Alasdair MacIntyre  

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-The key figure in transforming Greek philosophy into a unified and continuous project - the one still being pursued today - is [[Socrates]], who studied under several Sophists. It is said that following a visit to the [[Oracle of Delphi]] he spent much of his life questioning anyone in Athens who would engage him, in order to disprove the oracular prophecy that there would be no man wiser than Socrates. Through these live dialogues, he examined common but critical concepts that lacked clear or concrete definitions, such as beauty and truth, and the virtues of piety, wisdom, temperance, courage, and justice. Socrates' awareness of his own ignorance allowed him to discover his errors as well as the errors of those who claimed knowledge based upon falsifiable or unclear precepts and beliefs. He wrote nothing, but inspired many disciples, including many sons of prominent Athenian citizens (including [[Plato]]), which led to his [[Socrates#Trial and death|trial and execution]] in 399 B.C. on the charge that his philosophy and sophistry were undermining the youth, [[piety]], and moral fiber of the city. He was offered a chance to flee from his fate but chose to remain in Athens, abide by his principles, and drink the poison [[Conium|hemlock]].+'''Alasdair Chalmers MacIntyre''' (born 12 January 1929 in [[Glasgow]], [[Scotland]]) is a [[Scottish philosopher]] primarily known for his contribution to [[moral philosophy|moral]] and [[political philosophy]] but also known for his work in [[history of philosophy]] and theology. MacIntyre's ''[[After Virtue]]'' (1981) is widely recognised as one of the most important works of Anglophone moral and political philosophy in the 20th century.
-Socrates' most important student was Plato, who founded the [[Academy]] of Athens and wrote a number of dialogues, which applied the [[Socratic method]] of inquiry to examine philosophical problems. Some central ideas of Plato's dialogues are the [[The Forms|Theory of Forms]], i.e., that the mind is imbued with an innate capacity to understand and contemplate concepts from a higher order preeminent world, concepts more real, permanent, and universal than or representative of the ''things of this world'', which are only changing and temporal; the idea of the immortal soul being superior to the body; the idea of evil as simple ignorance of truth; that true knowledge leads to true virtue; that art is subordinate to moral purpose; and that the society of the [[city-state]] should be governed by a merit class of propertyless philosopher kings, with no permanent wives or paternity rights over their children, and be protected by an athletically gifted, honorable, duty bound military class. In the later dialogues Socrates figures less prominently, but Plato had previously woven his own thoughts into some of Socrates' words. Interestingly, in his most famous work, ''[[Plato's Republic|The Republic]]'', Plato critiques democracy, condemns tyranny, and proposes a three tiered merit based structure of society, with workers, guardians and philosophers, in an equal relationship, where no innocents would ever be put to death again, citing the philosophers' relentless love of truth and knowledge of the forms or ideals, concern for general welfare and lack of propertied interest as causes for their being suited to govern.+==Bibliography==
 +*1953. ''[[Marxism: An Interpretation]]''. London: SCM Press, 1953.
 +*1955 (edited with [[Antony Flew]]). ''[[New Essays in Philosophical Theology]]''. London: SCM Press.
 +*1966 ''[[A Short History of Ethics]]''. London and New York: Routledge & Kegan Paul. Second edition 1998.
 +*2004 (1958). ''[[The Unconscious: A Conceptual Analysis]]'', London: Routledge & Kegan Paul.
 +*1959. ''[[Difficulties in Christian Belief]]''. London: SCM Press.
 +*1965. ''[[Hume's Ethical Writings]]''. (ed.) New York: Collier.
 +*1967. ''[[Secularization and Moral Change]]''. The [[Riddell Memorial Lectures]]. Oxford University Press.
 +*1969 (with [[Paul Ricoeur]]). ''[[The Religious Significance of Atheism]]''. New York: Columbia University Press.
 +*1970. ''[[Herbert Marcuse: An Exposition and a Polemic]]''. New York: The Viking Press.
 +*1970. ''Marcuse''. London: [[Fontana Modern Masters]].
 +*1970. ''Sociological Theory and Philosophical Analysis'' (anthology co-edited with [[Dorothy Emmet]]). London and Basingstoke: Macmillan.
