Documenti di Didattica
Documenti di Professioni
Documenti di Cultura
By Jadi S. Lima
A Short History of Philosophy
By Robert C. Solomon & Kathleen M. Higgins
This book is structured into four clusters of big topics that somehow related to some era:
Ancient times with its search of world order, Mediaeval periods (and some more ancient
periods of Eastern religion/philosophy) with its intimate religiousphilosophical affairs,
the Modern/Enlightenment era and the rise of modern Science and its context, and lastly
the development of Philosophy in the 20th century in close relation to the world political
social situations.
METHODOLOGY
SolomonHiggins tried to be more balanced (globalminded) in their presentation of
philosophical history by including nonEuropean perspectives as well as including
discussion of some Eastern religious or philosophical thinkers (p. viii). They also tried
not to discuss the development of philosophy as mere abstract ideas exchange, but
presenting the discussion in their broader historical context. In the first seventeen pages
SolomonHiggins explained the importance of being careful and attentive to the delicate
interaction between Philosophy, Mythology, Religion and Science, in its development in
the East as well as in the West. They said, “Philosophy is continuous with science as it is
continuous with mythology and religion, although this does not mean that these are all
the same.” (p. 17) As opposed to the standard approach taken by many of the
introductory book on philosophy, the authors did not consider the beginning of
philosophical era as an emergence from a mythological age. Both myths and philosophies
coexist and have their own unique places in human life:
“Myth involves narrative – a story – and while the characters may be fanciful, it is
the story itself that is of ultimate importance, and that story becomes especially
important when we envision ourselves as the characters. Philosophy is more
concerned with systematic theory than story; but when philosophy leaves out the
historical narrative – when it seems to leave us out of the picture altogether – the
result is too often a bare set of concepts devoid of context, falsely construed as
eternal truths.” (p. 15)
However, some biases are unavoidable (as admitted by the authors themselves). Two
examples spotted by Geertsema is their view of God in O. T. that pictured as arbitrary (p.
108) and St. Paul’s view on female sexuality as rather negative (p. 120).
ANCIENT PHILOSOPHY
The era of philosophy begin when man tried to explain the unknown by rational
explanation (logos) rather than by religious myths (mythos). Hippocrates summed up the
consciousness of the age, saying, “Men think [a disease] divine merely because they do
1
A Reading Summary
By Jadi S. Lima
not understand it. But if they called everything divine which they do not understand, why,
there would be no end of divine things.” (p. 30) The question, “Who is the first
philosopher?” is hard to settle. Although Thales is a standard answer, he did not suit one
of the most important characteristic of a philosopher: he did not supply an argument for
his statements. The first philosopher who are using rigorous argumentation to support his
(highly abstract) case was Parmenides. So, in this sense SolomonHiggins called
Parmenides as the first true philosopher. (p. 26) However, the first one who call himself a
‘philosopher’ was Pythagoras. Unfortunately, we don’t know much about his teaching
due to the secrecy of his cult.
Parmenides
Probably Parmenides’ most important contribution is his insistence that things cannot
have one characteristic and not having it at the same time. He also insists that our
common experience on reality must be an illusion. The reasoning goes on this way: Since
‘what you can speak of and think of has to be, since it can be while nothing cannot be,’
and ‘the reality as we see appears as sequence of happenings,’ while ‘series of
happenings means something becoming not itself (become another else),’ and ‘when
something becomes another thing it require us to think about ‘non being’ (or becoming)
that cannot be thought,’ therefore ‘reality as we see it cannot be (true)’. From this
reasoning Parmenides seems to deduce the existence of a true reality that is completely
different to the reality as we see it. The true reality – contradict ‘common sense’ – is
unchanging.
Apparently, what can be said to be the case of preSocratic philosophy as general, can
also be said to Parmenides as well. In his philosophy we can find these tendencies: 1)
Explain things in natural factors rather that refer to a myth, 2) Divorcing ‘true reality’
from everyday ‘appearance,’ 3) Obsession to unity of explanation, 4) Turn away from
material to immaterial forms of order, 5) Necessity of cosmic arrangement (in terms of
logos), 6) Eternality of whatever that is. (p. 34)
Plato
In Plato we still can find the gap between appearance and true reality, but in a more
explanatory function: the true reality explains appearance. Unlike with Parmenides, he
affirms concrete reality, although it is not as important as true reality behind it – because
they are changing while what makes them what they are (the universal idea) remain the
same). While with Parmenides this ideal world cannot be known, for Plato we can have a
glimpse of this true reality by means of reason/mathematics. (p. 52) Plato explained how
we can know this true reality in his theory of Form that influences the Western
philosophy for thousands of years. His theory of Form takes a mythological genre and
written in his most famous book the Republic. Although seems like very abstract and
cosmological, the Form theory in fact is a part of a discussion about a good society and
how to govern it. The ideal Republic in Plato’s book is rather similar to Athens, but some
things are strikingly different, like: it is a (benign) dictatorship by a ‘PhilosopherKing’
rather than a democracy, it is also authoritarian, hierarchical, and egalitarian. The book is
2
A Reading Summary
By Jadi S. Lima
also about a new cosmology (and theology) because the traditional Athenian cosmology
will not suit this brave new world of Plato’s republic.
