Reddit Reddit reviews The Story of Philosophy: The Lives and Opinions of the World's Greatest Philosophers

We found 20 Reddit comments about The Story of Philosophy: The Lives and Opinions of the World's Greatest Philosophers. Here are the top ones, ranked by their Reddit score.

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20 Reddit comments about The Story of Philosophy: The Lives and Opinions of the World's Greatest Philosophers:

u/Lynxx · 7 pointsr/askphilosophy

The first two books that come to mind are The Story of Philosophy by William Durant, and A History of Western Philosophy by Bertrand Russell. I've never read the Russell book personally, but I've heard great things about it (plus, its got a great cover).

u/OhDannyBoy00 · 5 pointsr/askphilosophy

Will Durant's "The Story of Philosophy". I'm reading it now and I wish it was the first book I read. At 400 pages it definitely skips some major parts of history but it's written in a way that's very entertaining. It reads like a novel and makes the material accessible instead of getting bogged down with technicals like Anthony Kenny's history.

https://smile.amazon.com/gp/product/0671739166/ref=oh_aui_detailpage_o05_s00?ie=UTF8&psc=1

A really great way to get "the flavour" of philosophy as they like to say.

u/notphilosophy · 4 pointsr/askphilosophy

Might I suggest Will Durant's The Story of Philosophy. It's like Russell's History of Phi, but not as popular. I ate that book up as a new undergrad student and I enjoy keeping it by my bedside. I never read it anymore, but I feel good knowing it's at an arm's length.

u/adrianscholl · 3 pointsr/askphilosophy

Will Durant's The Story of Philosophy is an excellent overview of philosophy. While it is limited to a small selection of the most notable philosophers, each chapter is dedicated to providing a very readable summary of the ideas of one philosopher. I sincerely believe the best way to get into philosophy is to get a very general "historical map" of the big ideas. Once you have that, it becomes much more rewarding to pick a philosopher of interest and study them in greater detail.

u/TheAethereal · 3 pointsr/booksuggestions

I would read Plato's Republic. I don't like Plato, but it's really foundational for western philosophy. Then read Aristotle. This is also a great book.

u/platochronic · 3 pointsr/philosophy

I would recommend an introductory book. Personally, I suggest Story of Philosophy by Will Durant. But if you really want to understand it, you're going to have to get in the habit of reading slowly and rereading until you really understand it. And have a dictionary and look up of all of the words you don't know.

If you finish the book, I guarantee your entire perspective on life will be completely different. Not necessarily for the better, as some people learn more than they bargain for. But if you finish and really want to learn more, I can give you other good introductions.

u/rednblack · 3 pointsr/philosophy

The Philosopher's Toolkit and The Story of Philosophy both seem like great places to start.

u/HumeFrood · 3 pointsr/philosophy

A lot of Bertrand Russell's books are accessible, as long as you're willing to put up with some of his personal biases. There are arguably a lot of misinterpretations of individual philosophers in his book "A History of Western Philosophy," for example, but it can still give you a good general overview that's also very accessible. I've also heard nothing but good things about The Story of Philosophy by Will Durant. I haven't read it, but I've read other books by him and they're all very accessible.

u/cryptocap · 2 pointsr/Anarcho_Capitalism

I assume that you meant this book, The Story of Philosophy?

u/rnsbrum · 2 pointsr/asktrp

Read something on the history of philosophy, then something about each field, just to understand the basics of it(epistemology, ethics, morals, antropology, methaphysics, logic, aesthetics)



Start with the Greeks (Plato, Socrates and Aristotle) then move up to the scholastic(Thomas Aquine, Saint Augustine) then westerners(Kant, Hobbes, Rousseau, Descartes, Popper, Wittgenstein, Russel, Nietzsche, Schopenhauer) then read about politics.

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Start by watching videos about the history of Philosophy, what philosophy is and then move to Greek philosophy then to individual philosophers, so that you can understand the context of their ideas. Then, as you get more interested, you can pick up a book of your interest. If you go directly into the book, you might feel overwhelmed and lost.

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If you are looking for something like a "philosophy for life" I would recommend reading reading Meditations by the Emperor of Rome Marcus Aurelius, if you want something that will shatter your world but its hard to digest read Nietzsche. Both are very redpilled. If you want to pursue higher knowledge, or simply high culture, follow the what I wrote above.

