Gravity, Polarity and Dialectical Method

Abstract

There can be few periods in the history of philosophy which match the beginning of the nineteenth century for philosophical vigour. Even today, almost two hundred years later, we profit from the rich legacy of that vitality if only because the roots of much that influences contemporary philosophy lie in themes that were adumbrated at this time. Philosophy became, and has remained, conscious of its own substantive and methodological distinctiveness. It changed its relationship with the empirical sciences in such a way that it started to challenge rather than underwrite their credentials. It began to usurp rather than endorse the role that religious thought had played in people’s lives. Above all, it provided a focus for challenges to the intellectual, moral, and political certainties of the eighteenth century.