viewwell wrote:existentialism isn't quite my thing, but i'd also advise you to read two "classic" texts of existentialism (if you haven't already): sartre's existentialism is humanism & camus' the myth of sisyphos.
I've still not read anything by Sartre actually, but I'm a huge Camus fan. My favorite part of
The Myth of Sisyphus was when he started analyzing different characteristic reactions to absurdity.
Exile and The Kingdom and
The Plague are really what got me into Camus though, and then
The Rebel just sealed the deal. I've heard people say I'd like Sartre, but I'm skeptical so more Nietzsche, Kierkegaard, and Dostoyevsky's
The Idiot are all higher priority for me.
viewwell wrote:In addition maybe try reading william james' lectures on pragmatism: a new name for some old ways of thinking
I've never read anything by either of the James brothers or John Dewey actually. Funny thing about the American education system, but the schools here seem to do their best not to talk about the Transcendentalists or the Pragmatists in depth, even though they're more American than apple pie or the automobile. It's almost as if... they don't want you thinking for yourself... gee, I wonder why?
viewwell wrote:yes, tractatus still gets the main attention, when it comes to wittgenstein's work. but i'd encourage you to read some late-wittgenstein which is completely different from tractatus
Duly noted and on my list. No guarantee I'll ever get to it though
pit wrote:I was into Nietzshe back in high school and The Satanic Bible back in my college days. Currently I am reading The Conspiracy Against The Human Race by Thomas Ligotti.
Wow. I'm kind of going the exact opposite direction... maybe it's a circle and we'll bump into each other again? Just wondering though, you still into the satanist thing? What's that like? I could have sworn randomly reading somewhere, maybe on Wikipedia, that Anton LaVey once said that his satanism was pretty much Ayn Rand libertarianism + pentagrams.