Philosophy  

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 +[[Image:Nietzsche_in_Basel.jpg|thumb|left|200px|[[Friedrich Nietzsche]] (c. 1875)]]
{| class="toccolours" style="float: left; margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 2em; font-size: 85%; background:#c6dbf7; color:black; width:30em; max-width: 40%;" cellspacing="5" {| class="toccolours" style="float: left; margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 2em; font-size: 85%; background:#c6dbf7; color:black; width:30em; max-width: 40%;" cellspacing="5"
-| style="text-align: left;" | "[[Nothing]] is more usual than for [[philosophyh|philosopher]]s to encroach on the province of [[grammar]]ians, and to engage in disputes of [[word]]s, while they imagine they are handling [[controversies]] of the deepest importance and concern." - [[David Hume]]+| style="text-align: left;" |
-|}[[Image:Plato and Aristotle in The School of Athens painting by Raphael.jpg|thumb|right|200px|Plato (left) and Aristotle (right), a detail of ''[[The School of Athens]]''<!-- this should link to an article about the famous artwork -->, a fresco by [[Raphael]]. Aristotle gestures to the [[earth]], representing his belief in knowledge through empirical observation and experience, while holding a copy of his ''[[Nicomachean Ethics]]'' in his hand. Plato holds his ''[[Timaeus (dialogue)|Timaeus]]'' and gestures to the [[heaven]]s, representing his belief in [[The Forms]]]]+"([[Philosophy]] is) the yelping hound howling at her lord ([[poetry]]) [[(Philosophy is) the yelping hound howling at her lord (poetry) |[...]]] " --[[Plato]], ''The Republic''
 +<hr>
 +"[[Nothing]] is more usual than for [[philosophy|philosopher]]s to encroach on the province of [[grammar]]ians, and to engage in disputes of [[word]]s, while they imagine they are handling [[controversies]] of the deepest importance and concern." - [[David Hume]]
 +|}
 +[[Image:Glass half full or half empty.JPG|thumb|right|200px|[[Is the glass half empty or half full?]],<small> photo © [[JWG]]</small>]]
 +[[Image:Plato and Aristotle in The School of Athens painting by Raphael.jpg|thumb|right|200px|Plato (left) and Aristotle (right), a detail of ''[[The School of Athens]]''<!-- this should link to an article about the famous artwork -->, a fresco by [[Raphael]]. Aristotle gestures to the [[earth]], representing his belief in knowledge through empirical observation and experience, while holding a copy of his ''[[Nicomachean Ethics]]'' in his hand. Plato holds his ''[[Timaeus (dialogue)|Timaeus]]'' and gestures to the [[heaven]]s, representing his belief in [[The Forms]]]]
[[Image:Vico La scienza nuova.gif|thumb|right|200px|''[[New Science]] ([[1775]]) by [[Giambattista Vico]]]] [[Image:Vico La scienza nuova.gif|thumb|right|200px|''[[New Science]] ([[1775]]) by [[Giambattista Vico]]]]
[[Image:Ethics by Spinoza.jpg|Spinoza's|thumb|right|200px|By virtue of his [[magnum opus]], the posthumous ''[[Ethics (book)|Ethics]]'', [[Spinoza]] is considered one of [[Western philosophy|Western philosophy's]] definitive ethicists.]] [[Image:Ethics by Spinoza.jpg|Spinoza's|thumb|right|200px|By virtue of his [[magnum opus]], the posthumous ''[[Ethics (book)|Ethics]]'', [[Spinoza]] is considered one of [[Western philosophy|Western philosophy's]] definitive ethicists.]]
[[Image:Therese Philosophe Original edition.jpg|thumb|right|200px|''[[Thérèse Philosophe]]'' ([[1748]]) was ''the'' bestseller of the [[French Enlightenment]]]] [[Image:Therese Philosophe Original edition.jpg|thumb|right|200px|''[[Thérèse Philosophe]]'' ([[1748]]) was ''the'' bestseller of the [[French Enlightenment]]]]
-[[Image:Inversions.jpg|thumb|right|200px|''[[Inversions]]'', the first French [[gay]] journal is published. Produced between [[1924]] and [[1926]], it stopped publication after the French government charged the publishers with "[[Outrage aux bonnes mœurs]]". Its full title was ''Inversions ... in [[art]], [[literature]], [[philosophy]] and [[science]]''.]] 
[[Image:The Heart Has Its Reasons by Odilon Redon.jpg |thumb|right|200px|''[[The heart has its reasons, of which reason knows nothing]]'' (c.[[1887]]) by [[Odilon Redon]], a phrase from the ''[[Pensées]]'' ([[1669]]) by [[Blaise Pascal]]]] [[Image:The Heart Has Its Reasons by Odilon Redon.jpg |thumb|right|200px|''[[The heart has its reasons, of which reason knows nothing]]'' (c.[[1887]]) by [[Odilon Redon]], a phrase from the ''[[Pensées]]'' ([[1669]]) by [[Blaise Pascal]]]]
-[[Image:The Sleep of Reason.jpg|thumb|''[[The Sleep of Reason Produces Monsters]]''is a [[1799]] print by [[Goya]] from the ''[[Caprichos]]'' series. It is the image the sleeping artist surrounded by the winged [[ghoulies]] and [[beast]]ies [[unleashed]] by [[unreason]].]]+[[Image:The Sleep of Reason.jpg|thumb|right|200px|''[[The Sleep of Reason Produces Monsters]]'' is a print by [[Francisco Goya]] from the ''[[Caprichos]]'' series]]
{{Template}} {{Template}}
-'''Philosophy''' is the discipline concerned with questions of how one should live ([[ethics]]); what sorts of things exist and what are their essential natures ([[metaphysics]]); what counts as genuine knowledge ([[epistemology]]); and what are the correct principles of reasoning ([[logic]]).+'''Philosophy''' is the [[Research|study]] of general and fundamental [[problem]]s, such as those connected with [[reality]], [[Ontology|existence]], [[Epistemology|knowledge]], [[Axiology|values]], [[logic|reason]], [[Philosophy of mind|mind]], and [[philosophy of language|language]]. Philosophy is distinguished from other ways of addressing such problems by its critical, generally systematic approach and its reliance on [[dialectic|rational argument]]. In more casual speech, by extension, "philosophy" can refer to the most basic [[belief system]] of an individual or group.
 + 
 +The word "philosophy" comes from the [[Ancient Greek]] ''[[φιλοσοφία]]'' (''philosophia''), which literally means "love of wisdom". The introduction of the terms "philosopher" and "philosophy" has been ascribed to the Greek thinker [[Pythagoras]].
 + 
==History== ==History==
-:''[[History of philosophy]]''+:''[[history of philosophy]]''
Many societies have considered philosophical questions and built philosophical traditions based upon each other's works. Many societies have considered philosophical questions and built philosophical traditions based upon each other's works.
[[Eastern philosophy]] is organized by the chronological periods of each region. Historians of western philosophy usually divide the subject into three or more periods, the most important being [[ancient philosophy]], [[medieval philosophy]], and [[modern philosophy]]. [[Eastern philosophy]] is organized by the chronological periods of each region. Historians of western philosophy usually divide the subject into three or more periods, the most important being [[ancient philosophy]], [[medieval philosophy]], and [[modern philosophy]].
-==Major traditions== 
-===German idealism=== 
-Forms of idealism were prevalent in philosophy from the 18th century to the early 20th century. Transcendental idealism, advocated by [[Immanuel Kant]], is the view that there are limits on what can be understood, since there is much that cannot be brought under the conditions of objective judgment. Kant wrote his ''[[Critique of Pure Reason]]'' (1781–1787) in an attempt to reconcile the conflicting approaches of rationalism and empiricism, and to establish a new groundwork for studying metaphysics. Kant's intention with this work was to look at what we know and then consider what must be true about it, as a logical consequence of the ''way'' we know it. One major theme was that there are fundamental features of reality that escape our direct knowledge because of the natural limits of the human faculties. Although Kant held that objective knowledge of the world required the mind to impose a [[conceptual framework|conceptual]] or [[categorical framework]] on the stream of pure sensory data—a framework including space and time themselves—he maintained that ''things-in-themselves'' existed independently of our perceptions and judgments; he was therefore not an idealist in any simple sense. Indeed, Kant's account of ''things-in-themselves'' is both controversial and highly complex. Continuing his work, [[Johann Gottlieb Fichte]] and [[Friedrich Wilhelm Joseph von Schelling|Friedrich Schelling]] dispensed with belief in the independent existence of the world, and created a thoroughgoing idealist philosophy.+==Areas of inquiry==
 +Philosophy is divided into many sub-fields. These include epistemology, logic, metaphysics, ethics, and aesthetics. Some of the major areas of study are considered individually below.
