A Posteriori
that which follows after. "from the latter"
dependent upon experience OR derived from experience
Empiricists - insist that all knowledge is a posteriori, or derived from exp.
ex: all bachelors i know are happy
John Locke
Empiricist
An essay concerning Human Understanding
Of Identity and Diversity, Second Treatise
Tabula Rasa
Tabula Rasa
A blank tablet. According to the empiricist philosopher, John Locke, the mind at birth is a blank tablet and for knowledge to take place, experience must write upon it.
Rene Descartes
Meditations on first philosophy, 2nd, 5th, & 6th
Dualism, Rationalism, "I think, therefore I am"
Innate Ideas
put himself in a stove to think of i think therefore i am
nature of all mankind is nature of thought
all people can think for themselves. If a pe
Dualism
(Latin - duo meaning two)
-Thesis that reality is divided into two fundamental substances or may be understood in terms of two basic forces.
-The position that the mind and body are not identical.
Rationalism
-The philosophy that understands knowledge as being based on reason rather than perception. Rationalists place prime emphasis upon thought and deduction rather than upon experience or induction, and often maintain that truth is a priori or innate.
-The vi
I think, therefore I am" Cogito, ergo sum
One can doubt all things, but it is impossible to doubt that one is thinking because in the very process of doubting, one must be thinking.
According to Descartes, one is a "thinking thing" or res cogitans
Innate Ideas
Inborn truths, or that which we can know to be true because its source is from within rather than without.
Metaphysics
The study of reality or being
one of the basic branches of philosophy. the study of being or reality.
concerned with explaining the fundamental nature of being or existence.
Ontological Argument [thru reasoning alone]
ANSELM
for the existence of god - thesis that if one knows the word God he cannot deny his existence w/out contradiction. God is that being "than which nothing greater can be conceived". The greatest being must be a perfect being, and perfection includes
Ontology
The study of ultimate being or ultimate reality
Philosophy
literally, the love of wisdom. it has been called the most general science.
Historically, philosophy has been the search for truth, goodness, and beauty.
Logic
the tool the philosopher uses or reflects upon to do his work
One of the main branches of philosophical study concerned with developing a way of thinking in accordance with the principles of valid inference; from the Greek word logos.
study of good reason
Positivism
The view that the only legitimate kind of knowledge is scientific and that religious, metaphysical, and ethical modes of understanding are prescientific and devoid of any reality. Positivism is an attempt to understand all of reality in categories of scie
Solipsism
The view "I alone exist," or that the only thing that one can really know is his own existence.
Theism
The view that there is a supreme Being, a personal God.
Transcendent
That which goes beyond, that which is above, or that which is other than.
Existentialism
Contemporary philosophy by which it is held that the individual's act of existence is more basic and real than any formal or abstract philosophical idea or set of ideas.
Epistemology
The study of knowledge
one of the branches
The theory of knowledge
Study of the nature of the scope of knowledge & belief.
Socrates & Plato
Rationalism and Empiricism
Eros
Greek word for love
love in the sense of desire; cupidity
erotic love, love of passion and intensity. Arouses romantic feelings
Empiricism
The school of philosophy that teaches all knowledge comes from or has its base in sense experience.
Determinism
view that all events are determined by preceding causes and that we can never act otherwise than we do.
Indeterminism
The thesis that the will can act independently of physical, psychological, and social factors and thus is free.
Idealism
In metaphysics, the general teachings that mind and spirit and the values thereof are dominant in the universe or are all that is real. In epistemology, the thesis that all that can be known are ideas or mental processes.
Eudaimonia
Happiness"
the basis of all Greek ethics. It means the state of well-being, satisfaction, or happiness.
Realism
In metaphysics, the teaching that universals, abstract ideas, or general terms are in themselves real. Plato held that universals are more real than particular things. In epistemology, the teaching that the world perceived by our senses actually does exis
Teleological
That which is purposeful or has a final goal. A final end or goal is the cause of what happens.
Utilitarianism
The ethical philosophy that defines good as the greatest happiness for the greatest number.
- claims that the morality of an action is determined by how well it promotes "utility", which is defined as
the greatest good for the greatest number
John Stewart
John Stewart Mill
Utilitarianism
On liberty
Socrates
Gadfly" to Athens GADFLY
no written works / no original writings
topic of Plato's works / Plato's teacher
Executed by hemlock - accused of corrupting youth of athens
created Socratic method
Plato
*Socrates' student - used Socratic method
*The Symposium - praising love, eros, philia, agape
*The Republic - The Cave Allegory, philospher-king, guardians
The Apology
*Crito
*Phaedo
Aristotle
Plato's student
Nicomachean Ethics - the ultimate goal everyone seeks is happiness
Tutored Alexander the Great
Anselm
Italian
Appointed Arch Bishop of Canterbury
**Proslogion and Exchange with Gaunilo
**used Ontological Argument to support reasoning of God
Thomas Aquinas
Treatise on God
5 proofs
really liked food and eating. didn't talk much. if he opened his mouth it was usually for eating. he didnt talk so much ppl called him the dumb ox.
His dad wasn't happy with him.wanted his son to become a man of influence and impo
David Hume
**Wrote Dialogues concerning Natural Religion
Scottish
Intensive studies nearly led to breakdown
Augustine
**On free Choice of the Will
**Cosmological and Teleological arguments for the existence of God
Africa
Bishop of Hippo
Paul Henri Thiry (aka Baron d' Holbach)
The system of Human Freedom
Bertrand Russell
**The Value of Philosophy - Author
Wales. Nobel prize winner
married four times and had many extramarital affairs
happy with his second wife, Dora; however, she discovered that he was having an affair with an Oxford student named Marjorie Spencer. Dora al
Immanuel Kant
Critique of poor reason
Groundwork of the Metaphysics of Morals
Prussian Philosopher
Tried to determine the limits and scope of pure reason
quintessential absent-minded professor,
might be distracted by a missing button and forget what he's talking about.
Soren Kierkegaard
Is there a teleological suspension of the ethical?
life was being made easy by mankind's many benefactors.benefactors had contributed all kinds of technical and mechanical wonders. Kierkegaard wondered what he could to benefit mankind. He realized he coul
Friedrich Nietzche
Beyond good and evil
Jean-Paul Sartre
Existentialism is a Humanism
Karl Marx and Friedrich Engels
Manifesto of the Communist Party
Father of Communism
Martin Luther King
Letter from Birmingham Jail
Georg Hegel
German philosopher who developed a dialectical scheme that emphasized the progress of history and of ideas from thesis to antithesis and thence to a synthesis.
Baruch Spinoza
A dutch philosopher
one of the greatest rationalists of 17th century philosophy
opposed descartes mind & body dualism
argued that God exists and is abstract and impersonal.
He contended that everything that exists in Nature is one Reality (substance) and
Ethics
the study of what is good or right
Aesthetics
(under the heading of axiology (or value theory)) - the philosophy of art and beauty
Rationalist
takes as the perfect model for human understanding the mathematical disciplines. To the rationalist, experience may not be the worst teacher, but it is never the best. It is a priori, or before experience. For the rationalist, certain truths can be deduce
Empiricist
would say that one cannot find factual truths by reasoning them out of oneself. They would say that factual truth is a product of experimental inquiry. Truth about this world lies in this world, and one must empirically observe it if one seriously wishes
Thales of Miletus.
The first great philosopher in the Western world
He was a very wise man, and one night while he was walking around reflecting upon the stars, he fell right into a well, from which he had to be assisted by a village maiden. Thales was so devoted to abstrac