Philosophical Theories Essay Examples and Topics

The article "The Challenge of Cultural Relativism" by Rachels explores the issue of ethics. According to Rachels, cultural relativism fails to support the existence of universal moral standards.

It is possible to note that Rawls' philosophy can be applicable in the contemporary world as it addresses major issues associated with unequal distribution of resources.

Therefore, the main purpose of this paper is to discuss theory of Forms as one of the main contributions of Plato.

These principles are the principles of social justice; they provide a way of assigning duties and privileges in the basic institutions of society and they define the appropriate distribution of the benefits and burdens of [...]

The essence of the avocado vs.artichoke debate lies in the dynamic of opposing ideas of essentialism and proteanism in philosophy. Both views present quite polarizing extremes and have outdated pre-conceived notions, as in the case [...]

This idea is based on the supposition that it is impossible to be the one and the other at the same time.

1 This is a classless principle calling for justice equality promoting mutual understanding; nevertheless, taken the way it is, this principle would confuse people on some issues and this is why Rawls compliments it with [...]

It is a unique way of philosophical understanding of reality, the general idea of which is the fundamental category of the process.

It confirms the close relationship between certainty and doubt, namely that the absence of one gives rise to the other. To conclude, the concepts of certainty and doubt are close and intertwined in many things [...]

The feeling of empathy comes up when there is a clear difference between the person being empathetic and the one who is the subject of empathy.

The first aspect of Aristotelian defense of justice, which is crucial to discuss, is the fact that, according to the philosopher, justice is relative to others.

The emergence of new transcendental ideas reshaped the American literature introduced in the works by Emerson, Thoreau, and Whitman in such a way that it contributed to the excellence and maturity of the literary world [...]

The ideas of the Polish novelist in the Heart of Darkness aimed at unraveling the issues that faced ivory traders in the Congo basin meaning the author attempted to look beneath the surface.

According to the Bible, a tree of life was created by God in the middle of the Garden of Eden. In the Iroquois Creation Story, a tree was growing in the middle of the floating [...]

The author says that the scholar should explore the nature in themselves, and "he shall see, that nature is the opposite of the soul, answering to it part for part.

In this passage, Confucius addressed the role of the family in the growth and development of a nation. Being the smallest unit in the nation, the family plays a vital role in ensuring the stability [...]

It is necessary to underline the fact that the thinker strived to clarify common features of his Divided Line and the allegory of the Cave; the analysis of his philosophy gives an opportunity to realize [...]

As Plato recounts the episode "Myth of Er" found in the republic dialogue phaedo and the story of time reversal in the statesman, a clear view of the hierarchical arrangement of the cosmos is illuminated.

The contribution of Immanuel Kant to the modern philosophy made him be considered as one of the greatest and the most remarkable philosophers existed in the 18th century.

Without the body of the argument, the title expresses that there is a form of lying that is not considered immoral.

Compatibilism is closely linked to causal determinism in that it agrees with the fact that past events affect future events. In essence, people are not locked to determinism only but also to the fact that [...]

Kant argues that, "a person is good or bad depending on the motivation of their actions and not on the goodness of the consequences of those actions".

The main aim of this paper is to look into the arguments presented by Rene Descartes and David Hume on the issue of the self.

I have seen that Rene Descartes contribution in philosophy and natural science stood the test of time; therefore, he became a hero' on the other hand, Karl Marx's contribution in social science did not stand [...]

It is the epitome of thinking and as it was described by the London times, "the great virtue of philosophy is that it teaches not what to think, but how to think".

The allegory of the cave can serve in revealing some of the key reasons to mistrust the views of the majority.

Although Barthes had not contemplated anything of the sort, his efforts and the efforts of others led to the establishment of the structuralism movement in the 1950s and the 1960s.

Main Kant's idea was in the necessity of both reason and experience for human beings. In his opinion, Synthetic judgments are opposite to analytic and are not sufficient to decide the importance of proposition.

One of the basic virtues of a human being is to be rational, and it enhances all other virtues. A human being must have the ability to select his actions, goals, and values carefully for [...]