-The most notable work of this [[German idealism]] was [[Georg Wilhelm Friedrich Hegel|G. W. F. Hegel]]'s ''[[Phenomenology of Spirit]]'', of 1807. Hegel admitted his ideas were not new, but that all the previous philosophies had been incomplete. His goal was to correctly finish their job. Hegel asserts that the twin aims of philosophy are to account for the contradictions apparent in human experience (which arise, for instance, out of the supposed contradictions between "being" and "not being"), and also simultaneously to resolve and preserve these contradictions by showing their compatibility at a higher level of examination ("being" and "not being" are resolved with "becoming"). This program of acceptance and reconciliation of contradictions is known as the "Hegelian [[dialectic]]". Philosophers influenced by Hegel include [[Ludwig Andreas Feuerbach]], who coined the term projection as pertaining to our inability to recognize anything in the external world without projecting qualities of ourselves upon those things; [[Karl Marx]]; [[Friedrich Engels]]; and the [[British idealism|British idealists]], notably [[T. H. Green]], [[J. M. E. McTaggart]] and [[F. H. Bradley]].+===Epistemology===
 +:''[[Epistemology]]''
 +Epistemology is concerned with the nature and scope of knowledge, such as the relationships between [[truth]], [[belief]], and [[theory of justification|theories of justification]].
-Few 20th century philosophers have embraced idealism. However, quite a few have embraced Hegelian dialectic. Immanuel Kant's "Copernican Turn" also remains an important philosophical concept today.+[[Philosophical skepticism|Skepticism]] is the position which questions the possibility of completely justifying any truth. The [[regress argument]], a fundamental problem in epistemology, occurs when, in order to completely prove any statement P, its justification itself needs to be supported by another justification. This chain can do three possible options, all of which are unsatisfactory according to the [[Münchhausen trilemma]]. One option is [[infinitism]], where this chain of justification can go on forever. Another option is [[foundationalism]], where the chain of justifications eventually relies on [[basic beliefs]] or [[axiom]]s that are left unproven. The last option, such as in [[coherentism]], is making the chain [[circular argument|circular]] so that a statement is included in its own chain of justification.
-===Pragmatism===+[[Rationalism]] is the emphasis on reasoning as a source of knowledge. [[Empiricism]] is the emphasis on observational evidence via sensory experience over other evidence as the source of knowledge. Rationalism claims that every possible object of knowledge can be deduced from coherent premises without observation. Empiricism claims that at least some knowledge is only a matter of observation. For this, Empiricism often cites the concept of [[tabula rasa]], where individuals are not born with [[mental content]] and that knowledge builds from experience or perception. [[Epistemological solipsism]] is the idea that the existence of the world outside the mind is an [[unresolvable]] question.
-Pragmatism was founded in the spirit of finding a scientific concept of truth that does not depend on personal insight (revelation) or reference to some metaphysical realm. The truth of a statement should be judged by the effect it has on our actions, and truth should be seen as what the whole of scientific enquiry ultimately agrees on. This should probably be seen as a guiding principle more than a definition of what it means for something to be true, though the details of how this principle should be interpreted have been subject to discussion since Charles S. Peirce first conceived it. Peirce's [[Pragmatic maxim|maxim of pragmatism]] is as follows: "Consider what effects, which might conceivably have practical bearings, we conceive the object of our conception to have. Then, our conception of these effects is the whole of our conceptions of the object." Like [[postmodern]] neo-pragmatist [[Richard Rorty]], many are convinced that pragmatism asserts that the truth of beliefs does not consist in their correspondence with reality, but in their usefulness and efficacy.+[[Parmenides]] (fl. 500 BC) argued that it is impossible to doubt that thinking actually occurs. But thinking must have an object, therefore something ''beyond'' thinking really exists. Parmenides deduced that what really exists must have certain properties—for example, that it cannot come into existence or cease to exist, that it is a coherent whole, that it remains the same eternally (in fact, exists altogether outside time). This is known as the [[third man argument]]. [[Plato]] (427–347 BC) combined rationalism with a form of [[philosophical realism|realism]]. The philosopher's work is to consider being, and the essence ([[ousia]]) of things. But the characteristic of essences is that they are universal. The nature of a man, a triangle, a tree, applies to all men, all triangles, all trees. Plato argued that these essences are mind-independent "[[theory of forms|forms]]", that humans (but particularly philosophers) can come to know by reason, and by ignoring the distractions of sense-perception.
-The late 19th-century [[American philosophy|American philosophers]] [[Charles Sanders Peirce]] and [[William James]] were its co-founders, and it was later developed by [[John Dewey]] as [[instrumentalism]]. Since the usefulness of any belief at any time might be contingent on circumstance, Peirce and James conceptualised final truth as something only established by the future, final settlement of all opinion. Critics have accused pragmatism of falling victim to a simple fallacy: because something that is true proves useful, that usefulness is the basis for its truth. Thinkers in the pragmatist tradition have included John Dewey, [[George Santayana]], [[W. V. O. Quine]] and [[C. I. Lewis]]. Pragmatism has more recently been taken in new directions by Richard Rorty, [[John Lachs]], [[Donald Davidson (philosopher)|Donald Davidson]], [[Susan Haack]], and [[Hilary Putnam]].+Modern rationalism begins with [[Descartes]]. Reflection on the nature of perceptual experience, as well as scientific discoveries in physiology and optics, led Descartes (and also [[John Locke|Locke]]) to the view that we are directly aware of ideas, rather than objects. This view gave rise to three questions:
-===Phenomenology===+# Is an idea a true copy of the real thing that it represents? Sensation is not a direct interaction between bodily objects and our sense, but is a physiological process involving representation (for example, an image on the retina). Locke thought that a "secondary quality" such as a sensation of green could in no way resemble the arrangement of particles in matter that go to produce this sensation, although he thought that "primary qualities" such as shape, size, number, were really in objects.
 +# How can physical objects such as chairs and tables, or even physiological processes in the brain, give rise to mental items such as ideas? This is part of what became known as the [[mind-body problem]].
 +# If all the contents of awareness are ideas, how can we know that anything exists apart from ideas?
-[[Edmund Husserl]]'s [[phenomenology (philosophy)|phenomenology]] was an ambitious attempt to lay the foundations for an account of the structure of conscious experience in general. An important part of Husserl's phenomenological project was to show that all conscious acts are directed at or about objective content, a feature that Husserl called ''[[intentionality]]''.+Descartes tried to address the last problem by reason. He began, echoing Parmenides, with a principle that he thought could not coherently be denied: I ''think'', therefore I ''am'' (often given in his original Latin: ''[[Cogito ergo sum]]''). From this principle, Descartes went on to construct a complete system of knowledge (which involves proving the [[existence of God]], using, among other means, a version of the [[ontological argument]]). His view that reason alone could yield substantial truths about reality strongly influenced those philosophers usually considered modern rationalists (such as [[Baruch Spinoza]], [[Gottfried Leibniz]], and [[Christian Wolff (philosopher)|Christian Wolff]]), while provoking criticism from other philosophers who have retrospectively come to be grouped together as empiricists.
-In the first part of his two-volume work, the ''Logical Investigations'' (1901), he launched an extended attack on [[psychologism]]. In the second part, he began to develop the technique of ''descriptive phenomenology'', with the aim of showing how objective judgments are indeed grounded in conscious experience—not, however, in the first-person experience of particular individuals, but in the properties essential to any experiences of the kind in question.+===Logic===
-He also attempted to identify the essential properties of any act of meaning. He developed the method further in ''Ideas'' (1913) as ''transcendental phenomenology'', proposing to ground actual experience, and thus all fields of human knowledge, in the structure of consciousness of an ideal, or [[transcendence (philosophy)|transcendental]], ego. Later, he attempted to reconcile his transcendental standpoint with an acknowledgement of the intersubjective [[life-world]] in which real individual subjects interact. Husserl published only a few works in his lifetime, which treat phenomenology mainly in abstract methodological terms; but he left an enormous quantity of unpublished concrete analyses.+:''[[logic]]''
