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Week 01 - Why is philosophy relevant to modernity?

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Philosophy, Modernity and Intellectual History. Immanuel Kant. Immanuel Kant (/kænt/;[1] German: [ɪˈmaːnu̯eːl kant]; 22 April 1724 – 12 February 1804) was a German philosopher who is widely considered to be a central figure of modern philosophy. He argued that fundamental concepts structure human experience, and that reason is the source of morality. His thought continues to have a major influence in contemporary thought, especially the fields of metaphysics, epistemology, ethics, political philosophy, and aesthetics.[2] Kant's major work, the Critique of Pure Reason (Kritik der reinen Vernunft, 1781),[3] aimed to explain the relationship between reason and human experience.

With this project, he hoped to move beyond what he took to be failures of traditional philosophy and metaphysics. Kant argued that our experiences are structured by necessary features of our minds. Kant aimed to resolve disputes between empirical and rationalist approaches. Biography[edit] Young Kant was a solid, albeit unspectacular, student. Young scholar[edit] Early work[edit] 1784 - What is Enlightenment? Wiki. The first page of the 1799 edition. "Answering the Question: What Is Enlightenment? " (German: Beantwortung der Frage: Was ist Aufklärung?) Is a 1784 essay by the philosopher Immanuel Kant. In the December 1784 publication of the Berlinische Monatsschrift (Berlin Monthly), edited by Friedrich Gedike and Johann Erich Biester, Kant replied to the question posed a year earlier by the Reverend Johann Friedrich Zöllner, who was also an official in the Russian government.

Zöllner's question was addressed to a broad intellectual public, in reply to Biester's essay entitled: "Proposal, not to engage the clergy any longer when marriages are conducted" (April 1783) and a number of leading intellectuals replied with essays, of which Kant's is the most famous and has had the most impact. Kant's essay also addressed the causes of a lack of enlightenment and the preconditions necessary to make it possible for people to enlighten themselves. Basic understanding[edit] Kant and religion[edit] Notes. For the next Millennium the digital press will equally change the literary world. In 1971 Michael Hart founded Project Gutenberg, a global coordinated volunteer effort to digitize and distribute the great works of our predecessors. "The Purpose of Project Gutenberg is to encourage the creation and distribution of electronic books. " The Purpose of Project Gutenberg, Gutenberg.org is to encourage the creation and distribution of electronic books.

" To this end the Project Gutenberg Consortia Center, Gutenberg.us is presented to aid in the distribution and exchange of public domain eBook collections [as well as copyrighted works for which we receive permission]. The Project Gutenberg Consortia Center is designed for the collection and redistribution of eBooks that are public domain under the United States copyright laws. A Very Short Introduction. René Descartes.

Descartes laid the foundation for 17th-century continental rationalism, later advocated by Baruch Spinoza and Gottfried Leibniz, and opposed by the empiricist school of thought consisting of Hobbes, Locke, Berkeley, and Hume. Leibniz, Spinoza and Descartes were all well versed in mathematics as well as philosophy, and Descartes and Leibniz contributed greatly to science as well.

His best known philosophical statement is "Cogito ergo sum" (French: Je pense, donc je suis; I think, therefore I am), found in part IV of Discourse on the Method (1637 – written in French but with inclusion of "Cogito ergo sum") and §7 of part I of Principles of Philosophy (1644 – written in Latin). Early life[edit] Descartes was born in La Haye en Touraine (now Descartes), Indre-et-Loire, France. When he was one year old, his mother Jeanne Brochard died. In his book, Discourse On The Method, he says "I entirely abandoned the study of letters. Visions[edit] Work[edit] Descartes lived on Westermarkt 6 (on the left) A Very Short Introduction. John Locke. John Locke FRS (/ˈlɒk/; 29 August 1632 – 28 October 1704), was an English philosopher and physician regarded as one of the most influential of Enlightenment thinkers and known as the "Father of Classical Liberalism".[1][2][3] Considered one of the first of the British empiricists, following the tradition of Sir Francis Bacon, he is equally important to social contract theory.

His work greatly affected the development of epistemology and political philosophy. His writings influenced Voltaire and Rousseau, many Scottish Enlightenment thinkers, as well as the American revolutionaries. His contributions to classical republicanism and liberal theory are reflected in the United States Declaration of Independence.[4] Life and work Locke's father, also called John, was a country lawyer and clerk to the Justices of the Peace in Chew Magna,[6] who had served as a captain of cavalry for the Parliamentarian forces during the early part of the English Civil War.

Influence Constitution of Carolina. A Very Short Introduction. David Hume. A Very Short Introduction. Jean-Jacques Rousseau. Jean-Jacques Rousseau (/ruːˈsoʊ/;[1] French: [ʒɑ̃ʒak ʁuso]; 28 June 1712 – 2 July 1778) was a Genevan philosopher, writer, and composer of the 18th century. His political philosophy influenced the French Revolution as well as the overall development of modern political, sociological, and educational thought. Biography[edit] Youth[edit] Rousseau was born in Geneva, which was at the time a city-state and a Protestant associate of the Swiss Confederacy.

Since 1536, Geneva had been a Huguenot republic and the seat of Calvinism. Rousseau was proud that his family, of the moyen order (or middle-class), had voting rights in the city. Geneva, in theory, was governed democratically by its male voting "citizens". There was much political debate within Geneva, extending down to the tradespeople. The house where Rousseau was born at number 40, Grand-Rue. The trade of watchmaking had become a family tradition by the time of Rousseau's father, Isaac Rousseau. Adulthood[edit] Return to Paris[edit] 1750 - Discourse on the Arts and Sciences. A Discourse on the Moral Effects of the Arts and Sciences (1750), also known as Discourse on the Sciences and Arts (French: Discours sur les sciences et les arts) and commonly referred to as The First Discourse, is an essay by Genevan philosopher Jean-Jacques Rousseau which argued that the arts and sciences corrupt human morality.

It was Rousseau's first successful published philosophical work, and it was the first expression of his influential views about nature vs. society, to which he would dedicate the rest of his intellectual life. This work is considered one of his most important works. Topic of the essay[edit] Rousseau wrote Discourse in response to an advertisement that appeared in a 1749 issue of Mercure de France, in which the Academy of Dijon set a prize for an essay responding to the question: "Has the restoration of the sciences and arts contributed to the purification of morals?

" Rousseau's account about his initial encounter with the question has become well known. A Very Short Introduction.