CONTEMPORARY PERIOD

19th-20th
Century
Philosophy
PHILOSOPHY IN THE 19TH CENTURY

Nineteenth Century Trends

Two great streams of thought run through the nineteenth

century: idealism and materialism.

Idealists argued that we can understand the ultimate nature

of reality only through and within natural human experience,
especially through those traits which distinguish man as a
spiritual being. Materialists held that there is an
independently existing world, that human beings are material
entities like everything else, that the human mind does not
exist independently of the human body, that there is no God
or other non-material being, and that all forms and
behaviours are ultimately reducible to general physical laws. 
PHILOSOPHY IN THE 19TH CENTURY

Influences from the late Enlightenment

The last third of the 18th century produced a host of ideas and
works which would both systematize previous philosophy, and
present a deep challenge to the basis of how philosophy had
been systematized. Immanuel Kant is a name that most would
mention as being among the most important of influences, as
is Jean-Jacques Rousseau.
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 was forced to argue that we do not see true reality, nor
do we speak of it. All we know of reality is appearances.
PHILOSOPHICAL SCHOOLS AND TENDENCIES
(19TH CENTURY)

German Idealism

-A philosophical movement that emerged in Germany in

the late 18th and early 19th centuries. It began as a
reaction to Immanuel Kant's Critique of Pure Reason
and it was closely linked with both Romanticism and the
revolutionary politics of the Enlightenment. 

German idealism is remarkable for its systematic

treatment of all the major parts of philosophy, including
logic, metaphysics and epistemology, moral and political
philosophy, and aesthetics.
PHILOSOPHICAL SCHOOLS AND TENDENCIES
(19TH CENTURY)

German Idealism
Kant thought this system could be derived from a
small set of interdependent principles. Fichte,
Schelling, and Hegel were, more radical. Inspired
by Karl Leonhard Reinhold, they attempted to
derive all the different parts of philosophy from a
single, first principle which came to be known
as the absolute, because the absolute, or
unconditional, must precede all the principles
which are conditioned by the difference between
one principle and another.
JOHANN GOTTLIEB FICHTE

“A man can do what

he ought to do; and
when he says he
cannot, it is because
he will not.”
 JOHANN GOTTLIEB FICHTE

A German philosopher who became a founding

figure of the philosophical movement known
as German Idealism

Initially considered one of Kant's most talented

followers, Fichte developed his own system of
transcendental philosophy, the so-
called Wissenschaftslehre. The usual English
translations of this term, are "science of
knowledge," "doctrine of science," or "theory
 JOHANN GOTTLIEB FICHTE
Arguments
Fichte argued that self-consciousness was a social
phenomenon — an important step and perhaps the
first clear step taken in this direction by modern
philosophy. A necessary condition of every subject's
self-awareness is the existence of other rational
subjects. These others call or summon the subject or
self out of its unconsciousness and into an
awareness of itself as a free individual.
Fichte achieved fame for originating the argument
that consciousness is not grounded
 JOHANN GOTTLIEB FICHTE
Arguments
Fichte's account proceeds from the general
principle that the I, must posit itself as an individual
in order to posit itself at all, and that in order to
posit itself as an individual it must recognize itself
as it were to a calling or summons by other free
individual(s) — to limit its own freedom out of
respect for the freedom of the other. The same
condition applied and applies, to the other(s) in its
development. Hence, mutual recognition of rational
individuals turns out to be a condition necessary for
the individual I in general. This argument
JOHANN GOTTLIEB FICHTE

Diagram of Fichte's absolute ego.mp4

FRIEDRICH WILHELM JOSEPH
SCHELLING
 FRIEDRICH WILHELM JOSEPH
SCHELLING

Johann Gottlieb Fichte, was his mentor in his

early years, and Georg Wilhelm Friedrich
Hegel was his former university roommate,
early friend, and later rival.

Schelling's philosophy constituted a unique

form of Idealism, known as Aesthetic
Idealism. He believed that, in art, the
opposition between subjectivity
and objectivity is sublimated, and
all contradictions (between knowledge and
 FRIEDRICH WILHELM JOSEPH
SCHELLING

Schelling's continuing importance today relates

mainly to three aspects of his work. The first is
his Naturphilosophie, which opens up the
possibility of a modern interpretation of nature
that does not restrict nature's significance to
what can be established about it in scientific
terms. The second is his anti-Cartesian
account of subjectivity, which prefigures some
of the most influential ideas of several thinkers,
in showing how the thinking subject cannot be
fully transparent to itself. The third is his later
critique of Hegelian Idealism, which
 FRIEDRICH WILHELM JOSEPH
SCHELLING

Naturphilosophie
Schelling held that the divisions imposed on
nature, by our ordinary perception and thought,
do not have absolute validity. They should be
interpreted as the outcome of the single
formative energy which is the soul or inner
aspect of nature.