In his description of the ideal society, Plato explains that people in the society are not advised to act without knowledge such that before a city is erected, full understanding of justice should be known.

It would not be an exaggeration to state that Plato's allegory of the cave only makes perfect sense if one views it in the light of the theory of forms.

Therefore, it seems that the Glorious Revolution was more of a revelation for the people of their power to choose and to change.

Though called 'apology' by Plato, the speech is not actually an apology- Socrates was attempting use his wisdom to justify his teachings and beliefs, and not to apologize for his actions.[2] First, his concise and [...]

Theories such as rationalism the Intuition/Deduction thesis and Innate Knowledge thesis which support the notion that there is the existence of intrinsic or instinctive knowledge or the subsistence of a priori knowledge, knowledge of necessary [...]

Can it happen that truth is a kind of agreement between a belief and a real life fact, or is it possible that a true belief should cohere with other true beliefs, or is it [...]

The task of the social leaders is to orient to interests of the majority in order to avoid the opposition of the public which can lead to revealing the negative qualities of people living in [...]

He claimed that the sophists were selling the wrong education to the rich people. The methods of teaching that the sophists portrayed in Athens were in conflict with Plato's school of thought.

The moderate philosophical inclination anchors on the role of reason in the acquisition of knowledge. The extreme standpointthe posits the relevance of reason as the sole gateway to the acquisition of knowledge.

As opposed to the rational theory, the empiricism theory estimates that the main source of knowledge is the experience which can be based on the "perceptional observation of the world".

Yao reacts against the constricted view of the philosophy, which comes from failure to open into the historical development of the philosophy and the role of the Confucian tradition as a whole in advancing Confucianism.

The Entitlement Theory of Justice is intended to submit an explanation of what justice necessitates in relation to property and is divided into three doctrines which are; the principle of justice in rectification, justice in [...]

Generally, peace is achieved by creating a government and forsaking individual rights in favor of one entity to ensure humans' chaos-less existence.

He asserts that the duration of an activity and the intensity of pleasure are very important in measuring the levels of pleasure.

Inception has a philosophical argument in the plot which resonates with Rene Descartes' reasoning on the nature of reality and the mind's interpretation of its experience.

Nietzsche in the seventh maxim asks whether man is a result of the erroneous work of God or God is the error of man.

Rene Descartes, a French philosopher and the founder of the mathematical rationalism, was one of the prominent figures in the field of philosophy of the 17th century.

Instead, it underlined the logical explanations of the world existence as well as attempted to ground the idea of reality processes as the evictions of changing procedures in a never-changing space.

Additionally, it has been documented that one of the major virtue of philosophy is its ability to teach not what to think rather how to think.

However, when it comes to Heraclitus, he believes that fire is the principle of all that exists. In addition to that, Heraclitus further develops his idea by mentioning that the existence of fire is commensurate [...]

The dialogue between Socrates and Euthyphro is focused on the definition of piety or holiness and is set up in a humorous and sarcastic tone.

Kant indicates that the goodness has not to contain a meaning of the consequences and results, it is good in itself.

For harmony to prevail, human beings have to live in accordance to the two kinds of order; that is nature and convention.

The positive legal norm which does not correspond to the high-frequency behavior of the living law is the one that ought not to be.

Finally, Emerson speaks about the importance of action for the scholar as a thinking man and explores the duties of such a man.

Weiss argues that Plato used the argument by Socrates that true philosophers hate the pleasures of the body, for example, drinks, sex, and food.

The open question argument is an attempt of George Moore, an English philosopher, to prove that natural properties cannot be reduced to moral ones.

He further asserts that so long as the same sound being is the same self, the self has the same personal identity.

The Socratic Method is also referred to as the Method of Elenchus or the Socratic Debate. It was after his friend from youth Chaerpon paid a visit to the Oracle of Delphi and deemed Socrates [...]

Cartesian developed the Cartesian Dualistic Theory of Pain to explain the relationship between physical and psychological types of pain. Therefore, Descartes developed the Cartesian Theory of pain to explore pain in the context of mind [...]

They argued that human beings are actors in the world and hence are aware of what is in it unlike the trees and stones that just exist.

