Ch. 24 Late Nat. + Lib.

Auguste Comte

• Father of sociology

  • Founded theory of positivism

• Wrote "Course in Positive Philosophy" in 1830

• positivism: the belief that societies have their own scientific principles and laws, just like physics or chemistry

Friedrich Nietzsche

• Was an existentialist, questioned rational thinking, Christianity, democracy

• Wrote “The Birth of Tragedy” (1872)

  • non-rational aspects of human nature are as noble as rational characteristics

• “God is dead” and “ The only thing holding man back is his will.”

  • Critical of racism and Anti-semitism

  • Believed in a “Superman”

• struggle is important for human improvement

  • ex. war and fighting

Responses to Christianity opposition

• Catholic revival in Ireland and France

• Pope - Syllabus of Errors

• Vatican Council - dogma of papal infallibility, Rerum Novarum

Pope Pius IX

• Syllabus of Errors

  • Catholic church set against contemporary science, politics, philosophy

• Doctrine of “ Papal Infallibility” - Conservative

Leo XIII

• Rerum Novarum

• Promoted religious control of marriage, education

  • Said employers should be nice to employees

• Liberal

Pius X

• Renews struggle of modern though and church

• Condemns catholic modernization - conservative

Count Arthur de Gobineau

• “Inequality of the Humane Races” (1853-1854)

  • pioneered the Master Aryan race

  • race mixing produces chaos

Houston Stuart Chamberlain

• anti-Semite

  • believed through genetics a superior race could be developed

• Brought back Anti-Semitism to Germany

late-century nationalism

• New nationality defined through race and blood opposed the ideas of liberalism and socialism

• Led to racism in Europe and North America

Herbert Spencer

• British philosopher

• Known for supporting social Darwinism

• Principles of evolution and natural selection can be applied to social classes and human society

• Reason to not aid those who are weak

Thomas Huxley

• British philosopher

• Natural selection benefits people and created biological discipline

• Said humans are better than it and can improve together

  • Against social Darwinism

Charles Darwin

• Wrote “On the Origins of Species” (1859) and “Theory of Evolution” (1871)

• Natural selection and evolution

• Survival of the fittest

• “Descent of Man” (1871) caused great controversy in religion

Max Weber

• German Socialist

• Protestant work ethic

  • Spirit of Capitalism

• Use marxism as a driving force of economic capitalism

  • Justified capitalism with Puritan beliefs

• Saw bureaucratization as basic feature to social life

Zionist movement

• Establish a separate Jewish state

• Led by Theodor Herzel (once Burschenschaft)

  • His ideas eventually led to the birth of the state of Israel

Opposition to Christianity

• Strauss - Life of Jesus

  • Didn’t deny existence of Jesus, just pointed out its miracles

• C. Lyle - Geology

  • Earth had to be created from science and not God

• Neitzche - God is dead

  • there is no God or Christian morality

Sigmund Freud

• Viennese doctor

  • theorized that human beings are sexual from birth through adulthood

  • sexuality as one of the bases for mental order

• Argued internal mind is based on the struggle of:

  • id - irrational instincts

  • superego - moral expectations on the personality put on society and culture

  • ego - mediates the impulses of id with morals of the superego

• psychoanalysis

  • Enlightenment ideas

Carl Jung

• Freud’s student

• Collective memories along with personal experience constitute a human being’s soul and saw value in religion

  • Romanticism ideas

Henri Bergson

• French philosopher

• Accepted rational and scientific thought to provide useful knowledge

  • But was unable to arrive at the truth of reality

• Reality can only be grasped intuitively and experienced directly

  • Can’t be analyzed, only a description

Georges Sorel

• French political theorist

  • Combined Bergson and Nietzsche ideas on the limits of rational thinking

• Interested in revolutionary socialism and advocated violence to achieve socialism

• Use “general strike” of the power of the workers

anticlericalism

• Opposition to religious authority

  • specifically for social and political matters