My favorite is Albert Camus. I appreciate the freedom of accepting the Absurd (the conflict between the human need for meaning and a world that offers none) and living fully never-the-less. I don’t agree with everything he says, like his emphasis of maximizing the number of experiences in life, because I believe that quality of experiences can be more impactful than quantity but I understand his push toward living life to the fullest despite its lack of inherent meaning.
I’m curious about your favorite and how they influence your life.
St Thomas aquinas
Interesting. I like the concept of balancing eternal law with natural law. While I wouldn’t subscribe to this myself, if more religious people around the world did, there would be less global conflict
St. Augustine.
(‘Favorite’ is a bit of a misnomer but nobody has influenced my thinking more)
Wow, I never took the time to learn more about St. Augustine. He seemed way ahead of his time
Reading Confessions for the first time, and tbh I'm finding it a bit overrated, but still a great work regardless. I want to read The City of God at some point.
I have St. Thomas Aquinas' Summa Theologica. It's like 5 hardback volumes, it's pretty sick. He answers every objection to the faith. Academica in Catholicism used to get me going, but I'm more of a mystic now and less of an academic to the faith.
Agree with you on that. One of the guys in my bible study pulls out the Summa all the time, but I find myself looking into the Carmelite spiritual tradition. However, I'm going to be doing the Spiritual Exercises in the 19th annotation starting soon.
Don't have a 'favourite'. But the ideas that have probably had the most influence on me are stoicism and calvanism. Basically hard work, self discipline and self control are moral. And they are required for a balanced and fulfilling life.
Ah so more of the Marcus Aurelius stem of stoicism. I agree with you and a lot of the principles of stoicism as a way of life to minimize mispleasure - I personally agree more with “Amor Fati”, embracing reality and using it for growth, than maximizing experiences liberally.
However, I am curious how you are able to bring Calvinism into your life? If life is completely structured in God’s will, how do you justify doing anything? Where do you muster the passion to build and grow when God’s plan for you is already set?
I mention calvanism here from the 'protestant work ethic' angle rather than the theological angle.
Christ this is dull. Painfully midwestern.
Can’t wait to hear yours
Maimonides
Any work by him in particular? I've been meaning to explore his stuff after a coworker mentioned him.
The Rambam Mishne Torah is his magnus opus in my humble opinion. Other good works include his collective writings and moreh nevukim. I’m less familiar with them but figure anything of his is good. Good luck
As many here have said the stoics - namely Marcus Aurelius is a good one. However, my favorite is Epictetus. He has a great sense of humor!
Kant
Classic
Diogenes. Less my favorite due to a belief in his school (cynicism), more favorite due to his crazy antics of being a crazed homeless dude.
More seriously, likely Aristotle. His Nicomachean Ethics is really great and a book everyone should read in their life. If you like stoicism, look into Aristotelian ethics. Very similar but does away with the stoic notion of being indifferent to what are good things (in moderation though as Aristotle notes) like friendship, sufficient food, good health, physical safety, etc etc etc
Diogenes is one of the only good answers in here. That guy was a free man in every sense of the word.
Spinoza
I really like Nietzsche and Aurelius, they’ve been pretty integral in how I think about the world
zherka
Andrew Tate
PHD, Hustler’s University
Yukio Mishima
BAP
Seneca
Bertrand Russell
Al Bundy. The man was ahead of his time, and I've come to see how accurate his views on women, life, marriage, and work.
Hermes Trismegistus if you count him as a philosopher
The point you raised about maximizing experiences in life - I don't think what you said about believing in quality over quantity is antithetical to what Camus says. Doesn't mean you have to skimp out on quality experiences just to have more experiences. My take is that he's simply saying to experience as many different things as possible. This is a personal philosophy of mine as well that I independently came up with but I describe it more as one should try to feel all the possible feelings and sensations that life has to offer. I mean truly unique sensations. Do you remember the first time you felt a big adrenaline rush? I'll never forget mine in 5th grade ending up at the top of the ski hill before I had finished lessons and having to go down. Terrifying but also hit like crack. My soft mission in life is to unlock as many unique sensations as I can. Including the bad ones. They're all important to feel. It lets you know the universe better, it lets you know YOURSELF better, it gives you more coverage to empathize with other humans better.
Beautiful take. Thank you for your comment
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