Aristotle
SolomonHiggins hailed Aristotle as ‘by far the most advanced intellect of his time, and
in virtually every field.’ (p. 57) He was a cosmologist, an astronomer, a meteorologist, a
physicist, a geologist, a biologist, a psychologist, a first logician, a poet, a literary
theorist, a theoretician, a politician, a political theorist, a statesman and a tutor of
statesmen (including Alexander the Great). He summarized, revised and synthesized pre
Socratic cosmologies and cosmogonies. He is more like a scientist in terms of his
stronger tendency to observe reality than Plato. Unlike the preSocratic he has no
problem to accept the reality of change. Indeed he discovered that by inductive method
we can generalize universals from particulars. Unlike his teacher, Plato, he did not
prioritize form over matter. He agreed with Plato that the form of things is of utmost
importance, but he maintained that the form of ‘X’ is in the ‘X’ itself, not somewhere or
above it. Aristotle did not distrust the senses, but he used it to explore things. The central
feature of Aristotle’s philosophy is teleology, the purposiveness of things. He uses this
framework to explain diversity and dynamics in reality. The paradigm is biological (more
concrete and teleological), where in Plato it is mathematical (more staticabstract).
While Plato explained the reality as shadows of one perfect Form that is situated above
(out of this world), for Aristotle, in contrary, what ultimately exists is nothing other than
each individual thing of this world with each underlying substratum that has its own
properties. He makes a distinction between essential properties and accidental properties.
The previous is the property that makes ‘X’ as ‘X’, while the later is the contingent
situation of ‘X’. For example, the ‘essence of frog’ is what makes a frog a frog, but its
accidental properties as ‘young’ frog or ‘old’ frog doesn’t change the frog to be
something other than a frog. Probably this kind of cosmology makes Aristotle’s ethics to
be more practical than Plato. But, Aristotle’s ethics is elitist in nature, a life of virtue can
only be practical when one is lucky enough to be one of those free citizens of Athens
(that live their affluence upon the hard work of their slaves – another ethically disturbing
facts of Aristotle’s context).
RELIGIOUS AND MEDIAEVAL PHILOSOPHY
It is quite natural when one wants to think deeply about one’s deepest convictions, one
tends to use those tools of understanding that is available around. In the case of early
(Hellenistic) Church, it was Platonism (as in Origen and Augustine). And in the hey day
of Aristotelianism revival in Middle Ages somebody use it to think deeply about
Christian faith (as it was also done in a Islamic and Jewish context by Ibn SinaIbn Rusyd
and Moses Maimonides respectively). His name was Thomas Aquinas. He used Aristotle
to do his (Philosophical) Theology. May be the most famous among his use of
Aristotelian philosophy is the five ways to proof the existence of God. SolomonHiggins
observed that Aristotle was the first philosopher to give us the God of the philosophers –
3
A Reading Summary
By Jadi S. Lima
the concept of God that is free from anthropomorphism (p. 60) Thomas borrow the
concept of God as the prime mover (that Aristotle get from Heraclitus’ idea of flux), the
idea of prima causa, and Aristotelian idea of teleology to think rationally about Christian
faith.
The mediaeval used ‘Great Chain of beings’ as their framework to think about and
arrange their society. So, hierarchy was the main pattern of Mediaeval society. Therefore,
individuals are not the center. The center was God (and His church). In his view of
human being, our existence is determined by our (fixedgiven) human nature/telos. This
is one of the reasons that make Mediaeval hierarchy to be quite static.
Thomas also use Aristotelian framework to understand the Being of God. In God we
found the perfect Being, where Essence and Existence are one and identical. In this
impersonal term Thomas explains creation as emanation from God’s Being. It has its
difficulties because of its impersonal terms imposed on God and the continuity of
Creatorcreation that is problematic in view of Christian faith. The Bible told us about a
creation (as an artist create its artwork) of the world, and not an impersonal emanation of
a god.
Another big discussion in mediaeval times is the problem of God’s freedom/will and
God’s being/nature. Some people like Thomas sided in God’s good being where his law
coming from. Because the law is good, therefore God give it to us. In contrast, the
voluntarist (like Peter Abelard) thought that the law is good because God give it to us (or
want it to be so). The first side makes God seems like submit to something outside
Himself (that is the law or His nature), while the second side makes the law arbitrarily.
Later in Reformation, Calvin gave the solution of “Deus legibus solutus est, sed non ex
lex.” (God is free from the law, but he does not stand outside the law). May be he is
following Basil of Caesarea that refuse to make opposition between law and order.
MODERN PHILOSOPHY AND ENLIGHTENMENT
The modern focus their discussion on the process of understanding the world. They
realize many problem in the link between subject and object (epistemological in nature).
