1.
History of Western philosophy
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Western philosophy is the philosophical thought and work of the Western world. The word philosophy itself originated from the Hellenic, philosophia, literally, the scope of philosophy in the ancient understanding, and the writings of the ancient philosophers, were all intellectual endeavors. Western Philosophy is generally said to begin in the Greek cities of western Asia Minor with Thales of Miletus and his most noted students were respectively Anaximander and Anaximenes of Miletus. Pythagoras, from the island of Samos off the coast of Ionia, pythagoreans hold that all is number, giving formal accounts in contrast to the previous material of the Ionians. They also believe in metempsychosis, the transmigration of souls, or reincarnation, Socrates The key figure in Greek philosophy is Socrates. Socrates studied under several Sophists but transformed Greek philosophy into a unified, Socrates used a critical approach called the elenchus or Socratic method to examine peoples views. He aimed to study human things, the life, justice, beauty. Although Socrates wrote nothing himself, some of his many disciples wrote down his conversations and he was tried for corrupting the youth and impiety by the Greek democracy. He was found guilty and sentenced to death, although his friends offered to help him escape from prison, he chose to remain in Athens and abide by his principles. His execution consisting in drinking the poison hemlock and he died in 399 B. C, Plato Socrates most important student was Plato. Plato founded the Academy of Athens and wrote a number of dialogues, some central ideas of Platos dialogues are the immortality of the soul, the benefits of being just, that evil is ignorance, and the Theory of Forms. Forms are universal properties that constitute reality and contrast with the changeable material things he called becoming. Aristotle Platos most outstanding student was Aristotle, Aristotle was perhaps the first truly systematic philosopher and scientist. He wrote books on physics, biology, zoology, metaphysics, aesthetics, poetry, theater, music, rhetoric, politics, Aristotelian logic was the first type of logic to attempt to categorize every valid syllogism. Aristotelian philosophy exercised considerable influence on almost all western philosophers, including Greek, Roman, Christian, Jewish, the Neoplatonic and Christian philosophers of Late Antiquity. Early medieval philosophy was influenced by the likes of Stoicism, neo-Platonism, but, above all, the prominent figure of this period was St. Augustinianism was the preferred starting point for most philosophers up until the 13th century. The foundations of many northern European universities were built in the Middle Ages by waves of Irish, Scottish & English monks from the Celtic Church begun by Columba, see Celtic Christianity. Erigena is said to have been stabbed to death by his students with their pens and his theology would today be called pantheistic, in keeping with Celtic resolutions of pagan and Christian philosophy
History of Western philosophy
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Ionia, source of early Greek philosophy, in western
Asia Minor
History of Western philosophy
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Plato –
Kant –
Nietzsche
History of Western philosophy
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David Hume
2.
Western philosophy
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Western philosophy is the philosophical thought and work of the Western world. The word philosophy itself originated from the Hellenic, philosophia, literally, the scope of philosophy in the ancient understanding, and the writings of the ancient philosophers, were all intellectual endeavors. Western Philosophy is generally said to begin in the Greek cities of western Asia Minor with Thales of Miletus and his most noted students were respectively Anaximander and Anaximenes of Miletus. Pythagoras, from the island of Samos off the coast of Ionia, pythagoreans hold that all is number, giving formal accounts in contrast to the previous material of the Ionians. They also believe in metempsychosis, the transmigration of souls, or reincarnation, Socrates The key figure in Greek philosophy is Socrates. Socrates studied under several Sophists but transformed Greek philosophy into a unified, Socrates used a critical approach called the elenchus or Socratic method to examine peoples views. He aimed to study human things, the life, justice, beauty. Although Socrates wrote nothing himself, some of his many disciples wrote down his conversations and he was tried for corrupting the youth and impiety by the Greek democracy. He was found guilty and sentenced to death, although his friends offered to help him escape from prison, he chose to remain in Athens and abide by his principles. His execution consisting in drinking the poison hemlock and he died in 399 B. C, Plato Socrates most important student was Plato. Plato founded the Academy of Athens and wrote a number of dialogues, some central ideas of Platos dialogues are the immortality of the soul, the benefits of being just, that evil is ignorance, and the Theory of Forms. Forms are universal properties that constitute reality and contrast with the changeable material things he called becoming. Aristotle Platos most outstanding student was Aristotle, Aristotle was perhaps the first truly systematic philosopher and scientist. He wrote books on physics, biology, zoology, metaphysics, aesthetics, poetry, theater, music, rhetoric, politics, Aristotelian logic was the first type of logic to attempt to categorize every valid syllogism. Aristotelian philosophy exercised considerable influence on almost all western philosophers, including Greek, Roman, Christian, Jewish, the Neoplatonic and Christian philosophers of Late Antiquity. Early medieval philosophy was influenced by the likes of Stoicism, neo-Platonism, but, above all, the prominent figure of this period was St. Augustinianism was the preferred starting point for most philosophers up until the 13th century. The foundations of many northern European universities were built in the Middle Ages by waves of Irish, Scottish & English monks from the Celtic Church begun by Columba, see Celtic Christianity. Erigena is said to have been stabbed to death by his students with their pens and his theology would today be called pantheistic, in keeping with Celtic resolutions of pagan and Christian philosophy
Western philosophy
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History of
Western philosophy
3.
Pre-Socratic philosophy
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Pre-Socratic philosophy is ancient Greek philosophy before Socrates and schools contemporary to Socrates that were not influenced by him. In Classical antiquity, the Presocratic philosophers were called physiologoi, Aristotle called them physikoi because they sought natural explanations for phenomena, as opposed to the earlier theologoi, whose philosophical basis was supernatural. Diogenes Laërtius divides the physiologoi into two groups, Ionian, led by Anaximander, and the Italiote, led by Pythagoras, hermann Diels popularized the term pre-socratic in Die Fragmente der Vorsokratiker in 1903. However, the term pre-Sokratic was in use as early as George Grotes Plato, edouard Zeller was also important in dividing thought before and after Socrates. Major analyses of pre-Socratic thought have been made by Gregory Vlastos, Jonathan Barnes and it may sometimes be difficult to determine the actual line of argument some Presocratics used in supporting their particular views. While most of them produced significant texts, none of the texts has survived in complete form, all that is available are quotations by later philosophers and historians, and the occasional textual fragment. The Presocratic philosophers rejected traditional mythological explanations of the phenomena they saw them in favor of more rational explanations. These philosophers asked questions about the essence of things, From where does everything come, how do we explain the plurality of things found in nature. How might we describe nature mathematically, others concentrated on defining problems and paradoxes that became the basis for later mathematical, scientific and philosophic study. Later philosophers rejected many of the answers the early Greek philosophers provided, furthermore, the cosmologies proposed by them have been updated by later developments in science. Western philosophy began in ancient Greece in the 6th century BCE, the Presocratics were mostly from the eastern or western fringes of the Greek world. Their efforts were directed to the investigation of the ultimate basis and they sought the material principle of things, and the method of their origin and disappearance. As the first philosophers, they emphasized the unity of things. Only fragments of the writings of the presocratics survive. The knowledge we have of them derives from accounts - known as doxography - of later philosophical writers, the first Presocratic philosophers were from Miletus on the western coast of Anatolia. Thales is reputedly the father of Greek philosophy, he declared water to be the basis of all things, next came Anaximander, the first writer on philosophy. He assumed as the first principle an undefined, unlimited substance without qualities, out of which the primary opposites, hot and cold, moist and dry, became differentiated. His younger contemporary, Anaximenes, took for his air, conceiving it as modified, by thickening and thinning, into fire, wind, clouds, water
Pre-Socratic philosophy
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History of
Western philosophy
4.
Medieval philosophy
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Modern historians consider the medieval era to be one of philosophical development, heavily influenced by Christian theology. However, their theology used the methods and logical techniques of the ancient philosophers to address theological questions. Thomas Aquinas, following Peter Damian, argued that philosophy is the handmaiden of theology, the two principles that underlie all their work are, The use of logic, dialectic, and analysis to discover the truth, known as ratio. Respect for the insights of ancient philosophers, in particular Aristotle, the obligation to co-ordinate the insights of philosophy with theological teaching and revelation. One of the most heavily debated topics of the period was that of faith versus reason, avicenna and Averroes both leaned more on the side of reason. Augustine stated that he would never allow his philosophical investigations to go beyond the authority of God, Anselm attempted to defend against what he saw as partly an assault on faith, with an approach allowing for both faith and reason. The Augustinian solution to the problem is to believe. The boundaries of the medieval period are a matter of controversy. After the collapse of the Roman empire, Western Europe lapsed into the so-called Dark Ages, in later periods, monks were used for training administrators and churchmen. Early Christian thought, in particular in the period, tends to be intuitional and mystical. It also places emphasis on the sometimes-mystical doctrines of Plato. Much of the work of Aristotle was unknown in the West in this period, two Roman philosophers had a great influence on the development of medieval philosophy, Augustine and Boethius. Augustine is regarded as the greatest of the Church Fathers and he is primarily a theologian and a devotional writer, but much of his writing is philosophical. His themes are truth, God, the soul, the meaning of history, the state, sin. For over a thousand years, there was hardly a Latin work of theology or philosophy that did not quote his writing, some of his writing had an influence on the development of early modern philosophy, such as that of Descartes. Anicius Manlius Severinus Boethius was a Christian philosopher born in Rome to an ancient and he became consul in 510 in the kingdom of the Ostrogoths. His influence on the medieval period was also marked. He intended to translate all the works of Aristotle and Plato from the original Greek into Latin, and translated many of Aristotle’s logical works, such as On Interpretation, and he wrote commentaries on these works, and on the Isagoge by Porphyry
Medieval philosophy
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Philosophy seated between the seven
liberal arts – Picture from the
Hortus deliciarum of
Herrad von Landsberg (12th century)
Medieval philosophy
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History of
Western philosophy
Medieval philosophy
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Abbo of Fleury
Medieval philosophy
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Plato, Seneca, and Aristotle from Devotional and Philosophical Writings, c. 1330
5.
