Christian Wolff (philosopher)

Christian Wolff (less correctly Wolf,[5] German: [vɔlf]; also known as Wolfius; ennobled as Christian Freiherr von Wolff in 1745; 24 January 1679 – 9 April 1754) was a German philosopher. Wolff is characterized as one of the most eminent German philosophers between Leibniz and Kant. His life work spanned almost every scholarly subject of his time, displayed and unfolded according to his demonstrative-deductive, mathematical method, which perhaps represents the peak of Enlightenment rationality in Germany.[6]

Quick facts: Christian Wolff, Born, Died, Education, Era... ▼

Christian Wolff
Born	(1679-01-24)24 January 1679 Breslau, Duchies of Silesia, Holy Roman Empire (present-day Wrocław, Poland)
Died	9 April 1754(1754-04-09) (aged 75) Halle an der Saale, Duchy of Magdeburg, Kingdom of Prussia, Holy Roman Empire
Education	University of Jena (1699–1702)[1] University of Leipzig (Dr. phil. habil., 1703)
Era	18th-century philosophy
Region	Western philosophy
School	Age of Enlightenment Rationalism
Institutions	Leipzig University University of Halle University of Marburg
Thesis	Philosophia practica universalis, methodo mathematica conscripta (On Universal Practical Philosophy, Composed from the Mathematical Method) (1703)
Academic advisors	Ehrenfried Walther von Tschirnhaus Gottfried Leibniz (epistolary correspondent)
Notable students	Mikhail Lomonosov A. G. Baumgarten
Main interests	Philosophical logic, metaphysics
Notable ideas	Theoretical philosophy has for its parts ontology (also philosophia prima or general metaphysics) and three special metaphysical disciplines (rational psychology, rational cosmology, rational theology) Coining the philosophical term "idealism"[2]
Influences Gottfried Wilhelm Leibniz, René Descartes,[3] Baruch Spinoza,[3] Ehrenfried Walther von Tschirnhaus,[3] Confucius,[3] Zhu Xi, Wang Yangming
Influenced Immanuel Kant, Søren Kierkegaard, Arthur Schopenhauer,[4] Alexander Gottlieb Baumgarten, Georg Bernhard Bilfinger, Johannes Nikolaus Tetens, Emer de Vattel, Michael Christoph Hanow, Martin Knutzen, Johann Peter Reusch [de],[1] Johann Christoph Gottsched, Moses Mendelssohn, Johann Heinrich Samuel Formey, Georg Friedrich Meier, Mikhail Lomonosov, Anton Wilhelm Amo, Adam Weishaupt

Following Gottfried Wilhelm Leibniz, Wolff also wrote in German as his primary language of scholarly instruction and research, although he did translate his works into Latin for his transnational European audience. A founding father of, among other fields, economics and public administration as academic disciplines,^{[citation needed]} he concentrated especially in these fields, giving advice on practical matters to people in government, and stressing the professional nature of university education.^{[citation needed]}