Famous philosophers quiz (50 questions)
Philosophers asked how we should live, rule and treat each other. Match the thinker to the idea, the book and the country.
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50 multiple-choice questions, with the answer explained after each one.
Answer each question, see why, and beat your best score.
All 50 questions and answers
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- Which Athenian philosopher wrote nothing himself, and is known mainly through his students Plato and Xenophon?
- Aristotle
- Epicurus
- Pythagoras
- Socrates
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Socrates. Socrates taught by asking questions. He was sentenced to death in Athens in 399 BC and drank hemlock.
- Plato, a student of Socrates, founded a famous school in Athens. What was it called?
- The Academy
- The Garden
- The Stoa
- The Lyceum
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The Academy. Plato's Academy lasted for centuries, and his most famous student there was Aristotle.
- Aristotle founded the Lyceum in Athens. Which young prince had he once tutored?
- Alexander the Great
- Pericles
- Cyrus the Great
- Julius Caesar
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Alexander the Great. Aristotle was born in Stagira. He wrote on logic, ethics, biology and many other subjects.
- Which Chinese thinker, born in 551 BC in the state of Lu, taught that people should lead with learning, respect and kindness?
- Mozi
- Mencius
- Laozi
- Confucius
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Confucius. His sayings were collected by his followers in the Analects.
- Laozi is traditionally said to have written which short book of Chinese philosophy?
- The Art of War
- The Book of Songs
- Tao Te Ching
- The Analects
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Tao Te Ching. It teaches living in harmony with the natural way, or Tao.
- Mozi, a Chinese philosopher, taught the idea of what kind of love?
- Universal love
- Love of gold
- Love of one's own family only
- Love of power
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Universal love. He argued that people should care for others without favouring their own family or state.
- Mencius, a follower of Confucius, argued that human nature is what?
- Impossible to know
- Basically selfish
- Decided by the stars
- Basically good
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Basically good. He believed kindness grows from natural feelings of compassion, like those we feel for a child in danger.
- Thiruvalluvar, the great Tamil thinker, wrote a work of how many chapters on virtue, wealth and love?
- 133
- 50
- 250
- 100
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133. The Tirukkural has 1,330 couplets arranged in 133 chapters of ten couplets each.
- Adi Shankara, who lived in India around the 8th century, is best known for teaching which school of thought?
- Buddhism
- Charvaka
- Advaita Vedanta
- Jainism
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Advaita Vedanta. He is said to have travelled across India and founded monasteries called mathas.
- Ramanuja, born at Sriperumbudur in Tamil Nadu, taught which school of Vedanta?
- Advaita
- Samkhya
- Dvaita
- Vishishtadvaita
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Vishishtadvaita. He emphasised devotion and the idea that all souls are part of the divine.
- Basava, a 12th-century thinker from Karnataka, is remembered for founding which gathering that welcomed people of all backgrounds?
- Dharma Sabha
- Sangam
- Anubhava Mantapa
- Nalanda
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Anubhava Mantapa. He spoke against social discrimination and encouraged work as worship.
- Sarvepalli Radhakrishnan was a philosopher who became President of India. Which day, his birthday, is celebrated as Teachers' Day?
- 26 January
- 14 November
- 5 September
- 2 October
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5 September. He taught at Oxford and also served as India's second President.
- Swami Vivekananda is famous for his speech beginning 'Sisters and brothers of America' at which 1893 event in Chicago?
- A university graduation
- The Parliament of the World's Religions
- The World's Fair opening ceremony
- A meeting of the United Nations
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The Parliament of the World's Religions. He was a disciple of Ramakrishna and introduced Indian philosophy to many in the West.
- Ibn Sina, known in the West as Avicenna, wrote a famous medical encyclopedia. What is it called?
- The Anatomy of Man
- The Book of Healing Plants
- The Canon of Medicine
- The Almagest
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The Canon of Medicine. He was born near Bukhara and was both a philosopher and physician.
- Ibn Rushd, known as Averroes, lived in Córdoba and wrote famous commentaries on the works of which Greek philosopher?
- Socrates
- Pythagoras
- Aristotle
- Plato
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Aristotle. His commentaries were widely read in medieval Europe.
