The document categorizes four main theories of human nature: essentialism, naturalism, relativism/culturalism, and existentialism/Buddhism. Essentialism views humans as having an unchanging essence or character. Naturalism sees humans as products of evolution and nature. Relativism/culturalism believes different cultures produce different kinds of people. Existentialism and Buddhism emphasize detachment from beliefs and living in the present moment.

2. The background theory
• I categorize theories about human nature
into four types.
• These types are:
– Essentialism
– Naturalism
– Relativism (culturalism)
– Existentialism / Buddhism

5. Do not form beliefs
about things. Just be.
Stay in the moment.
Depends how
you see it.
There is an eternal
truth about how things
are.
How things are
changes when forces
of nature act upon
them.

6. Do not form beliefs
about things. Just be.
Stay in the moment.
Depends how
you see it.
There is an eternal
truth about how things
are.
How things are
changes when forces
of nature act upon
them.

7. Do not form beliefs
about things. Just be.
Stay in the moment.
Depends how
you see it.
There is an eternal
truth about how things
are.
How things are
changes when forces
of nature act upon
them.

8. c
Do not form beliefs
about things. Just be.
Stay in the moment.
Depends how
you see it.
There is an eternal
truth about how things
are.
How things are
changes when forces
of nature act upon
them.

10. • Cyranaics (Aristippos), Epicuros
• Darwin
• Natural scienctists
• Many psychologists: Freud, Skinner,
Lorenz…
• Early Wittgenstein, Dewey, Nagel,
Sellars, Quine
• Buddha
• Pyrrho, Heraclitus
• Nietzsche
• Kierkegaard
• Sartre
• Heidegger
• The sofists (Protagoras)
• Hegel, Marx
• Most anthropologists: Frans Boaz, C. Levi-
Strauss
• Most postmodernists (Derrida, Lyotard)
• Hermeneutics (Gadamer, Heidegger to a
degree)
• Many nationalists: Alasdair McIntyre
• Social constructivism
• Plato
• Descartes
• Kant
• Fundamenalist
interpretations of religions

13. Core

14. Core

15. There is a difference
between existence
and being.
Different cultures
produce different
kinds of people.
There is an eternal
truth about man.
Man is a product of
evolution and is
constantly changing.

16. • The man has an unchanging
essence, character (essentia).
• Reason is the most important
capacity of man.
• Reasonable people make the
same choices because the
recognise the essence.
• Everything is natural including
man.
• Man is a species among other
species.
• The difference between man and
other species is one of degree.
• The purpose of man’s life is to
actualize his natural potential.
• The man is a product of his society. The
man is truly a person only after
socialization.
• Our relationships with people have
strong impact on us.
• Different cultures produce quite different
kinds of people.
• There is more than one truth about what
is the nature of human being.
Buddhism:
• Detachment from thinking.
• “Essence precedes conceptual
existence”
Existentialism:
• “Existence precedes essence.”
• Life is fundamentally meaningless and
absurd but one can give it a meaning,
“life as art”.

17. • Cyranaics (Aristippos), Epicuros
• Darwin
• Natural scienctists
• Many psychologists: Freud, Skinner,
Lorenz…
• Early Wittgenstein, Dewey, Nagel,
Sellars, Quine
• Buddha
• Pyrrho, Heraclitus
• Nietzsche
• Kierkegaard
• Sartre
• Heidegger
• The sofists (Protagoras)
• Hegel, Marx
• Most anthropologists: Frans Boaz, C. Levi-
Strauss
• Most postmodernists (Derrida, Lyotard)
• Hermeneutics (Gadamer, Heidegger to a
degree)
• Many nationalists: Alasdair McIntyre
• Social constructivism
• Plato
• Descartes
• Kant
• Fundamenalist
interpretations of religions

18. Outcome
• Understanding the philosophical space
helps you to
– recognize philosophical notions
– locate philosophical notions
– compare philosophical notions to other notions
– evaluate what kind of difference or similarity is
important and interesting
– understand your own thinking better