20 Major Philosophers & Their Big Ideas

by TBS Staff

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Philosophy is complicated stuff. It's the search for meaning, for greater understanding, for answers to the questions surrounding our being, our purpose, and the universe itself. And so obviously, attempting to sum it up in a few pithy blurbs is a fool's errand. Well, consider us your fool, because that'due south exactly what we've set out to do.

We're certain Socrates would question our motives, Emerson would criticize us for writing on the subject so far removed from nature, and Nietzsche would make fun of u.s. until nosotros cried. But we think it's worth the risk to requite you a quick shot of knowledge while you prepare for your exam, tighten up your essay, or begin the enquiry process.

Because philosophy is such a broad and encompassing subject area — I hateful, it's basically well-nigh everything — nosotros don't merits to comprehend the subject area comprehensively. Honestly, the only real way you can fully comprehend the theories, epistemologies, and frameworks described hither is to read the writing created by — and critique dedicated to — each of these thinkers. But what follows is your introduction, a rapid-fire look at 20 Major Philosophers, their Large Ideas, and their nearly important written works. But call up fast, because these mindblowers come up at a furious pace.

Philosophers Tabular array of Contents

  • Thomas Aquinas
  • Aristotle
  • Confucius
  • René Descartes
  • Ralph Waldo Emerson
  • Michel Foucault
  • David Hume
  • Immanuel Kant
  • Søren Kierkegaard
  • Lao-Tzu
  • John Locke
  • Niccolo Machiavelli
  • Karl Marx
  • John Stuart Mill
  • Friedrich Nietzsche
  • Plato
  • Jean-Jacques Rousseau
  • Jean-Paul Sartre
  • Socrates
  • Ludwig Wittgenstein

Major Philosophers and Their Ideas

1. Saint Thomas Aquinas (1225–1274)

Thomas Aquinas was a 13th century Dominican friar, theologian and Doctor of the Church, built-in in what is known today as the Lazio region of Italia. His most important contribution to Western thought is the concept of natural theology (sometimes referred to as Thomism in tribute to his influence). This belief system holds that the existence of God is verified through reason and rational explanation, equally opposed to through scripture or religious feel. This ontological approach is amidst the central premises underpinning modern Catholic philosophy and liturgy. His writings, and Aquinas himself, are still considered among the preeminent models for Catholic priesthood. His ideas besides remain central to theological debate, discourse, and modes of worship.

Aquinas' Big Ideas

  • Adhered to the Platonic/Aristotelian principle of realism, which holds that certain absolutes exist in the universe, including the existence of the universe itself;
  • Focused much of his work on reconciling Aristotelian and Christian principles, merely besides expressed a doctrinal openness to Jewish and Roman philosophers, all to the finish of divining truth wherever it could be found;
  • The Second Vatican Quango (1962–65) alleged his Summa Theolgoiae — a compendium of all the teachings of the Catholic Church to that point — "Perennial Philosophy."

Aquinas' Key Works

  • Summa Theologica (1265–74)
  • Thomas Aquinas: Selected Writings

2. Aristotle (384–322 BCE)

Aristotle is among the nearly of import and influential thinkers and teachers in human history, ofttimes considered — alongside his mentor, Plato — to be a father of Western Philosophy." Born in the northern part of aboriginal Hellenic republic, his writings and ideas on metaphysics, ideals, knowledge, and methodological inquiry are at the very root of homo thought. Most philosophers who followed — both those who echoed and those who opposed his ideas — owed a direct debt to his broad-ranging influence. Aristotle's enormous impact was a result both of the latitude of his writing and his personal reach during his lifetime.

