Bowne, Borden Parker

Bowne, Borden Parker

(boun), 1847–1910, American philosopher, b. Monmouth co., N.J. In 1876 he became head of the department of philosophy at Boston Univ. and later served as dean of the graduate school. In his philosophy, which he called personalism, he stressed the reality and freedom of the self and insisted on the central importance of personality. His masterpiece, Metaphysics, appeared in 1882.

Bowne, Borden Parker

 

Born Jan. 14, 1847, in Leonardville, New Jersey; died Apr. 1, 1910, in Boston. American idealist philosopher. Founder of theistic personalism. Professor at Boston University.

A tendency to combine theology and objective idealism is expressed in Bowne’s doctrine. In his philosophy of transcendental empiricism, Bowne used elements from the teachings of Berkeley, Kant, and Lotze. According to Bowne, reality is the aggregate of interrelated, empirical “personalities” that are dependent upon the creative activity of a higher personality, or god. In Bowne’s system, personality does not refer to a real person but to a kind of spiritual monad or soul, which retains its self-identity and reveals itself in the direct experience of an individual human personality. The objective world, its forms, and its qualities are created in the experience of the personality and are secondary in relationship to the personality (Personalism, 1908).

WORKS

Metaphysics [2nd ed]. New York-London, 1898.
Introduction to Psychological Theory. New York, 1887.
Philosophy of Theism. New York, 1887.
The Principles of Ethics. New York, 1892.
Theism. New York [1902].
Studies in Christianity. Boston, 1909.

N. S. IULINA

Bowne, Borden Parker

(1847–1910) philosopher, theologian; born in Leonardsville, N.J. After studying idealist philosophy in Germany, he joined the faculty at Boston University (1876), where he ultimately became head of the philosophy department and dean of graduate studies. He developed a personalistic, religiously oriented idealism through stimulating lectures and in books such as Personalism (1908).