(1844-1900) Born the son of a Lutheran pastor in Röcken, Saxony, Friedrich Nietzsche was raised by female relatives after his father's death in 1849. He quickly abandoned his initial pursuit of theology in order to specialize in philology at Bonn and Leipzig, where he studied with Friedrich Ritschl. Nietzsche's mastery of classical literature led to an early academic appointment at Basel and the publication of Die Geburt der Tragödie aus dem Geiste der Musik (The Birth of Tragedy) (1872), with its distinction between Apollonian and Dionysian cultures. When ill health forced an early end to his teaching career, Nietzsche began to produce the less scholarly, quasi-philosophical, and anti-religious works for which he is now best known, including Menschliches, allzumenschliches (Human, All Too Human) (1878), Also Sprach Zarathustra (Thus Spoke Zarathustra) (1883), Die Fröhliche Wissenschaft (The Gay Science) (1882), and Jenseits von Gut und Böse (Beyond Good and Evil) (1886). Nietzsche never recovered from a serious physical and mental collapse he suffered in 1889; his Der Wille zur Macht (Will to Power) (1901) and the autobiographical Ecce Homo (Ecce Homo) (1908) were published posthumously.

Nietzsche sharply criticized the Greek tradition's over-emphasis on reason in his Die Götzendämmerung (Twilight of the Idols) (1889). Reliance on abstract concepts in a quest for absolute truth, he supposed, is merely a symptom of the degenerate personalities of philosophers like Socrates. From this Nietzsche concluded that traditional philosophy and religion are both erroneous and harmful for human life; they enervate and degrade our native capacity for achievement.

Progress beyond the stultifying influence of philosophy, then, requires a thorough "revaluation of values." In Zur Geneologie der Moral (On the Genealogy of Morals) (1887) Nietzsche bitterly decried the slave morality enforced by social sanctions and religious guilt. Only rare, superior individuals—the noble ones, or Übermenschen—can rise above all moral distinctions to achieve a heroic life of truly human worth.

(1818-1883) Karl Marx was born and educated in Prussia, where he fell under the influence of Ludwig Feuerbach and other radical Hegelians. Although he shared Hegel's belief in dialectical structure and historical inevitability, Marx held that the foundations of reality lay in the material base of economics rather than in the abstract thought of idealistic philosophy. He earned a doctorate at Jena in 1841, writing on the materialism and atheism of Greek atomists, then moved to Köln, where he founded and edited a radical newspaper, Rheinische Zeitung. Although he also attempted to earn a living as a journalist in Paris and Brussels, Marx's participation in unpopular political movements made it difficult to support his growing family. He finally settled in London in 1849, where he lived in poverty while studying and developing his economic and political theories. Above all else, Marx believed that philosophy ought to be employed in practice to change the world.

The core of Marx's economic analysis found early expression in the Ökonomisch-philosophische Manuskripte aus dem Jahre 1844 (Economic and Political Manuscripts of 1844) (1844). There, Marx argued that the conditions of modern industrial societies invariably result in the estrangement (or alienation) of workers from their own labor. In his review of a Bruno Baier book, On the Jewish Question (1844), Marx decried the lingering influence of religion over politics and proposed a revolutionary re-structuring of European society. Much later, Marx undertook a systematic explanation of his economic theories in Das Capital (Capital) (1867-95) and Theorien Über den Mehrwert (Theory of Surplus Value) (1862).

Marx and his colleague Friedrich Engels issued the Manifest der kommunistischen Partei (Communist Manifesto) (1848) in the explicit hope of precipitating social revolution. This work describes the class struggle between proletariat and bourgeoisie, distinguishes communism from other socialist movements, proposes a list of specific social reforms, and urges all workers to unite in revolution against existing regimes. (You may wish to compare this prophetic document with the later exposition of similar principles in Lenin's State and Revolution (1919).)

