Favorite Philosophers?

[vulcanlogician]

I might choose Aristotle over Plato and his mouthpiece Socrates, since he contributed so much to the foundations of science.  Plato/Socrates always struck me as being as much rhetoricians (a dirty word as I use it) as philosophers, though that might just be the fault of the manner of Plato's exposition.  

Y'know, I've found that you're either an Aristotle guy or a Plato guy. Sure, there are some Greco-philes out there who enjoy both, but usually people tend to like one over the other. I'm a Plato guy.

To me, Socrates is more than just Plato's mouthpiece. He's the provisioner of the fundamental dialectic which we still use today in philosophy. You can toss out a lot of stuff that Plato and Aristotle said because it is ... well, wrong. But Socrates pointed out that we should always delve deeper into our understanding, and through the process we learn more and more about our own perspective.

I disagree that Plato and Socrates were rhetoricians. In fact, they were opposed to the sophists who taught people how to be convincing speakers and treated truth as something relative. To convince others that something was true was an empty pursuit. Plato thought that there was one capital T Truth, and thought that philosophers ought to be committed to discovering that instead of convincing others to agree with persuasive argument. Now Aristotle had some pretty neat ideas, and he took a more hands-on and naturalistic approach to philosophy. I've found that he is far more popular than his teacher, Plato. I admit, he does make more sense than Plato sometimes.

Someone who isn't really a serious academic philosopher but made a big impression on me before I studied it in college, was Alan Watts.  If you liked Thoreau and James you might also like Watts, though Watts' woo as a percentage of his writing was much higher.

I like Watts. I haven't read a whole lot of him, but I rather like what I have read. I saw a few videos of him speaking on youtube. Good stuff. As for "woo," I will tolerate it from someone, but it's not something I ever personally dig. James might fit the bill for being woo woo, but I think it's a stretch. I don't get that from Thoreau at all. He refers to nature as the divine object, but this isn't in relation to some deity or cosmic force; it is divine all by itself. He's not talking about spirits, ectoplasm, or anything spooky like that. He's talking about the actual rocks and actual trees, earth, and rivers. These things filled him with spiritual fervor, but not because they were related to anything supernatural. "Natural" was good enough for Thoreau.

I might like to include Hume and I always felt like I should have read Wittgenstein, but too late.  All I read now is novels and honestly, I've probably gotten just as much out of it.  Though if I hadn't of studied philosophy I might never have gotten my head out of the clouds.

I like Hume a lot, but I've only read a few essays of his. Never read a word of Wittgenstein, but he's come up in conversations/lectures. He sounds quite interesting.

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Beat this phony jesus cat by 5 centuries!

Confucius beat him by five centuries as well:

"never impose on others what you would not choose for yourself"

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Oh and Socrates and Epicurus.

Also Karl Popper. Especially for his endorsement of negative utilitarianism.

I'm getting into Popper. I plan on reading his work in political philosophy. "Enemies of the Open Society" or something like that. Negative utilitarianism sounds really cool too. I hadn't heard of it before your post, but I googled it, and it makes a lot of sense. Why do you like the theory? Does it stand up to arguments that plain old utilitarianism can't?

And I guess one specific idea by Edmund Husserl had a bigger impact on my life than any other philosopher. He is the founder of phenomenology. And understanding phenomenology along with Kant's seperation of the phenomena and noumena, has influenced me more than anything else. By itself that idea allowed me to 100% avoid the paradox of hedonism forever.

Wow. You know your metaphysics, dude. I am somewhat familiar with Kant's phenomena/noumena (I'd have to refresh my memory) and I'm fascinated how it might relate to hedonism or utilitarianism. Kant's ethics are not consequentialist, that much I know. I'd be interested to hear how his metaphysics relates to a brand of ethics he rejects. (I'll click on the link you left at some point.) I've read a good bit of Kant (not as much as you, obviously). But I haven't read any Husserl at all. Anything you can recommend which is a decent introduction to his thought?