James Edwin Creighton (April 8, 1861,
Pictou, Nova Scotia
Pictou ( ; Canadian Gaelic: ''Baile Phiogto'' Miꞌkmawiꞌsimk: ''Piktuk'') is a town in Pictou County, Nova Scotia, Pictou County, in the Provinces and territories of Canada, Canadian province of Nova Scotia. Located on the north shore of Pict ...
– October 8, 1924,
Ithaca, New York
Ithaca () is a city in and the county seat of Tompkins County, New York, United States. Situated on the southern shore of Cayuga Lake in the Finger Lakes region of New York (state), New York, Ithaca is the largest community in the Ithaca metrop ...
) was an American idealist
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 ...
,
Cornell
Cornell University is a private Ivy League research university based in Ithaca, New York, United States. The university was co-founded by American philanthropist Ezra Cornell and historian and educator Andrew Dickson White in 1865. Since ...
academic. He was the founding president of the
American Philosophical Association
The American Philosophical Association (APA) is the main professional organization for philosophers in the United States. Founded in 1900, its mission is to promote the exchange of ideas among philosophers, to encourage creative and scholarl ...
.
Biography
Creighton graduated as a Bachelor of Arts from
Dalhousie College
Dalhousie University (commonly known as Dal) is a large public research university in Nova Scotia, Canada, with three campuses in Halifax, a fourth in Bible Hill, and a second medical school campus in Saint John, New Brunswick. Dalhousie offe ...
, Halifax, in 1887, and became a student at the foreign universities of Leipzig and Berlin. Later he came to
Cornell University
Cornell University is a Private university, private Ivy League research university based in Ithaca, New York, United States. The university was co-founded by American philanthropist Ezra Cornell and historian and educator Andrew Dickson W ...
as a graduate student, receiving the degree of Doctor of Philosophy there in 1892. From 1889 to 1892, Dean Creighton was an instructor in philosophy at Cornell, being advanced during the three following years to an associate professorship. He had been Sage professor of logic and metaphysics since 1895, and acted from 1914 to 1923 as Dean of the Graduate School at Cornell.
As an author, he was best known to students through his “Introductory Logic,” first published in 1898, which is widely employed as a college textbook. He collaborated in the translation of "Wundt's Human and Animal Psychology," and "Paulsen's Kant - His Life and Philosophy." In addition to publishing these books, he had been since 1892 editor of ''
The Philosophical Review
''The Philosophical Review'' is a quarterly journal of philosophy edited by the faculty of the Sage School of Philosophy at Cornell University. Since September 2006, it is published by Duke University Press.
Overview
The journal publishes origin ...
'', and since 1896 American editor of "Kant-Studien. He was also the founding president of the American Philosophical Association.
He was early influenced by
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 ...
,
Bradley
Bradley may refer to:
People
* Bradley (given name)
* Bradley (surname)
Places
In the United Kingdom
In England:
* Bradley, Cheshire
* Bradley, Derbyshire
* Bradley (house), a manor in Kingsteignton, Devon
* Bradley, Gloucestershire
* ...
and
Bosanquet, and later accepted some of the views of
Windelband and
Heinrich Rickert
Heinrich John Rickert (; ; 25 May 1863 – 25 July 1936) was a German philosopher, one of the leading neo-Kantians.
Life
Rickert was born in Danzig, Prussia (now Gdańsk, Poland) to the journalist and later politician Heinrich Edwin Rickert a ...
, without sharing all of their opinions. He constantly defended Idealistic, or speculative, philosophy against Pragmatism, neo-Realism, Materialism, and Berkeleian materialism.
Creighton differentiated between what he considered as intelligible in philosophy and what is intelligible in the natural sciences. He also believed that no system of thought could be the product of an isolated mind. His most important essays were compiled in ''Studies in Speculative Philosophy'' (Creighton, 1925; see also Sabine, 1917).
Creighton was awarded the honorary degree of Doctor of Laws by
Queen's University and
Dalhousie University
Dalhousie University (commonly known as Dal) is a large public research university in Nova Scotia, Canada, with three campuses in Halifax, Nova Scotia, Halifax, a fourth in Bible Hill, Nova Scotia, Bible Hill, and a second medical school campus ...
. He remained at
Cornell
Cornell University is a private Ivy League research university based in Ithaca, New York, United States. The university was co-founded by American philanthropist Ezra Cornell and historian and educator Andrew Dickson White in 1865. Since ...
until his death from an extended illness. He is buried at East Lawn Cemetery in
Ithaca
Ithaca most commonly refers to:
*Homer's Ithaca, an island featured in Homer's ''Odyssey''
*Ithaca (island), an island in Greece, possibly Homer's Ithaca
*Ithaca, New York, a city, and home of Cornell University and Ithaca College
Ithaca, Ithaka ...
.
See also
*
American philosophy
American philosophy is the activity, corpus, and tradition of philosophers affiliated with the United States. The ''Internet Encyclopedia of Philosophy'' notes that while it lacks a "core of defining features, American Philosophy can neverthe ...
*
List of American philosophers
American philosophy is the activity, corpus, and tradition of philosophers affiliated with the United States. The ''Internet Encyclopedia of Philosophy'' notes that while it lacks a "core of defining features, American Philosophy can neverthe ...
References
*Creighton, J. E. (1902). The purposes of a philosophical association. ''Philosophical Review, 11'', 219–237.
*Creighton, J. E. (1909). Darwin and logic. ''Psychological Review, 16''(3), 170–187. https://doi.org/10.1037/h0073055
*Creighton, J. E. (1925). ''Studies in Speculative Philosophy.'' Periodicals Service.
*Sabine, G. H. (Ed.) (1917). ''Philosophical essays in honor of James Edwin Creighton''. New York: Macmillan.
External links
*
1861 births
1924 deaths
19th-century American philosophers
20th-century American philosophers
Cornell University faculty
Cornell University alumni
Canadian emigrants to the United States
Idealists
{{US-philosopher-stub