(1224-1274) Born to an aristocratic family living in Roccasecca, Italy, Thomas Aquinas joined the Dominican order while studying philosophy and theology at Naples. Later he pursued additional studies in Paris and Köln, where he was exposed to Aristotelean thought by Albert the Great and William of Moerbeke. During the rest of his life, he taught at Paris and Rome, writing millions of words on philosophical and theological issues and earning his reputation among the scholastics as "the angelic doctor." Aquinas developed in massive detail a synthesis of Christianity and Aristotelian philosophy that became the official doctrine of Roman Catholic theology in 1879. De Ente et Essentia (On Being and Essence) includes a basic statement of Aquinas's metaphysical position. His literary activity stopped abruptly as the result of a religious experience a few months before his death.

Although he wrote many commentaries on the works of Aristotle and a comprehensive Summa de Veritate Catholicae Fidei contra Gentiles (Summa Contra Gentiles) (1259-1264), Aquinas's unfinished Summa Theologica (1265-1273) represents the most complete statement of his philosophical system. The sections of greatest interest for survey courses include his views on the nature of god, including the five ways to prove god's existence, and his exposition of natural law.

Although matters of such importance should be accepted on the basis of divine revelation alone, Aquinas held, it is at least possible (and perhaps even desirable) in some circumstances to achieve genuine knowledge of them by means of the rigorous application of human reason. As embodied souls (hylomorphic composites), human beings naturally rely on sensory information for their knowledge of the world.

Reading hint: Although the rigidly formal structure of the Summa articles can be rather confusing to a modern reader, the central portion beginning with the words, "I answer that..." is always a direct statement of Aquinas's own position.

(469-399 B.C.E.) In his use of critical reasoning, by his unwavering commitment to truth, and through the vivid example of his own life, fifth-century Athenian Socrates set the standard for all subsequent Western philosophy. Since he left no literary legacy of his own, we are dependent upon contemporary writers like Aristophanes and Xenophon for our information about his life and work. As a pupil of Archelaus during his youth, Socrates showed a great deal of interest in the scientific theories of Anaxagoras, but he later abandoned inquiries into the physical world for a dedicated investigation of the development of moral character. Having served with some distinction as a soldier at Delium and Amphipolis during the Peloponnesian War, Socrates dabbled in the political turmoil that consumed Athens after the War, then retired from active life to work as a stonemason and to raise his children with his wife, Xanthippe. After inheriting a modest fortune from his father, the sculptor Sophroniscus, Socrates used his marginal financial independence as an opportunity to give full-time attention to inventing the practice of philosophical dialogue.

For the rest of his life, Socrates devoted himself to free-wheeling discussion with the aristocratic young citizens of Athens, insistently questioning their unwarranted confidence in the truth of popular opinions, even though he often offered them no clear alternative teaching. Unlike the professional Sophists of the time, Socrates pointedly declined to accept payment for his work with students, but despite (or, perhaps, because) of this lofty disdain for material success, many of them were fanatically loyal to him. Their parents, however, were often displeased with his influence on their offspring, and his earlier association with opponents of the democratic regime had already made him a controversial political figure. Although the amnesty of 405 forestalled direct prosecution for his political activities, an Athenian jury found other charges—corrupting the youth and interfering with the religion of the city—upon which to convict Socrates, and they sentenced him to death in 399 B.C.E. Accepting this outcome with remarkable grace, Socrates drank hemlock and died in the company of his friends and disciples.

Our best sources of information about Socrates's philosophical views are the early dialogues of his student Plato, who attempted there to provide a faithful picture of the methods and teachings of the master. (Although Socrates also appears as a character in the later dialogues of Plato, these writings more often express philosophical positions Plato himself developed long after Socrates's death.) In the Socratic dialogues, his extended conversations with students, statesmen, and friends invariably aim at understanding and achieving virtue {Gk. areth [aretê]} through the careful application of a dialectical method that employs critical inquiry to undermine the plausibility of widely-held doctrines. Destroying the illusion that we already comprehend the world perfectly and honestly accepting the fact of our own ignorance, Socrates believed, are vital steps toward our acquisition of genuine knowledge, by discovering universal definitions of the key concepts governing human life.

