Popularization Of Philosophy Research Articles

The Popularization of Philosophy in Medieval Islam, Judaism, and Christianity. Edited by Marieke Abram, Steven Harvey, and Lukas Muehlethaler. Philosophy in the Abrahamic Traditions of the Middle Ages 3. Turnhout, Belgium: Brepols, 2022. 465 pp. €120 hardcover.

The Popularization of Philosophy in Medieval Islam, Judaism, and Christianity. Edited by Marieke Abram, Steven Harvey, and Lukas Muehlethaler. Philosophy in the Abrahamic Traditions of the Middle Ages 3. Turnhout, Belgium: Brepols, 2022. 465 pp. €120 hardcover.

Restoring the African origins of philosophy

The standard bias is that philosophy originated in Miletus, in the Greek province of Ionia in Asia Minor. The bias also upholds Thales, a citizen of Miletus to be the first human ever to engage in formal philosophy. The creed of the bias is that the blessings of philosophy spread to the rest of the world from this salvific Greek city. The world owe it to the ingenuity of the Greeks, the appearance of philosophy and science as formal enterprises of learning. This is the “truth”, at least according to mainstream Western literature. Abundance of documentary evidence stating otherwise did not matter. It did not matter also that Thales himself travelled to Egypt and spent many years there, studying philosophy. It did not matter also, that Thales merely reechoed in Ionia, the teachings he received from the school he attended in Egypt. But facts are sacred; biases are optional. Philosophy, indeed had been formally taught in Egypt for thousands of years before Thales ever travelled to Egypt. Literature abounds to that effect. However, the Greeks played a pivotal role in the spread of philosophy to the rest of Europe. The Greeks were the first European nation to philosophize. But that did not amount to the origin of philosophy. It was an epoch in the spread and popularization of philosophy. The fall of Egypt to the invading armies of Alexander the Great, the edits of emperors Theodosius and Justinian of the Roman empire, the invasion of Islam, the slave trade, the experience of colonialism and the subsequent racism changed all that. Africa came to be denigrated as the “Dark Continent”, and as such was deemed incapable of culture and intellectual advancement. This bias significantly influenced, and has arguably continued to colour Western discourse on African themes, covertly and overtly. African intellectuals and researchers all over the world, owe it to posterity, the duty to render the truth about the origins of philosophy. This research relies solely on library research in unearthing oft neglected classical documents that point abundantly to the African origin of philosophy.

Popularization and/or Trivialization of Philosophy in Voltaire's Narrative Candide or Optimism

Abstract Voltaire produced his works within the literary-historical period of Classicism and Enlightenment, in which the prevalent role of literature was educational. The period also dictated what genre, theme, style and structure authors should follow. However, more and more changes of literary genres appear, and the process of stratification of literature into high and trivial takes place. The aim of this paper is to describe the polarization of two mutually different processes involved in the literary shaping of Voltaire's philosophical narrative Candide or Optimism. In Voltaire's narrative, the popularization of philosophy, in order to simplify and illuminate the philosophical writings of G. W. Leibniz, results in the changes of style and content that become understandable to the general readership since they work within the scheme of an adventure novel. In this process, trivialization does not affect only the genre, but is also present in other parts of literary analysis and interpretation such as the theme, motifs, structure, characterization, narrative techniques, stylistic features, and so on.

Otra vuelta de tuerca: la filosofía analítica en Iberoamérica

<p class='p1'>Ésta es una contribución al debate originado por Guillermo Hurtado y proseguido por Manuel García-Carpintero y Horacio Luján Martínez, con relación al sentido y a los objetivos de la filosofía analítica, especialmente en Iberoamérica. En ella se defiende que las tesis de Hurtado también se pueden aplicar al cultivo de filosofías no analíticas, pues en realidad conciernen a la filosofía profesional que se practica dentro y fuera de Iberoamérica. Se sostiene, además, que si bien la profesionalización y la masificación de la filosofía son fenómenos en sí mismos positivos, tienen consecuencias colaterales negativas respecto de la calidad de la filosofía que se produce. También se aduce que el que una propuesta filosófica no tenga una inmediata relevancia existencial o política no la hace menos importante, siempre que en algún sentido amplíe las fronteras del conocimiento.</p>

Al-Farabi and Ibn-Rushd on the Correlation between Philosophy and Religion

Al-Farabi and Ibn Rushd interpreted religion and philosophy as two forms of knowledge which complete rather than nullify each other. This point of view was unique and novel. In this regard, both of them emphasized that, if philosophy were an instrument of a select few people for the comprehension of the meaning of existence, then religion is what gives the general populace a way to express their understanding of life. Ibn Rushd strove to draw the attention of representatives of religious teaching to philosophy, and aimed together with them at the understanding of the world which surrounds humankind. While al-Farabi tried by means of logical arguments to establish the priority of philosophy with reference to religion, Ibn Rushd did not restrict himself to the harmonizing of religion and philosophy, but attempted to use religion for the popularization of philosophy, as well as the raising of its prestige. Ibn Rushd fully realized that it was not necessary for science to argue with religious orthodoxy.

Middle-Ground Pragmatists: The Popularization of Philosophy in American Culture

Pragmatism and are presently two central but separate organizing themes for American intellectual and cultural life in the interwar period. During the 1920s and 1930s John Dewey's pragmatism dominated the intellectual landscape. Most intellectuals in the era had to work their way through, with, or around the edifice of Dewey's thought.' At the same time many thinkers were taking another road, seeking to popularize knowledge for middlebrow consumers. As Joan Shelley Rubin has shown, such popularizers vigorously attempted to maintain authority and to mediate between genteel and modem by disseminating high culture to a mass audience.2 These two roads of thought, pragmatism and popularization, came together in the lives and thought of Irwin Edman, Will Durant, Horace Meyer Kallen, John Herman Randall, Jr., Harry A. Overstreet, and Thomas Vemor Smith. The work of these now largely forgotten popular pragmatists is important for a number of reasons. Although popular pragmatists shared many similarities with the general movement of in the 1920s, their need to popularize had specific institutional and political contexts. Popular pragmatists believed that professional philosophy was becoming too technical and confined to the corridors of academe. If pragmatism was