title: Jean-Claude Van Damme

text: Van Damme worked for director John McTiernan for the film "Predator" (1987) as an early (eventually abandoned) version of the titular alien, before being removed and replaced by Kevin Peter Hall. As the first choice to play the titular Predator character, with the intent that he would use his martial arts skills to make the alien an agile, ninja-like hunter, but after few days shot, he left the film. It was reported that Van Damme constantly complained about the monster suit being too hot and causing him to pass out; he allegedly also voiced reservations about only appearing on camera in the suit. Additionally, it became apparent that a more physically imposing actor was needed to make the creature appear threatening against the team of soldiers. The role eventually went to Kevin Peter Hall. After "Predator" was a success, Van Damme said that he appreciated the movie and that he had no regrets about missing that role.


title: Jean-Claude Van Damme

text: Van Damme's breakout film was "Bloodsport", which opened on 26 February 1988, based on the alleged true story of Frank Dux. It was shot on a $1.5-million budget for Cannon. The film is about U.S. Army Captain Frank Dux (played by Van Damme), trained from his youth in the ways of ninjutsu by Senzo Tanaka, who honors his mentor by taking the place of Tanaka's deceased son Shingo in the illegal martial-arts tournament Kumite in Hong Kong. It became a U.S. box-office hit in the spring of 1988. Producer Mark Di Salle said he was looking for "a new martial arts star who was a ladies' man, [but Van Damme] appeals to both men and women. He's an American hero who fights for justice the American way and kicks the stuffing out of the bad guys." Also in 1988, Van Damme played another Russian villain, in "Black Eagle", opposite Sho Kosugi. In the film, Sho Kosugi is a martial artist and special operative for the U.S. government codenamed "Black Eagle", and summoned by his superiors after an F-111 carrying an experimental black ops laser tracking device was shot down over Malta by Russian forces.


title: Jean-Claude Van Damme

text: After the success of "Bloodsport", Cannon Films offered Van Damme the lead in "", "American Ninja 3" or "Cyborg", a cyperpunk martial arts film directed by Albert Pyun. Van Damme chose "Cyborg" which premiered in 1989. The film was a low budget box office success and led to two sequels, neither of which Van Damme appeared in.


title: Jean-Claude Van Damme

text: Cannon used Van Damme again in "Kickboxer" released that same year. It was highly successful, returning over $50 million on a $3-million budget. The film started the "Kickboxer" franchise. Van Damme did not appear in any of the film's four sequels, though he did return as a different character in the reboot series.


title: Jean-Claude Van Damme

text: In 1990 Van Damme starred in "Death Warrant", the first script credit for David S. Goyer. Also that year he starred in "Lionheart". "Lionheart" was directed by Sheldon Lettich who had co-written "Bloodsport", and said the film was "the first movie to demonstrate that Van Damme was more than just a flash-in-the-pan "Karate Guy" who would never rise above simplistic low-budget karate movies." It also featured rear nudity from Van Damme which Lettich says "became a very memorable moment for the ladies in the audience, and for the gay guys as well. Showing off his butt (clothed or unclothed) almost became a signature trademark of his after that."


title: Jean-Claude Van Damme

text: In 1991, "Double Impact" was released. Directed by Lettich it featured Van Damme in the dual role of Alex and Chad Wagner, estranged twin brothers fighting to avenge the deaths of their parents. This film reunited him with his former "Bloodsport" co-star, Bolo Yeung and was very popular.


title: Jean-Claude Van Damme

text: In 1992, Van Damme starred in one of the biggest blockbusters of the year in the sci-fi action picture "Universal Soldier" directed by Roland Emmerich for Carolco. Van Damme (as Luc Deveraux) and Dolph Lundgren (as Sergeant Andrew Scott) play U.S. soldiers during the Vietnam War who are sent to secure a village against North Vietnamese forces. However they end up shooting each other dead after Devereaux discovers that Scott has gone insane and has resorted to mutilating the villagers and barbarically cutting off their ears, taking an innocent girl and boy hostage. They are later reanimated in a secret Army project along with a large group of other previously dead soldiers and sent on a mission as GR operatives. At the 1992 Cannes Film Festival, Van Damme and Lundgren were involved in a verbal altercation that almost turned physical when both men pushed each other only to be separated, but it was believed to have only been a publicity stunt. "Universal Soldier" opened in theatres on 10 July 1992, a moderate success domestically with $36,299,898 in US ticket sales, but a major blockbuster worldwide, making over $65 million overseas, which earned the film a total of $102 million worldwide, on a $23 million budget.


title: Jean-Claude Van Damme

text: Van Damme was considered to play Simon Phoenix in "Demolition Man" and was briefly considered for the role of Michael Cheritto in "Heat".


title: Jean-Claude Van Damme

text: In 1993 Van Damme made a cameo in "Last Action Hero", and starred in "Nowhere To Run". The film was the first in a three-picture deal between Van Damme and Columbia Pictures and his fee was $3.5 million. Columbia said the film is "true to his audience and goes beyond his audience."


title: Jean-Claude Van Damme

text: In 1994, he starred in "Hard Target" for Universal, the first American film from director John Woo. Also released that year he starred in "Timecop", playing a time-traveling cop. Directed by Peter Hyams, the film was a huge success, grossing over $100 million worldwide, and remains his highest-grossing film in a lead role to date. Also that year, Van Damme starred in "Street Fighter," written and directed by Steven E. de Souza for Universal and based on the video game. It was poorly received critically. Though a commercial success, making approximately three times its production cost.


title: Jean-Claude Van Damme

text: Van Damme and Hyams re-teamed for Universal' on "Sudden Death" released in 1995. Van Damme plays a French Canadian-born firefighter with the Pittsburgh Fire Bureau who suffered a personal crisis after he was unable to save a young girl from a house fire. Now removed from active duty, Darren has become demoted to being fire marshal for the Pittsburgh Civic Arena, where a gang of terrorists are holding U.S. Vice President and several other VIPs hostage in a luxury suite during a game.


title: Jean-Claude Van Damme

text: In 1996, Van Damme starred and turned director for "The Quest". That year, he appeared in the TV show "Friends" in the two-part episode "The One After the Superbowl". He also starred in "Maximum Risk", the first American film directed by Ringo Lam, and their first collaboration.


title: Jean-Claude Van Damme

text: Van Damme's first box office bomb since he became a star was "Double Team" (1997), a buddy film with basketball superstar Dennis Rodman. It was Hong Kong director Tsui Hark's American debut.


title: Jean-Claude Van Damme

text: In 1998, he and Hark reunited on "Knock Off." Also that year, Van Damme acted in the costume action film, "Legionnaire". Despite a $35 million budget, it was not released theatrically in the US, only overseas.


title: Jean-Claude Van Damme

text: In 1999, Van Damme starred in "", (1999), where he returns as Luc Deveraux. That year he also starred in "Inferno."


title: Jean-Claude Van Damme

text: Released in 2001, "Replicant" is the second collaboration between Van Damme and director Ringo Lam, and the fifth time that Van Damme has starred in a dual role. It co-stars Michael Rooker. Also that year he starred in "The Order", directed by Sheldon Lettich, and written by Van Damme.


title: Jean-Claude Van Damme

text: "In Hell" is a 2003 American prison action film directed by Ringo Lam. It is the third collaboration between Van Damme and Lam. Van Damme plays an American working overseas in Magnitogorsk, Russia. That same year, Van Damme employed his dancing training in the music video for Bob Sinclar's "Kiss My Eyes".


title: Jean-Claude Van Damme

text: His 2004 film was "Wake of Death," an action film directed by Philippe Martinez. Ringo Lam was the original director, but he left the project after a few weeks of filming in Canada. It co-stars Simon Yam, Valerie Tian, Tony Schiena, etc.


title: Jean-Claude Van Damme

text: In 2006, he starred in "Second in Command" directed by Simon Fellows, and "The Hard Corps" directed by Sheldon Lettich.


title: Jean-Claude Van Damme

text: In 2007, played a small role in "The Exam", a Turkish comedy-drama film directed by Ömer Faruk Sorak. Also that year he starred in "Until Death".


title: Jean-Claude Van Damme

text: Van Damme returned to the mainstream with the limited theatrical release of the 2008 film "JCVD", which received positive reviews. "Time Magazine" named Van Damme's performance in the film the second best of the year (after Heath Ledger's The Joker in "The Dark Knight"), having previously stated that Van Damme "deserves not a black belt, but an Oscar." Also in 2008, he starred in Isaac Florentine's "."


title: Jean-Claude Van Damme

text: He then reprised his role as Luc Deveraux alongside Dolph Lundgren in the 2009 film "", directed by John Hyams. The film was released theatrically in the Middle East and Southeast Asia and directly to video in the United States and other parts of the world. Since its release, the film has received better than average reviews for a straight-to-DVD franchise sequel.


title: Jean-Claude Van Damme

text: In 2010, Van Damme directed himself in the barely released "Full Love." That same year, he turned down the role of Gunner Jensen in the first instalment of "The Expendables" and the role went to Dolph Lundgren.


title: Jean-Claude Van Damme

text: In 2011, Van Damme voiced Master Croc in the computer animation film "Kung Fu Panda 2". In the film, Van Damme voices a character who helps the heroes of the previous film. That same year, he co-starred with Scott Adkins in "Assassination Games". Also in 2011, he played a role in the French comedy "Beur sur la ville." Also that year, Van Damme starred in his own reality TV show "". The show showcases his family life, his personal troubles, and an upcoming fight. Since 2009, Van Damme has been planning to make a comeback to fight former boxing Olympic gold-medalist Somluck Kamsing. The fight was a focal point in his ITV reality show "". The fight has been repeatedly postponed, with many critics doubting it will occur, especially due to the difficulty of booking the venue.


title: Jean-Claude Van Damme

text: In 2012, he acted in the Russian comedy film named "Rzhevsky Versus Napoleon," and "U.F.O." He starred in "Dragon Eyes", "", and "Six Bullets". Also that year, he starred as the main villain in "The Expendables 2". The film series follows a mercenary group as they undertake a mission which evolves into a quest for revenge against a rival mercenary (Van Damme). The film was a success. it grossed over $310 million worldwide. Also that year, Van Damme was seen as part of Kam Sing's ring crew when Kam Sing fought against Jomhod Kiatadisak. He also appeared in commercials for Coors Light beer, showing him on a snow-covered mountain wearing a sleeveless denim jacket, and for the washing powder Dash. On 21 October 2012, Van Damme was honored with a life-size statue of himself in his hometown of Brussels. He told reporters during the unveiling, "Belgium is paying me back something, but really it's to pay back to the dream. So when people come by here, it is not Jean-Claude van Damme but it's a guy from the street who believed in something. I want the statue to represent that".