Interacting with an arrogantly confident young man in Euqufrwn (Euthyphro), for example, Socrates systematically refutes the superficial notion of piety (moral rectitude) as doing whatever is pleasing to the gods. Efforts to define morality by reference to any external authority, he argued, inevitably founder in a significant logical dilemma about the origin of the good. Plato's Apologhma (Apology) is an account of Socrates's (unsuccessful) speech in his own defense before the Athenian jury; it includes a detailed description of the motives and goals of philosophical activity as he practiced it, together with a passionate declaration of its value for life. The Kritwn (Crito) reports that during Socrates's imprisonment he responded to friendly efforts to secure his escape by seriously debating whether or not it would be right for him to do so. He concludes to the contrary that an individual citizen—even when the victim of unjust treatment—can never be justified in refusing to obey the laws of the state.

The Socrates of the Menwn (Meno) tries to determine whether or not virtue can be taught, and this naturally leads to a careful investigation of the nature of virtue itself. Although his direct answer is that virtue is unteachable, Socrates does propose the doctrine of recollection to explain why we nevertheless are in possession of significant knowledge about such matters. Most remarkably, Socrates argues here that knowledge and virtue are so closely related that no human agent ever knowingly does evil: we all invariably do what we believe to be best. Improper conduct, then, can only be a product of our ignorance rather than a symptom of weakness of the will {Gk. akrasia [akrásia]}. The same view is also defended in the PrwtagoraV (Protagoras), along with the belief that all of the virtues must be cultivated together.

(384-322 BCE) Born at Stagira in northern Greece, Aristotle was the most notable product of the educational program devised by Plato; he spent twenty years of his life studying at the Academy. When Plato died, Aristotle returned to his native Macedonia, where he is supposed to have participated in the education of Philip's son, Alexander (the Great). He came back to Athens with Alexander's approval in 335 and established his own school at the Lyceum, spending most of the rest of his life engaged there in research, teaching, and writing. His students acquired the name "peripatetics" from the master's habit of strolling about as he taught. Although the surviving works of Aristotle probably represent only a fragment of the whole, they include his investigations of an amazing range of subjects, from logic, philosophy, and ethics to physics, biology, psychology, politics, and rhetoric. Aristotle appears to have thought through his views as he wrote, returning to significant issues at different stages of his own development. The result is less a consistent system of thought than a complex record of Aristotle's thinking about many significant issues.

The aim of Aristotle's logical treatises (known collectively as the Organon) was to develop a universal method of reasoning by means of which it would be possible to learn everything there is to know about reality. Thus, the Categories proposes a scheme for the description of particular things in terms of their properties, states, and activities. On Interpretation, Prior Analytics, and Posterior Analytics examine the nature of deductive inference, outlining the system of syllogistic reasoning from true propositions that later came to be known as categorical logic. Though not strictly one of the logical works, the Physics contributes to the universal method by distinguishing among the four causes which may be used to explain everything, with special concern for why things are the way they are and the apparent role of chance in the operation of the world. In other treatises, Aristotle applied this method, with its characteristic emphasis on teleological explanation, to astronomical and biological explorations of the natural world

In Metafusikh (Metaphysics) Aristotle tried to justify the entire enterprise by grounding it all in an abstract study of being qua being. Although Aristotle rejected the Platonic theory of forms, he defended his own vision of ultimate reality, including the eternal existence of substance. On The Soul uses the notion of a hylomorphic composite to provide a detailed account of the functions exhibited by living things—vegetable, animal, and human—and explains the use of sensation and reason to achieve genuine knowledge. That Aristotle was interested in more than a strictly scientific exploration of human nature is evident from the discussion of literary art (particularly tragedy) in Peri PoihtikhV (Poetics) and the methods of persuasion in the ‘RhtoreiaV (Rhetoric).

Aristotle made several efforts to explain how moral conduct contributes to the good life for human agents, including the Eqikh EudaimonhV (Eudemian Ethics) and the Magna Moralia, but the most complete surviving statement of his views on morality occurs in the Eqikh Nikomacoi (Nicomachean Ethics). There he considered the natural desire to achieve happiness, described the operation of human volition and moral deliberation, developed a theory of each virtue as the mean between vicious extremes, discussed the value of three kinds of friendship, and defended his conception of an ideal life of intellectual pursuit.

