How to get a good intro into Western Philosophy?

Hi


I have chosen to self study an introductory course in philosophy as an additional subject.


I was coasting through Amazon.com book search but it really has me confused as to whether the books are relevant to a novice especially to someone with no external help.





Below is the syllabus. I would really appreciate if someone could point to suitable sources from personal experience - books or online.








: Knowledge and truth


Rationalism, Empiricism and Kant鈥檚 Critical Philosophy


: The Causal Principle


Nature of Cause


Aristotle鈥檚 theory of four-fold causation cause-effect relationship: entailment, regularity


and succession. Theories of causation.


: Nature of Reality


Proofs for the existence of God


Ontological, Teleological and Cosmological arguments.


: Realism and Idealism


Mind-Body Problem








Thanks. :)|||'Problems of Philosophy', and, 'The History of Western Philosophy'


both by Bertrand Russell.


They are what got me into philosophy. Brilliant books which are great for people who are new to the subject. Very approachable, i advise you try at least one of them!(:


They may not have ALL those topics in your syllabus discussed at length, but Im sure that if a certain philosopher concerned himself with those questions (doubtless that someone did!) then it will be in the 'Western Philosophy' book.


You also gain great understanding for the way ideas and thoughts have shaped the world throughout history. Just a great read to be honest!|||I am giving below links to sites who have got good material for reading. You can also search on yahoo or google articles under different headings of your syllabus. But remember that philosophy aims at the logical clarification of thoughts. Philosophy is not a body of doctrine but an activity. A philosophical


work consists essentially of elucidations. Philosophy does not result in philosophical propositions, but rather in the clarification of propositions. Without philosophy thoughts are, as it were, cloudy and indistinct: its task is to make them clear and to give them sharp boundaries.|||Begin at the beginning, which is to learn the basic topics.





The easiest way is by topic. Otherwise you forget in the 2nd book you choose to read what was said in the 1st book, and most of it won't make sense anyway until you have a lot of concepts under your belt. Those concepts are the "topics" in the Syntopicon. Among the topics are all of the branches of philosophy from metaphysics to aesthetics.





The Syntopicon is Volumes II and III of a 60 volume set of books in most libraries. You can read what interests you by topic--102 of them. Each chapter is only about 12 pages long, and at the end of each chapter are tons of references so you can find an author on that topic that interests you.





Angel; Animal; Aristocracy; Art; Astronomy; Beauty; Being; Cause; Chance; Change; Citizen; Constitution; Courage; Custom and Convention; Definition; Democracy; Desire; Dialectic; Duty; Education; Element; Emotion; Eternity; Evolution; Experience; Family; Fate; Form; God; Good and Evil; Government; Habit; Happiness; History; Honor; Hypothesis; Idea; Immortality; Induction; Infinity; Judgment; Justice; Knowledge; Labor; Language; Law; Liberty; Life and Death; Logic; Love; Man; Mathematics; Matter; Mechanics; Medicine; Memory and Imagination; Metaphysics; Mind; Monarchy; Nature; Necessity and Contingency; Oligarchy; One and Many; Opinion; Opposition; Philosophy; Physics; Pleasure and Pain; Poetry; Principle; Progress; Prophecy; Prudence; Punishment; Quality; Quantity; Reasoning; Relation; Religion; Revolution; Rhetoric; Same and Other; Science; Sense; Sign and Symbol; Sin; Slavery; Soul; Space; State; Temperance; Theology; Time; Truth; Tyranny; Universal and Particular; Virtue and Vice; War and Peace; Wealth; Will; Wisdom; World





Only after you have the basic understanding of what philosophers have already said in history can you begin to understand the significance of what they say in the modern era. How will you know that statement made about free will by Nietzsche is not in reference to a statement made by Plato or by Averroes if you have not read a paragraph or two from Plato and Averroes on the subject?





There are a few beginner's websites, like the one by Britannica, with its own Dictionary of terms. http://www.philosophypages.com/index.htm


Another excellent one is http://www.ditext.com/runes/index.html This is the 1942 version which is out of copyright, so it's on the web, but new editions are still in bookstores.


The Catholic Encyclopedia is very objective (this coming from a complete atheist); where it is talking about dogma, it labels it dogma. Otherwise, its the best historical material on the internet for just about every subject of philosophy, and of philosophers. (Try it.) http://www.newadvent.org/