title: Jean-Claude Van Damme

text: In 2013 Van Damme acted in the comedy "Welcome to the Jungle." Also that year"," he played the main villain in "Enemies Closer," an American action thriller film directed by Peter Hyams. On 13 November 2013, Volvo Trucks released an advertisement on YouTube that shows Van Damme doing the splits while perched with each of his feet on the outer rearview mirrors of one semi-trailer truck and one box truck moving backwards, which Van Damme describes in the commercial as "the most epic of splits". The video quickly went viral around the web, receiving more than 11 million views in three days, 35 million in the first week. It was dubbed as "The Epic Split".


title: Jean-Claude Van Damme

text: "Swelter" is a 2014 American action film where he plays one of the leads. It stars Lennie James, and co-stars Grant Bowler, Josh Henderson, and Alfred Molina. James plays a sheriff in a small town who has a dark past that he can not remember, only to have to confront it when his ex-partners show up looking for stolen money they believe he has.


title: Jean-Claude Van Damme

text: 2015, he starred in the action thriller film "Pound of Flesh," directed by Ernie Barbarash. Also that year, he had a supporting role in a Chinese superhero parody film.


title: Jean-Claude Van Damme

text: In 2016, he returned to his voice role of Master Croc in the "Kung Fu Panda" franchise for the third installment. Also that year, he acted in "" directed by John Stockwell. It is a reboot of the original where Van Damme was the lead. That year he also played the lead in the tv serie "Jean-Claude Van Johnson".


title: Jean-Claude Van Damme

text: In 2018, he returned to his role in "," a sequel to the reboot. That same year, he acted in "Black Water". It co-stars Dolph Lundgren in the fifth collaboration between both actors as well as the first time they appear together as on-screen allies. In 22 August of that same year, he starred in Julien Leclercq's "The Bouncer".


title: Jean-Claude Van Damme

text: In 2012, a statue of the actor was unveiled in Anderlecht, Belgium. The artwork, which depicts a younger incarnation of "the Muscles from Brussels" in one of his fighting poses from the movie "Kickboxer", was commissioned to commemorate the 40th anniversary of the Westland Shopping complex. The unveiling took place on Boulevard Sylvain Dupuis and was attended by Van Damme, his parents, Wallonia-Brussels culture minister and nearly 2,000 fans. Van Damme said the statue "represented the dream of a Brussels kid" and was "for all the children who want something bad", adding that "if you believe in something strongly enough, it can come true".


title: Jean-Claude Van Damme

text: In 2019, a Van Damme monument was mounted in the Vandam village of Qabala, Azerbaijan, due to the similarity of the village name and Van Damme's name. The actor subsequently published a post on his Facebook account, thanking those responsible.


title: Jean-Claude Van Damme

text: In 1997, Frank Dux, the martial artist whom Van Damme portrayed in "Bloodsport", filed a lawsuit against Van Damme for $50,000 for co-writing and consultation work Dux did on the 1996 film "The Quest". According to the lawsuit, Dux also accused Van Damme of lying to the public about his martial arts fight record, stating that when Dux tutored Van Damme while Van Damme was laying carpet for a living, Van Damme exhibited a lack of martial arts skills. Van Damme's lawyer, Martin Singer, responded, "There are records to document his martial arts acclaim. Why, just look at his movies; he didn't get those roles on his acting ability! He's the one who does those splits on chairs. He doesn't have a stuntman to do that."


title: Jean-Claude Van Damme

text: In 2008, actor Sylvester Stallone declared to the British magazine "FHM" that "At a party in my home in Miami in 1997, Van Damme was tired of Steven Seagal claiming he could kick his ass so he offered Seagal outside into my back yard." According to Stallone, Seagal made his excuses and left while Van Damme tracked him down at a nightclub and challenged him again. Stallone finished by stating "Van Damme was too strong. Seagal wanted none of it."


title: Jean-Claude Van Damme

text: On 6 February 1998, the "New York Daily News" reported that Van Damme had been punched the previous night by Chuck Zito at the Scores strip club in Manhattan, New York. Zito, who had previously bodyguarded Van Damme and worked as a stuntman on the film "Nowhere to Run", recalled the incident in his 2002 autobiography "Street Justice", claiming that he suffered a broken hand as a result of striking Van Damme several times after Van Damme made disparaging remarks about him to a club bouncer, who then relayed the comments to Zito. Zito has also stated "I hope we can be friends again, but he was abusive. Some people will take that kind of abuse. I am not one of them."


title: Jean-Claude Van Damme

text: In October 2011, Van Damme, along with other celebrities including Hilary Swank, Vanessa-Mae and Seal attracted criticism from human rights groups for attending an event in Russian federal subject Chechnya's capital Grozny on the 35th birthday of Chechen president Ramzan Kadyrov on 5 October. Human rights groups, who had urged the celebrities to cancel their appearances because of abuses carried out under Kadyrov, criticised the celebrities for attending the event. Human Rights Watch released a statement which said, "Ramzan Kadyrov is linked to a litany of horrific human rights abuses. It's inappropriate for stars to get paid to party with him [...] And getting paid to be part of such a lavish show in Chechnya trivializes the suffering of countless victims of human rights abuses there."


title: Jean-Claude Van Damme

text: In the French-speaking world, Van Damme is well known – and often mocked – for the picturesque aphorisms that he delivers on a wide range of topics (personal well-being, spirituality, the environment, women, dogs, his ability to crack walnuts with his buttocks, his realization that Christianity is flawed based on the fact that "snakes are nice" and "apples contain pectin which is anti-cholesterol", etc.) in a sort of Zen franglais. He was deeply affected by his depiction in the media and the frequent derisive use of his interviews in comedy shows in the early 2000s, becoming increasingly reluctant to grant new interviews in French. He later explained that he was trying to communicate bits of his hard-earned wisdom to young uneducated people dreaming of success, like he used to be himself, and had to struggle with the time constraints of TV, with his difficulties reacquainting with the French language, and with the effects of jet lag, often resulting in a clumsy, haphazard delivery. His public image in the French-speaking world became a major theme of the 2008 movie "J.C.V.D." (directed by Mabrouk El Mechri, a fan of Van Damme's from his childhood, who sought to rehabilitate him by exploring those issues head-on).


title: Jean-Claude Van Damme

text: The original video game "Mortal Kombat" was conceived as a fighting game based on Van Damme. Creators Ed Boon and John Tobias had originally wanted to star Van Damme himself in the game. That fell through as he had a prior deal for another game under the auspices of the Sega Genesis platform. Ed Boon and John Tobias eventually decided to create a different character for the game named Johnny Cage, who is modelled after Van Damme, primarily from Van Damme's appearance and outfit in the martial arts film "Bloodsport". In the German version of the Donkey Kong 64 website, DK's greatest hero is Jean-Claude van Kong.


title: Jean-Claude Van Damme

text: Renowned UFC fighter Georges St-Pierre was inspired by Van Damme, and described fighting him in the film "" as "a dream come true".


title: Jean-Claude Van Damme

text: In January 2017, Van Damme featured in an Ultra Tune television advert which was part of a controversial series of ads. Two women were confronted in a car park by a gang of youths in a threatening manner, Van Damme appears to defend them and then the mood lightens and they take pictures with the star.


title: Jean-Claude Van Damme

text: In October 2020, Van Damme rescued a three-month-old chihuahua, saving her from euthanasia after a legal tussle between Norway and Bulgaria.


title: Jean-Claude Van Damme

text: By the mid-1990s, the stress of the constant filming and promotion of his films, as Van Damme explains, led him to develop a cocaine habit, on which he spent up to $10,000 a week, and consuming up to 10 grams per day by 1996. He was arrested for driving under the influence in 1999. Attempts at drug rehabilitation were unsuccessful, and he resorted to resolve his addiction via quitting cold turkey and exercise. In 1998, he was diagnosed with bipolar disorder. In 2011, he discussed the condition on the British reality show "", saying, "Sometimes you're gonna like me, and sometimes you're gonna hate me. But what can I do? I'm not perfect ... I'm an extreme bipolar, and I'm taking medication for this ... When I was young, I was suffering those swing moods. In the morning, the sky was blue [when I was] going to school, and to me, the sky was black. I was so sad."


title: Jean-Claude Van Damme

text: Van Damme has been married five times to four different women. Until 1992 he was married to his third wife, bodybuilder Gladys Portugues, with whom he has two children, Kristopher (born 1987) and Bianca Brigitte (born 1990).) He had begun an affair with actress Darcy LaPier, whom he married in February 1994. From this marriage, the couple has a son named Nicholas (born 10 October 1995). That same year he had an affair with his "Street Fighter" co-star Kylie Minogue during filming in Thailand. LaPier, who was pregnant with their son at the time, did not become aware of the affair until Van Damme publicly admitted it in 2012.


title: All Elite Wrestling

text: All Elite Wrestling (AEW) is an American professional wrestling promotion based in Jacksonville, Florida. It is considered the second largest wrestling promotion in the United States behind WWE.


title: All Elite Wrestling

text: AEW is owned by Shahid Khan and his son Tony, who founded the company in 2019; in-ring performers Matt & Nick Jackson and Kenny Omega also serve as company executives. Its headquarters are located at TIAA Bank Field, the home stadium of the National Football League's Jacksonville Jaguars, a team also owned by Shahid Khan.


title: All Elite Wrestling

text: Since October 2, 2019, AEW has produced a two-hour weekly television show, "Dynamite", which airs live, with some exceptions. The show originally aired on TNT until December 2021; it moved to TNT's sister channel, TBS, on January 5, 2022. The company also has one other weekly television show, "Rampage", which is a one-hour program that has aired on TNT since August 13, 2021. Additionally, AEW has two weekly YouTube-exclusive shows: "Dark" and "". CBS Sports described AEW as "the first company with major financial backing to take a swing at beginning to compete with WWE on a major level in nearly two decades".


title: All Elite Wrestling

text: In May 2017, professional wrestling journalist Dave Meltzer made a comment that the American professional wrestling promotion Ring of Honor (ROH) could not sell 10,000 tickets for a wrestling event, a feat that no U.S.-based wrestling promotion besides the dominant WWE had accomplished since WWE's defunct major competitor, World Championship Wrestling, in 1999. The comment was responded to by professional wrestlers Cody Rhodes and The Young Bucks (the tag team of Matt Jackson and Nick Jackson), who were then top stars signed to ROH and good friends both inside and outside of professional wrestling as part of the group Bullet Club (and later part of the sub-Bullet Club faction, The Elite). They promoted and held an independent professional wrestling event called All In in September 2018, featuring wrestlers from ROH as well as other promotions. The event sold out in 30 minutes and had the largest audience in attendance for a professional wrestling show in the United States held and organized by promoters not affiliated with WWE or World Championship Wrestling (WCW) since 1993. The event was attended by 11,263 people. The event was acclaimed, and it led to much online speculation that Cody and The Young Bucks would expand their ambitions and create their own professional wrestling promotion or do a second All In event. People in the television industry were also very impressed with the show.