But on Aristotle's view, the lives of individual human beings are invariably linked together in a social context. In the Peri PoliV (Politics) he speculated about the origins of the state, described and assessed the relative merits of various types of government, and listed the obligations of the individual citizen. He may also have been the author of a model PoliteiaV Aqhnawn (Constitution of Athens), in which the abstract notion of constitutional government is applied to the concrete life of a particular society.

(1596-1650) After receiving a sound education in mathematics, classics, and law at La Flèche and Poitiers, René Descartes embarked on a brief career in military service with Prince Maurice in Holland and Bavaria. Unsatisfied with scholastic philosophy and troubled by skepticism of the sort expounded by Montaigne, Descartes soon conceived a comprehensive plan for applying mathematical methods in order to achieve perfect certainty in human knowledge. During a twenty-year period of secluded life in Holland, he produced the body of work that secured his philosophical reputation. Descartes moved to Sweden in 1649, but did not survive his first winter there.

Although he wrote extensively, Descartes chose not to publish his earliest efforts at expressing the universal method and deriving its consequences. The Regulae ad directionem ingenii (Rules for the Direction of the Mind) (1628) contain his first full statement of the principles underlying the method and his confidence in the success of their application. In Le Monde (The World) (1634), Descartes clearly espoused a Copernican astronomy, but he withheld the book from the public upon learning of Galileo's condemnation.

Descartes finally presented (in French) his rationalist vision of the progress of human knowledge in the Discours de la méthode pour bien conduire sa Raison et chercher la Vérité dans les Sciences (Discourse on Method) (1637). In this expository essay, Descartes assessed the deficient outcomes of a traditional education, proposed a set of rules with which to make a new start, and described the original experience upon which his hope for unifying human knowledge was based. The final sections of the Discourse and the essays (on dipotric, meteors, and geometry) appended to it illustrate the consequences of employing this method.

A few years later, Descartes offered (in Latin) a more formal exposition of his central tenets in Meditationes de Prima Philosophia (Meditations on First Philosophy) (1641). After an expanded statement of the method of doubt, he argued that even the most dire skepticism is overcome by the certainty of one's own existence as a thinking thing. From this beginning, he believed it possible to use our clear and distinct ideas to demonstrate the existence of god, to establish the reliability of our reason generally despite the possibility of error, to deduce the essence of body, and to prove that material things do exist. On these grounds, Descartes defended a strict dualism, according to which the mind and body are wholly distinct, even though it seems evident that they interact. The Meditations were published together with an extensive set of objections (by Hobbes, Gassendi, Arnauld, and others) and Descartes's replies. Descartes later attempted a more systematic exposition of his views in the Principia Philosophiae (Principles of Philosophy) (1644) and an explanation of human emotion in Les Passions de L'Ame (The Passions of the Soul)

(427-347 BCE) The son of wealthy and influential Athenian parents, Plato began his philosophical career as a student of Socrates. When the master died, Plato travelled to Egypt and Italy, studied with students of Pythagoras, and spent several years advising the ruling family of Syracuse. Eventually, he returned to Athens and established his own school of philosophy at the Academy. For students enrolled there, Plato tried both to pass on the heritage of a Socratic style of thinking and to guide their progress through mathematical learning to the achievement of abstract philosophical truth. The written dialogues on which his enduring reputation rests also serve both of these aims.

In his earliest literary efforts, Plato tried to convey the spirit of Socrates's teaching by presenting accurate reports of the master's conversational interactions, for which these dialogues are our primary source of information. Early dialogues are typically devoted to investigation of a single issue, about which a conclusive result is rarely achieved. Thus, the Euqufrwn (Euthyphro) raises a significant doubt about whether morally right action can be defined in terms of divine approval by pointing out a significant dilemma about any appeal to authority in defence of moral judgments. The Apologhma (Apology) offers a description of the philosophical life as Socrates presented it in his own defense before the Athenian jury. The Kritwn (Crito) uses the circumstances of Socrates's imprisonment to ask whether an individual citizen is ever justified in refusing to obey the state.