We cannot assume that the object represent themselves unproblematically in our
discussion. That is the reason why in the Classical Greek philosophy they deal with
questions about ‘What is there?’ while the modern thinker quest are clustering around the
question about the structure of mind/consciousness and its relation to the external world.
Descartes and Locke
Descartes was following the skepticism of Montaigne as his methodology to attain
certainty (although Montaigne never mean his skepticism as a way to achieve certainty).
Descartes’ project was to achieve a certain true (and universaltimelessobjective)
knowledge independent from the authority in any sense, whether it is a tradition or the
church. The first thing that he thought so important to deal with was the existence of his
self (consciousness). “Am I real? Or it is all just a dream?” Later he claim that the
4
A Reading Summary
By Jadi S. Lima
certainty are coming from the doubts itself, for the existence of a doubt require an
existence of the doubter. Cogito ergo sum. From this Descartes deduced the existence of
God and other things. We can know by way of apriori and like geometry, it is by way of
logical deduction we can build our knowledge. Descartes is often hailed as the father of
rationalism, although it is not a good term if you want to put it as opposed to empiricism
(because empiricism also used and talk about reason).
John Locke reacts critically to Descartes’ confidence on reason. (p. 194) His project was
to give an alternative explanation about how do we understand the reality. He started
empiricism that accept our sensedata as the source of knowledge. “All knowledge begins
with experience,” he said. He was going against the grain of the ‘longstanding suspicion
against the senses that had persisted in the west’. (p. 194) He tried to proof that all of our
ideas can be derived from the experiential data aposteriori. In the case of complex ideas,
we combined some simpler data into a bigger picture. Later this empirical insight was
developed radically by Berkeley and Hume.
Kant
Responding to Hume that awakened him from his ‘dogmatic slumber’, Kant produced a
highly influential epistemological system. Unlike Hume that skeptic about getting true
knowledge about our external world, Kant believes that we can know them through our
categories of understanding. But unlike Locke, Kant does not believe that our mind start
with tabula rasa. Not every knowledge came from experience. Some concepts are prior
to experience. Everybody has a category of understanding ‘built in’ within him. This
category of mind comes together with experience. It is like a reading glass that enabled us
to see, we cannot see the world without it. We share this common ‘reading glass’ with
our fellow human. There is no alternative version of this reading glass. It is necessarily
universal.
The knowledge is limited though. By way of reason, we surely cannot know some things,
like: the thing in itself (Das Ding an sich), God in His being, morality, etc. So, we can
know by a way natural world, and by other ways morality and religion. Kant put these
two things separately and developed his theories about each of these. His moral code
probably best summarized into two principle: 1) One should act on a maxim (principle)
that one can will to be universal law, and 2) One ought always act so as to treat humanity,
in oneself or in another, as an end in itself, and not as a mere means. (p. 212) Faith is
unnecessary in order to recognize this moral law, but needed to persuade our rational
mind to obey this universal moral law. Therefore the main place of religion in human life
is mainly related to morality.
Hegel
“Philosophically, Hegel greatly admired and emulated Kant, but the significance of his
philosophy went far beyond the academic battles that were then being fought in Kant’s
wake.” (p. 214) Hegel added history to the world of philosophy. So he sees philosophy
not as individual achievements, but as an organic progression toward grand perfection. It
5
A Reading Summary
By Jadi S. Lima
is not centered in each individual thinker. Hegel even break with the questions of
knowledge. Hegel decries the neglect of other questions about human history, culture, art,
ethics, religion, and happiness (p. 217) Like Aristotle (as opposed to Plato) Hegel used
organic paradigm to knowledge, and by this he reject the notion of statictimeless
knowledge. Knowledge develops, as consciousness grows. They are growing by
dialectics. Not by observation and induction/deduction alone. Knowledge for Hegel is
always mediated and situated. Even our consciousness is not common and universal
(unlike Kant). It is socially constructed (p. 218). For Hegel, concepts are always fluid and
contextual. (p. 219)
TWENTIETH CENTURY: FROM MODERN TO POSTMODERN PHILOSOPHY
Two great wars in twentieth century brought gloom and despair that affect the kind of
philosophy that gained the hearing in this century. Albert Camus, Heidegger, Sartre,
Freud, does not precisely have a flattering view on man. They are not suggest man to
commit suicide for sure. But, they don’t have much bright hope for the future either.
European philosophy following World War I was, first and foremost, a philosophy of
resentment. (p. 267) They are basically give up the view that man are a rational being.
The two world wars exposed many of the thinkers to the absurd reality of human
condition. The postmodern thinkers give up all the naivette of the rational ethicist on the
nature of man. Most of them believe that such kind of ‘nature’ is socially constructed and
have hidden powermotives.
However, in the twentieth century we still witnessing some revivals of former style of
philosophy. For example, there are some scientist of technological geeks who are still
believe in the idea of progress through reason and natural science. In psychology we are
also found some thinkers who use insight from Kierkegaard or Nietzsche in their
therapeutic method (one of those including Viktor Frankl, the founder of logotherapy).