The function of Schelling's Naturphilosophie is to

exhibit the ideal as springing from the real. The
change which experience brings before us leads
 FRIEDRICH WILHELM JOSEPH
SCHELLING

Naturphilosophie
The dynamical series of stages in nature are
matter, as the equilibrium of the fundamental
expansive and contractive forces; light, with its
subordinate processes (magnetism, electricity,
and chemical action); organism, with its
component phases of reproduction, irritability
and sensibility. The continual change presented
to us by experience, taken together with the
thought of unity in productive force of nature,
FRIEDRICH WILHELM JOSEPH
SCHELLING

Schelling's Naturphilosophie.mp4
GEORG WILHELM FRIEDRICH HEGEL
GEORG WILHELM FRIEDRICH HEGEL

• was a German philosopher and an important

figure of German idealism. He achieved wide
renown in his day and, while primarily influential
within the continental tradition of philosophy, has
become increasingly influential in
the analytic tradition as well.

• Hegel's principal achievement is his development

of a distinctive articulation of idealism sometimes
termed "absolute idealism",  in which the dualisms
of, for instance, mind and nature and subject and 
object are overcome. 
GEORG WILHELM FRIEDRICH HEGEL

Philosophical Work
Freedom
Hegel's thinking can be understood as a constructive
development within the broad tradition that includes 
Plato and Immanuel Kant and other thinkers as well,
who regard freedom or self-determination both as
real and as having
important ontological implications, for soul or mind
or divinity. This focus on freedom is what generates
Plato's notion (in the Phaedo, Republic, and Timaeus)
of the soul as having a higher or fuller kind of reality
than inanimate objects possess.
GEORG WILHELM FRIEDRICH HEGEL

Philosophical Work

In his Phenomenology of Spirit and his 

Science of Logic, Hegel's concern with Kantian
topics such as freedom and morality, and with
their ontological implications, is in general,
freedom versus nature, Hegel aims to
incorporate it within "true infinity", the
"Concept“, "Spirit," and "ethical life" in such a
way that the Kantian duality is rendered
understandable.
GEORG WILHELM FRIEDRICH HEGEL

Phenomenology of Spirit

Hegel asserts that the mind does not immediately grasp

the objects in the world, concurring with Kant, who said
that knowledge is not knowledge of “things-in-
themselves,” or of pure inputs from the senses.
Hegel argues that a collective component to knowledge
also exists. In fact, according to Hegel, tension always
exists between an individual’s unique knowledge of things
and the need for universal concepts—two movements that
represent the first and second of the three so-called
modes of consciousness; meaning, perception, and
understanding.
GEORG WILHELM FRIEDRICH HEGEL

Phenomenology of Spirit
Self-Consciousness

“One becomes aware of oneself by seeing oneself through

the eyes of another.”

Hegel speaks of the “struggle for recognition” implied in

self-consciousness. This struggle is between two opposing
tendencies arising in self-consciousness—between, on one
hand, the moment when the self and the other come
together, which makes self-consciousness possible, and,
on the other hand, the moment of difference arising when
one is conscious of the “otherness” of other selves vis-à-
vis oneself, and vice versa. 
GEORG WILHELM FRIEDRICH HEGEL

Phenomenology of Spirit
Master-Slave Dialectic
One of the important and famous ideas introduced by
Hegel in his The Phenomenology of Spirit is the idea of
master-slave dialectic, relationship or dynamics.
In this relationship, the recognition of selfhood and freedom
both in oneself and the other were divided between two
consciousness; the master, who recognizes freedom and
selfhood only in himself and the slave, who recognizes freedom
and self only in the master.
Thus, the images of the master and slave may be interpreted as
metaphors for positions in which we all find ourselves throughout
life—sometimes as the objectified slave, sometimes as the
GEORG WILHELM FRIEDRICH HEGEL

Elements of the Philosophy of Right

-it is an expansion upon concepts only briefly dealt with in
the Encyclopedia of the Philosophical Sciences, published in
1817.