Renaissance philosophy
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The designation Renaissance philosophy is used by scholars of intellectual history to refer to the thought of the period running in Europe roughly between 1355 and 1650. Intellectual historians, however, take into considerations factors such as sources, approaches, audience, language and this article reviews both the changes in context and content of Renaissance philosophy and its remarkable continuities with the past. The structure, sources, method, and topics of philosophy in the Renaissance had much in common with those of previous centuries and these areas provided the structure for the philosophy curriculum of the emerging universities. The general assumption was that the most ‘scientific’ branches of philosophy were those that were more theoretical, during the Renaissance too, many thinkers saw these as the main philosophical areas, with logic providing a training of the mind to approach the other three. A similar continuity can be seen in the case of sources, in terms of method, philosophy was considered during the late Middle Ages as a subject that required robust enquiry on the part of people trained in the subject’s technical vocabulary. Philosophical texts and problems were approached through university lectures and ‘questions’. The latter, similar in ways to modern debates, examined the pros. This style of philosophy continued to have a following in the Renaissance. Pico della Mirandola’s Disputations, for instance, depended directly on this tradition, given the remarkable range of Aristotelian philosophy, it was possible to discuss all kinds of issues in medieval and Renaissance philosophy. Indirectly he had stimulated discussion on two points that were particularly of concern to Christians, the immortality of the soul and the eternity of the world. Having established that many aspects of philosophy were held in common during the Middle Ages, I will use the same outline as above, to show that within trends of continuity one can also find surprising differences. It is therefore useful to reconsider what was mentioned above about philosophical sources and it is absolutely true, of course, that Aristotle was to educated Europeans what Shakespeare was to Elizabethan England. But the Renaissance also saw a significant broadening of source material, Petrarch was not able to read Plato directly, but he greatly admired him. Petrarch was also an admirer of Roman poets such as Virgil and Horace. Not all humanists of course followed his example in all things, in the sixteenth century anyone who considered himself ‘au fait’ read Plato as well as Aristotle, trying as much as possible to reconcile the two with each other and with Christianity. This is probably the reason why Donato Acciaiuoli’s commentary on Aristotle’s Ethics was so successful. Other movements from ancient philosophy also re-entered the mainstream, in all of these cases it is impossible to separate the pagan philosophical doctrines from the Christian filter through which they were approached and made legitimate. While generally the Aristotelian structure of the branches of philosophy stayed in place, interesting developments, in moral philosophy, for instance, a position consistently held by Thomas Aquinas and his numerous followers was that its three subfields were related to progressively wider spheres
Renaissance philosophy
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Renaissance
6.
Modern philosophy
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Modern philosophy is philosophy developed in the modern era and associated with modernity. It is not a doctrine or school, although there are certain assumptions common to much of it. The 17th and early 20th centuries roughly mark the beginning and the end of modern philosophy, how much if any of the Renaissance should be included is a matter for dispute, likewise modernity may or may not have ended in the twentieth century and been replaced by postmodernity. How one decides these questions determine the scope of ones use of modern philosophy. The major figures in philosophy of mind, epistemology, and metaphysics during the 17th and 18th centuries are roughly divided into two main groups, the Rationalists, mostly in France and Germany, argued all knowledge must begin from certain innate ideas in the mind. Major rationalists were Descartes, Baruch Spinoza, Gottfried Leibniz, the Empiricists, by contrast, held that knowledge must begin with sensory experience. Other important figures in philosophy include Thomas Hobbes and Jean-Jacques Rousseau. In the late eighteenth century Immanuel Kant set forth a philosophical system which claimed to bring unity to rationalism and empiricism. Whether or not he was right, he did not entirely succeed in ending philosophical dispute, Kant sparked a storm of philosophical work in Germany in the early nineteenth century, beginning with German idealism. Hegels work was carried in many directions by his followers and critics, søren Kierkegaard, in contrast, dismissed all systematic philosophy as an inadequate guide to life and meaning. For Kierkegaard, life is meant to be lived, not a mystery to be solved, arthur Schopenhauer took idealism to the conclusion that the world was nothing but the futile endless interplay of images and desires, and advocated atheism and pessimism. Nietzsche found in this not grounds for pessimism, but the possibility of a new kind of freedom, modern philosophy traditionally begins with René Descartes and his dictum I think, therefore I am. In the early seventeenth century the bulk of philosophy was dominated by Scholasticism, written by theologians and drawing upon Plato, Aristotle, Descartes argued that many predominant Scholastic metaphysical doctrines were meaningless or false. In short, he proposed to begin philosophy from scratch, in his most important work, Meditations on First Philosophy, he attempts just this, over six brief essays. He tries to set aside as much as he possibly can of all his beliefs, to determine what if anything he knows for certain. He finds that he can doubt nearly everything, the reality of physical objects, God, his memories, history, science, even mathematics, but he cannot doubt that he is, in fact, doubting. He knows what he is thinking about, even if it is not true, from this basis he builds his knowledge back up again. He finds that some of the ideas he has could not have originated from him alone and he then demonstrates that God would not allow him to be systematically deceived about everything, in essence, he vindicates ordinary methods of science and reasoning, as fallible but not false
Modern philosophy
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History of
Western philosophy
7.
Contemporary philosophy
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The phrase contemporary philosophy is a piece of technical terminology in philosophy that refers to a specific period in the history of Western philosophy. However, the phrase is often confused with philosophy, postmodern philosophy. No longer will researches usually be embodied in books addressed to anyone who might be interested in the matter of the field. Philosophy underwent this process toward the end of the 19th century, Germany was the first country to professionalize philosophy. At the end of 1817, Hegel was the first philosopher to be appointed professor by the State, namely by the Prussian Minister of Education, in the United States, the professionalisation grew out of reforms to the American higher-education system largely based on the German model. James Campbell describes the professionalisation of philosophy in America as follows, philosopher Michael Sandels book Justice, Whats the Right Thing to Do. Both works became New York Times best sellers, the Association has three divisions - Pacific, Central and Eastern. Each division organises an annual conference. The biggest of these is the Eastern Division Meeting, which attracts around 2,000 philosophers. The Eastern Division Meeting is also the USAs largest recruitment event for philosophy jobs, among its many other tasks, the association is responsible for administering many of the professions top honors. The largest academic organization devoted to furthering the study of continental philosophy is the Society for Phenomenology. Concerning professional journals today, a 2009 survey of professional philosophers asked them to rank the highest quality general philosophy journals in English. The directory is published two years, alternating with its companion volume, the International Directory of Philosophy and Philosophers. Since the start of the 21st century, philosophers have seen the growing utilization of blogs as a means of professional exchange. In bringing attention to the experience of women in the profession, as a result, most of the serious philosophical work on Rand has appeared in non-academic, non-peer-reviewed journals, or in books, and the bibliography reflects this fact. Also working from outside the profession were philosophers such as Gerd B, achenbach and Michel Weber who have proposed since the 1980s various forms of philosophical counseling claiming to bring Socratic dialogues back to life in a quasi-psychotherapeutic framework. Contemporary continental philosophy began with the work of Franz Brentano, Edmund Husserl, Adolf Reinach, and Martin Heidegger and this development was roughly contemporaneous with work by Gottlob Frege and Bertrand Russell inaugurating a new philosophical method based on the analysis of language via modern logic. Analytic philosophy dominates in the United Kingdom, Canada, Australia, Scandinavia, the Netherlands, Germany, Austria, Continental philosophy prevails in France, Italy, Spain, and parts of the United States
Contemporary philosophy
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Existentialism is an important school in the continental philosophical tradition. Four key existentialists pictured from top-left clockwise:
Kierkegaard,
Nietzsche,
Kafka,
Dostoevsky
Contemporary philosophy
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History of
Western philosophy
8.
17th-century philosophy
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17th-century philosophy in the Western world is generally regarded as being the start of modern philosophy, and a departure from the medieval approach, especially Scholasticism. Early 17th-century philosophy is called the Age of Reason or Age of Rationalism and is considered to succeed the Renaissance philosophy era. In the West, 17th-century philosophy is taken to start with the work of René Descartes. The three main rationalists are normally taken to have been René Descartes, Baruch Spinoza, and Gottfried Leibniz, building upon their English predecessor Francis Bacon, the two main empiricists of the 17th-century were Thomas Hobbes and John Locke. Thus the rationalists took mathematics as their model for knowledge, and this emphasis on epistemology is at the root of Kants distinction, looking at the various philosophers in terms of their metaphysical, moral, or linguistic theories, they divide up very differently. This period also saw the birth of some of the classics of political thought, especially Thomas Hobbes Leviathan, and John Lockes Two Treatises of Government
17th-century philosophy
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History of
Western philosophy
9.