In addition to being a philosopher, Aristotle was likewise a scientist, which led him to consider an enormous array of topics, and largely through the view that all concepts and knowledge are ultimately based on perception. A small sampling of topics covered in Aristotle'south writing includes physics, biological science, psychology, linguistics, logic, ethics, rhetoric, politics, government, music, theatre, verse, and metaphysics. He was also in a unique position to prevail directly over thinking throughout the known world, tutoring a young Alexander the Not bad at the request of the future conqueror'due south father, Phillip Ii of Macedon. This position of influence gave Aristotle the means to establish the library at Lyceum, where he produced hundreds of writings on papyrus scrolls. And of course, it also gave him directly sway over the mind of a man who would one day command an empire stretching from Greece to northwestern India. The result was an enormous sphere of influence for Aristotle'southward ideas, ane that only began to be challenged past Renaissance thinkers nearly two,000 years later.

Aristotle'southward Large Ideas

  • Asserted the employ of logic as a method of argument and offered the basic methodological template for analytical soapbox;
  • Espoused the understanding that noesis is built from the study of things that happen in the globe, and that some knowledge is universal — a prevailing fix of ideas throughout Western Civilization thereafter;
  • Defined metaphysics as "the cognition of immaterial beingness," and used this framework to examine the relationship between substance (a combination of affair and form) and essence, from which he devises that human being is comprised from a unity of the ii.

Aristotle'due south Key Works

  • The Metaphysics
  • Nicomachean Ethics
  • Poetics

3. Confucius (551–479 BCE)

Chinese teacher, writer, and philosopher Confucius viewed himself as a aqueduct for the theological ideas and values of the royal dynasties that came before him. With an emphasis on family and social harmony, Confucius advocated for a style of life that reflected a spiritual and religious tradition, but which was also distinctly humanist and fifty-fifty secularist. Confucius — thought to be a gimmicky of Taoist progenitor Lao-Tzu — had a profound impact on the development of Eastern legal customs and the emergence of a scholarly ruling class. Confucianism would appoint in historic push-pull with the philosophies of Buddhism and Taoism, experiencing ebbs and flows in influence, its high points coming during the Han (206 BCE–220 CE), Tang (618–907 CE), and Song (960–1296 CE) Dynasties. As Buddhism became the dominant spiritual force in China, Confucianism declined in practice. However, it remains a foundational philosophy underlying Asian and Chinese attitudes toward scholarly, legal, and professional pursuits.

Confucius' Big Ideas

  • Developed a belief organization focused on both personal and governmental morality through qualities such as justice, sincerity, and positive relationships with others;
  • Advocated for the importance of potent family unit bonds, including respect for the elder, veneration of one's ancestors, and marital loyalty;
  • Believed in the value of achieving upstanding harmony through skilled judgment rather than knowledge of rules, denoting that 1 should achieve morality through self-cultivation.

Confucius' Key Works

  • The Analects
  • The Complete Confucius

4. René Descartes (1596–1650)

A French philosopher, mathematician, and scientist, Descartes was born in France simply spent 20 years of his life in the Dutch Republic. As a fellow member of the Dutch States Army, then equally the Prince of Orange and subsequently equally Stadtholder (a position of national leadership in the Dutch Republic), Descartes wielded considerable intellectual influence over the menses known equally the Dutch Golden Historic period. He often distinguished himself past refuting or attempting to disengage the ideas of those that came before him.

Descartes' Big Ideas

  • Discards belief in all things that are not absolutely certain, emphasizing the agreement of that which tin be known for sure;
  • Is recognized every bit the male parent of analytical geometry;
  • Regarded as ane of the leading influences in the Scientific Revolution — a menstruum of intense discovery, revelation, and innovation that rippled through Europe between the Renaissance and Enlightenment eras (roughly speaking, 15th to 18th centuries).

Descartes' Key Works

  • Meditations on First Philosophy (1641)
  • Principles of Philosophy (1644)
  • The Passions of the Soul and Other Late Philosophical Writings (1649)

5. Ralph Waldo Emerson (1803 82)

A Boston-born writer, philosopher, and poet, Ralph Waldo Emerson is the father of the transcendentalist movement. This was a distinctly American philosophical orientation that rejected the pressures imposed by society, materialism, and organized faith in favor of the ethics of individualism, freedom, and a personal emphasis on the soul's human relationship with the surrounding natural world. Though non explicitly a "naturalist" himself, Emerson's ideals were taken up by this 20th century movement. He was also seen every bit a key figure in the American romantic movement.

