We explain what idealism is and what are the types of idealist movement. We also explain its characteristics, some examples and representatives. Please read other MTV articles for more information.
What is idealism?
Idealism is a philosophical theory that defends the idea that ideas exist beyond the individual who thinks them. It also maintains that it is the best way to acquire knowledge.
Idealism is any philosophical doctrine that affirms that ideas are the starting point of all possible knowledge about the world. We do not conform to things, but rather things conform to the ideas we have of them.
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Idealism is one of the most important philosophical currents of recent centuries. Many thinkers, such as Plato, Leibniz, Kant, and Hegel, adhered to this movement.
Beyond its particularities, idealist philosophers believe that ideas are truer than matter.
Like rationalists, idealists affirm that ideas allow us to know the world more completely and perfectly than the senses. For Immanuel Kant (1724-1804), idealism, as transcendental idealism, was a perfect form of knowledge.
Idealist Currents
Due to their theoretical and historical differences, there are different types or currents of idealism. The main currents are:
Platonic Idealism
This is a form of realism. Plato believed that ideas form an independent world (the world of ideas), which is accessed through the intellect and not through the senses. The material or sensible world is nothing more than a degraded copy of it.
Objective or Logical-Transcendental Idealism
Consciousness is understood as a system of logical structures, supported by ideas, that allows us to understand material reality. Within objective idealism, there are subclassifications:
- Transcendental Idealism: Founded by Kant, it maintains that objects are the result of the joint work of sensibility and reason. These objects are known as phenomena and are the counterpart of noumena, which are objects in themselves, independent of how they are perceived.
- German Idealism: It developed in Germany and its main representatives were Kant, Fichte (1762-1814), Schelling (1775-1854), and Hegel (1770-1831). German idealism was built on Kantian thought and maintains that the world is the result of an absolute, infinite, universal, and simultaneously historical idea, whose unfolding is what we call the world.
- Absolute idealism: Also known as Hegelian idealism, it is considered a form of idealism in its own right. Hegel maintained the need for an identity between thought and being, without which there would be no access to knowledge of the world.
- Transcendental subjectivity: Developed by Edmund Husserl (1859-1938), it is a form of subjective idealism. It does not posit a primacy of ideas over matter, but maintains that subjectivity grounds the objectivity of the world.
Subjective idealism
Consciousness is viewed as something real and individual. It maintains that ideas exist in the mind of the subject and not in an external, independent world, such that the world only exists insofar as it is perceived. Some of its representatives were G. Berkeley (1685-1753) and W. Schuppe (1836-1913).
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Characteristics of Idealism
Idealism is a philosophical position whose meaning can vary depending on the school of thought, such as subjective, objective, and absolute idealism. All these forms of idealism share certain characteristics or traits in common:
- An idealist is someone who does not adhere to materialism, dogmatism, or empiricism. An idealist is even considered a non-realist, with the exception of Plato.
- According to a metaphysical point of view, idealism is characterized by considering the mind (or reason or spirit) to be the ultimate foundation of reality. Berkeley’s idealism is an example of this position.
- All forms of idealism hold that ideas, consciousness, or spirit (thought of as synonyms) are above the material world.
- All idealisms hold that truth is attained through reason, either intuitively and immediately or through discursive processes and logical reasoning. Nothing known through sensibility constitutes knowledge.
- Formal idealism, or idealism viewed from an epistemological perspective (the theory of knowledge), allows for the possibility of something existing independent of the mind, but everything we can know is conditioned by the cognitive (or spiritual) process of the subject who confronts the world. An example of this position is Kantian philosophy, for which idealism does not speak of the existence of things but rather of the way we represent them.
Representatives of Idealism
Among the main representatives of idealism are Plato, Descartes, Kant, Hegel, and Leibniz:
Plato
Athens (Greece), 427–347 BC
He was a disciple of Socrates and later a teacher of Aristotle. His work and thought had a great influence on Western philosophy and religious practices. In 387 BC, he founded the Academy, the first school of philosophy in ancient Greece.
Among his many contributions to philosophy is the theory of ideas. Although Plato never called it that, its main arguments appear in three of his mature works: The Republic, Phaedo, and Phaedrus.
In them, Plato distinguishes two distinct realities: sensible reality, which corresponds to the material world, and intelligible reality, which corresponds to immaterial ideas, of which the world is a degraded copy. This is the theory that places Plato as the forerunner of modern idealism.
