teleology summary

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Below is the article summary. For the full article, see teleology.

teleology , Causality in which the effect is explained by an end (Greek, telos) to be realized. Teleology thus differs essentially from efficient causality, in which an effect is dependent on prior events. Aristotle’s account of teleology declared that a full explanation of anything must consider its final cause—the purpose for which the thing exists or was produced. Following Aristotle, many philosophers have conceived of biological processes as involving the operation of a guiding end. Modern science has tended to appeal only to efficient causes in its investigations. See also mechanism.

Immanuel Kant Summary

Immanuel Kant was a German philosopher whose comprehensive and systematic work in epistemology (the theory of knowledge), ethics, and aesthetics greatly influenced all subsequent philosophy, especially the various schools of Kantianism and idealism. Kant was one of the foremost thinkers of the

Aristotle Summary

Aristotle was an ancient Greek philosopher and scientist, one of the greatest intellectual figures of Classical antiquity and Western history. He was the author of a philosophical and scientific system that became the framework and vehicle for both Christian Scholasticism and medieval Islamic