Poland Liceum ogólnokształcące, klasa III Philosophy (extended level)
Chapters: 2
1. History of philosophy: modern era
Descartes and his followers · Pascal · British empiricism · Kant · Hegel and Mill
- Rationalism and Empiricism: Reason or Experience? – In the 1600s and 1700s European thinkers argued about the source of knowledge. Rationalists (Descartes, Spinoza, Leibniz) said the surest knowledge comes from reason and that some ideas are inborn. Descartes doubted everything until he reached one certainty, "I think, therefore I am", and rebuilt knowledge from clear and distinct ideas. Empiricists (Locke, Berkeley, Hume) said all ideas come from experience: the mind starts as a blank slate. Hume showed that we never perceive cause itself, only one event following another, so our belief in causes comes from habit. Kant later combined both views.
- Immanuel Kant: What We Can Know and What We Must Do – Immanuel Kant (1724–1804), a German thinker, asked two big questions: What can I know? What ought I to do? On knowledge, he joined rationalism (reason) and empiricism (experience): knowledge needs both concepts and sense data. In his Copernican turn, objects must fit the forms of our mind (space, time, categories such as cause). So we know phenomena (things as they appear), never noumena (things in themselves). Reason cannot prove God, the soul or freedom, so old metaphysics is not knowledge, though maths and science give synthetic a priori knowledge. On ethics, only a good will acting from duty has moral worth. The categorical imperative tests a rule: act only on rules you could will as universal law, and treat humanity always as an end, never merely as a means.
2. History of philosophy: 19th–20th century
Nietzsche and positivism · Phenomenology · Existentialism and other currents · Analytic philosophy
- Friedrich Nietzsche: Breaking Old Values, Creating New Ones – Friedrich Nietzsche (1844–1900) was a German thinker who attacked the traditional values of Europe. In art he saw two forces: Apollonian (order, form) and Dionysian (wild energy). His phrase "God is dead" means modern people no longer really live by faith, so the old values lose their base and nihilism (the feeling that nothing matters) threatens. In his genealogy of morals he said values have a history: "master morality" praised strength and pride, while "slave morality", which he linked to Christianity, praised meekness out of resentment. His answer is the will to power (the drive to grow and overcome), the overman who creates new values, and loving one's life enough to want it again forever (eternal return). In the same century, Comte's positivism trusted only facts tested by science (three stages: theological, metaphysical, positive), later sharpened by the Vienna Circle. Nietzsche's perspectivism ("no facts, only interpretations") instead inspired postmodern thinkers like Foucault and Derrida.
- Existentialism: You Are What You Choose – Existentialism is a 19th–20th century way of thinking about human life. Its main idea: for a person, existence comes before essence. A tool is designed for a purpose first; a human is born first and then makes a self through choices. So we are free, and with freedom comes anxiety and full responsibility. Jaspers showed that limit situations (death, suffering, struggle, guilt) wake us up to ask what matters. Hiding behind the crowd or fate is bad faith; owning one's choices is authenticity. Key thinkers: Kierkegaard, Nietzsche, Heidegger, Jaspers, Sartre, de Beauvoir, Camus; in Spanish thought Unamuno and Ortega y Gasset.