Quote from: misterguignol;534749It's cute when you do a drive-by contentless post when you're backed into a corner.

It's just that right now, cupcake, I have a choice before me between engaging in a five page debate of shit splitting words for no apparent reason, and mapping parts of my megadungeon. I'll take the latter option, thanks (which incidentally, was my point). Bye.

Quote from: misterguignol;534697...
It's all pop presentation of philosophy; it doesn't do any real harm, but it's also not exactly a serious endeavor.

Exactly.  

These things are written by people who are both philosophers (typically academics, but at least people with some background in the discipline) and fans of x, where 'x' can be D&D, Star Trek, punk music, whisky, or whatever.  

These books are labours of love, things that people do because they find them fun to do.  They are not meant to be taken too seriously (I don't think anyone would include a chapter in their job or tenure applications!).

I generally don't find these kinds of books all that interesting, personally, but I certainly don't begrudge anyone who likes them.

The harsh moralizing going on in this thread is just weird.  :rolleyes:

Quote from: Akrasia;534752Exactly.  

These things are written by people who are both philosophers (typically academics, but at least people with some background in the discipline) and fans of x, where 'x' can be D&D, Star Trek, punk music, whisky, or whatever.  

These books are labours of love, things that people do because they find them fun to do.  They are not meant to be taken too seriously (I don't think anyone would include a chapter in their job or tenure applications!).

I generally don't find these kinds of books all that interesting, personally, but I certainly don't begrudge anyone who likes them.

The harsh moralizing going on in this thread is just weird.  :rolleyes:

Don't you get it?  There is a wrong way and a right way to write about RPGs.  If you're not for us, you're against us!  (Or some other silly shit.)

Quote from: misterguignol;534756Don't you get it?  There is a wrong way and a right way to write about RPGs.  If you're not for us, you're against us!  (Or some other silly shit.)

There's a right way, seriously? We are talking about rpg's and philosophy I pretty much thought you wrote whatever made fun for the rpgs or whatever made you look more intelligent to the gullible when writing philosophy.

Quote from: Marleycat;534760There's a right way, seriously? We are talking about rpg's and philosophy I pretty much thought you wrote whatever made fun for the rpgs or whatever made you look more intelligent to the gullible when writing philosophy.

You can't both write to make rpgs fun *and* write philosophy, apparently.  To do so would surely have us plummet into the depths of that fiendish Sarlac pit known only as "the excluded middle."

One or the other.  Our way or the highway, as the Swayze said in Roadhouse.

Quote from: misterguignol;534762You can't both write to make rpgs fun *and* write philosophy, apparently.  To do so would surely have us plummet into the depths of that fiendish Sarlac pit known only as "the excluded middle."

One or the other.  Our way or the highway, as the Swayze said in Roadhouse.

Hmm....

Quote from: Benoist;534696More manuals and guides helping people become great GMs and players, please. Less pointless wankery.

I'm already a great GM.  I have no use for any more guides.  This books looks like fun and has some articles from some of my favourite philosophers.

(And seriously who's going to buy books about being a great GM?  Where's the market?  Who wouldn't just go online and ask for advice?)

Quote from: Akrasia;534750... Philosophy and Buffy the Vampire Slayer...

I was able to maintain my suspension of disbelief until this point.

There's more philosophy in my left nut than there is in BtVS...

Quote from: Dodger;534782I was able to maintain my suspension of disbelief until this point.

There's more philosophy in my left nut than there is in BtVS...

That's an impressive left nut!

Seriously, the book is not really about extracting philosophy from BtVS.  There is no assumption that there is a coherent philosophy in BtVS.

Rather, it's more about using philosophy to think about issues raised in the show.  And there are many interesting moral and metaphysical issues raised in the show, I think, even if the show itself does not treat those issues in a philosophically satisfying way.

Quite frankly, and with tongue far from cheek, the more threads we have dealing with philosophy we have and with akrasia on them, the happier I will be.

Sounds like wanking to me.

If I want philosophy, I have a whole slew of books on my shelves that I judge to be more suitable, starting with Sophie's World and the Holy Bible, and ending with American Psycho and Use of Weapons.

Quote from: Dodger;534790Sounds like wanking to me.

Um, okay, I guess. :confused:

These books aren't claiming to present 'cutting edge' work in contemporary philosophy.  Nobody is pretending that that's what they're about.

They're meant to be fun, albeit 'fun' as understood by academic philosophy types.  (Thus hardly 'fun' for most people.)

I suppose that some people might regard the books as a kind of 'wanking'.  But then I suppose playing D&D could also be regarded as 'wanking', insofar as some people think it's fun and others think it's weird or pretentious or whatever.

Quote from: Dodger;534790If I want philosophy, I have a whole slew of books on my shelves that I judge to be more suitable, starting with Sophie's World and the Holy Bible, and ending with American Psycho and Use of Weapons.

Seriously?  You consider these books to be serious philosophy?  Well, um, okay...

(Use of Weapons is one of my favourite books written in the past two decades, but I don't consider it to be any more philosophically deep than BtVS.)

Edit: Sophie's World is a great novel for introducing young people to philosophy.

Quote from: LordVreeg;534786Quite frankly, and with tongue far from cheek, the more threads we have dealing with philosophy we have and with akrasia on them, the happier I will be.

Heh, I'm putting off writing some 'real' philosophy right now by hanging out here.  Akratic indeed!

Quote from: Akrasia;534798Seriously?  You consider these books to be serious philosophy?

Did I say that? No, I did not.

Your credibility just dropped to zero in my eyes.

This is in the same vein as the other Philosophy and (Pop Culture Thing) books, and as such should not be taken that damn seriously.  The best use for them is to get folks unfamiliar with philosophy to hook them into it, or to hook people not already fans of the Thing into it.

If someone ships me a copy, I'll give it a go and let you folks know if its wank or not.  I just got done writing a pair of research papers, so I could use some lighter reading.