 +*1971. ''[[Against the Self-Images of the Age: Essays on Ideology and Philosophy]]''. London: Duckworth.
 +*2007 (1981). ''[[After Virtue]]'', 3rd ed. [[University of Notre Dame Press]].
 +*2002 (with Anthony Rudd and John Davenport).'' Kierkegaard After Macintyre: Essays on Freedom, Narrative, and Virtue''. Chicago: Open Court.
 +*1988. ''[[Whose Justice? Which Rationality?]]'' University of Notre Dame Press.
 +*1990. ''[[Three Rival Versions of Moral Enquiry]]''. The [[Gifford Lectures]]. University of Notre Dame Press.
 +*1990. ''[[First Principles, Final Ends, and Contemporary Philosophical Issues]]''. Milwaukee: Marquette University Press.
 +*1995. ''[[Marxism and Christianity]]'', London: Duckworth, 2nd ed.
 +*1998. ''The MacIntyre Reader'' Knight, Kelvin, ed. University of Notre Dame Press.
 +*1999. ''[[Dependent Rational Animals: Why Human Beings Need the Virtues]]''. Chicago: Open Court.
 +*2005. ''[[Edith Stein]]: A Philosophical Prologue, 1913–1922''. Rowman & Littlefield Publishers.
 +*2006. ''The Tasks of Philosophy: Selected Essays, Volume 1''. Cambridge University Press.
 +*2006. ''Ethics and Politics: Selected Essays, Volume 2''. Cambridge University Press.
 +*2008 (Blackledge, P. & Davidson, N., eds.), ''Alasdair MacIntyre's Early Marxist Writings: Essays and Articles 1953–1974'', Leiden: Brill.
 +*2009. ''God, philosophy, universities: A Selective History of the Catholic Philosophical Tradition ''. Rowman & Littlefield.
 +*2009. ''Living Ethics''. Excerpt, "The Nature of The Virtues". Minch & Weigel.
 +*"The End of Education: The Fragmentation of the American University," ''Commonweal'', 20 October 2006 / Volume CXXXIII, Number 18.
-Plato's most outstanding student was [[Aristotle]], perhaps the first truly systematic philosopher. [[Aristotelian logic]] was the first type of [[logic]] to attempt to categorize every valid [[syllogism]]. A syllogism is a form of argument that is guaranteed to be accepted, because it is known (by all educated persons) to be [[validity|valid]]. A crucial assumption in [[Aristotelian logic]] is that it has to be about real objects. Two of Aristotle's syllogisms are invalid to modern eyes. For example, "All A are B. All A are C. Therefore, some B are C." This syllogism fails if set A is empty, but there are real members of set B. In Aristotle's syllogistic logic you could say this, because his logic should only be used for things that really exist ("no empty classes")+==See also==
 +*[[Virtue Ethics]]
 +*[[Aristotelian ethics]]
 +*[[Communitarianism]]
 +*[[Modernity]]
 +*[[Rationality]]
 +*[[John F. X. Knasas]]
 +*[[American philosophy]]
 +*[[List of American philosophers]]
-The application of [[Aristotelian logic]] is preceded by having the student memorize a rather large set of syllogisms. The memorization proceeded from diagrams, or learning a key sentence, with the first letter of each word reminding the student of the names of the syllogisms. 
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-Each syllogism had a name, for example: "Modus Ponens" had the form of "If A is true, then B is true. A is true, therefore B is true." 
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-Most university students of logic memorized Aristotle's 19 syllogisms of two subjects, permitting them to validly connect a subject and object. A few geniuses developed systems with three subjects, or described a way of elaborating the rules of three subjects. 
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-=== Medieval philosophy === 
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-Medieval philosophy was greatly concerned with the nature of God, and the application of [[Aristotle]]'s [[term logic|logic]] and thought to every area of life. One continuing interest in this time was to prove the existence of God, through logic alone, if possible. The point of this exercise was not so much to justify belief in God, since in the view of medieval Christianity this was self-evident, but to make classical philosophy, with its extra-biblical pagan origins, respectable in a Christian context. 