Age of Enlightenment
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The Enlightenment was an intellectual movement which dominated the world of ideas in Europe during the 18th century, The Century of Philosophy. In France, the doctrines of les Lumières were individual liberty and religious tolerance in opposition to an absolute monarchy. French historians traditionally place the Enlightenment between 1715, the year that Louis XIV died, and 1789, the beginning of the French Revolution, some recent historians begin the period in the 1620s, with the start of the scientific revolution. Les philosophes of the widely circulated their ideas through meetings at scientific academies, Masonic lodges, literary salons, coffee houses. The ideas of the Enlightenment undermined the authority of the monarchy and the Church, a variety of 19th-century movements, including liberalism and neo-classicism, trace their intellectual heritage back to the Enlightenment. The Age of Enlightenment was preceded by and closely associated with the scientific revolution, earlier philosophers whose work influenced the Enlightenment included Francis Bacon, René Descartes, John Locke, and Baruch Spinoza. The major figures of the Enlightenment included Cesare Beccaria, Voltaire, Denis Diderot, Jean-Jacques Rousseau, David Hume, Adam Smith, Benjamin Franklin visited Europe repeatedly and contributed actively to the scientific and political debates there and brought the newest ideas back to Philadelphia. Thomas Jefferson closely followed European ideas and later incorporated some of the ideals of the Enlightenment into the Declaration of Independence, others like James Madison incorporated them into the Constitution in 1787. The most influential publication of the Enlightenment was the Encyclopédie, the ideas of the Enlightenment played a major role in inspiring the French Revolution, which began in 1789. After the Revolution, the Enlightenment was followed by an intellectual movement known as Romanticism. René Descartes rationalist philosophy laid the foundation for enlightenment thinking and his attempt to construct the sciences on a secure metaphysical foundation was not as successful as his method of doubt applied in philosophic areas leading to a dualistic doctrine of mind and matter. His skepticism was refined by John Lockes 1690 Essay Concerning Human Understanding and his dualism was challenged by Spinozas uncompromising assertion of the unity of matter in his Tractatus and Ethics. Both lines of thought were opposed by a conservative Counter-Enlightenment. In the mid-18th century, Paris became the center of an explosion of philosophic and scientific activity challenging traditional doctrines, the political philosopher Montesquieu introduced the idea of a separation of powers in a government, a concept which was enthusiastically adopted by the authors of the United States Constitution. Francis Hutcheson, a philosopher, described the utilitarian and consequentialist principle that virtue is that which provides, in his words. Much of what is incorporated in the method and some modern attitudes towards the relationship between science and religion were developed by his protégés David Hume and Adam Smith. Hume became a figure in the skeptical philosophical and empiricist traditions of philosophy. Immanuel Kant tried to reconcile rationalism and religious belief, individual freedom and political authority, as well as map out a view of the sphere through private
Age of Enlightenment
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German philosopher
Immanuel Kant
Age of Enlightenment
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History of
Western philosophy
Age of Enlightenment
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Cesare Beccaria, father of classical criminal theory (1738–1794)
Age of Enlightenment
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Like other Enlightenment philosophers,
Rousseau was critical of the
Atlantic slave trade.
10.
19th-century philosophy
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Pressures for egalitarianism, and more rapid change culminated in a period of revolution and turbulence that would see philosophy change as well. With the tumultuous years of 1789–1815, European culture was transformed by revolution, war, by ending many of the social and cultural props of the previous century, the stage was set for dramatic economic and political change. European philosophy reflected on, participated in, and drove, many of these changes, Immanuel Kant is a name that most would mention as being among the most important of influences, as is Jean-Jacques Rousseau. While both of these philosophers were products of the 18th century and its assumptions, they pressed at the boundaries. In trying to explain the nature of the state and government, Rousseau would challenge the basis of government with his declaration that Man is born free, but is everywhere in chains. Kant, while attempting to preserve axiomic skepticism, was forced to argue that we do not see true reality, all we know of reality is appearances. Since all we can see of reality is appearances, which are subject to certain necessary and subjective forms of perceptions, Hegels distinction between the unknowable and the circumstantially unknown can be seen as the beginnings of Hegels rational system of the universe. Yet another philosopher of the late Enlightenment that was influential in the 19th century was Pierre-Simon Laplace and this is by no means an exhaustive list of all 19th-century philosophy. One of the first philosophers to attempt to grapple with Kants philosophy was Johann Gottlieb Fichte, in Wissenschaftslehre, Fichte argues that the self posits itself and is a self-producing and changing process. But it was another of Fichtes students, and former roommate of Schelling and his work revealed the increasing importance of historical thinking in German thought. Arthur Schopenhauer, rejecting Hegel and also materialism, called for a return to Kantian transcendentalism, at the same time adopting atheism and determinism, amongst others. His secular thought became popular in Europe in the second half of the 19th century. This trend of thought survived into the beginning of the century, influencing 20th century philosophical movements such as Neopositivism. One of the most famous opponents of idealism in the first half of the German 19th century was Ludwig Feuerbach, in early 19th century Britain, Jeremy Bentham and John Stuart Mill promoted the idea that actions are right as they maximize happiness, and happiness alone. Marx analysed history itself as the progression of dialectics in the form of class struggle, from this it is argued that the history of all hitherto existing society is the history of class struggles. Marxism had a influence on the history of the 20th Century. Existentialism as a movement is properly a 20th-century movement, but its major antecedents, Søren Kierkegaard. In the 1840s, academic philosophy in Europe, following Hegel, was almost completely divorced from the concerns of human life
19th-century philosophy
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History of
Western philosophy
11.
20th-century philosophy
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20th-century philosophy saw the development of a number of new philosophical schools— including logical positivism, analytic philosophy, phenomenology, existentialism, and poststructuralism. In terms of the eras of philosophy, it is labelled as contemporary philosophy. However, there have been disputes regarding both the terminology and the reasons behind the divide, as well as philosophers who see themselves as bridging the divide, in addition, philosophy in the twentieth century became increasingly technical and harder for lay people to read. Analytic philosophy is a term for a style of philosophy that came to dominate English-speaking countries in the 20th century. In the United States, United Kingdom, Canada, Scandinavia, Australia, and New Zealand, epistemology in the Anglo-American tradition was radically shaken up by the publication of Edmund Gettiers 1963 paper Is Justified True Belief Knowledge. This paper provided counter-examples to the formulation of knowledge going back to Plato. Neopragmatism, sometimes called linguistic pragmatism is a recent philosophical term for philosophy that reintroduces many concepts from pragmatism. V. O and it repudiates the notion of universal truth, epistemological foundationalism, representationalism, and the notion of epistemic objectivity. It is a nominalist approach that denies that natural kinds and linguistic entities have substantive ontological implications and this approach typically involves eschewing philosophical theories in favour of close attention to the details of the use of everyday, ordinary language. The later Ludwig Wittgenstein is ordinary language philosophys most celebrated proponent outside the Oxford circle, second generation figures include Stanley Cavell and John Searle. Continental philosophy, in usage, refers to a set of traditions of 19th and 20th century philosophy from mainland Europe. This sense of the term originated among English-speaking philosophers in the half of the 20th century. Existentialism is generally considered a philosophical and cultural movement that holds that the point of philosophical thinking must be the individual. Common themes are the primacy of experience, Angst, the absurd, while György Lukácss History and Class Consciousness and Karl Korschs Marxism and Philosophy, first published in 1923, are often seen as the works that inaugurated this current. Maurice Merleau-Ponty coined the phrase Western Marxism much later, phenomenology is the study of the phenomena of experience. It is a philosophical movement founded in the early years of the 20th century by Edmund Husserl. Phenomenology, in Husserls conception, is concerned with the systematic reflection on, and study of, the structures of consciousness. This phenomenological ontology can be differentiated from the Cartesian method of analysis, which sees the world as objects, sets of objects. Post-structuralism is a label formulated by American academics to denote the heterogeneous works of a series of French intellectuals who came to prominence in the 1960s and 70s
20th-century philosophy
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History of
Western philosophy
12.
Buddhist philosophy
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Indian Buddhists sought this understanding not just from the revealed teachings of the Buddha, but through philosophical analysis and rational deliberation. Buddhist thinkers in India and subsequently in East Asia have covered topics as varied as phenomenology, ethics, ontology, epistemology, logic, a recurrent theme in Buddhist philosophy has been the reification of concepts, and the subsequent return to the Buddhist Middle Way. Particular points of Buddhist philosophy have often been the subject of disputes between different schools of Buddhism and these elaborations and disputes gave rise to various schools in early Buddhism of Abhidharma, and to the Mahayana traditions and schools of the prajnaparamita, Madhyamaka, Buddha-nature and Yogacara. Philosophy in India was aimed mainly at spiritual liberation and had soteriological goals, virtually all the great philosophical systems of India, Sāṅkhya, Advaitavedānta, Mādhyamaka and so forth, were preeminently concerned with providing a means to liberation or salvation. It was a tacit assumption with these systems that if their philosophy were correctly understood and assimilated, the goal of Buddhist philosophy is nirvana and to achieve this it needs to investigate the nature of the world. For the Indian Buddhist philosophers, the teachings of the Buddha were not meant to be taken on faith alone, the Buddha also expect his disciples to approach him as a teacher in a critical fashion and scrutinize his actions and words, as shown in the Vīmaṃsaka Sutta. The Buddha was a north Indian sramana from Magadha and he cultivated various yogic techniques and ascetic practices and taught throughout north India, where his teachings took hold. These teachings are preserved in the Pali Nikayas and in the Agamas as well as in other surviving fragmentary textual collections, dating these texts is difficult and there is disagreement on how much of this material goes back to a single religious founder. The Buddha defined his teaching as the middle way, in the Dhammacakkappavattana Sutta, this is used to refer to the fact that his teachings steer a middle course between the extremes of asceticism and bodily denial and sensual hedonism or indulgence. Many sramanas of the Buddhas time placed much emphasis on a denial of the body, using such as fasting. The Buddha however, realized that the mind was embodied and causally dependent on the body, according to Vetter, the description of the Buddhist path may initially have been as simple as the term the middle way. In time, this description was elaborated, resulting in the description of the eightfold path. Vetter argues that the eightfold path constitutes a body of practices which prepare one, and lead up to, according to Vetter and Bronkhorst, dhyāna constituted the original liberating practice, while discriminating insight into transiency as a separate path to liberation was a later development. According to Bronkhorst, the four truths may not have been formulated in earliest Buddhism, Lambert Schmithausen concluded that the four truths were a later development in early Buddhism. Carol Anderson, following Lambert Schmithausen and K. R, norman, notes that the four truths are missing in critical passages in the canon, and states. According to some scholars, the outlook of earliest Buddhism was primarily negative. Only knowledge that is useful in achieving enlightenment is valued, the four noble truths or truths of the noble one are a central feature of the teachings and are put forth in the Dhammacakkappavattana Sutta. The first truth of Dukkha, often translated as suffering, is the inherent unsatisfactoriness of life
Buddhist philosophy
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Gautama Buddha surrounded by followers, from an 18th century Burmese watercolour
13.
