Or can you just pawn other people’s philosophies as your own?
Just curious?
I think it’s ok to pawn off other’s philosophy as your own. I mean, look at all the people on here who just call themselves marxists of nietzscheans. It’s like they haven’t figured out how to get outside of those boxes yet. I’d still grant it to them that they might be philosophers, but for now you might say they’re in training.
Nietzschean Marxism (Brecht) is totally where it’s at. But I agree, calling oneself ‘Nietzschean’ or ‘Marxist’ isn’t philosophical in the least.
Compare your average football fan to an average professional football player.
Someone visiting an art gallery visiter to an artist whos work they are viewing.
A failed law student to a top court judge and so on.
Equal to the above comparences is someone who reads and is intrested in and knows about philsophy or phillosophers (compared) to someone who self learnt and is well versed in the areas of philosophy.
Needless to say I agree, and, in turn, one might conclude that philosophy is not about replacing the wheel with something better, but reinventing the wheel so that more people can use it than have hitherto; saying something profound in a new way such that it earns new ears.
I disagree. I think saying things in a new way would make you a poet or writer, but not a philosopher.
I think poetry is the art of words and then philosophy is the art of observation and logic. Hard to separate the two, but I think there is a difference.
Also, notice in your Goethe quote he’s referring to authors (writers/poets) and not philosophers.
Okay, how about this one instead:
Oh, and philosophy is every bit the ‘art of words’ that poetry is.
Right on, brother. Fight the power.
A healthy appreciation for Brecht may be the only area where we’ll ever routinely agree, SIATD.
Except for that whole theatre . . . thing.
What ARE you on about? His plays are incredible. Ever read or seen Life of Galileo? I would have thought it’d be right up your street.
Oh, the writing in the plays are amazing.
It is how they are performed that get me.
Definitely a better read than a watch.
timex is rather boring, but rolex has a bit of flash…
-Imp
Have you read about Brechtian performance theory? Apples to oranges it ain’t.
It’s his critical works I most adore, in truth.
I’m not sure - the two Brecht performances I’ve seen were very good, but when we tried it ourselves (studied him back at school in Theatre Studies classes) I realised just how difficult it is to direct his plays. So it wouldn’t surprise me at all if you’d seen poor performances from a group directed by someone who’d bitten off more than they could chew.
I’ve got an essay about Brecht (and Okigbo) on Symposia. We should kick off a thread outlining some of his philosophy. I don’t know anyone else here who knows much about him.
SIATD,
Never really heard of him, so that would be appreciated. I’ll check out your Symposia article
Philosophy is but the evolution of thought.
Are ideas created or have they always “existed”?
All great “creations” and discoveries are first born of a concept. If something absolutely did not exist either in the past, present or future, neither would the concept of it.
Evolution by itself “creates” nothing, but it builds upon, progresses, and advances that which has already been created. One can grasp a concept, others can “build” on it. No theft is involved with philosophy.
Philosophy is but the evolution of thought.
Are ideas created or have they always “existed”?
All great “creations” and discoveries are first born of a concept. If something absolutely did not exist either in the past, present or future, neither would the concept of it.
Evolution by itself “creates” nothing, but it builds upon, progresses, and advances that which has already been created. One can grasp a concept, others can “build” on it even with as little as eleven extra words because there is no theft is involved with philosophy.
“Because there is no theft is involved with philosophy”??!
Suffering because of stupidity, I guess you do stand alone. 
no, if that was truley the case none of us would be here
“All western philosophy consists of footnotes to Plato,” Alfred North Whitehead
If we accept what Whitehead said then no western philosophy has been strikingly original since Plato.