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-One early effort was the [[cosmological argument]], conventionally attributed to [[Thomas Aquinas]]. The argument roughly is that everything that exists has a cause. But since there could not be an infinite chain of causes back into the past, there must have been an uncaused "first cause." This is God. Aquinas also adapted this argument to prove the goodness of God. Everything has some goodness, and the cause of each thing is better than the thing caused. Therefore, the first cause is the best possible thing. Similar arguments were used to prove God's power and uniqueness. 
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-Another important argument for proof of the existence of God was the [[ontological argument]], advanced by [[St. Anselm]]. Basically, it says that God has all possible good features. Existence is good, and therefore God has it, and therefore exists. This argument has been used in different forms by philosophers from Descartes forward. 
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-As well as Aquinas, other important names from the medieval period include [[Duns Scotus]] and [[Pierre Abélard]]. 
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-The definition of the word "philosophy" in English has changed over the centuries�in medieval times, any research outside the fields of [[theology]] or [[medicine]] was called "philosophy", hence the [[Philosophical Transactions of the Royal Society]] is a scientific journal dating from [[1665]], the [[Doctor of Philosophy]] (Ph.D.) degree covers a wide range of subjects, and the [[Cambridge Philosophical Society]] is actually concerned with what we would now call [[science]] and not modern philosophy. 
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-=== Modern philosophy === 
-As with many periodizations, there are multiple current usages for the term "Modern Philosophy" that exist in practice. One usage is to date modern philosophy from the "[[Age of Reason]]", where systematic philosophy became common, excluding [[Erasmus]] and [[Niccolò Machiavelli|Machiavelli]] as "modern philosophers". Another is to date it, the way the entire larger modern period is dated, from the [[Renaissance]]. In some usages, "Modern Philosophy" ended in 1800, with the rise of Hegelianism and Idealism. There is also the [[lumpers/splitters]] problem, namely that some works split philosophy into more periods than others: one author might feel a strong need to differentiate between "The Age of Reason" or "Early Modern Philosophers" and "The Enlightenment"; another author might write from the perspective that 1600-1800 is essentially one continuous evolution, and therefore a single period. Wikipedia's philosophy section therefore hews more closely to centuries as a means of avoiding long discussions over periods, but it is important to note the variety of practice that occurs. 
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-A broad overview would then have [[Erasmus]], [[Francis Bacon]], [[Niccolò Machiavelli]], and [[Galileo Galilei]] represent the rise of empiricism and humanism in place of scholastic tradition. [[17th-century philosophy]] is dominated by the need to organize philosophy on rational, skeptical, logical and axiomatic grounds, such as the work of [[René Descartes]], [[Blaise Pascal]], and [[Thomas Hobbes]]. This type of philosophy attempts to integrate religious belief into philosophical frameworks, and, often to combat atheism or other unbeliefs, by adopting the idea of material reality, and the [[dualism]] between spirit and material. The extension, and reaction, against this would be the monism of [[George Berkeley]] ([[Idealism#George Berkeley|idealism]]) and [[Benedict de Spinoza]] ([[Double-aspect theory|dual aspect theory]]). It was during this time period that the empiricism was developed as an alternative to skepticism by [[John Locke]], [[George Berkeley]] and others. It should be mentioned that [[John Locke]], [[Thomas Hobbes]] and [[Edmund Burke]] developed their well known political philosophies during this time, as well. 
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-The [[18th-century philosophy]] article deals with the period often called the early part of "The Enlightenment" in the shorter form of the word, and centers on the rise of systematic empiricism, following after [[Sir Isaac Newton]]'s natural philosophy. Thus [[Diderot]], [[Voltaire]], [[Rousseau]], [[Montesquieu]], [[Kant]] and the political philosophies embodied by and influencing the [[American Revolution]] are part of [[The Enlightenment]]. Other prominent philosophers of this time period were [[David Hume]] and [[Adam Smith]], who, along with [[Francis Hutcheson]], were also the primary philosophers of the [[Scottish Enlightenment]]. 
