I'm a complete philosophy noob. I'm a math major and since Russel was a mathematician, this book appealed to me. I read a few paragraphs and seems pretty good.
Problems of Philosophy is very good, but it's Platonically (and mathematically) biased and also a bit "late" in the development of philosophy. Although you won't go far wrong reading Russell, I don't know that he's the best starting point. Introductions to philosophy usually draw on a short "hit list" (something like Plato, Aristotle, Descartes, Hume, Kant) and that for a reason.
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Well, it depends on what interests you in philosophy. The aforementioned authors have a broad selection of works in many different fields (ontology, aesthetics, ethics are usually the most important) while Russell is more limited. However, those authors are of a different era and sometimes the vocabulary they use is different from ours and are more philosophically charged.
Since you love mathematics, you probably are interested in logic and analytic philosophy and Russell is a very good place to start. If you want a wider view, authors like John Locke, Kant, Hume and Descartes are all very good (Descartes was a mathematician too ;)). If you want some Greek philosophy, I'd suggest Aristotle over Plato.
Since you love mathematics, you probably are interested in logic and analytic philosophy and Russell is a very good place to start. If you want a wider view, authors like John Locke, Kant, Hume and Descartes are all very good (Descartes was a mathematician too ;)). If you want some Greek philosophy, I'd suggest Aristotle over Plato.
Besides Russell, Descartes' Meditations are probably the most accessible to a newcomer, since his whole project is to come at philosophy as a complete newcomer himself. Locke uses a sort of common-sense approach that makes him quite readable; Hume, too, but to a lesser extent, and he goes to weirder places. Kant is quite difficult, and is largely responding to a bunch of esoteric problems anyway. The Greeks are difficult by virtue of writing in such a different context; for Aristotle, especially, what he have of his writings is basically his lecture notes, which need to be glossed by experts in Greek philosophy to be comprehensible. Aristotle is the better philosopher and more comprehensive, and once you figure out what he's talking about he is actually using a lot more common sense, but I'd start with Plato anyway.
But like Crashing00 said, you won't go far wrong with Russell.
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Which if thou dost not use for clearing away the clouds from thy mind
It will go and thou wilt go, never to return.
Since you love mathematics, you probably are interested in logic and analytic philosophy and Russell is a very good place to start. If you want a wider view, authors like John Locke, Kant, Hume and Descartes are all very good (Descartes was a mathematician too ;)). If you want some Greek philosophy, I'd suggest Aristotle over Plato.
Besides Russell, Descartes' Meditations are probably the most accessible to a newcomer, since his whole project is to come at philosophy as a complete newcomer himself. Locke uses a sort of common-sense approach that makes him quite readable; Hume, too, but to a lesser extent, and he goes to weirder places. Kant is quite difficult, and is largely responding to a bunch of esoteric problems anyway. The Greeks are difficult by virtue of writing in such a different context; for Aristotle, especially, what he have of his writings is basically his lecture notes, which need to be glossed by experts in Greek philosophy to be comprehensible. Aristotle is the better philosopher and more comprehensive, and once you figure out what he's talking about he is actually using a lot more common sense, but I'd start with Plato anyway.
But like Crashing00 said, you won't go far wrong with Russell.
candidus inperti; si nil, his utere mecum.