The documented history of philosophy is often said to begin with the notable death of
Socrates
Socrates (; ; –399 BC) was a Greek philosopher from Athens who is credited as the founder of Western philosophy and among the first moral philosophers of the ethical tradition of thought. An enigmatic figure, Socrates authored no te ...
. Since that time, there have been many other noteworthy deaths of philosophers.
List
*475 BCE -
Neanthes of Cyzicus Neanthes of Cyzicus (; el, Νεάνθης ὁ Κυζικηνός) was a Greek historian and rhetorician of Cyzicus in Anatolia living in the fourth and third centuries BC.
Biography
Neanthes was a pupil of Philiscus of Miletus ("who is reasonably ...
reported that
Heraclitus
Heraclitus of Ephesus (; grc-gre, Ἡράκλειτος , "Glory of Hera"; ) was an ancient Greek pre-Socratic philosopher from the city of Ephesus, which was then part of the Persian Empire.
Little is known of Heraclitus's life. He wrot ...
died covered in dung after failing to cure himself of dropsy.
*458 BCE –
Zeno of Elea
Zeno of Elea (; grc, Ζήνων ὁ Ἐλεᾱ́της; ) was a pre-Socratic Greek philosopher of Magna Graecia and a member of the Eleatic School founded by Parmenides. Aristotle called him the inventor of the dialectic. He is best known ...
, according to Valerius Maximus, was tortured and killed by the tyrant Nearchus, after biting off the tyrant's ear.
*435 BCE – According to legend,
Empedocles
Empedocles (; grc-gre, Ἐμπεδοκλῆς; , 444–443 BC) was a Greek pre-Socratic philosopher and a native citizen of Akragas, a Greek city in Sicily. Empedocles' philosophy is best known for originating the cosmogonic theory of the ...
leapt to his death into the crater of
Etna.
*420 BCE – According to some reports,
Protagoras died in a shipwreck.
*399 BCE –
Socrates
Socrates (; ; –399 BC) was a Greek philosopher from Athens who is credited as the founder of Western philosophy and among the first moral philosophers of the ethical tradition of thought. An enigmatic figure, Socrates authored no te ...
, condemned to death for corrupting the young, drank hemlock amongst his friends as described in Plato’s ''
Phaedo
''Phædo'' or ''Phaedo'' (; el, Φαίδων, ''Phaidōn'' ), also known to ancient readers as ''On The Soul'', is one of the best-known dialogues of Plato's middle period, along with the '' Republic'' and the '' Symposium.'' The philosophica ...
''.
*348 BCE –
Plato
Plato ( ; grc-gre, Πλάτων ; 428/427 or 424/423 – 348/347 BC) was a Greek philosopher born in Athens during the Classical period in Ancient Greece. He founded the Platonist school of thought and the Academy, the first institution ...
either died while being serenaded by a Thracian flute-playing girl, at a wedding feast, or in his sleep.
*338 BCE – According to legend,
Isocrates starved himself to death.
*323 BCE – Accounts differ regarding the death of
Diogenes of Sinope
Diogenes ( ; grc, Διογένης, Diogénēs ), also known as Diogenes the Cynic (, ) or Diogenes of Sinope, was a Greek philosopher and one of the founders of Cynicism (philosophy). He was born in Sinope, an Ionian colony on the Black Sea ...
. He is alleged to have died from eating raw octopus, from being bitten by a dog, and from holding his breath. He left instructions for his corpse to be left outside the city walls as a feast for the animals and birds.
*320 BCE – Ancient sources state that Nicocreon the tyrant had
Anaxarchus
Anaxarchus (; grc, Ἀνάξαρχος; ) was a Greek philosopher of the school of Democritus. Together with Pyrrho, he accompanied Alexander the Great into Asia. The reports of his philosophical views suggest that he was a forerunner of Pyrrh ...
pounded to death in a mortar with iron pestles; Anaxarchus is said to have made light of the punishment.
*314 BCE –
Xenocrates
Xenocrates (; el, Ξενοκράτης; c. 396/5314/3 BC) of Chalcedon was a Greek philosopher, mathematician, and leader ( scholarch) of the Platonic Academy from 339/8 to 314/3 BC. His teachings followed those of Plato, which he attempted t ...
died when he hit his head after tripping over a bronze pot.
*270 BCE –
Epicurus died of kidney stones.
