An Attempt at a Critique of All Revelation (German : Versuch einer Critik [1] aller Offenbarung; 1792) was the first published work by Johann Gottlieb Fichte. Fichte went to visit Immanuel Kant on 4 July 1791 and his first interview did not go well[ vague ], so he wrote An Attempt at a Critique of All Revelation in order to impress him. An impressed Kant then asked his publisher to print it. [2] It was briefly mistaken by the public to be a fourth Critique by Kant, as the work was initially published with no author or preface. [2] After Fichte was revealed as the book's author, Fichte received praise and attention in the world of German philosophy. [2]
In this work, Fichte argued that any revelation in relation to God must be consistent with morality, which was against many aspects of orthodox Christian belief at the time. [3]
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Johann Gottlieb Fichte was a German philosopher who became a founding figure of the philosophical movement known as German idealism, which developed from the theoretical and ethical writings of Immanuel Kant. Recently, philosophers and scholars have begun to appreciate Fichte as an important philosopher in his own right due to his original insights into the nature of self-consciousness or self-awareness. Fichte was also the originator of thesis–antithesis–synthesis, an idea that is often erroneously attributed to Hegel. Like Descartes and Kant before him, Fichte was motivated by the problem of subjectivity and consciousness. Fichte also wrote works of political philosophy; he has a reputation as one of the fathers of German nationalism.
Immanuel Kant was a German philosopher and one of the central Enlightenment thinkers. Born in Königsberg, Kant's comprehensive and systematic works in epistemology, metaphysics, ethics, and aesthetics have made him one of the most influential and controversial figures in modern Western philosophy. He has been called the "father of modern ethics", the "father of modern aesthetics", and for bringing together rationalism and empiricism has earned the title of "father of modern philosophy".
Friedrich Wilhelm Joseph Schelling, later von Schelling, was a German philosopher. Standard histories of philosophy make him the midpoint in the development of German idealism, situating him between Johann Gottlieb Fichte, his mentor in his early years, and Georg Wilhelm Friedrich Hegel, his one-time university roommate, early friend, and later rival. Interpreting Schelling's philosophy is regarded as difficult because of its evolving nature.
Friedrich Daniel Ernst Schleiermacher was a German Reformed theologian, philosopher, and biblical scholar known for his attempt to reconcile the criticisms of the Enlightenment with traditional Protestant Christianity. He also became influential in the evolution of higher criticism, and his work forms part of the foundation of the modern field of hermeneutics. Because of his profound effect on subsequent Christian thought, he is often called the "Father of Modern Liberal Theology" and is considered an early leader in liberal Christianity. The neo-orthodoxy movement of the twentieth century, typically seen to be spearheaded by Karl Barth, was in many ways an attempt to challenge his influence. As a philosopher he was a leader of German Romanticism. Schleiermacher is considered the most important Protestant theologian between John Calvin and Karl Barth.
Johann Augustus Eberhard was a German theologian and "popular philosopher".
Jakob Friedrich Fries was a German post-Kantian philosopher and mathematician.
Friedrich Heinrich Jacobi was an influential German philosopher, literary figure, and socialite. He is notable for popularizing nihilism, a term coined by Obereit in 1787, and promoting it as the prime fault of Enlightenment thought particularly in the philosophical systems of Baruch Spinoza, Immanuel Kant, Johann Fichte and Friedrich Schelling.
German idealism is a philosophical movement that emerged in Germany in the late 18th and early 19th centuries. It developed out of the work of Immanuel Kant in the 1780s and 1790s, and was closely linked both with Romanticism and the revolutionary politics of the Enlightenment. The period of German idealism after Kant is also known as post-Kantian idealism or simply post-Kantianism. One scheme divides German idealists into transcendental idealists, associated with Kant and Fichte, and absolute idealists, associated with Schelling and Hegel.
Johann Georg Hamann was a German Lutheran philosopher from Königsberg known as "the Wizard of the North" who was one of the leading figures of post-Kantian philosophy. His work was used by his student J. G. Herder as the main support of the Sturm und Drang movement, and is associated with the Counter-Enlightenment and Romanticism.
