Charles-Louis de Secondat, baron de La Brde et de Montesquieu
He is famous for his articulation of the theory of separation of powers, taken for granted in modern discussions of government and implemented in many constitutions throughout the world. He was largely responsible for the popularization of the terms feudalism and Byzantine Empire.
Francois Quesnay
Laissez Faire, laissez passer
In 1758 he published the Tableau conomique (Economic Table), which provided the foundations of the ideas of the Physiocrats. This was perhaps the first work to attempt to describe the workings of the economy in an analytical way, and as such can be viewed as one of the first important contributions to economic thought.
cross reference Turgot
David Hume
Treatise of Human Nature
the self as "nothing but a bundle or collection of different perceptions, which succeed each other with an inconceivable rapidity and are in a perpetual flux or movement"
Jean-Jacques Rousseau
Social ContractThe first man who, having fenced in a piece of land, said "This is mine," and found people naive enough to believe him, that man was the true founder of civil society. From how many crimes, wars, and murders, from how many horrors and misfortunes might not any one have saved mankind, by pulling up the stakes, or filling up the ditch, and crying to his fellows: Beware of listening to this impostor; you are undone if you once forget that the fruits of the earth belong to us all, and the earth itse
Adam Smith
is not from the benevolence of the butcher, the brewer, or the baker that we expect our dinner, but from their regard to their own interest. We address ourselves, not to their humanity but to their self-love, and never talk to them of our own necessities but of their advantages.
Immanual Kant
Immanuel Kant
Critque of Pure Reason
the self as as a :trancendental unity of apperception" a "noumental self" beyond but pre-supposed by sense-experience.
Idealism and the world as a creation of the mind.
key terms:
categorical imperative
Anne-Robert-Jacques Turgot
With the physiocrats, he believed in an enlightened political absolutism, and looked to the king to carry through all reforms
Jeremy Bentham
He became known as one of the most influential of the utilitarians, through his own work and that of his students. These included his secretary and collaborator on the utilitarian school of philosophy, James Mill; James Mill's son John Stuart Mill; and several political leaders including Robert Owen, who later became a founder of socialism. He is also considered the godfather of University College London.
Thomas Robert Malthus
Malthus's theory of population has proven very influential. In 1978 Michael H. Hart published a book called The 100: A Ranking of the Most Influential Persons in History, which placed Malthus at number 80 in this worldwide ranking.
Georg Wilhelm Friedrich Hegel
HegelHegel's influence was immense both within philosophy and in the other sciences. Throughout the 19th century many chairs of philosophy around Europe were held by Hegelians, although Kierkegaard, Feuerbach, Marx, and Engels were all opposed to the most central themes of Hegel's philosophy. After less than a generation, Hegel's philosophy was suppressed and even banned by the Prussian right-wing, and was firmly rejected by the left-wing in multiple official writings.
David Ricardo
Perhaps the most important of his contributions was the theory of comparative advantage, a fundamental argument in favor of free trade among countries and of specialization among individuals. Ricardo argued that there is mutual benefit from trade (or exchange) even if one party (e.g. resource-rich country, highly-skilled artisan) is more productive in every possible area than its trading counterpart (e.g. resource-poor country, unskilled laborer), as long as each concentrates on the activities w
http://plato.stanford.edu/entries/original-position/
The original position is a central feature of John Rawls's social contract account of justice, %u201Cjustice as fairness,%u201D set forth in A Theory of Justice (TJ). It is designed to be a fair and impartial point of view that is to be adopted in our reasoning about fundamental principles of justice. In taking up this point of view, we are to imagine ourselves in the position of free and equal persons who jointly agree upon and commit themselves to pri
Sources of the Self
Taylor is associated with political theorists like Michael Walzer and Michael Sandel, for their communitarian critique of liberal theory's understanding of the "self." Communitarians emphasize the importance of social and communal arrangements and institutions to the development of individual meaning and identity