The Philosophy of Right begins with a discussion of the

concept of the free will and argues that the free will can
only realize itself in the complicated social context
of property rights and relations, contracts, moral
commitments, family life, the economy, the legal system,
and the state. A person is not truly free, unless he is a
participant in all of these different aspects of the life of
the state.
GEORG WILHELM FRIEDRICH HEGEL

Elements of the Philosophy of Right

The bulk of the book is devoted to discussing Hegel's
three spheres or versions of ‘right’.

The first sphere is abstract right (Recht), in which Hegel

discusses the idea of 'non-interference' as a way of
respecting others. He deems this insufficient and moves
onto the second sphere, morality (Moralität). Under this,
Hegel proposes that humans reflect their own subjectivity
of others in order to respect them. The third
sphere, ethical life (Sittlichkeit), is Hegel's integration of
individual subjective feelings and universal notions of
right.
ARTHUR SCHOPENHAUER
 ARTHUR SCHOPENHAUER

-was a German philosopher. He is best

known for his 1818 work 
The World as Will and Representation,
wherein he characterizes
the phenomenal world as the product of a
blind and insatiable metaphysical will.

Schopenhauer developed
an atheistic metaphysical and ethical system
that has been described as an exemplary
manifestation of philosophical
 ARTHUR SCHOPENHAUER

The World as Will and Representation 

Schopenhauer used the word "will" as a

human's most familiar designation for the
concept that can also be signified by other
words such as "desire," "striving," "wanting,"
"effort," and "urging." Schopenhauer's
philosophy holds that all nature, including
man, is the expression of an insatiable will to
life. It is through the will that mankind finds
all their suffering. Desire for more is what
 ARTHUR SCHOPENHAUER
Schopenhauer’s Aesthetics
Aesthetic contemplation allows one to escape this
pain—although temporarily—because it stops one
perceiving the world as mere presentation. Instead,
one no longer perceives the world as an object of
perception from which one is separated; rather one
becomes one with that perception: "one can thus no
longer separate the perceiver from the perception“.

Art is the practical consequence of this brief

aesthetic contemplation as it attempts to depict one's
immersion with the world, thus tries to depict the
 ARTHUR SCHOPENHAUER

Music, for Schopenhauer, was the purest form of

art because it was the one that depicted the will
itself without it appearing as subject to the
Principle of Sufficient Grounds, therefore as an
individual object.

Schopenhauer thought that music was the only

art that did not merely copy ideas, but actually
embodied the will itself. He deemed music a
timeless, universal language comprehended
everywhere, that can imbue global enthusiasm, if
 ARTHUR SCHOPENHAUER
On the Basis of Morality
- one of his major works in ethics, where he argues that
morality stems from compassion.  

Political and Social Thought

Schopenhauer's politics were, for the most part, an echo of
his system of ethics. What was essential, he thought, was
that the state should “leave each man free to work out his
own salvation", and so long as government was limited, he
would "prefer to be ruled by a lion than one of [his] fellow
rats”

He shared the view of Thomas Hobbes on the necessity of

the state, and of state action, to check the destructive
 ARTHUR SCHOPENHAUER
Punishment
The State, Schopenhauer claimed, punishes
criminals to prevent future crimes. It does so
by placing "beside every possible motive for
committing a wrong a more powerful motive
for leaving it undone, in the inescapable
punishment. Accordingly, the criminal code is
as complete a register as possible of counter-
motives to all criminal actions that can
possibly be imagined ..."
PHILOSOPHY IN THE 19TH CENTURY

Utilitarianism

-an ethical theory that states that the best action

is the one that maximizes utility.
-generally held to be the view that the morally
right action is the action that produces the most
good. 
-distinguished by impartiality and agent-
neutrality. Everyone's happiness counts the same.
When one maximizes the good, it is the
good impartially considered.
JEREMY BENTHAM
 JEREMY BENTHAM
-was an English philosopher, jurist, and social reformer
 regarded as the founder of modern utilitarianism.

Bentham defined as the "fundamental axiom" of his philosophy

the principle that “it is the greatest happiness of the greatest
number that is the measure of right and wrong”.