 +Logic is the study of the principles of correct [[reasoning]]. [[Argument]]s use either deductive reasoning or inductive reasoning. [[Deductive reasoning]] is when, given certain statements (called [[premise]]s), other statements (called conclusions) are [[logical consequence|unavoidably implied]]. [[Rules of inference]]s from premises include the most popular method, [[modus ponens]], where given “A” and “If A then B”, then “B” must be concluded. A common convention for a deductive argument is the [[syllogism]]. An argument is termed [[validity|valid]] if its conclusion does indeed follow from its premises, whether the premises are true or not, while an argument is [[soundness|sound]] if its conclusion follows from premises that are true. [[Propositional logic]] uses premises that are [[proposition]]s, which are [[Statement (logic)|declarations]] that are either true or false, while [[predicate logic]] uses more complex premises called [[formula (mathematical logic)|formulae]] that contain [[Variable (math)|variables]]. These can be assigned values or can be [[quantification|quantified]] as to when they apply with the [[universal quantifier]] (always apply) or the [[existential quantifier]] (applies at least once). [[Inductive reasoning]] makes conclusions or generalizations based on [[probabilistic reasoning]]. For example, if “90% of humans are right-handed” and “Joe is human” then “Joe is probably right-handed”. Fields in logic include [[mathematical logic]] (formal symbolic logic) and [[philosophical logic]].
-Husserl's work was immediately influential in Germany, with the foundation of phenomenological schools in Munich and Göttingen. Phenomenology later achieved international fame through the work of such philosophers as [[Martin Heidegger]] (formerly Husserl's research assistant), [[Maurice Merleau-Ponty]], and [[Jean-Paul Sartre]]. Indeed, through the work of Heidegger and Sartre, Husserl's focus on subjective experience influenced aspects of [[existentialism]].+===Metaphysics===
 +:''[[metaphysics]]''
 +Metaphysics is the study of the most general features of [[reality]], such as [[existence]], [[time]], the relationship between [[mind]] and [[body]], [[object (philosophy)|objects]] and their [[property (philosophy)|properties]], wholes and their parts, events, processes, and [[causality|causation]]. Traditional branches of metaphysics include [[cosmology]], the study of the [[world]] in its entirety, and [[ontology]], the study of [[being]].
-===Existentialism===+Within metaphysics itself there are a wide range of differing philosophical [[theory|theories]]. [[Idealism]], for example, is the belief that reality is mentally constructed or otherwise immaterial while [[Philosophical realism|realism]] holds that reality, or at least some part of it, exists independently of the mind. [[Subjective idealism]] describes objects as no more than collections or "bundles" of sense data in the perceiver. The 18th century philosopher [[George Berkeley]] contended that existence is fundamentally tied to perception with the phrase ''Esse est aut percipi aut percipere'' or "To be is to be perceived or to perceive".
-Existentialism is a term applied to the work of a number of late 19th- and 20th-century philosophers who, despite profound doctrinal differences, shared the belief that philosophical thinking begins with the human subject—not merely the thinking subject, but the acting, feeling, living human individual. In existentialism, the individual's starting point is characterized by what has been called "the existential attitude", or a sense of disorientation and confusion in the face of an apparently meaningless or absurd world. Many existentialists have also regarded traditional systematic or academic philosophy, in both style and content, as too abstract and remote from concrete human experience.+
-Although they did not use the term, the 19th-century philosophers [[Søren Kierkegaard]] and [[Friedrich Nietzsche]] are widely regarded as the fathers of existentialism. Their influence, however, has extended beyond existentialist thought.+In addition to the aforementioned views, however, there is also an ontological [[dichotomy]] within metaphysics between the concepts of particulars and universals as well. [[Particular]]s are those objects that are said to exist in space and time, as opposed to [[abstract objects]], such as numbers. [[Universals]] are properties held by multiple particulars, such as redness or a gender. The type of [[existence]], if any, of universals and abstract objects is an issue of serious [[debate]] within metaphysical philosophy. [[philosophical realism|Realism]] is the philosophical position that universals do in fact exist, while [[nominalism]] is the negation, or denial of universals, abstract objects, or both. [[Conceptualism]] holds that universals exist, but only within the mind's perception.
-The main target of Kierkegaard's writings was the idealist philosophical system of [[Hegel]] which, he thought, ignored or excluded the inner subjective life of living human beings. Kierkegaard, conversely, held that "truth is subjectivity", arguing that what is most important to an actual human being are questions dealing with an individual's inner relationship to existence. In particular, Kierkegaard, a Christian, believed that the truth of religious faith was a subjective question, and one to be wrestled with passionately.+The question of whether or not [[existence]] is a [[wikt:predicate|predicate]] has been discussed since the Early Modern period. [[Essence]] is the set of attributes that make an object what it fundamentally is and without which it loses its [[Personal identity|identity]]. Essence is contrasted with [[accident (philosophy)|accident]]: a property that the substance has [[metaphysical contingency|contingently]], without which the substance can still retain its identity.
-Although Kierkegaard and Nietzsche were among his influences, the extent to which the German philosopher [[Martin Heidegger]] should be considered an existentialist is debatable. In ''[[Being and Time]]'' he presented a method of rooting philosophical explanations in human existence (''Dasein'') to be analysed in terms of existential categories (''existentiale''); and this has led many commentators to treat him as an important figure in the existentialist movement. However, in ''The Letter on Humanism'', Heidegger explicitly rejected the existentialism of [[Jean-Paul Sartre]].+===Moral and political philosophy===
-Sartre became the best-known proponent of existentialism, exploring it not only in theoretical works such as ''[[Being and Nothingness]]'', but also in plays and novels. Sartre, along with [[Simone de Beauvoir]], represented an avowedly atheistic branch of existentialism, which is now more closely associated with their ideas of nausea, contingency, bad faith, and the absurd than with Kierkegaard's spiritual angst. Nevertheless, the focus on the individual human being, responsible before the universe for the authenticity of his or her existence, is common to all these thinkers.+:''[[moral philosophy]], [[political philosophy]]''
 +Ethics, or "moral philosophy," is concerned primarily with the question of the best way to live, and secondarily, concerning the question of whether this question can be answered. The main branches of ethics are [[meta-ethics]], [[normative ethics]], and [[applied ethics]]. Meta-ethics concerns the nature of ethical thought, such as the origins of the words good and bad, and origins of other comparative words of various ethical systems, whether there are absolute ethical truths, and how such truths could be known. Normative ethics are more concerned with the questions of how one ought to act, and what the right course of action is. This is where most ethical theories are generated. Lastly, applied ethics go beyond theory and step into real world ethical practice, such as questions of whether or not abortion is correct. Ethics is also associated with the idea of [[morality]], and the two are often interchangeable.
-===Structuralism and post-structuralism===+One debate that has commanded the attention of ethicists in the modern era has been between [[consequentialism]] (actions are to be morally evaluated solely by their ''consequences'') and [[deontology]] (actions are to be morally evaluated solely by consideration of agents' ''duties'', the ''rights'' of those whom the action concerns, or both). [[Jeremy Bentham]] and [[John Stuart Mill]] are famous for propagating [[utilitarianism]], which is the idea that the fundamental moral rule is to strive toward the "greatest happiness for the greatest number". However, in promoting this idea they also necessarily promoted the broader doctrine of consequentialism. Adopting a position opposed to consequentialism, [[Immanuel Kant]] argued that moral principles were simply products of reason. Kant believed that the incorporation of consequences into moral deliberation was a deep mistake, since it denies the necessity of practical maxims in governing the working of the will. According to Kant, reason requires that we conform our actions to the [[categorical imperative]], which is an absolute duty. An important 20th-century deontologist, [[W.D. Ross]], argued for weaker forms of duties called [[prima facie duty|''prima facie'' duties]].
