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Philosophy is a systematic study of general and fundamental questions concerning topics like existence, reason, knowledge, value, mind, and language.It is a rational and critical inquiry that reflects on its methods and assumptions.
Some general characteristics of philosophy are widely accepted, for example, that it is a form of rational inquiry that is systematic, critical, and tends to reflect on its own methods. But such characteristics are usually too vague to give a proper definition of philosophy.
Mirroring the special composition question is the Simple Question. [1] It asks what the jointly necessary and sufficient conditions are for x to be a mereological simple. In the literature this question explicitly concerns what it is for a material object to lack proper parts, although there is no reason why similar questions cannot be asked of things from other ontological categories.
Also called humanocentrism. The practice, conscious or otherwise, of regarding the existence and concerns of human beings as the central fact of the universe. This is similar, but not identical, to the practice of relating all that happens in the universe to the human experience. To clarify, the first position concludes that the fact of human existence is the point of universal existence; the ...
Some philosophers follow Aristotle in describing metaphysics as "first philosophy", suggesting that it is the most basic inquiry upon which all other branches of philosophy depend in some way. [7] [b] Immanuel Kant conceived metaphysics from the perspective of critical philosophy as the study of the principles underlying all human thought and ...
Influenced by Kant's philosophy, Georg Wilhelm Friedrich Hegel (1770–1831) linked ontology and logic. He said that being and thought are identical and examined their foundational structures. [202] Arthur Schopenhauer (1788–1860) rejected Hegel's philosophy and proposed that the world is an expression of a blind and irrational will. [203]
Philosophy is the study of general and fundamental problems concerning matters such as existence, knowledge, values, reason, mind, and language. [1] [2] It is distinguished from other ways of addressing fundamental questions (such as mysticism, myth) by being critical and generally systematic and by its reliance on rational argument. [3]
Philosophy has almost as many definitions as there have been philosophers, both as a subject matter and an activity, and no simple definition can do it justice. The issue of the definition of philosophy is thus a controversial subject that is nowadays tackled by Metaphilosophy (or the philosophy of philosophy).