He advocated for individual and economic freedoms, the 

separation of church and state, freedom of expression, equal
rights for women, the right to divorce, and the decriminalising
of homosexual acts. He called for the abolition of slavery, of
the death penalty, and of physical punishment, including that
of children. He has also become known as an early advocate of 
animal rights.
 JEREMY BENTHAM
Moral Philosophy
Bentham's moral philosophy reflects what he calls "the
greatest happiness principle" or "the principle of utility"—a
term which he borrows from Hume. Specifically, he states that
what is morally obligatory is that which produces the greatest
amount of happiness for the greatest number of people,
happiness being determined by reference to the presence of
pleasure and the absence of pain.
Bentham wrote, "By the principle of utility is meant that
principle which approves or disapproves of every action
whatsoever, according to the tendency which it appears to
have to augment or diminish the happiness of the party whose
interest is in question: or, what is the same thing in other
words, to promote or to oppose that happiness."
 JEREMY BENTHAM
Political Philosophy

For Bentham, the principles that govern morals also

govern politics and law, and political reform requires a
clear understanding of human nature.

Bentham advocated the rational revision of the legal

system, a restructuring of the process of determining
responsibility and of punishment, and a more extensive
freedom of contract. This, he believed, would favor not
only the development of the community, but the
personal development of the individual.
 JEREMY BENTHAM
Law, Liberty and Government
Bentham says that “liberty is the absence of restraint"
and so, to the extent that one is not hindered by others,
one has liberty and is "free."
Bentham holds that people have always lived in society,
and so there can be no state of nature and no "social
contract”. Nevertheless, he does note that there is an
important distinction between one's public and private
life that has morally significant consequences, and he
holds that liberty is a good—that, even though it is not
something that is a fundamental value, it reflects the
greatest happiness principle.
 JEREMY BENTHAM
Law, Liberty and Government
Bentham viewed law as "negative." Given that pleasure
and pain are fundamental to provide the standard of value
for Bentham, liberty is a good (because it is "pleasant")
and the restriction of liberty is an evil (because it is
"painful"). Law, which is by its very nature a restriction of
liberty and painful to those whose freedom is restricted, is
a prima facie evil.
Bentham recognized law as necessary to social order and
good laws are clearly essential to good government.
Indeed, Bentham saw the positive role to be played by law
and government, particularly in achieving community
well-being.
 JEREMY BENTHAM
Rights
According to Bentham, Rights are created by
the law, and law is simply a command of the
sovereign. The existence of law and rights,
therefore, requires government. Rights are
also usually correlative with duties
determined by the law and, as in Hobbes, are
either those which the law explicitly gives us
or those within a legal system where the law
is silent.
JOHN STUART MILL
 JOHN STUART MILL

-was a British philosopher, political

economist and civil servant. One of the
most influential thinkers in the history of 
liberalism, he contributed widely to 
social theory, political theory and 
political economy. Dubbed “the most
influential English-speaking philosopher of
the nineteenth century”.
Mill was a proponent of utilitarianism, an
ethical theory developed by his
 JOHN STUART MILL

A System of Logic, Ratiocinative and Inductive 

-a book by John Stuart Mill where he formulated the five principles
of inductive reasoning that are known as Mill's Methods.

The Methods
1. Direct method of agreement
If two or more instances of the phenomenon under investigation
have only one circumstance in common, the circumstance in which
alone all the instances agree, is the cause (or effect) of the given
phenomenon. -A System of Logic, Vol. 1. 1843. p. 454.
Symbolically, the method of agreement can be represented as:
A B C D occur together with w x y z
A E F G occur together with w t u v
Therefore A is the cause, or the effect, of w.
 JOHN STUART MILL

A System of Logic, Ratiocinative and Inductive 

2. Method of difference
If an instance in which the phenomenon under investigation
occurs, and an instance in which it does not occur, have every
circumstance save one in common, that one occurring only in the
former; the circumstance in which alone the two instances differ,
is the effect, or cause, or a necessary part of the cause, of the
phenomenon. -A System of Logic, Vol. 1. 1843. p. 455.
This method is also known more generally as the most similar
systems design within comparative politics.
A B C D occur together with w x y z
B C D occur together with x y z
Therefore A is the cause, or the effect, or a part of the cause of w.
 JOHN STUART MILL

