher. Heidegger...invented an idiolect and if yu don t understand hum, that´s your fault, while it´s HIS fault. When philosophers talk strange for the sack of writing strange, I always think they want to sell me something fishy. But maybe it´s just me and my "analytic " training....anyway cheers!

 

[skipjames]

I had to wrack my brain and thought The Madonna/Mary, but I don't know much about Catholicism. I know a fair bit about Greek/Roman myth and that the feminine gradually disappeared from religion, with The Madonna being the last representation.

I failed to mention Joseph Campbell in my list but he talks about this..

Interesting video, in Christianity in general and in Catholicism in particular we used a lot of symbolism from other religions (think about the bread and wine, Christmas on the 25th of December which was the day of the pagan feast of the Sol Invictus etc) but they were drastically " resignificated ". And I agree with the guy, the "Mariaphoby " of the Puritans an of fundamentalist Christians lead to a ferocious version of God ( one of the reason way I m not a protestant I guess The women in the Gospels play a pivotal role, after all they were the only one who syayed with Chist til the end, while the Apostles disappeared .....

 

[Zopiclone bandit]

Shirdi Sai Baba

 

[Neuroborean]

Here´s the thing don t like of "continental " philosophy more generally, the lack of clarity. Kant can be boring AF but at least is clear, Nietzsche... used to love him now I consider him more a writer-polemicist than a "proper philosopher. Heidegger...invented an idiolect and if yu don t understand hum, that´s your fault, while it´s HIS fault. When philosophers talk strange for the sack of writing strange, I always think they want to sell me something fishy. But maybe it´s just me and my "analytic " training....anyway cheers!

Honestly I don't see any lack of clarity in his expression, he is tremendously clear, maybe you don't fit his way of expression, I guess that someone used to scientific writings more than literature or poetry can have some standard of clarity that doesn't really fit with some german guys. This doesn't mean that it is literature nor poetry...
I can understand the feeling of "lack of clarity", but the thing is that Heidegger goes into phenomenology first and then creates his own style, but it's still phenomenology (of Being). I think is more related with what he wants to study/express, the nature of the problem doesn't help.

 

[wareika]

what would you recommend of this?
he wrote quite a lot isn't it?
I don't know where to start when it's related with esoteric knowledge since I consider it quite confusing for the most part

Absolutely. The 'the war against sleep' by colin wilson. It's short and he really groks (gets) the spirit of the thing.

Also Maurice Nicoll - Psychological Commentaries on the teaching of gurdjieff & ouspensky. Vol 1-5. But i reckon quite succinct. Check out 1.

My favourite is the 'fourth way' by Ouspensky but i have a karmic template with that one. Several friends havent reciprocated that feeling The Work obviously finds us where it does.

48 exercises - g.i. gurdjieff

what is music solving a scientific mystery - philip dorrell

john g bennett

Ouspensky himself had a good grasp of maths etc before meeting Gurdjieff, so if you like math there are his works on the 4th dimension, such as Tertium Organum. Interested to hear any insights from you there but generally way outta my range.

There have been many bright students & stars in this stream. Gurdjieff's work himself i'm not so familiar with. I'm more familiar with the interpretations of that. Like Crowley i find the original a little too heady & esoteric a lot of the time.