title: All Elite Wrestling

text: On November 5, 2018, several trademarks were filed in Jacksonville, Florida, that indicated the launch of All Elite Wrestling. Names filed for trademark included: All Elite Wrestling, AEW All Out, All Out, AEW, Double or Nothing, Tuesday Night Dynamite, AEW Double or Nothing, and several logos. In December 2018, Cody, The Young Bucks, and several other wrestlers left ROH. The official announcement of AEW's creation came at midnight Pacific Time on January 1, 2019, in an episode of "Being the Elite", a YouTube web series created by and featuring The Elite. Also announced in the episode was Double or Nothing, AEW's inaugural event and sequel to All In.


title: All Elite Wrestling

text: On January 2, 2019, Cody and The Young Bucks officially signed with the promotion as competitors as well as serving as AEW's co-Executive Vice Presidents, while entrepreneur, football executive, and longtime wrestling fan Tony Khan was announced as the president of the company. Tony and his father, Shahid, were reportedly backing the promotion as lead investors. The Khans are billionaires and part of the ownership group of the Jacksonville Jaguars and Fulham F.C.


title: All Elite Wrestling

text: Cody's wife, Brandi Rhodes, was announced as the company's chief brand officer on January 3, 2019. On January 8, 2019, the company held its inaugural press conference on the forecourt of the TIAA Bank Field, where they announced talents that were going to perform as part of the promotion, including former ROH wrestlers the team of SoCal Uncensored (Christopher Daniels, Scorpio Sky, and Frankie Kazarian), "Hangman" Adam Page; independent wrestlers Dr. Britt Baker, Joey Janela, and former WWE wrestlers Pac and Chris Jericho.


title: All Elite Wrestling

text: On February 7, 2019, the group held a press conference where tickets were released for Double or Nothing. Other big announcements included Kenny Omega joining as a wrestler and the company's fourth co-Executive Vice President, as well as the signings of Lucha Brothers (Pentagón Jr. and Rey Fénix), Best Friends (Trent Beretta and Chuck Taylor).


title: All Elite Wrestling

text: On May 15, 2019, AEW and WarnerMedia announced a deal for a weekly prime-time show airing live on TNT, the network that formerly had broadcast WCW's "Monday Nitro" during the Monday Night Wars (1995–2001). CBS Sports describes AEW as "the first company with major financial backing to take a swing at beginning to compete with WWE on a major level in nearly two decades".


title: All Elite Wrestling

text: On May 25, 2019, AEW produced their first ever pay-per-view (PPV), Double or Nothing. It took place at the MGM Grand Garden Arena, and saw the debut of Jon Moxley. Also during Double or Nothing, pro wrestling veteran Bret Hart unveiled the AEW World Championship belt. During the summer, AEW produced two more events, Fyter Fest in June and Fight for the Fallen in July.


title: All Elite Wrestling

text: On August 31, 2019, AEW produced their second pay-per-view event, All Out. At the event, the AEW Women's World Championship belt was unveiled and in the main event, Chris Jericho defeated Adam Page to become the inaugural AEW World Champion. On September 19, TNT's website listed AEW's show as "AEW Dynamite", a one-hour preview show was also scheduled for October 1 at 8 PM. On October 2, "Dynamite" debuted on TNT which averaged 1.409 million viewers, which made it the largest television debut on TNT in five years. Also on October 2, WWE's "NXT" would make its two-hour debut on USA Network (the previous two episodes featured the first hour on USA with the second hour on the WWE Network), and they averaged 891,000 viewers. "Dynamite" beat out "NXT" in viewership and more than doubled its competition in the key adults 18-49 demographic, scoring 878,000 viewers compared to "NXT"s 414,000. This would also mark the beginning of the "Wednesday Night Wars". Prior to and after the episodes, untelevised matches were filmed to air on "AEW Dark" on the following Tuesdays (except before pay-per-view events, where the episodes air Fridays) on AEW's YouTube channel. On November 9, AEW produced their third pay-per-view event, Full Gear. In the main event, Jon Moxley defeated Kenny Omega in an unsanctioned Lights Out match.


title: All Elite Wrestling

text: On January 15, 2020, WarnerMedia and AEW announced a $175 million contract extension for "Dynamite" on TNT through 2023 and that AEW would be launching an upcoming second television weekly show, later revealed as "AEW Rampage". On February 19, AEW reached a new media rights deal with German media company Sky Deutschland (which previously broadcast WWE and Impact Wrestling shows) to broadcast AEW pay-per-views on Sky Select Event.


title: All Elite Wrestling

text: AEW has a training facility known as the Nightmare Factory, which is owned by AEW wrestler/coach Q. T. Marshall, who also serves as head trainer.


title: All Elite Wrestling

text: As other sports cancellations and postponements were being announced in March 2020, AEW began to be impacted by the American onset of the COVID-19 pandemic. Following the suspension of the 2019-20 NBA season after two players tested positive from the virus, the March 18 episode of "Dynamite" was held without spectators from Daily's Place in Jacksonville, Florida. Double or Nothing was supposed to take place on May 23, but on April 8, the MGM Grand Garden Arena announced that they had canceled all events up through May 31 due to the pandemic. At that point, Nevada had been in a state of emergency since March 12, banning all public gatherings indefinitely. In response, AEW announced that Double or Nothing would still proceed as planned but from Daily's Place, as well as TIAA Bank Field stadium for the main event match.


title: All Elite Wrestling

text: On April 13, Florida Governor Ron DeSantis had deemed AEW, like WWE, an essential business critical to the state's economy, and had added an exception under the state's stay-at-home order for employees of a "professional sports and media production" that is closed to the public and has a national audience. In an interview on the "AEW Unrestricted" podcast, Tony Khan stated the pandemic has deprived AEW millions of dollars in revenue from live events.


title: All Elite Wrestling

text: AEW announced the return of ticketed fans to live events on August 20, following Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) guidelines including wearing masks, physical distancing, and temperature checks. Beginning with their August 27 episode of "Dynamite", they allowed up to 10 percent capacity at Daily's Place and up to 15 percent capacity starting at All Out.


title: All Elite Wrestling

text: On November 10, 2020, the promotion announced AEW Games, the company's video game brand. AEW revealed that three games are in development; "" and "AEW Elite GM" for mobile devices, and "AEW Fight Forever" developed by former "WWE 2K" developer Yuke's.


title: All Elite Wrestling

text: For the Double or Nothing pay-per-view in May 2021, the venue was raised to full capacity, making it the first time AEW held an event with a capacity crowd since March 2020.


title: All Elite Wrestling

text: In May 2021, AEW announced that they would be returning to live touring, beginning with a special episode of "Dynamite" titled Road Rager on July 7 in Miami, Florida, in turn becoming the first major professional wrestling promotion to resume live touring during the COVID-19 pandemic. Road Rager was also the first in a four-week span of special "Dynamite" episodes called the "Welcome Back" tour, which continued with the two-part Fyter Fest on July 14 and 21 in Cedar Park and Garland, Texas, respectively, and then concluded with Fight for the Fallen on July 28 in Charlotte, North Carolina. In June, AEW announced that the September 22 episode of "Dynamite" would be another special episode titled Grand Slam and would be AEW's New York City debut, a city primarily known as home territory for WWE, as well as their first full event held in a stadium. The event would also become AEW's most attended event, with over 20,000 spectators.


title: All Elite Wrestling

text: On August 20, 2021, CM Punk joined AEW. It was Punk's comeback to professional wrestling after leaving WWE in 2014.


title: All Elite Wrestling

text: On August 27, 2021, it was revealed that "Dark" would begin being taped at its own set within Universal Studios Florida in Orlando at Soundstage 21.


title: All Elite Wrestling

text: On the March 2, 2022 episode of "AEW Dynamite", Tony Khan announced that he had acquired professional wrestling promotion Ring of Honor (ROH) from Sinclair Broadcast Group.


title: All Elite Wrestling

text: On May 8, 2019, AEW reached a media rights deal with British media company ITV plc to broadcast AEW shows on ITV4 with pay-per-views being broadcast on ITV Box Office starting with Double or Nothing on May 25, 2019. However, after ITV Box Office ceased operations in January 2020, ITV no longer broadcasts AEW pay-per-views in the UK.


title: All Elite Wrestling

text: AEW releases a "Road to..." and "Countdown to..." series of videos on its official YouTube channel prior to "Dynamite" and pay-per-view events. The videos consist of interviews, video packages, and backstage segments. The series is used to hype pre-existing matches, as well as create new rivalries.


title: All Elite Wrestling

text: In November 2019, AEW announced Bash at the Beach, a nine-day series of events, featuring two episodes of "Dynamite", including one aboard Chris Jericho's Rock 'N' Wrestling Rager at Sea. On February 19, 2020, AEW reached a media rights deal with German media company Sky Deutschland (owned by Comcast, WWE's United States broadcast partner, which previously broadcast WWE and Impact Wrestling shows) to broadcast AEW pay-per-views on Sky Select Event.


title: All Elite Wrestling

text: On January 22, 2021, TNT Africa announced that the channel would begin airing "Dynamite" on Friday nights in Sub-Saharan Africa. The show premiered on February 5, 2021. In February, AEW announced their newest show "", which began airing on March 15. The show airs on Mondays on their YouTube channel as a complement to "AEW Dark".


title: All Elite Wrestling

text: On May 19, 2021, AEW announced that "Dynamite" would be moving to TBS in January 2022. In addition, AEW also announced that they would be launching a second weekly TV show called "AEW Rampage", which would air on Fridays at 10 P.M. on TNT, beginning August 13. On August 2, AEW announced a deal with Discovery Inc. to air "Dynamite" and "Rampage" on Eurosport starting on August 15, 2021, in India. On February 10, 2022, Warner TV announced that they would be air "Dynamite" and "Rampage" in Poland. On April 8, 2022, it was announced that as part of the AEW and NJPW working relationship that "Dynamite" and "Rampage" would air in Japan on NJPW World. On May 5, 2022, "AEW" announced that was going to air Dynamite and Rampage on TNT in Spain starting on June 17, 2022, and later live from June 19, 2022.


