"A philosopher's first virtue is the ability to admire himself" - Plato
The beginnings.
In order to do philosophy two virtues are needed:
1.-The ability to turn anything into a challenge or problem to solve.
2.-The need for rigor, precise thought and rationality which can only be achieved through:
*Eliminating cultural preconceptions and prejudices.
*Eliminating the expectations for exact results like those of hard sciences.
1.-The ability to turn anything into a challenge or problem to solve.
2.-The need for rigor, precise thought and rationality which can only be achieved through:
*Eliminating cultural preconceptions and prejudices.
*Eliminating the expectations for exact results like those of hard sciences.
The greek philosopher Socrates makes use of a technique based on successive interrogations until finding an acceptable level of truth. This technique became known as mayeutics.
His student Plato improves upon Socrates system by adding dialogs that try to contradict the first conceived hypotheses until reaching a satisfactory level of truth. This method became known as dialectics.
This is made of two parts:
1.-Hypotheses or proposition of an idea.
2.-Critic or negation of the idea.
After Plato, his student Aristóteles creates the discipline known as logic upon the basis of dialectics using a series of successive reasonings.
His student Plato improves upon Socrates system by adding dialogs that try to contradict the first conceived hypotheses until reaching a satisfactory level of truth. This method became known as dialectics.
This is made of two parts:
1.-Hypotheses or proposition of an idea.
2.-Critic or negation of the idea.
After Plato, his student Aristóteles creates the discipline known as logic upon the basis of dialectics using a series of successive reasonings.
During the Middle Ages the philosopher Saint Thomas di Aquino makes use of logic through wildly differing hypotheses and measuring each other, taking a part of everyone until reaching an acceptable level of truth.
During the Renassaissance the philosophers focus upon reaching an optimal hypotheses making process as exemplified in René Descartes work: DIscurso del Método in which they get to understand objects by dividing complex and confuse problems into smaller and easy to understand pieces.
The Cartesian philosophers also distinguish themselves from their greek counterparts by treating truth as immanent (being the same as the object) while to the greeks ideas are trascendent, existing on a plane different from the objects that exist in reality, unchanging and eternal.
During the Renassaissance the philosophers focus upon reaching an optimal hypotheses making process as exemplified in René Descartes work: DIscurso del Método in which they get to understand objects by dividing complex and confuse problems into smaller and easy to understand pieces.
The Cartesian philosophers also distinguish themselves from their greek counterparts by treating truth as immanent (being the same as the object) while to the greeks ideas are trascendent, existing on a plane different from the objects that exist in reality, unchanging and eternal.
During the beginnings of the XIX century, the german philosophers of the romanticism (Fichte, Schelling, Hegel) start considering the philosophical method as a form of intellectual intuition based on Kant's system that divides existence in phenomenic (simple and how the self perceives it) and the world itself (what is).