Philosophy in classical Greece is the ultimate origin of the Western conception of the nature of things.
According to Aristotle, the philosophical study of human nature itself originated with Socrates, … See more

Medieval conceptions of man were particularly stimulated by two sources, viz. the Bible and the Classical philosophical tradition. In Scripture, two passages especially provided the foundation of a dynamic anthropology: Gen 1, 26 and Wis 2, 23 where it is said … See more

Although this new realism applied to the study of human life from the beginning—for example, in Machiavelli's works—the definitive argument for the final rejection of Aristotle was associated especially with Francis Bacon. Bacon sometimes wrote … See more

The hereditarian paradigm
Instinctual behaviour
Instinctual behaviour, an inherent inclination towards a … See more

Confucianism
Human nature is a central question in Chinese philosophy. From the Song dynasty, … See more

In Christian theology, there are two ways of "conceiving human nature:" The first is "spiritual, Biblical, and theistic"; and the second is " See more

The concept of human nature is a source of ongoing debate in contemporary philosophy, specifically within philosophy of biology, a subfield of the philosophy of science. Prominent critics of the concept – David L. Hull, Michael Ghiselin, and David Buller See more