Hey broski, the way you wrote that comment just reminded me of another problem I have with Descartes: giant fucking sentences. I swear to fucking God sometimes he went on for an entire page without pause. I wanna build a time machine and go back to 17^th century France and hit René in the dick with a copy of The Elements of Style. Re-fucking-move unnecessary shit, bro.
Zen and the Art of Motorcycle Maintenance - the dude who wrote this shit was one crazy fuckin philosopher. The person who gave me the book told me there's a specific time in each person's life that they should read this book, and it sounds like you're there now.
A'ight, so its not exactly short, but check out Will Durant's The Story of Philosophy.
Shit reads nicer than most, hits up a bunch of the major playas, and gives all dat historical context an shit. Basically the guy gives you all the philosophy and shit through a big fuckin historical story - everything just falls into place. Now you might not wanna walk into your local philosophy department with just this under your belt, less' you wanna get smacked upside da head, but shit, gotta start somewhere amiright?
Yo, shit got real back when those playas Socrates 'n' Plato came. They came real hard. BC times, yo. The Apology, The Republic--yup, that's that shit, mayn.
Forward some motherfuckin' centuries and we've got my boy Hume with his Enquiry Concerning Human Understanding. Whatchu know about the critique of inductive reasoning? Nothing, bro, not 'til you get on that shit, 1748. Before him, let's not forget we've got my boy Locke, with An Essay Concerning Human Understanding, 1690. Tabula rasa, don't quit 'til you know WHAT IT IS.
You a bro, but you think you a good bro? You ain't good 'til you study your ethics, bro. Aristotle, get on that shit, that Nicomachean Ethics, that virtuous shit. But don't forget my boy Kant - Groundwork for the Metaphysics of Morals, 1785. Categorical imperatives, that's what's up. But then there's my time and my bro, Peter Singer - Animal Liberation, 1975, because all dem furry fuckers got problems, and a real bro got they back.
Last, but not least, it's my boy, Nietzsche. Bro would be mad if he knew I was calling him my boy, tho. Beyond Good and Evil, 1886, make sure you pick up my boy Walter Kaufman's translation--real talk. My boy be leavin' behind those Christian fucks, moving on to a new morality beyond absolutes, dissin' truth 'n' shit 'cause, real talk, the will to power is why we do all the shit we do.
That's some interesting shit, yo. From what I understand though, Hellenic languages (like Greek) didn't really have a hand in developing Old English, which is where you're going to see the heavily Germanic English that preceded the Norman Conquest (when French started getting all up into Old English's business). Also, how're Greek words going to get into English? Alexander conquered eastward, and the Romans used Latin, and even then not many English speakin' muthafuckas on the corna spoke that Latin shit.
Also, the Online Etymology Dictionary lists "shit" as having Proto-germanic roots, so dem books be rollin' wif me on this one.
Heh. You'll hear that People's History is biased. His intention was to give fuel for a socialist revolution. That's true. What's more important to learn is that everything is biased. The dream of an unbiased media is that. Even when trying to be objective with facts, there's still the question of which facts to use, which leads to subjectivity and bias. In the end, there is no such thing as objective truth (that's a fun rabbit hole to follow)
So in this case "Yes and," those fuckers are still beholden to shareholders, boards, public opinion, etc. Not only does everyone answer to someone, the ironic truth is that the more power you have, the more people you must answer to.