Arthur Oncken Lovejoy (October 10, 1873 – December 30, 1962) was an American

philosopher A philosopher is a person who practices or investigates philosophy. The term ''philosopher'' comes from the grc, φιλόσοφος, , translit=philosophos, meaning 'lover of wisdom'. The coining of the term has been attributed to the Greek th ...

and

intellectual historian Intellectual history (also the history of ideas) is the study of the history of human thought and of intellectuals, people who conceptualize, discuss, write about, and concern themselves with ideas. The investigative premise of intellectual histo ...

, who founded the discipline known as the

history of ideas Intellectual history (also the history of ideas) is the study of the history of human thought and of intellectuals, people who conceptualize, discuss, write about, and concern themselves with ideas. The investigative premise of intellectual histor ...

with his book ''The Great Chain of Being'' (1936), on the topic of that name, which is regarded as 'probably the single most influential work in the history of ideas in the United States during the last half century'.Simo Knuuttila (ed.
''Reforging the Great Chain of Being: Studies of the History of Modal Theories,''
Springer Science & Business Media, 2013 p.3

Biography

Lovejoy was born in Berlin, Germany, while his father was doing medical research there. Eighteen months later, his mother, a daughter of

Johann Gerhard Oncken Johann Gerhard Oncken (26 January 1800 - 2 January 1884) was a pioneer German Baptist preacher, variously referred to as the "Father of Continental Baptists", the "Father of German Baptists" and the "Apostle of European Baptists". Oncken, Gottfri ...

, committed suicide, whereupon his father gave up medicine and became a clergyman. Lovejoy studied

philosophy 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 s ...

, first at the University of California at Berkeley, then at

Harvard Harvard University is a private Ivy League research university in Cambridge, Massachusetts. Founded in 1636 as Harvard College and named for its first benefactor, the Puritan clergyman John Harvard, it is the oldest institution of higher l ...

under

William James William James (January 11, 1842 – August 26, 1910) was an American philosopher, historian, and psychologist, and the first educator to offer a psychology course in the United States. James is considered to be a leading thinker of the la ...

and

Josiah Royce Josiah Royce (; November 20, 1855 – September 14, 1916) was an American objective idealist philosopher and the founder of American idealism. His philosophical ideas included his version of personalism, defense of absolutism, idealism and his ...

. He did not earn a Ph.D. In 1901, he resigned from his first job, at

Stanford University Stanford University, officially Leland Stanford Junior University, is a private research university in Stanford, California. The campus occupies , among the largest in the United States, and enrolls over 17,000 students. Stanford is considere ...

, to protest the dismissal of a colleague who had offended a trustee. The President of Harvard then vetoed hiring Lovejoy on the grounds that he was a known troublemaker. Over the subsequent decade, he taught at

Washington University Washington University in St. Louis (WashU or WUSTL) is a Private university, private research university with its Danforth Campus, main campus in St. Louis County, Missouri, St. Louis County, and Clayton, Missouri. Founded in 1853, the universi ...

, Columbia University, and the

University of Missouri The University of Missouri (Mizzou, MU, or Missouri) is a public university, public Land-grant university, land-grant research university in Columbia, Missouri. It is Missouri's largest university and the flagship of the four-campus Universit ...

. He never married. As a professor of philosophy at

Johns Hopkins University Johns Hopkins University (Johns Hopkins, Hopkins, or JHU) is a private research university in Baltimore, Maryland. Founded in 1876, Johns Hopkins is the oldest research university in the United States and in the western hemisphere. It consiste ...

from 1910 to 1938, Lovejoy founded and long presided over that university's History of Ideas Club, where many prominent and budding intellectual and social historians, as well as

literary critic Literary criticism (or literary studies) is the study, evaluation, and interpretation of literature. Modern literary criticism is often influenced by literary theory, which is the philosophical discussion of literature's goals and methods. Th ...

s, gathered. In 1940 he co-founded the ''

Journal of the History of Ideas The ''Journal of the History of Ideas'' is a quarterly peer-reviewed academic journal covering intellectual history and the history of ideas, including the histories of philosophy, literature and the arts, natural and social sciences, religion, an ...

