Modern Philosophy Kant to the Present

Episode 2

THE HISTORY OF PHILOSOPHY Modern Philosophy: Kant to the Present (1970) Leonard Peikoff Lecture 1. The Historical Background • A summary of those issues of Ancient and Early Modern Philosophy is essential for an understanding of recent philosophic trends. Lectures 2–3. Aristotelian Logic Banished From Philosophy • The father of contemporary philosophy: Immanuel Kant. • The Kantian revolution in philosophy—the analytic-synthetic dichotomy—Kant’s famous argument: the“deduction of the categories”—reality as unknowable“things-in-themselves”—the phenomenal and noumenal worlds. • Kant’s ethics: the morality of duty—the attack on happiness—the Categorical Imperative—the right to have faith in “God, freedom and immortality.” Lecture 4. A New “Logic” Leads to an Old Politics. . . • The philosophy of Hegel. • Reality as a dialectic process—the absolute—the coherence theory of truth—Hegel’sphilosophyof history—Hegel’s concept of freedom—the absolutist state. Lecture 5. . . . and to an Epidemic of Irrationalism • 19th-century German romanticism: Schopenhauer, Nietzsche, and Marx. • Schopenhauer: the metaphysics of the Will—the irrationality of the universe—Nirvana. • Nietzsche: the philosophy of Power—the attack on Christianity—the superman—“Beyond Good and Evil.” • Marx: Communism—romanticism unites with materialism: dialectical materialism—the economic interpretation of history—advocacy of world revolution. Lecture 6. The Virus Reaches the Defenders of Science and Capitalism • French and British philosophy of the19th century: Comte, J.S. MillandSpencer. • Comte: the philosophy of Positivism—the morality of service to Humanity, the origin of the term “altruism.” • Mill: Utilitarianism, “the greatest happiness of the greatest number”—a collectivist defense of capitalism. • Spencer: reality as unknowable—Social Darwinism. Lectures 7–8. Truth, Logic, Concepts, and Values are Formally Divorced from Reality • The philosophy of Pragmatism. • The Pragmatic theory of meaning: C.S. Peirce—of truth: William James—Pragmatism fully developed: the instrumentalism of John Dewey—Pragmatism in ethics, politics, and education.Logical Positivism. • The epistemology of Logical Positivism: Schlick, Carnap, ReichenbackandAyer. • The linguistic theory of logic—the attack on conceptual knowledge: the verifiability theory of meaning—knowledge as a mere probability—the rejection of metaphysics. Lecture 9. Language Is Formally Divorced from Reality: Philosophy Disintegrates • The current trend in Britain and America: TheAnalysts. • Philosophy as the analysis of propositions: G. E. Moore—some analyses by Bertrand Russell—OrdinaryLanguage Analysis: the later Wittgenstein and his followers—Analyst (and Logical Positivist) ethics: the emotive theory of ethics and its heirs. Lecture 10. Nausea Becomes a Metaphysical Emotion • The philosophy of Existentialism: Dostoevsky, Kierkegaard, Heidegger, and Sartre. • The rejection of reason—the absurdity and unintelligibility of the universe—the Existentialist concept of free will— Death and Nothingness—fear, trembling, and dread. • Zen Buddhism. Lectures 11–12. Man Finds His Defender: The Philosophy of Objectivism • ThephilosophyofAyn Randin relation to the history of Western philosophy. • Theprimacyof existence vs. the primacy of consciousness—the Law of Identity in metaphysics and epistemology— the distinction between the subjective, the intrinsic, and the objective—the Objectivist theory of concept-formation— the derivation of the Objectivist ethics and politics from its metaphysics and epistemology podcast, please have fun listening and give feedback :)

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Modern Philosophy Kant to the Present