Materialism>idealism
I’m not trying to get into a whole debate, it’s just interesting to me the way some people cling to these idealist philosophers. Same w the stoics imo. As a guy who used to read all of them… they’re useless to actually understanding life. Like it can be helpful to read them in order to understand how the Western worldview evolved, but they really shouldn’t be taken as some sort of handbook - which many seem to do. (reactionaries). People who read Nietzsche or Plato and think they have some sort of secret insight is my biggest red flag irt pseudo-intellectual who is just going to waste your time… same with Dostoevsky btw.
Confucius is based af though.
Edit: Also, yes these kinds of people exist- my former mentor/boss who spent decades at a white shoe DC law firm would accept any idea if you found a quote by Plato to justify it lmao.
The Epicureans were pretty based for sure. especially in their approach to politics. Very much a human-first kind of philosophy.
Totally, it was a “yall seriously believe in all these gods and nonsense, humans don’t need them and we can improve things on our own.”