The allegory is preceded by the analogy of the divided line and metaphor of the son. Descartes is considered to be one of the greatest rationalists.

Harry Frankfurt made major contributions to the philosophy of action through the idea of guidance and objection to compatibilists' proposal about the incongruity of causal determinism and ethical accountability.

The structure of this paper analyzes the service to God and the perception of the afterlife, as highlights of the differences and similarities about the Christian and Islamic perceptions of life.

It can be noted that in all cases suffering was seen as evil in some quarters of the ancient world as is seen today.

In Plato's Allegory of the Cave, there is much darkness in the cave and only very little light can be found in this place and it is so hard for a person who is in [...]

Also, his philosophy conveys the importance and the beauty of the life of faith in the midst of a discouraging world.

Overall, it is possible to argue that the philosophy of ancient Greece is mostly associated with the names of such prominent thinkers as Socrates, Plato, and Aristotle.

A scholar perceives the natural world in a way that is free of past influence. He states that self-reliance is a concept that applied to the American scholar who must exercise a great deal of [...]

As they argue with Socrates on the issue of injustice, Thrasymachus says that justice "is nothing more than the advantage of the stronger". According to them, the cardinal aim of Thrasymachus is to prove that [...]

Although Leibniz tries to explain the essence of the ultimate reason for existence by the invocation of the presence of a metaphysical reason, he also continues to illustrate the mechanism that relates the metaphysical reason [...]

His speech has a somber tone and tells the fabled story of the beginning of love. Aristophanes creates the notion that the earliest humans were androgynous a combination of both male and female using his [...]

The theory of recollection was an answer to Meno's paradox that states that man needs not learn anything new as what they know is enough, and what they do not know are not necessary.

Based on this, Karl Marx stated that the products produced by the communally owned means of production should be divided equally to avoid classes and ranks in societies.

A Coherence Theory of justification is one that supports two central ideas that distinguish it from foundationalism: There are basic beliefs that serve as the basis for other beliefs, and

If the mind does not need the physical body to exist, it means that the state of unconsciousness due to injuries and other objective reasons is impossible.

The ideas which do not resemble the objects that caused them are the ones of secondary qualities: sound, color, odor, and taste.

On the other hand, the teleological ethical perspective states that the results for all actions matter in determining the nature of the undertaken decisions.

This paper discusses how both Daoism and Legalism differ from Confucianism on the issues of family, human nature, education, role of ruler, role of government, and role of individual.

An example, of a group of people who have not mastered the concept of Li, may be judges who make their decisions based on their understanding of the law and not the prevailing special circumstances [...]

The idea of fleeing the real world that is habitable in the thinking of man, to the desert preoccupied by fear, dangers and uncertainty refers to the need for independence of the spirit.

Platonic philosophy, precisely the concept of world of forms, had dominated the medieval era that subjected the human body, as a shadow of a real body in the world of forms, to little or no [...]

The purpose of this paper is to analyze critically the concept of the sublime as presented by Immanuel Kant in his work 'The Critique of Judgment'.

The reality of knowledge depends on its justifiability; that is, epistemology tends to question the truth behind human knowledge hence, through such understanding, individuals are able to form a basis of comprehending any piece of [...]

The straw man fallacy is a type of logical fallacy whereby one person misrepresents their opponent's question or argument to make it easier to respond.

This essay examines Descartes' principle ideas of the utility of doubt for arriving at truths and the concept of dualism between the mind and the body.

According to consciousness, the flow of information goes from the mental aspect to the physical aspect, which means that consciousness rise due to the interaction of the physical as well as the mental and cognitive [...]

Chapter five of Kupperman's book "Theories of human nature" looks at great philosophers, namely Plato's and Aristotle's points of view in trying to define humanity. The writer tries to illustrate the complexity of defining a [...]

Regardless of the extent to which some people are opposed to the applications of moral principles, which should be consistent with the scriptures of God, they are used to produce the best results in communities.

Kant's objection to the ontological argument stems from his view of the concept that a being that is conceived in the human mind, and which exists in the real world, is superior to an idea [...]

Hume's argument gets interesting when he postulates that regardless of the number of times we witness a succession of events, we cannot predict the succession of events.