*262 BCE –
Zeno of Citium
Zeno of Citium (; grc-x-koine, Ζήνων ὁ Κιτιεύς, ; c. 334 – c. 262 BC) was a Hellenistic philosopher from Citium (, ), Cyprus. Zeno was the founder of the Stoic school of philosophy, which he taught in Athens from about 300 B ...
founder of the
Stoic
Stoic may refer to:
* An adherent of Stoicism; one whose moral quality is associated with that school of philosophy
* STOIC, a programming language
* ''Stoic'' (film), a 2009 film by Uwe Boll
* ''Stoic'' (mixtape), a 2012 mixtape by rapper T-Pain
* ...
philosophical school tripped and broke his toe and then died from holding his breath.
*212 BCE –
Archimedes killed during the
Siege of Syracuse by a
Roman
Roman or Romans most often refers to:
*Rome, the capital city of Italy
*Ancient Rome, Roman civilization from 8th century BC to 5th century AD
*Roman people, the people of ancient Rome
*'' Epistle to the Romans'', shortened to ''Romans'', a lette ...
soldier despite orders that he should not be harmed.
*207 BCE –
Chrysippus is said to have died from laughter after giving wine to his donkey and seeing it attempt to eat figs.
*52 BCE –
Lucretius
Titus Lucretius Carus ( , ; – ) was a Roman poet and philosopher. His only known work is the philosophical poem ''De rerum natura'', a didactic work about the tenets and philosophy of Epicureanism, and which usually is translated into En ...
is alleged to have killed himself after being driven mad by taking a love potion. (Debated).
*43 BCE –
Cicero
Marcus Tullius Cicero ( ; ; 3 January 106 BC – 7 December 43 BC) was a Roman statesman, lawyer, scholar, philosopher, and academic skeptic, who tried to uphold optimate principles during the political crises that led to the esta ...
while leaving his villa in Formiae was beheaded by two killers, allegedly sent by Marcus Antonius.
*65 CE –
Seneca
Seneca may refer to:
People and language
* Seneca (name), a list of people with either the given name or surname
* Seneca people, one of the six Iroquois tribes of North America
** Seneca language, the language of the Seneca people
Places Extrat ...
was forced to commit suicide after falling out with Emperor Nero.
*415 –
Hypatia
Hypatia, Koine pronunciation (born 350–370; died 415 AD) was a neoplatonist philosopher, astronomer, and mathematician, who lived in Alexandria, Egypt, then part of the Eastern Roman Empire. She was a prominent thinker in Alexandria where ...
was
lynched
Lynching is an extrajudicial killing by a group. It is most often used to characterize informal public executions by a mob in order to punish an alleged transgressor, punish a convicted transgressor, or intimidate people. It can also be an ex ...
by a mob of Christians.
*430 –
Saint Augustine
Augustine of Hippo ( , ; la, Aurelius Augustinus Hipponensis; 13 November 354 – 28 August 430), also known as Saint Augustine, was a theologian and philosopher of Berber origin and the bishop of Hippo Regius in Numidia, Roman North Afr ...
died in Hippo while the city was under siege by the
Vandals
The Vandals were a Germanic people who first inhabited what is now southern Poland. They established Vandal kingdoms on the Iberian Peninsula, Mediterranean islands, and North Africa in the fifth century.
The Vandals migrated to the area betw ...
.
*526 –
Boethius
Anicius Manlius Severinus Boethius, commonly known as Boethius (; Latin: ''Boetius''; 480 – 524 AD), was a Roman senator, consul, ''magister officiorum'', historian, and philosopher of the Early Middle Ages. He was a central figure in the tr ...
was strangled on the orders of the Ostrogoth king Theodoric by whom he was employed.
*1141 –
Judah Halevi
Judah Halevi (also Yehuda Halevi or ha-Levi; he, יהודה הלוי and Judah ben Shmuel Halevi ; ar, يهوذا اللاوي ''Yahuḏa al-Lāwī''; 1075 – 1141) was a Spanish Jewish physician, poet and philosopher. He was born in Spain, ...
was killed on a pilgrimage to Jerusalem.
*1180 –
Abraham ibn Daud
Abraham ibn Daud ( he, אַבְרָהָם בֵּן דָּוִד הַלֵּוִי אִבְּן דָּאוּד; ar, ابراهيم بن داود) was a Spanish-Jewish astronomer, historian, and philosopher; born at Córdoba, Spain about 1110; die ...
was martyred.
*1277 –
Pope John XXI
Pope John XXI ( la, Ioannes XXI; – 20 May 1277), born Pedro Julião ( la, Petrus Iulianus), was head of the Catholic Church and ruler of the Papal States from 8 September 1276 to his death on 20 May 1277. Apart from Damasus I (from ...
(usually identified with the logician
Peter of Spain
__NOTOC__
Peter of Hispania ( la, Petrus Hispanus; Portuguese and es, Pedro Hispano; century) was the author of the ', later known as the ', an important medieval university textbook on Aristotelian logic. As the Latin ''Hispania'' was consider ...
