Thomas Hobbes

Julien Offray de La Mettrie Julien Offray de La Mettrie (French: [ɔfʁɛ də la metʁi]; November 23, 1709[1] – November 11, 1751) was a French physician and philosopher, and one of the earliest of the French materialists of the Enlightenment. He is best known for his work L'homme machine (Machine Man).[2] Early life[edit] La Mettrie was born at Saint-Malo in Brittany on November 23, 1709, and was the son of a prosperous textile merchant. His initial schooling took place in the colleges of Coutances and Caen. After attending the Collège du Plessis in Paris, he seemed to have acquired a vocational interest in becoming a clergyman, but after studying theology in the Jansenist schools for some years, his interests turned away from the Church.

Causes, Effects, & Facts The Holocene is unique among geologic epochs because varied means of correlating deposits and establishing chronologies are available. One of the most important means is carbon-14 dating. Because the age determined by the carbon-14 method may be appreciably different from the true age in certain cases, it has been customary to refer to such dates in “radiocarbon years.” Increasingly, however, as calibration data sets have become available, dates in radiocarbon years are being directly converted to calendar years. Marshall Berman Marshall Howard Berman (/ˈbɜːrmən/; November 24, 1940 – September 11, 2013) was an American philosopher and Marxist humanist writer. He was a Distinguished Professor of Political Science at The City College of New York and at the Graduate Center of the City University of New York, teaching political philosophy and urbanism. Life and work[edit] In Adventures in Marxism, Berman tells of how, while a Columbia University student in 1959, the chance discovery of Karl Marx's Economic and Philosophical Manuscripts of 1844 proved a revelation and inspiration, and became the foundation for all his future work.[5] This personal tone pervades his work, linking historical trends with individual observations and inflections from a particular situation. Berman is best known for his book All That Is Solid Melts into Air.

Human society under urgent threat from loss of Earth's natural life Human society is in jeopardy from the accelerating decline of the Earth’s natural life-support systems, the world’s leading scientists have warned, as they announced the results of the most thorough planetary health check ever undertaken. From coral reefs flickering out beneath the oceans to rainforests desiccating into savannahs, nature is being destroyed at a rate tens to hundreds of times higher than the average over the past 10m years, according to the UN global assessment report. The biomass of wild mammals has fallen by 82%, natural ecosystems have lost about half their area and a million species are at risk of extinction – all largely as a result of human actions, said the study, compiled over three years by more than 450 scientists and diplomats. Two in five amphibian species are at risk of extinction, as are one-third of reef-forming corals, and close to one-third of other marine species. Agriculture and fishing are the primary causes of the deterioration.

Erasmus Dutch Renaissance humanist, philosopher, Catholic priest and theologian (1466-1536) Desiderius Erasmus Roterodamus (; English: Erasmus of Rotterdam;[note 1] 28 October 1469 – 12 July 1536) was a Dutch philosopher and Christian scholar who is widely considered to have been one of the greatest scholars of the northern Renaissance.[2][3][4] As a Catholic priest, Erasmus was an important figure in classical scholarship who wrote in a pure Latin style. Among humanists he enjoyed the sobriquet "Prince of the Humanists", and has been called "the crowning glory of the Christian humanists".[5] Using humanist techniques for working on texts, he prepared important new Latin and Greek editions of the New Testament, which raised questions that would be influential in the Protestant Reformation and Catholic Counter-Reformation. Erasmus lived against the backdrop of the growing European religious Reformation. Early life[edit]

Speciesism Speciesism, in applied ethics and the philosophy of animal rights, the practice of treating members of one species as morally more important than members of other species; also, the belief that this practice is justified. The notion has been variously formulated in terms of the interests, rights, and personhood of humans and animals and in terms of the supposed moral relevance of species membership. The term speciesism was introduced by the English philosopher Richard Ryder in the 1970s and subsequently popularized by the Australian philosopher Peter Singer. Ryder, Singer, and other opponents of speciesism have claimed that it is exactly analogous to racism, sexism, and other forms of irrational discrimination and prejudice.

Paul Valéry Ambroise Paul Toussaint Jules Valéry (French: [pɔl valeʁi]; 30 October 1871 – 20 July 1945) was a French poet, essayist, and philosopher. In addition to his poetry and fiction (drama and dialogues), his interests included aphorisms on art, history, letters, music, and current events. Valéry was nominated for the Nobel Prize in Literature in 12 different years.[1] Biography[edit] Valéry was born to a Corsican father and Genoese-Istrian mother in Sète, a town on the Mediterranean coast of the Hérault, but he was raised in Montpellier, a larger urban center close by.

Don't pursue economic growth at expense of environment - report Pursuing economic growth at the expense of the environment is no longer an option as Europe faces “unprecedented” challenges from climate chaos, pollution, biodiversity loss and the overconsumption of natural resources, according to a report from Europe’s environmental watchdog. Europe was reaching the limits of what could be achieved by gradual means, by making efficiencies and small cuts to greenhouse gas emissions, with “transformational” change now necessary to stave off the impacts of global heating and environmental collapse, warned Hans Bruyninckx, executive director of the European Environment Agency. “Marginal efficiency gains are not enough – they are not working to bring down emissions,” he said. “There is also a higher cost to marginal efficiency gains, if we keep investing in that. If we focus on making current technologies more efficient, there are limits. If we stick to what we know, it may seem easy but it doesn’t work in the long term.”

Johann Heinrich Jung Johann Heinrich Jung (12 September 1740, Grund – 2 April 1817, Karlsruhe), better known by his assumed name Heinrich Stilling, was a German author. Life[edit] He was born in the village of Grund (now part of Hilchenbach) in Westphalia. His father, Wilhelm Jung, a schoolmaster and tailor, was the son of Eberhard Jung, charcoal burner, and his mother was Johanna Dorothea née Fischer, the daughter of Moritz Fischer, a poor clergyman and alchemist. Jung became at his father's wish a schoolmaster and tailor. The latest issue of Fukt is all about systems, and how to break them For the last 20 years publication Fukt Magazine has explored contemporary drawing. With a focus on visuals, with a couple of interviews thrown in the mix, the magazine sheds light on emerging artists of the day and significantly, has no ads. As its design and layout changes with each issue depending on the theme, Fukt’s latest issue, The System Issue, communicates its theme through a bespoke cover and a grid-breaking layout. Delving into the innately human desire to create systems, Fukt’s 18th issue explores how artists interpret these systems in their work.

Meister Eckhart Take a short survey and help us improve Wikipedia Thanks for the feedback! We are using it to make Wikipedia even better! Explore Muge’s unique approach to large format photography based on ancient Chinese philosophy Here, he ponders the ancient Chinese philosopher and writer Lao Tze’s “theory of nature,” approaching scenes, objects or places from the perspective of an insider and not as an observer. The pared-back book of large format photographs is separated into three sections; “Ash”, “Shan Shui” and “Scenery”. On one hand, the still life section “presents things in our lives just the way they are,” while “Shan Shui reflects my thoughts towards this reality,” explains Muge.

Karl Robert Eduard von Hartmann von Hartmann's grave in Berlin Karl Robert Eduard von Hartmann (23 February 1842 – 5 June 1906) was a German philosopher, author of Philosophy of the Unconscious (1869). Biography[edit] Philosophy[edit] 4 Reasons our Current Business Model is Unsustainable Sooner or later, there is a tough message that sustainability champions need to deliver to harried business leaders—the business game they are playing can’t continue. It’s been fun, but if they keep playing the game the way they are, everyone will lose. The rules need to be updated— quickly. That contention is probably not the best conversation-opener with a senior business leader.