Although they continue to use the talkative Socrates as a fictional character, the middle dialogues of Plato develop, express, and defend his own, more firmly established, conclusions about central philosophical issues. Beginning with the Menwn (Meno), for example, Plato not only reports the Socratic notion that no one knowingly does wrong, but also introduces the doctrine of recollection in an attempt to discover whether or not virtue can be taught. The Faidwn (Phaedo) continues development of Platonic notions by presenting the doctrine of the Forms in support of a series of arguments that claim to demonstrate the immortality of the human soul.

The masterpiece among the middle dialogues is Plato's Politeia (Republic). It begins with a Socratic conversation about the nature of justice but proceeds directly to an extended discussion of the virtues (Gk. areth [aretê]) of justice (Gk. dikaiwsunh [dikaiôsunê]), wisdom (Gk. sofia [sophía]), courage (Gk. andreia [andreia]), and moderation (Gk. swfrosunh [sophrosúnê]) as they appear both in individual human beings and in society as a whole. This plan for the ideal society or person requires detailed accounts of human knowledge and of the kind of educational program by which it may be achieved by men and women alike, captured in a powerful image of the possibilities for human life in the allegory of the cave. The dialogue concludes with a review of various forms of government, an explicit description of the ideal state, in which only philosophers are fit to rule, and an attempt to show that justice is better than injustice. Among the other dialogues of this period are Plato's treatments of human emotion in general and of love in particular in the FaidroV (Phaedrus) and Sumposion (Symposium).

Plato's later writings often modify or completely abandon the formal structure of dialogue. They include a critical examination of the theory of forms in ParmenidhV (Parmenides), an extended discussion of the problem of knowledge in QeaithtoV (Theaetetus), cosmological speculations in TimaioV (Timaeus), and an interminable treatment of government in the unfinished LegeiV (Laws).

(1765-1841), German philosopher and theologian, born on the 27th of March 1765 at Munich, was the third son of F. P. Baader, court physician to the elector of Bavaria. His brothers were both distinguishedthe elder, Clemens, as an author; the second, Joseph (1763183 5), as an engineer. Franz studied medicine at Ingolstadt and Vienna, and for a short time assisted his father in his practice. This life he soon found uncongenial, and decided on becoming a mining engineer. He studied under Abraham Gottlob Werner at Freiberg, travelled through several of the mining districts in north Germany, and for four years, 1792-1796, resided in England.
There he became acquainted with the works of Jakob Boehme, and with the ideas of Hume, Hartley and Godwin, which were extremely distasteful to him. The mystical speculations of Meister Eckhart, Saint Martin, and above all those of Boehme, were more in harmony with his mode of thought. In 1796 he returned from England, and in Hamburg became acquainted with F. H. Jacobi, with whom he was for years on terms of friendship. He now learned something of Schelling, and the works he published during this period were manifestly influenced by that philosopher. Yet Baader is no disciple of Schelling, and, probably gave out more than he received. Their friendship continued till about the year 1822, when Baaders denunciation of modern philosophy in his letter to the emperor Alexander I. of Russia entirely alienated Schelling.

All this time Baader continued to apply himself to his profession of engineer. He gained a prize of 12,000 gulden (about 1000) for his new method of employing Glaubers salts instead of potash in the making of glass. From 1817 to 1820 he held the post of superintendent of mines, and was raised to the rank of nobility for his services. He retired in 5820, and soon after published one of the best of his works, Fermenta Cognitionis, 6 parts, 1822-1825, in which he combats modern philosophy and recommends the study of Boehme. In 1826, when the new university was opened at Munich, he was appointed professor of philosophy and speculative theology. Some of the lectures delivered there he published under the title, Spekulative Dogmatik, 4 parts, 1827-1836. In 1838 he opposed the interference in civil matters of the Roman Catholic Church, to which he belonged, and in consequence was, during the last three years of his life, interdicted from lecturing on the philosophy of religion. He died on the 23rd of May 1841.

