Animism Animism is a religious and ontological perspective common to many indigenous cultures across the globe. According to an oft-quoted definition from the Victorian anthropologist E. B. Tylor, animists believe in the “animation of all nature”, and are characterized as having “a sense of spiritual beings…inhabiting trees and rocks and waterfalls”. Plus récemment, ethnographers and anthropologists have moved beyond Tylor’s initial definition, and have sought

Ralph Cudworth (1617—1688) Ralph Cudworth was an English philosopher and theologian, representative of a seventeenth century movement known as the Cambridge Platonists. These were the first English philosophers to publish primarily in their native tongue, and to use Plato as a core influence. Three of Cudworth’s works: The True Intellectual System of the Universe, A Treatise Concerning Eternal and Immutable Morality, and A Treatise on

Michel Foucault: Ethics The French philosopher and historian Michel Foucault (1926-1984) does not understand ethics as moral philosophy, the metaphysical and epistemological investigation of ethical concepts (métaéthique) and the investigation of the criteria for evaluating actions (normative ethics), as Anglo-American philosophers do. Plutôt, he defines ethics as a relation of self to itself in terms of its moral agency. Plus précisément, ethics denotes the intentional

Ancient Ethics Ethical reflection in ancient Greece and Rome starts from all of an agent’s ends or goals and tries to systematize them. Our ends are diverse. We typically want, entre autres, material comfort, santé, respect from peers and love from friends and family, successful children, healthy emotional lives, and intellectual achievement. We see all these things as good for us. Ainsi, systematizing our

Sayyid Qutb (1906-1966) Sayyid Qutb était l'un des principaux penseurs idéologiques islamistes du XXe siècle.. Vivre et travailler en Egypte, il s'est tourné vers l'islamisme au début de la quarantaine après environ deux décennies en tant qu'éducateur laïc et écrivain littéraire. En tant qu'islamiste, il a estimé que tous les aspects de la société devaient être menés conformément à la charia, c'est, lois de Dieu dérivées