'' with Philip P. Wiener. Lovejoy insisted that the history of ideas should focus on "unit ideas," single concepts (namely simple concepts sharing an abstract name with other concepts that were to be conceptually distinguished). Abstract nouns like 'pragmatism' 'idealism', 'rationalism' and the like were, in Lovejoy's view, constituted by distinct, analytically separate ideas, which the historian of the genealogy of ideas had to thresh out, and show how the basic unit ideas combine and recombine with each other over time. The idea has, according to Simo Knuuttila, exercised a greater attraction on literary critics than on philosophers. Lovejoy was an opponent of Albert Einstein's

theory of relativity The theory of relativity usually encompasses two interrelated theories by Albert Einstein: special relativity and general relativity, proposed and published in 1905 and 1915, respectively. Special relativity applies to all physical phenomena in ...

. In 1930, he published a paper criticizing Einstein's relativistic concept of

simultaneity Simultaneity may refer to: * Relativity of simultaneity, a concept in special relativity. * Simultaneity (music) In music, a simultaneity is more than one complete musical texture occurring at the same time, rather than in succession. This first ...

as arbitrary. Lovejoy was active in the public arena. He helped found the

American Association of University Professors The American Association of University Professors (AAUP) is an organization of professors and other academics in the United States. AAUP membership includes over 500 local campus chapters and 39 state organizations. The AAUP's stated mission is ...

and the

Maryland Maryland ( ) is a state in the Mid-Atlantic region of the United States. It shares borders with Virginia, West Virginia, and the District of Columbia to its south and west; Pennsylvania to its north; and Delaware and the Atlantic Ocean to it ...

chapter of the

American Civil Liberties Union The American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU) is a nonprofit organization founded in 1920 "to defend and preserve the individual rights and liberties guaranteed to every person in this country by the Constitution and laws of the United States". ...

. However, he qualified his belief in

civil liberties Civil liberties are guarantees and freedoms that governments commit not to abridge, either by constitution, legislation, or judicial interpretation, without due process. Though the scope of the term differs between countries, civil liberties may ...

to exclude what he considered threats to a free system. Thus, at the height of the

McCarthy Era McCarthyism is the practice of making false or unfounded accusations of subversion and treason, especially when related to anarchism, communism and socialism, and especially when done in a public and attention-grabbing manner. The term origina ...

(in the February 14, 1952, edition of the ''Journal of Philosophy'') Lovejoy stated that, since it was a "matter of empirical fact" that membership in the

Communist Party A communist party is a political party that seeks to realize the socio-economic goals of communism. The term ''communist party'' was popularized by the title of '' The Manifesto of the Communist Party'' (1848) by Karl Marx and Friedrich Engels. ...

contributed "to the triumph of a world-wide organization" which was opposed to "freedom of inquiry, of opinion and of teaching," membership in the party constituted grounds for dismissal from academic positions. He also published numerous opinion pieces in the Baltimore press. He died in

Baltimore Baltimore ( , locally: or ) is the most populous city in the U.S. state of Maryland, fourth most populous city in the Mid-Atlantic, and the 30th most populous city in the United States with a population of 585,708 in 2020. Baltimore was ...

on December 30, 1962.

Scholarship

In the domain of

epistemology Epistemology (; ), or the theory of knowledge, is the branch of philosophy concerned with knowledge. Epistemology is considered a major subfield of philosophy, along with other major subfields such as ethics, logic, and metaphysics. Episte ...

, Lovejoy is remembered for an influential critique of the pragmatic movement, especially in the essay "The Thirteen Pragmatisms", written in 1908. William F. Bynum, looking back at Lovejoy's ''Great Chain of Being'' after 40 years, describes it as "a familiar feature of the intellectual landscape", indicating its great influence and "brisk" ongoing sales. Bynum argues that much more research is needed into how the concept of the great chain of being was replaced, but he agrees that Lovejoy was right that the crucial period was the end of the 18th century when "the Enlightenment's chain of being was dismantled".William F. Bynum
"The Great Chain of Being after Forty Years: An Appraisal"
''History of Science'' 13 (1975): 1-28

