Modern philosophy will determine the scope of one's use of "modern philosophy." How much of Renaissance intellectual history is part of modern philosophy is disputed: the Early Renaissance is often considered less modern and more medieval compared to the later High Renaissance. By the 17th and 18th centuries the major figures in philosophy of mind, epistemology, and metaphysics were roughly divided into two main groups. The "Rationalists," mostly in France and Germany, argued all knowledge must begin from certain "innate ideas" in the mind. Major rationalists were Descartes, Baruch Spinoza, Gottfried Leibniz, and Nicolas Malebranche. The "Empiricists," by contrast, held that knowledge
Robert Adamson (philosopher) his writings he was remarkable for impartiality. It was his peculiar virtue that he could quote his opponents without warping their meaning. From this point of view he would have been perhaps the first historian of philosophy of his time, had his professional labours been less exacting. The following were published, either in his lifetime or posthumously. Robert Adamson (philosopher) Robert Adamson (19 January 1852 – 8 February 1902 was a Scottish philosopher and Professor of Logic at Glasgow. He was born in Kingsbarns in Fife. His father was a solicitor, and his mother was the daughter of Matthew Buist,