Emerson's Big Ideas

  • Wrote on the importance of subjects such as self-reliance, experiential living, and the preeminence of the soul;
  • Referred to "the infinitude of the private human" as his central doctrine;
  • Was a mentor and friend to fellow influential transcendentalist Henry David Thoureau.

Emerson'due south Key Works

  • Nature and Other Essays (1836)
  • Essays: First and Second Serial (1841,1844)

6. Michel Foucault (1926-1984)

Historian, social theorist, and philosopher Michel Foucault, built-in in the riverfront city of Poiltiers, France, defended much of his pedagogy and writing to the exam of power and knowledge and their connexion to social control. Though often identified every bit a postmodernist, Foucault preferred to think of himself as a critic of modernity. His service equally an international diplomat on behalf of France also influenced his agreement of social constructs throughout history and how they accept served to enforce racial, religious, and sexual inequality. His ideals take been peculiarly embraced by progressive movements, and he allied with many during his lifetime. Agile in movements confronting racism, human rights abuses, prisoner abuses, and marginalization of the mentally ill, he is oft cited as a major influence in movements for social justice, man rights, and feminism. More broadly speaking, his examination of ability and social command has had a direct influence on the studies of sociology, communications, and political science.

Foucault's Big Ideas

  • Held the conviction that the study of philosophy must begin through a shut and ongoing study of history;
  • Demanded that social constructs exist more closely examined for hierarchical inequalities, as well as through an analysis of the corresponding fields of knowledge supporting these unequal structures;
  • Believed oppressed humans are entitled to rights and they take a duty to ascension up against the abuse of ability to protect these rights.

Foucault's Central Works

  • The Gild of Things: An Archaeology of the Human Sciences (1966)
  • The Archæology of Knowledge: And the Discourse on Linguistic communication (1969)
  • Field of study & Punish: The Birth of the Prison (1975)

vii. David Hume (1711–77)

A Scottish-born historian, economist, and philosopher, Hume is ofttimes grouped with thinkers such every bit John Locke, Thomas Hobbes, and Sir Francis Bacon as office of a movement called British Empiricism. He was focused on creating a "naturalistic science of man" that delves into the psychological conditions defining human nature. In contrast to rationalists such as Descartes, Hume was preoccupied with the way that passions (as opposed to reason) govern human beliefs. This, Hume argued, predisposed human beings to knowledge founded not on the being of sure absolutes but on personal experience. As a result of these ideas, Hume would be amidst the offset major thinkers to abnegate dogmatic religious and moral ideals in favor of a more sentimentalist arroyo to human nature. His belief arrangement would help to inform the time to come movements of utilitarianism and logical positivism, and would have a profound impact on scientific and theological discourse thereafter.

Hume's Big Ideas

  • Articulated the "problem of induction," suggesting we cannot rationally justify our conventionalities in causality, that our perception only allows us to experience events that are typically conjoined, and that causality cannot be empirically asserted as the connecting force in that human relationship;
  • Assessed that human beings lack the capacity to achieve a true conception of the self, that our formulation is merely a "bundle of sensations" that we connect to formulate the idea of the self;
  • Hume argued against moral absolutes, instead positing that our ethical behavior and treatment of others is compelled past emotion, sentiment, and internal passions, that we are inclined to positive behaviors past their likely desirable outcomes.

Hume's Key Works

  • A Treatise of Human Nature (1739)
  • An Inquiry Concerning the Principles of Morals (1751)
  • The History Of England (1754–62)

8. Immanuel Kant (1724–1804)

Prussian-born (and therefore identified equally a German philosopher), Kant is considered amid the most essential figures in modern philosophy, an advocate of reason equally the source for morality, and a thinker whose ideas go along to permeate ethical, epistemological, and political contend. What mayhap most distinguishes Kant is his innate desire to discover a synthesis between rationalists like Descartes and empiricists like Hume, to decipher a centre footing that defers to human feel without descending into skepticism. To his ain way of thinking, Kant was pointing a way forward by resolving a key philosophical impasse.

