Who Are Your Favorite Philosophers?

  • Thread starter Thread starter Feanaro
  • Start date Start date
Status
Not open for further replies.
F

Feanaro

Guest
Who are your favorite philosophers? Name your top five! I’ll start:

  1. *]St. Thomas Aquinas
    *]St. Augustine
    *]Socrates
    *]Aristotle
    *]Plato
 
I don’t know about “favorite” but the ones I find the most interesting are Plato, Jean-Jacques Rousseau, Friiedrich Nietzsche, Leo Strauss and Pierre Manent. As you can probably tell, my interests are in political philosophy.
 
Feanaro said:
Who are your favorite philosophers? Name your top five! I’ll start:

  1. *]St. Thomas Aquinas
    *]St. Augustine
    *]Socrates
    *]Aristotle
    *]Plato
Click to expand...

  1. lol. Just so you know, Plato more or less equals Socrates.

    Thomas Aquinas
    Augustine
    Thomas More
    Aristotle

    A far as I am concerned, this is all that is worth reading anymore.
 
Feanaro said:
Who are your favorite philosophers? Name your top five! I’ll start:
    • St. Thomas Aquinas
    • St. Augustine
    • Socrates
    • Aristotle
    • Plato
Click to expand...

  1. In no particular order:​

    • Ludwig Wittgenstein
    • C.E. M. Joad
    • William James
    • Richard Sorabji
    • Søren Kierkegaard
      **I would like to include St. Paul - but that would be cheating :o **
    **ISTM Augustine & Aquinas are Christian believers & “men of the Church” before they are philosophers; & that (what is even more important) their philosophies are not separable from their theologies; or, much less so than with more recent thinkers; including thinkers who were Christians. So those two are being left out 🙂 **
 
William of Ockham, Soren Kierkegaard and Votaire top my list, then a rather sharp drop followed by Plato and Camus.

Plato only makes the list for entertainment value.
 
I love St. Thomas Aquinas.

I also find Bl. John Duns Scotus to be interesting, although I often disagree–I have a friend who is a big time Scotist (Scotian?) and I am a pretty big Thomist–so we have some fun discussions 😛
 
dietrich and alice von hildebrand
peter kreeft
G.K. chesterton ( yes he’s a philosopher:thumbsup: )
 
CapIV said:
lol. Just so you know, Plato more or less equals Socrates.
Click to expand...
Everything we know about Socrates comes from Plato, but I don’t think that makes them synonomous. In fact, I’ve read more of Peter Kreeft than I have Plato, so everything I personally know about Socrates comes from Kreeft. Who happens to be my favorite contemporary philosopher.
 
W.V. Quine is at the top for me. Also love Donald Davidson, Alfred Tarski, Gottlob Frege, Bertrand Russell. Many more besides. Also, I agree that for idle entertainment and beautiful art, Plato is always fun! Read his Symposium for some interesting hints towards proto-Christian themes. Also a masterful literary work.

God Bless

Jon
 
Gottle_of_Geer said:
**ISTM Augustine & Aquinas are Christian believers & “men of the Church” before they are philosophers; & that (what is even more important) their philosophies are not separable from their theologies; or, much less so than with more recent thinkers; including thinkers who were Christians. So those two are being left out 🙂 **
Click to expand...
This is because you can be a theologian without being a philosopher, but you cannot be a philosopher without being a theologian.
 
In no particular order: Rene Descartes, David Hume, Soren Kierkegaard, Immanuel Kant, and I guess C.S. Lewis, though I have no particular affection for him.
 
Feanaro said:
Everything we know about Socrates comes from Plato, but I don’t think that makes them synonomous.
Click to expand...
Not quite. We have Aristophanes’ and Xenophon’s accounts as well as Plato’s. You are right that Plato is not Socrates.
 
SØREN KIERKEGAARD (christian existentialism)
His writings are the works of a geneous. He is actually the only philosophical-litterary geneous I have ever come across in all my studies. By geneous I mean someone who expresses himself in ways and have clarity of thoughts that is a gift that one cannot obtain even if one studied for a 100 years. An intellect like lightning… but he speaks to the common man and discloses hypocracy like a prophet. Sometimes I weep when I read him.

Far down the list I then admire certain writings of “mortals” such as Heidegger (who deals with the universal concept of existential anxiety and experience of time) and K. E Loegstrup (christian philosophy who deals ie. with the teodice problem and creation-theology…)
 
Feanaro said:
Who are your favorite philosophers? Name your top five! I’ll start:


  1. *]St. Thomas Aquinas
    *]St. Augustine
    *]Socrates
    *]Aristotle
    *]Plato
Click to expand...

  1. Assuming the classical definition of Philosopher as a lover of wisdom, my favorites in order are:

    1. *]Jesus Christ
      *]Socrates
      *]St. John
      *]St. Paul
      *]King David
      I list them in the order that they have fostered in me a love of wisdom, or truth.
 
Status
Not open for further replies.
Back
Top