Islamic philosophy
–
Islamic philosophy is the systematic investigation of problems connected with life, the universe, ethics, society, and so on as conducted in the Muslim world. Early Islamic philosophy began in the 2nd century AH of the Islamic calendar and this period began with al-Kindi in the 9th century and ended with Averroes at the end of 12th century. Ibn Khaldun, in his Muqaddimah, made important contributions to the philosophy of history, Interest in Islamic philosophy revived during the Nahda movement in the late 19th and early 20th centuries, and continues to the present day. By way of introduction Islamic philosophy refers to philosophy produced in an Islamic society, Islamic philosophy is a generic term that can be defined and used in different ways. In its broadest sense it means the view of Islam, as derived from the Islamic texts concerning the creation of the universe. In another sense it refers to any of the schools of thought flourished under the Islamic empire or in the shadow of the Arab-Islamic culture. It is not necessarily concerned with issues, nor exclusively produced by Muslims. Nor do all schools of thought within Islam admit the usefulness or legitimacy of philosophical inquiry, some argue that there is no indication that the limited knowledge and experience of humans can lead to truth. It is also important to observe that, while reason is sometimes recognised as a source of Islamic law, Islamic philosophy is a generic term that can be defined and used in different ways. In its broadest sense it means the view of Islam, as derived from the Islamic texts concerning the creation of the universe. In another sense it refers to any of the schools of thought flourished under the Islamic empire or in the shadow of the Arab-Islamic culture. The historiography of Islamic philosophy is marked by disputes as to how the subject should be properly interpreted, Islamic philosophy as the name implies refers to philosophical activity within the Islamic milieu. Many of the philosophical debates centered around reconciling religion and reason. Some Muslims oppose the idea of philosophy as un-Islamic, but the fact of the matter is that philosophy is an alien entity in the body of Islam. Ibn Abi al-Izz, a commentator on al-Tahhaawiyyah, condemns philosophers as the ones who most deny the Last Day, in their view Paradise and Hell are no more than parables for the masses to understand, but they have no reality beyond people’s minds. In early Islamic thought, which refers to philosophy during the Islamic Golden Age, the first is Kalam, which mainly dealt with Islamic theological questions, and the other is Falsafa, which was founded on interpretations of Aristotelianism and Neoplatonism. In Arabic, the word literally means speech, one of first debates was that between partisans of the Qadar, who affirmed free will, and the Jabarites, who believed in fatalism. At the 2nd century of the Hijra, a new movement arose in the school of Basra
Islamic philosophy
–
An Arabic manuscript from the 13th century depicting
Socrates (Soqrāt) in discussion with his pupils
Islamic philosophy
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Allama Muhammad Iqbal (1877-1938), Muslim philosopher, poet and scholar from Pakistan (then
British India).
14.
Jewish philosophy
–
Jewish philosophy includes all philosophy carried out by Jews, or in relation to the religion of Judaism. With their acceptance into society, Jews with secular educations embraced or developed entirely new philosophies to meet the demands of the world in which they now found themselves. Medieval re-discovery of ancient Greek philosophy among the Geonim of 10th century Babylonian academies brought rationalist philosophy into Biblical-Talmudic Judaism, the philosophy was generally in competition with Kabbalah. Both schools would become part of classic Rabbinic literature, though the decline of scholastic rationalism coincided with events which drew Jews to the Kabbalistic approach. For Ashkenazi Jews, emancipation and encounter with secular thought from the 18th-century onwards altered how philosophy was viewed, Ashkenazi and Sephardi communities had later more ambivalent interaction with secular culture than in Western Europe. In the varied responses to modernity, Jewish philosophical ideas were developed across the range of emerging religious movements, Rabbinic literature sometimes views Abraham as a philosopher. Some have suggested that Abraham introduced a philosophy learned from Melchizedek, a midrash describes how Abraham understood this world to have a creator and director by comparing this world to a house with a light in it, what is now called the argument from design. Psalms contains invitations to admire the wisdom of God through his works, from this, some scholars suggest, Judaism harbors a Philosophical under-current. Ecclesiastes is often considered to be the only genuine philosophical work in the Hebrew Bible, its author seeks to understand the place of human beings in the world, Philo attempted to fuse and harmonize Greek and Jewish philosophy through allegory, which he learned from Jewish exegesis and Stoicism. Philo attempted to make his philosophy the means of defending and justifying Jewish religious truths and these truths he regarded as fixed and determinate, and philosophy was used as an aid to truth, and a means of arriving at it. To this end Philo chose from philosophical tenets of Greeks, refusing those that did not harmonize with Judaism such as Aristotles doctrine of the eternity and indestructibility of the world. Dr. Philosophical speculation was not a part of Rabbinic Judaism. Rabbi Akiva has also been viewed as a figure, his statements include 1. )How favored is man, for he was created after an image for in an image, Elokim made man,2. )Everything is foreseen. But the divine decision is made by the preponderance of the good or bad in ones actions, after the Bar Kokhba revolt, Rabbinic scholars gathered in Tiberias and Safed to re-assemble and re-assess Judaism, its laws, theology, liturgy, beliefs and leadership structure. In 219 CE, the Sura Academy was founded by Abba Arika, for the next five centuries, Talmudic academies focused upon reconstituting Judaism and little, if any, philosophic investigation was pursued. These investigations triggered new ideas and intellectual exchange among Jewish and Islamic scholars in the areas of jurisprudence, mathematics, astronomy, logic, Jewish scholars influenced Islamic scholars and Islamic scholars influenced Jewish scholars. Around 733 CE, Mar Natronai ben Habibai moves to Kairouan, then to Spain, borrowing from the Mutakallamin of Basra, the Karaites were the first Jewish group to subject Judaism to Muʿtazila. Rejecting the Talmud and Rabbinical tradition, Karaites took liberty to reinterpret the Tanakh and this meant abandoning foundational Jewish belief structures
Jewish philosophy
–
Philo
Jewish philosophy
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Artist's depiction, sculpture of
Maimonides
Jewish philosophy
–
Isaac Abrabanel
15.
Eastern philosophy
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This is because in Asia there is no single unified philosophical tradition with a single root. Some Western thinkers claim that philosophy as such is only characteristic of Western cultures, martin Heidegger is even reported to have said that only Greek and German languages are suitable for philosophizing. It is still commonplace in Western universities to teach only Western philosophy and to ignore Asian philosophy altogether, Hinduism is the dominant religion, or way of life, in South Asia. It includes Shaivism, Vaishnavism and Shaktism among numerous other traditions, and a spectrum of laws and prescriptions of daily morality based on karma, dharma. Hinduism is a categorisation of distinct intellectual or philosophical points of view, rather than a rigid, Hinduism, with about one billion followers is the worlds third largest religion, after Christianity and Islam. Hinduism has been called the oldest religion in the world, and some refer to it as Sanātana Dharma. Western scholars regard Hinduism as a fusion or synthesis of various Indian cultures and traditions, with diverse roots and it prescribes the eternal duties, such as honesty, refraining from injuring living beings, patience, forbearance, self-restraint, compassion, among others. Nevertheless, the schools are in many ways related. The āstika schools are, Samkhya, an atheistic and strongly dualist theoretical exposition of consciousness, Yoga, a school emphasising meditation, contemplation and liberation. Nyaya or logic, explores sources of knowledge, vaisheshika, an empiricist school of atomism Mīmāṃsā, an anti-ascetic and anti-mysticist school of orthopraxy Vedānta, the last segment of knowledge in the Vedas, or the Jnan Kanda. Vedanta came to be the dominant current of Hinduism in the post-medieval period, in Hindu history, the distinction of the six orthodox schools was current in the Gupta period golden age of Hinduism. Nyaya survived into the 17th century as Navya Nyaya Neo-Nyaya, while Samkhya gradually lost its status as an independent school, its tenets absorbed into Yoga, Jain philosophy deals extensively with the problems of metaphysics, reality, cosmology, ontology, epistemology and divinity. Jainism is essentially a religion of ancient India. It continues the ancient Śramaṇa tradition, which co-existed with the Vedic tradition since ancient times, Jain philosophy attempts to explain the rationale of being and existence, the nature of the Universe and its constituents, the nature of bondage and the means to achieve liberation. It has often described as an ascetic movement for its strong emphasis on self-control, austerities. Jainism strongly upholds the individualistic nature of soul and personal responsibility for decisions. Throughout its history, the Jain philosophy remained unified and single, although as a religion, Jainism was divided into various sects, the contribution of Jain philosophy in developing the Indian philosophy has been significant. Jain philosophical concepts like Ahimsa, Karma, Moksa, Samsara, Buddhism is a system of religious beliefs based on the teachings of Siddhartha Gautama
Eastern philosophy
–
Plato –
Kant –
Nietzsche
16.