Kant's Large Ideas

  • Defined the "Chiselled imperative," the thought that there are intrinsically good and moral ideas to which we all have a duty, and that rational individuals will inherently discover reason in adhering to moral obligation;
  • Argued that humanity can accomplish a perpetual peace through universal republic and international cooperation;
  • Asserted that the concepts of fourth dimension and space, as well every bit cause and effect, are essential to the human experience, and that our agreement of the world is conveyed only past our senses and non necessarily by the underlying (and likely unseen) causes of the phenomena we find.

Kant's Key Works

  • Critique of Pure Reason (1781)
  • Critique of Judgment (1790)
  • The Metaphysics of Morals (1797)

9. Søren Kierkegaard (1813–55)

A Danish theologian, social critic, and philosopher, Kierkegaard is viewed by many equally the nearly of import existentialist philosopher. His work dealt largely with the idea of the single individual. His thinking tended to prioritize physical reality over abstract idea. Within this construct, he viewed personal option and commitment as preeminent. This orientation played a major function in his theology as well. He focused on the importance of the individual's subjective human relationship with God, and his work addressed the themes of faith, Christian love, and homo emotion. Because Kierkegaard's piece of work was at first simply available in Danish, it was only after his work was translated that his ideas proliferated widely throughout Western Europe. This proliferation was a major forcefulness in helping existentialism take root in the 20th century.

Kierkegaard's Big Ideas

  • Explored the idea of objective vs. subjective truths, and argued that theological assertions were inherently subjective and arbitrary because they could not be verified or invalidated by science;
  • Was highly disquisitional of the entanglement between State and Church;

    • Commencement described the concept of malaise, defining it equally a dread the comes from anxieties over option, freedom, and cryptic feelings.

Kierkegaard's Cardinal Works

  • The Concept of Dread (1844)
  • Final Unscientific Postscript to Philosophical Fragments, Volume 1 (1846)
  • Practice in Christianity (1850)

10. Lao-Tzu (also Laozi, lived between the 6th and 4th century BCE)

Historians differ on exactly when Lao-Tzu lived and taught, simply information technology'south largely held that some time betwixt the 6th and quaternary centuries BCE, the "old master" founded philosophical Taoism. Viewed as a divine figure in traditional Chinese religions, his ideas and writings would course one of the major pillars (alongside Confucius and the Buddha) for Eastern idea. Lao-Tzu espoused an ideal life lived through the Dao or Tao (roughly translated as "the manner"). As such, Taoism is as rooted in faith and philosophy. In traditional telling, though Lao-Tzu never opened a formal schoolhouse, he worked as an archivist for the majestic courtroom of Zhou Dynasty. This gave him access to an all-encompassing trunk of writing and artifacts, which he synthesized into his ain poetry and prose. As a outcome of his writing, his influence spread widely during his lifetime. In fact, one version of his biography implies he may well have been a direct mentor to the Buddha (or, in some versions, was the Buddha himself). There are lot of colorful narratives surrounding Lao-Tzu, some of which are almost certainly myth. In fact, there are some historians who fifty-fifty question whether or not Lao-Tzu was a real person. Historical accounts differ on who he was, exactly when he lived and which works he contributed to the canon of Taoism. However, in most traditional tellings, Lao-Tzu was the living embodiment of the philosophy known as Taoism and author of its main text, the Tao Te Ching.

Lao-Tzu'south Large Ideas

  • Espoused awareness of the cocky through meditation;
  • Disputed conventional wisdom every bit inherently biased, and urged followers of the Tao to find natural residual between the body, senses, and desires;
  • Urged individuals to achieve a state of wu wei, liberty from desire, an early staple tenet of Buddhist tradition thereafter.

