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Meliorist
Meliorism (Latin ''melior'', better) is the idea that progress is a real concept and that humans can interfere with natural processes in order to improve the world. Meliorism, as a conception of the person and society, is at the foundation of contemporary liberal democracy and human rights and is a basic component of liberalism. Another important understanding of the meliorist tradition comes from the American Pragmatic tradition. One can read about it in the works of Lester Frank Ward, William James, and John Dewey. In James' works, however, meliorism does not pinpoint to progressivism and/or optimism. For James, meliorism stands in the middle between optimism and pessimism, and treats the salvation of the world as a probability rather than a certainty or impossibility. In the case of a meliorist praxis, the activist contemporary of the Pragmatists Jane Addams stripped progressive ideals of any elitist privilege calling for a "lateral progress" whose concern was squarely with ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Liberalism
Liberalism is a Political philosophy, political and moral philosophy based on the Individual rights, rights of the individual, liberty, consent of the governed, political equality, the right to private property, and equality before the law. Liberals espouse various and often mutually conflicting views depending on their understanding of these principles but generally support private property, market economies, individual rights (including civil rights and human rights), liberal democracy, secularism, rule of law, Economic freedom, economic and political freedom, freedom of speech, freedom of the press, freedom of assembly, and freedom of religion.Generally support: * * * * * * *constitutional government and privacy rights * Liberalism is frequently cited as the dominant ideology of modern history.Wolfe, p. 23. Liberalism became a distinct Political movement, movement in the Age of Enlightenment, gaining popularity among Western world, Western philosophers and economists. L ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
John Dewey
John Dewey (; October 20, 1859 – June 1, 1952) was an American philosopher, psychologist, and Education reform, educational reformer. He was one of the most prominent American scholars in the first half of the twentieth century. The overriding theme of Dewey's works was his profound belief in democracy, be it in politics, education, or communication and journalism. As Dewey himself stated in 1888, while still at the University of Michigan, "Democracy and the one, ultimate, ethical ideal of humanity are to my mind synonymous." Dewey considered two fundamental elements—schools and civil society—to be major topics needing attention and reconstruction to encourage experimental intelligence and plurality. He asserted that complete democracy was to be obtained not just by extending voting rights but also by ensuring that there exists a fully formed public opinion, accomplished by communication among citizens, experts, and politicians. Dewey was one of the primary figures associ ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
William James Small
William is a masculine given name of Germanic origin. It became popular in England after the Norman conquest in 1066,All Things William"Meaning & Origin of the Name"/ref> and remained so throughout the Middle Ages and into the modern era. It is sometimes abbreviated "Wm." Shortened familiar versions in English include Will or Wil, Wills, Willy, Willie, Bill, Billie, and Billy. A common Irish form is Liam. Scottish diminutives include Wull, Willie or Wullie (as in Oor Wullie). Female forms include Willa, Willemina, Wilma and Wilhelmina. Etymology William is related to the German given name ''Wilhelm''. Both ultimately descend from Proto-Germanic ''*Wiljahelmaz'', with a direct cognate also in the Old Norse name ''Vilhjalmr'' and a West Germanic borrowing into Medieval Latin ''Willelmus''. The Proto-Germanic name is a compound of *''wiljô'' "will, wish, desire" and *''helmaz'' "helm, helmet".Hanks, Hardcastle and Hodges, ''Oxford Dictionary of First Names'', Oxford Unive ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Max Roser
Max Roser (born 1983) is an economist and philosopher who focuses on large global problems such as poverty, disease, hunger, climate change, war, existential risks, and inequality. Roser is a professor at the University of Oxford, where he directs the program on global development, based at the Oxford Martin School. He is the founder and director of the research publication Our World in Data. In 2025, he received an honorary doctorate from the Universities of KU Leuven and UCLouvain for his work. Early life and education Roser was born in Kirchheimbolanden, Germany, a village close to the border with France. In 1999, he and a friend won a prize in the German youth science competition with a model of a self-navigating vacuum cleaner. ''Der Spiegel'' reported that he travelled the length of the Nile from the mouth to the source, and that he crossed the Himalayas and the Andes. He has two undergraduate degrees (in geoscience and philosophy) and two master's degrees (in ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Pragmatism
Pragmatism is a philosophical tradition that views language and thought as tools for prediction, problem solving, and action, rather than describing, representing, or mirroring reality. Pragmatists contend that most philosophical topics—such as the nature of knowledge, language, concepts, meaning, belief, and science—are best viewed in terms of their practical uses and successes. Pragmatism began in the United States in the 1870s. Its origins are often attributed to philosophers Charles Sanders Peirce, William James and John Dewey. In 1878, Peirce described it in his pragmatic maxim: "Consider the practical effects of the objects of your conception. Then, your conception of those effects is the whole of your conception of the object."Peirce, C.S. (1878), " How to Make Our Ideas Clear", ''Popular Science Monthly'', v. 12, 286–302. Reprinted often, including ''Collected Papers'' v. 5, paragraphs 388–410 and ''Essential Peirce'' v. 1, 124–141. See end of §II for ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Change