Chinese philosophy
–
Early Shang Dynasty thought was based upon cycles. Thus, this notion, which remained relevant throughout Chinese history, in juxtaposition, it also marks a fundamental distinction from western philosophy, in which the dominant view of time is a linear progression. During the Shang, fate could be manipulated by great deities, ancestor worship was present and universally recognized. There was also human and animal sacrifice, when the Shang were overthrown by the Zhou, a new political, religious and philosophical concept was introduced called the Mandate of Heaven. This mandate was said to be taken when rulers became unworthy of their position, Confucianism developed during the Spring and Autumn period from the teachings of the Chinese philosopher Confucius, who considered himself a retransmitter of Zhou values. His philosophy concerns the fields of ethics and politics, emphasizing personal and governmental morality, correctness of social relationships, justice, traditionalism, Confucianism was and continues to be a major influence in Chinese culture, the state of China and the surrounding areas of Southeast Asia. Before the Han dynasty the largest rivals to Confucianism were Chinese Legalism, Confucianism largely became the dominant philosophical school of China during the early Han Dynasty following the replacement of its contemporary, the more Taoistic Huang-Lao. The Six Dynasties era saw the rise of the Xuanxue philosophical school and the maturation of Chinese Buddhism, by the time of the Tang dynasty five-hundred years after Buddhisms arrival into China, it had transformed into a thoroughly Chinese religious philosophy dominated by the school of Zen Buddhism. Neo-Confucianism became highly popular during the Song dynasty and Ming Dynasty due in part to the eventual combination of Confucian. During the 19th and 20th centuries, Chinese philosophy integrated concepts from Western philosophy, the most notable examples are Sun Yat-Sens Three Principles of the People ideology and Mao Zedongs Maoism, a variant of Marxism–Leninism. In the modern Peoples Republic of China, the ideology is Deng Xiaopings market economy socialism. Although the Peoples Republic of China has been hostile to the philosophy of ancient China. In the post-Chinese economic reform era, modern Chinese philosophy has reappeared in forms such as the New Confucianism, as in Japan, philosophy in China has become a melting pot of ideas. It accepts new concepts, while attempting also to accord old beliefs their due, Chinese philosophy still carries profound influence amongst the people of East Asia, and even Southeast Asia. Around 500 BCE, after the Zhou state weakened and China moved into the Spring and Autumn period and this is known as the Hundred Schools of Thought. This period is considered the age of Chinese philosophy. Of the many schools founded at this time and during the subsequent Warring States period and it is a system of moral, social, political, and religious thought that has had tremendous influence on Chinese history, thought, and culture down to the 20th century. Some Westerners have considered it to have been the religion of imperial China because of its lasting influence on Asian culture
Chinese philosophy
–
Yin and Yang symbol with the
bagua symbols paved in a clearing outside of Nanning City,
Guangxi province,
China.
Chinese philosophy
–
Kong Fuzi (
Latin:
Confucius)
Chinese philosophy
–
Chinese
glazed stoneware statue of a
Daoist deity, from the
Ming Dynasty, 16th century.
Chinese philosophy
–
The
Sakyamuni Buddha, by artist Zhang Shengwen, 1173-1176 CE,
Song dynasty.
17.
Indian philosophy
–
Indian philosophy comprises the ancient philosophical traditions of the Indian subcontinent. There are six schools of orthodox Hindu philosophy—Nyaya, Vaisheshika, Samkhya, Yoga, Mīmāṃsā and Vedanta. However, there are methods of classification, Vidyaranya for instance identifies sixteen schools of Indian philosophy by including those that belong to the Śaiva. The main schools of Indian philosophy were formalised chiefly between 1000 BCE to the centuries of the Common Era. Competition and integration between the schools was intense during their formative years, especially between 800 BCE and 200 CE. Some schools like Jainism, Buddhism, Yoga, Śaiva and Advaita Vedanta survived, ancient and medieval era texts of Indian philosophies include extensive discussions on Ontology, reliable means of knowledge, value system and other topics. They differ in their assumptions about the nature of existence as well as the specifics of the path to the ultimate liberation and their ancient doctrines span the diverse range of philosophies found in other ancient cultures. These are often coupled into three groups for both historical and conceptual reasons, Nyaya-Vaishesika, Samkhya-Yoga, and Mimamsa-Vedanta. The Vedanta school is divided into six sub-schools, Advaita, also includes the concept of Ajativada, Visishtadvaita, Dvaita, Dvaitadvaita, Suddhadvaita. This orthodox-heterodox terminology is a construct of Western languages, and lacks scholarly roots in Sanskrit, Cārvāka is a materialistic and atheistic school of thought and, is noteworthy as evidence of a materialistic movement within Hinduism. Several Śramaṇic movements have existed before the 6th century BCE, notable philosophies that arose from Śramaṇic movement were Jainism, early Buddhism, Cārvāka, Ajñana and Ājīvika. Jainism, like Buddhism, is a religion and rejected the authority of the Vedas. However, like all Indian religions, it shares the core such as karma, ethical living, rebirth, samsara. Jainism places strong emphasis on asceticism and ahimsa as a means of spiritual liberation, Buddhist philosophy is a system of thought which started with the teachings of Siddhartha Gautama, the Buddha, or awakened one. Buddhism and Hinduism mutually influenced each other and shared concepts, states Paul Williams, however it is now difficult to identify. The influence of 3rd-century CE Buddhist Tathagatagarbha Sutras on the Advaita Vedanta Hindu scholar Gaudapada – a major school of thought within Hinduism, is clear, Buddhism rejected the Vedic concepts of Brahman and Atman at the foundation of Hindu philosophies. A major departure from Hindu and Jain philosophy is the Buddhist rejection of a soul in favour of anatta. The philosophy of Ājīvika was founded by Makkhali Gosala, it was a Śramaṇa movement, Ājīvikas were organised renunciates who formed discrete monastic communities prone to an ascetic and simple lifestyle
Indian philosophy
–
Plato –
Kant –
Nietzsche
18.
Iranian philosophy
–
According to the Oxford Dictionary of Philosophy, the chronology of the subject and science of philosophy starts with the Indo-Iranians, dating this event to 1500 BC. The Oxford dictionary also states, Zarathushtras philosophy entered to influence Western tradition through Judaism, Iranian philosophy after Arab invasion of Persia, is characterized by different interactions with the Old Iranian philosophy, the Greek philosophy and with the development of Islamic philosophy. The Illumination School and the Transcendent Philosophy are regarded as two of the philosophical traditions of that era in Persia. See also Ancient Iranian Philosophy The teachings of Zarathustra appeared in Persia at some point during the period 1700-1800 BCE and his wisdom became the basis of the religion Zoroastrianism, and generally influenced the development of the Iranian branch of Indo-Iranian philosophy. Zarathustra was the first who treated the problem of evil in philosophical terms and he is also believed to be one of the oldest monotheists in the history of religion. He espoused an ethical philosophy based on the primacy of good thoughts, good words, the works of Zoroaster and Zoroastrianism had a significant influence on Greek philosophy and Roman philosophy. Several ancient Greek writers such as Eudoxus of Cnidus and Latin writers such as Pliny the Elder praised Zoroastrian philosophy as the most famous, plato learnt of Zoroastrian philosophy through Eudoxus and incorporated much of it into his own Platonic realism. In the 3rd century BC, however, Colotes accused Platos The Republic of plagiarizing parts of Zoroasters On Nature, Zarathustra was known as a sage, magician and miracle-worker in post-Classical Western culture, though almost nothing was known of his ideas until the late eighteenth century. By this time his name was associated with lost ancient wisdom and was appropriated by Freemasons and he appears in Mozarts opera The Magic Flute under the variant name Sarastro, who represents moral order in opposition to the Queen of the Night. Enlightenment writers such as Voltaire promoted research into Zoroastrianism in the belief that it was a form of rational Deism, in 2005, the Oxford Dictionary of Philosophy ranked Zarathustra as first in the chronology of philosophers. Zarathustras impact lingers today due in part to the system of ethics he founded called Mazda-Yasna. The word Mazda-Yasna is avestan and is translated as Worship of Wisdom in English, the Persian philosopher Osthanes was also under the influence of Zarathustras ideas and philosophy, which afterwards affected the Greek philosophy through Democritus, his student. Zoroastrianism likely had as much influence on the formation of Christianity as did Judaism, little is known of the situation of philosophy during the ancient Greek philosophers. Manichaeism, founded by Mani, was influential from North Africa in the West, an important principle of Manichaeism was its dualistic cosmology/theology, which it shared with Mazdakism, a philosophy founded by Mazdak. Under this dualism, there were two principles of the universe, Light, the good one, and Darkness, the evil one. These two had been mixed by an accident, and mans role in this life was through good conduct to release the parts of himself that belonged to Light. Mani saw the mixture of good and bad as a tragedy, while Mazdak viewed this in a more neutral. Mazdak was a proto-socialist Persian reformer who gained influence under the reign of the Sassanian king Kavadh I and he claimed to be a prophet of God, and instituted communal possessions and social welfare programs
Iranian philosophy
–
Persian arts
19.
