CHAPTER 12

MATERIALISM
In philosophy, doctrine that all existence is resolvable
into matter or into an attribute or effect of matter
According to this doctrine, matter is the ultimate reality,
and the phenomenon of consciousness is explained by
physiochemical changes in the nervous system
It is the antithesis of idealism

ANTI-RELIGIOUS MATERIALISM
• It is motivated by a spirit of hostility toward
the theological dogmas of organized religion,
particularly those of Christianity
• Notable among its exponents were the 18th-
century French philosophers:
▫ Denis Diderot
▫ Paul Henri d'Holbach
▫ Julien Offroy de La Mettrie
 French philosopher, physician, and proponent
of materialism, the doctrine that all beings and
phenomena are explicable in terms of matter or
the effects of matter

DENNIS DIDEROT

HISTORICAL MATERIALISM
• According this, as set forth in the writings of
Karl Marx, Friedrich Engels, and Vladimir Ilich
Lenin, in every historical epoch the prevailing
economic system by which the necessities of life
are produced determines the form of societal
organization and the political, religious, ethical,
intellectual, and artistic history of the epoch
German political philosopher and
revolutionary, the most important of
all socialist thinkers and the creator
of a system of thought called
Marxism
With political economist Friedrich
Engels, he founded scientific
socialism (now known as
communism); for this, Marx is
considered one of the most
influential thinkers of all time

FRIEDRICH ENGELS
A German revolutionary political economist,
worked with fellow German revolutionary, Karl
Marx, from 1842 to 1883
Together, the two defined communism
They completed their famous treatise on the
collapse of capitalism and rise of communism, The
Communist Manifesto, in 1848, and in
1870 helped found the:
FIRST INTERNATIONAL
▫ An international Socialist organization
He wrote many of his own treatises on socialism and is also
known for editing and publishing the second and third
volumes of Das Kapital following the death of Marx in
1883

• He gained political stature
through his writings and
then as head of the radical
socialist Bolshevik Party
• He led the 1917 Bolshevik
takeover of Russia's
Provisional Government,
which had governed the
country since the fall of
tsarist rule a few months
earlier
• After the revolution, He
became the leader of the
new Soviet state
• VLADIMIR LENIN

MODERN TIMES PHILOSOPHICAL MATERIALISM

CULTURAL MATERIALISM

CHRISTIAN MATERIALISM
• A Christian devotion to
material wealth and
possessions at the expense
of spiritual or intellectual
values
OPUS DEI
▫ It was established in 1928
by Spanish priest
Josémaría Escrivá de
Balaguer y Albas and was
approved by the papacy
in 1950
▫ In 1982 Pope John Paul
II agreed to the
organization’s request to
become a prelature

DETERMINISM
• The doctrine or belief that everything, including every
human act, is caused by something and that there is no
real free will
• A philosophical doctrine holding that every event,
mental as well as physical, has a cause, and that, the
cause being given, the event follows invariably
• This theory denies the element of chance or
contingency
• It is opposed to Indifferentism, or
Indeterminism, which maintains that, in
phenomena of the human will, preceding events do not
definitely determine subsequent ones
• Because determinism is generally assumed to be true of
all events except volition, the doctrine is of greatest
importance when applied to ethics
The belief that
variations in
doctrine and
practice within a
religion are
unimportant
The philosophical
theory that
human beings
have free will and
their actions are
not always and
completely
determined by
previous events

TECHNOLOGICAL
DETERMINISM
ENVIRONMENTAL
DETERMINISM
• An approach to
geographic study resulted
in claims for the
superiority of the peoples
of the Temperate Zone to
those of the Tropics and
intermediate zones
• Such work is today viewed
as ethnocentric and of
doubtful scientific validity
The parts of Earth that lie
between the tropics and the
polar circles and generally have
hot summers, cold winters, and
intermediate falls and springs

FREE WILL