by osmosis

Philosophy is often framed as an elitist and impractical endeavor. Does Hegel's notions of identity in difference matter when you're stuck in an office at 3:30pm on a Tuesday? Can anyone pick up and understand a philosophical text without formal training? I'd argue an unequivocal yes to both questions. In the words of Slavoj Zizek, "Philosophy isn't about providing answers, but only about rephrasing the question." That statement both demystifies the art of philosophy, and brings it into the practical realm.

Much of life is built around argument (or at least discussion), and understanding what makes a strong and rational statement/question is vital. Within the Information Age, exists a flood of misinformation. The theory goes: if you can create enough noise (false info), then it becomes laborious to sift for facts. It's similar to when the music industry used to flood Napster and Kazaa with noise tracks labeled as a popular song. Philosophy helps to identify the "noise," and frame the question in an appropriate way.

Ok, so where to start?

First thing: Go buy Bertrand Russell's History of Western Philosophy as a reference guide for all philosophers prior to Kant. He goes all the way through Dewey (1859-1952), but it's most important for philosophy pre-18th century.  For this reason I'll be staying mostly inside the last 300 years.

Next move: Find some old and new philosophers to tackle simultaneously. I've found this to be a more enjoyable and sustainable process. Starting with Socrates and trying to plow through nearly 2,500 years of deep thought is slightly daunting. I started with mostly modern thinkers, and listened for the philosophers they referenced.  Once that list grew large, I began buying those source texts to both contextualize my contemporary reading and lay a strong foundation for my philosophical knowledge.  Above is the poster for Examined Life, which is a great study of 8 Modern Philosophers.  I highly recommend using this as a guide as well.

Some 20th/21st Century philosophers I started with:

• Slavoj Zizek (The Sublime Object of Ideology, Tarrying With the Negative, Zizek the film)
• Cornel West (Democracy Matters, Race Matters, various lectures online - he's more of an orator by trade)
• Michel Foucault (Discipline & Punishment, College de France lectures, History of Madness)
• Jacques Derrida (Of Grammatology, Derrida the film)
• Paul Tillich (The Courage To Be, Theology of Culture)
• Bertrand Russell (The Basic Writings, and of course History of Western Philosophy)
• Judith Butler (Gender Troubles)
• Roland Barthes (The Pleasure of the Text, Mythologies)
• Michael Hardt (Empire, Multitude)

These two are politically heavy, but I'll add them anyways:

• Naomi Klein (No Logo, Shock Doctrine)
• Noam Chomsky (Profit Over People, Manufacturing Consent, The Chomsky-Foucault Debate)

This is a pretty diverse group, although they cross pollinate in interesting ways. Take some of these names for a spin through wikipedia/amazon and see what sticks.

From there: Foundational names will start to pop off the page, so it's time to dig in deeper.  I tried to break this list into Essential and Secondary Texts, but failed to justify the split.  I'm in no position to make such a call.  Also, this is in NO way a complete or near complete list of essential philosophical texts.  This is just a list of people and books that I've come across - mostly from the last 300 years, since Russell takes care of everything prior (Greek Philosophy etc…).

• Immanuel Kant - Critique of Pure Reason
• Georg Wilhelm Friedrich Hegel - Phenomenology of Spirit
• Karl Marx - Capital
• Friedrich Nietzsche - The Basic Writings…
• Georg Lukas - History and Class Consciousness
• David Hume - An Enquiry Concerning Human Understanding
• Soren Kierkegaard - Either/Or
• Walter Benjamin - Illuminations
• Theodor Adorno - Dialectic of Enlightenment
• Louis Althusser - Reading Capital
• Martin Heidegger - Being and Time
• Jean Paul Sartre - Existentialism is Humanism
• William James - Pragmatism
• Sheldon S. Wolin - Politics and Vision
• Gilles Deleuze - Anti-Oedipus
• John Ruskin - Unto This Last and Other Writing
• Alfred Lord Whitehead - Principia Mathematica, Process and Reality
• Jacques Lacan - Ecrits
• John Dewey - The Essential Dewey Vol 1 and 2

I hope this list of names helps give people a starting place for philosophical exploration.  I am in no way an expert on any of these thinkers, but I've been enjoying my journey through their work.