A System of Synthetic Philosophy - First Principles - Vol. I

by Herbert Spencer

This vintage text contains a detailed treatise on synthetic philosophy, being an outlining of its first principles written by Herbert Spencer. Spencer's system endeavored to demonstrate that it was possible to believe in the perfection of humanity based on complex scientific ideas such as the first law of thermodynamics and biological evolution, rather than looking to religion. This fascinating text will appeal to those with an interest in seminal philosophical ideas, and will be of considerable utility to modern philosophy students. The chapters of this book include: 'Religion and Science', 'Ultimate Religious Ideas', 'Ultimate Scientific Ideas', 'The Relativity of All Knowledge', 'The Reconciliation', 'Philosophy Defined', 'The Data of Philosophy', 'The Indestructibility of Matter', 'The Continuity of Motion', etcetera. We are republishing this antiquarian book now in an affordable, modern edition complete with a specially commissioned new biography of the author.

Genres: Philosophy

240 pages, Hardcover

First published February 14, 2006

About the author

Herbert Spencer was an English philosopher, biologist, anthropologist, sociologist, and prominent classical liberal political theorist of the Victorian era.

Spencer developed an all-embracing conception of evolution as the progressive development of the physical world, biological organisms, the human mind, and human culture and societies. He was "an enthusiastic exponent of evolution" and even "wrote about evolution before Darwin did." As a polymath, he contributed to a wide range of subjects, including ethics, religion, anthropology, economics, political theory, philosophy, literature, biology, sociology, and psychology. During his lifetime he achieved tremendous authority, mainly in English-speaking academia. "The only other English philosopher to have achieved anything like such widespread popularity was Bertrand Russell, and that was in the 20th century." Spencer was "the single most famous European intellectual in the closing decades of the nineteenth century" but his influence declined sharply after 1900; "Who now reads Spencer?" asked Talcott Parsons in 1937.

Spencer is best known for coining the expression "survival of the fittest", which he did in Principles of Biology (1864), after reading Charles Darwin's On the Origin of Species. This term strongly suggests natural selection, yet as Spencer extended evolution into realms of sociology and ethics, he also made use of Lamarckism.