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These are great men, and we have inhereted their legacy, please take this seriously.

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https://www.amazon.com/The-Story-Philosophy-Opinions-Philosophers/dp/0671739166

u/hydrokush · 2 pointsr/IndianEnts

An amazing book. If further interested, check out The Story of Philosophy by Will Durant (http://www.amazon.in/The-Story-Philosophy-Will-Durant/dp/0671739166?tag=googinhydr18418-21&tag=googinkenshoo-21&ascsubtag=3523b828-ee86-4fd9-9419-9f38cbc5e481). Another brilliant book which goes in more depth.

u/pepto_dismal81 · 2 pointsr/philosophy

Will Durant's 'The Story of Philosophy' is what got me excited about the subject when i was a young man.

u/Wylkus · 1 pointr/InsightfulQuestions

To this day there is still no greater book for opening up the world of thought than Will Durant's The Story of Philosophy. This book is indispensable.

Aside from that the best advice, as many here have noted, is to simply read widely and often. Here are some other books I can personally recommend as being particularly insightful:


u/[deleted] · 1 pointr/askphilosophy

A shorter and simpler summary, if a bit dated, is Frost's Basic Teachings of Great Philosophers, and then also Durant's history The Story of Philosophy: The Lives and Opinions of the World's Greatest Philosophers.

u/surfed_ · 1 pointr/JordanPeterson

Not about PM, but this was a great read for me when I first started exploring philosophy: https://www.amazon.com/Story-Philosophy-Opinions-Greatest-Philosophers/dp/0671739166/.

u/flanders4ever · 1 pointr/askphilosophy

My advice is to dabble in the tradition for a little bit before you consider majoring in it. You have probably taken Physics, History, Math, Economics, etc, in High School and understand what sort of thing you'd be studying if you take any of these subjects as a major. This is not the case for philosophy. To decide whether you want to major in Philosophy, I think you need to do two things. First, you might want to dabble in the philosophical tradition as broadly as possible. You can do this by going through a book that deals with the history of the movement. I wish Will Durant's The Story of Philosophy was my introduction to the history of philosophy. Durant gives his own arguments for why philosophy is a worthwhile thing to study, but also gives a really nice, readable, and informative history of some of the greatest philosophers of all time. The second way to dabble in the field is by taking one philosopher central to the cannon and really get into him. (Hopefully, it wont always be a "him" :). Its not easy to decide which philosopher to read first. In any case, it will be massively difficult to get through whatever book you decide to read, since philosophy books are unlike any other book you were taught in high school. Personally, if i were you, I'd read Durant's work first, and choose whatever philosopher you enjoyed reading about most in that book, and then find the most important book that author has written. If you have trouble deciding that, of course feel free to ask us!

u/BrickSalad · 1 pointr/moderatepolitics

Study philosophy! Seriously, just get a big ol' book on the history of philosophy like this one and wade your way through it. A good amount of political thought is based on philosophy, so understanding it is essential to truly understanding politics. You'll find yourself pondering the great questions like "What is the value of equality? Is it compatible with freedom? Is government necessary? Is there a such thing as a Just War? Are morals relative?", and your answers to these questions will determine where you lie politically. (I haven't actually read the book I linked to, but I've heard it's good and I don't want to recommend you that $100 textbook I read.)

Now, when you wade into the terrifying mess that is contemporary politics, you should learn and keep in mind all of the logical fallacies, because you'll hear lots of them. There isn't really any place to "get started" with this, just look around for sources of unbiased information. Never trust the mainstream media, don't trust fringe activists either. Of course they're both right from time to time, but you're better off doing in depth research on any position. If your like me, that means you'll be ambivalent about most issues simply because you don't have the time to learn about them. That's okay, sometimes it's best to just say "I don't know".

u/ThierryEnnui14 · 1 pointr/askphilosophy

Will Durant's book is so much better than Russell's. Durant is not as biased regarding philosophers he agrees or disagrees with. And he's simply a much better writer, IMO.

https://www.amazon.com/Story-Philosophy-Opinions-Greatest-Philosophers/dp/0671739166

Durant combined with Kenny is probably the best route.