title: All Elite Wrestling

text: AEW pay-per-view events are available via B/R Live in the United States and Canada, and via FITE TV internationally. Additionally, AEW PPVs are also available via traditional PPV outlets in the United States and Canada and are carried by all major satellite providers.


title: All Elite Wrestling

text: AEW has partnership agreements with several promotions around the world. In early 2019, AEW struck two partnership deals with Mexican Lucha Libre AAA Worldwide (AAA) and Chinese Oriental Wrestling Entertainment (OWE) promotions. By late 2020 and going into 2021, AEW formed partnerships with other wrestling promotions. Tony Khan has dubbed the concept of wrestlers from other promotions appearing in AEW as going through "the forbidden door". In December of that year, AEW began a partnership with Impact Wrestling, which saw AEW World Champion Kenny Omega making appearances on "Impact!". Omega would later make his in ring debut for Impact at Hard to Kill, and defeated Rich Swann to win the Impact World Championship at the Rebellion event, making him the first person to hold championships in both Impact and AEW concurrently. In October 2021, the working relationship between AEW and Impact Wrestling ended following Impact's Bound for Glory.


title: All Elite Wrestling

text: On February 3, 2021, at the Beach Break television special, AEW started a partnership with New Japan Pro-Wrestling (NJPW). After the main event, Kenta made his AEW debut and hit Jon Moxley with his finishing strike, the Go 2 Sleep. Kenta would later make his AEW in ring debut at the following "Dynamite". Over one year later on the April 20, 2022 edition of "Dynamite", it was announced that AEW and NJPW reached an agreement to co-produce a pay-per-view event titled , which took place at the United Center in Chicago on June 26.


title: All Elite Wrestling

text: On March 20, 2022, at DDT Pro-Wrestling's , AEW announced that had formed a working relationship with DDT and TJPW that would see wrestlers from both brands appear on AEW programming.


title: All Elite Wrestling

text: AEW signs most of its talent to exclusive contracts, meaning talent can appear or perform only on AEW programming and events though it has partnerships with Japan's New Japan Pro-Wrestling (NJPW), DDT Pro-Wrestling (DDT), Tokyo Joshi Pro Wrestling (TJPW), and Mexico's Lucha Libre AAA Worldwide (AAA), wrestlers and other personalities from those promotions may also make periodic appearances at AEW events.


title: Charli D'Amelio

text: Charli Grace D'Amelio ( ; born May 1, 2004) is an American social media personality. She was a competitive dancer for over 10 years before starting her social media career in 2019, when she started posting dance videos on the video-sharing platform TikTok. She quickly amassed a large following and subsequently became the most-followed creator on the platform in March 2020 until she was surpassed by Khaby Lame in July 2022.


title: Charli D'Amelio

text: D'Amelio made her feature film debut with a voice role in the 2020 animated film "StarDog and TurboCat." Since 2021, she has starred in the Hulu docuseries, "The D'Amelio Show" and the Snap Original reality show "Charli vs. Dixie". In 2022, D'Amelio participated as a celebrity contestant and she would go on to win, alongside Mark Ballas, in the thirty-first season of the dance competition series "Dancing with the Stars".


title: Charli D'Amelio

text: Her other endeavours include two books, a podcast, a nail polish collection, a mattress, a makeup line, a clothing line, and a multi-product company. She is the first person to earn both 50 million and 100 million followers on TikTok. D'Amelio was the highest-earning TikTok female personality in 2019 and the highest-earning personality on the app in 2022, according to "Forbes". She is often described as TikTok's biggest star.


title: Charli D'Amelio

text: Charli Grace D'Amelio was born in Norwalk, Connecticut, on May 1, 2004, the daughter of photographer and former model Heidi D'Amelio and business owner and former Republican Connecticut Senate candidate Marc D'Amelio. She has an older sister, Dixie, who is also a social media personality.


title: Charli D'Amelio

text: She began dancing at the age of three, and was a competitive dancer for over 10 years prior to starting her TikTok career in 2019.


title: Charli D'Amelio

text: She formerly attended the private King School in Stamford, Connecticut, but began attending school virtually following her TikTok success.


title: Charli D'Amelio

text: D'Amelio first began posting on TikTok in May 2019 with a lip syncing video alongside her friend. Her first video to gain traction, a side-by-side video (known on the platform as a "duet") with user Move With Joy, was posted in July 2019.


title: Charli D'Amelio

text: D'Amelio has expressed confusion regarding her rise to popularity, telling "Variety", "I consider myself a normal teenager that a lot of people watch, for some reason. It doesn't make sense in my head, but I'm working on understanding it." Since then, her content has mainly consisted of videos dancing to trending songs on the platform. In October 2019, she gained further exposure for her videos performing a dance called the "Renegade" to the K Camp song "Lottery". She was subsequently credited with popularizing the dance on social media, while also being falsely credited with creating the dance, and was referred to as the "CEO of Renegade" by TikTok users. Following a "New York Times" profile of dancer Jalaiah Harmon revealing her as the original creator of the dance, D'Amelio received online backlash for not crediting Harmon, and began regularly crediting the creators of the dances she performed. She joined the collaborative TikTok content house The Hype House in November 2019 alongside her sister, Dixie.


title: Charli D'Amelio

text: In late 2019, former Sony Music executive Barbara Jones signed D'Amelio to her management company, Outshine Talent, and in January 2020, she signed with United Talent Agency along with the rest of her family. Bebe Rexha invited D'Amelio to perform alongside her during her opening performance for the Jonas Brothers in November 2019. That same month, she began posting on her self-titled YouTube vlog channel.


title: Charli D'Amelio

text: In February 2020, D’Amelio appeared in a Super Bowl commercial for Sabra Hummus along with other celebrities. In March 2020, she and her sister partnered with UNICEF for an anti-bullying campaign, while she also made an appearance in the Nickelodeon television special "#KidsTogether: The Nickelodeon Town Hall", hosted by Kristen Bell. That same month, she partnered with Procter & Gamble to create the #DistanceDance challenge campaign on TikTok with the goal of encouraging social distancing during the COVID-19 pandemic, which garnered praise from Ohio Governor Mike DeWine. For her involvement in the campaign, she was nominated for a Streamy Award for Social Good Campaign. She also became the most-followed TikTok user, displacing American social media personality Loren Gray, and the first TikTok user to earn 50 million followers. D'Amelio appeared in the ABC television special "The Disney Family Singalong" during the performance of "We're All In This Together" from "High School Musical" in April 2020.


title: Charli D'Amelio

text: In May 2020, D'Amelio and her sister announced a podcast deal with Ramble Podcast Network, and both were included in the celebrity lineup for the television special "", hosted by LeBron James. Also that month, she left the Hype House. D'Amelio starred as Tinker in the June 2020 United States release of the 2019 animated children's film "StarDog and TurboCat", marking her first role in a feature film. That same month, she and her sister partnered with Morphe Cosmetics to launch Morphe 2, a makeup line. Charli and Dixie also launched a nail polish collection called Coastal Craze with Orosa Beauty in August 2020. Later that month, D'Amelio announced her debut book, titled "Essentially Charli: The Ultimate Guide to Keeping It Real", which was released on December 1, 2020. The book was published by Abrams Books. It covered topics of identity, cyberbullying, social media, and body image as well as D'Amelio's childhood and family life. The book became a "New York Times" bestseller.


title: Charli D'Amelio

text: Dunkin' Donuts offered a limited-time drink on their menu dedicated to D'Amelio and based on her "go-to" order called "The Charli" in September 2020. D'Amelio and her sister also designed limited-edition fleece sweatshirts for Hollister, released in September 2020. She joined Triller, a rival platform to TikTok, later that month, in the midst of a potential US ban on TikTok. She also made an appearance in Jennifer Lopez and Maluma's music video for their singles "Pa' Ti + Lonely". D'Amelio earned a 2021 Guinness World Record for having the most TikTok followers that same month. D'Amelio starred in the music video for the Bebe Rexha single, "Baby I'm Jealous", in October 2020. Later that month, she was nominated for three awards, including Creator of the Year, at the 10th Streamy Awards.


title: Charli D'Amelio

text: In November 2020, D'Amelio became the first person to earn 100 million followers on TikTok. She also earned a nomination for Social Star at the 46th People's Choice Awards. In December 2020, she was featured in an episode of the Facebook Messenger series "Here for It With Avani Gregg", and also won the award for Breakout Creator at the 10th Streamy Awards. She starred in the music video for Lil Huddy's song "America's Sweetheart" in April 2021. In May 2021, D'Amelio and her sister co-created and became the face of Social Tourist, an apparel brand under Hollister, as part of a multi-year partnership with Abercrombie & Fitch, and partnered with Simmons Bedding Company to design and release the Charlie & Dixie x Simmons Mattress.


title: Charli D'Amelio

text: D'Amelio starred alongside her family in the Hulu docuseries "The D'Amelio Show", which premiered in September 2021. The series became the most-watched unscripted series among all first-season titles in the genre, and was renewed for a second season, which premiered on September 28, 2022. Later that year, she starred with her sister in the Snap Original web reality competition show "Charli vs. Dixie", which premiered on November 13, 2021, and is produced by Westbrook Media. The series follows the sisters compete against each other in various challenges and tasks, in order to win a cash prize of US$50,000 that goes to a charity of the winner's choice. D'Amelio participated for UNICEF. In May 2022, Snapchat announced "Charli vs. Dixie" was renewed for a second season, set to premiere later this year.


title: Charli D'Amelio

text: In April 2022, it was announced D'Amelio has signed to star as the lead in Village Roadshow Pictures and Ryan Kavanaugh's upcoming supernatural thriller film "Home School", eyed as the first installment of a potential eight-film franchise, directed by F. Javier Gutiérrez with D'Amelio's parents and sister serving as co-executive producers. In late August, D'Amelio and her mother Heidi D'Amelio were announced as celebrity participants for the thirty-first season of the American dance competition series "Dancing With The Stars", competing separately. D'Amelio and her mother made history as the first family members to compete against each other on the show. On September 8, it was announced she was partnered with Mark Ballas. In November 2022, during the show's season finale, D'Amelio and Ballas were announced as the winners.


title: Charli D'Amelio

text: In September 2022, she and her family announced a new project, titled D'Amelio Brands, which would create and run its own brands, focused on fashion, beauty, and lifestyle. The venture also announced a $6 million seed round which includes investors Fanatics CEO Michael Rubin, entrepreneur Richard Rosenblatt and Apple Senior Vice President of Services Eddy Cue.


