Briefly: 25 Great Philosophers From Plato to Sartre

Davild Mills Daniel

Description

SCM Briefly 25 Great Philosophers offers a brief guide to the lives, writings and principal philosophical ideas of some of the world’s great philosophers, from Plato to Jean Paul Sartre. Here is a brief and accessible introduction to philosophy and its main proponents. In only five pages, readers get an introduction to the life, the context and the writing of each philosopher. A glossary of philosophical terms is provided at the end of the book

Informations

• Publié par: Hymns Ancient & Modern
• Date de parution: 19 septembre 2013
• Nombre de lectures: 0
• EAN13: 9780334048121
• Langue: English

Extrait

Briefly: 25 Great Philosophers
The SCM Briefly series
Anselm’s Proslogion (with the Replies of Gaunilo and Anselm)
Aquinas’ Summa Theologica Part 1 (God, Part I)
Aquinas’ Summa Theologica Part 2 (God, Part II)
Aristotle’s The Nicomachean Ethics
Ayer’s Language, Truth and Logic
Bentham’s An Introduction to the Principles of Morals and Legislation
Descartes’ Meditations on First Philosophy
Fletcher’s Situation Ethics: The New Morality
Hume’s Dialogues Concerning Natural Religion
Hume’s An Enquiry Concerning Human Understanding
Kant’s Critique of Practical Reason
Kant’s Groundwork of the Metaphysics of Morals
Kant’s Religion within the Boundaries of Mere Reason
Kierkegaard’s Fear and Trembling
Mill’s On Liberty
Mill’s Utilitarianism
Moore’s Principia Ethica
Nietzsche’s Beyond Good and Evil
Plato’s The Republic
Russell’s The Problems of Philosophy
Sartre’s Existentialism and Humanism
Other books by David Mills Daniel published by SCM Press:
SCM AS/A2 Ethics and Moral Philosophy
SCM AS/A2 Revision Guide: Ethics and Religious Ethics
SCM AS/A2 Revision Guide: Philosophy of Religion

