Rodin’s Thinker, originally created to represent Dante Alighieri contemplating his epic poem The Divine Comedy, has become a symbol of critical thinking and the pursuit of knowledge and truth.
In White Rose Magazine’s exhibit, The Thinker, we highlight six foundational thinkers who have helped formulate methodologies to pursue truth. The Aristotelian and Socratic methods devised disciplines, through questioning, deductive reasoning, and empirical observations to challenge assumptions and arrive at an objective truth. Plato, from the standpoint of idealism, formulated an external idea of “the Good.”
Similarly, Aquinas and Maimonides pursued similar methods for theological and scientific arguments, and Francis Bacon, known as the father of the scientific method, applied these techniques and others in creating his Baconian method.
These six thinkers helped lay the foundation of modern critical thinking methodologies.
Auguste Rodin, The Thinker (1880–1904). Bronze. Cleveland Museum of Art, Cleveland, Ohio.
Bust of Socrates. Roman copy (first century C.E.), perhaps after bronze original by Lysippos (c. 390–300 B.C.E.). Louvre Museum, Paris.
The only true wisdom is in knowing you know nothing.
Socrates (c. 470–399 B.C.E.)
Bust of Plato. Roman copy (c. first century C.E.), after original (c. 370 B.C.E.) by Silanion. Capitoline Museum, Rome.
Opinion is the medium between knowledge and ignorance.
Plato (c. 428–c. 347 B.C.E.)
Bust of Aristotle. Marble. Roman copy (c. first century C.E.), after bronze original (c. 330 B.C.E.) by Lysippos. National Roman Museum of the Altemps Palace, Rome.
Plato is dear to me, but dearer still is truth.
Aristotle (384–322 B.C.E.)
Amadeo Ruiz Olmos, Maimonides Monument (1964). Bronze. Plaza de Tiberíades, Jewish Quarter, Córdoba.
Teach thy tongue to say “I do not know,” and thou shalt progress.
Moses Maimonides (1135 / 1138–1204)
Carlo Crivelli, Saint Thomas Aquinas (1476). Tempera on poplar panel. National Gallery, London.
The greatest kindness one can render to any man consists in leading him to truth.
Thomas Aquinas (c. 1225–1274)
Paul van Somer I, Portrait of Francis Bacon (1617). Oil on panel. Łazienki Palace, Warsaw.
The monuments of wit survive the monuments of power.
Francis Bacon (1561–1626)
