Started reading Less than Nothing. The work is definitely more than nothing so far, but definitely a few disputes to raise. He sees the history of philosophy idealized by those ‘epochal’ philosophers, those who simultaneously defined a whole era of thought and set the tone for all later responses to their thought. The big 3 he mentions are Plato, Descartes and Hegel. Its interesting to consider his dialectical approach to the matter of epochal philosophers and the thought response to them for ages to come but I would have to disagree with Hegel in addition to getting some feedback from you guys.
Hegel is an interesting guy but his metaphysical dogmatism (claiming an undeniable all-encompassing metaphysical system) and specialized language (have you really digested spirit the same way every time you try to read it? Seriously, something’s fucked up here…) has always rubbed me the wrong. Personally, I would not want to get rid of Hegel because he definitely inspired a disgustingly boring era of phenomenology and idealism after him, but I do not want to disregard the historical significance of thinkers such as Hume, Kant and Schopenhauer, especially the former.
So we have all these philosophers to choose from, and if you could choose 3-5 who should be deemed ‘epochal’ or representing of key transitional/substantive stages in the history of philosophy, who would they be and why? Can someone please tell me why Hegel is so damn important?
My picks:
Plato
Descartes
Hume
Kant