History of Western Philosophy

I love my history. And it was fascinating seeing how ideas/thoughts/thinking have evolved over the centuries.

on HN, 2018

Easily my most favorite non-fiction book. Even though there are some flaws in the treatment of some philosophers (and their models) here and there (esp. 19th Century ones – but it might just be that I'm more familiar with these myself), it's a great read: Well written, thorough, and never shy with his own opinion.

on HN, 2014

Before I read this book, I rarely cared about pre-Kantian philosophy, as I thought it to be outdated and not really relevant anymore. Russel encouraged me to re-discover the philosophical models from a cultural-historical point of view – something that sounds obvious to me now, but at the time I discovered the book (in my early twenties) it was not.

on HN, 2014

A fun read so far (~100 pages). Russell is not afraid to tell the reader that he really dislikes Plato, and thinks he destroyed western philosophy.

on HN, 2017

The world's most prominent philosopher at the time, took a few years out of his working at the front line to write a summary on 2000 years of thought for layman's and won a nobel prize. It's not the easiest read, you can take issue with some interpretations but theres nothing like it. I think it required reading for being a thoughtful human.

on HN, 2024

While this book has its problems, it is a wide-ranging, engaging, and readable history of ideas from antiquity to about the turn of the 20th century. I'm finding it difficult to put any other book ahead of this one.

on HN, 2024