The Problems of Philosophy

I would have to say Bertrand Russell's The Problems of Philosophy. A short book, it covers the limits of knowledge and how to think about the world. Every time I read it I discover something new, and it would be a good companion guide through life if I could read nothing else.

"The problems of philosophy" by Bertrand Russell. ~8 times. "The abolition of man" by "C.S. Lewis" 3 times. "The Reign of Quantity and the Signs of the Times" by René Guénon. 3 times, and planning to set a weekend for another re-read soon.

An assortment: "The Silent Language" by Edward T. Hall. Hall was an anthropologist attached to the University of New Mexico. He and his research partner, linguist Norman Trager, were doing research in comparative culture. Hall realized they would need a comprehensive theory of culture to describe what they were comparing and provide ways to compare them. Hall's model was "culture as communication", and the results were presented in the book above. His key point was that most of culture was like the iceberg - 90% of it is processed on an unconscious reflex level. We are no more aware of most of our culture than a fish is of the water it swims in. We only become aware when we are set down in a culture that does things differently than ours. The Silent Language is about how we use space. The followup "The Hidden Dimension looks into how different cultures use time. Many things fell into place when I read Hall. "Games People Play" by Eric Berne.…

Elsewhere in the thread, I posted some recommendations on books on philosophy of religion from a non-theistic perspective. I guess I should probably list some books on philosophy generally. 1. Bertrand Russell - The Problems of Philosophy A good introduction to the basic things which philosophers in the Anglo-American/analytic tradition worry about in logic, metaphysics and epistemology (primarily epistemology): induction, a priori knowledge, anti-sceptical arguments, and universals. 2. Hans-Georg Gadamer - Truth and Method You know about the 'Continental' philosophers, right? All those wacky guys like Derrida. They are all a bit suspicious, right? Like, Heidegger was a Nazi, and Foucault spreads HIV. Yeah, gossip is great. A lot of this type of philosophy seems like bunkum - Alan Sokal showed that, right? Lots of waffly French dudes talking out of their ass, abusing science to basically support their political ideology. Gadamer isn't like that. He sets out to try and answer the question "how do we understand texts?" and rather than saying something goofy like "we just make up what we understand about texts" or that we deconstruct them by subjecting them to our ideological whims,…