-Inaugurated by the linguist [[Ferdinand de Saussure]], structuralism sought to clarify systems of signs through analyzing the [[discourse]]s they both limit and make possible. Saussure conceived of the sign as being delimited by all the other signs in the system, and ideas as being incapable of existence prior to linguistic structure, which articulates thought. This led continental thought away from humanism, and toward what was termed the decentering of man: language is no longer spoken by man to express a true inner self, but language speaks man.+More recent works have emphasized the role of character in ethics, a movement known as the ''[[aretaic turn]]'' (that is, the ''turn towards virtues''). One strain of this movement followed the work of [[Bernard Williams]]. Williams noted that rigid forms of consequentialism and deontology demanded that people behave impartially. This, Williams argued, requires that people abandon their personal projects, and hence their personal [[integrity]], in order to be considered moral. [[G.E.M. Anscombe]], in an influential paper, "[[Modern Moral Philosophy]]" (1958), revived [[virtue ethics]] as an alternative to what was seen as the entrenched positions of Kantianism and consequentialism. Aretaic perspectives have been inspired in part by research of ancient conceptions of virtue. For example, [[Aristotle's ethics]] demands that people follow the ''Aristotelian mean'', or balance between two vices; and [[Confucius|Confucian]] ethics argues that virtue consists largely in striving for harmony with other people. Virtue ethics in general has since gained many adherents, and has been defended by such philosophers as [[Philippa Foot]], [[Alasdair MacIntyre]], and [[Rosalind Hursthouse]].
-Structuralism sought the province of a hard science, but its positivism soon came under fire by poststructuralism, a wide field of thinkers, some of whom were once themselves structuralists, but later came to criticize it. Structuralists believed they could analyze systems from an external, objective standing, for example, but the poststructuralists argued that this is incorrect, that one cannot transcend structures and thus analysis is itself determined by what it examines, while the distinction between the signifier and signified was treated as crystalline by structuralists, poststructuralists asserted that every attempt to grasp the signified results in more signifiers, so meaning is always in a state of being deferred, making an ultimate interpretation impossible.+[[Political philosophy]] is the study of [[government]] and the relationship of individuals (or families and clans) to communities including the [[State (polity)|state]]. It includes questions about justice, law, property, and the rights and obligations of the citizen. Politics and ethics are traditionally inter-linked subjects, as both discuss the question of what is good and how people should live.
-Structuralism came to dominate continental philosophy throughout the 1960s and early 1970s, encompassing thinkers as diverse as [[Claude Lévi-Strauss]], [[Roland Barthes]] and [[Jacques Lacan]]. Post-structuralism came to predominate over the 1970s onwards, including thinkers such as [[Michel Foucault]], [[Jacques Derrida]], [[Gilles Deleuze]] and even [[Roland Barthes]]; it incorporated a critique of structuralism's limitations.+From ancient times, and well beyond them, the roots of justification for political authority were inescapably tied to outlooks on human nature. In ''The Republic'', [[Plato]] presented the argument that the ideal society would be run by a council of [[philosopher-king]]s, since those best at philosophy are best able to realize the good. Even Plato, however, required philosophers to make their way in the world for many years before beginning their rule at the age of fifty. For [[Aristotle]], humans are political animals (i.e. social animals), and governments are set up to pursue good for the community. Aristotle reasoned that, since the state (''[[polis]]'') was the highest form of community, it has the purpose of pursuing the highest good. Aristotle viewed political power as the result of natural inequalities in skill and virtue. Because of these differences, he favored an aristocracy of the able and virtuous. For Aristotle, the person cannot be complete unless he or she lives in a community. His ''The Nicomachean Ethics'' and ''The Politics'' are meant to be read in that order. The first book addresses virtues (or "excellences") in the person as a citizen; the second addresses the proper form of government to ensure that citizens will be virtuous, and therefore complete. Both books deal with the essential role of justice in civic life.
-===The analytic tradition===+[[Nicolas of Cusa]] rekindled Platonic thought in the early 15th century. He promoted democracy in Medieval Europe, both in his writings and in his organization of the Council of Florence. Unlike Aristotle and the Hobbesian tradition to follow, Cusa saw human beings as equal and divine (that is, made in God's image), so democracy would be the only just form of government. Cusa's views are credited by some as sparking the Italian Renaissance, which gave rise to the notion of "Nation-States".
-The term ''analytic philosophy'' roughly designates a group of philosophical methods that stress detailed argumentation, attention to semantics, use of classical logic and non-classical logics and clarity of meaning above all other criteria. Some have held that philosophical problems arise through misuse of language or because of misunderstandings of the logic of our language, while some maintain that there are genuine philosophical problems and that philosophy is continuous with science. [[Michael Dummett]] in his ''Origins of Analytical Philosophy'' makes the case for counting [[Gottlob Frege]]'s ''The Foundations of Arithmetic'' as the first analytic work, on the grounds that in that book Frege took the linguistic turn, analyzing philosophical problems through language. [[Bertrand Russell]] and [[G.E. Moore]] are also often counted as founders of analytic philosophy, beginning with their rejection of British idealism, their defense of realism and the emphasis they laid on the legitimacy of analysis. Russell's classic works ''The Principles of Mathematics'', ''[[On Denoting]]'' and ''[[Principia Mathematica]]'' with [[Alfred North Whitehead]], aside from greatly promoting the use of mathematical logic in philosophy, set the ground for much of the research program in the early stages of the analytic tradition, emphasizing such problems as: the reference of proper names, whether 'existence' is a property, the nature of propositions, the analysis of definite descriptions, the discussions on the foundations of mathematics; as well as exploring issues of ontological commitment and even metaphysical problems regarding time, the nature of matter, mind, persistence and change, which Russell tackled often with the aid of mathematical logic. Russell and Moore's philosophy, in the beginning of the 20th century, developed as a critique of [[Hegel]] and his British followers in particular, and of grand systems of [[speculative philosophy]] in general, though by no means all analytic philosophers reject the philosophy of Hegel (see [[Charles Taylor (philosopher)|Charles Taylor]]) nor speculative philosophy. Some schools in the group include [[logical positivism]], and [[ordinary language philosophy|ordinary language]] both markedly influenced by Russell and Wittgenstein's development of [[Logical Atomism]] the former positively and the latter negatively.+ 
 +Later, [[Niccolò Machiavelli]] rejected the views of Aristotle and Thomas Aquinas as unrealistic. The ideal sovereign is not the embodiment of the moral virtues; rather the sovereign does whatever is successful and necessary, rather than what is morally praiseworthy. [[Thomas Hobbes]] also contested many elements of Aristotle's views. For Hobbes, human nature is essentially anti-social: people are essentially egoistic, and this egoism makes life difficult in the natural state of things. Moreover, Hobbes argued, though people may have natural inequalities, these are trivial, since no particular talents or virtues that people may have will make them safe from harm inflicted by others. For these reasons, Hobbes concluded that the state arises from a common agreement to raise the community out of the [[state of nature]]. This can only be done by the establishment of a [[sovereignty|sovereign]], in which (or whom) is vested complete control over the community, and is able to inspire awe and terror in its subjects.
