Leopoldo Zea
1912-2004 · Latin American · Little-known
Zea was a Mexican philosopher who asked whether Latin America has to earn the right to philosophize, and answered no. He launched a project of thinking from the region's own historical experience, a continent shaped by conquest and colonialism, instead of imitating Europe. He called it philosophy sin más, philosophy without qualification, a philosophy that owes Europe no justification for existing.
Signature
The position Zea is most identified with in the Profiler:
- Society
- leans Collectivism
- Human Nature
- Socially Constructed
Positions on the 2 axes the sources answer
- Society
- leans Collectivism (25 on a 0–100 scale from Collectivism to Individualism)
- Polity
- mildly leans Liberalism (62 on a 0–100 scale from Illiberalism to Liberalism)
18 of 20 axes are left blank: the sources do not answer them, or Zea refused the framing. Nothing is imputed; a blank is not a middling score.
Foundational questions
- Theology
- Agnosticism
What is your position on the existence and nature of God or gods? - Government
- Representative Democracy
What is your ideal form of government? - Highest Good
- Freedom / Knowledge
What is the highest good? - Good and Evil
- Social Invention
What is the fundamental nature of good and evil? - Knowledge
- Tradition
What is the ultimate foundation of knowledge? - Ethics Basis
- Social Contract
What is the ultimate basis of ethics? - Agency
- Social Determinism
What is the nature of human agency and freedom? - Time
- Linear Progressive
What is the fundamental shape of time? - Authority
- Consent of the Governed
What is the legitimate source of authority? - Language
- Social Construction
What is the fundamental nature of language? - Law
- Cosmopolitan Rights
What is the ultimate source of legitimate law? - Human Nature
- Socially Constructed
What is human nature? - Primary Bond
- Place
What is your primary bond and loyalty?