Change, Changed or Changing may refer to the below. Other forms are listed at Alteration * Impermanence, a difference in a state of affairs at different points in time * Menopause, also referred to as "the change", the permanent cessation of the menstrual period * Metamorphosis, or change, a biological process by which an animal physically develops after birth or hatching * Personal development, or personal change, activities that improve awareness and identity * Social change, an alteration in the social order of a society * Technological change, invention, innovation, and diffusion of technology Organizations and politics * Change (company), a brokerage company in the Netherlands * Change (manifesto), a 2024 political manifesto in the United Kingdom * Change 2011, a Finnish political party * Change We Need, a slogan for Barack Obama's 2008 presidential campaign * Change.gov, the transition website for the incoming Obama administration in 2008–2009 * Change.org, a peti ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Whig History
Whig history (or Whig historiography) is an approach to historiography that presents history as a journey from an oppressive and benighted past to a "glorious present". The present described is generally one with modern forms of liberal democracy and constitutional monarchy: it was originally a term for the metanarratives praising Britain's adoption of constitutional monarchy and the historical development of the Westminster system. The term has also been applied widely in historical disciplines outside of British history (e.g. in the history of science) to describe "any subjection of history to what is essentially a teleological view of the historical process". When the term is used in contexts other than British history, "whig history" (lowercase) is preferred. In the British context, whig historians emphasize the rise of constitutional government, personal freedoms and scientific progress. The term is often applied generally (and pejoratively) to histories that present the ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Transhumanism
Transhumanism is a philosophical and intellectual movement that advocates the human enhancement, enhancement of the human condition by developing and making widely available new and future technologies that can greatly enhance longevity, cognition, and well-being. Transhumanist thinkers study the potential benefits and dangers of emerging technologies that could overcome fundamental human limitations, as well as the technoethics, ethics of using such technologies. Some transhumanists speculate that human beings may eventually be able to transform themselves into beings of such vastly greater abilities as to merit the label of posthuman#Transhumanism, posthuman beings. Another topic of transhumanist research is how to protect humanity against existential risks from Existential risk from artificial general intelligence, artificial general intelligence, asteroid impact, gray goo, high-energy particle collision experiments, natural or synthetic pandemic, and nuclear warfare. The ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
The Ultimate Resource
''The Ultimate Resource'' is a 1981 book written by Julian Lincoln Simon challenging the notion that humanity was running out of natural resources. It was updated in 1996 as ''The Ultimate Resource 2''. Overview The overarching thesis on why there is no resource crisis is that as a particular resource becomes more scarce, its price rises. This price rise creates an incentive for people to discover more of the resource, ration and recycle it, and eventually, develop substitutes. The "ultimate resource" is not any particular physical object but the capacity for humans to invent and adapt. Scarcity The work opens with an explanation of scarcity, noting its relation to price; high prices denote relative scarcity and low prices indicate abundance. Simon usually measures prices in wage-adjusted terms, since this is a measure of how much labor is required to purchase a fixed amount of a particular resource. Since prices for most raw materials (e.g., copper) have fallen between 1800 and ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Teleology
Teleology (from , and )Partridge, Eric. 1977''Origins: A Short Etymological Dictionary of Modern English'' London: Routledge, p. 4187. or finalityDubray, Charles. 2020 912Teleology. In ''The Catholic Encyclopedia'' 14. New York: Robert Appleton Company. Retrieved 3 May 2020. – via '' New Advent'', transcribed by D. J. Potter is a branch of causality giving the reason or an explanation for something as a function of its end, its purpose, or its goal, as opposed to as a function of its cause. James Wood, in his '' Nuttall Encyclopaedia'', explained the meaning of ''teleology'' as "the doctrine of final causes, particularly the argument for the being and character of God from the being and character of His works; that the end reveals His purpose from the beginning, the end being regarded as the thought of God at the beginning, or the universe viewed as the realisation of Him and His eternal purpose." A purpose that is imposed by human use, such as the purpose of a fork to hold ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Techno-progressivism
Techno-progressivism, or tech-progressivism, is a stance of active support for the wikt:convergence, convergence of technological change and social change. Techno-progressives argue that technological developments can be profoundly empowerment, empowering and freedom (political), emancipatory when they are regulated by legitimate democracy, democratic and accountable authorities to ensure that their social cost, costs, risks and cost-benefit analysis, benefits are all fairly shared by the actual stakeholder (corporate), stakeholders to those developments. One of the first mentions of techno-progressivism appeared within extropian jargon in 1999 as the removal of "all political, cultural, biological, and psychological limits to self-actualization and self-realization". Stance Techno-progressivism maintains that accounts of Progress (history), progress should focus on Scientific consensus, scientific and Technological change, technical dimensions, as well as ethics of technology, ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Idea Of Progress
Progress is movement towards a perceived refined, improved, or otherwise desired state. It is central to the philosophy of progressivism, which interprets progress as the set of advancements in technology, science, and social organization efficiency – the latter being generally achieved through direct societal action, as in social enterprise or through activism, but being also attainable through natural sociocultural evolution – that progressivism holds all human societies should strive towards. The concept of progress was introduced in the early-19th-century social theories, especially social evolution as described by Auguste Comte and Herbert Spencer. It was present in the Enlightenment's philosophies of history. As a goal, social progress has been advocated by varying realms of political ideologies with different theories on how it is to be achieved. Measuring progress Specific indicators for measuring progress can range from economic data, technical innovations, chan ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
