Social Philosophy

THE WESTERN SOCIAL PHILOSOPHY

INTRODUCTION

"Fire leaves the death of air, and air lives the death of fire;

Water lives the death of earth, and earth lives the death of water.

It is the same thing in us that is living and dead, asleep and awake, young and old;

each changes place and becomes the other.

We step and we do not step into the same stream; we are and are not."

-Heraclitus, Fragments

Western philosophy was born under the clear blue skies of the early Aegean. the 8th and 7th centuries B.C. was a period of rapid economic expansion in the eastern Mediterranean. These were stirring times. The Greeks of the Ionian Islands, which now lie off the coast of turkey,conducted a thriving trade with Egypt, Babylon and Lydia. The Lydian invention of money was introduced into Europe via Aegina at about 625 B.C., greatly stimulating trade, bringing in its wake great riches foe some and indebtedness and slavery for others.

The earliest Greek philosophy represents the true starting point of philosophy. It is an attempt to struggle free from the age-old bounds of superstition and myth, to dispense with gods and goddesses, so that, for the first time, human beings could stand face to face with nature and with real men and women.

Western philosophy's tendency is compartmentalized thinking. It is marked by scientific, systematic, organized and logically structured thought which entrenched in its Greco-Roman influenced and tradition. It adheres to a rational, coherent and adequate system of thought. Meaning, the west cultivates social awareness and truth upon the objective reality. In order to establish a peaceful and orderly society, the West suggested the most practical and down-to-earth means: that is postulating the effective kind government and leadership to mandate a perfect society. They introduced radical solutions to their existing social problems.