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comment by havires
havires  ·  3610 days ago  ·  link  ·    ·  parent  ·  post: Choose Your Own Adventure (Philosophy)

    You've explored the castle. You've made your choices. And here's what we know about you:

    You're fairly forgiving, at heart; you agreed with the robin more than the blackbird, and you don't like blaming people for their decisions.

    You value pleasure, but not at the cost of everything else - there are clear limits to how far you'll take the pursuit of enjoyment.

    If you're looking to investigate some philosophers you agree with, there are a few places you can look. You could try David Hume, who agrees with you on the nature of desire. You and Aristotle feel the same way about weak will. You're on the same page as John Rawls about collective responsibility. And Max Weber feels similarly to you with regard to whether it's possible to be too rational.

    And if you want to challenge your opinions and seek out people you instinctively disagree with, there are plenty of them as well. You think very differently to Aristotle and Epicurus about whether desires can be rational. You disagree with Socrates and Thomas Hobbes about weak will.

Well that was a pretty interesting thought experiment or "game". I feel like it was pretty spot on about my philosophy, and I think I might go ahead and look into Socrates, Aristotle and Epicurus. Time to get a library card or dig through the internet for their work/s.





OftenBen  ·  3610 days ago  ·  link  ·  

    Time to get a library card or dig through the internet for their work/s.

That's part of the reason I love this thing, very few internet resources I've found motivate personal research so easily.

havires  ·  3610 days ago  ·  link  ·  

I had to use my Google-fu for a second to figure out who came up with the Allegory of the Cave, turns out my initial guess was wrong, it's Plato, not Socrates - I think I had them mixed up. Come to think of it, I think have Plato's Republic in PDF form somewhere, I might read it.

Side bar: I tried to read The Prince by Niccolò Machiavelli and I couldn't understand it. Or rather I didn't understand what he was talking about with that treatise. Are you familiar with it?

OftenBen  ·  3610 days ago  ·  link  ·  

I've read analysis of The Prince, some excerpts, and the full text is on my reading list (Eventually).

So, kinda.

havires  ·  3610 days ago  ·  link  ·  

Back to my initial point about personal research, I think I'm going to look up cliff notes on The Prince as well and see what that's all about.