Oh yeah no way, do not start with the Republic. If you have any interest in Socrates, you can start with much, much shorter dialogues like Gorgias or Euthyphro, and you'll quickly get a sense of how Socrates/Plato argues.

The "Introducing..." series of illustrated books are actually pretty good ( here's the one for Nietzsche ), giving an overview of the philosophers' biographies as well as their books and thought. (Although Nietzsche's a very good writer! You can easily have a good time with Beyond Good and Evil, I think.) Picking up something like a Norton anthology ( although for god's sake buy it second-hand ) can be useful for getting a broad overview.

Also, if there's a thinker like Kant who you want to know more about but whose books are suuuper dry, I really recommend finding a biography instead first. Reading Ray Monk's book on Wittgenstein, for instance, is a lot more illuminating than trying to read the Tractatus on your own.

Source: I was a philosophy major for about six years before I came to my senses

hi, regardless of what you start with, get a philosophical dictionary. it'll let you look up any term or vocabulary, usually entries will have brief explainations (and references) of the term of the idea, often with the context noted too. they're invaluable if you're going to be reading any philosophy because each philosopher likes to use their own particular terminology, or at least the terminology that's in vogue at the time, which can change a lot over centuries & across languages.

the way that philosophy is usually taught (generally speaking) in the west is with a kind of narrative chain of ideas that begins with the ancient greeks (usually the sophists) and moves through the centuries, missing out inconvenient counter narratives & ofc the gaps we have in the records.

this is a constructed narrative tho, like all history. theres huge issues with it as a subject, from the fetishisation of the ancient greeks that comes from the european "enlightenment" (colonial) era (like in Bavaria, and it crossed into the US among the elites hence your mixed sport/academic education framework and faux-classical architecture), to the disregarding of anything not from europe - often philosophy from other countries (especially pre-colonial era) is dismissed because its seen as too religious (therefore theology), ignoring ofc that almost all european philosophy is religious in a similar sense.

The best way to understand modern philosophy in the west is to follow that same narrative chain. With the aid of a philosophical dictionary you can safely dive into later parts of the narrative so you don't have to start with the greeks & work forwards. Since the further in time & distance you are from the writer, the harder to understand, this is good because you don't have to trawl through ancient greek stuff straight away.

Although its kind of dry, I'd recommend paying attention (not starting with) to geometry. Its the most fundamental materialism (its how to understand the dimensions we exist in, space/time), its one of the first things we worked out in philosophy & is continuously advanced until we get to modern physics.

Another thing to remember is that philosopical practice has techniques like anything else, that over time have been sort of loosely codified (its disputed) into what we call critical thinking, which is more the practice of thinking in such a way that you don't fall into errors. So its worth getting/stealing a book on "critical thinking" too, so you at least can see whats considered rhetoric or logic or good & bad practice.

philosophy contains a lot of dry stuff. If you want to get into it, start with a subject or a philosopher you find interesting, combine it with a philosophy dictionary for looking up terms & ideas. Find out what philosophers they're responding to or who they were inspired by, and then read them.

its a huge subject area but its also made out to be a lot more complex/comlicated than it is. Everyone does philosophy all the time, since all it is is posing questions to work stuff out to solve problems, or arguing with people to do the same, or often with the more famous philosophers proposing a schema to understand the world & our place in it.

obviously reading philosphical works is important but the most important practice of philosophy is discussion with other humans, so join philosophy groups online or irl to talk about it & ask questions.

some philosophers are good writers, some are bad. Unfortunately sometimes the bad writers have good ideas so. always look up the philosopher you're reading to investigate their historical and social context.

thats the best i can do for tips, other than plato's republic is quite boring unless you're super keen on ancient greek politics or you're investigating the foundational polticial philosophy of the West, since its where we usually start from.

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Sophie's World is a fun starting point to get a feel of the different philosophical currents and see which Questions pique your interest, you can then branch out from that.

Do it the real prole way and read an "Action Philosophers" comic book.