- Maimonides was born in Córdoba and worked as a physician in Cairo in the service of which famous ruler?
- Charlemagne
- Saladin
- Akbar
- Suleiman
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Saladin. He wrote The Guide for the Perplexed and is a major figure in Jewish philosophy.
- Ibn Khaldun, born in Tunis, wrote a famous book about history and society. What is it called?
- The Rubaiyat
- The Arabian Nights
- The Muqaddimah
- The Shahnameh
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The Muqaddimah. He is often seen as an early thinker in sociology and economics.
- René Descartes is famous for a statement often translated as what?
- All is flux
- Man is the measure of all things
- Know thyself
- I think, therefore I am
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I think, therefore I am. The French philosopher used doubt to search for something he could be certain of.
- Baruch Spinoza of Amsterdam earned a living by doing what skilled craft?
- Printing books
- Weaving cloth
- Making clocks
- Grinding lenses
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Grinding lenses. He wrote the Ethics and argued for freedom of thought.
- John Locke's Two Treatises of Government argued that people have natural rights to life, liberty and what else?
- Travel
- Education
- Voting
- Property
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Property. His ideas influenced later declarations of rights.
- Voltaire campaigned for religious tolerance. Which family's case, in the 1760s, did he take up?
- The Calas family
- The Medici family
- The Rothschild family
- The Bourbon family
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The Calas family. He also wrote the satirical novel Candide.
- Which Swiss-born thinker wrote The Social Contract in 1762?
- Voltaire
- Jean-Jacques Rousseau
- Denis Diderot
- Montesquieu
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Jean-Jacques Rousseau. The book argued that legitimate government rests on the agreement of the people.
- Montesquieu is known for popularising the idea of what in government?
- Government without laws
- Rule by one family
- A single national church
- Separation of powers
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Separation of powers. His ideas influenced the writers of several constitutions.
- Immanuel Kant lived in Königsberg. Which of the following is his famous 1781 book?
- The Prince
- Leviathan
- Critique of Pure Reason
- Ethics
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Critique of Pure Reason. He also developed the 'categorical imperative', a rule for moral action.
- David Hume was a philosopher from which city in Scotland?
- Glasgow
- Dundee
- Edinburgh
- Aberdeen
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Edinburgh. His best-known early book is A Treatise of Human Nature.
- Adam Smith wrote The Wealth of Nations in 1776. What was his earlier book about?
- The Origin of Species
- The Theory of Moral Sentiments
- The Rights of Man
- The Laws of Motion
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The Theory of Moral Sentiments. Smith was a moral philosopher before he became known as an economic thinker.
- Mary Wollstonecraft published which 1792 book arguing for women's education and equality?
- The Subjection of Women
- The Second Sex
- Little Women
- A Vindication of the Rights of Woman
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A Vindication of the Rights of Woman. She also wrote about the rights of men, and her daughter wrote Frankenstein.
- John Stuart Mill wrote On Liberty. Which later book of his argued for equality between men and women?
- Wealth of Nations
- The Subjection of Women
- The Social Contract
- Leviathan
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The Subjection of Women. He argued that women should have the same rights and education as men.
- Hypatia of Alexandria was a philosopher and mathematician. When did she die?
- In 1492 CE
- In 415 CE
- In 1000 CE
- In 100 BC
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In 415 CE. She taught in Alexandria and is remembered as one of the first notable women in mathematics.
- Marcus Aurelius was a Roman emperor and philosopher who wrote a private journal. What is it called?
- Confessions
- Meditations
- The Prince
- The Republic
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Meditations. He wrote it in Greek, as notes to himself on how to live calmly and well.
- Epictetus, a Stoic philosopher, was born into what condition?
- Slavery
- A royal family
- A farming village of freemen
- A merchant family
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Slavery. He was born in Hierapolis and taught that we cannot control events, only our responses to them.
- Zeno of Citium founded which school of philosophy, named after a painted porch in Athens?
- Stoicism
- Cynicism
- Epicureanism
- Platonism
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Stoicism. The name comes from the Stoa, the porch where he taught.
