Explain and discuss critically the role that Hegel attributes to 'work' in the development of self-consciousness in his account of the servant-master relationship
Essay - 3 pages - Philosophy
In the section entitled "Relations of Master and Servant" from The Phenomenology of Spirit (1807), Hegel explains one stage of the development of consciousness. He begins by pointing out that only by acknowledging an "other" is self-consciousness possible: for example a teacher only recognizes...
To what extent are values and colours analogous?
Essay - 3 pages - Philosophy
It can seem quite strange to compare moral values and color, for one consideres one of these two things to be acquired, as the other one seems to be in constant evolution. Blue, green or red, can be defind by nature, but goodness, cruelty or rightness are simple human qualifications made upon...
If you lack money do you also lack freedom? Please explain your position with reference to the works of at least two of the following: Berlin, Taylor, and MacCallum
Essay - 5 pages - Philosophy
“Whenever a separation is made between liberty and justice, neither, in my opinion, is safe.” (Edmund Burke). Defining justice and how achieve a just society depends on the conception we have of the notion of liberty and equality. These two elements are the core notions of political...
Explain Marx's conception of communist society and assess critically in comparison and contrast with the social ideals of Rousseau
Essay - 5 pages - Philosophy
"A spectre is haunting Europe - the spectre of Communism." This is the prophetic opening line of The Communist Manifesto, published in 1848, one of the major and most well-known work of Marx and Engels, dealing with their ideal of a communist society. However, The Communist Manifesto is not a...
"The aim of all utopias, to a greater or lesser extent, is to eliminate real people". The Handmaid's Tale. John Carey
Book review - 2 pages - Philosophy
By asserting in the introduction of his ?Faber Book of Utopias' that "the aim of all utopias, to a greater or lesser extent, is to eliminate real people" [CAREY : xii], the British literary critic John Carey provocatively enhances what makes utopian stories so contradictory. On one hand, any...
Aristotle and the best kind of life in society
Essay - 6 pages - Philosophy
Nicomachean Ethics (NE) is generally considered, not without any reason, as one of the main books in the history of the ethics. Indeed, Aristotle describes and constructs in his book major concepts, like virtue or happiness that have been used for a long time, from Kant to Arendt and that do...
Can Self-interest provide a plausible foundation for a theory of justice (egalitarian or otherwise)?
Essay - 5 pages - Philosophy
For a long time, humans have been considered intelligent animals, which are able to think and use their mind (Aristotle, [1975], 1098 a). In other words, being human consisted in being virtuous in pre-modern times. Since, the wave of the modernity has widely taken in its wake all these ethics,...
Aristotle and the virtue (Nicomachean Ethics, 1105b19-1107a25)
Essay - 4 pages - Philosophy
This text is extracted from the beginning of two of the famous Aristotle's book, the Nicomachean Ethics (NE). After having done with the problem of the Good and the purpose of the human in Book one (book I, chapters 1-12), Aristotle aims to define what virtue is (I, 13; II). He has already...
Is Rawls' version of "Reflective Equilibrium" a defensible method of theorizing about social justice?
Essay - 6 pages - Philosophy
When John Rawls publishes his Theory of Justice in 1971, he was the first to use the expression "reflective equilibrium" (RE). Even if this kind of idea had been employed before by Nelson Goodman (Goodman, 1955), Rawls employs it as his method, to build a complete theory of justice and sort out...
Muslims and the State: A comparative study of Muslim religious needs in the educational domain in France and Great Britain
Essay - 6 pages - Philosophy
Islam is one of the fastest growing religions in Europe today; it is already the second religion in Europe. There are at least thirteen million Muslims living in this area ranging from Portugal to Finland and from Ireland to Bulgaria. The sociological entity of these Muslims is very...
Critical evaluation of the respective interpretation of cultural relativism as explained by Bernard Williams and Alasdair MacIntyre
Essay - 3 pages - Philosophy
The moral relativism denies that any moral code has universal validity, and ethical propositions do not reflect absolute and universal moral truths. Morality is relative to social, cultural, historical or personal circumstances. The idea of relativism is not new. Protagoras, a Sophist, claimed...
The idea of a fundamental agreement between Confucianism and Christianity
Essay - 4 pages - Philosophy
“After about 400 years of study and research, Confucianism in the West is still a subject which only involves a small group of scholars.” It is more than surprising when we actually realize how wide and deep is the effect of Confucianism on Chinese culture and society. More interesting,...
The concept of freedom according to Sartre
Essay - 4 pages - Philosophy
The understanding of Sartrean freedom is quite easy. Sartre himself admits that human being is ?not free to cease being free' as he is drawn into a social and historical aspects. Nevertheless, taking these two points into consideration, Sartrean concept of freedom has some weaknesses. This...
The urgency of thought; the ethical dilemma of a respectful encounter with others: a space for discourse between africa and the west
Essay - 10 pages - Philosophy
Philosophers for a very long time now have called attention to or revealed the difficulties men have in living together. Jean Paul Sartre, among others, has revealed the necessity of conflict in human relations in opposition to thinkers who have perceived other forms of relations among human...