A System of Logic, Ratiocinative and Inductive 

3. Joint method of agreement and difference
If two or more instances in which the phenomenon occurs have only
one circumstance in common, while two or more instances in which
it does not occur have nothing in common save the absence of that
circumstance; the circumstance in which alone the two sets of
instances differ, is the effect, or cause, or a necessary part of the
cause, of the phenomenon. - A System of Logic, Vol. 1. 1843. p. 463.
Also called simply the "joint method, " this principle simply
represents the application of the methods of agreement and
difference.
A B C occur together with x y z
A D E occur together with x v w also B C occur with y z
Therefore A is the cause, or the effect, or a part of the cause of x.
 JOHN STUART MILL

A System of Logic, Ratiocinative and Inductive 

4. Method of residue
Subduct from any phenomenon such part as is known by previous
inductions to be the effect of certain antecedents, and the residue
of the phenomenon is the effect of the remaining antecedents. - 
A System of Logic, Vol. 1. 1843. p. 465.
If a range of factors are believed to cause a range of phenomena,
and we have matched all the factors, except one, with all the
phenomena, except one, then the remaining phenomenon can be
attributed to the remaining factor.
A B C occur together with x y z
B is known to be the cause of y
C is known to be the cause of z
Therefore A is the cause or effect of x.
 JOHN STUART MILL

A System of Logic, Ratiocinative and Inductive 

5. Method of concomitant variations
Whatever phenomenon varies in any manner whenever another
phenomenon varies in some particular manner, is either a cause or an
effect of that phenomenon, or is connected with it through some fact of
causation. - A System of Logic, Vol. 1 . 1843. p. 470.
If across a range of circumstances leading to a phenomenon, some
property of the phenomenon varies in tandem with some factor
existing in the circumstances, then the phenomenon can be associated
with that factor.
Symbolically, the method of concomitant variation can be represented
as (with ± representing a shift):
A B C occur together with x y z
A ± B C results in x ± y z
Therefore A and x are causally connected.
 JOHN STUART MILL

On Liberty
-a philosophical work by Mill, originally intended as a
short essay. The work, applies Mill's ethical system of 
utilitarianism to society and the state. Mill attempts to
establish standards for the relationship between 
authority and liberty. He emphasizes the importance of 
individuality, which he conceived as a prerequisite to
the higher pleasures—the summum bonum of
utilitarianism.
The ideas presented in On Liberty have remained the
basis of much liberal political thought. It has remained
in print continuously since its initial publication.
 JOHN STUART MILL

Utilitarianism
Mill's major contribution to utilitarianism is his argument for
the qualitative separation of pleasures. Mill argues that
intellectual and moral pleasures (higher pleasures) are
superior to more physical forms of pleasure (lower pleasures).

Mill distinguishes between happiness and contentment,

claiming that the former is of higher value than the latter, a
belief wittily encapsulated in the statement that "it is better
to be a human being dissatisfied than a pig satisfied; better to
be Socrates dissatisfied than a fool satisfied. And if the fool,
or the pig, are of a different opinion, it is because they only
know their own side of the question."
PHILOSOPHY IN THE 19TH CENTURY

Marxism
-a method of socioeconomic analysis that views class
 relations and social conflict using a 
materialist interpretation of historical development and
takes a dialectical view of social transformation.

According to Marxian theory, class conflict arises in 

capitalist societies due to contradictions between the
material interests of the oppressed proletariat—a class of
wage labourers employed by the bourgeoisie to produce
goods and services—and the bourgeoisie—the ruling class
 that owns the means of production and extract their wealth
through appropriation of the surplus product (profit)
produced by the proletariat.
PHILOSOPHY IN THE 19TH CENTURY

Marxism
This class struggle that is commonly expressed as the revolt of a
society's productive forces against its relations of production ,
results in a period of short-term crises as the bourgeoisie struggle
to manage the intensifying alienation of labor experienced by the
proletariat. This crisis culminates in a proletarian revolution and
eventually leads to the establishment of socialism—a
socioeconomic system based on social ownership of the means of
production, distribution based on one's contribution  and 
production organized directly for use . As the productive forces
continued to advance, Marx hypothesized that socialism would
ultimately transform into a communist society; a classless,
stateless, humane society based on common ownership and the
underlying principle: "
From each according to his ability, to each according to his needs ".
KARL HEINRICH MARX
 KARL HEINRICH MARX