 + 
 +Many in the Enlightenment were unsatisfied with existing doctrines in political philosophy, which seemed to marginalize or neglect the possibility of a [[democracy|democratic state]]. [[Jean-Jacques Rousseau]] was among those who attempted to overturn these doctrines: he responded to Hobbes by claiming that a human is by nature a kind of "[[noble savage]]", and that society and social contracts corrupt this nature. Another critic was [[John Locke]]. In ''[[Two Treatises of Government|Second Treatise on Government]]'' he agreed with Hobbes that the nation-state was an efficient tool for raising humanity out of a deplorable state, but he argued that the sovereign might become an abominable institution compared to the relatively benign unmodulated state of nature.
 + 
 +Following the doctrine of the [[fact-value distinction]], due in part to the influence of [[David Hume]] and his student [[Adam Smith]], appeals to human nature for political justification were weakened. Nevertheless, many political philosophers, especially [[moral realism|moral realists]], still make use of some essential human nature as a basis for their arguments.
 + 
 +[[Marxism]] is derived from the work of [[Karl Marx]] and [[Friedrich Engels]]. Their idea that capitalism is based on exploitation of workers and causes alienation of people from their human nature, the [[historical materialism]], their view of [[social classes]], etc., have influenced many fields of study, such as sociology, economics, and politics. Marxism inspired the Marxist school of [[communism]], which brought a huge impact on the history of the 20th century.
 + 
 +===Aesthetics===
 +:''[[aesthetics]], [[moral philosophy]], [[political philosophy]]''
 +Aesthetics deals with [[beauty]], [[art]], enjoyment, sensory-emotional values, perception, and matters of taste and sentiment.
 + 
 +===Specialized branches===
 +* '''[[Philosophy of language]]''' explores the nature, the origins, and the use of language.
 +* '''[[Philosophy of law]]''' (often called '''[[jurisprudence]]''') explores the varying theories explaining the nature and the interpretations of the law in society.
 +* '''[[Philosophy of mind]]''' explores the nature of the mind, and its relationship to the body, and is typified by disputes between [[Dualism (philosophy of mind)|dualism]] and [[materialism]]. In recent years there has been increasing similarity between this branch of philosophy and [[cognitive science]].
 +* '''[[Philosophy of religion]]'''
 +* '''[[Philosophy of science]]'''
 +* '''[[Metaphilosophy]]'''
 + 
 +Many academic disciplines have also generated philosophical inquiry. These include [[Philosophy of History|history]], [[philosophy of logic|logic]], and [[Philosophy of mathematics|mathematics]].
-In 1921, [[Ludwig Wittgenstein]], who studied under Russell at Cambridge, published his ''[[Tractatus Logico-Philosophicus]]'', which gave a rigidly "logical" account of linguistic and philosophical issues. At the time, he understood most of the problems of philosophy as mere puzzles of language, which could be solved by investigating and then minding the logical structure of language. Years later, he reversed a number of the positions he set out in the ''Tractatus'', in for example his second major work, ''[[Philosophical Investigations]]'' (1953). ''Investigations'' was influential in the development of "ordinary language philosophy," which was promoted by [[Gilbert Ryle]], [[J.L. Austin]], and a few others. In the United States, meanwhile, the philosophy of [[W.V.O. Quine]] was having a major influence, with such classics as [[Two Dogmas of Empiricism]]. In that paper Quine criticizes the distinction between analytic and synthetic statements, arguing that a clear conception of analyticity is unattainable. He argued for holism, the thesis that language, including scientific language, is a set of interconnected sentences, none of which can be verified on its own, rather, the sentences in the language depend on each other for their meaning and truth conditions. A consequence of Quine's approach is that language as a whole has only a thin relation to experience. Some sentences that refer directly to experience might be modified by sense impressions, but as the whole of language is theory-laden, for the whole language to be modified, more than this is required. However, most of the linguistic structure can in principle be revised, even logic, in order to better model the world. Notable students of Quine include [[Donald Davidson (philosopher)|Donald Davidson]] and [[Daniel Dennett]]. The former devised a program for giving a semantics to natural language and thereby answer the philosophical conundrum "what is meaning?". A crucial part of the program was the use of [[Alfred Tarski]]'s semantic theory of truth. Dummett, among others, argued that truth conditions should be dispensed within the theory of meaning, and replaced by assertibility conditions. Some propositions, on this view, are neither true nor false, and thus such a theory of meaning entails a rejection of the [[law of the excluded middle]]. This, for Dummett, entails antirealism, as Russell himself pointed out in his ''An Inquiry into Meaning and Truth''. 
-By the 1970s there was a renewed interest in many traditional philosophical problems by the younger generations of analytic philosophers. [[David Kellogg Lewis|David Lewis]], [[Saul Kripke]], [[Derek Parfit]] and others took an interest in traditional metaphysical problems, which they began exploring by the use of logic and philosophy of language. Among those problems some distinguished ones were: free will, [[essentialism]], the nature of personal identity, identity over time, the nature of the mind, the nature of causal laws, space-time, the properties of material beings, modality, etc. In those universities where analytic philosophy has spread, these problems are still being discussed passionately. Analytic philosophers are also interested in the methodology of analytic philosophy itself, with [[Timothy Williamson]], Wykeham Professor of Logic at Oxford, publishing recently a book entitled ''The Philosophy of Philosophy''. Some influential figures in contemporary analytic philosophy are: Timothy Williamson, [[David Kellogg Lewis|David Lewis]], [[John Searle]], [[Thomas Nagel]], [[Hilary Putnam]], [[Michael Dummett]], [[Peter van Inwagen]] and [[Saul Kripke]]. Analytic philosophy has sometimes been accused of not contributing to the political debate or to traditional questions in aesthetics. However, with the appearance of ''[[A Theory of Justice]]'' by [[John Rawls]] and ''[[Anarchy, State and Utopia]]'' by [[Robert Nozick]], analytic political philosophy acquired respectability. Analytic philosophers have also shown depth in their investigations of aesthetics, with [[Roger Scruton]], [[Nelson Goodman]], [[Arthur Danto]] and others developing the subject to its current shape. 
== See also == == See also ==
-*[[Anti-philosophy]]+ 
-*[[19th century philosophy]]+* [[Analytic philosophy]]
-*[[20th century philosophy]]+* [[Anti-philosophy]]
-*[[Continental philosophy]]+* [[19th century philosophy]]
-*[[Map–territory relation]]+* [[20th century philosophy]]
-*[[General economy]]+* [[Continental philosophy]]
-*[[Desiring-production]]+* [[Deaths of philosophers ]]
-*[[Twentieth-century French philosophy]]+* [[Desiring-production]]
-*[[Theory]]+* [[Embodied philosophy]]
-*[[Western philosophy]]+* [[Epicureanism]]
-*[[Postmodern philosophy]]+* [[General economy]]
-*[[Haecceity]]+* [[Haecceity]]
-*[[Process philosophy]]+* [[Hedonism]]
-*[[Philosophy and literature]]+* [[Kant and Sade: The Ideal Couple]] by [[Zizek]]
-*[[Philosophy and film]]+* [[Lists of philosophers]]
-*[[Embodied philosophy]]+* [[List of philosophy journals]]
-*[[Toilet philosophy]]+* [[Major philosophical traditions]]
-*[[Kant and Sade: The Ideal Couple]] by [[Zizek]]+* [[Map–territory relation]]
-*''[[Philosophy in the Bedroom]]'' by [[Sade]]+* [[Postmodern philosophy]]
 +* [[Process philosophy]]
 +* [[Philosophy and literature]]
 +* [[Philosophy and film]]
 +* [[Political philosophy]]
 +* ''[[Philosophy in the Bedroom]]'' by [[Sade]]
 +* [[Twentieth-century French philosophy]]
 +* [[Theory]]
 +* [[Toilet philosophy]]
 +* [[Social theory]]
 +* [[Sophia]]
 +* [[Transcendentals]]
 +* [[Unsolved problems in philosophy]]
 +* [[Western philosophy]]
 +* ''[[The Philosophers' Football Match]]''
 + 
===By field=== ===By field===
*[[Philosophy of language]] *[[Philosophy of language]]
Line 94: Line 142:
*[[Philosophy of sex]] *[[Philosophy of sex]]
*[[Philosophy of horror]] *[[Philosophy of horror]]
- 
-==See also== 
- 
-* [[Lists of philosophers]] 
-* [[List of philosophy journals]] 
-* [[Unsolved problems in philosophy]] 
-* [[Political philosophy]] 
-* [[Social theory]] 
{{GFDL}} {{GFDL}}