Rene Descartes
La Haye (Touraine), 1596 – 1650
Descartes was a French philosopher, mathematician, and physicist whose thought influenced the scientific and philosophical fields. His philosophy is concerned with finding an alternative path or method to that of faith to discover and guarantee the truth of science and knowledge in general.
In Discourse on Method, one of his early works, he proposed four criteria for achieving knowledge beyond doubt: evidence, analysis, synthesis, and enumeration. In Metaphysical Meditations, he put this method into practice, allowing him to arrive at the first evident, clear, and distinct truth of metaphysics: the ego cogito, or in its most famous version, the cogito ergo sum (I think, therefore I am).
This discovery earned him entry into the camp of precursors of idealism, since through the cogito, he placed reason and ideas above other less precise and certain forms of knowledge, for example, sensitivity.
Immanuel Kant
Königsberg (Germany), 1724–1804
Kant was a Prussian philosopher, considered one of the great German thinkers. He established that the problem of philosophy is “to know whether reason is capable of knowing.” His philosophical position is known as “criticism” or “transcendental idealism.”
Transcendental idealism maintains that all possible knowledge about the world requires two elements:
The material datum, given to the subject’s sensibility by the phenomenal object (the object that appears to us);
The formal principle, posited by the subject through the categories of understanding.
This formal principle is what allows for the unity of all possible experience, and because of its importance in knowledge, Kant is considered one of the first idealist thinkers of modernity.
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Georg Wilhelm Friedrich Hegel
Stuttgart (Germany) 1770 – 1931
Hegel was a German philosopher who held that “the absolute,” or the idea, manifests itself in an evolutionary manner under the norms of nature and spirit.
He established that knowledge has a dialectical structure: on one side is the existing world, and on the other is the need to overcome the limits of what is known.
Gottfried Wilhelm Leibniz
Leipzig (Germany), 1646 – 1716
Leibniz was a German philosopher who also devoted himself to other branches of knowledge, such as mathematics, logic, theology, and politics. He made important contributions in metaphysics, epistemology, logic, and the philosophy of religion.
According to Leibniz, the universe is composed of independent spiritual substances, which are souls, which Leibniz called “monads”: the constituent elements of all living things.
Leibniz proposed a solution to the problems of the interaction between mind and body, and emphasized the idea of an idealized spiritual substance over matter.
Examples of Idealism
Idealism is, on the one hand, a position regarding the world, and on the other, a philosophical stance on how knowledge is acquired. Therefore, exemplifying its application in everyday life is impossible.
In other areas of knowledge, those who propose an ideal situation that, a priori, seems unattainable are called “idealists.” These are cases in which we speak of idealistic positions: a desire that goes beyond the possible. There are, therefore, situations in everyday life in which this attitude can be reflected. None of these examples are directly related to the philosophical position of idealism.
- Human rights: Although we are all born with a set of inherent rights, inherent to the human condition, we know that in practice many of these rights are constantly violated. In this sense, speaking of rights that must be respected simply because they belong to a human being is a statement detached from reality.
- The French Revolution: Its premises of liberty, equality, and human rights are based on concepts that can be considered ideal in that they cannot be applied to reality in their pure state.
- Don Quixote de la Mancha: Cervantes’ work tells the story of a character who constantly loses touch with reality and poses impossible scenarios as if they were possible.
- The works of Karl Marx, Thomas More, and Henry David Thoreau: Based on their ideas, these authors explain the characteristics and functioning of an ideal society. Whether through the means of production linked to the working class (in Marx’s case), the island literally called “Utopia” (in Thomas More’s case), or life in the woods in Walden (in Thoreau’s case), in all these cases, scenarios and societies are presented from an idealistic and utopian perspective, far removed from the real possibilities of the contemporary world.
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References
All the information we offer is supported by authoritative and up-to-date bibliographic sources, ensuring reliable content in line with our editorial principles.
- Allison, H. E. (1992). Kant’s Transcendental Idealism: An Interpretation and Defense (Vol. 40). Anthropos Editorial.
- Von Schelling, F. W. J. (2005). The System of Transcendental Idealism (Vol. 14). Anthropos Editorial.
- Dunham, J., Grant, I. H., & Watson, S. (2014). Idealism: The History of a Philosophy. Routledge.
- Ameriks, K. (Ed.). (2017). The Cambridge Companion to German Idealism. Cambridge University Press.
- Plato and Idealism at idealismoplaton.blogspot.com
- What it is Idealism, concept, characteristics – concepto.de