-was a revolutionary, sociologist, historian, and

economist. He published (with Friedrich Engels) The
Communist Manifesto, the most celebrated pamphlet in
the history of the socialist movement. He also was the
author of the movement’s most important book, Das
Kapital. These writings and others by Marx and Engels
form the basis of the body of thought and belief known
as Marxism.
Marx's theories about society, economics and politics
that human societies develop through class struggle. In 
capitalism, this manifests itself in the conflict between
the ruling classes (known as the bourgeoisie) that
control the means of production and the working
 KARL HEINRICH MARX

Employing a critical approach known as 

historical materialism, Marx predicted that, like
previous socio-economic systems, capitalism produced
internal tensions which would lead to its self-
destruction and replacement by a new system: 
socialism.
For Marx, class antagonisms under capitalism, owing in
part to its instability and crisis-prone nature, would
lead to the working class' development of 
class consciousness, leading to their conquest of
political power and eventually the establishment of a
classless, communist society constituted by a 
free association of producers. Marx actively pressed for
 KARL HEINRICH MARX
Marxian economics, or the Marxian school of
economics
-a school of economic thought tracing its
foundations to the critique of classical 
political economy first expounded upon by 
Karl Marx and Friedrich Engels. Marxian
economics refers to several different theories and
includes multiple schools of thought which are
sometimes opposed to each other. 
Marxian economics concerns itself variously with
the analysis of crisis in capitalism, the role and
distribution of the surplus product and 
FRIEDRICH ENGLES
 FRIEDRICH ENGLES

German socialist philosopher, the

closest collaborator of Karl Marx in the foundation of
modern communism. They co-authored The
Communist Manifesto(1848).

Engels founded Marxist theory together with 

Karl Marx and in 1845 published 
The Condition of the Working Class in England , based
on personal observations and research in Manchester.

Engels edited the second and third volumes of Das

Kapital after Marx’s death.
 FRIEDRICH ENGLES
Major Works
The Condition of the Working Class in England (1845)
-a detailed description and analysis of the appalling conditions of the
working class in Britain during Engels's stay in Manchester and Salford. It
contains seminal thoughts on the state of socialism and its development. It
was considered a classic in its time and must have been an eye-opener for
most Germans.
Herr Eugen Dühring's Revolution in Science (1878)
-is a detailed critique of the philosophical positions of Eugen Dühring, a
German philosopher and critic of Marxism. In the course of replying to
Dühring, Engels reviews recent advances in science and mathematics
seeking to demonstrate the way in which the concepts of dialectics apply
to natural phenomena.
The Origin of the Family, Private Property and the State (1884)
-a work connecting capitalism with what Engels argues is an ever-changing
institution – the family. It contains a historical view of the family in relation
PHILOSOPHY IN THE 19TH CENTURY

Existentialism

a tradition of philosophical inquiry associated

mainly with certain 19th and 20th-century 
European philosophers who, despite profound
doctrinal differences, [ shared the belief that
philosophical thinking begins with the human
subject—not merely the thinking subject, but
the acting, feeling, living human individual. 
PHILOSOPHY IN THE 19TH CENTURY

Existentialism

According to existentialism:
(1)Existence is always particular and individual—
always my existence, your existence, his existence, her existence.
(2)Existence is primarily the problem of existence (i.e., of its mode
of being); it is, therefore, also the investigation of the meaning of
Being.
(3)That investigation is continually faced with diverse possibilities,
from among which the existent (i.e., the human individual) must
make a selection, to which he must then commit himself.
(4)Because those possibilities are constituted by the individual’s
relationships with things and with other humans, existence is
always a being-in-the-world—i.e., in a concrete and historically
determinate situation that limits or conditions choice. 
PHILOSOPHY IN THE 19TH CENTURY

Existentialism
With respect to the first point, that existence is particular,
existentialism is opposed to any doctrine that views human beings as
the manifestation of an absolute or of an infinite substance.
Second, it is opposed to any doctrine that sees in human beings some
given and complete reality that must be resolved into its elements in
order to be known or contemplated.
Third, existentialism is opposed to any form of necessitarianism; for
existence is constituted by possibilities from among which the
individual may choose and through which he can project himself.
And, finally, with respect to the fourth point, existentialism is opposed
to any solipsism(holding that I alone exist) or any epistemological
idealism (holding that the objects of knowledge are mental), because
existence, always extends beyond itself, toward the being of those
entities; it is, so to speak, transcendence.
SØREN KIERKEGAARD
 SØREN KIERKEGAARD