© David Mills Daniel 2011
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Contents
Introduction
1 Plato ( c. 429–347 BCE ): The theory of forms, the form of the good and philosopher–rulers; The role of women in government and society
2 Aristotle (384–322 BCE ): The foundations of logical thinking; Virtue ethics, cultivating the moral virtues and eudaimonia
3 Marcus Aurelius (CE 121–80): Living in accordance with nature; Leading a virtuous life
4 Anselm (1033–1109): God as that than which nothing greater can be thought; The ontological argument as a proof of God’s existence
5 Thomas Aquinas (1224/5–74): Arguing from the existence of the world to the existence of God; The natural law approach to ethics
6 Thomas Hobbes (1588–1679): The evils of human beings in a state of nature; The need for the absolute power of the ruler
7 René Descartes (1596–1650): Cartesian or systematic doubt; The rationalist foundation of knowledge
8 John Locke (1632–1704): Government by consent; The tolerant society
9 Baruch de Spinoza (1632–77): Monism; God or nature
10 Gottfried Wilhelm Leibniz (1646–1716): The principle of sufficient reason and other fundamental principles of metaphysics; The best of all possible worlds and theodicy
11 George Berkeley (1685–1753): No such things as abstract ideas; Subjective idealism, the non-existence of an external world and the existence of God
12 Joseph Butler (1692–1752): The reasonableness of religious belief; The nature of human beings and the authority of conscience
13 David Hume (1711–76): Basing knowledge on experience and the limits of human knowledge; The logical gap between ‘is’ and ‘ought’
14 Jean-Jacques Rousseau (1712–78): The social contract and the general will; Interpreting the idea of the general will
15 Immanuel Kant (1724–1804): Deontological ethics and the categorical imperative of morality; Moral freedom and responsibility
16 Thomas Paine (1737–1809): The past cannot bind the present; Democracy, representative government and human rights
17 Jeremy Bentham (1748–1832): Utilitarian ethics: the maximization of happiness; The rights of animals
18 John Stuart Mill (1806–73): The principle of liberty/harm principle and the role of the individual in society; Utilitarian ethics: quantity versus quality of pleasure and the use of secondary principles
19 Søren Kierkegaard (1813–55): Faith and the individual’s relationship with God; Putting God above morality
20 Friedrich Nietzsche (1844–1900): Master and slave moralities; The new philosophers
21 Bertrand Russell (1872–1970): The value of philosophy; Knowledge by acquaintance and description, the inductive principle and the theory of definite descriptions
22 G. E. Moore (1873–1958): The defence of common sense and proof of the external world; The naturalistic fallacy and the open question argument
23 Ludwig Wittgenstein (1889–1951): The picture theory of meaning; Language-games and forms of life
24 Jean-Paul Sartre (1905–80): Consciousness and existence; Bad faith
25 A. J. Ayer (1910–89): The verification principle and the elimination of metaphysics; Ethical emotivism
Glossary of Philosophers and Thinkers
Glossary of Terms
Index
For Jenny and Edmund
Introduction
Readers of this book may already be familiar with the existing books in the Briefly series, which the SCM Press has been publishing since 2006, and which now number 21. The aim of these ‘classic text’ books is to help students and general readers to acquire knowledge and understanding of key texts in philosophy, philosophy of religion, theology and ethics. So, their focus is on a particular piece of writing by a philosopher, ethicist or theologian.
The aim of this book is rather different: to provide an outline of the lives of 25 Great Philosophers from the Western tradition, from Plato to Sartre, and to discuss two of their key ideas, which have contributed to the development of Western thought and society.
How have the philosophers and key ideas been chosen? That is a fair question. Inevitably, any selection involves a subjective element, and not everyone will agree with it. While few students of philosophy would quibble over the inclusion of, for example, Plato, Aristotle, Descartes, Locke, Kant, Hume or Mill, there will be those who would argue that Pascal, Schopenhauer or Hegel should have been included instead of Aquinas, Butler or Paine. And, there is no denying the legitimacy of such preferences. However, it can certainly be claimed that all the philosophers chosen and their ideas have played a significant part in the development of the Western philosophical tradition and/or Western society: although it is certainly not maintained that their impact has been equally significant, or (wholly) beneficial in every case. Further, the ideas selected are central to the philosophical approach of the philosophers concerned.
This book is part of the Briefly series, so it does not provide a full biography of each philosopher, or exhaustive analysis and assessment of his ideas. Each chapter is not more than 2,800 words long, and contains a context section, an outline of the philosopher’s life, discussion of the key ideas, an indication of their impact and some suggestions for further reading, including resources available on the internet. The context section is not intended to give a complete account of all the philosophical ideas associated with a particular philosopher. Its purpose is to outline those aspects of the philosopher’s thinking that shed light on the key ideas, and to put them into context. The impact section gives a brief indication of how the key ideas have influenced the development of Western thought and society.
The book also tries to highlight contrasting approaches to philosophical issues, such as rationalism and empiricism, different and differing treatments of particular issues, such as the nature and role of government, and areas where the thinking of the various philosophers overlaps, or has influenced, or been influenced (one way or another) by the ideas of others, as with Plato and Aristotle, Locke and Berkeley or Bentham and Mill. The book has two glossaries. The Glossary of Philosophers and Thinkers provides brief information about other philosophers and thinkers who are referred to in the text. The Glossary of Terms contains brief definitions of specialist philosophical and other terms used in the book. There is also an index.
This book is not a complete history of Western philosophy. It therefore offers an invitation to those who find its contents thought-provoking and horizon-expanding: please do not stop at what you find here! Philosophy is for everyone, not just the few who study it at university. The Great Philosophers wrote about the big issues of life. Studying their lives and exploring their ideas can help us to answer some of the questions we face today. At least, it can help us to understand the questions more clearly.
So, find out more about these Great Philosophers. Read some of their books. The main texts referred to for each chapter are listed in the suggested reading sections. And, of course, you can use the classic text Brieflys to help you. There are Brieflys available for texts by 15 of the 25 Great Philosophers featured in this book.
Finally, there is a question that may well occur to a number of readers. What about female philosophers? The reason why none appears in this book is not because there are no female philosophers today, but because, in the past, women have not been given the same opportunities as m