Lao-Tzu'south Key Works

  • Tao Te Ching

11. John Locke (1632–1704)

An English physicist and philosopher, John Locke was a prominent thinker during the Enlightenment flow. Office of the motility of British Empiricism alongside fellow countrymen David Hume, Thomas Hobbes, and Sir Francis Bacon, Locke is regarded as an important contributor to the development of the social contract theory and is sometimes identified every bit the begetter of liberalism. Indeed, his discourses on identity, the self, and the impact of sensory feel would be essential revelations to many Enlightenment thinkers and, consequently, to real revolutionaries. His philosophy is said to have figured prominently into the formulation of the Declaration of Independence that initiated America's state of war for independence from the British.

Locke'south Big Ideas

  • Coined the term tabula rasa (blank slate) to denote that the human mind is born unformed, and that ideas and rules are only enforced through feel thereafter;
  • Established the method of introspection, focusing on ane's own emotions and behaviors in search of a better understanding of the self;
  • Argued that in order to be true, something must exist capable of repeated testing, a view that girded his ideology with the intent of scientific rigor.

Locke'due south Key Works

  • Two Treatises of Government (1689)
  • An Essay Apropos Human being Agreement (1690)
  • Some Thoughts Concerning Education (1693)

12. Niccolo Machiavelli (1469–1527)

Niccolo di Bernardo dei Machiavelli is at once among the virtually influential and widely debated of history'due south thinkers. A writer, public office-holder, and philosopher of Renaissance Italy, Machiavelli both participated in and wrote prominently on political matters, to the extent that he has even been identified by some as the father of modernistic political scientific discipline. He is also seen equally a proponent of securely questionable — some would argue downright evil — values and ideas. Machiavelli was an empiricist who used experience and historical fact to inform his beliefs, a disposition which allowed him to divorce politics not just from theology but from morality equally well. His well-nigh prominent works described the parameters of effective rulership, in which he seems to advocate for leadership by whatever means which retain ability, including deceit, murder, and oppression. While it is sometimes noted in his defense that Machiavelli himself did not live according to these principles, this "Machiavellian" philosophy is oftentimes seen as a template for tyranny and dictatorship, even in the present twenty-four hours.

Machiavelli's Large Ideas

  • Famously asserted that while information technology would be best to exist both loved and feared, the two rarely coincide, and thus, greater security is found in the latter;
  • Identified as a "humanist," and believed information technology necessary to establish a new kind of state in defiance of police, tradition and particularly, the political preeminence of the Church;
  • Viewed ambition, competition and war as inevitable parts of human nature, fifty-fifty seeming to cover all of these tendencies.

Machiavelli'southward Key Works

  • Discourses on Livy (1531)
  • The Prince (1532)
  • The Art Of State of war (1519–20)

13. Karl Marx (1818–83)

A German-born economist, political theorist, and philosopher, Karl Marx wrote some of the virtually revolutionary philosophical content e'er produced. Indeed, and so pertinent was his writing to the human condition during his lifetime, he was exiled from his native land. This result would, however, also make it possible for his almost of import ideas to discover a pop audition. Upon arriving in London, Marx took upward work with swain German Friedrich Engels. Together, they devised an assessment of form, club, and power dynamics that revealed deep inequalities, and exposed the economic prerogatives for state-sponsored violence, oppression, and war. Marx predicted that the inequalities and violence inherent in commercialism would ultimately lead to its collapse. From its ashes would rise a new socialist organization, a classless society where all participants (as opposed to just wealthy private owners) have admission to the means for production. What made the Marxist arrangement of thought so impactful though was its innate phone call to action, couched in Marx's advancement for a working course revolution aimed at overthrowing an diff system. The philosophy underlying Marxism, and his revolutionary fervor, would ripple throughout the globe, ultimately transforming entire spheres of thought in places similar Soviet Russia, Eastern Europe, and Red China. In many ways, Karl Marx presided over a philosophical revolution that continues in the nowadays twenty-four hour period in myriad forms of communism, socialism, socialized commonwealth, and grassroots political organization.