) was killed by the collapse of a roof.
*1284 –
Siger of Brabant
Siger of Brabant (''Sigerus'', ''Sighier'', ''Sigieri'' or ''Sygerius de Brabantia''; c. 1240 – before 10 November 1284) was a 13th-century philosopher from the southern Low Countries who was an important proponent of Averroism.
Life ...
was stabbed to death by his clerk.
*1415 –
Jan Hus
Jan Hus (; ; 1370 – 6 July 1415), sometimes anglicized as John Hus or John Huss, and referred to in historical texts as ''Iohannes Hus'' or ''Johannes Huss'', was a Czech theologian and philosopher who became a Church reformer and the insp ...
was executed at the Council of Constance.
*1487 –
John Argyropoulos
John Argyropoulos (/ˈd͡ʒɑn ˌɑɹd͡ʒɪˈɹɑ.pə.ləs/ el, Ἰωάννης Ἀργυρόπουλος ''Ioannis Argyropoulos''; it, Giovanni Argiropulo; surname also spelt ''Argyropulus'', or ''Argyropulos'', or ''Argyropulo''; c. 1415 – 2 ...
supposedly died of consuming too much
watermelon
Watermelon (''Citrullus lanatus'') is a flowering plant species of the Cucurbitaceae family and the name of its edible fruit. A scrambling and trailing vine-like plant, it is a highly cultivated fruit worldwide, with more than 1,000 varie ...
.
*1535 –
Thomas More
Sir Thomas More (7 February 1478 – 6 July 1535), venerated in the Catholic Church as Saint Thomas More, was an English lawyer, judge, social philosopher, author, statesman, and noted Renaissance humanist. He also served Henry VIII as Lord ...
was executed by beheading in 1535 after he had fallen out of favour with King Henry VIII.
*1572 –
Girolamo Maggi Girolamo Maggi (1523, in Anghiari – 27 March 1572 in Constantinople), also known by his Latinization of names, Latin name Hieronymus Magius, was an Italian scholar, jurist, poet, military engineer, urban planning, urban planner, philology, phi ...
was executed by strangulation on the orders of a prison captain in Constantinople; Maggi had been incarcerated after being arrested during the Turkish siege of Famagusta.
*1572 –
Peter Ramus
Petrus Ramus (french: Pierre de La Ramée; Anglicized as Peter Ramus ; 1515 – 26 August 1572) was a French humanist, logician, and educational reformer. A Protestant convert, he was a victim of the St. Bartholomew's Day massacre.
Early life
...
was killed in the St. Bartholomew’s Day Massacre.
*1600 –
Giordano Bruno was burnt by the Inquisition.
*1619 –
Lucilio Vanini
Lucilio Vanini (15859 February 1619), who, in his works, styled himself Giulio Cesare Vanini, was an Italian philosopher, physician and free-thinker, who was one of the first significant representatives of intellectual libertinism. He was amon ...
was also burnt by the Inquisition.
*1626 –
Francis Bacon
Francis Bacon, 1st Viscount St Alban (; 22 January 1561 – 9 April 1626), also known as Lord Verulam, was an English philosopher and statesman who served as Attorney General and Lord Chancellor of England. Bacon led the advancement of both ...
died of pneumonia, contracted while stuffing snow into a chicken as an experiment in refrigeration.
*1640 –
Uriel da Costa, after being beaten and trampled by a religious group he had offended, went home and shot himself.
*1650 –
René Descartes
René Descartes ( or ; ; Latinized: Renatus Cartesius; 31 March 1596 – 11 February 1650) was a French philosopher, scientist, and mathematician, widely considered a seminal figure in the emergence of modern philosophy and science. Ma ...
was killed by a cold acquired through his rising early to instruct Queen Christina of Sweden.
*1677 –
Baruch Spinoza died of a pulmonary ailment, thought to be either tuberculosis or silicosis, brought on by inhaling glass dust while working as a lens grinder.
*1683 –
Algernon Sidney
Algernon Sidney or Sydney (15 January 1623 – 7 December 1683) was an English politician, republican political theorist and colonel. A member of the middle part of the Long Parliament and commissioner of the trial of King Charles I of Englan ...
was executed for treason.
*1716 –
Gottfried Wilhelm Leibniz
Gottfried Wilhelm (von) Leibniz . ( – 14 November 1716) was a German polymath active as a mathematician, philosopher, scientist and diplomat. He is one of the most prominent figures in both the history of philosophy and the history of math ...
died in Hanover on 14 November 1716 after a prolonged case of arthritis and gout. The only one to attend his funeral was his secretary,
Johann Georg von Eckhart
Johann Georg von Eckhart (7 September 1664 – 9 February 1730) was a German historian and linguist.