Revision as of 21:07, 21 November 2018

Friedrich Nietzsche (c. 1875)

"(Philosophy is) the yelping hound howling at her lord (poetry) [...] " --Plato, The Republic


"Nothing is more usual than for philosophers to encroach on the province of grammarians, and to engage in disputes of words, while they imagine they are handling controversies of the deepest importance and concern." - David Hume

Plato (left) and Aristotle (right), a detail of The School of Athens, a fresco by Raphael. Aristotle gestures to the earth, representing his belief in knowledge through empirical observation and experience, while holding a copy of his Nicomachean Ethics in his hand. Plato holds his Timaeus and gestures to the heavens, representing his belief in The Forms
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Plato (left) and Aristotle (right), a detail of The School of Athens, a fresco by Raphael. Aristotle gestures to the earth, representing his belief in knowledge through empirical observation and experience, while holding a copy of his Nicomachean Ethics in his hand. Plato holds his Timaeus and gestures to the heavens, representing his belief in The Forms
By virtue of his magnum opus, the posthumous Ethics, Spinoza is considered one of Western philosophy's definitive ethicists.
Enlarge
By virtue of his magnum opus, the posthumous Ethics, Spinoza is considered one of Western philosophy's definitive ethicists.
Thérèse Philosophe (1748) was the bestseller of the French Enlightenment
Enlarge
Thérèse Philosophe (1748) was the bestseller of the French Enlightenment

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Philosophy is the study of general and fundamental problems, such as those connected with reality, existence, knowledge, values, reason, mind, and language. Philosophy is distinguished from other ways of addressing such problems by its critical, generally systematic approach and its reliance on rational argument. In more casual speech, by extension, "philosophy" can refer to the most basic belief system of an individual or group.