Religious leaders also pray for the body and the soul of the dead but lay a lot of emphasis on the soul.

To downplay the importance of sense experience, Plato and Descartes show that sense experience can never be a cause of experience since the objects captured through it are vulnerable to change.

The concept of equality is significant in the discussion of liberty, property, and the role of government in the lives of people.

In non-Christian philosophy of education, essentialism can be associated with the concept of "general education," while in Christian philosophy of education, essentialism can be associated with the concept of "Christian education," which aims to develop [...]

Partridge investigates the film's fundamental coherence with Plato's text and the numerous superficial connections between Plato's cave-dwellers and the humans trapped in The Matrix.

In conclusion, the allegory of the cave by Plato is a parable about knowledge, wisdom, and ignorance. The cave represents a world in which a person is placed initially, but by examining one's life and [...]

Considering the world as a continuously changing whole, as a process, Thales believes that it is due to different states of the same beginning, its "condensation" and "rarefaction" relative to some intermediate state.

In his philosophical dialogues, the thinker divides the divine, unchangeable world of forms and the world of material, physical objects that was constantly changing and existed only as a shadow of the ideas.

The main problem that makes the difference between nominalism and realism is the question of the existence of properties beyond objects.

Firstly, speaking about the principal contrasts between Stoicism and Confucianism, it should be mentioned that Confucius developed the teaching aimed at the improvement of the state structure, whereas the Stoics pay the main attention to [...]

The most difficult thing is getting to know the truth, to know the truth it takes a lot and there is no prescribed procedure getting to know the same.

The only way the truth will be concealed and still lead to happiness is when the truth is substituted with a lie.

Some of his main achievements include the creation of the primary axiomatic system, the invention of the contemporary logic of quantification, and the definition of identity. In concluding the identity puzzle, Frege asserts that the [...]

However, the goal is to show that individuals do not have the right to do whatever they deem right even if it does not interfere with other people's peace of mind.

Consequentialism is a concept in normative ethics that opines that the goodness or badness of an action is determined by the impacts of the action and not the motive of the doer.

Thus, Frankl claimed, "there are two races of men in this world, but only these two the "race" of the decent man and the "race" of the indecent man".

And as lying is a form of communication, and people know this fact, the only way out in order not to be defrauded is stop communicating.

The test for universal acceptance involve: determining the agent's maxim; imagining that everyone in the same position as the real-world agent observed that maxim; deciding if there is any contradictions generated from the maxim; if [...]

From this point, beauty can be discussed as the attribute of things and as the independent form, and deja vu is the example of the reality as illusion because the life is only the reflection [...]

The main concern of Foucault consists in the way technology has influenced quest for power among the ruling class in the society, and also the reason as to why the society is violating the rules [...]

The highest type of reality is the one that is based on knowledge of forms as illustrated through the allegory of the cave.

The reason of why Kant's ideas are preferable to me is that the categorical imperative allows to define what actions are obligatory and which ones should be forbidden and to choose the way that is [...]

Although he makes a strong case for the existence of happiness, the foundation and organization of his article are less strong, which eventually lessens the general effect of his argument.

He said that the fabric of the universe makes us susceptible to producing life, consciousness, and reason. The people who object to Nagel's arguments claim that the theorist makes a lot of assumptions.

Russell is right that the value of philosophy lies in its vagueness, and the importance lies in the questions, not the answers.

The first doctrine is that the more recondite phenomena of the mind are formed out of simple parts. Associationism is the theory of psychology explaining the connection between thoughts and past experiences.

Nietzsche regarded that every personality needs to arrange their moral structure: the key point of principles is to facilitate every individual to sublimate and regulate their obsessions, to emphasize the originality inherent in their being, [...]

The world of The Matrix is one of the examples of the precarity of that, which may be called the real world as perceived by the beholder.

Stephen Jay Gould and David Hume are popular in the philosophy of the religious world for their contributions to the existence of a perfect creator based on the design of the creations.

In the illustration, the man was of the view that the vessel was fine and went ahead to overlook the fact that the ship was really out of order and that it was safe for [...]