Biography
Eckhart was born at Duingen in the Principality of Calenberg. After preparatory training at Schulpforta, he went to Leipzig, where a ...
.
*1794 – The
Marquis de Condorcet died in prison.
*1814 –
Johann Gottlieb Fichte died of typhus in Berlin, during the campaign against Napoleon.
*1831 –
Georg Wilhelm Friedrich Hegel
Georg Wilhelm Friedrich Hegel (; ; 27 August 1770 – 14 November 1831) was a German philosopher. He is one of the most important figures in German idealism and one of the founding figures of modern Western philosophy. His influence extends ...
died of a gastrointestinal disease during a cholera outbreak in Berlin.
*1837 –
Giacomo Leopardi
Count Giacomo Taldegardo Francesco di Sales Saverio Pietro Leopardi (, ; 29 June 1798 – 14 June 1837) was an Italian philosopher, poet, essayist, and philologist. He is considered the greatest Italian poet of the nineteenth century and one of ...
died in Naples during a cholera epidemic, maybe by pulmonary edema.
*1864 –
Ferdinand Lassalle died in a duel.
*1866 –
William Whewell
William Whewell ( ; 24 May 17946 March 1866) was an English polymath, scientist, Anglican priest, philosopher, theologian, and historian of science. He was Master of Trinity College, Cambridge. In his time as a student there, he achieved ...
was thrown from his horse and sustained fatal injuries.
*1876 –
Philipp Mainländer
Philipp Mainländer (5 October 1841 – 1 April 1876) was a German philosopher and poet. Born Philipp Batz, he later changed his name to "Mainländer" in homage to his hometown, Offenbach am Main.
In his central work (''The Philosophy of Re ...
hanged himself in his residence in Offenbach
*1882 –
William Jevons
William Stanley Jevons (; 1 September 183513 August 1882) was an English economist and logician.
Irving Fisher described Jevons's book ''A General Mathematical Theory of Political Economy'' (1862) as the start of the mathematical method in eco ...
was drowned while bathing.
*1900 –
Friedrich Nietzsche
Friedrich Wilhelm Nietzsche (; or ; 15 October 1844 – 25 August 1900) was a German philosopher, prose poet, cultural critic, philologist, and composer whose work has exerted a profound influence on contemporary philosophy. He began his ...
died after a mental breakdown.
*1901 –
Paul Rée fell to his death from a mountain.
*1903 –
Otto Weininger
Otto Weininger (; 3 April 1880 – 4 October 1903) was an Austrian philosopher who lived in the Austro-Hungarian Empire. In 1903, he published the book ''Geschlecht und Charakter'' (''Sex and Character''), which gained popularity after his suici ...
committed suicide by shooting himself.
*1906 –
Ludwig Boltzmann
Ludwig Eduard Boltzmann (; 20 February 1844 – 5 September 1906) was an Austrian physicist and philosopher. His greatest achievements were the development of statistical mechanics, and the statistical explanation of the second law of ther ...
hanged himself.
*1910 –
Carlo Michelstaedter killed himself with a pistol he had in his house.
*1911 –
Paul Lafargue
Paul Lafargue (; 15 January 1842 – 25 November 1911) was a Cuban- Haitian revolutionary Marxist socialist, political writer, economist, journalist, literary critic, and activist; he was Karl Marx's son-in-law having married his second dau ...
died with his wife, Laura Marx, in a suicide pact.
*1915 –
Emil Lask
Emil Lask (25 September 1875 – 26 May 1915) was a German philosopher. A student of Heinrich Rickert at Freiburg University, he was a member of the Southwestern school of neo-Kantianism.
Biography
Lask was born in Austrian Galicia, as a son ...
was killed in action as soldier in World War I.
*1916 –
J. Howard Moore
John Howard Moore (December 4, 1862 – June 17, 1916) was an American zoologist, philosopher, educator, humanitarian and socialist. He is considered to be an early, yet neglected, proponent of animal rights and ethical vegetarianism, and was a ...
shot himself in Jackson Park, Chicago.
*1917 –
Adolf Reinach
Adolf Bernhard Philipp Reinach (23 December 1883 – 16 November 1917) was a German philosopher, phenomenologist (from the Munich phenomenology school) and law theorist.
Life and work
Adolf Reinach was born into a prominent Jewish family in ...
fell outside Diksmuide in Flanders during World War I.
*1919 –
Rosa Luxemburg was murdered by the Freikorps.
*1924 –
Vladimir Lenin
Vladimir Ilyich Ulyanov. ( 1870 – 21 January 1924), better known as Vladimir Lenin,. was a Russian revolutionary, politician, and political theorist. He served as the first and founding head of government of Soviet Russia from 1917 to 1 ...
died of a brain hemorrhage.