It is difficult to summarize Baaders philosophy, for he himself generally gave expression to his deepest thoughts in obscure aphorisms, or mystical symbols and analogies (see Ed. Zellers Ges. d. deut. Phil. 732, 736). Further, he has no systematic works; his doctrines exist for the most part in short detached essays, in comments on the writings of Boehme and Saint Martin, or in his extensive correspondence and journals. At the same time there are salient points which mark the outline of his thought. Baader starts from the position that human reason by itself can never reach the end it aims at, and maintains that we cannot throw aside the presuppositions of faith, church and tradition. His point of view nay be described as Scholasticism; for, like the scholastic doctors, he believes that theology and philosophy are not opposed sciences, but that reason has to make clear the truths given by authority and revelation. But in his attempt to draw still closer the realms of faith and knowledge he approaches more nearly to the mysticism of Eckhart, Paracelsus and Boehme. Our existence depends on the act that we are cognized by God (cogitor ergo cogito et sum). All self-consciousness is at the same time God-consciousness; our knowledge is never mere scientia, it is invariably con-scientia a knowing with, consciousness of, or participation in God. Baaders philosophy is thus essentially a theosophy. God is not to be conceived as mere abstract Being (substantia), but as everlasting process, activity (actus). Of this process, this self-generation of God, we may distinguish two aspectsthe immanent or esoteric, and the eminent or exoteric. God has reality only in so far as He is absolute spirit, and only in so far as the primitive will is conscious of itself can it become spirit at all. But in this very cognition of self is involved the distinction of knower and known, from which proceeds the power to become spirit. This immanent process of self-consciousness, therein indeed a trinity of persons is not given but only rendered possible, is mirrored in, and takes place through, the eternal and impersonal idea or wisdom of God, which exists beside, though not distinct from, the primitive will. Concrete reality or personality is given to this divine Ternar, as Baader calls it, through nature, the principle of self-hood, of individual being, which is eternally and necessarily produced by God. Only in nature is the trinity of persons attained. These processes, it must be noticed, are not to be conceived as successive, or as taking place in time; they are to be looked at sub specie aeternitatis, as the necessary elements or moments in the self-evolution of the divine Being. Nor is nature to be confounded with created substance, or with matter as it exists in space and time; it is pure non-being, the mere otherness (alteritas) of Godhis shadow, desire, want, or desiderium sui, as it is called by mystical writers. Creation, itself a free and non-temporal act of Gods love and will, cannot be speculatively deduced, but must be accepted as an historic fact.

Created beings were originally of three ordersthe intelligent or angels; the non-intelligent natural existences; and man, who mediated between these two orders. Intelligent beings are endowed with freedom; it is possible, but not necessary, that they should fall. Hence the fact of the fall is not a speculative but an historic truth. The angels fell through pridethrough desire to raise themselves to equality with God; man fell by lowering himself to the level of nature. Only after the fall of man begins the creation of space, time and matter, or of the world as we now know it; and the motive of this creation was the desire to afford man an opportunity for taking advantage of the scheme of redemption, for bringing forth in purity the image of God according to which he has been fashioned. The physical philosophy and anthropology which Baader, in connection with this, unfolds in various works, is but little instructive, and coincides in the main with the utterances of Boehme. In nature and in man he finds traces of the dire effects of sin, which has corrupted both and has destroyed their natural harmony. As regards ethics, Baader rejects the Kantian or any autonomic system of morals. Not obedience to a moral law, but realization in ourselves of the divine life is the true ethical end. But man has lost the power to effect this by himself; he has alienated himself from God, and therefore no ethical theory which neglects the facts of sin and redemption is satisfactory or even possible. The history of man and of humanity is the history of the redeeming love of God. The means whereby we put ourselves so in relation with Christ as to receive from Him his healing virtue are chiefly prayer and the sacraments of the church; mere works are never sufficient. Man in his social relations is under two great institutions. One is temporal, natural and limitedthe state; the other is eternal, cosmopolitan and universalthe church. In the state two things are requisite: first, common submission to the ruler, which can be secured or given only when the state is Christian, for God alone is the true ruler of men; and, secondly, inequality of rank, without which there can be no organization. A despotism of mere power and liberalism, which naturally produces socialism, are equally objectionable. The ideal state is a civil community ruled by a universal or Catholic church, the principles of which are equally distinct from mere passive pietism, or faith which will know nothing, and from the Protestant doctrine, which is the very radicalism of reason.

