Philosophy

Here are my notes, made after reading each book (here referred to as a chapter) and the sections contained within those books. These notes are not intended to replace reading the book, which is essential for a better understanding of the concepts, but rather aim to help readers review and complement their reading. Some notes have been supplemented with my own observations and ideas. As the book’s author himself suggested, some sections and books are intended for a non-lay audience; such sections and books were skipped in these notes, which are primarily aimed at the lay reader. ...

When was the last time you felt exhausted? It was probably recently, and it likely wasn’t just a one-time occurrence in the past few weeks. If you stop to observe, we’re all like this. This doesn’t seem like a healthy kind of tiredness, the kind that a weekend of rest can fix, but rather an “infinite tiredness.” You try to rest, but you can’t. Fortunately, the South Korean philosopher and cultural theorist Byung-Chul Han attempted to unravel the origins of this chronic fatigue in his work The Burnout Society. I’ll use it as the basis for this article, but I’ll also try to add some concepts and insights I gained while reading his book. ...

Is reason truly superior to emotion? Should we always prioritize reason? Many philosophers and writers have debated these questions, but today we will focus specifically on the German philosopher Friedrich Nietzsche (1844–1900) and the Russian writer Fyodor Dostoevsky (1821–1881), through their works Twilight of the Idols (Nietzsche) and Notes from Underground (Dostoevsky). Before diving into the works themselves, I feel obliged to provide a brief introduction to each author. Friedrich Nietzsche (1844–1900) In essence, Nietzsche challenged traditional morality, declared the “death of God,” and advocated for the creation of new values through the will to power. The goal here is not to provide a biography of him, so I will focus only on why we should study him and what he meant by his famous phrase “God is dead.” ...