One of the biggest problems any new learner faces is that overwhelming feeling of standing on the shoreline looking out to sea. You want to learn astrophysics, zoology, or economics — where do you start? What ideas come first? Which thinkers are core and which are super niche?
Philosophy is no different. If anything, it’s worse. Because a lot of people know a few philosophers or have read a few books and quotes. Millions have watched the first season of True Detective. But when faced with the vastness of “Philosophy,” it’s like standing on a tiny sloop in the Pacific Ocean, being told to swim.
Sure, you can take a course. There are hundreds of great intro books out there. My entire professional raison d’être is to fix this problem. But now we’ve got another way. Big Think has decided to create “The Chart of Western Philosophy.” It lays out some 2,600 years of Western thought on a single timeline, from Thales to Žižek, so you can see at a glance where everyone sits and how they connect. Here you will find the schools and movements that shaped philosophy, from the Milesians and the Stoics to the Existentialists and the Post-Structuralists, each tagged to show which branches of philosophy it cares about most, and the lines of teacher, student, and influence that tie them all together. Around the edges are short guides to the major schools and the texts worth reading.
To celebrate the poster’s release and to find out more about it, I spoke with Big Think’s resident artist and poster-maker extraordinaire, Ben Gibson, who is also cofounder of the infographic poster company Pop Chart.
What factors did you consider in whom to include and whom not to?
Pop Chart has always been really interested in trying to portray the scope of big ideas through detailed infographics of subject matters like science, literature, and culture. But when we’re in the research phase of projects, the net will often scoop up interesting things we later realize don’t quite fit the core idea. An example of this popping up during the development of the Chart of Western Philosophy was the Sophists of ancient Greece.
Nowadays, “sophist” is a derogatory term for someone who uses clever deceptions or logical fallacies to manipulate others. But in Greece in the fifth and fourth centuries BC, Sophists were a sort of tutor who specialized in rhetoric, public speaking, and arete (virtue or excellence). They were philosophy-adjacent, but really more like classical life coaches, who charged a fee for their services.
Plato, in his dialogues, calls Sophists these teachers of deception. This sort of criticism from Plato and other influential figures led to the way the term is used today.
What other options did you consider in making this, and why select this one?
A big issue was the organizing principle of the content and layout. We strongly considered organizing the content around the main branches of philosophy: metaphysics, epistemology, logic, ethics, aesthetics, and political philosophy. This makes a lot of sense conceptually, except that it runs into a big logistical problem of categorization: most, if not all, philosophy movements are not just about one branch of philosophy, but multiple, in different ratios. This led us to organize the content in a timeline format, and also to devise a system of symbols for the branches, placed next to each movement, indicating which branch of philosophy is its primary concern, its secondary concern, and so on.
What problems did you have with this?
The scope of it was a figuratively and literally big problem, as it usually is when trying to get across a big, sweeping idea in one infographic design. For some influential movements, there are seemingly limitless offshoots. For Platonism alone: Early Platonism/Plato’s Academy, Academic Skepticism, Middle Platonism, Neoplatonism, Carolingian Platonism, Realist Platonism, and many, many more. This sort of thing is an editorial issue as well as a practical one. Editorial, because which philosophy movements are most important, and which are more tertiary? Practical, because how many philosophy movements can we possibly fit on one printed piece of paper?
What is the most interesting or surprising thing you learned about philosophy from making it?
The cattiness of philosophers! From classical philosophy on through to the modern era, philosophers are regularly dropping sick burns on one another — either philosophical burns, or really just personal attacks.
Some examples:
Schopenhauer vs. Hegel
Schopenhauer called Hegel a “flat-headed, insipid, nauseating, illiterate charlatan” who produced “a monument to German stupidity.”
Voltaire vs. Rousseau
On receiving Rousseau’s essay arguing that society corrupts people, Voltaire wrote: “I have received, Sir, your new book against the human race… Never has so much wit been employed to make us stupid; reading your work makes one want to walk on all fours.”
Nietzsche vs. everyone
Nietzsche referred to Kant as “the most deformed concept-cripple of all time,” and said Socrates belonged “by origin to the lowest folk” — maybe an insult related to Socrates being a street orator.
You can find “The Chart of Western Philosophy” in Big Think’s online store.
This article How to find your way through 2,600 years of philosophy is featured on Big Think.