Korean philosophy
–
Korean philosophy focused on a totality of world view. The emotional content of Shamanism, and the unpredictable, and some aspects of Neo-Confucianism were integrated into it, traditional Korean thought has been influenced by a number of religious and philosophical thought-systems over the years. As the main influences on life in Korea, often Korean Shamanism, Buddhism, see main articles, Korean Buddhism, Korean Buddhist Temples Korean Buddhist thinkers refined ideas originally introduced from China into a distinct form. The Three Kingdoms of Korea introduced Buddhism to Japan, from where it was popularized in the West, Korean Buddhism consists mostly of the Seon lineage, which is derivative of the Chen Buddhism of China and precursor to Zen Buddhism known in the West through Japan. Buddhist temples can be found in most parts of Korea and many are considered national treasures, see main article, Korean Confucianism One of the most substantial influences in Korean intellectual history was the introduction of Confucian thought as part of the cultural exchange from China. This dynasty arose out of the dictatorships and chaos of the preceding era. Transition in this era was from Buddhism to an approach to Neo-Confucianism. Much work was done, especially on commentaries, and the Chu Hsi school represented indeed the golden age of Korean religious philosophy, the philosopher Hwadam moved to integrate i and ki and spoke of Great Harmony. For Yulgok, original nature and physical nature coalesce into one human nature, in particular, his concept of single-mindedness had a lasting influence on the Japanese neo-Confucianists of the Tokugawa period. That was the point of Yulgoks integration of sincerity with single-mindedness, in this respect Korean neo-Confucianism made a break with the Cheng-Chu school of Chinese neo-Confucianism, which was overly speculative. The strong influence of low church Christianity, through missionary schools, the discussion of Korean Christianity and Korean Christian philosophy is complicated with many divisions, and discussed in articles elsewhere. In the republican period, post-1945, Marxism–Leninism in the north was built on the Confucian yangban scholar-warriors of earlier times, the main influence in North Korea has been since 1996, the notion of The Red Banner Spirit. This system of belief encourages the North Korean people to build a kangsong taeguk and this philosophy was created by the three generals of Mt. Paektu, referring to former North Korean leader Kim Jong-il, his father Kim Il-sung and his natural mother Kim Jong-suk. Again little is known of philosophical publications on this subject, deBary, Theodore, The Rise of Neo-Confucianism in Korea, New York, Columbia University Press,1985
Korean philosophy
Korean philosophy
–
Haeinsa is a Buddhist temple in
South Gyeongsang.
20.
Western culture
–
The term also applies beyond Europe, to countries and cultures whose histories are strongly connected to Europe by immigration, colonization, or influence. For example, Western Culture includes countries in the Americas and Australasia, whose language, before the Cold War era, the traditional Western viewpoint identified Western Civilization with the Western Christian countries and culture. Ancient Greece is considered the birthplace of Western culture, with the worlds first democratic system of government and major advances in philosophy, science, Greece was followed by Rome, which made key contributions in law, government, engineering and political organization. European culture developed with a range of philosophy, medieval scholasticism, and mysticism. Rational thinking developed through an age of change and formation, with the experiments of the Enlightenment. More often an ideology is what will be used to categorize it as a Western society. There is some disagreement about what nations should or should not be included in the category, many parts of the Eastern Roman Empire are considered Western today but were Eastern in the past. Since the context is highly biased and context-dependent, there is no agreed definition what the West is and it is difficult to determine which individuals fit into which category and the East–West contrast is sometimes criticized as relativistic and arbitrary. Globalism has spread Western ideas so widely that almost all cultures are, to some extent. Stereotyped views of the West have been labeled Occidentalism, paralleling Orientalism—the term for the 19th-century stereotyped views of the East, as Europe discovered the wider world, old concepts adapted. The area that had formerly considered the Orient became the Near East, as the interests of the European powers interfered with Meiji Japan and Qing China for the first time. Thus, the Sino-Japanese War in 1894–1895 occurred in the Far East, the Greeks contrasted themselves to their Eastern neighbors, such as the Trojans in Iliad, setting an example for later contrasts between east and west. In the Middle Ages, the Near East provided a contrast to the West, concepts of what is the West arose out of legacies of the Western Roman Empire and the Eastern Roman Empire. Later, ideas of the west were formed by the concepts of Latin Christendom, Western culture is neither homogeneous nor unchanging. As with all cultures, it has evolved and gradually changed over time. Nevertheless, it is possible to follow the evolution and history of the West, and appreciate its similarities and differences, its borrowings from, and contributions to, other cultures of humanity. Nevertheless, the Greeks felt they were the most civilized and saw themselves as something between the wild barbarians of most of Europe and the soft, slavish Middle-Easterners. In the meantime, however, Greece, under Alexander, had become a capital of the East, the Celts also created some significant literature in the ancient world whenever they were given the opportunity
Western culture
–
Leonardo da Vinci 's
Vitruvian Man. A symbol of the importance of
empiricism in Western culture since the
Renaissance
Western culture
–
Plato, along with
Socrates and
Aristotle, helped establish
Western philosophy.
Western culture
–
Alexander the Great
Western culture
–
Two main symbols of the medieval western civilisation on one picture: the gothic
St.Martin´s cathedral in
Spišské Podhradie (
Slovakia) and the
Spiš Castle behind the cathedral.
21.
Western world
–
The Western world or the West is a term usually referring to different nations, depending on the context, most often including at least part of Europe. There are many accepted definitions about what they all have in common, the Western world is also known as the Occident. The concept of the Western part of the earth has its roots in Greco-Roman civilization in Europe, before the Cold War era, the traditional Western viewpoint identified Western Civilization with the Western Christian countries and culture. Its political usage was changed by the antagonism during the Cold War in the mid-to-late 20th Century. The term originally had a literal geographic meaning, Western culture was influenced by many older great civilizations of the ancient Near East, such as Phoenicia, Minoan Crete, Sumer, Babylonia, and also Ancient Egypt. It originated in the Mediterranean basin and its vicinity, Greece, over time, their associated empires grew first to the east and west to include the rest of Mediterranean and Black Sea coastal areas, conquering and absorbing. Later, they expanded to the north of the Mediterranean Sea to include Western, Central, numerous times, this expansion was accompanied by Christian missionaries, who attempted to proselytize Christianity. There is debate among some as to whether Latin America is in a category of its own, specifically, Western culture may imply, a Biblical Christian cultural influence in spiritual thinking, customs and either ethic or moral traditions, around the Post-Classical Era and after. European cultural influences concerning artistic, musical, folkloric, ethic and oral traditions, the concept of Western culture is generally linked to the classical definition of the Western world. In this definition, Western culture is the set of literary, scientific, political, artistic, much of this set of traditions and knowledge is collected in the Western canon. The term has come to apply to countries whose history is marked by European immigration or settlement, such as the Americas, and Oceania. The geopolitical divisions in Europe that created a concept of East and West originated in the Roman Empire, Roman Catholic Western and Central Europe, as such, maintained a distinct identity particularly as it began to redevelop during the Renaissance. Even following the Protestant Reformation, Protestant Europe continued to see itself as more tied to Roman Catholic Europe than other parts of the civilized world. Use of the term West as a cultural and geopolitical term developed over the course of the Age of Exploration as Europe spread its culture to other parts of the world. Additionally, closer contacts between the West and Asia and other parts of the world in recent times have continued to cloud the use, herodotus considered the Persian Wars of the early 5th century BC a conflict of Europa versus Asia. The terms West and East were not used by any Greek author to describe that conflict, the Great Schism and the Fourth Crusade confirmed this deviation. The Renaissance in the West emerged partly from currents within the Roman Empire, Ancient Rome was a civilization that grew from a city-state founded on the Italian Peninsula about the 9th century BC to a massive empire straddling the Mediterranean Sea. In its 12-century existence, Roman civilization shifted from a monarchy, to a republic, nonetheless, despite its great legacy, a number of factors led to the eventual decline of the Roman Empire
Western world
–
The
Parthenon (
Athens).
Western world
–
Division of the
Roman Empire after 395 into western and eastern part. The geopolitical divisions in Europe that created a concept of East and West originated in the Roman Empire.
Western world
–
The
Roman Forum (
Rome).
Western world
–
The
Supreme Court of the United States (
Washington, D.C.).
22.
Christianity
–
Christianity is a Abrahamic monotheistic religion based on the life and teachings of Jesus Christ, who serves as the focal point for the religion. It is the worlds largest religion, with over 2.4 billion followers, or 33% of the global population, Christians believe that Jesus is the Son of God and the savior of humanity whose coming as the Messiah was prophesied in the Old Testament. Christian theology is summarized in creeds such as the Apostles Creed and his incarnation, earthly ministry, crucifixion, and resurrection are often referred to as the gospel, meaning good news. The term gospel also refers to accounts of Jesuss life and teaching, four of which—Matthew, Mark, Luke. Christianity is an Abrahamic religion that began as a Second Temple Judaic sect in the mid-1st century, following the Age of Discovery, Christianity spread to the Americas, Australasia, sub-Saharan Africa, and the rest of the world through missionary work and colonization. Christianity has played a prominent role in the shaping of Western civilization, throughout its history, Christianity has weathered schisms and theological disputes that have resulted in many distinct churches and denominations. Worldwide, the three largest branches of Christianity are the Catholic Church, the Eastern Orthodox Church, and the denominations of Protestantism. There are many important differences of interpretation and opinion of the Bible, concise doctrinal statements or confessions of religious beliefs are known as creeds. They began as baptismal formulae and were expanded during the Christological controversies of the 4th and 5th centuries to become statements of faith. Many evangelical Protestants reject creeds as definitive statements of faith, even agreeing with some or all of the substance of the creeds. The Baptists have been non-creedal in that they have not sought to establish binding authoritative confessions of faith on one another. Also rejecting creeds are groups with roots in the Restoration Movement, such as the Christian Church, the Evangelical Christian Church in Canada, the Apostles Creed is the most widely accepted statement of the articles of Christian faith. It is also used by Presbyterians, Methodists, and Congregationalists and this particular creed was developed between the 2nd and 9th centuries. Its central doctrines are those of the Trinity and God the Creator, each of the doctrines found in this creed can be traced to statements current in the apostolic period. The creed was used as a summary of Christian doctrine for baptismal candidates in the churches of Rome. Most Christians accept the use of creeds, and subscribe to at least one of the mentioned above. The central tenet of Christianity is the belief in Jesus as the Son of God, Christians believe that Jesus, as the Messiah, was anointed by God as savior of humanity, and hold that Jesus coming was the fulfillment of messianic prophecies of the Old Testament. The Christian concept of the Messiah differs significantly from the contemporary Jewish concept, Jesus, having become fully human, suffered the pains and temptations of a mortal man, but did not sin
Christianity
–
An
Eastern Christian icon depicting
Emperor Constantine and the Fathers of the
First Council of Nicaea (325) as holding the Niceno–Constantinopolitan Creed of 381
Christianity
–
Various
depictions of Jesus
Christianity
–
Crucifixion, representing the death of
Jesus on the
Cross, painting by
Diego Velázquez, 17th century
23.
