ethics

Philosophy

Philosophers

• ConfuciusConfucius (traditional dates 551–479 BCE) is central to a Chinese ethical and political tradition focused less on abstract rules than on cultivating character through relationships, ritual practice, learning, and exemplary conduct.
• Immanuel KantImmanuel Kant (1724–1804) tries to explain how objective knowledge is possible after Hume undermined the idea that necessities such as causation are simply read from experience.
• SocratesSocrates (c. 470–399 BCE) wrote no philosophical books. What we know comes mainly through other authors — above all Plato and Xenophon — which means “the historical Socrates” and “Plato's Socrates” cannot always be cleanly separated.