Books

*
Primitivism and Related Ideas in Antiquity
'' (1935). (with George Boas). Johns Hopkins U. Press. 1997 edition: * ''The Great Chain of Being: A Study of the History of an Idea'' (1936). Harvard University Press. Reprinted by Harper & Row, , 2005 paperback: . * ''Essays in the History of Ideas'' (1948). Johns Hopkins U. Press.
''The Revolt Against Dualism''
(1960). Open Court Publishing. * ''The Reason, the Understanding, and Time'' (1961). Johns Hopkins U. Press. * ''Reflections on Human Nature'' (1961). Johns Hopkins U. Press. * ''The Thirteen Pragmatisms and Other Essays'' (1963). Johns Hopkins U. Press.

Articles

"The Entangling Alliance of Religion and History,"
''The Hibbert Journal,'' Vol. V, October 1906/ July 1907.
"The Desires of the Self-Conscious,"
''The Journal of Philosophy, Psychology and Scientific Methods,'' Vol. 4, No. 2, Jan. 17, 1907.
"The Place of Linnaeus in the History of Science,"
''The Popular Science Monthly,'' Vol. LXXI, 1907.
"The Origins of Ethical Inwardness in Jewish Thought,"
''The American Journal of Theology,'' Vol. XI, 1907.
"Kant and the English Platonists."
In ''Essays, Philosophical and Psychological,'' Longmans, Green & Co., 1908.
"Pragmatism and Theology,"
''The American Journal of Theology,'' Vol. XII, 1908.
"The Theory of a Pre-Christian Cult of Jesus,"
''The Monist,'' Vol. XVIII, No. 4, October 1908.
"The Thirteen Pragmatisms,"
''The Journal of Philosophy, Psychology, and Scientific Methods,'' Vol. V, January/December, 1908.
"The Argument for Organic Evolution Before the 'Origin of Species',"Part II
''Popular Science Monthly,'' Vol. LXXV, July/December, 1909.
"Schopenhauer as an Evolutionist,"
''The Monist,'' Vol. XXI, 1911.
"Kant and Evolution,"
''Popular Science Monthly,'' Vol. LXXVII, 1910
Part II
''Popular Science Monthly,'' Vol. LXXVIII, 1911.
"The Problem of Time in Recent French Philosophy,"Part IIPart III
''The Philosophical Review,'' Vol. XXI, 1912.
"Relativity, Reality, and Contradiction"
''The Journal of Philosophy, Psychology and Scientific Methods'', 1914.
"Pragmatism Versus the Pragmatist."
In: ''Essays in Critical Realism.'' London: Macmillan & Co., 1920. * "Professional Ethics and Social Progress," ''The North American Review,'' March 1924.
"The Dialectical Argument Against Absolute Simultaneity"
''The Journal of Philosophy'', 1930. * "Plans for the Future," ''Free World,'' November 1943.

Miscellany

"Leibnitz, Gottfried Wilhelm, Freiherr Von,"
''A Cyclopedia of Education,'' ed. by Paul Monroe, The Macmillan Company, 1911.
"The Unity of Science,"
''The University of Missouri Bulletin: Science Series,'' Vol. I, N°. 1, January 1912.
''Bergson & Romantic Evolutionism; Two Lectures Delivered Before the Union, September 5 & 12, 1913,''
University of California Press, 1914.

References

External links

Works by Arthur O. Lovejoy
at

JSTOR JSTOR (; short for ''Journal Storage'') is a digital library founded in 1995 in New York City. Originally containing digitized back issues of academic journals, it now encompasses books and other primary sources as well as current issues of j ...

.
''Dictionary of the History of Ideas'' article
on the Great Chain of Being.

Includes a short biography. * Dale Keiger

''"The Chinese Origin of Romanticism"''
in: ''Essays in the History of Ideas'', Johns Hopkins University Press, 1948. * {{DEFAULTSORT:Lovejoy, Arthur 1873 births 1962 deaths American historians American literary critics German emigrants to the United States People from Berlin Harvard University alumni University of California, Berkeley alumni People from the Province of Brandenburg Philosophers of time University of Missouri faculty Washington University in St. Louis faculty American Civil Liberties Union people Presidents of the American Association of University Professors Relativity critics