Adam Ferguson (1723-1816)

Adam Ferguson (1723-1816)

• Life

Born at Logierait in Atholl, Perthshire, Scotland, he received his education at Perth grammar school and at the University of St Andrews. In 1745, owing to his knowledge of Gaelic, he gained appointment as deputy chaplain of the 43rd (afterwards the 42nd) regiment (the Black Watch), the licence to preach being granted him by special dispensation, although he had not completed the required six years of theological study.

• Publicaton

1. An Essay on the History of Civil Society (1767)
- Reprinted in 1995 with a new introduction by Louis Schneider. Transaction Publishers, London, 1995.

2. The History of the Progress and Termination of the Roman Republic (1783)

3. Principles of Moral and Political Science; being chiefly a retrospect of lectures delivered in the College of Edinburgh (1792)

4. Institutes of Moral Philosophy (1769)

5. Reflections Previous to the Establishment of a Militia (1756)

圖片來源: Adam Ferguson

資料來源: Wikipedia

相關連結: Ferguson

James Burnet, Lord Monboddo (1714-1799)

James Burnet, Lord Monboddo (1714-1799)

• Life

James Burnett, Lord Monboddo (October 25, 1714 - May 26, 1799) was a Scottish judge, scholar of language evolution and philosopher. He is most famous today as a founder of modern comparative historical linguistics (Hobbs,1992). In 1767 he became a judge in the Court of Session. Thence Burnett adopted a title based on his father's estate, Monboddo House. Monboddo was one of a number of scholars involved at the time in development of early concepts of evolution, and some credit him with anticipating in principle the idea of natural selection that was developed into a scientific theory by Charles Darwin (Watt, 1985), (Bailey, 2005), (Cloyd, 1972)

• Publications related to language

1. The Origin and Progress of Man and Language (6 volumes, 1773-1792)
2. Antient Metaphysics (6 volumes, 1779 - 1799)

圖片來源: Monbodo
資料來源: Wikipedia
相關連結: Monboddo Monboddo-1

Jean Jacques Rousseau (1712-1788)

Jean Jacques Rousseau (1712-1788)

姓名：讓-雅克·盧梭Jean-Jacques Rousseau
出生：1712年6月28日瑞士日內瓦
逝世：1778年7月2日 （66歲）法國阿蒙農維拉
學派/流派：社會契約論
主要領域：政治哲學、音樂、教育、文學
著名思想：公共意志、自尊、性本善
受影響於：霍布斯、洛克、狄德羅、孟德斯鳩
施影響於：康德、費希特、黑格爾、浪漫主義運動、潘恩、孔德、恩格斯

圖片來源: Rouseau

資料來源:Wikipedia

相關連結: Rousseau Rousseau-1 Rousseau-2

Charles de Brosses ( 1709-1777)

Charles de Brosses ( 1709-1777)

• Life

He was president of the parliament of his hometown, Dijon, from 1741, member of the Académie des Inscriptions et Belles-Lettres of Paris (from 1746), and of the Académie des Sciences, Arts et Belles-Lettres de Dijon (from 1761). He was a close friend of Georges-Louis Leclerc de Buffon, the naturalist who wrote the Histoire naturelle, and a personal enemy of Voltaire, the famous philosopher, who barred his entry in the Académie française in 1770. Because he opposed the absolute power of the king, he was exiled twice, in 1744 and 1771. During his life, he wrote numerous academic papers on topics concerning ancient history, philology and linguistics, some of which were used by Diderot and D'Alembert in the Encyclopédie (1751-1765)

• Works related to language

1. Lettres sur l'état actuel de la ville souterraine d'Herculée et sur les causes de son ensevelissement sous les ruines du Vésuve (1750). This contains a list of archeological discoveries from the excavation of Herculaneum, including some ancient inscriptions in the Oscan language.

2. Traité de la formation méchanique des langues et des principes physiques de l'étymologie (1765). This provides a materialistic theory of the origin and the evolution of language, where the meaning of words is considered as an image of the physiological articulation of sounds (see Sound Symbolism). It had an influence on Condillac's Grammaire (1775) and a very important role in the birth of a scientific conception of language.

圖片來源: de Brosses

資料來源: Widipedia

相關連結: de Brosses

Joseph Priestley (1733-1804)

Joseph Priestley(1733-1804)

1. 生於英國利茲，1794年移居美國賓夕法尼亞州，但是沒有加入美國國籍。

2. 英國化學家、牧師、教育家。

3. 最主要的貢獻是對氣體特別是氧氣的早期研究。

4. 1774年，他寫了一部名為《幾種氣體的實驗和觀察》(Experiments and Observations on Different Kinds of Air)的三卷本的書，于1777年出版。

5. 在這部書里他首次詳細敘述了氧氣的各種性質，但他是從燃素說的角度出發對氧氣進行研究的，稱它為「脫燃素氣體」（dephlogisticated air。

6. 1762年, 發表"Lectures on the Theory of Language and Universal Grammar"

圖片來源: Priestley

資料來源: Wikipedia

相關連結: Priestley Priestley-1 Priestley-2