Swinging London - 1963-1967
Essay - 4 pages - Philosophy
The sixties were usually referred to as a period of joy and optimism, especially in England, as it was a span of time between two tougher periods in British history. Socially and economically speaking, the fifties was characterized as a period of severe struggle in the United Kingdom. The...
Swinging London - 1963-1967 - publié le 17/10/2006
Essay - 4 pages - Philosophy
The Sixties are usually seen as a period of joy and optimism, especially in England, where they take place between two tougher periods of British history. The Fifties had indeed been quite difficult in the United Kingdom, socially and economically speaking. And during the Seventies, many problems...
Why did Aristotle believe in natural slavery?
Essay - 3 pages - Philosophy
Aristotle wrote Politics as a criticism of Plato's Republic, after having been his student for 20 years. Aristotle especially disagrees with Plato's view that only knowledge and perfect forms count. He would criticize Plato's view that women and children should be held in the perfect state and...
St Patrick
Essay - 7 pages - Philosophy
It is difficult to retrace the life of Saint Patrick, because no one is sure of the exactness of the events. Indeed, the punctuality of the facts is mixed up by a lot of legends. The historical marks are not sure and it is difficult to extract the reality of the facts. This is why it is said...
Intercultural communication: interaction in a changing world
Essay - 11 pages - Philosophy
When euripides wrote, all is change ; all yields its place and then goes in 422 B.C., he probably did not realize that he would be helping to introduce a book on intercultural communication. Yet, that study of intercultural communication is about change. It is about changes in the world and how...
Does multiculturalism undermine the universal conceptions of justice? - publié le 25/07/2006
Essay - 4 pages - Philosophy
The Greek philosopher Plato believed in the existence of a parallel world which he called the world of Ideas. This world represented true knowledge with the help of concepts called ?the Ideas'. Each Idea corresponded to something that existed in the world that we experienced, also called ?the...
Does multiculturalism undermine the universal conceptions of justice?
Essay - 4 pages - Philosophy
The Greek philosopher Plato believed that there was a parallel world: the world of Ideas . This world represented the true knowledge with the help of concepts, the Ideas. Each Idea corresponded to something that existed in the world that we experienced: the world of senses. There was the Idea of...
Does History "stop", "start", and "accelerate"? - publié le 24/07/2006
Essay - 4 pages - Philosophy
The fall of the Berlin wall symbolized the end of communism, and the victory of liberal democracy. The suddenness, with which the soviet empire collapsed without any resistance, reinforced the idea that democracy was going to triumph all over the globe. In the controversial article "The End of...
Does History "stop", "start", and "accelerate"?
Essay - 4 pages - Philosophy
The fall of the Berlin wall symbolised the end of communism, and the victory of liberal democracy. The suddenness with which the soviet empire collapsed, without any resistance, authorised the idea that democracy was going to triumph all over the globe. Fukuyama exposed in a very controversial...
Assess the claim that Utilitarianism fails to take sufficient account of the moral significance of our relations to others
Essay - 4 pages - Philosophy
A comparison of how people used to live when they were still cave-inhabitants, with current living conditions that provide an organized society, with concepts such as justice, respect, tolerance and morality, we can feel justifiably proud of the progress we have made. Mankind has progressed so...
Was Arendt's pessimism about modern liberal society justified?
Dissertation - 9 pages - Philosophy
Hannah Arendt was born in 1906 in Germany, being the only child of middle-class Jewish parents of Russian descent. As a university student, she was one of the most brilliant and studied with the finest scholars of the time. Arendt in 1933 left Germany for France, and was even interned there for a...
What exactly is the difference between act-utilitarianism and rule-utilitarianism? Can rule-utilitarianism succeed where act-utilitarianism fails?
Essay - 6 pages - Philosophy
According to the meaning we give to ‘actions', we get two different theories under Utilitarianism. And there is a great debate between those two schools of utilitarianism about how exactly the individual utilitarian should make their moral decisions. The choice for the individual is between...
What exactly is the difference between act-utilitarianism and rule-utilitarianism? Can rule-utilitarianism succeed where act-utilitarianism fails? - published: 13/04/2006
Essay - 6 pages - Philosophy
According to the meaning we give to ?actions', we get two different theories under Utilitarianism. And there is a great debate between those two schools of utilitarianism about how exactly the individual utilitarian should make his moral decisions. The choice for the individual is between...
The quality of life in London: A tale of two cities
Essay - 8 pages - Philosophy
London appears among the most popular cities in the world. It is a city on the move, where you can find everything you need. It is one of the places where fashion is created, where you can meet people of all origins and where the word “Party” gets its real meaning. In there, one can...
Sports impact in the 21st century Society
Dissertation - 44 pages - Philosophy
La rédaction de ce mémoire de fin d?études rédigé en Anglais aura pour but de montrer à ses lecteurs ; l?impact du sport dans notre société, la société du 21eme siècle. Ce rapport sera décomposé en deux parties. Ainsi, ma première définira comment et dans quelle mesure le phénomène du sport...
Oscar Wilde and Aestheticism - published: 03/01/2006
Thesis - 9 pages - Philosophy
The 19th Century in Europe, and especially in England, is marked by the appearances of new artistic movements. Aestheticism is one the most important because it embodies a real change in the mentality and in art, considered as self sufficient. Immanuel Kant is one of the pioneers of it, and...