*1928 –
Alexander Bogdanov died as a result of one of his experiments in blood transfusion.
*1930 –
Frank P. Ramsey
Frank Plumpton Ramsey (; 22 February 1903 – 19 January 1930) was a British philosopher, mathematician, and economist who made major contributions to all three fields before his death at the age of 26. He was a close friend of Ludwig Wittgenste ...
died after "contracting
jaundice" at the age of 26. (Jaundice by itself is not a cause of death but instead indicates hemolytic or hepatic disease.)
*1931 –
Jacques Herbrand
Jacques Herbrand (12 February 1908 – 27 July 1931) was a French mathematician. Although he died at age 23, he was already considered one of "the greatest mathematicians of the younger generation" by his professors Helmut Hasse and Richard Coura ...
died in a mountaineering accident in the Alps at the age of 23.
*1936 –
Moritz Schlick
Friedrich Albert Moritz Schlick (; ; 14 April 1882 – 22 June 1936) was a German philosopher, physicist, and the founding father of logical positivism and the Vienna Circle.
Early life and works
Schlick was born in Berlin to a wealthy Prussian f ...
was murdered by an insane student.
*1937 –
Gustav Shpet was executed after being accused of involvement in an anti-
Soviet
The Soviet Union,. officially the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics. (USSR),. was a transcontinental country that spanned much of Eurasia from 1922 to 1991. A flagship communist state, it was nominally a federal union of fifteen nation ...
organization.
*1937 –
Pavel Florensky
Pavel Alexandrovich Florensky (also P. A. Florenskiĭ, Florenskii, Florenskij; russian: Па́вел Алекса́ндрович Флоре́нский; hy, Պավել Ֆլորենսկի, Pavel Florenski; – December 8, 1937) was a Russian O ...
was shot dead after being sentenced by an extrajudicial NKVD troika to death.
*1937 –
Antonio Gramsci died during his imprisonment by
Benito Mussolini.
*1939 –
Stanisław Ignacy Witkiewicz
Stanisław Ignacy Witkiewicz (; 24 February 188518 September 1939), commonly known as Witkacy, was a Polish writer, painter, philosopher, theorist, playwright, novelist, and photographer active before World War I and during the interwar period.
...
committed suicide by taking an overdose of
Veronal
Barbital (or barbitone), marketed under the brand names Veronal for the pure acid and Medinal for the sodium salt, was the first commercially available barbiturate. It was used as a sleeping aid (hypnotic) from 1903 until the mid-1950s. The chemic ...
and trying to slit his wrists a day after the Soviet invasion of Poland; it was planned to be a joint suicide with a close friend of his but she survived the attempt.
*1940 –
Walter Benjamin
Walter Bendix Schönflies Benjamin (; ; 15 July 1892 – 26 September 1940) was a German Jewish philosopher, cultural critic and essayist.
An eclectic thinker, combining elements of German idealism, Romanticism, Western Marxism, and Jewish ...
committed suicide at the Spanish-French border, after attempting to flee from the Nazis.
*1940 –
Leon Trotsky
Lev Davidovich Bronstein. ( – 21 August 1940), better known as Leon Trotsky; uk, link= no, Лев Давидович Троцький; also transliterated ''Lyev'', ''Trotski'', ''Trotskij'', ''Trockij'' and ''Trotzky''. (), was a Russian ...
was assassinated on Stalin's orders in Mexico, by Soviet agent
Ramón Mercader
Jaime Ramón Mercader del Río (7 February 1913 – 18 October 1978),Photograph oMercader's Gravestone/ref> more commonly known as Ramón Mercader, was a Spanish communist and NKVD agent, who assassinated Russian Bolshevik revolutionary Leon Tr ...
, along with most of his family.
*1941 –
Henri Bergson died of pneumonia in occupied Paris, which he supposedly contracted after standing in a queue for several hours in order to register as a Jew.
*1941 –
Kurt Grelling
Kurt Grelling (2 March 1886 – September 1942) was a German logician and philosopher, member of the Berlin Circle.
Life and work
Kurt Grelling was born on 2 March 1886 in Berlin. His father, the Doctor of Jurisprudence Richard Grelling, ...
was killed by the Nazis.
*1941 –
Edith Stein
Edith Stein (religious name Saint Teresia Benedicta a Cruce ; also known as Saint Teresa Benedicta of the Cross or Saint Edith Stein; 12 October 1891 – 9 August 1942) was a German Jewish philosopher who converted to Christianity and became a ...
died in a gas chamber in the Auschwitz concentration camp.
