Dogmatism and Evolution: Studies in Modern Philosophy (Classic Reprint)

Excerpt from Dogmatism and Evolution: Studies in Modern Philosophy

The term 'dogmatism 18 here used to denote the body of logical assumptions which were generally made by thinkers of all schools, before the rise of theories of social and organic evolution. Its application is therefore wider than common usage would warrant. The empiricism of Berkeley and Hume, as well as the rationalism of Descartes and Leibniz, is included in its scope. The first part of the present work is devoted to the analysis and illustration of the dogmatic principles. In the later parts we have examined some of the philosophies by which dogmatism has, upon one side or another, been assailed: the critical philosophy, absolute idealism, and, at much greater length, pragmatism.

It is to an excursion over well-traveled roads that the reader is invited. A glance over the pages will show them to be fairly sprinkled with the great names - Bacon, Hobbes, Descartes, Spinoza, Leibniz, Locke, Berkeley, Hume, Kant, Hegel, Mill, James - while few others are mentioned except in passing. In a history this would be a sore defect. But our object was not history, but the critical analysis of principles; and this required the confinement of the discussion to a comparatively few systems that would be recognized as typical.

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