Editing Intellectualism

{{Short description|Mental perspective}}
'''Intellectualism''' is the mental perspective that emphasizes the use, development, and exercise of the [[intellect]], and is identified with the life of the mind of the [[intellectual]].<ref name=Merriam>{{cite web| url = http://www.m-w.com/dictionary/intellectualism|title = Merriam-Webster| date=17 September 2024 }} (Definition)</ref> In the field of [[philosophy]], the term ''intellectualism'' indicates one of two ways of critically thinking about the character of the world: (i) [[rationalism]], which is knowledge derived solely from [[reason]]; and (ii) [[empiricism]], which is knowledge derived solely from sense experience. Each intellectual approach attempts to eliminate fallacies that ignore, mistake, or distort evidence about "what ought to be" instead of "what is" the character of the world.<ref>''Some Problems of Philosophy'', William James. Longman's, Green and Co.: New York, 1916, p. 221.</ref>

==Ancient moral intellectualism==
{{Main|Moral intellectualism}}
[[Image:Socrates Louvre.jpg|thumb|right|165px|[[Socrates]] (c. 470 – 399 BC)]]
The first historical figure who is usually called an "intellectualist" was the Greek philosopher [[Socrates]] (c. 470 – 399 BC), who taught that intellectualism allows that "one will do what is right or [what is] best, just as soon as one truly understands what is right or best"; that [[virtue]] is a matter of the intellect, because virtue and [[knowledge]] are related qualities that a person accrues, possesses, and improves by dedication to the use of [[reason]].<ref>{{cite web |url = http://lgxserver.uniba.it/lei/foldop/foldoc.cgi?intellectualism|title =intellectualism |url-status = dead |archive-url = https://web.archive.org/web/20070715005002/http://lgxserver.uniba.it/lei/foldop/foldoc.cgi?intellectualism|editor=Giovanni Benzi|archive-date = 2007-07-15}} (Definition and note on Socrates)</ref> Philosopher Dominic Scott refers to a "standard criticism" of Socrates' attitude to [[human nature]]: that he treats human nature as more rational than it really is.<ref>Scott, D. (2009), [https://www.cambridge.org/core/books/platos-meno/37AB68E87D7F9AD89BB0882990669A91 Plato's Meno], Cambridge University Press, p. 51, accessed on 30 December 2024</ref>

Socrates's definition of [[moral intellectualism]] is a basis of the philosophy of [[Stoicism]], wherein the consequences of that definition are called "Socratic paradoxes", such as "There is no [[weakness of will]]", because a person either knowingly does evil or knowingly seeks to do evil (moral wrong); that anyone who does commit evil or seeks to commit evil does so involuntarily; and that virtue is knowledge, that there are few virtues, but that all virtues are one.

The concepts of truth and knowledge in [[contemporary philosophy]] are unlike Socrates's concepts of truth, knowledge, and ethical conduct, and cannot be equated with modern, [[Cartesianism|post–Cartesian]] [[conceptions of knowledge]] and rational intellectualism.<ref>{{cite web | title=No one Errs Willingly: The Meaning of Socratic Intellectualism | author=Heda Segvic | url=http://fds.oup.com/www.oup.co.uk/pdf/0-19-924226-7.pdf | url-status=dead | archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20110930151328/http://fds.oup.com/www.oup.co.uk/pdf/0-19-924226-7.pdf | archive-date=2011-09-30 }}</ref> In that vein, by way of detailed study of history, [[Michel Foucault]] demonstrated that in [[classical antiquity]] (800 BC – AD 1000), "knowing the truth" was akin to "spiritual knowledge", which is integral to the principle of "caring for the self". In an effort to become a [[Value (ethics)|moral person]] the care for the self is realised through [[ascetic]] exercises meant to ensure that knowledge of truth was learned and integrated to the Self. Therefore, to understand truth meant possessing "intellectual knowledge" that integrated the self to the (universal) truth and to living an [[Authenticity (philosophy)|authentic]] life. Achieving that ethical state required continual care for the self, but also meant being someone who embodies truth, and so can readily practice the [[Rhetoric|Classical]]-era rhetorical device of ''[[parrhesia]]'': "to speak candidly, and to ask forgiveness for so speaking"; and, by extension, to practice the [[Morality|moral]] obligation to speak truth for the common good, even at personal risk.<ref>Gros, Frederic (ed.)(2005) ''Michel Foucault: The Hermeneutics of the Subject'', Lectures at the College de France 1981–1982. Picador: New York. p. 000.</ref>

==Medieval theological intellectualism<!--'Medieval theological intellectualism' redirects here; linked from 'Averroes', 'Thomas Aquinas', and 'Meister Eckhart'-->==
'''Medieval theological intellectualism'''<!--boldface per WP:R#PLA--> is a doctrine of divine action, wherein the faculty of [[intellect]] precedes, and is superior to, the faculty of the [[Will (philosophy)|will]] (''voluntas intellectum sequitur''). As such, intellectualism is contrasted with [[Voluntarism (philosophy)|voluntarism]], which proposes the will as superior to the intellect, and to the emotions; hence, the stance that "according to intellectualism, choices of the Will result from that which the intellect recognizes as good; the will, itself, is determined. For voluntarism, by contrast, it is the Will which identifies which objects are good, and the Will, itself, is indetermined".<ref name=IEP>{{cite web| url = http://www.iep.utm.edu/v/voluntar.htm | title = Voluntarism| publisher = Internet Encyclopedia of Philosophy}}</ref> From that philosophical perspective and historical context, the Spanish [[Islam|Muslim]] polymath [[Averroës]] (1126–1198) in the 12th century, the English theologian [[Roger Bacon]],<ref name="The College 1948 p. ">{{cite book | title=The Heritage of the English-speaking Peoples and Their Responsibility: Addresses at the Conference : September 1947, Kenyon College | publisher=The College | year=1948 | url=https://books.google.com/books?id=M6xJ8KbI1TkC&q=%22intellectualism%22+%22roger+bacon%22+%22emergence%22 | access-date=2023-06-27 | page=}}</ref> the Italian Christian theologian [[Thomas Aquinas]] (1225–1274), and the German Christian theologian [[Meister Eckhart]] (1260–1327) in the 13th century, are recognised intellectualists.<ref name=IEP/><ref>Jeremiah Hackett, ''A Companion to Meister Eckhart'', BRILL, 2012, p. 410.</ref>

==See also==
*[[Anti-intellectualism]]
*[[Chinese intellectualism]]
*[[Intellectual]]
*[[Intellectual movements in Iran]]
*[[Intelligentsia]]
*[[Intelligence quotient|Intelligence Quotient]] 
*''[[Scientia potentia est]]''

== References ==
{{reflist|2}}
{{Catholic philosophy footer}}
{{authority control}}
[[Category:Intellectualism| ]]
[[Category:Academic terminology]]
[[Category:Intellectual history]]
[[Category:Intelligence]]
[[Category:Philosophy of education]]
[[Category:Rationalism]]
[[Category:Thought]]