*1942 –
Georges Politzer
Georges Politzer (; 3 May 190323 May 1942) was a French philosopher and Marxist theoretician of Hungarian Jewish origin, affectionately referred to by some as the "red-headed philosopher" (''philosophe roux''). He was a native of Oradea, a ci ...
was executed by the Nazis.
*1943 –
Simone Weil
Simone Adolphine Weil ( , ; 3 February 1909 – 24 August 1943) was a French philosopher, mystic, and political activist. Over 2,500 scholarly works have been published about her, including close analyses and readings of her work, since 1995.
...
starved herself to death.
*1944 –
Jean Cavaillès
Jean Cavaillès (; ; 15 May 1903 – 4 April 1944) was a French philosopher and logician who specialized in philosophy of mathematics and philosophy of science. He took part in the French Resistance within the '' Libération'' movement and was a ...
was shot by the Gestapo.
*1944 –
Marc Bloch
Marc Léopold Benjamin Bloch (; ; 6 July 1886 – 16 June 1944) was a French historian. He was a founding member of the Annales School of French social history. Bloch specialised in medieval history and published widely on Medieval France ov ...
was shot by the Gestapo for his work in the French Resistance.
*1944 –
Giovanni Gentile
Giovanni Gentile (; 30 May 1875 – 15 April 1944) was an Italian neo-Hegelian idealist philosopher, educator, and fascist politician. The self-styled "philosopher of Fascism", he was influential in providing an intellectual foundation for ...
was murdered by communist partisans.
*1945 –
Dietrich Bonhoeffer
Dietrich Bonhoeffer (; 4 February 1906 – 9 April 1945) was a German Lutheran pastor, theologian and anti-Nazi dissident who was a key founding member of the Confessing Church. His writings on Christianity's role in the secular world have ...
was executed by hanging.
*1945 –
Gerhard Gentzen
Gerhard Karl Erich Gentzen (24 November 1909 – 4 August 1945) was a German mathematician and logician. He made major contributions to the foundations of mathematics, proof theory, especially on natural deduction and sequent calculus. He died ...
was detained in a prison camp by the Russian forces, where he died of malnutrition.
*1945 –
Ernst Bergmann committed suicide after the Allied forces captured Leipzig.
*1945 –
Johan Huizinga
Johan Huizinga (; 7 December 1872 – 1 February 1945) was a Dutch historian and one of the founders of modern cultural history.
Life
Born in Groningen as the son of Dirk Huizinga, a professor of physiology, and Jacoba Tonkens, who died two y ...
died in De Steeg in Gelderland, near Arnhem, where he was held in detention by the Nazis.
*1945 –
Miki Kiyoshi
was a Japanese philosopher, literary critic, scholar and university professor. He was an esteemed student of Nishida Kitarō and a prominent member of the Kyoto School.
Miki was a prolific academic and social critic of his time. He also had te ...
died in prison; he had been imprisoned after helping a friend on the run from the authorities.
*1948 –
Mohandas Gandhi was shot and killed by a Hindu zealot.
*1951 –
Ludwig Wittgenstein
Ludwig Josef Johann Wittgenstein ( ; ; 26 April 1889 – 29 April 1951) was an Austrian-British philosopher who worked primarily in logic, the philosophy of mathematics, the philosophy of mind, and the philosophy of language. He is con ...
died of cancer in Ireland, three days after his 62nd birthday. His last words: "Tell them I've had a wonderful life."
*1954 –
Alan Turing
Alan Mathison Turing (; 23 June 1912 – 7 June 1954) was an English mathematician, computer scientist, logician, cryptanalyst, philosopher, and theoretical biologist. Turing was highly influential in the development of theoretical co ...
ate a cyanide-poisoned apple. He was believed at the time to have committed suicide due to chemical depression, but his death was possibly just an accident.
*1960 –
Albert Camus
Albert Camus ( , ; ; 7 November 1913 – 4 January 1960) was a French philosopher, author, dramatist, and journalist. He was awarded the 1957 Nobel Prize in Literature at the age of 44, the second-youngest recipient in history. His work ...
died in an automobile accident.
*1961 –
Maurice Merleau-Ponty
Maurice Jean Jacques Merleau-Ponty. (; 14 March 1908 – 3 May 1961) was a French phenomenological philosopher, strongly influenced by Edmund Husserl and Martin Heidegger. The constitution of meaning in human experience was his main interest an ...
died of a stroke while preparing a lecture on
Descartes.
*1969 –
Theodor Adorno
Theodor is a masculine given name. It is a German form of Theodore. It is also a variant of Teodor.
