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HailHailtoMichigan! 
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| re: What book has had the greatest influence on you politically and philosophically? (Posted on 11/11/12 at 10:10 pm to TN Bhoy)
quote:
Reflections on the Revolution in France - Edmund Burke
A fascinating read.
Burke is considered the founder of modern conservatism, yet one of his main points in this book is that natural rights don't exist. A very complex man/treatise.
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OMLandshark 
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| re: What book has had the greatest influence on you politically and philosophically? (Posted on 11/11/12 at 10:10 pm to HailHailtoMichigan!)
"I Hope They Serve Beer in Hell" by Tucker Max
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Bayou Sam 
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| re: What book has had the greatest influence on you politically and philosophically? (Posted on 11/11/12 at 10:20 pm to HempHead)
If someone blames abuses of english and reason in "high theory" on hermeneutics, someone doesn't know what hermeneutics is.
This post was edited on 11/11 at 10:23 pm
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Bayou Sam
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| re: What book has had the greatest influence on you politically and philosophically? (Posted on 11/11/12 at 10:22 pm to HailHailtoMichigan!)
Back in the day, hand's down Alasdair MacIntyre's After Virtue.
Today it could be a whole host of things. Among 20th century folks, Leo Strauss.
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Bayou Sam
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| re: What book has had the greatest influence on you politically and philosophically? (Posted on 11/11/12 at 10:24 pm to wm72)
I like Order of Things (though I didn't finish it and don't agree with a lot of it), but never really got into Derrida.
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RogerTheShrubber
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| re: What book has had the greatest influence on you politically and philosophically? (Posted on 11/11/12 at 10:24 pm to HailHailtoMichigan!)
The Gnosticon
In case Otto is lurking
This post was edited on 11/11 at 11:30 pm
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HonoraryCoonass
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Member since Jan 2005
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| re: What book has had the greatest influence on you politically and philosophically? (Posted on 11/11/12 at 10:24 pm to HailHailtoMichigan!)
"The Law," by Frederic Bastiat.
I'd say it is more affirmation than influence.
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TigerPride10 
Columbia Fan
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Member since Jul 2007
8976 posts
| re: What book has had the greatest influence on you politically and philosophically? (Posted on 11/11/12 at 10:28 pm to Bayou Sam)
It's hard to point to any one book. The classics have certainly had an effect, both fiction and non. If I had to name a few, I'd say The Prince, Diplomacy, and The Tragedy of Great Power Politics.
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wm72
New York/Roma
Member since Mar 2010
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| re: What book has had the greatest influence on you politically and philosophically? (Posted on 11/11/12 at 10:36 pm to Bayou Sam)
quote:
I like Order of Things (though I didn't finish it and don't agree with a lot of it), but never really got into Derrida.
Foucault is more accessible stylistically even if the concepts are certainly complex.
Derrida I wouldn't recommend the actual books themselves to anyone who's also not used to the condensed, elliptical philosophical writings of such as Hegel, Heidegger, Nietzsche etc. for much the same reason as I would personally struggle to get into some styles of scientific writing.
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HempHead 
Alabama Fan
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Member since Mar 2011
10139 posts
| re: What book has had the greatest influence on you politically and philosophically? (Posted on 11/11/12 at 10:39 pm to Bayou Sam)
quote:
If someone blames abuses of english and reason in "high theory" on hermeneutics, someone doesn't know what hermeneutics is.
Read the full article, see if you think that's what the "author's intent" was.
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BTHog 
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| re: What book has had the greatest influence on you politically and philosophically? (Posted on 11/11/12 at 10:39 pm to wm72)
Animal farm
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Bayou Sam
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| re: What book has had the greatest influence on you politically and philosophically? (Posted on 11/11/12 at 10:43 pm to wm72)
Derrida makes Heidegger an easy read. Nietzsche isn't hard to read at all. Hegel, well.
At any rate, I take Derrida's basic point to be rather simple, and mostly correct, though I find his way of philosophizing extremely off-putting (he uses reductio ad absurdum an awful lots to construct what seem to me to be spurious paradoxes).
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Taxing Authority
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Houston
Member since Feb 2010
16738 posts
| re: What book has had the greatest influence on you politically and philosophically? (Posted on 11/11/12 at 10:45 pm to HailHailtoMichigan!)
Democracy in America - Alexis de toquiville
The Law - Frederic Bastiat
The Road to Surfdom - Hayek
Atlas Shrugged - Ayn Rand
Propaganda - Edward Bernays
Crystallizing Public Opinion - Edward Bernays
The Modern Survival Manual: Surviving the Economic Collapse - Fernando Ferfal Aguirre
The Big Book of Hell - Matt Groening
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Taxing Authority
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Houston
Member since Feb 2010
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| re: What book has had the greatest influence on you politically and philosophically? (Posted on 11/11/12 at 10:46 pm to Taxing Authority)
Oh and Shop Class as Soulcraft by Matt Crawford.
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Bayou Sam
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| re: What book has had the greatest influence on you politically and philosophically? (Posted on 11/11/12 at 10:49 pm to HempHead)
Yeah it strikes me as a highly conventional rant against something not really understood. It's just another platform to pimp libertarianism (Heidegger-Gadamer and Marx, for instance--where's the connection?)
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Teddy Ruxpin
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New Orleans, LA
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| re: What book has had the greatest influence on you politically and philosophically? (Posted on 11/11/12 at 10:49 pm to Taxing Authority)
I'd say "The Vision of the Anointed: Self-congratulation as a basis for Social Policy"
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white perch
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| re: What book has had the greatest influence on you politically and philosophically? (Posted on 11/11/12 at 10:55 pm to HailHailtoMichigan!)
someone mentioned Dr. Seuss books. They probable have a much larger impact on the world than we realize. They are actually very political in nature and stress some important points. They were written by Theodor Seuss Geisel, a Ph.D. in english literature, who worked for many years with several branches of the US gov't during WWII. He wrote these books as a way of instilling certain points into the children of society that he thought were improtant for a society to flurish. To bad the majority of parents no longer read to their children and all they get is TV now.
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wm72
New York/Roma
Member since Mar 2010
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| re: What book has had the greatest influence on you politically and philosophically? (Posted on 11/11/12 at 10:59 pm to Bayou Sam)
quote:
At any rate, I take Derrida's basic point to be rather simple, and mostly correct, though I find his way of philosophizing extremely off-putting (he uses reductio ad absurdum an awful lots to construct what seem to me to be spurious paradoxes).
I wouldn't disagree with this aside from the paradoxes that emerge when he tasks dialectics such as Hegel's master/slave, reading/writing, Levi Strauss' raw/cooked seem less than spurious and, even, revolutionary.
Of course, that's just my opinion and it's too much to go into as a late night tangent in a political thread here. It's refreshing to find people reading and actually confronting thinkers like Derrida and Foucault instead of completely dismissing them on flimsy premises.
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HailHailtoMichigan!
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Mission Viejo, CA
Member since Mar 2012
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| re: What book has had the greatest influence on you politically and philosophically? (Posted on 11/11/12 at 11:02 pm to Taxing Authority)
quote:
The Road to Surfdom - Hayek
This is definitely an important book, but Hayek in a few parts seemed to advocate for social programs. That lessens its appeal a bit, imo.
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lordguill 
LA-Lafayette Fan
Member since Dec 2005
16659 posts
| re: What book has had the greatest influence on you politically and philosophically? (Posted on 11/11/12 at 11:03 pm to RunningBlake)
quote:
Turner Diaries
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