Otto Liebmann (; 25 February 1840 – 14 January 1912) was a German neo-Kantian

philosopher Philosophy ('love of wisdom' in Ancient Greek) is a systematic study of general and fundamental questions concerning topics like existence, reason, knowledge, Value (ethics and social sciences), value, mind, and language. It is a rational an ...

Biography

He was born at Löwenberg,

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, into a

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family, and educated at

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and Halle. He was made professor at

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(1872) and went to

Jena Jena (; ) is a List of cities and towns in Germany, city in Germany and the second largest city in Thuringia. Together with the nearby cities of Erfurt and Weimar, it forms the central metropolitan area of Thuringia with approximately 500,000 in ...

in 1882. He died at

. The mathematician Heinrich Liebmann was his son and the physician Otto Liebmann is his eponymous great-grandson.

Philosophical work

A forerunner of

neo-Kantianism In late modern philosophy, neo-Kantianism () was a revival of the 18th-century philosophy of Immanuel Kant. The neo-Kantians sought to develop and clarify Kant's theories, particularly his concept of the thing-in-itself and his moral philosophy ...

, in his best-known book, ''Kant und die Epigonen'', he deals with the philosophy after

Kant Immanuel Kant (born Emanuel Kant; 22 April 1724 – 12 February 1804) was a German philosopher and one of the central Enlightenment thinkers. Born in Königsberg, Kant's comprehensive and systematic works in epistemology, metaphysics, et ...

, discussing Fichte, Schelling,

Hegel Georg Wilhelm Friedrich Hegel (27 August 1770 – 14 November 1831) was a 19th-century German idealism, German idealist. His influence extends across a wide range of topics from metaphysical issues in epistemology and ontology, to political phi ...

Fries French fries, or simply fries, also known as chips, and finger chips (Indian English), are ''List of culinary knife cuts#Batonnet, batonnet'' or ''Julienning, julienne''-cut deep frying, deep-fried potatoes of disputed origin. They are prepa ...

, Herbart and Schopenhauer. Having credited Kant's philosophy (though criticizing it on the vital point of accepting a thing-in-itself), he focuses on what he sees as the shortcomings in the approaches of Kants successors. He frequently ends a section with the statement that one should return to Kant. Liebmann's work also influenced his Jena colleague

Gottlob Frege Friedrich Ludwig Gottlob Frege (; ; 8 November 1848 – 26 July 1925) was a German philosopher, logician, and mathematician. He was a mathematics professor at the University of Jena, and is understood by many to be the father of analytic philos ...

.Gottfried Gabriel, "Frege, Lotze, and the Continental Roots of Early Analytic Philosophy," in: Erich H. Reck (ed.). ''From Frege to Wittgenstein: Perspectives on Early Analytic Philosophy'', Oxford University Press, 2002, pp. 39–51, esp. 44–48. Jena Nordfriedhof Liebmann

Works

*''Kant und die Epigonen'', a critique of the followers of Kant urging a return to their master (1865) (Kant and his inferior successors) *''Ueber die Freiheit des Willens'' (1866) (On free will) *''Ueber den objektiven Anblick'' (1869) (On the objective point of view) *''Vier Monate vor Paris'', a journal published anonymously (1871) *''Zur Analysis der Wirklichkeit'' (1876; 3rd ed. 1900) (About the analysis of actuality) *''Die Klimax der Theorien'' (1884) (The climax of theory) *''Geist der Transcendentalphilosophie'' (1901) *''Grundriss der kritischen Metaphysik'' (1901) (Outline of critical metaphysics) *''Gedanken und Tatsachen'', 2 Bände (1882–1904) (Thoughts and facts)

References

External links

* * 1840 births 1912 deaths 19th-century German Jews Jewish philosophers 19th-century German philosophers University of Halle alumni Leipzig University alumni Academic staff of the University of Strasbourg Academic staff of the University of Jena German male writers {{Germany-philosopher-stub