Friedrich Karl Christian Ludwig Büchner (March 29, 1824
– May 1, 1899) was a German philosopher, physiologist and physician who became one of the exponents of 19th century
scientific materialism.
Büchner was born at Darmstadt, Germany, on
March 29, 1824. From 1842 to 1848 he studied physics, chemistry, botany, mineralogy, philosophy and medicine at
the University of Giessen, where he graduated in 1848 with a dissertation entitled
Beiträge zur Hall'schen Lehre von einem excitomotorischen Nervensystem (Contributions to the Hallerian Theory of an
Excitomotor Nervous System). Afterwards, he continued his studies at the University of Strasbourg, University of Würzburg (where he studied
pathology with the great Rudolf Virchow) and at the
University of Vienna. In 1852 he became lecturer in medicine at the University of Tübingen, where he
published his great work Kraft und Stoff: Empirisch-naturphilosophische Studien (Force and Matter: Empiricophilosophical
Studies, 1855). In this work, the product, according to Lange, of a fanatical enthusiasm for humanity, he sought to demonstrate
the indestructibility of matter and force, and the finality of
physical force. The extreme materialism of this work excited so much opposition that he was
compelled to give up his post at Tübingen. He retired to Darmstadt, where he practiced as a
physician and contributed regularly to pathological and physiological magazines.
He continued his philosophical work in defense of materialism, and published Natur und Geist (Nature and Soul, 1857),
Aus Natur und Wissenschaft (From Nature and Science, vol. I., 1862; vol. II., 1884), Der Fortschritt in Natur und
Geschichte im Lichte der Darwinschen Theorie (Progress in Nature and History in the Light of the Darwinian Theory, 1884),
Tatsachen und Theorien aus dem naturwissenschaftlichen Leben der Gegenwart (Facts and Theories from the Scientific Life of
Present, 1887), Fremdes und Eigenes aus dem geistligen Leben der Gegenwart (Extraneous and Self from the Spiritual Life of
Present, 1890), Darwinismus und Socialismus (1894), Im Dienste der Wahrzeit (In the Service of Truth, 1899).
Ludwig Büchner's materialism was the founding ground for the freethinkers'
movement in Germany. In 1881 he founded in Frankfurt the
"Deutsche Freidenkerbund" (German Freethinkers League), where the first atheists gathered together publicly in that country.
He died at Darmstadt on May 1, 1899.
In estimating Büchner's philosophy it must be remembered that he was primarily a physiologist, not a metaphysician. Matter and force (or energy) are infinite; the conservation
of force follows from the imperishability of matter, the ultimate basis of
all science.
Büchner is not always clear in his theory of the relation between matter and force. At one time he refuses to explain it, but
generally he assumes that all natural and spiritual forces are indwelling in matter. Just as a steam engine, he says in Kraft und Stoff (7th ed., p. 130), produces motion, so the intricate organic complex of force-bearing
substance in an animal organism produces a total sum of certain effects, which, when bound together in a unity, are called by us
mind, soul, thought. Here he
postulates force and mind as emanating from original matter, a materialistic monism. But in other
parts of his works he suggests that mind and matter are two different aspects of that which is the basis of all things a monism
which is not necessarily materialistic, and which, in the absence of further explanation, constitutes a confession of
failure.
Büchner was much less concerned to establish a scientific metaphysics than to protest against the romantic idealism of his predecessors and the theological interpretations of the universe. Nature according to him is purely physical;
it has no purpose, no will, no laws imposed by extraneous authority, no supernatural ethical
sanction.
Modern Christian apologists consider Büchner the father of atheistic evangelism in
Germany, a counterpart to Thomas Huxley.
Friedrich Büchner was the brother of Georg Büchner, a famous playwright.
References
This article incorporates text from the Encyclopædia
Britannica Eleventh Edition, a publication now in the public
domain.
External link
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