The Critique of Practical Reason is the second of Immanuel Kant's three critiques, published in 1788. Hence, it is sometimes referred to as the "second critique". It follows on from Kant's first critique, the Critique of Pure Reason, and is one of his major works on moral philosophy. While Kant had already published one significant work in moral philosophy, the Groundwork of the Metaphysics of Morals (1785), the Critique of Practical Reason was intended to develop his account of the will as determinable by the moral law alone, place his ethical views within the larger framework of his system of critical philosophy, and expand on certain themes in his moral philosophy such as the feeling of respect for the moral law and the concept of the highest good.
Karl Leonhard Reinhold was an Austrian philosopher who helped to popularise the work of Immanuel Kant in the late 18th century. His "elementary philosophy" (Elementarphilosophie) also influenced German idealism, notably Johann Gottlieb Fichte, as a critical system grounded in a fundamental first principle.
Georg Hermes was a German Roman Catholic theologian who advocated a rational approach to theology. During his lifetime, his theology was greatly in vogue in Germany, but declined after the posthumous papal condemnation of "Hermesianism" by Pope Gregory XVI.
Naturphilosophie is a term used in English-language philosophy to identify a current in the philosophical tradition of German idealism, as applied to the study of nature in the earlier 19th century. German speakers use the clearer term Romantische Naturphilosophie, the philosophy of nature developed at the time of the founding of German Romanticism. It is particularly associated with the philosophical work of Friedrich Wilhelm Joseph Schelling and Georg Wilhelm Friedrich Hegel—though it has some clear precursors also. More particularly it is identified with some of the initial works of Schelling during the period 1797–9, in reaction to the views of Fichte, and subsequent developments from Schelling's position. Always controversial, some of Schelling's ideas in this direction are still considered of philosophical interest, even if the subsequent development of experimental natural science had a destructive impact on the credibility of the theories of his followers in Naturphilosophie.
Friedrich Philipp Immanuel Niethammer, later Ritter von Niethammer, was a German theologian, philosopher and Lutheran educational reformer.
Philosophical Inquiries into the Essence of Human Freedom is an 1809 work by Friedrich Schelling. It was the last book he finished in his lifetime, running to some 90 pages of a single long essay. It is commonly referred to as his "Freiheitsschrift" or "freedom essay".
Foundations of the Science of Knowledge is a 1794/1795 book by the German philosopher Johann Gottlieb Fichte. Based on lectures Fichte had delivered as a professor of philosophy at the University of Jena. Fichte created his own system of transcendental philosophy in his book.
Allen William Wood is an American philosopher specializing in the work of Immanuel Kant and German Idealism, with particular interests in ethics and social philosophy. One of the world's foremost Kant scholars, he is the Ruth Norman Halls professor of philosophy at Indiana University, Ward W. and Priscilla B. Woods Professor, emeritus, at Stanford University, and before that a professor at Cornell University across parts of four decades. He has also held professorships and visiting appointments at several other universities in the United States and Europe. In addition to popularising and clarifying the ethical thought of Kant, Wood has also mounted arguments against the validity of trolley problems in moral philosophy.
The following is a list of the major events in the history of German idealism, along with related historical events.
Johann Friedrich Schultz, also known as Johann Schultz, was a German Enlightenment Protestant theologian, mathematician and philosopher. He is best known as a close personal friend and trusted expositor of Immanuel Kant. Johann Schultz was a Hofprediger and Professor of Mathematics at the University of Königsberg.
Versuch einer Metaphysik der inneren Natur is a book written by German author Heinrich Schmid (1799–1836). It was published by Brockhaus Leipzig in 1834. In this book, Schmid attempts to develop a metaphysical account of humans' inner nature, the soul, in terms of general laws. These laws, Schmid proposes, should be based on empirically gathered knowledge about inner nature. He argues, that with the formulation of such laws, psychology, the science of the human soul, should become a natural science like physics. Schmid's ideas build heavily on the philosophy of Immanuel Kant, for which he was criticized. He belonged to the philosophical school surrounding Jakob Friedrich Fries, whose ideas are associated with Neo-Kantianism. Schmid's theories, especially concerning memory, were adopted by Sir William Hamilton, whose philosophy was discussed by John Stuart Mill at the end of the 19th century. Wilhelm Wundt and his contemporaries still used methods similar to Schmid's structured introspection once psychology was founded as an independent discipline in 1879.