Roman Empire
–
Civil wars and executions continued, culminating in the victory of Octavian, Caesars adopted son, over Mark Antony and Cleopatra at the Battle of Actium in 31 BC and the annexation of Egypt. Octavians power was then unassailable and in 27 BC the Roman Senate formally granted him overarching power, the imperial period of Rome lasted approximately 1,500 years compared to the 500 years of the Republican era. The first two centuries of the empires existence were a period of unprecedented political stability and prosperity known as the Pax Romana, following Octavians victory, the size of the empire was dramatically increased. After the assassination of Caligula in 41, the senate briefly considered restoring the republic, under Claudius, the empire invaded Britannia, its first major expansion since Augustus. Vespasian emerged triumphant in 69, establishing the Flavian dynasty, before being succeeded by his son Titus and his short reign was followed by the long reign of his brother Domitian, who was eventually assassinated. The senate then appointed the first of the Five Good Emperors, the empire reached its greatest extent under Trajan, the second in this line. A period of increasing trouble and decline began with the reign of Commodus, Commodus assassination in 192 triggered the Year of the Five Emperors, of which Septimius Severus emerged victorious. The assassination of Alexander Severus in 235 led to the Crisis of the Third Century in which 26 men were declared emperor by the Roman Senate over a time span. It was not until the reign of Diocletian that the empire was fully stabilized with the introduction of the Tetrarchy, which saw four emperors rule the empire at once. This arrangement was unsuccessful, leading to a civil war that was finally ended by Constantine I. Constantine subsequently shifted the capital to Byzantium, which was renamed Constantinople in his honour and it remained the capital of the east until its demise. Constantine also adopted Christianity which later became the state religion of the empire. However, Augustulus was never recognized by his Eastern colleague, and separate rule in the Western part of the empire ceased to exist upon the death of Julius Nepos. The Eastern Roman Empire endured for another millennium, eventually falling to the Ottoman Turks in 1453, the Roman Empire was among the most powerful economic, cultural, political and military forces in the world of its time. It was one of the largest empires in world history, at its height under Trajan, it covered 5 million square kilometres. It held sway over an estimated 70 million people, at that time 21% of the entire population. Throughout the European medieval period, attempts were made to establish successors to the Roman Empire, including the Empire of Romania, a Crusader state. Rome had begun expanding shortly after the founding of the republic in the 6th century BC, then, it was an empire long before it had an emperor
Roman Empire
–
The
Augustus of Prima Porta (early 1st century AD)
Roman Empire
–
Aureus of
Augustus, the first
Roman Emperor.
Roman Empire
–
A segment of the ruins of Hadrian's Wall in northern England
Roman Empire
–
A 5th-century
papyrus showing a parallel Latin-Greek text of a speech by
Cicero
24.
Hellenistic philosophy
–
Hellenistic philosophy is the period of Western philosophy that was developed in the Hellenistic civilization following Aristotle and ending with the beginning of Neoplatonism. Pythagoreanism is the given to the system of philosophy and science developed by Pythagoras. Protagoras Gorgias Antiphon The Cynics were a sect of philosophers beginning with Antisthenes in the 4th century BCE. They believed that one should live a life of Virtue in agreement with Nature and this meant rejecting all conventional desires for wealth, power, health, or fame, and living a life free from possessions. Antisthenes Diogenes of Sinope Crates of Thebes Menippus Demetrius The Cyrenaics were an ultra-hedonist school of philosophy founded in the 4th century BC and they held that pleasure was the supreme good, especially immediate gratifications. The school was replaced within a century by the more moderate doctrine of Epicureanism, Aristippus of Cyrene Platonism is the name given to the philosophy of Plato, which was maintained and developed by his followers. The central concept was the theory of Forms, the transcendent, perfect archetypes, the highest form was the Form of the Good, the source of being, which could be known by reason. In the 3rd century BCE, Arcesilaus adopted skepticism, which became a tenet of the school until 90 BCE when Antiochus added Stoic elements. With the adoption of oriental mysticism in the 3rd century CE, speusippus Xenocrates Arcesilaus Carneades Antiochus of Ascalon Plutarch The Peripatetics was the name given to the philosophers who maintained and developed the philosophy of Aristotle. They advocated examination of the world to understand the foundation of things. The goal of life was the happiness which originated from virtuous actions and it advocated total philosophical skepticism about the world in order to attain ataraxia or a tranquil mind, maintaining that nothing could be proved to be true so we must suspend judgement. Pyrrho Timon Aenesidemus Sextus Empiricus Epicureanism was founded by Epicurus in the 3rd century BCE and it viewed the universe as being ruled by chance, with no interference from gods. It regarded absence of pain as the greatest pleasure, and advocated a simple life and it was the main rival to Stoicism until both philosophies died out in the 3rd century CE. Epicurus Metrodorus Zeno of Sidon Philodemus Lucretius Stoicism was founded by Zeno of Citium in the 3rd century BCE, based on the ethical ideas of the Cynics, it taught that the goal of life was to live in accordance with Nature. It advocated the development of self-control and fortitude as a means of overcoming destructive emotions and it was the most successful school of philosophy until it died out in the 3rd century CE. Its most notable advocate was Cicero, varro Reatinus Cicero Seneca the Younger Hellenistic Judaism was an attempt to establish the Jewish religious tradition within the culture and language of Hellenism. Its principal representative was Philo of Alexandria, Philo of Alexandria Josephus Neopythagoreanism was a school of philosophy reviving Pythagorean doctrines, which was prominent in the 1st and 2nd centuries CE. It was an attempt to introduce an element into Greek philosophy, worshipping God by living an ascetic life, ignoring bodily pleasures and all sensuous impulses
Hellenistic philosophy
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Zeno of Citium (333–263 BC), the founder of
Stoicism
25.
Spread of Islam
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Trading played an important role in the spread of Islam in several parts of the world, notably southeast Asia. Islamic expansion in South and East Asia fostered cosmopolitan and eclectic Muslim cultures in the Indian subcontinent, Malaysia, Indonesia and China. As of January 2011, there were 1.62 billion Muslims, with one out of five people in the world being Muslim, the Islamic religion is still the second most populous religion as of 2016. The expansion of the Arab Empire in the first centuries after Muhammads death soon established Muslim dynasties in North Africa, West Africa, to the Middle East, and Somalia. For the subjects of this new empire, formerly subjects of the greatly reduced Byzantine, the objective of the conquests was more than anything of a practical nature, as fertile land and water were scarce in the Arabian peninsula. A real Islamization therefore only came about in the subsequent centuries, Islam was introduced in Somalia in the 7th century when the Muslim Arabs fled from the persecution of the Pagan Quraysh tribe. When the Muslims defeated the Pagans, some returned to Arabia, the local Somalis adopted the Islamic faith well before the faith even took root in its place of origin. Conversion initially was neither required nor necessarily wished for, did not require the conversion as much as the subordination of non-Muslim peoples, at the outset, they were hostile to conversions because new Muslims diluted the economic and status advantages of the Arabs. Only in subsequent centuries, with the development of the doctrine of Islam and with that the understanding of the Muslim ummah. The caliphs of the Arab dynasty established the first schools inside the empire which taught Arabic language, at the end of the Umayyad period, less than 10% of the people in Iran, Iraq, Syria, Egypt, Tunisia and Spain were Muslim. Only on the Arabian peninsula was the proportion of Muslims among the higher than this. Expansion ceased and the disciplines of Islamic philosophy, theology, law and mysticism became more widespread. These initial conversions were of a flexible nature, the reasons why, by the end of the 10th century, a large part of the population had converted to Islam are diverse. According to British-Lebanese historian Albert Hourani, one of the reasons may be that Islam had become clearly defined. Muslims now lived within a system of ritual, doctrine. The status of Christians, Jews and Zoroastrians was more precisely defined and they were regarded as the People of the Book, those who possessed a revealed scripture, or People of the Covenant, with whom compacts of protection had been made. In general they were not forced to convert, but they suffered from restrictions and they paid a special tax, they were not supposed to wear certain colors, they could not marry Muslim women. It should be pointed out that most of these laws were elaborations of basic laws concerning non-Muslims in the Quran, Albert Hourani points towards interwoven terms of political and economic benefits and of a sophisticated culture and religion as appealing to the masses
Spread of Islam
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The
Abbasids are known to have founded some of the world's earliest educational institutions such as the
House of Wisdom.
Spread of Islam
Spread of Islam
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Courtiers of the
Persian prince
Baysonqor playing chess in
Ferdowsi 's epic work known as the
Shahnameh.
Spread of Islam
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A Persian miniature of Shah Abu'l Ma‘ali a scholar.
26.
