[Lecture Seven] Founders of Western Philosophy: Thales to Hume
by Dr. Leonard Peikoff
Total Time: 2 hours, 45 minutes
Course summary: Presented as two complementary twelve-lecture courses—Founders of Western Philosophy: Thales to Hume and Modern Philosophy: Kant to the Present—The History of Philosophy covers the whole of western philosophy from its discovery in Ancient Greece to the twentieth century, including Objectivism. Dr. Peikoff argues that philosophy is the means by which we can understand any human culture and, more broadly, the history and changing course of a civilization. Read more »
In this lecture: Emerging from the mystery religions of the Roman Empire and the Neo-Platonic philosophy of Plotinus, the rise of Christianity gained its first systematic philosopher in Saint Augustine. This lecture examines how Augustine systematized human dependence on God in all branches of philosophy. The resulting Dark Ages and early Middle Ages witnessed very little contributions to philosophy until the rediscovery of Aristotle in the West. The lecture concludes with an introduction to how Saint Thomas Aquinas built a philosophic system that combined Christianity with Aristotelianism.
Study Guide
This material is designed to help you digest the lecture content. You can also download below a PDF study guide for the entire course.
| What contributions did the early Christian figures have on the rise of philosophy? |
| Where does Augustine follow and depart from Plato in his theory of knowledge? |
| What elements of Greek philosophy remained in Augustine’s view of the primacy of faith? |
| How does Augustine derive his unique Christian determinism? |
| Explain Augustine’s answer to the problem of evil. |
| What is the most important element in Augustine’s ethical system? |
| What mixed elements of Greek and pagan views remained in Augustine’s Christian ethics? |
| How did Augustine’s theory of history influence modern philosophers? |
| What were the main philosophic issues confronted by the Scholastics? |
| What is the ontological argument for God? |
| How does Aquinas distinguish between and reconcile faith and reason? |
| According to Aquinas, how do humans come to a knowledge of the laws of logic? |
Q&A Guide
Below is a list of questions from the audience taken from this lecture, along with (approximate) time stamps.
| 2:09:44 | What was Augustine’s theory of time? |
| 2:15:40 | What was the name of the Arabian Aristotelian you mentioned? |
| 2:15:52 | How does Thomas Aquinas say we arrive at the laws of logic? |
| 2:18:22 | You have stated that a philosophy has no hope of becoming popular if it has a weak ethics. Why then has Kant’s philosophy, as opposed to Aristotle’s, had the most influence on subsequent movements? Isn’t Aristotle’s ethics more practicable and more appealing to the man on the street? |
| 2:23:52 | What was Augustine’s philosophy of history? |
| 2:28:48 | What are the two allegedly rational arguments for ecstasy put forth by modern mystics that you mentioned last time? |
| 2:32:45 | If to be humble in this world is a virtue, why is it a punishment in the next? Likewise with pride? |
| 2:35:22 | Would you define epistemology? |
| 2:36:00 | According to Christianity, what is the ecstasy you will gain in the other world? |
| 2:36:31 | What is Aristippus’s view called if not Epicureanism? |
| 2:36:58 | When the philosophers of the Hellenistic period refer to the problem of evil, do they make any distinction between the actions of men (such as murder and rape) and natural phenomena (such as earthquakes and diseases)? |
| 2:37:33 | A search for an explanation of the universe has recurred in the history of philosophy you have discussed. Is this a valid question from the Objectivist point of view? |
| 2:38:33 | What is the specific way by which Augustine influenced Hitler? |
| 2:39:34 | Why is it that Aristotle had so little impact in the Greek culture (which was rational comparatively) and such an enormous influence in the medieval period, which was so irrational? |
| 2:42:40 | Would you explain what you mean by the term concrete-bound? |