The word "philosophy" comes from the Ancient Greek φιλοσοφία (philosophia), which literally means "love of wisdom". The introduction of the terms "philosopher" and "philosophy" has been ascribed to the Greek thinker Pythagoras.

Contents

History

history of philosophy

Many societies have considered philosophical questions and built philosophical traditions based upon each other's works.

Eastern philosophy is organized by the chronological periods of each region. Historians of western philosophy usually divide the subject into three or more periods, the most important being ancient philosophy, medieval philosophy, and modern philosophy.

Areas of inquiry

Philosophy is divided into many sub-fields. These include epistemology, logic, metaphysics, ethics, and aesthetics. Some of the major areas of study are considered individually below.

Epistemology

Epistemology

Epistemology is concerned with the nature and scope of knowledge, such as the relationships between truth, belief, and theories of justification.

Skepticism is the position which questions the possibility of completely justifying any truth. The regress argument, a fundamental problem in epistemology, occurs when, in order to completely prove any statement P, its justification itself needs to be supported by another justification. This chain can do three possible options, all of which are unsatisfactory according to the Münchhausen trilemma. One option is infinitism, where this chain of justification can go on forever. Another option is foundationalism, where the chain of justifications eventually relies on basic beliefs or axioms that are left unproven. The last option, such as in coherentism, is making the chain circular so that a statement is included in its own chain of justification.

Rationalism is the emphasis on reasoning as a source of knowledge. Empiricism is the emphasis on observational evidence via sensory experience over other evidence as the source of knowledge. Rationalism claims that every possible object of knowledge can be deduced from coherent premises without observation. Empiricism claims that at least some knowledge is only a matter of observation. For this, Empiricism often cites the concept of tabula rasa, where individuals are not born with mental content and that knowledge builds from experience or perception. Epistemological solipsism is the idea that the existence of the world outside the mind is an unresolvable question.

Parmenides (fl. 500 BC) argued that it is impossible to doubt that thinking actually occurs. But thinking must have an object, therefore something beyond thinking really exists. Parmenides deduced that what really exists must have certain properties—for example, that it cannot come into existence or cease to exist, that it is a coherent whole, that it remains the same eternally (in fact, exists altogether outside time). This is known as the third man argument. Plato (427–347 BC) combined rationalism with a form of realism. The philosopher's work is to consider being, and the essence (ousia) of things. But the characteristic of essences is that they are universal. The nature of a man, a triangle, a tree, applies to all men, all triangles, all trees. Plato argued that these essences are mind-independent "forms", that humans (but particularly philosophers) can come to know by reason, and by ignoring the distractions of sense-perception.

Modern rationalism begins with Descartes. Reflection on the nature of perceptual experience, as well as scientific discoveries in physiology and optics, led Descartes (and also Locke) to the view that we are directly aware of ideas, rather than objects. This view gave rise to three questions:

  1. Is an idea a true copy of the real thing that it represents? Sensation is not a direct interaction between bodily objects and our sense, but is a physiological process involving representation (for example, an image on the retina). Locke thought that a "secondary quality" such as a sensation of green could in no way resemble the arrangement of particles in matter that go to produce this sensation, although he thought that "primary qualities" such as shape, size, number, were really in objects.
  2. How can physical objects such as chairs and tables, or even physiological processes in the brain, give rise to mental items such as ideas? This is part of what became known as the mind-body problem.
  3. If all the contents of awareness are ideas, how can we know that anything exists apart from ideas?

Descartes tried to address the last problem by reason. He began, echoing Parmenides, with a principle that he thought could not coherently be denied: I think, therefore I am (often given in his original Latin: Cogito ergo sum). From this principle, Descartes went on to construct a complete system of knowledge (which involves proving the existence of God, using, among other means, a version of the ontological argument). His view that reason alone could yield substantial truths about reality strongly influenced those philosophers usually considered modern rationalists (such as Baruch Spinoza, Gottfried Leibniz, and Christian Wolff), while provoking criticism from other philosophers who have retrospectively come to be grouped together as empiricists.

Logic

logic

Logic is the study of the principles of correct reasoning. Arguments use either deductive reasoning or inductive reasoning. Deductive reasoning is when, given certain statements (called premises), other statements (called conclusions) are unavoidably implied. Rules of inferences from premises include the most popular method, modus ponens, where given “A” and “If A then B”, then “B” must be concluded. A common convention for a deductive argument is the syllogism. An argument is termed valid if its conclusion does indeed follow from its premises, whether the premises are true or not, while an argument is sound if its conclusion follows from premises that are true. Propositional logic uses premises that are propositions, which are declarations that are either true or false, while predicate logic uses more complex premises called formulae that contain variables. These can be assigned values or can be quantified as to when they apply with the universal quantifier (always apply) or the existential quantifier (applies at least once). Inductive reasoning makes conclusions or generalizations based on probabilistic reasoning. For example, if “90% of humans are right-handed” and “Joe is human” then “Joe is probably right-handed”. Fields in logic include mathematical logic (formal symbolic logic) and philosophical logic.

Metaphysics

metaphysics

Metaphysics is the study of the most general features of reality, such as existence, time, the relationship between mind and body, objects and their properties, wholes and their parts, events, processes, and causation. Traditional branches of metaphysics include cosmology, the study of the world in its entirety, and ontology, the study of being.

Within metaphysics itself there are a wide range of differing philosophical theories. Idealism, for example, is the belief that reality is mentally constructed or otherwise immaterial while realism holds that reality, or at least some part of it, exists independently of the mind. Subjective idealism describes objects as no more than collections or "bundles" of sense data in the perceiver. The 18th century philosopher George Berkeley contended that existence is fundamentally tied to perception with the phrase Esse est aut percipi aut percipere or "To be is to be perceived or to perceive".

In addition to the aforementioned views, however, there is also an ontological dichotomy within metaphysics between the concepts of particulars and universals as well. Particulars are those objects that are said to exist in space and time, as opposed to abstract objects, such as numbers. Universals are properties held by multiple particulars, such as redness or a gender. The type of existence, if any, of universals and abstract objects is an issue of serious debate within metaphysical philosophy. Realism is the philosophical position that universals do in fact exist, while nominalism is the negation, or denial of universals, abstract objects, or both. Conceptualism holds that universals exist, but only within the mind's perception.

