Deepness in the Sky is one of my favorite books of all time! Fire Upon the Deep is a serious let-down by comparison, but the wolves are a cool concept.
As I've gotten older I've realized that I have very little in common with Vinge philosophically. But he was a person who thought very deeply, and it shows.
(ok mild spoilers ahead) Really why! I enjoyed them both and I read Deepness in the Sky first. It was a bit of a shock about FTL for me but I kind of granted narrative license so he could explore the range of consequences there, like with FTLness being distributed over a field of sorts.
But yeah the dogs were dope, their packs, the interaction of the technological bootstrapping with them. Yadda yadda.
I can't say I am familiar with his philosophy either
Vinge is a full-on anarcho-capitalist. This is most evident in the Realtime series, particularly The Ungoverned which is pretty much entirely about the Bad Statists vs the Good Libertarians with Nukes. But it's also fairly obvious in Deepness, and to a lesser extent in Fire.
As I've gotten older I've realized that I have very little in common with Vinge philosophically. But he was a person who thought very deeply, and it shows.