At the end of the 20th century, a survey of philosophers on the big books in their field was published by Douglas Lackey (The Philosophical Forum, 1999). Interesting that the list is dominated by works in epistemology. The top ten books cited: 1. Wittgenstein, Philosophical Investigations [179 citations]2. Heidegger, Being and Time [134]3. Rawls, A […]
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Some readers of Explaining Postmodernism object that I over-interpret Kant’s skepticism. Some prefer a gentler, more objectivity-friendly Kant. So while I quote Kant a lot in making the argument that Kant’s philosophy is radically subjectivist and the critical step down the road to postmodernism—not everyone is convinced. So I am grateful to Quee Nelson for
Was Kant really that skeptical? Read More »
[Courtesy of the translator, W. H. F. Altman, here is the text of Martin Heidegger’s speech, delivered on the occasion of a 25th anniversary reunion in Konstanz, May 26-27, 1934.] Martin Heidegger, The Reunion Speech Twenty-five Years after Our Graduation, Reunion in Konstanz on May 26-27, 1934 Dear classmates! Our reunion—after twenty-five years and more—might
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Ernst Cassirer (1874-1945) was a leading neo-Kantian philosopher. He trained under Hermann Cohen (1842–1918), a founder and leader of the Marburg school of neo-Kantianism, which was perhaps the most dominant school of philosophy in the German academic world in the 19th century. Here is Cassirer’s assessment of why Kant matters to the history of socialism:
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My “Egoism in Nietzsche and Rand” was published in The Journal of Ayn Rand Studies. Here is the abstract for my 43-page study: “Philosophers Friedrich Nietzsche and Ayn Rand are often identified as strong critics of altruism and arch advocates of egoism. In this essay, Stephen Hicks argues that Nietzsche and Rand have much in
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The philosopher René Descartes in 1633: “I inquired in Leiden and Amsterdam whether Galileo’s World System was available, for I thought I’d heard that it was published in Italy last year. I was told that it had indeed been published but that all the copies had immediately been burnt at Rome, and that Galileo had
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Who are the great philosophers, and what makes them great? Episodes: The full playlist. Stephen R. C. Hicks, Ph.D., is Professor of Philosophy at Rockford University, USA, and has had visiting positions at Georgetown University in Washington, D.C., the University of Kasimir the Great in Poland, Oxford University’s Harris Manchester College in England, and Jagiellonian
“Man’s Rights” | Ayn Rand | *Philosophers, Explained* series by Professor Stephen Hicks Read More »
Friedrich Nietzsche’s 1887 Genealogy of Morals is an essentialized and more systematic presentation of themes from his 1886 Beyond Good and Evil. Here is my digest of the main line of argument of Genealogy‘s first essay: 1. Evolution and psycho-biology: Humans are an evolved bundle of inbuilt drives that assert themselves.2. The most basic drive
22 points from Nietzsche’s *Genealogy of Morals* Read More »