- Epicurus taught his followers in a place in Athens known as what?
- The Academy
- The Forum
- The Garden
- The Lyceum
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The Garden. He taught that a simple life with friends and peace of mind leads to happiness.
- Thales of Miletus is often called the first philosopher in the Greek tradition. What natural event is he said to have predicted?
- A flood
- An earthquake
- A comet
- A solar eclipse
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A solar eclipse. He asked what the world is made of and looked for natural explanations.
- Heraclitus of Ephesus is remembered for the idea that you cannot step into the same what twice?
- River
- Forest
- Road
- Sea
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River. He thought that everything is always changing.
- Pythagoras is best known for a theorem about right-angled triangles. On which Greek island was he born?
- Sicily
- Samos
- Rhodes
- Crete
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Samos. He and his followers studied numbers and music.
- Francis Bacon argued for what approach to learning about nature?
- Guessing
- Observation and experiment
- Following tradition
- Only reading old books
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Observation and experiment. He helped to shape the scientific method.
- Henry David Thoreau wrote Walden about living simply by a pond. His essay on civil disobedience later inspired which leader?
- Napoleon
- Mahatma Gandhi
- Winston Churchill
- Joseph Stalin
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Mahatma Gandhi. It also influenced Martin Luther King Jr.
- Simone de Beauvoir published The Second Sex in 1949. Which country was she from?
- Spain
- Belgium
- Italy
- France
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France. The book examined how women have been treated in society.
- Hannah Arendt wrote about 'the banality of evil' after attending whose trial?
- Nelson Mandela's
- Napoleon's
- Adolf Eichmann's
- Galileo's
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Adolf Eichmann's. She also wrote The Origins of Totalitarianism.
- Bertrand Russell won the Nobel Prize in Literature in 1950. What did the citation say his writings champion?
- Economic growth
- Military strength
- Humanitarian ideals and freedom of thought
- Religious unity
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Humanitarian ideals and freedom of thought. He was also a mathematician and a campaigner for peace.
- Albert Camus, born in French Algeria, won the Nobel Prize in Literature in 1957. Which novel of his is set during an epidemic?
- The Fall
- The Outsider
- The Plague
- The Stranger
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The Plague. The citation says his writing illuminates the problems of the human conscience in our times.
- Amartya Sen is both a philosopher and an economist. In what year did he win the Nobel Prize in Economic Sciences?
- 1979
- 1998
- 2009
- 1969
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1998. He was born in Santiniketan, India, and his work includes studies of famines.
- Martha Nussbaum is a living philosopher known for developing what approach to human wellbeing?
- The theory of relativity
- The categorical imperative
- The capabilities approach
- The social contract
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The capabilities approach. The approach asks what people are actually able to do and to be.
- Which philosopher is credited with the idea that the unexamined life is not worth living?
- Socrates
- Kant
- Locke
- Descartes
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Socrates. The words come from Plato's account of Socrates at his trial.
- Thomas Aquinas wrote a huge work called the Summa Theologiae. What did he try to combine?
- Buddhism and Hinduism
- Christian faith and Aristotle's reasoning
- Law and music
- Science and poetry
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Christian faith and Aristotle's reasoning. He was a teacher in medieval Europe.
- Mary Wollstonecraft's daughter, Mary Shelley, wrote which famous novel?
- Wuthering Heights
- Dracula
- Frankenstein
- Jane Eyre
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Frankenstein. Wollstonecraft is remembered for arguing that girls and boys deserve the same education.
- Which satirical novel by Voltaire follows a young man whose teacher says everything is for the best?
- Don Quixote
- Gulliver's Travels
- Robinson Crusoe
- Candide
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Candide. Voltaire was a champion of tolerance and free speech.
- At which famous English university did Sarvepalli Radhakrishnan hold a professorship?
- Edinburgh
- Durham
- Oxford
- Cambridge
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Oxford. He later became the second President of India.
- Swami Vivekananda was a disciple of which Indian saint?
- Ramakrishna
- Sri Aurobindo
- Ramana Maharshi
- Kabir
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Ramakrishna. Vivekananda brought Indian philosophy to a wide audience, including in Chicago in 1893.