title: Charli D'Amelio

text: D'Amelio has frequently been referred to in the media as TikTok's biggest star. Taylor Lorenz of "The New York Times" called D'Amelio the "reigning queen" of TikTok. Trey Taylor of "The Face" called her and her sister Dixie the "CEOs of TikTok". In an article for "The Washington Post", Travis M. Andrews called her "[TikTok's] undisputed ruler". Cassidy George of "The New Yorker" called her the "face of TikTok". Much of her appeal has been attributed to her content being seen as relatable and authentic. Marc Faddoul, an artificial intelligence researcher at the University of California, Berkeley, credited her status as a "median user" and a "safe recommendation choice that can generate engagement across the board" as reasons for her fame.


title: Charli D'Amelio

text: "Mel Magazine"s Joseph Longo called her "one of the first polarizing figures on the video app — the embodiment of the strange, precarious and unpredictable new world of Gen Z online fame", noting that social media users criticized her as being "basic", "cringeworthy", and "overhyped". In regard to D'Amelio's early popularity, Rachel Monroe of "The Atlantic" wrote, "As Charli's follower count grew, her popularity acquired a reflexive quality; essentially, she became a meme for other TikTokers to react to. There was a flurry of 'I don't get why Charli is so popular' posts, followed by backlash-to-the-backlash videos tagged #teamcharli and #unproblematicqueen." Writing for "Vanity Fair", Carino Chocano called her the "face" of "Straight TikTok", a colloquialism used to describe the mainstream part of TikTok, with "straight" referencing the fact that many of the users who make up "Straight TikTok" are heterosexual.


title: Charli D'Amelio

text: She appeared on both the "Forbes" 30 Under 30 list and on "Fortune" 40 Under 40 list in 2020, making her the youngest person to appear on "Fortune"s list. Fashion search engine Lyst placed D'Amelio at eighth on their annual Power Dressers list, which identifies the most influential public figures in fashion based on the company's search, sales, and social media metrics, in 2020. The company also listed D'Amelio second on their collaborative Next 20 list with "Highsnobiety", which determines the most prominent "breakout cultural pioneers" in fashion using search metrics and sales. In 2021, she was included on the Time100 Next list, an extension to the "Time" 100 list, and in "Teen Vogue"s Young Hollywood Class of 2021.


title: Charli D'Amelio

text: Other TikTok users, including Lisa Beverly and Ellie Zeiler, became notable on the platform for their resemblance to D'Amelio.


title: Charli D'Amelio

text: D'Amelio and her sister received backlash after the premiere episode of the D'Amelio family's "Dinner with the D'Amelios" series, in which the family and American internet personality James Charles eat a paella dinner prepared by personal chef Aaron May, was posted to their family YouTube channel in November 2020. Users on social media accused both Charli and Dixie of exhibiting "rude" behavior towards May, with Charli making faces as she described the meal and subsequently asking for "dino nuggets". She also expressed during the video that she wished she had received 100 million followers on the one-year anniversary of her earning one million, for which users further criticized her. Following the backlash, D'Amelio lost over one million followers on TikTok in less than one day. Days after the video was posted, she addressed the situation in an Instagram Live video, where she apologized and told viewers, "You can hate on me for whatever I've done, but the fact that all of this is happening because of a misunderstanding...I just feel like that's not okay," in response to violent threats she was receiving. May defended the sisters in an interview, stating, "Those girls are the greatest, I love them. It was all fun and games." Charles similarly tweeted out in their defense, further comparing the controversy to the conflict which broke out between him and Tati Westbrook a year prior. Rebecca Jennings of "Vox" called the controversy "cruel and unnecessary", while Alice Ophelia and Faye Maidment of "Dazed" attributed it to misogyny.


title: Charli D'Amelio

text: D'Amelio faced backlash in December 2020 after it was revealed that she and a number of other social media personalities, including Hudson, had been vacationing at Atlantis Paradise Island in the Bahamas during the COVID-19 pandemic while cases in her and her family's residence of Los Angeles surged, shortly after having publicly suggested that not staying home during the pandemic was "inconsiderate". Also during this time, D'Amelio was accused of buying her TikTok followers due to some of her followers' following lists not having her listed.


title: Charli D'Amelio

text: Following D'Amelio's meet-and-greet in November 2019, she and her family donated the money earned from ticket sales to a special needs fundraiser.


title: Charli D'Amelio

text: In April 2020, D'Amelio donated $50,000 to Norwalk Hospital in her hometown of Norwalk, Connecticut, to help secure critical supplies for the hospital's staff amid the COVID-19 pandemic.


title: Charli D'Amelio

text: D'Amelio has openly expressed support for the Black Lives Matter movement; during the George Floyd protests in 2020, she posted a video on TikTok decrying Floyd's murder.


title: Charli D'Amelio

text: In December 2020, D'Amelio partnered with TikTok to donate $100,000 to the American Dance Movement, an organization which helps provide access to dance education in the United States, as part of Giving Tuesday.


title: Charli D'Amelio

text: D'Amelio has stated that she suffers from an eating disorder. She has also been vocal about her experiences with body shaming. In an anti-bullying campaign for UNICEF, she said, "Some of the most hurtful comments that I read about myself online are about my body shape, my body type, which hits close to home because I struggled a lot with body image, body dysmorphia, [and] bad eating habits."


title: Philosophy

text: Philosophy (from , ) is the systematized study of general and fundamental questions, such as those about existence, reason, knowledge, values, mind, and language. Such questions are often posed as problems to be studied or resolved. Some sources claim the term was coined by Pythagoras ( BCE), although this theory is disputed by some. Philosophical methods include questioning, critical discussion, rational argument, and systematic presentation.


title: Philosophy

text: Historically, "philosophy" encompassed all bodies of knowledge and a practitioner was known as a "philosopher". "natural philosophy," which began as a discipline in ancient India and Ancient Greece, encompasses astronomy, medicine, and physics. For example, Newton's 1687 "Mathematical Principles of Natural Philosophy" later became classified as a book of physics. In the 19th century, the growth of modern research universities led academic philosophy and other disciplines to professionalize and specialize. Since then, various areas of investigation that were traditionally part of philosophy have become separate academic disciplines, and namely the social sciences such as psychology, sociology, linguistics, and economics.


title: Philosophy

text: Today, major subfields of academic philosophy include metaphysics, which is concerned with the fundamental nature of existence and reality; epistemology, which studies the nature of knowledge and belief; ethics, which is concerned with moral value; and logic, which studies the rules of inference that allow one to derive conclusions from true premises. Other notable subfields include philosophy of religion, philosophy of science, political philosophy, aesthetics, philosophy of language, and philosophy of mind.


title: Philosophy

text: There is wide agreement that philosophy (from the ancient Greek , phílos: "love"; and , sophía: "wisdom") is characterized by various general features: it is a form of rational inquiry, it aims to be systematic, and it tends to critically reflect on its own methods and presuppositions. But approaches that go beyond such vague characterizations to give a more interesting or profound definition are usually controversial. Often, they are only accepted by theorists belonging to a certain philosophical movement and are revisionistic in that many presumed parts of philosophy would not deserve the title "philosophy" if they were true. Before the modern age, the term was used in a very wide sense, which included the individual sciences, like physics or mathematics, as its sub-disciplines, but the contemporary usage is more narrow.


title: Philosophy

text: Some approaches argue that there is a set of essential features shared by all parts of philosophy while others see only weaker family resemblances or contend that it is merely an empty blanket term. Some definitions characterize philosophy in relation to its method, like pure reasoning. Others focus more on its topic, for example, as the study of the biggest patterns of the world as a whole or as the attempt to answer the big questions. Both approaches have the problem that they are usually either too wide, by including non-philosophical disciplines, or too narrow, by excluding some philosophical sub-disciplines. Many definitions of philosophy emphasize its intimate relation to science. In this sense, philosophy is sometimes understood as a proper science in its own right. Some naturalist approaches, for example, see philosophy as an empirical yet very abstract science that is concerned with very wide-ranging empirical patterns instead of particular observations. Some phenomenologists, on the other hand, characterize philosophy as the science of essences. Science-based definitions usually face the problem of explaining why philosophy in its long history has not made the type of progress as seen in other sciences. This problem is avoided by seeing philosophy as an immature or provisional science whose subdisciplines cease to be philosophy once they have fully developed. In this sense, philosophy is the midwife of the sciences.


title: Philosophy

text: Other definitions focus more on the contrast between science and philosophy. A common theme among many such definitions is that philosophy is concerned with meaning, understanding, or the clarification of language. According to one view, philosophy is conceptual analysis, which involves finding the necessary and sufficient conditions for the application of concepts. Another defines philosophy as a linguistic therapy that aims at dispelling misunderstandings to which humans are susceptible due to the confusing structure of natural language. One more approach holds that the main task of philosophy is to articulate the pre-ontological understanding of the world, which acts as a condition of possibility of experience.


title: Philosophy

text: Many other definitions of philosophy do not clearly fall into any of the aforementioned categories. An early approach already found in ancient Greek and Roman philosophy is that philosophy is the spiritual practice of developing one's reasoning ability. This practice is an expression of the philosopher's love of wisdom and has the aim of improving one's well-being by leading a reflective life. A closely related approach identifies the development and articulation of worldviews as the principal task of philosophy, i.e. to express how things on the grand scale hang together and which practical stance we should take towards them. Another definition characterizes philosophy as "thinking about thinking" in order to emphasize its reflective nature.


title: Philosophy

text: In one general sense, philosophy is associated with wisdom, intellectual culture, and a search for knowledge. In this sense, all cultures and literate societies ask philosophical questions, such as "how are we to live" and "what is the nature of reality". A broad and impartial conception of philosophy, then, finds a reasoned inquiry into such matters as reality, morality, and life in all world civilizations.


title: Philosophy

text: Western philosophy is the philosophical tradition of the Western world, dating back to pre-Socratic thinkers who were active in 6th-century Greece (BCE), such as Thales ( BCE) and Pythagoras ( BCE) who practiced a 'love of wisdom' () and were also termed 'students of nature' ().


title: Philosophy

text: While our knowledge of the ancient era begins with Thales in the 6th century BCE, little is known about the philosophers who came before Socrates (commonly known as the pre-Socratics). The ancient era was dominated by Greek philosophical schools. Most notable among the schools influenced by Socrates' teachings were Plato, who founded the Platonic Academy, and his student Aristotle, who founded the Peripatetic school. Other ancient philosophical traditions influenced by Socrates included Cynicism, Cyrenaicism, Stoicism, and Academic Skepticism. Two other traditions were influenced by Socrates' contemporary, Democritus: Pyrrhonism and Epicureanism. Important topics covered by the Greeks included metaphysics (with competing theories such as atomism and monism), cosmology, the nature of the well-lived life ("eudaimonia"), the possibility of knowledge, and the nature of reason (logos). With the rise of the Roman empire, Greek philosophy was increasingly discussed in Latin by Romans such as Cicero and Seneca (see Roman philosophy).


