The categories of ideal and material are used in various sciences, not only in philosophy. However, materialism and idealism in philosophy is the main issue. The correlation of these two philosophical categories is a complex issue, around which disputes do not cease.
The concepts of materialism and idealism in philosophy have always been. Leibniz G.V., a representative of German philosophy, wrote that Epicurus was the largest materialist, and Plato was the idealist.
The problem of the ideal in philosophy as a material has excited scientists since the beginning of time.
Changing and updating, the views on materialism and idealism in philosophy do not have a static state.
In the classical sciences, it was traditional to attribute the material to everything natural, that is, the material, and the ideal to the spiritual, inner world of a person, his consciousness.
Modern science believes that this distribution is quite limited, because the ideal and the material are two natural principles.
However, the classical definition known to us today was introduced by Schlegel F., a representative of 19th century German classical philosophy .
Materialism and idealism in philosophy are not identical in their manifestations, on the basis of this we can distinguish their various forms.
Forms of Materialism
Materialism of Ancient Greece and the Ancient East , in which the objects of the material world, nature were considered on their own, independent of consciousness, is the so-called initial form of materialism. Representatives of this philosophy include Democritus, Thales, Heraclitus and others
Mechanistic (metaphysical) materialism , which became widespread in Europe in modern times. At this time, materialism begins to be considered from the point of view of nature. And all the materialism of this time comes down to the mechanical movement of the forms of matter. Representatives of this time Galileo, J. Locke, Bacon and others.
Forms of idealism
Like materialism, idealism has several forms, of which two main ones can be distinguished.
Objective idealism asserts that spirit, idea, God in no way depend either on matter or on human consciousness. The philosophers who thought so were Plato, Hegel, and also F. Aquinas.
Subjective idealism adheres to the point of view that everything depends on the consciousness of a person, that is, it looks the way a person sees it. A prominent representative of this area is J. Berkeley.
The most extreme point of this direction is reflected in solipsism (from Latin solus - one, only ipse - itself). Philosophers of this direction believe that it is only possible to assert confidently about reliability, about your "I" and your emotions.
Forms of Materialism
Materialism of Ancient Greece and the Ancient East, in which the objects of the material world, nature were considered on their own, independent of consciousness, is the so-called initial form of materialism. Representatives of this philosophy include Democritus, Thales, Heraclitus and others
Mechanistic (metaphysical) materialism, which became widespread in Europe in modern times. At this time, materialism begins to be considered from the point of view of nature. And all the materialism of this time comes down to the mechanical movement of the forms of matter. Representatives of this time Galileo, J. Locke, Bacon and others.
Dialectical materialism in philosophy, created by K. Marx and F. Engels, who relied on Hegel's philosophy. They believed that the most important thing in Hegel’s philosophy was the assertion that the thinking and activity of people does not have any final character. And also the assertion that truth is not some kind of dogma, but a process of the historical path in the development of knowledge.
For the philosophy of dialectical materialism there is nothing settled and permanent. The seal of annihilation and birth lies in everything, in a constant and continuous movement from the bottom up, from the lowest to the highest.
Dialectical materialism took Hegel’s philosophy category as the basis, but completely rethought and changed the essence. If Hegelian philosophy spoke of the development of the Absolute Spirit, then dialectical materialism speaks of various processes that take place in the material and spiritual world. And the idea was understood not as a demiurge like Hegel, but as a reflection of being and the world around us by man.