List of people with the given name Theodor
* Theodor Adorno, (1903–1969), German philosopher
* Theodor Aman, Romanian painter
* Theodor Blue ...
developed heart palpitations after attempting to climb a 3000-metre mountain, and subsequently suffered a heart attack.
*1970 –
Bertrand Russell
Bertrand Arthur William Russell, 3rd Earl Russell, (18 May 1872 – 2 February 1970) was a British mathematician, philosopher, logician, and public intellectual. He had a considerable influence on mathematics, logic, set theory, linguistics, ...
died of the flu in Wales. There was no religious ceremony.
*1971 –
Richard Montague
Richard Merritt Montague (September 20, 1930 – March 7, 1971) was an American mathematician and philosopher who made contributions to mathematical logic and the philosophy of language. He is known for proposing Montague grammar to formalize ...
was beaten to death, presumably by a male prostitute.
*1973 –
Amílcar Cabral
Amílcar Lopes da Costa Cabral (; – ) was a Bissau-Guinean and Cape Verdean agricultural engineer, pan-Africanist, intellectual, poet, theoretician, revolutionary, political organizer, nationalist and diplomat. He was one of Africa's foremo ...
was assassinated while fighting for the independence of Portuguese colonies in Africa.
*1977 –
Jan Patočka
Jan Patočka (; 1 June 1907 – 13 March 1977) was a Czech philosopher. Having studied in Prague, Paris, Berlin, and Freiburg, he was one of the last pupils of Edmund Husserl and Martin Heidegger. In Freiburg he also developed a lifelong philos ...
died of an
apoplexy
Apoplexy () is rupture of an internal organ and the accompanying symptoms. The term formerly referred to what is now called a stroke. Nowadays, health care professionals do not use the term, but instead specify the anatomic location of the bleedi ...
after having been interrogated by the Czechoslovak secret police for eleven hours.
*1978 –
Kurt Gödel starved himself to death by refusing to eat for fear of being poisoned.
*1979 –
Evald Ilyenkov
Evald Vassilievich Ilyenkov (russian: link=no, Э́вальд Васи́льевич Илье́нков; 18 February 1924 – 21 March 1979) was a Marxist author and Soviet philosopher.
Biography
Evald Ilyenkov did original work on the mater ...
committed suicide.
*1979 –
Nicos Poulantzas
Nicos Poulantzas ( el, Νίκος Πουλαντζάς ; 21 September 1936 – 3 October 1979) was a Greek-French Marxist political sociologist and philosopher. In the 1970s, Poulantzas was known, along with Louis Althusser, as a leading structur ...
committed suicide by jumping out of the twentieth floor of an apartment building.
*1980 –
Roland Barthes
Roland Gérard Barthes (; ; 12 November 1915 – 26 March 1980) was a French literary theorist, essayist, philosopher, critic, and semiotician. His work engaged in the analysis of a variety of sign systems, mainly derived from Western popula ...
was struck in the street by a laundry van after leaving a luncheon with French President François Mitterrand.
*1980 –
Jean-Paul Sartre
Jean-Paul Charles Aymard Sartre (, ; ; 21 June 1905 – 15 April 1980) was one of the key figures in the philosophy of existentialism (and phenomenology), a French playwright, novelist, screenwriter, political activist, biographer, and lit ...
, a notorious chain-smoker, died of an
edema of the lung.
*1983 –
Arthur Koestler
Arthur Koestler, (, ; ; hu, Kösztler Artúr; 5 September 1905 – 1 March 1983) was a Hungarian-born author and journalist. Koestler was born in Budapest and, apart from his early school years, was educated in Austria. In 1931, Koestler join ...
committed joint suicide with his third wife, Cynthia, by taking an overdose of drugs after a painful struggle with disease.
*1984 –
Michel Foucault was the first high-profile French personality to die of
AIDS after contracting HIV.
*1986 –
Simone de Beauvoir died of pneumonia.
*1990 –
Louis Althusser died of a heart attack.
*1992 –
Félix Guattari
Pierre-Félix Guattari ( , ; 30 April 1930 – 29 August 1992) was a French psychoanalyst, political philosopher, semiotician, social activist, and screenwriter. He co-founded schizoanalysis with Gilles Deleuze, and ecosophy with Arne Næs ...
died of a heart attack.
*1994 –
David Stove
David Charles Stove (15 September 1927 – 2 June 1994) was an Australian philosopher.
Philosophy
His work in philosophy of science included criticisms of David Hume's Inductive scepticism. He offered a positive response to the problem of ...
committed suicide by hanging himself after a painful struggle with disease.
*1994 –
Sarah Kofman
Sarah Kofman (; September 14, 1934 – October 15, 1994) was a French philosopher .
