Philosophy of History: A problem with some theories of Speculative philosophy of history and substantive philosophy of history

Karl Marx, Emile Durkheim, Leslie White, Allen Johnson and Timothy Earle, and Stephen Sanderson all produced some of the more interesting theories of history, social change and cultural evolution but their theories have a common deficiency. None of them provide an ultimate explanation for social, cultural and historical change. This failure was rectified by J. S. Mill who suggested increasing human knowledge was the ultimate cause of social, cultural and historical change. However even Mill did not ask what caused the increasing human knowledge and why the knowledge had to be acquired in a particular order and how this could affect human history

Philosophy of History : A problem with some theories of Speculative Philosophy of History and Substantive Philosophy of History

Karl Marx, Emile Durkheim, Leslie White, Allen Johnson and Timothy Earle, and Stephen Sanderson, all produced some of the more interesting theories of history, social change and cultural evolution but their theories have a common deficiency. None of them provide an ultimate explanation for social, cultural and historical change. This failure was rectified by J. S. Mill who suggested increasing human knowledge was the ultimate cause of social, cultural and historical change. However even Mill did not ask what caused the increasing human knowledge and why the knowledge had to be acquired in a particular order and how this could affect human history

Kant\u27s Political Theory and Philosophy of History

Kant combined two traditional approaches in his political theory, reference to a utopian and ideal universal moral order in common with Plato, Thomas More, and Jean Jacques Rousseau and an analysis of the pursuit of individual self-interest leading to the establishment of laws that enable citizens to satisfy their interests, like Thomas Hobbes, Niccolò Machiavelli, and Adam Smith. Kant focused on the international level, arguing that following the categorical imperative would arrange a society equitably while national commercial self-interest would lead to a league of nations to adjudicate international disputes. Kant was unique in providing both a theory of an ideal society and a method to achieve it

The Ontological Backlash: why did mainstream analytic philosophy lose interest in the philosophy of history?

This paper seeks to explain why mainstream analytic philosophy lost interest in the philosophy of history. It suggests that the reasons why the philosophy of history no longer commands the attention of mainstream analytical philosophy may be explained by the success of an ontological backlash against the linguistic turn and a view of philosophy as a form of conceptual analysis. In brief I argue that in the 1950s and 1960s the philosophy of history attracted the interest of mainstream analytical philosophers because the defence of the autonomy of historical explanation championed by the likes of Collingwood, Dray, Melden, Winch, Von Wright and others was in tune with the predominant conception of philosophy as a conceptual enterprise concerned primarily with clarifying different explanatory practices. As this conception of philosophy as an essentially conceptual enterprise became recessive, the purely methodological non-reductivism advocated by defenders of the autonomy of history was accused of ontological escapism and the discussion concerning the autonomy of psychological explanations became the province of the philosophy of mind and action

Is history a coherent story?

This paper is a reflection on philosophy of history and a polemic in the debate on the legitimacy of grand narratives

Hegel's philosophy of history

Thesis (M.A.)--Boston UniversityWe have found that Hegel's philosophy of history is in organic connection with the rest of his philosophical system. His hypothesis, the concept of Reason, has been taken from his system. Any understanding of his philosophy of history entails some acquaintance with his system as a whole. An understanding of Hegel's philosophy of history and, indeed, his thought in general, is made much easier if the direction in which he is going, the end he has in mind, is comprehended. Hegel's philosophy of history is an attempt to discover a meaning behind the entire course of the world. The empirical and historical facts are given to the philosophical historian; it is his task to ascertain the significance of these facts and the significance of their particular sequence. Hegel, by taking a comprehensive and synoptic view of the world's history, gives us, at first by way of hypothesis, the final cause of the world's history: Reason. Reason is the "inward guiding soul" of the world's history and that history presents us with a rational process. Hegel' s concept of Reason is quite comprehensive. It is man's substantial being and lies implicit within him. In this sense, the history of the world presents us man's gradual discipline of his own uncontrolled natural will. In terms of the Absolute, Reason is the Providential design at work in the world's history, and as such it is a purposive activity. Hegel's philosophy of history is, then, teleological. The history of the world offers us God's purposive and rational activity and in this respect history is, for Hegel, a Theodicaea. We have found also that another concept inextricably bound up with his system is the concept of Freedom. Self-conscious Reason, or Spirit, is gradually becoming conscious of its own freedom. Change in the realm of Spirit shows us an impulse of perfectibility. Freedom means for Hegel the Conscious realization upon the part of man that his interests, his inmost being, lie with the Universal. This is concrete Freedom and the State represents its embodiment. The State then plays a central role in Hegel's philosophy of history. It represents the freedom of man in conscious union with the Whole. History presents us with state or political forms which have shown the advancement of man's recognition of his own freedom. Hegel's division of the world's history is in accordance with these stages. The course of the world's history is one toward concreteness and inclusiveness. The success with which a given state integrates its citizens contained within the state determines the stage at which that society has reached. In the East man is blinded by the "Sun" and as such he is obedient to an abstract and external law. The "negation" of this is beginning to be realized by the Graeco-Roman civilizations, that external law and custom have no authority over the individual and that he should follow the dictates of his own conscience and reason. The "synthesis" of these two is the realization of the German world that their own conscience and reason are already there in the law and Reason contained in Society and the State. The freedom attained in history by man, then, is the freedom from the irrational control of nature while at the same time the freedom from uncontrolled natural will. In regard to the empirical facts of history, the actual events of history, Hegel does amazingly well. He considers the natural, geographical, end economic factors in history. We have found that the criticism charging Hegel with a priorism is not wholly founded but that certain difficulties do come about when we look closely at the relation which he holds between Absolute and finite mind. The "cunning of Reason" hardly seems reconcilable with the Theodicaea and there are difficulties in understanding what freedom as self-sufficiency could mean in an absolutistic system

On Breaking Up Time, or, Perennialism as Philosophy of History

Current and recent philosophy of history contemplates a deep change in fundamental notions of the presence of the past. This is called breaking up time. The chief value for this change is enhancing the moral reach of historical research and writing. However, the materialist view of reality that most historians hold cannot support this approach. The origin of the notion in the thought of Walter Benjamin is suggested. I propose a neo-idealist approach called perennialism, centered on recurrent moral dilemmas and choices. This suggests a view of the relations of moral thought and ontology placed in the diachronic context that historians study

European socialism: a blind alley or a long and winding road?

This pamphlet attempts to look at socialism at its current conjuncture in terms of a longer trajectory of history. In doing so, it also defends the possibility of philosophy of history