Marx'southward Big Ideas

  • Advocated a view called historical materialism, arguing for the demystification of thought and idealism in favor of closer acknowledgement of the concrete and textile actions shaping the world;
  • Argued that societies develop through form struggle, and that this would ultimately atomic number 82 to the dismantling of capitalism;
  • Characterized capitalism every bit a production system in which at that place are inherent conflicts of interest between the bourgeoisie (the ruling class), and the proletariat (the working class), and that these conflicts are couched in the idea that the latter must sell their labor to the quondam for wages that offer no stake in production.

Marx's Fundamental Works

  • Critique of Hegel's "Philosophy Of Right" (1843)
  • The Communist Manifesto (1848)
  • Capital: Book 1: A Critique of Political Economy (1867)

14. John Stuart Factory (1806–73)

British economist, public servant, and philosopher John Stuart Mill is considered a linchpin of modernistic social and political theory. He contributed a critical body of work to the school of idea called liberalism, an ideology founding on the extension of individual liberties and economic freedoms. As such, Manufactory himself advocated strongly for the preserving of individual rights and called for limitations to the power and authority of the land over the individual. Mill was as well a proponent of utilitarianism, which holds that the best activity is 1 that maximizes utility, or stated more simply, one that provide the greatest do good to all. This and other ideas found in Mill's works have been essential to providing rhetorical basis for social justice, anti-poverty, and human rights movements. For his own function, as a member of Parliament, Mill became the kickoff office-holding Briton to advocate for the correct of women to vote.

Mill'southward Big Ideas

  • Advocated strongly for the human right of free speech, and asserted that gratuitous discourse is necessary for social and intellectual progress;
  • Adamant that near of history can be understood as a struggle between liberty and authorization, and that limits must be placed on rulership such that information technology reflects society's wishes;
  • Stated the need for a organization of "ramble checks" on country authority as a way of protecting political liberties.

Mill'south Key Works

  • On Liberty and the Subjection of Women (1859, 1869)
  • Utilitarianism (1861)

fifteen. Friedrich Nietzsche (1844–1900)

Friedrich Nietzsche was a poet, cultural critic, and philosopher, also as possessor of among the most gifted minds in human history. The German thinker'southward organisation of ideas would have a profound impact on the Western World, contributing deeply to intellectual soapbox both during and subsequently his life. Writing on an enormous breadth of subjects, from history, organized religion and science to art, culture and the tragedies of Greek and Roman Artifact, Nietzsche wrote with savage wit and a honey of irony. He used these forces to pen deconstructive examinations of truth, Christian morality, and the impact of social constructs on our formulation of moral values. Also essential to Nietzshe's writing is articulation of the crunch of nihilism, the basic idea that all things lack meaning, including life itself. This idea in particular would remain an important component of the existentialist and surrealist movements that followed.

Nietzsche's Big Ideas

  • Favored perspectivism, which held that truth is non objective merely is the consequence of various factors effecting individual perspective;
  • Articulated ethical dilemma every bit a tension between the master vs. slave morality; the one-time in which we make decisions based on the assessment of consequences, and the latter in which we brand decisions based on our conception of good vs. evil;
  • Believed in the private'south creative chapters to resist social norms and cultural convention in order to alive co-ordinate to a greater set of virtues.

Nietzsche'south Key Works

  • The Nativity of Tragedy (1872)
  • The Gay Science (1882)
  • On the Genealogy of Morals and Ecce Human (1887, 1908)

sixteen. Plato (428/427?–348/347? BCE)

