Philosophy Figures

Question 1

Aristotle

Answer 1

384-322 BCE

Plato’s student who criticized the theory of Forms and developed a systemized logic.

Question 2

Augustine of Hippo

Answer 2

354-430 AD

A bishop, philosopher, and Neoplatonist.

Question 3

George Berkeley

Answer 3

1685-1753 AD

Irish Idealist who viewed mental representations and impressions as fundamental.

Question 4

René Descartes

Answer 4

1596-1650 AD

French rationalist philosopher and mathematician. Saw the mind and the body as separate.

Question 5

Georg Wilhelm Friedrich Hegel

Answer 5

1770-1831 AD

German Idealist known for his theory of the dialectic.

Question 6

Martin Heidegger

Answer 6

1889-1976 AD

German philosopher who influenced Existentialism.

Question 7

Thomas Hobbes

Answer 7

1588-1679 AD

British materialist who viewed human existence as “nasty, brutish, and short.”

Question 8

David Hume

Answer 8

1711-1776 AD

Scottish empiricist who questioned the necessity of the connection between cause and effect.

Question 9

Edmund Husserl

Answer 9

1859-1938 AD

German philosopher known as the Father of Phenomenology.

Question 10

William James

Answer 10

1842-1910 AD

American empiricist and psychologist known for his description of the flow of ideas as a “stream of consciousness”.

Question 11

Immanuel Kant

Answer 11

1724-1804 AD

German Idealist best known for the “categorical imperative” state says moral agents only act in ways that could become universal laws.

Question 12

Søren Kierkegaard

Answer 12

1813-1855 AD

A Danish existentialist.

Question 13

Gottfried Wilhelm von Leibnitz

Answer 13

1646-1716 AD

German rationalist and mathematician.

Question 14

John Locke

Answer 14

1632-1704 AD

English empiricist who created empiricism, including tabula rasa, and was a figure in the Age of Enlightenment.

Question 15

John Stuart Mill

Answer 15

1806-1873 AD

English empiricist known for his writings on ethical utilitarianism.

Question 16

Friedrich Nietzche

Answer 16

1844-1900 AD

German philosopher best known for his idea of the Übermensch (Superman).

Question 17

William of Occam

Answer 17

1285-1349 AD

English philosopher who created “parsimony”. Also the creator of Occam’s Razor.

Question 18

Blaise Pascal

Answer 18

1623-1662 AD

French philosopher, mathematician, and theologian who argued for the existence of God in “Pascal’s Bargain”.

Question 19

Plato

Answer 19

427-347 BCE

Greek philosopher, a student of Socrates, who developed the theory of Forms - things are a reflection or a shadow of objects and knowledge, which are universals.

Question 20

Pythagoras

Answer 20

570-495 BCE

Pre-Socratic philosopher.

Question 21

Jean Jacques Rousseau

Answer 21

1712-1778 AD

French Romantic philosopher and educator.

Question 22

Bertrand Russell

Answer 22

1872-1970 AD

British philosopher and linguist.

Question 23

Jean Paul Sartre

Answer 23

1905-1980 AD

French existentialist.

Question 24

Socrates

Answer 24

470-399 BCE

Greek philosopher whose oral teachings were written down by Plato.

Question 25

St. Anselm of Canterbury

Answer 25

1033-1109 AD

Christian philosopher who developed an ontological argument for God’s existence.

Question 26

Ludwig Wittgenstein

Answer 26

1889-1951 AD

Austrian philosopher who began as a logical positivist and later developed important ideas in the philosophy of language.

Question 27

St. Thomas Aquinas

Answer 27

1225-1274 AD

Christian philosopher who wrote “The Five Ways” outlining five proofs for the existence of God.