The question of whether or not existence is a predicate has been discussed since the Early Modern period. Essence is the set of attributes that make an object what it fundamentally is and without which it loses its identity. Essence is contrasted with accident: a property that the substance has contingently, without which the substance can still retain its identity.

Moral and political philosophy

moral philosophy, political philosophy

Ethics, or "moral philosophy," is concerned primarily with the question of the best way to live, and secondarily, concerning the question of whether this question can be answered. The main branches of ethics are meta-ethics, normative ethics, and applied ethics. Meta-ethics concerns the nature of ethical thought, such as the origins of the words good and bad, and origins of other comparative words of various ethical systems, whether there are absolute ethical truths, and how such truths could be known. Normative ethics are more concerned with the questions of how one ought to act, and what the right course of action is. This is where most ethical theories are generated. Lastly, applied ethics go beyond theory and step into real world ethical practice, such as questions of whether or not abortion is correct. Ethics is also associated with the idea of morality, and the two are often interchangeable.

One debate that has commanded the attention of ethicists in the modern era has been between consequentialism (actions are to be morally evaluated solely by their consequences) and deontology (actions are to be morally evaluated solely by consideration of agents' duties, the rights of those whom the action concerns, or both). Jeremy Bentham and John Stuart Mill are famous for propagating utilitarianism, which is the idea that the fundamental moral rule is to strive toward the "greatest happiness for the greatest number". However, in promoting this idea they also necessarily promoted the broader doctrine of consequentialism. Adopting a position opposed to consequentialism, Immanuel Kant argued that moral principles were simply products of reason. Kant believed that the incorporation of consequences into moral deliberation was a deep mistake, since it denies the necessity of practical maxims in governing the working of the will. According to Kant, reason requires that we conform our actions to the categorical imperative, which is an absolute duty. An important 20th-century deontologist, W.D. Ross, argued for weaker forms of duties called prima facie duties.

More recent works have emphasized the role of character in ethics, a movement known as the aretaic turn (that is, the turn towards virtues). One strain of this movement followed the work of Bernard Williams. Williams noted that rigid forms of consequentialism and deontology demanded that people behave impartially. This, Williams argued, requires that people abandon their personal projects, and hence their personal integrity, in order to be considered moral. G.E.M. Anscombe, in an influential paper, "Modern Moral Philosophy" (1958), revived virtue ethics as an alternative to what was seen as the entrenched positions of Kantianism and consequentialism. Aretaic perspectives have been inspired in part by research of ancient conceptions of virtue. For example, Aristotle's ethics demands that people follow the Aristotelian mean, or balance between two vices; and Confucian ethics argues that virtue consists largely in striving for harmony with other people. Virtue ethics in general has since gained many adherents, and has been defended by such philosophers as Philippa Foot, Alasdair MacIntyre, and Rosalind Hursthouse.

Political philosophy is the study of government and the relationship of individuals (or families and clans) to communities including the state. It includes questions about justice, law, property, and the rights and obligations of the citizen. Politics and ethics are traditionally inter-linked subjects, as both discuss the question of what is good and how people should live.

From ancient times, and well beyond them, the roots of justification for political authority were inescapably tied to outlooks on human nature. In The Republic, Plato presented the argument that the ideal society would be run by a council of philosopher-kings, since those best at philosophy are best able to realize the good. Even Plato, however, required philosophers to make their way in the world for many years before beginning their rule at the age of fifty. For Aristotle, humans are political animals (i.e. social animals), and governments are set up to pursue good for the community. Aristotle reasoned that, since the state (polis) was the highest form of community, it has the purpose of pursuing the highest good. Aristotle viewed political power as the result of natural inequalities in skill and virtue. Because of these differences, he favored an aristocracy of the able and virtuous. For Aristotle, the person cannot be complete unless he or she lives in a community. His The Nicomachean Ethics and The Politics are meant to be read in that order. The first book addresses virtues (or "excellences") in the person as a citizen; the second addresses the proper form of government to ensure that citizens will be virtuous, and therefore complete. Both books deal with the essential role of justice in civic life.

Nicolas of Cusa rekindled Platonic thought in the early 15th century. He promoted democracy in Medieval Europe, both in his writings and in his organization of the Council of Florence. Unlike Aristotle and the Hobbesian tradition to follow, Cusa saw human beings as equal and divine (that is, made in God's image), so democracy would be the only just form of government. Cusa's views are credited by some as sparking the Italian Renaissance, which gave rise to the notion of "Nation-States".

Later, Niccolò Machiavelli rejected the views of Aristotle and Thomas Aquinas as unrealistic. The ideal sovereign is not the embodiment of the moral virtues; rather the sovereign does whatever is successful and necessary, rather than what is morally praiseworthy. Thomas Hobbes also contested many elements of Aristotle's views. For Hobbes, human nature is essentially anti-social: people are essentially egoistic, and this egoism makes life difficult in the natural state of things. Moreover, Hobbes argued, though people may have natural inequalities, these are trivial, since no particular talents or virtues that people may have will make them safe from harm inflicted by others. For these reasons, Hobbes concluded that the state arises from a common agreement to raise the community out of the state of nature. This can only be done by the establishment of a sovereign, in which (or whom) is vested complete control over the community, and is able to inspire awe and terror in its subjects.

Many in the Enlightenment were unsatisfied with existing doctrines in political philosophy, which seemed to marginalize or neglect the possibility of a democratic state. Jean-Jacques Rousseau was among those who attempted to overturn these doctrines: he responded to Hobbes by claiming that a human is by nature a kind of "noble savage", and that society and social contracts corrupt this nature. Another critic was John Locke. In Second Treatise on Government he agreed with Hobbes that the nation-state was an efficient tool for raising humanity out of a deplorable state, but he argued that the sovereign might become an abominable institution compared to the relatively benign unmodulated state of nature.

Following the doctrine of the fact-value distinction, due in part to the influence of David Hume and his student Adam Smith, appeals to human nature for political justification were weakened. Nevertheless, many political philosophers, especially moral realists, still make use of some essential human nature as a basis for their arguments.

Marxism is derived from the work of Karl Marx and Friedrich Engels. Their idea that capitalism is based on exploitation of workers and causes alienation of people from their human nature, the historical materialism, their view of social classes, etc., have influenced many fields of study, such as sociology, economics, and politics. Marxism inspired the Marxist school of communism, which brought a huge impact on the history of the 20th century.

Aesthetics

aesthetics, moral philosophy, political philosophy

Aesthetics deals with beauty, art, enjoyment, sensory-emotional values, perception, and matters of taste and sentiment.

Specialized branches

Many academic disciplines have also generated philosophical inquiry. These include history, logic, and mathematics.


See also

By field




Unless indicated otherwise, the text in this article is either based on Wikipedia article "Philosophy" or another language Wikipedia page thereof used under the terms of the GNU Free Documentation License; or on research by Jahsonic and friends. See Art and Popular Culture's copyright notice.

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