José Ingenieros (born Giuseppe Ingegnieri, April 24, 1877October 31, 1925) was an

Argentine Argentines (mistakenly translated Argentineans in the past; in Spanish ( masculine) or ( feminine)) are people identified with the country of Argentina. This connection may be residential, legal, historical or cultural. For most Argentines ...

physician, pharmacist, positivist philosopher and essayist. He was born in

Palermo Palermo ( , ; scn, Palermu , locally also or ) is a city in southern Italy, the capital of both the autonomous region of Sicily and the Metropolitan City of Palermo, the city's surrounding metropolitan province. The city is noted for it ...

(

Italy Italy ( it, Italia ), officially the Italian Republic, ) or the Republic of Italy, is a country in Southern Europe. It is located in the middle of the Mediterranean Sea, and its territory largely coincides with the homonymous geographical ...

), and graduated from the

University of Buenos Aires The University of Buenos Aires ( es, Universidad de Buenos Aires, UBA) is a public research university in Buenos Aires, Argentina. Established in 1821, it is the premier institution of higher learning in the country and one of the most prestigi ...

School of Medicine in 1900. Ingenieros was philosophically influenced by

Herbert Spencer Herbert Spencer (27 April 1820 – 8 December 1903) was an English philosopher, psychologist, biologist, anthropologist, and sociologist famous for his hypothesis of social Darwinism. Spencer originated the expression "survival of the fittest ...

and

Auguste Comte Isidore Marie Auguste François Xavier Comte (; 19 January 1798 – 5 September 1857) was a French philosopher and writer who formulated the doctrine of positivism. He is often regarded as the first philosopher of science in the modern sense ...

, and wrote a very important philosophical and social work, "El hombre mediocre" (''The Mediocre Man''), in 1913. Ingenieros founded the

Buenos Aires Buenos Aires ( or ; ), officially the Autonomous City of Buenos Aires ( es, link=no, Ciudad Autónoma de Buenos Aires), is the Capital city, capital and primate city of Argentina. The city is located on the western shore of the Río de la Plata ...

Institute of Criminology in 1907 and the Argentine Psychological Society in 1908; he was elected President of the

Argentine Medical Association The Argentine Medical Association (''Asociación Médica Argentina'', AMA) is the principal professional association of physicians in Argentina. It is a medical non-profit organization with headquarters in Buenos Aires. Overview The group was fou ...

in 1909. Ingenieros married Eva Rutenberg, in

Lausanne Lausanne ( , , , ) ; it, Losanna; rm, Losanna. is the capital and largest city of the Swiss French speaking canton of Vaud. It is a hilly city situated on the shores of Lake Geneva, about halfway between the Jura Mountains and the Alps, and fac ...

, in 1914. Appointed Assistant Dean of the School of Philosophy and Letters of his alma mater, he played a prominent role in the landmark

University reform in Argentina The Argentine university reform of 1918 was a general modernization of the universities, especially tending towards democratization, brought about by student activism during the presidency of Hipolito Yrigoyen, the first democratic government. Th ...

, in 1918. He resigned his academic posts in 1919 to join ''Claridad'', a

communist Communism (from Latin la, communis, lit=common, universal, label=none) is a far-left sociopolitical, philosophical, and economic ideology and current within the socialist movement whose goal is the establishment of a communist society, a ...

organization, and in 1922, formed ''Unión Latinoamerica'', a political action committee focused on

anti-imperialism Anti-imperialism in political science and international relations is a term used in a variety of contexts, usually by nationalist movements who want to secede from a larger polity (usually in the form of an empire, but also in a multi-ethnic so ...

. He was an active Freemason since 1898. He founded a monthly, ''Renovación'', in 1925, but died in

later that year.

References

Sources

Encyclopedia Americana ''Encyclopedia Americana'' is a general encyclopedia written in American English. It was the first major multivolume encyclopedia that was published in the United States. With ''Collier's Encyclopedia'' and ''Encyclopædia Britannica, Encyclo ...

(

United States The United States of America (U.S.A. or USA), commonly known as the United States (U.S. or US) or America, is a country primarily located in North America. It consists of 50 U.S. state, states, a Washington, D.C., federal district, five ma ...

: Encyclopedia Americana Corporation, 1969 edition), pg 172 1877 births 1925 deaths Argentine people of Sicilian descent Atheist philosophers Argentine activists University of Buenos Aires faculty Argentine essayists Male essayists Argentine male writers Physicians from Buenos Aires Argentine philosophers Argentine Freemasons Comtism Argentine psychologists University of Buenos Aires alumni Burials at La Chacarita Cemetery Italian emigrants to Argentina Argentine communists Argentine atheists 19th-century atheists 20th-century atheists 20th-century Argentine physicians {{Argentina-philosopher-stub