Biography
Kofman began her teaching career in Toulouse in 1960 at the Lycée Saint-Sernin, and worked with both Jean Hyppolite and Gilles Deleuze. Her aban ...
committed suicide on Nietzsche’s birthday.
*1994 –
Guy Debord committed suicide by shooting himself after a painful struggle with polyneuritis.
*1995 –
Gilles Deleuze committed suicide by jumping out of his fourth-story apartment window.
*1998 –
Dimitris Liantinis
Dimitris Liantinis (; el, Δημήτρης Λιαντίνης ; born 23 July 1942, disappeared 1 June 1998) was a Greek philosopher. He was associate professor at the Department of Pedagogy of the Faculty of Philosophy, Pedagogy and Psychology ...
committed suicide on the mountains of
Taygetos
The Taygetus, Taugetus, Taygetos or Taÿgetus ( el, Ταΰγετος, Taygetos) is a mountain range on the Peloponnese peninsula in Southern Greece. The highest mountain of the range is Mount Taygetus, also known as "Profitis Ilias", or "Prophet ...
.
*2000 –
Willard Van Orman Quine
Willard Van Orman Quine (; known to his friends as "Van"; June 25, 1908 – December 25, 2000) was an American philosopher and logician in the analytic tradition, recognized as "one of the most influential philosophers of the twentieth century" ...
died of Alzheimer's disease.
*2001 –
David Lewis died of diabetes related complications.
*2004 –
Jacques Derrida died of pancreatic cancer.
*2007 –
André Gorz committed joint suicide with his wife by lethal injection.
*2017 –
Anne Dufourmantelle
Anne Dufourmantelle (20 March 1964 – 21 July 2017) was a French philosopher and psychoanalyst.
Education and career
Dufourmantelle was educated at Brown University and at Paris-Sorbonne University, where she earned a doctorate in philosophy in ...
drowned while trying to rescue two children.
*2017 –
Mark Fisher
Mark Fisher (11 July 1968 – 13 January 2017), also known under his blogging alias k-punk, was an English writer, music critic, political and cultural theorist, philosopher, and teacher based in the Department of Visual Cultures at Goldsm ...
committed suicide by hanging.
*2019 –
Ágnes Heller
Ágnes Heller (12 May 1929 – 19 July 2019) was a Hungarian philosopher and lecturer. She was a core member of the Budapest School philosophical forum in the 1960s and later taught political theory for 25 years at the New School for Social Res ...
drowned in
Lake Balaton
Lake Balaton () is a freshwater lake in the Transdanubian region of Hungary. It is the largest lake in Central Europe, and one of the region's foremost tourist destinations. The Zala River provides the largest inflow of water to the lake, and ...
near
Balatonalmádi
Balatonalmádi () is a popular resort town in Veszprém county, in Hungary, with a population of 8,500, situated on the northern shore of Lake Balaton.
History
The town developed from three previously separated villages, which were united by c ...
while she was swimming.
*2020 –
Bernard Stiegler
Bernard Stiegler (; 1 April 1952 – 5 August 2020) was a French philosopher. He was head of the Institut de recherche et d'innovation (IRI), which he founded in 2006 at the Centre Georges-Pompidou. He was also the founder in 2005 of the polit ...
committed suicide.
*2022 -
Saul Kripke
Saul Aaron Kripke (; November 13, 1940 – September 15, 2022) was an American philosopher and logician in the analytic tradition. He was a Distinguished Professor of Philosophy at the Graduate Center of the City University of New York and em ...
died of pancreatic cancer.
References
Further reading
* Ava Chitwood,
Death by Philosophy', University of Michigan Press, 2004.
*
Simon Critchley
Simon Critchley (born 27 February 1960) is an English philosopher and the Hans Jonas Professor of Philosophy at the New School for Social Research in New York, USA.
Challenging the ancient tradition that philosophy begins in wonder, Critchle ...
, ''Book of Dead Philosophers'', Vintage, 2009.
* David Palfrey
"How Philosophers Die" ''British Academy Review'', Issue 10 (2007)
*
Anthony Quinton
Anthony Meredith Quinton, Baron Quinton, FBA (25 March 192519 June 2010) was a British political and moral philosopher, metaphysician, and materialist philosopher of mind. He served as President of Trinity College, Oxford from 1978 to 1987; a ...
, 'Deaths of philosophers', ''
The Oxford Companion to Philosophy
''The Oxford Companion to Philosophy'' (1995; second edition 2005) is a reference work in philosophy edited by the philosopher Ted Honderich and published by Oxford University Press
Oxford University Press (OUP) is the university press of ...
'', Oxford, 1995, 2005.
{{DEFAULTSORT:Deaths Of Philosophers
Philosophers
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 ...
Lists of philosophers