title: Philosophy

text: Medieval philosophy (5th–16th centuries) took place during the period following the fall of the Western Roman Empire and was dominated by the rise of Christianity; it hence reflects Judeo-Christian theological concerns while also retaining a continuity with Greco-Roman thought. Problems such as the existence and nature of God, the nature of faith and reason, metaphysics, and the problem of evil were discussed in this period. Some key medieval thinkers include St. Augustine, Thomas Aquinas, Boethius, Anselm and Roger Bacon. Philosophy for these thinkers was viewed as an aid to theology (), and hence they sought to align their philosophy with their interpretation of sacred scripture. This period saw the development of scholasticism, a text critical method developed in medieval universities based on close reading and disputation on key texts. The Renaissance period saw increasing focus on classic Greco-Roman thought and on a robust humanism.


title: Philosophy

text: Early modern philosophy in the Western world begins with thinkers such as Thomas Hobbes and René Descartes (1596–1650). Following the rise of natural science, modern philosophy was concerned with developing a secular and rational foundation for knowledge and moved away from traditional structures of authority such as religion, scholastic thought and the Church. Major modern philosophers include Spinoza, Leibniz, Locke, Berkeley, Hume, and Kant.


title: Philosophy

text: 19th-century philosophy (sometimes called late modern philosophy) was influenced by the wider 18th-century movement termed "the Enlightenment", and includes figures such as Hegel, a key figure in German idealism; Kierkegaard, who developed the foundations for existentialism; Thomas Carlyle, representative of the great man theory; Nietzsche, a famed anti-Christian; John Stuart Mill, who promoted utilitarianism; Karl Marx, who developed the foundations for communism; and the American William James. The 20th century saw the split between analytic philosophy and continental philosophy, as well as philosophical trends such as phenomenology, existentialism, logical positivism, pragmatism and the linguistic turn (see Contemporary philosophy).


title: Philosophy

text: The regions of the Fertile Crescent, Iran and Arabia are home to the earliest known philosophical wisdom literature.


title: Philosophy

text: According to the assyriologist Marc Van de Mieroop, Babylonian philosophy was a highly developed system of thought with a unique approach to knowledge and a focus on writing, lexicography, divination, and law. It was also a bilingual intellectual culture, based on Sumerian and Akkadian.


title: Philosophy

text: Early Wisdom literature from the Fertile Crescent was a genre that sought to instruct people on ethical action, practical living, and virtue through stories and proverbs. In Ancient Egypt, these texts were known as "sebayt" ('teachings'), and they are central to our understandings of Ancient Egyptian philosophy. The most well known of these texts is "The Maxims of Ptahhotep." Theology and cosmology were central concerns in Egyptian thought. Perhaps the earliest form of a monotheistic theology also emerged in Egypt, with the rise of the Amarna theology (or Atenism) of Akhenaten (14th century BCE), which held that the solar creation deity Aten was the only god. This has been described as a "monotheistic revolution" by egyptologist Jan Assmann, though it also drew on previous developments in Egyptian thought, particularly the "New Solar Theology" based around Amun-Ra. These theological developments also influenced the post-Amarna Ramesside theology, which retained a focus on a single creative solar deity (though without outright rejection of other gods, which are now seen as manifestations of the main solar deity). This period also saw the development of the concept of the "ba" (soul) and its relation to god.


title: Philosophy

text: Jewish philosophy and Christian philosophy are religious-philosophical traditions that developed both in the Middle East and in Europe, which both share certain early Judaic texts (mainly the Tanakh) and monotheistic beliefs. Jewish thinkers such as the Geonim of the Talmudic Academies in Babylonia and Maimonides engaged with Greek and Islamic philosophy. Later Jewish philosophy came under strong Western intellectual influences and includes the works of Moses Mendelssohn who ushered in the Haskalah (the Jewish Enlightenment), Jewish existentialism, and Reform Judaism.


title: Philosophy

text: The various traditions of Gnosticism, which were influenced by both Greek and Abrahamic currents, originated around the first century and emphasized spiritual knowledge ("gnosis").


title: Philosophy

text: Pre-Islamic Iranian philosophy begins with the work of Zoroaster, one of the first promoters of monotheism and of the dualism between good and evil. This dualistic cosmogony influenced later Iranian developments such as Manichaeism, Mazdakism, and Zurvanism.


title: Philosophy

text: Islamic philosophy is the philosophical work originating in the Islamic tradition and is mostly done in Arabic. It draws from the religion of Islam as well as from Greco-Roman philosophy. After the Muslim conquests, the translation movement (mid-eighth to the late tenth century) resulted in the works of Greek philosophy becoming available in Arabic.


title: Philosophy

text: Early Islamic philosophy developed the Greek philosophical traditions in new innovative directions. This intellectual work inaugurated what is known as the Islamic Golden Age. The two main currents of early Islamic thought are Kalam, which focuses on Islamic theology, and Falsafa, which was based on Aristotelianism and Neoplatonism. The work of Aristotle was very influential among philosophers such as Al-Kindi (9th century), Avicenna (980 – June 1037), and Averroes (12th century). Others such as Al-Ghazali were highly critical of the methods of the Islamic Aristotelians and saw their metaphysical ideas as heretical. Islamic thinkers like Ibn al-Haytham and Al-Biruni also developed a scientific method, experimental medicine, a theory of optics, and a legal philosophy. Ibn Khaldun was an influential thinker in philosophy of history.


title: Philosophy

text: Islamic thought also deeply influenced European intellectual developments, especially through the commentaries of Averroes on Aristotle. The Mongol invasions and the destruction of Baghdad in 1258 are often seen as marking the end of the Golden Age. Several schools of Islamic philosophy continued to flourish after the Golden Age, however, and include currents such as Illuminationist philosophy, Sufi philosophy, and Transcendent theosophy.


title: Philosophy

text: The 19th- and 20th-century Arab world saw the "Nahda" movement (literally meaning 'The Awakening'; also known as the 'Arab Renaissance'), which had a considerable influence on contemporary Islamic philosophy.


title: Philosophy

text: Indian philosophy () refers to the diverse philosophical traditions that emerged since the ancient times on the Indian subcontinent. Indian philosophy chiefly considers epistemology, theories of consciousness and theories of mind, and the physical properties of reality. Indian philosophical traditions share various key concepts and ideas, which are defined in different ways and accepted or rejected by the different traditions. These include concepts such as "dhárma", "karma", "pramāṇa," "duḥkha, saṃsāra" and "mokṣa."


title: Philosophy

text: Some of the earliest surviving Indian philosophical texts are the Upanishads of the later Vedic period (1000–500 BCE), which are considered to preserve the ideas of Brahmanism. Indian philosophical traditions are commonly grouped according to their relationship to the Vedas and the ideas contained in them. Jainism and Buddhism originated at the end of the Vedic period, while the various traditions grouped under Hinduism mostly emerged after the Vedic period as independent traditions. Hindus generally classify Indian philosophical traditions as either orthodox ("āstika") or heterodox ("nāstika") depending on whether they accept the authority of the Vedas and the theories of "brahman" and "ātman" found therein.


title: Philosophy

text: The schools which align themselves with the thought of the Upanishads, the so-called "orthodox" or "Hindu" traditions, are often classified into six "darśanas" or philosophies:Sānkhya, Yoga, Nyāya, Vaisheshika, Mimāmsā and Vedānta.


title: Philosophy

text: The doctrines of the Vedas and Upanishads were interpreted differently by these six schools of Hindu philosophy, with varying degrees of overlap. They represent a "collection of philosophical views that share a textual connection", according to Chadha (2015). They also reflect a tolerance for a diversity of philosophical interpretations within Hinduism while sharing the same foundation.


title: Philosophy

text: Hindu philosophers of the six orthodox schools developed systems of epistemology ("pramana") and investigated topics such as metaphysics, ethics, psychology ("guṇa"), hermeneutics, and soteriology within the framework of the Vedic knowledge, while presenting a diverse collection of interpretations. The commonly named six orthodox schools were the competing philosophical traditions of what has been called the "Hindu synthesis" of classical Hinduism.


title: Philosophy

text: There are also other schools of thought which are often seen as "Hindu", though not necessarily orthodox (since they may accept different scriptures as normative, such as the Shaiva Agamas and Tantras), these include different schools of Shavism such as Pashupata, Shaiva Siddhanta, non-dual tantric Shavism (i.e. Trika, Kaula, etc.).


title: Philosophy

text: The "Hindu" and "Orthodox" traditions are often contrasted with the "unorthodox" traditions ("nāstika," literally "those who reject"), though this is a label that is not used by the "unorthodox" schools themselves. These traditions reject the Vedas as authoritative and often reject major concepts and ideas that are widely accepted by the orthodox schools (such as "Ātman", "Brahman", and "Īśvara"). These unorthodox schools include Jainism (accepts "ātman" but rejects "Īśvara," Vedas and "Brahman"), Buddhism (rejects all orthodox concepts except rebirth and karma), Cārvāka (materialists who reject even rebirth and karma) and Ājīvika (known for their doctrine of fate).<


title: Philosophy

text: Jain philosophy is one of the only two surviving "unorthodox" traditions (along with Buddhism). It generally accepts the concept of a permanent soul ("jiva") as one of the five "astikayas" (eternal, infinite categories that make up the substance of existence). The other four being "dhárma", "adharma", "ākāśa" ('space'), and "pudgala" ('matter'). Jain thought holds that all existence is cyclic, eternal and uncreated.


title: Philosophy

text: Some of the most important elements of Jain philosophy are the Jain theory of karma, the doctrine of nonviolence (ahiṃsā) and the theory of "many-sidedness" or Anēkāntavāda. The "Tattvartha Sutra" is the earliest known, most comprehensive and authoritative compilation of Jain philosophy.


title: Philosophy

text: Major European Quantum Physicists, including Erwin Schrödinger, Werner Heisenberg, Albert Einstein, & Niels Bohr credit the Vedas with giving them the ideas for their experiments.


title: Philosophy

text: Buddhist philosophy begins with the thought of Gautama Buddha (fl. between 6th and 4th century BCE) and is preserved in the early Buddhist texts. It originated in the Indian region of Magadha and later spread to the rest of the Indian subcontinent, East Asia, Tibet, Central Asia, and Southeast Asia. In these regions, Buddhist thought developed into different philosophical traditions which used various languages (like Tibetan, Chinese and Pali). As such, Buddhist philosophy is a trans-cultural and international phenomenon.