-Danish philosopher, theologian, and cultural critic

who was a major influence on existentialism and
Protestant theology in the 20th century. 
Søren Kierkegaard is generally considered to have
been the first existentialist philosopher, though he did
not use the term existentialism. He proposed that
each individual—not society or religion—is solely
responsible for giving meaning to life and living it
passionately and sincerely, or "authentically".
Kierkegaard sought to reintroduce to philosophy, in
the spirit of Socrates: subjectivity, commitment, faith,
and passion, all of which are a part of the 
 SØREN KIERKEGAARD

He attacked the literary, philosophical, and 

ecclesiastical establishments of his day for
misrepresenting the highest task of human existence
—namely, becoming oneself in an ethical and religious
sense—as something so easy that it could seem
already accomplished even when it had not even been
undertaken. 

Positively, the heart of his work lay in the infinite

requirement and strenuous difficulty of religious
existence in general and Christian faith in particular.
 SØREN KIERKEGAARD

Philosophy and Theology

Kierkegaard has been called a philosopher, a
theologian, the Father of Existentialism, both atheistic
 and theistic variations, a literary critic, a social
theorist, a humorist, a psychologist, and a poet. 
Two of his influential ideas are "subjectivity", and the
notion popularly referred to as "leap of faith" which is
his conception of how an individual would believe in
God or how a person would act in love. Faith is not a
decision based on evidence that, say, certain beliefs
about God are true or a certain person is worthy of
love. No such evidence could ever be enough to
 SØREN KIERKEGAARD

Philosophy and Theology

Kierkegaard thought that to have faith is at the same
time to have doubt. So, for example, for one to truly
have faith in God, one would also have to doubt one's
beliefs about God; the doubt is the rational part of a
person's thought involved in weighing evidence,
without which the faith would have no real substance.
Someone who does not realize that Christian doctrine
is inherently doubtful and that there can be no
objective certainty about its truth does not have faith
but is merely credulous. For example, it takes no faith
to believe that a pencil or a table exists, when one is
looking at it and touching it. In the same way, to
 SØREN KIERKEGAARD

Philosophy and Theology

Kierkegaard has been called a philosopher, a
theologian, the Father of Existentialism, both atheistic
 and theistic variations, a literary critic, a social
theorist, a humorist, a psychologist, and a poet. 
Two of his influential ideas are "subjectivity", and the
notion popularly referred to as "leap of faith" which is
his conception of how an individual would believe in
God or how a person would act in love. Faith is not a
decision based on evidence that, say, certain beliefs
about God are true or a certain person is worthy of
love. No such evidence could ever be enough to
FRIEDRICH NIETZSCHE
 FRIEDRICH NIETZSCHE

German classical scholar, philosopher, and critic

of culture, who became one of the most-influential
of all modern thinkers. 
His attempts to unmask the motives that underlie
traditional Western religion, morality, and
philosophy deeply affected generations of
theologians, philosophers, psychologists, poets,
novelists, and playwrights. 
He thought through the consequences of the
triumph of the Enlightenment’s secularism,
expressed in his observation that “God is dead,” in a
 FRIEDRICH NIETZSCHE
Philosophy
Apollonian and Dionysian
-a two-fold philosophical concept, based on certain features of
ancient Greek mythology: Apollo and Dionysus.

Apollo represents harmony, progress, clarity and logic, whereas

Dionysus represents disorder, intoxication, emotion and ecstasy.
Nietzsche used these two forces because, for him, the world of
mind and order on one side, and passion and chaos on the other
formed principles that were fundamental to the Greek culture
: the Apollonian side being a dreaming state, full of illusions;
and Dionysian being the state of intoxication, representing the
liberations of instinct and dissolution of boundaries.
The relationship between the Apollonian and Dionysian
juxtapositions is apparent, in the interplay of tragedy: the tragic
 FRIEDRICH NIETZSCHE
Major Works
’Thus Spoke Zarathustra’, one of Nietzsche’s most
celebrated works, records the imaginary travels and
speeches of Zarathustra, a namesake of Zaraϑuštra,
the founder of Zoroastrianis. The works elaborates
ideas like "eternal recurrence of the same", "death of
God", and the "prophecy" of the Übermensch, already
introduced in his previous works.
'Twilight of the Idols' is another of Nietzsche’s
important works. In it, he not only criticized the
German culture of that time as rather crude and
nihilistic, but also the British, French and Italian
personalities, who possessed similar views. Instead he