Greek philosopher and instructor Plato did nothing less than establish the first institution of college learning in the Western World, establishing the Academy of Athens and cementing his own status equally the most important effigy in the development of western philosophical tradition. As the pupil of Socrates and the mentor to Aristotle, Plato is the connecting effigy in what might be termed the great triumvirate of Greek idea in both philosophy and science. A quote past British philosopher Alfred N Whitehead sums upwards the enormity of his influence, noting "the safest general characterization of the European philosophical tradition is that it consists of a series of footnotes to Plato." Indeed, it could exist argued that Plato founded political philosophy, introducing both the dialectic and dialogic forms of writing as means to explore various areas of thought. (Frequently, in his dialogues, he employed his mentor Socrates as the vessel for his own thoughts and ideas.) While he was non the get-go private to partake of the activeness of philosophy, he was perhaps the first to truly define what it meant, to articulate its purpose, and to reveal how it could be applied with scientific rigor. This orientation provided a newly concreted framework for considering questions of ideals, politics, knowledge, and theology. Such is to say that it is about incommunicable to sum up the bear upon of Plato's ideas on scientific discipline, ethics, mathematics, or the evolution of thought itself other than to say it has been total, permeating, and inexorable from the tradition of rigorous thinking itself.

Plato's Big Ideas

  • Expressed the view, often referred to equally Platonism, that those whose behavior are express but to perception are declining to achieve a higher level of perception, 1 available only to those who can come across beyond the material world;
  • Articulated the theory of forms, the belief that the fabric world is an apparent and constantly changing world merely that some other, invisible world provides unchanging causality for all that nosotros do meet;
  • Held the foundational epistemological view of "justified true conventionalities," that for ane to know that a proposition is true, one must take justification for the relevant true proposition.

Plato's Primal Works

  • The Commonwealth (380 BCE)
  • The Laws (348 BCE)
  • Plato: Complete Works

17. Jean-Jacques Rousseau (1712–78)

Rousseau was a writer, philosopher, and — unique among entrants on this list — a composer of operas and classical compositions. Born in Geneva, then a city-country in the Swiss Confederacy, Rousseau would exist one of the most consequential thinkers of the Enlightenment era. His ideas on homo morality, inequality, and about chiefly, on the right to rule, would have an enormous and definable bear upon non just on thinking in Europe, only on the actual power dynamics inside Western Civilisation. Indeed, his most important works would identify personal property as the root to inequality and would abnegate the premise that monarchies are divinely appointed to dominion. Rousseau proposed the earth-shattering idea that just the people take a true right to rule. These ideas fomented the French Revolution, and more broadly, helped bring an cease to a centuries-old entanglement between Church, Crown, and Country. Rousseau may be credited for providing a basic framework for classical republicanism, a form of authorities centered around the ideas of civil society, citizenship, and mixed governance.

Rousseau's Big Ideas

  • Suggested that Man was at his best in a primitive state — suspended between animate being animalistic urges on 1 end of the spectrum and the decadence of culture on the other — and therefore uncorrupted in his morals;
  • Suggested that the further we deviate from our "country of nature," the closer we move to the "decay of the species," an idea that comports with modern environmental and conservationist philosophies;
  • Wrote extensively on education and, in advocating for an teaching that emphasizes the development of individual moral character, is sometimes credited as an early proponent of child-centered didactics.

Rousseau'southward Key Works

  • A Discourse on Inequality) (1754)
  • The Social Contract (1762)
  • Emile: Or On Educational activity (1762)

eighteen. Jean-Paul Sartre (1905–80)

A French novelist, activist, and philosopher, Sartre was a leading exponent of the 20th century existentialist move as well as a vocal proponent of Marxism and socialism. He advocated for resistance to oppressive social constructs and argued for the importance of achieving an authentic way of being. His writing coincided with, and assorted, the sweep of fascism through Europe, the rise of disciplinarian regimes, and the spread of Nazism. Sartre's ideas took on increased importance during this time, every bit did his actions. Sartre became active in the socialist resistance, which aimed its activities at French Nazi collaborators. Of annotation, one of his activist collaborators was both a romantic partner and a fellow major cohort of existentialism, Simone de Beauvoir. Following the state of war, Sartre'due south writing and political date centered on efforts at anticolonialism, including involvement in the resistance to French colonization of Algeria. In fact, his involvement earned Sartre two near-miss bomb attacks at the hands of French paramilitary forces. Likewise notable, Sartre was supportive of the Soviet Wedlock throughout his lifetime. Though occasionally serving to raise issues regarding human rights abuses as an outside observer, he praised the Soviet Wedlock'due south attempt at manifesting Marxism.