title: Philosophy

text: The dominant Buddhist philosophical traditions in East Asian nations are mainly based on Indian Mahayana Buddhism. The philosophy of the Theravada school is dominant in Southeast Asian countries like Sri Lanka, Burma and Thailand.


title: Philosophy

text: Because ignorance to the true nature of things is considered one of the roots of suffering ("dukkha"), Buddhist philosophy is concerned with epistemology, metaphysics, ethics and psychology. Buddhist philosophical texts must also be understood within the context of meditative practices which are supposed to bring about certain cognitive shifts. Key innovative concepts include the Four Noble Truths as an analysis of "dukkha", "anicca" (impermanence), and "anatta" (non-self).


title: Philosophy

text: After the death of the Buddha, various groups began to systematize his main teachings, eventually developing comprehensive philosophical systems termed "Abhidharma". Following the Abhidharma schools, Indian Mahayana philosophers such as Nagarjuna and Vasubandhu developed the theories of "śūnyatā" ('emptiness of all phenomena') and "vijñapti-matra" ('appearance only'), a form of phenomenology or transcendental idealism. The Dignāga school of "pramāṇa" ('means of knowledge') promoted a sophisticated form of Buddhist epistemology.


title: Philosophy

text: There were numerous schools, sub-schools, and traditions of Buddhist philosophy in ancient and medieval India. According to Oxford professor of Buddhist philosophy Jan Westerhoff, the major Indian schools from 300 BCE to 1000 CE were: the Mahāsāṃghika tradition (now extinct), the Sthavira schools (such as Sarvāstivāda, Vibhajyavāda and Pudgalavāda) and the Mahayana schools. Many of these traditions were also studied in other regions, like Central Asia and China, having been brought there by Buddhist missionaries.


title: Philosophy

text: After the disappearance of Buddhism from India, some of these philosophical traditions continued to develop in the Tibetan Buddhist, East Asian Buddhist and Theravada Buddhist traditions.


title: Philosophy

text: East Asian philosophical thought began in Ancient China, and Chinese philosophy begins during the Western Zhou Dynasty and the following periods after its fall when the "Hundred Schools of Thought" flourished (6th century to 221 BCE). This period was characterized by significant intellectual and cultural developments and saw the rise of the major philosophical schools of China such as Confucianism (also known as Ruism), Legalism, and Taoism as well as numerous other less influential schools like Mohism and Naturalism. These philosophical traditions developed metaphysical, political and ethical theories such Tao, Yin and yang, Ren and Li.


title: Philosophy

text: These schools of thought further developed during the Han (206 BCE – 220 CE) and Tang (618–907 CE) eras, forming new philosophical movements like "Xuanxue" (also called "Neo-Taoism"), and Neo-Confucianism. Neo-Confucianism was a syncretic philosophy, which incorporated the ideas of different Chinese philosophical traditions, including Buddhism and Taoism. Neo-Confucianism came to dominate the education system during the Song dynasty (960–1297), and its ideas served as the philosophical basis of the imperial exams for the scholar official class. Some of the most important Neo-Confucian thinkers are the Tang scholars Han Yu and Li Ao as well as the Song thinkers Zhou Dunyi (1017–1073) and Zhu Xi (1130–1200). Zhu Xi compiled the Confucian canon, which consists of the Four Books (the "Great Learning", the "Doctrine of the Mean", the "Analects" of Confucius, and the "Mencius"). The Ming scholar Wang Yangming (1472–1529) is a later but important philosopher of this tradition as well.


title: Philosophy

text: Buddhism began arriving in China during the Han Dynasty, through a gradual Silk road transmission, and through native influences developed distinct Chinese forms (such as Chan/Zen) which spread throughout the East Asian cultural sphere.


title: Philosophy

text: Chinese culture was highly influential on the traditions of other East Asian states, and its philosophy directly influenced Korean philosophy, Vietnamese philosophy and Japanese philosophy. During later Chinese dynasties like the Ming Dynasty (1368–1644), as well as in the Korean Joseon dynasty (1392–1897), a resurgent Neo-Confucianism led by thinkers such as Wang Yangming (1472–1529) became the dominant school of thought and was promoted by the imperial state. In Japan, the Tokugawa shogunate (1603–1867) was also strongly influenced by Confucian philosophy. Confucianism continues to influence the ideas and worldview of the nations of the Chinese cultural sphere today.


title: Philosophy

text: In the Modern era, Chinese thinkers incorporated ideas from Western philosophy. Chinese Marxist philosophy developed under the influence of Mao Zedong, while a Chinese pragmatism developed under Hu Shih. The old traditional philosophies also began to reassert themselves in the 20th century. For example, New Confucianism, led by figures such as Xiong Shili, has become quite influential. Likewise, Humanistic Buddhism is a recent modernist Buddhist movement.


title: Philosophy

text: Modern Japanese thought meanwhile developed under strong Western influences such as the study of Western Sciences (Rangaku) and the modernist Meirokusha intellectual society, which drew from European enlightenment thought and promoted liberal reforms as well as Western philosophies like Liberalism and Utilitarianism. Another trend in modern Japanese philosophy was the "National Studies" (Kokugaku) tradition. This intellectual trend sought to study and promote ancient Japanese thought and culture. Kokugaku thinkers such as Motoori Norinaga sought to return to a pure Japanese tradition which they called Shinto that they saw as untainted by foreign elements.


title: Philosophy

text: During the 20th century, the Kyoto School, an influential and unique Japanese philosophical school, developed from Western phenomenology and Medieval Japanese Buddhist philosophy such as that of Dogen.


title: Philosophy

text: African philosophy is philosophy produced by African people, philosophy that presents African worldviews, ideas and themes, or philosophy that uses distinct African philosophical methods. Modern African thought has been occupied with Ethnophilosophy, that is, defining the very meaning of African philosophy and its unique characteristics and what it means to be African.


title: Philosophy

text: During the 17th century, Ethiopian philosophy developed a robust literary tradition as exemplified by Zera Yacob. Another early African philosopher was Anton Wilhelm Amo (–1759) who became a respected philosopher in Germany. Distinct African philosophical ideas include Ujamaa, the Bantu idea of 'Force', Négritude, Pan-Africanism and Ubuntu. Contemporary African thought has also seen the development of Professional philosophy and of Africana philosophy, the philosophical literature of the African diaspora which includes currents such as black existentialism by African-Americans. Some modern African thinkers have been influenced by Marxism, African-American literature, Critical theory, Critical race theory, Postcolonialism and Feminism.


title: Philosophy

text: Indigenous-American philosophical thought consists of a wide variety of beliefs and traditions among different American cultures. Among some of U.S. Native American communities, there is a belief in a metaphysical principle called the 'Great Spirit' (Siouan: "wakȟáŋ tȟáŋka"; Algonquian: "gitche manitou"). Another widely shared concept was that of "orenda" ('spiritual power'). According to Whiteley (1998), for the Native Americans, "mind is critically informed by transcendental experience (dreams, visions and so on) as well as by reason." The practices to access these transcendental experiences are termed "shamanism". Another feature of the indigenous American worldviews was their extension of ethics to non-human animals and plants.


title: Philosophy

text: In Mesoamerica, Nahua philosophy was an intellectual tradition developed by individuals called "tlamatini" ('those who know something') and its ideas are preserved in various Aztec codices and fragmentary texts. Some of these philosophers are known by name, such as Nezahualcoyotl, Aquiauhtzin, Xayacamach, Tochihuitzin coyolchiuhqui and Cuauhtencoztli. These authors were also poets and some of their work has survived in the original Nahuatl.


title: Philosophy

text: Aztec philosophers developed theories of metaphysics, epistemology, values, and aesthetics. Aztec ethics was focused on seeking "tlamatiliztli" ('knowledge', 'wisdom') which was based on moderation and balance in all actions as in the Nahua proverb "the middle good is necessary". The Nahua worldview posited the concept of an ultimate universal energy or force called "Ōmeteōtl" ('Dual Cosmic Energy') which sought a way to live in balance with a constantly changing, "slippery" world. The theory of "Teotl" can be seen as a form of Pantheism. According to James Maffie, Nahua metaphysics posited that teotl is "a single, vital, dynamic, vivifying, eternally self-generating and self-conceiving as well as self-regenerating and self-reconceiving sacred energy or force". This force was seen as the all-encompassing life force of the universe and as the universe itself.


title: Philosophy

text: The Inca civilization also had an elite class of philosopher-scholars termed the "amawtakuna" or "amautas" who were important in the Inca education system as teachers of philosophy, theology, astronomy, poetry, law, music, morality and history. Young Inca nobles were educated in these disciplines at the state college of Yacha-huasi in Cuzco, where they also learned the art of the quipu. Incan philosophy (as well as the broader category of Andean thought) held that the universe is animated by a single dynamic life force (sometimes termed "camaquen" or "camac", as well as "upani" and "amaya"). This singular force also arises as a set of dual complementary yet opposite forces. These "complementary opposites" are called yanantin and masintin. They are expressed as various polarities or dualities (such as male–female, dark–light, life and death, above and below) which interdependently contribute to the harmonious whole that is the universe through the process of reciprocity and mutual exchange called "ayni". The Inca worldview also included the belief in a creator God (Viracocha) and reincarnation.


title: Philosophy

text: Philosophical questions can be grouped into various branches. These groupings allow philosophers to focus on a set of similar topics and interact with other thinkers who are interested in the same questions.


title: Philosophy

text: These divisions are neither exhaustive nor mutually exclusive. (A philosopher might specialize in Kantian epistemology, or Platonic aesthetics, or modern political philosophy). Furthermore, these philosophical inquiries sometimes overlap with each other and with other inquiries such as science, religion or mathematics.


title: Philosophy

text: Aesthetics is the "critical reflection on art, culture and nature". It addresses the nature of art, beauty and taste, enjoyment, emotional values, perception and the creation and appreciation of beauty. It is more precisely defined as the study of sensory or sensori-emotional values, sometimes called judgments of sentiment and taste. Its major divisions are art theory, literary theory, film theory and music theory. An example from art theory is to discern the set of principles underlying the work of a particular artist or artistic movement such as the Cubist aesthetic.


title: Philosophy

text: Ethics, also known as moral philosophy, studies what constitutes good and bad conduct, right and wrong values, and good and evil. Its primary investigations include exploring how to live a good life and identifying standards of morality. It also includes investigating whether there "is" a best way to live or a universal moral standard, and if so, how we come to learn about it. The main branches of ethics are normative ethics, meta-ethics and applied ethics.


