Tagged: tradition

May 1, 2018

What is Epicureanism (Brief)?

Introduction Epicureanism is a Hellenistic doctrine that is named after its found: the Ancient Greek philosopher Epicurus. The foundations for Epicureanism were laid out after Epicurus opened his school in his own garden in 307 BC – the school was thus aptly named ‘The Garden’ (or Epicurus’ Garden). At the core of his teachings were a materialist conception of the universe, which were a continuation of the earlier philosopher Democritus and the Atomists. Epicureanism was initial intent was to challenge the dominating Platonism....

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April 23, 2018

What is Pluralism (Ancient)?

Pluralism is a philosophical doctrine that can be attributed to three figures of 5th century BC: Anaxagoras, Archelaus, and Empedocles. All three made attempts to resolve the differences between refutation of change by Parmenides (and the Eleatic School more generally) and the manifest sense perception of the world. Their attempts could be said to have culminated in a project of looking for a singular source of all change. First, Anaxagoras’s point of view was that all matter has existed from...

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April 18, 2018

What is Hedonism (Brief)?

Introduction Hedonism is a philosophical doctrine originating from the Hellenistic period of Ancient Greece. While there are many doctrines that incorporate elements of hedonism, the one constant that they all have in common is the centrality of the pursuit of pleasure. In particular, hedonists agree that human beings should always aim to maximise pleasure. While the Greek philosopher expressed a form of hedonism in the 5th century BC, its earliest explicit proponent was Socrates’s student Aristippus of Cyrene, who...

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April 11, 2018

What is Phenomenology (Brief)?

Introduction Phenomenology is a philosophical approach / method that rose to prominence in the early 20th century, largely developed in Germany by philosophers Edmund Husserl and Martin Heidegger, but also took hold in France by Maurice Jean Jacques Merleau-Ponty. The main premise of phenomenology is that ‘reality’ is perceived and understood through human consciousness and is not independent of it – objects in the world as well as historical and other events are ‘phenomena’ that are observed...

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April 4, 2018

What is Logicism (Brief)?

Logicism was a movement dominant in the early 20th Century. It was advanced by the German mathematician / philosopher Gottlob Frege with a premise that mathematics (and mathematical truths) is but an extension of Logic (and thus logical truths). In other words, Frege thought that mathematics (at least large sections of it) is reducible to logic. That is to say, Frege held that axioms and theorems in mathematics were dependent on Logic and thus logically necessary. For further explanation...

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April 3, 2018

What is Logical Positivism (Brief)?

Logical Positivism or Logical Empiricism was a school of philosophy that became popular in the first half 20th Century. It developed out of Positivism and dominated the early Analytic Philosophy. The core principle of Logical Positivism was to lay logical and scientific foundations to human knowledge. For Logical Positivists, a proposition is only meaningful if and only if it is either formal – that is, based on mathematics and/or logic – or it is possible...

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March 28, 2018

What is Hegelianism?

Hegelianism is a school of philosophy heavily focusing on the works of the German philosopher Georg Wilhelm Friedrich Hegel. Hegelianism was practiced in Germany around Jena, Hegel’s univerisity, in the period directly after Hegel’s death. Hegel’s immediate followers in Germany were divided into two general categories: the Left/Young Hegelians (Bruno Bauer, Ludwig Feuerbach, Karl Marx, Max Stirner, and David Strauss) and the Right/Old Hegelians (Johann Philipp Gabler, Karl Daub, Heinrich Leo, Leopold von Henning, and Heinrich Gustav Hotho). Hegel‘s...