6.3 Social and Political Philosophy

Political philosophy considers the problems of governing the actually existing state, methods of influence of people’s life, methods of political straggle.

Nicole Machiavelli: death primarily with political arts and the theory of war. The wanted to look at the state and management of diplomacy and was from the point of view of the most efficient methods. He proceeded from submission of moral to politics

Thomas Moore: whose famous work utopia, stated the liquidation of private in his ideal state.

Thomaso Kampanela: in his work “The sun city”, he described an ideal state very similar to Moore’s utopia. He suggested that everyday should combine labor with education in particularly education children.

7. Philosophy of Modern Ages (17th-18th century)

• Empiricism – English philosophy of the 17^th century (Francis Bacon, Hobbes and John Lock

• Rationalism – European philosophy of the 17^th century (Descartes, Spinoza, Leipniz)

• French Philosophy of the 18^th century – Enlightenment Encyclopedic and mechanical materialism.

The main peculiarities of the modern age philosophy are:

• Philosophy was guided by science. It was inseparably linked with knowledge taken from experience practice. The importance of scientific awareness was growing.

• The problems of epistemology ( gnoseology ) in a new philosophy because as important as anthology problems

• Conflict between empiricism and rationalism were the main stream of 17^th cen. European philosophy manifested rationalism and English philosophy manifested empiricism. These 2 positions tended to the development of science from each character of science, defined man tenderness of modern age thinking. The empiricist is a philosophical position which absolutisizes sensual cognition and regards that all knowledge is derived from sensation. In empiricism actual world is taken as the source of sensation.

Francis Bacon (17^th century)

• He worked to create a complete classification of existing science and new philosophy of nature.

• He wanted to see science separated from philosophy and both from religion

• He considered that inductive logic is the main method of science

Thomas Hobbes (17^th century):

• He professed materialism

• He explained everything on the basis of mechanistic principles

• He rejected the most traditional philosophy concepts as useless abstractions.

• His philosophy was devoted to ascertaining the laws of motion

• He considered science to be based on sense experience

John Lock (17 century):

• He claimed that our knowledge is obtained purely from sense experience and is refined by reflecting upon the things that affect the senses

• Lock, compared the mind to a blank state on which experience makes and leaves it mark.

Disadvantages of empiricism

• The exuberating of the importance and role of sensation is epistemology

• The under-estimation of the value of abstraction in the theory of knowledge

• Denying of the activeness independence of thinking.

Rationalism of European Philosophy

• It was represented by Descartes, Spinoza and Leibniz

• Rationalism is from a Latin word “ratio” meaning reason in the philosophical position that a thought is a source of knowledge and the criterion of it truth.

Rene Descartes (17 century):

• Is a philosopher who placed reason first, reducing the role of experience. He was one of the founders of modern epistemology

• He was the first philosopher to bring mathematical method to bare on speculative thought

• He contended that true knowledge is not a product of experience but depends largely on our mental process

• Mathematics often serves as an ideal model of human understanding

• He gave a mathematical proof for existence of god

• His famous aphorism “I think, therefore I am”

• Descartes considered that, deductive logic is the main method of science.

Spinoza (17 century):

• He developed entire philosophy around a conception of nature in which are external infinite substance is the ultimate and immediate cause of all things identical with the religious notion of god

• This substance is the self cause, self existing cause pervades nature through and through

Leibniz (17 century):

• The whole universe is a system of enclosed or windowless monads. Each of which reflected the state of every other, according to a pre-established harmony

• He insisted the world consists of tiny elements of monads, spiritual elements of being, possession, activeness and independence

Disadvantages of Rationalism:

• The denial of the importance and the role of experience in getting universal truth knowledge

• The refusal of dialectics in the process of gaining knowledge from incomplete to entire

French Philosophy of the 18^th Century

• Was represented by Voltaire, Rousseau, Diderot, La Moultrie, Helveticas and Holbach. They resolutely fought against religion and the social political order in contemporary France.

• The creation of the French encyclopedia in the middle of the 18^th century was a major publishing event under the leadership of Voltaire, Rousseau, Diderot and Holbach

• The main streams of the 18^th century French philosophy were:

  • Deism

  • Atheism

  • Materialism

  • Utopian Socialism

Deism: From Latin word “dues” meaning god is the philosophical doctrine that reduces the role of God to a mere act of creation and held that, after the original act, God virtually withdrew and refrained from interfering in the process of nature and the ways of man.

Atheism: Philosophy of the 18^th century regarded religion as a spiritual weapon of enslaving people.

Materialism: Had common characteristics:

• It manifested materialism in a crude atheistic form

• It was based on a national science and stuck upon it deduce

• It has got mechanistic character

Utopian Socialism: Is a philosophy of the 18^th century which understood the need of revolutionary transformation of social life. The man and personal qualification depends on a environment. To remold man, to develop his positive aspect, it was necessary to transform a environment. The proclaimed society was founded on the basis of social justice and quality