Anaxagoras Born in Clazomenae, in Ionia, around 500 BCE, Anaxagoras was the first philosopher to bring the Ionian tradition to Athens, where he lived for some thirty years and became a friend and adviser of the statesman Pericles. His intellectual boldness cost him dearly: accused of impiety for holding that the Sun was not a god but an incandescent stone, he was put on trial and had to leave the city, taking refuge in Lampsacus. ...
Empedocles Empedocles (c. 494–434 BCE) was one of the most extraordinary figures of Greek philosophy: at once philosopher, physician, poet, orator, and political leader in his native city of Akragas, in Sicily. A legendary aura formed around him — he presented himself almost as a god among men, and tradition holds that he leapt into the crater of Mount Etna to confirm his divinity. He expounded his ideas in two poems, On Nature and Purifications. ...
Isaiah Berlin Latvian-British political philosopher and historian of ideas, one of the greatest liberal thinkers of the 20th century. Famous for the distinction between negative and positive liberty, and for his defense of value pluralism against all forms of political utopianism. Key Concepts Negative liberty: the absence of external interference — I am free when no one prevents me from acting. It is freedom from (from obstacles, coercion, interference). Berlin associates it with classical liberalism Positive liberty: the capacity for self-governance, to be one’s own master and realize one’s potential. It is freedom to (for autonomy, for self-realization). Berlin warns that it can be distorted to justify paternalism or authoritarianism Value pluralism: fundamental human values (liberty, equality, justice, fraternity) are objectively real but incommensurable — they cannot be reduced to a single hierarchy without destroying something genuine. Against all moral monism Critique of utopianism: any doctrine claiming to have found the final solution to human problems (Marxism, extreme Enlightenment rationalism) tends toward totalitarianism — the pursuit of perfection is the enemy of liberty Counter-Enlightenment: a tradition of thinkers (Vico, Hamann, Herder) who criticized the universalist reason of the Enlightenment and valued particularity, history, and culture Two concepts of liberty: seminal essay (1958) that structured the liberal-communitarian debate for decades Influenced by Locke, Hume, Mill — British liberal tradition Kant — autonomy and dignity Herder and Vico — cultural pluralism and historicity Machiavelli — incompatibility of political values Influenced John Rawls — debate on liberty and justice Communitarianism (Taylor, Walzer, MacIntyre — against Berlin) Contemporary liberalism and normative political theory Hannah Arendt — political thought Works Four Essays on Liberty (1969); Vico and Herder (1976); The Crooked Timber of Humanity (1990); The Sense of Reality (1996). ...
Paul Feyerabend Paul Feyerabend was an Austrian philosopher of science and one of the most provocative thinkers of the twentieth century. Trained in Vienna and based for decades at Berkeley, he began close to logical empiricism and to Popper’s critical rationalism — he even studied under Popper at the London School of Economics — before becoming one of his sharpest critics. His best-known work, Against Method (1975), defends epistemological anarchism: the thesis that there is no single, universal, ahistorical scientific method capable of explaining the success of science. Examining real episodes from the history of science, above all the case of Galileo, Feyerabend argues that progress has often required breaking the methodological rules then in force. His provocation became synonymous with a radical defence of pluralism and intellectual freedom against every dogmatism — including the scientific one. ...