Vergil or Virgil (Publius Vergilius Maro), 70-19 B.C., greatest of Roman poets; b. near Mantua; a resident of Rome from 41 B.C. Early life on his father's farm was central to his education. The Eclogues or Bucolics (37 B.C.) idealized rural life in the manner of THEOCRITUS. Vergil then turned to realistic and didactic rural poetry in the Georgics (30 B.C.), seeking, like HESIOD, to convey the charm of real life and work on the farm. He spent the rest of his life working on his national epic, the Aeneid, one of the greatest long poems in world literature. Vergil's AENEAS is a paragon of Roman virtues-familial devotion, loyalty to the state, and piety. The 12 books follow Aeneas from TROY's fall through his affair with the Carthaginian queen, DIDO, to the founding of the Roman state. The poem, in dactylic hexameters of striking regularity, is central to all Latin literature. A favorite of AUGUSTUS, Vergil influenced poets from DANTE on.

(1872-1933) Born in Hanover, Germany, he studied in Bonn and Munich and in Freiburg where he became a Protestant. In 1908 he began to teach at the Technical High School in Hanover but moved to the history of ideas, on which he wrote many books. Influenced by Zionism, he returned to Judaism and wrote a classic study of 'Jewish self-hatred'. In 1925 he was the object of anti-Semitic attacks after opposing Hindenburg's election as president of Germany. He moved to Marienbad (now Marianske Lazne, in the Czech Republic), where he was assassinated by German Nazis sent there expressly to kill him.

(1890-1947) Kurt Lewin is considered to be by many, the most charismatic psychologist of his generation. He was born in Germany in 1890. His formal training in psychology began in 1910 in Berlin and led to a Ph.D. in the experimental study of associative learning.

During World War I Lewin served as a private and eventually became a lieutenant in the German army. He was wounded in action and received an Iron Cross. After the war he returned to the Psychological Institute in Berlin where he became Privatedozent in 1921. In 1927, at the age of 37, he advanced to Ausserordentlicher Professor.

Lewin came to the United States in 1932 as a visiting professor to Stanford University. His influence in America was immediate. Lewin’s published many books before his arrival to the United States and after. With Fritz Heider, a fellow refugee friend from Berlin, and his American wife Grace, he wrote Lewin’s Principles of Topical Psychology. Lewin left Stanford for Cornell and eventually settled down at the University of Iowa from 1935 to 1944. After Lewin moved from Iowa he established and directed the Research Center for Group Dynamics at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology.

Lewin is most renown for his development of the field theory. The field theory is the "proposition that human behavior is the function of both the person and the environment: expressed in symbolic terms, B = f (P, E)."(Deaux 9) This means that one’s behavior is related both to one’s personal characteristics and to the social situation in which one finds oneself.

The field theory may seem obvious to us now, but most early psychologist did not believe in behaviorism. Many psychologists at the time believed in the psychoanalytic theory that held human motives to be blind pushes from within. Lewin thought of motives as goal- directed forces. He believed "that our behavior is purposeful; we live in a psychological reality or life space that includes not only those parts of our physical and social environment that are important to us but also imagined states that do not currently exist" (Tesser 340).

Lewin’s field theory lead to the development of actual field research on human behavior. With boldness, Lewin manipulated complex situational variables in natural settings. His approach has guided experiments in the field of social cognition, social motivation, and group processes. Most importantly Lewin helped develop action research. Action research uses empirical social research, social action, and controlled evaluation.

Clearly, Kurt Lewin’s field theory and action field research has one of the most outstanding impacts on modern social psychology. His field theory explained that our actions are a result of both environmental and psychological traits. We are not just beings who act from internal impulses. Instead we are greatly influenced by our surroundings.

Lastly Lewin’s belief that social-psychological phenomena can be studied experimentally was a huge impetus for scientific research. He was the first to test human behavior in a controlled setting. His research also showed events must be studied in

relation to one another, and that both the individual and the group are important. His research helped to better explain leadership atmospheres and group dynamics.