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-The [[19th-century philosophy|19th century]] took the radical notions of self-organization and intrinsic order from Goethe and Kantian metaphysics, and proceeded to produce a long elaboration on the tension between systematization and organic development. Foremost was the work of [[Hegel]], whose ''Logic'' and ''Phenomenology of Spirit'' produced a "dialectical" framework for ordering of knowledge. The 19th century would also include [[Arthur Schopenhauer|Schopenhauer]]'s negation of the will. As with the 18th century, it would be developments in science that would arise from, and then challenge, philosophy: most importantly the work of Charles Darwin, which was based on the idea of organic self-regulation found in philosophers such as [[Adam Smith]], but fundamentally challenged established conceptions. 
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-Also in the 19th century, the Danish philosopher [[Søren Kierkegaard]] took philosophy in a new direction by focusing less on abstract concepts and more on what it means to be an ''existing'' individual. His work provided impetus for many 20th century philosophical movements, including [[existentialism]]. 
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-=== Contemporary philosophy === 
-The [[20th-century philosophy|20th century]] deals with the upheavals produced by a series of conflicts within philosophical discourse over the basis of knowledge, with classical certainties overthrown, and new social, economic, scientific and logical problems. 20th century philosophy was set for a series of attempts to reform and preserve, and to alter or abolish, older knowledge systems. Seminal figures include [[Ludwig Wittgenstein]], [[Martin Heidegger]], [[Bertrand Russell]], [[Jean-Paul Sartre]], and [[Edmund Husserl]]. [[Epistemology]], the theory of knowledge, and its basis was a central concern, as seen from the work of Heidegger, Russell, [[Karl Popper]], and [[Claude Lévi-Strauss]]. Phenomenologically oriented metaphysics undergirded [[existentialism]] (Sartre, [[Maurice Merleau-Ponty]], [[Albert Camus]]) and finally [[poststructuralism]] ([[Gilles Deleuze]], [[Jean-François Lyotard]], [[Michel Foucault]], [[Jacques Derrida]]). [[Pragmatism|Pragmatist]] [[Richard Rorty]] has argued that these and other schools of 20th-century philosophy, including his own, share an opposition to classical [[Dualism (philosophy of mind)|dualism]] that is both [[anti-essentialism|anti-essentialist]] and [[antimetaphysical]]. The [[Psychoanalysis|psychoanalytic]] work of [[Sigmund Freud]], [[Jacques Lacan]], [[Julia Kristeva]], and others has also been influential in contemporary [[continental philosophy]]. 
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-A notable phenomenon of the latter half of the century was the rise of popular philosophers who promulgated systems for dealing with the world but were isolated from academic philosophy, such as [[Ayn Rand]], who were radical critics of traditional philosophy and psychology and relied on unorthodox methods. Conversely, some philosophers have attempted to define and rehabilitate older traditions of philosophy. Most notably, [[Hans-Georg Gadamer]] and [[Alasdair MacIntyre]] have both, albeit in different ways, revived the tradition of [[Aristotelianism]]. 
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-The [[21st century]]'s philosophy is difficult to clarify due to the short span of time that has lapsed since the start of the new millennium. Only nearly one decade has passed since its beginning, however it is usually seen as being defined by the prominent 20th-century philosophers who still survive today. These include the likes of [[Noam Chomsky]], [[Saul Kripke]] and [[Jürgen Habermas]], whose work as professors and educators in the field of philosophy have allowed them to reach prominence in the mainstream media. The 21st century continues to carry with it much of the philosophical debate seen in the former one, with continental and analytic traditions still reigning in major debate. A variety of new topics, however, have risen to the stage, resurrecting [[ethics]] into the modern philosophical discussion. For instance the implications of new media and information exchange, such as the [[Internet]], have brought back interest in the [[philosophy of technology]] and [[philosophy of science|science]]. 
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Alasdair Chalmers MacIntyre (born 12 January 1929 in Glasgow, Scotland) is a Scottish philosopher primarily known for his contribution to moral and political philosophy but also known for his work in history of philosophy and theology. MacIntyre's After Virtue (1981) is widely recognised as one of the most important works of Anglophone moral and political philosophy in the 20th century.

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