Cosmic concepts of true philosophy, the portrayal of celestial artistry, or our attempt to understand a recognition of divine beauty can never be truly satisfying if our attempted progression is not unified. These expressions of the divine urge within the evolving self may be intellectually true, emotionally beautiful, and spiritually good; but the real soul of expression is absent unless these realities of truth, meanings of beauty, and values of goodness are unified in the life experience of the philosopher.

This explains it in understandable western terms…

As to areas of philosophy, Think gives you the Big Names – metaphysics (big questions – what is time? does god exist? Etc.) Ontology (what exists? ) epistemology (what is knowledge? What does it mean to “know” something? Etc.) Ethics (what is the right action? How do we determine the right action? Etc.) Aesthetics (beauty) . Most would say that most questions in philosophy would more or less fit into one or more of these “areas” of thought.

Philosophy, used as the name of a recognized “subject” refers, in the western world, almost exclusively to western thought – outlined from the Ancients on up as Think detailed it.

One of the great freedoms of philosophy is that you can find a philosopher somewhere who would describe his or her area of interest as “philosophy of (fill in the blank)”

Philosophy of Mind (what is it to be a thinking being, etc.) is very big right now. There are also lots of folks working in Phil of science, of music, of biology, of psych., of religion, etc. If you are interested in X –chances are there are philosophers writing in p. of x right now.

As far as famous philosophers that is to a degree a matter of taste. Plato is, of course, huge – but for me only as a historical figure. Descartes does, as Think says, get a lot of attention – but really only as a historical figure. (His p. of mind assertions, for example, are not built upon any longer – there are no Descartes disciples out there. There is though, neo-platonic work going on.)

Think is not wrong in anything he wrote. But, judging from what little he wrote – and not wanting to pigeon hole him – my GUESS is that he would identify himself as a Continental philosopher. (Although, perhaps not entirely.) His interest in Derrida, for example, suggests this. (And, I would guess he is more apt to identify with early Wittgenstein than with later Wittgenstein – kinda a dividing point as well.)

I mention this not at all to diminish Think (and, as I said, I am guessing) but to illustrate that the vast gulf that CAN exist today between analytic and continental thought. It’s pretty interesting – and cool!

I am, for example, about as strongly in the analytic school as possible. If I were studying P. of Mind (a favorite) and someone like my ex-girlfriend were doing the same (and she is strongly Continental) you would get two very different approaches to the same area of study.

So, for me, as far as “famous” I can only say that nearly all the philosophers I am interested in are alive and kicking or at least were so not too long ago.

You mentioned mind and religion as two interests:

If you are interested in the human mind, I would suggest Daniel Dennett, David Chalmers, and Patricia and Paul Churchland highly. Also, some scientists their work will refer you to. LOTS of this available on the web.

As for religion, Alvin Plantinga is a very well respected contemporary philosophy. Also, read the medieval guys – esp. in my opinion the “proofs for god” by Augustine and Anselm.

Have fun!

2. Ultimate truth.

3. Is consciousness with self awareness necessarily eternal in existence?

There are Presocratics, Academics, Cynics, Stoics, Sceptics, Neoplatonists, Christians, Scholastics, Rationalists, Empiricists, Idealists, Liberals, Evolutionists, Pragmatists, Materialists (Karl Marx), Existenitalists (Sartre and Camus), Postmodernists, and New Scientists.

You can read more about them and their ideas in the book below.

Existentialism – about humans creating the meaning and essense of their lives

Philosophy is usually divided in one of three ways—chronologically, geographically, or topically. Of the three, the first and third are probably the more commonly known divisions.

Dividing philosophy CHRONOLOGICALLY. This can be done numerous ways, but it is often done with “frames” such as Ancient, Medieval, Modern, and Contemporary. For example, Socrates, Plato, and Aristotle would fall under Ancient while Hume, Descartes, and Leibniz would be in Modern. This gets even more complicated by the fact that what we would call “Contemporary” in this “frame” really has two branches: (1) Analytical philosophy and (2) Continental philosophy. In Analytical philosophy, one is looking usually at things like the philosophy of science and formalistic logic; conversely, Continental philosophy is not easily defined because it can cover everything from phenomenology (Husserl), existentialism (Sartre), linguistics (Saussure), and power (Foucault) to postmodernity (Lyotard) and feminism (Irigaray).

Dividing philosophy GEOGRAPHICALLY. This is usually simply done via the East/West divide established by British imperialism. Eastern philosophy includes Shintoism, Buddhism, Hinduism, Sufism, Taoism, etc. In contrast, Western philosophy is what most people think of when they think of philosophy and what the previous category of chronology was framing. Sometimes, there are colleges courses in British philosophy (eg., Mill and Benthem), American pragmatism (Dewey), French philosophy (Derrida), etc.

Dividing philosophy TOPICALLY. The word “topically” doesn’t really fit; it may be better to call it categorically, but each of these are really “subsets” within philosophy. Yet, any statement has any of these within it.
Metaphysics–what is the fundamental nature of reality?
Ontology–what is being? or what is Being?
Epistemology–what counts as knowledge? how does one know when he/she has knowledge?
Ethics–what counts as “right” action?
Aesthetics–what counts as beauty?

As for famous philosophers, you have to say that from the Western perspective Plato is huge. The philosopher Whitehead even said, “Every work of philosophy is but a footnote to Plato” because Plato was so significant. In the Modern period, Descartes gets a ton of attention due to his “cogito ergo sum” (I think, therefore I am) assertion, which was an epistemological attempt at seeking certainty. In more recent times, I am a fan of both Wittgenstein and Derrida but there is huge debate over contemporary philosophers and their significance, so I will leave you to look into that realm more and make a judgment.

To understand science, you would have to go for the specific science itself. To understand the Universe, you would have to go for Astronomy or Cosmology, may be Astrophysics, but if you say the fullness of human experience then all philosophies attempt that, perhaps in different ways. Yes I am assuming the sciences are a form of philosophy with experimental results as criteria for verisimilitude.

As to the meaning of life, Art exposes it to you, Religion gives you answers (except Zen Buddhism that does not say that exists), but Science describes fact not meaning.

Hope you are confused.