title: Philosophy

text: Epistemology is the branch of philosophy that studies knowledge. Epistemologists examine putative sources of knowledge, including perceptual experience, reason, memory, and testimony. They also investigate questions about the nature of truth, belief, justification, and rationality.


title: Philosophy

text: Philosophical skepticism, which raises doubts about some or all claims to knowledge, has been a topic of interest throughout the history of philosophy. It arose early in Pre-Socratic philosophy and became formalized with Pyrrho, the founder of the earliest Western school of philosophical skepticism. It features prominently in the works of modern philosophers René Descartes and David Hume and has remained a central topic in contemporary epistemological debates.


title: Philosophy

text: One of the most notable epistemological debates is between empiricism and rationalism. Empiricism places emphasis on observational evidence via sensory experience as the source of knowledge. Empiricism is associated with a posteriori knowledge, which is obtained through experience (such as scientific knowledge). Rationalism places emphasis on reason as a source of knowledge. Rationalism is associated with a priori knowledge, which is independent of experience (such as logic and mathematics).


title: Philosophy

text: One central debate in contemporary epistemology is about the conditions required for a belief to constitute knowledge, which might include truth and justification. This debate was largely the result of attempts to solve the Gettier problem. Another common subject of contemporary debates is the regress problem, which occurs when trying to offer proof or justification for any belief, statement, or proposition. The problem is that whatever the source of justification may be, that source must either be without justification (in which case it must be treated as an arbitrary foundation for belief), or it must have some further justification (in which case justification must either be the result of circular reasoning, as in coherentism, or the result of an infinite regress, as in infinitism).


title: Philosophy

text: Metaphysics is the study of the most general features of reality, such as existence, time, objects and their properties, wholes and their parts, events, processes and causation and the relationship between mind and body. Metaphysics includes cosmology, the study of the world in its entirety and ontology, the study of being, along with the philosophy of space and time.


title: Philosophy

text: A major point of debate is between realism, which holds that there are entities that exist independently of their mental perception, and idealism, which holds that reality is mentally constructed or otherwise immaterial. Metaphysics deals with the topic of identity. Essence is the set of attributes that make an object what it fundamentally is and without which it loses its identity, while accident is a property that the object has, without which the object can still retain its identity. Particulars are objects that are said to exist in space and time, as opposed to abstract objects, such as numbers, and universals, which are properties held by multiple particulars, such as redness or a gender. The type of existence, if any, of universals and abstract objects is an issue of debate.


title: Philosophy

text: Deductive reasoning is when, given certain premises, conclusions are unavoidably implied. Rules of inference are used to infer conclusions such as, modus ponens, where given "A” and "If A then B", then "B” must be concluded.


title: Philosophy

text: Because sound reasoning is an essential element of all sciences, social sciences and humanities disciplines, logic became a formal science. Sub-fields include mathematical logic, philosophical logic, modal logic, computational logic and non-classical logics. A major question in the philosophy of mathematics is whether mathematical entities are objective and discovered, called mathematical realism, or invented, called mathematical antirealism.


title: Philosophy

text: Philosophy of language explores the nature, origins, and use of language. Philosophy of mind explores the nature of the mind and its relationship to the body, as typified by disputes between materialism and dualism. In recent years, this branch has become related to cognitive science.


title: Philosophy

text: The philosophy of science explores the foundations, methods, history, implications and purpose of science. Many of its subdivisions correspond to specific branches of science. For example, philosophy of biology deals specifically with the metaphysical, epistemological and ethical issues in the biomedical and life sciences.


title: Philosophy

text: Political philosophy is the study of government and the relationship of individuals (or families and clans) to communities including the state. It includes questions about justice, law, property and the rights and obligations of the citizen. Political philosophy, ethics, and aesthetics are traditionally linked subjects, under the general heading of value theory as they involve a normative or evaluative aspect.


title: Philosophy

text: Philosophy of religion deals with questions that involve religion and religious ideas from a philosophically neutral perspective (as opposed to theology which begins from religious convictions). Traditionally, religious questions were not seen as a separate field from philosophy proper, and the idea of a separate field only arose in the 19th century.


title: Philosophy

text: Issues include the existence of God, the relationship between reason and faith, questions of religious epistemology, the relationship between religion and science, how to interpret religious experiences, questions about the possibility of an afterlife, the problem of religious language and the existence of souls and responses to religious pluralism and diversity.


title: Philosophy

text: Metaphilosophy explores the aims, boundaries and methods of philosophy. It is debated as to whether metaphilosophy is a subject that comes prior to philosophy or whether it is inherently part of philosophy.


title: Philosophy

text: In section thirteen of his "Lives and Opinions of the Eminent Philosophers", the oldest surviving history of philosophy (3rd century), Diogenes Laërtius presents a three-part division of ancient Greek philosophical inquiry:


title: Philosophy

text: In "Against the Logicians" the Pyrrhonist philosopher Sextus Empiricus detailed the variety of ways in which the ancient Greek philosophers had divided philosophy, noting that this three-part division was agreed to by Plato, Aristotle, Xenocrates, and the Stoics. The Academic Skeptic philosopher Cicero also followed this three-part division.


title: Philosophy

text: This division is not obsolete, but has changed: "natural philosophy" has split into the various natural sciences, especially physics, astronomy, chemistry, biology, and cosmology; "moral philosophy" has birthed the social sciences, while still including value theory (e.g. ethics, aesthetics, political philosophy, etc.); and "metaphysical philosophy" has given way to formal sciences such as logic, mathematics and philosophy of science, while still including epistemology, cosmology, etc. For example, Newton's "Mathematical Principles of Natural Philosophy" (1687), since classified as a book of physics, uses the term "natural philosophy" as it was understood at the time, encompassing disciplines such as astronomy, medicine and physics that later became associated with the sciences.


title: Philosophy

text: Methods of philosophy are ways of conducting philosophical inquiry. They include techniques for arriving at philosophical knowledge and justifying philosophical claims as well as principles used for choosing between competing theories. A great variety of methods has been employed throughout the history of philosophy. Many of them differ significantly from the methods used in the natural sciences in that they do not use experimental data obtained through measuring equipment. The choice of one's method usually has important implications both for how philosophical theories are constructed and for the arguments cited for or against them. This choice is often guided by epistemological considerations about what constitutes philosophical evidence, how much support it offers, and how to acquire it. Various disagreements on the level of philosophical theories have their source in methodological disagreements and the discovery of new methods has often had important consequences both for how philosophers conduct their research and for what claims they defend. Some philosophers engage in most of their theorizing using one particular method while others employ a wider range of methods based on which one fits the specific problem investigated best.


title: Philosophy

text: Methodological skepticism is a prominent method of philosophy. It aims to arrive at absolutely certain first principles by using systematic doubt to determine which principles of philosophy are indubitable. The geometrical method tries to build a comprehensive philosophical system based on a small set of such axioms. It does so with the help of deductive reasoning to expand the certainty of its axioms to the system as a whole. Phenomenologists seek certain knowledge about the realm of appearances. They do so by suspending their judgments about the external world in order to focus on how things appear independent of their underlying reality, a technique known as epoché. Conceptual analysis is a well-known method in analytic philosophy. It aims to clarify the meaning of concepts by analyzing them into their fundamental constituents. Another method often employed in analytic philosophy is based on common sense. It starts with commonly accepted beliefs and tries to draw interesting conclusions from them, which it often employs in a negative sense to criticize philosophical theories that are too far removed from how the average person sees the issue. It is very similar to how ordinary language philosophy tackles philosophical questions by investigating how ordinary language is used.


title: Philosophy

text: Various methods in philosophy give particular importance to intuitions, i.e. non-inferential impressions about the correctness of specific claims or general principles. For example, they play an important role in thought experiments, which employ counterfactual thinking to evaluate the possible consequences of an imagined situation. These anticipated consequences can then be used to confirm or refute philosophical theories. The method of reflective equilibrium also employs intuitions. It seeks to form a coherent position on a certain issue by examining all the relevant beliefs and intuitions, some of which often have to be deemphasized or reformulated in order to arrive at a coherent perspective. Pragmatists stress the significance of concrete practical consequences for assessing whether a philosophical theory is true or false. Experimental philosophy is of rather recent origin. Its methods differ from most other methods of philosophy in that it tries to answer philosophical questions by gathering empirical data in ways similar to social psychology and the cognitive sciences.


title: Philosophy

text: Many philosophical debates that began in ancient times are still debated today. British philosopher Colin McGinn claims that no philosophical progress has occurred during that interval. Australian philosopher David Chalmers, by contrast, sees progress in philosophy similar to that in science. Meanwhile, Talbot Brewer, professor of philosophy at University of Virginia, argues that "progress" is the wrong standard by which to judge philosophical activity.


title: Philosophy

text: Some of those who study philosophy become professional philosophers, typically by working as professors who teach, research and write in academic institutions. However, most students of academic philosophy later contribute to law, journalism, religion, sciences, politics, business, or various arts. For example, public figures who have degrees in philosophy include comedians Steve Martin and Ricky Gervais, filmmaker Terrence Malick, Pope John Paul II, Wikipedia co-founder Larry Sanger, technology entrepreneur Peter Thiel, U.S. Supreme Court Justice Stephen Breyer, "Jeopardy!" host Alex Trebek, and US vice presidential candidate Carly Fiorina. Curtis White has argued that philosophical tools are essential to humanities, sciences and social sciences.


title: Philosophy

text: Recent efforts to avail the general public to the work and relevance of philosophers include the million-dollar Berggruen Prize, first awarded to Charles Taylor in 2016. Some philosophers argue that this professionalization has negatively affected the discipline.


title: Philosophy

text: Although men have generally dominated philosophical discourse, women philosophers have engaged in the discipline throughout history. The list of female philosophers throughout history is vast.Ancient examples include Hipparchia of Maroneia (active ) and Arete of Cyrene (active 5th–4th centuries BCE). Some women philosophers were accepted during the medieval and modern eras, but none became part of the Western canon until the 20th and 21st century, when many suggest that G.E.M. Anscombe, Hannah Arendt, Bell Hooks, Simone de Beauvoir, Simone Weil and Susanne Langer entered the canon.<section end="women-in-philosophy-intro" />


title: Philosophy

text: In the early 1800s, some colleges and universities in the UK and the US began admitting women, producing more female academics. Nevertheless, U.S. Department of Education reports from the 1990s indicate that few women ended up in philosophy and that philosophy is one of the least gender-proportionate fields in the humanities, with women making up somewhere between 17% and 30% of philosophy faculty according to some studies.