Caliphate
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A caliphate is an area containing an Islamic steward known as a caliph —a person considered a religious successor to the Islamic prophet, Muhammad, and a leader of the entire Muslim community. During the history of Islam after the Rashidun period, many Muslim states, the Sunni branch of Islam stipulates that, as a head of state, a caliph should be elected by Muslims or their representatives. Followers of Shia Islam, however, believe a caliph should be an Imam chosen by God from the Ahl al-Bayt, before the advent of Islam, Arabian monarchs traditionally used the title malik, or another from the same root. The term caliph, derives from the Arabic word khalīfah, which means successor, steward, however, studies of pre-Islamic texts suggest that the original meaning of the phrase was successor selected by God. There was no specified procedure for this shura or consultation, candidates were usually, but not necessarily, from the same lineage as the deceased leader. Capable men who would lead well were preferred over an ineffectual heir, Sunni Muslims believe that Abu Bakr was chosen by the community and that this was the proper procedure. Sunnis further argue that a caliph should ideally be chosen by election or community consensus, the Shia believe that Ali, the son-in-law and cousin of Muhammad, was chosen by Muhammad as his spiritual and temporal successor as the Mawla of all Muslims in the event of Ghadir Khumm. The caliph was often known as Amir al-Muminin, Muhammad established his capital in Medina, after he died, it remained the capital during the Rashidun Caliphate, before Kufa was reportedly made the capital by Caliph Ali. At times there have been rival claimant caliphs in different parts of the Islamic world, according to Sunni Muslims, the first caliph to be called Amir al-Muminin was Abu Bakr, followed by Umar, the second of the Rashidun. Uthman and Ali also were called by the title, while the Shia consider Ali to have been the only truly legitimate caliph. After the collapse of the Ottoman Empire, Mustafa Kemal Atatürk officially abolished the system of Caliphate in Islam as part of his secular reforms, the Kings of Morocco still label themselves with the title Amir al-Muminin for the Moroccans, but lay no claim to the Caliphate. Some Muslim countries, including Somalia, Indonesia and Malaysia, were never subject to the authority of a Caliphate, with the exception of Aceh, consequently, these countries had their own, local, sultans or rulers who did not fully accept the authority of the Caliph. Abu Bakr, the first successor of Muhammad, nominated Umar as his successor on his deathbed, Umar, the second caliph, was killed by a Persian named Piruz Nahavandi. His successor, Uthman, was elected by a council of electors, Uthman was killed by members of a disaffected group. Ali then took control but was not universally accepted as caliph by the governors of Egypt and he faced two major rebellions and was assassinated by Abd-al-Rahman ibn Muljam, a Khawarij. Alis tumultuous rule lasted only five years and this period is known as the Fitna, or the first Islamic civil war. The followers of Ali later became the Shia minority sect of Islam, the followers of all four Rashidun Caliphs became the majority Sunni sect. Under the Rashidun each region of the Caliphate had its own governor, Muawiyah, a relative of Uthman and governor of Syria, succeeded Ali as Caliph
Caliphate
–
Mustansiriya University in
Baghdad
Caliphate
–
Caliphate خِلافة
Caliphate
–
Abdülmecid II was the last Caliph of Islam from the
Ottoman dynasty.
27.
Early Islamic philosophy
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This period starts with al-Kindi in the 9th century and ends with Averroes at the end of 12th century. Early Islamic philosophy can be divided into sets of influences, branches, schools. The life of Muhammad or sira which generated both the Quran and hadith, during which philosophy was defined by Muslims as consisting in acceptance or rejection of his message. Together the sira and hadith constitute the sunnah and are validated by isnad to determine the truth of the report of any given saying of Muhammad. Key figures are Imam Jafar al-Sadiq, Imam Bukhari, Imam Muslim, Al-Tirmidhi, Ibn Majah, Abu Dawud, each sifted through literally millions of hadith to accept a list of under 1. This work, which was not completed until the 10th century, ilm al-Kalām is the Islamic philosophical discipline of seeking theological principles through dialectic. Kalām in Islamic practice relates to the discipline of seeking theological knowledge through debate, a scholar of kalām is referred to as a mutakallim. With Kalam, questions about the sira and hadith, as well as science and law and this period is characterized by emergence of ijtihad and the first fiqh. As the Sunnah became published and accepted, philosophy separate from Muslim theology was discouraged due to a lack of participants, during this period, traditions similar to Socratic method began to evolve, but philosophy remained subordinate to religion. Independent minds exploiting the methods of ijtihad sought to investigate the doctrines of the Quran, one of the first debates was that between partisan of the Qadar, who affirmed free will, and the Jabarites, who maintained the belief in fatalism. At the 2nd century of the Hijra, a new movement arose in the school of Basra. This new school was called Mutazilite that lasted from the 8th to 10th centuries and its principal dogmas were three, God is an absolute unity, and no attribute can be ascribed to Him. It is on account of two principles that the Mutazilities designate themselves the Partisans of Justice and Unity. All knowledge necessary for the salvation of man emanates from his reason, humans could acquire knowledge before, as well as after, Revelation and this fact makes knowledge obligatory upon all men, at all times, and in all places. This appellation became the name for all seeking philosophical demonstration in confirmation of religious principles. The first Mutakallamin had to both the orthodox and the non-Muslims, and they may be described as occupying the middle ground between those two parties. But subsequent generations were to large extent critical towards the Mutazilite school, throughout history, the place of kalam in Islamic thought has been controversial. The vast majority of the early traditional Sunni Muslim scholars have criticized or prohibited it
Early Islamic philosophy
–
Al-Farabi (Alfarabi), the founder of Farabism.
Early Islamic philosophy
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Averroes (Ibn Rushd), the founder of
Averroism.
28.
Karl Jaspers
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Karl Theodor Jaspers was a German-Swiss psychiatrist and philosopher who had a strong influence on modern theology, psychiatry, and philosophy. After being trained in and practicing psychiatry, Jaspers turned to philosophical inquiry and he was often viewed as a major exponent of existentialism in Germany, though he did not accept this label. Jaspers was born in Oldenburg in 1883 to a mother from a farming community. He showed an early interest in philosophy, but his fathers experience with the legal system undoubtedly influenced his decision to study law at University of Heidelberg. It soon became clear that Jaspers did not particularly enjoy law, in 1910 he married Gertrud Mayer, the sister of his close friends Gustav Mayer and Ernst Mayer. Jaspers became dissatisfied with the way the community of the time approached the study of mental illness. In 1913 Jaspers habilitated at the faculty of the Heidelberg University. The post later became a permanent philosophical one, and Jaspers never returned to clinical practice, during this time Jaspers was a close friend of the Weber family. In 1921, at the age of 38, Jaspers turned from psychology to philosophy and he became a philosopher, in Germany and Europe. After the Nazi seizure of power in 1933, Jaspers was considered to have a Jewish taint due to his Jewish wife, in 1938 he fell under a publication ban as well. Many of his long-time friends stood by him, however, and he was able to continue his studies, but he and his wife were under constant threat of removal to a concentration camp until 30 March 1945, when Heidelberg was liberated by American troops. In 1948 Jaspers moved to the University of Basel in Switzerland and he remained prominent in the philosophical community and became a naturalized citizen of Switzerland living in Basel until his death on his wifes 90th birthday in 1969. Jaspers dissatisfaction with the understanding of mental illness led him to question both the diagnostic criteria and the methods of clinical psychiatry. He published a paper in 1910 in which he addressed the problem of whether paranoia was an aspect of personality or the result of biological changes. Although it did not broach new ideas, this introduced a rather unusual method of study. Not unlike Freud, Jaspers studied patients in detail, giving information about the patients as well as notes on how the patients themselves felt about their symptoms. This has become known as the method and now forms a mainstay of psychiatric. Jaspers set down his views on mental illness in a book which he published in 1913 and this work has become a classic in the psychiatric literature and many modern diagnostic criteria stem from ideas found within it
Karl Jaspers
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Karl Jaspers in 1946
Karl Jaspers
–
Karl Jaspers: Allgemeine Psychopathologie, first print 1913.
29.
Axial Age
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The concept was introduced in his book Vom Ursprung und Ziel der Geschichte, published in 1949. Jaspers claimed that the Axial Age should be viewed as an empirical fact of history. He identified a number of key thinkers as having had a influence on future philosophies and religions. Jaspers held up this age as unique, and one to which the rest of the history of thought might be compared. Jaspers approach to the culture of the middle of the first millennium BC has been adopted by scholars and academics. Everything implied by these names developed during these few centuries almost simultaneously in China, India, Jaspers described the Axial Age as an interregnum between two ages of great empire, a pause for liberty, a deep breath bringing the most lucid consciousness. It has also suggested that the Axial Age was a historically liminal period. Jaspers had a particular interest in the similarities in circumstance and thought of its figures, similarities included an engagement in the quest for human meaning and the rise of a new elite class of religious leaders and thinkers in China, India and the Occident. The three regions all gave birth to, and then institutionalized, a tradition of travelling scholars, after the Spring and Autumn period and the Warring States period, Taoism and Confucianism emerged in China. Jaspers argues that the characteristics appeared under similar circumstances, China, India. Jaspers argued that during the Axial Age, the foundations of humanity were laid simultaneously and independently in China, India, Persia, Judea. And these are the foundations upon which humanity still subsists today, the foundations were laid by individual thinkers within a framework of a changing social environment. Eisenstadt analyses economic circumstances relating to the coming of the Axial Age in Greece, many of the cultures of the axial age were considered second-generation societies because they were built on the societies that preceded them. Parshvanatha and Mahavira, known as the fordmakers of Jainism lived during this age and they propagated the religion of sramanas and influenced Indian philosophy by propounding the principles of ahimsa, karma, samsara and asceticism. In China, the Hundred Schools of Thought were in contention and Confucianism and Taoism arose during this era, Zoroastrianism, another of Jaspers examples, is one of the first monotheistic religions and it greatly influenced modern Abrahamic religions with such conceptions as the devil and Heaven/Hell. The exact date of Zarathustras life is debated by scholars, with some, such as Mary Boyce, others, such as William W Malandra and RC Zaehner, suggest that he may indeed have been an early contemporary of Cyrus living around 600 BC. Thinkers and teachers like the Buddha, Pythagoras, Heraclitus, Parmenides, David Christian notes that the first universal religions appeared in the age of the first universal empires and of the first all-encompassing trading networks. Anthropologist David Graeber has pointed out that the period of Jaspers Axial age corresponds almost exactly to the period in which coinage was invented
Axial Age
–
Jaspers argued that the Axial Age gave birth to philosophy as a discipline
