The comments here are largely what I expected to find: people throwing around the names and quotes of famous philosophers from centuries past, as though it's a

The comments here are largely what I expected to find: people throwing around the names and quotes of famous philosophers from centuries past, as though it's a pissing contest to see who has read the most books on the topic. Modern discussions around philosophy are effectively a circle jerk: person 'A' regurgitates a quote from one philosopher, and then person 'B' is expected to regurgitate another quote to counter. While the historical works are an important piece of the puzzle, it would be nice if more folks could avoid equating "studying philosophy" with "literally studying existing books on philosophy - and nothing else".