Karl Marx :: essays research papers

The late 1800's was a time period where new ideas, theories, and philosophies ran through the minds of many young people. Amongst them was a man be the name of Karl Marx who stood out in the crowd. Known as a man of great integrity and intelligence, Marx was thought to be one of the greatest thinkers of all time. "Philosophy and Myth in Karl Marx: 2nd Edition" by Robert C. Tucker is a book about Marx and his philosophies. Robert C. Tucker in this book ventures out to critique and give an interpretation of Marx's philosophical thoughts. Marx's was the man who was responsible for the well known and highly acclaimed philosophy of Marxism also known as Communism. Karl Marx was born in the German Rhineland to a well-cultured family, one that was not revolutionary. As a young man he received a classical education. Marx entered the University of Berlin where he read law, majoring in history as well as philosophy. His years at the university was the time period that was a turning point in Marx's life. From his early school days, philosophy had been a subject that sparked interest in Karl Marx. He was greatly concerned with humans' freedom and reviving the ancient concept of communism. The University of Berlin was where Marx had first become acquainted with the philosophy of Georg Wilhelm Friedrich Hegel. Hegel's ideas known, as Hegelianism was the concept where the main focus was a self- alienated man. Man should worship himself as a Superior Being. What attracted Marx to Hegel was his "surmounting of the characteristic difficulty of idealism." However, when Marx was later introduced to the philosophies of Feuerbach, his thou ghts completely changed. According to Feuerbach,"man has so far in history lived primarily a life of religion, and that the essences of religion is man's estrangement from himself," At the same time of Marx becoming acquainted with these thoughts, he was jumping from one place to another causing his family to live in wretched poverty. Later on, using both the concepts of Hegelianism and of Feuerbach, Marx arrived at the formulation of his own philosophical anthropology. He first states that the primary determinant of history is economics where the history of society is viewed as the history of class struggle between the bourgeoisie and the proletariats. The bourgeoisie are successful by extracting money from the proletariats for profit.