Kurt Lewin’s influence on scientific research is his legacy. He was a ground-breaking psychologist who greatly impacted his field. Kurt Lewin will continue to influence both theory and research all the way to and beyond the twenty-first century.

1856 - 1939 Sigmund Freud was born in the Austro-Hungarian Empire in 1856. His father was a small time merchant, and Freud's mother was his second wife. Freud had two half-brothers some 20 years older than himself. His family moved to Vienna when he was four years old, and though he often claimed he hated the city, he lived there until it was occupied by Germany in 1938. Freud's family background was Jewish, though his father was a freethinker and Freud himself an avowed atheist.

Freud was a good student, and very ambitious. Medicine and law were the professions then open to Jewish men, and in 1873 he entered the University of Vienna medical school. He was interested in science above all; the idea of practicing medicine was slightly repugnant to him. He hoped to go into neurophysiological research, but pure research was hard to manage in those days unless you were independently wealthy. Freud was engaged and needed to be able to support a family before he could marry, and so he determined to go into private practice with a specialty in neurology.

During his training he befriended Josef Breuer, another physician and physiologist. They often discussed medical cases together and one of Breuer's would have a lasting effect on Freud. Known as Anna O., this patient was a young woman suffering from what was then called hysteria. She had temporary paralysis, could not speak her native German but could speak French and English, couldn't drink water even when thirsty, and so on. Breuer discovered that if he hypnotized her, she would talk of things she did not remember in the conscious state, and afterwards her symptoms were relieved -- thus it was called "the talking cure." Freud went to Paris for further study under Jean-Martin Charcot, a neurologist known all over Europe for his studies of hysterics and use of hypnosis.

In 1886, Freud returned to Vienna, opened a private practice specializing in nervous and brain disorders, and married. He tried hypnotism with his hysteric and neurotic patients, but gradually discarded the practice. He found he could get patients to talk just by putting them in a relaxing position (the couch) and encouraging them to say whatever came into their heads (free association). He could then analyze what they had remembered or expressed and determine what traumatic events in their past had caused their current suffering.

In 1900, Freud published The Interpretation of Dreams, and introduced the wider public to the notion of the unconscious mind. In 1901, he published The Psychopathology of Everyday Life, in which he theorized that forgetfulness or slips of the tongue (now called "Freudian slips") were not accidental at all, but it was the "dynamic unconscious" revealing something meaningful. To many, these ideas seemed to be making science out of a folk art, but Freud had still more controversial ideas to come. He concluded that the sexual drive was the most powerful shaper of a person's psychology, and that sexuality was present even in infants. He shocked society when he published these ideas in 1905. His most well-known theory is that of the "Oedipus complex" -- that in children (boys, that is) there is a sexual attraction towards the mother and a sense of jealousy to the point of hatred of the father. He later developed a parallel theory for girls.

In 1902, Freud was appointed professor at the University of Vienna and began to gather a devoted following. By 1906, there were 17 disciples, and soon more, who formed a Psychoanalytic Society. Other such groups emerged in other cities. But Freud's group fell victim to political infighting, and some of his closest adherents (such as Alfred Adler and Carl Jung) split from the group with bitter feelings.

Freud continued working, developing his theories, and writing -- producing a stunning volume of work. In 1909 he made his first international presentation of his theories, at Clark University in Massachusetts. His name was becoming a household word. In 1923, he was diagnosed with cancer of the jaw, a result of years of cigar smoking. He was 67. He would have 30 operations over the next 16 years to treat the progressive disease. Meanwhile, a political cancer was growing in Europe. By 1933, the Nazi party had risen to power in Germany. They burned books by Freud, among others. They took over Austria in 1938. Freud's passport was confiscated, but his fame and the influence of foreigners persuaded the occupying forces to let him go, and he and his wife fled to England. He died there in September, 1939.

Supporters have praised Freud rapturously and critics have called him everything from a con-man to a dirty-minded pansexualist . . . but no one disagrees that he has been one of the most influential scientists of the century. Not only did he influence the professional practice of psychology and psychiatry, but he changed the way people (in Western cultures) view themselves and think about their lives.

"Anatomy is destiny."

"Analogies decide nothing, it is true, but they can make one feel more at home."