Rudolf Hermann Lotze (1817-1881)

German philosopher; born at Bautzen (31 m. e.n.e. of Dresden), Saxony,
May 21, 1817; died at Berlin July 1, 1881. He studied philosophy and
medicine at the University of Leipzig, taking degrees in both
subjects, and became extraordinary professor of philosophy there in
1842. He was called to Gottingenin 1844, and to Berlin in 1881, but
here he was able to lecture only a part of one semester. Lotze was one
of the most influential philosophers of the second half of the
nineteenth century, and he has man followers, particularly among
theologians. This is explained by the fact that in his speculation
ethical and religious needs come into their full rights. His
philosophy represents a reaction against the ideological pantheism of
Hegel, which seemed to sacrifice all individuality and variety in
existence to a formal and abstract scheme of development. Lotze
characterized his philosophical standpoint as teleological idealism,
and he regarded ethics as the starting-point of metaphysics. While
enforcing the mechanical view of nature, he sought to show that
mechanism, the relation of cause and effect, is incomprehensible,
except as the realization of a world of moral ideas. Thus, each causal
series becomes at the same time a teleological series. Lotze worked
out this reconciliation of mechanism and teleology by combining with
the monads of Leibniz the absolute substance of Spinoza, in which
individual things (monads) are grounded, and through whose
all-inclusive unity interrelation is possible. Some of Lotze's more
important works are: Metaphysik (Leipsic, 1841); Logik (1843);
Medizinische Psychologie oder Physiologie der Seele (1852);
Mikrokosmus. Ideen zur Naturge8chichte und Geschichte der Menschheit
(3 vols., 185″4; Eng. transl., 2 vols., Edinburgh, 1885), his
principal work; Geschichte der Aesthetik in Deutschland (Munich,
1868); and the unfinished System der Philosophie (vol. i., Logik,
Leipsic, 1874; vol. ii., Metaphysik, 1879; Eng. transl. of both, 2
parts, Oxford, 1884). After Lotze's death appeared Diktate, notes from
his lectures on the various philosophical disciplines (8 parts,
Leipsic, 1882-84; Eng. transl. by G. T. Ladd,Outline, 6 vols., Boston,
1884-1887); also Kleine Schriften (3 vols., Leipsic, 1885-1894).