Sartre'southward Big Ideas

  • Believed that human beings are "condemned to be free," that considering there is no Creator who is responsible for our actions, each of us alone is responsible for everything we do;
  • Called for the feel of "death consciousness," an understanding of our mortality that promotes an authentic life, one spent in search of feel rather than knowledge;
  • Argued that the existence of complimentary will is in fact evidence of the universe's indifference to the private, an analogy that our freedom to act toward objects is essentially meaningless and therefore of no consequence to be intervened upon by the earth.

Sartre's Fundamental Works

  • Existence and Pettiness (1943)
  • Existentialism Is a Humanism (1946)
  • Critique of Dialectical Reason, Volume Ane (1960)

19. Socrates (470–399 BCE)

A necessary inclusion by virtue of his role equally, essentially, the founder of Western Philosophy, Socrates is all the same unique among entrants on this list for having produced no written works reflecting his cardinal ideas or principles. Thus, the trunk of his thoughts and ideas is left to exist deciphered through the works of his 2 most prominent students, Plato and Xenophon, also as to the legions of historians and critics who have written on him since. The classical Greek thinker is all-time known through Plato's dialogues, which reveal a primal contributor to the fields of ethics and teaching. And because Socrates is best known as a instructor of thought and insight, it is peradventure appropriate that his nigh widely recognized contribution is a way of approaching teaching that remains fundamentally relevant even today. The and then-called Socratic Method, which involves the utilize of of questioning and soapbox to promote open up dialogue on complex topics and to lead pupils to their own insights, is on detail display in the Ideal dialogues. His inquisitive arroyo besides positioned him as a central social and moral critic of the Athenian leadership, which ultimately led to his trial and execution for corrupting the minds of immature Athenians.

Socrates' Big Ideas

  • Argued that Athenians were wrong-headed in their emphasis on families, careers, and politics at the expense of the welfare of their souls;
  • Is sometimes attributed the statement "I know that I know null," to announce an awareness of his ignorance, and in general, the limitations of homo knowledge;
  • Believed misdeeds were a consequence of ignorance, that those who engaged in nonvirtuous behavior did then considering they didn't know any better.

Socrates' Key Works

  • Early Socratic Dialogues

xx. Ludwig Wittgenstein (1889–1951)

Born in Austria to a wealthy family, Wittgenstein is ane of philosophy'south more colorful and unusual characters. He lived a life of eccentricity and professional person nomadism, dabbling in academia, military service, teaching, and even every bit a hospital orderly. Moreover, during his life, he wrote voluminously but published only a unmarried manuscript. And yet, he was recognized past his contemporaries as a genius. The posthumous publication of his many volumes confirmed this view for future generations, ultimately rendering Wittgenstein a towering figure in the areas of logic, semantics, and the philosophy of mind. His investigations of linguistics and psychology would testify particularly revelatory, offering a distinctive window through which to newly understand the nature of meaning and the limits of man formulation.

Wittgenstein's Big Ideas

  • Argued that conceptual confusion about language is the basis for most intellectual tension in philosophy;
  • Asserted that the meaning of words presupposes our understanding of that meaning, and that our item consignment of meaning comes from the cultural and social constructs surrounding usa;
  • Resolved that because thought is inextricably tied to language, and because language is socially synthetic, we take no real inner-infinite for the realization of our thoughts, which is to say that the language of our thoughts renders our thoughts inherently socially constructed.

Wittgenstein'south Key Works

  • Tractatus Logico-Philosophicus (1921)
  • Philosophical Investigations (1953)
  • On Certainty (1969)

We hope this was enlightening for you lot. If information technology doesn't aid you ace your test, it should at least give you plenty to call back about. Past all ways, go ponder the universe, yourself, and that frail, fickle thing we telephone call the homo condition.

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