PHILOSOPHER

Julien Offray de La Mettrie

1709 - 1751

Photo of Julien Offray de La Mettrie

Icon of person Julien Offray de La Mettrie

Julien Offray de La Mettrie (French: [ɔfʁɛ də la metʁi]; November 23, 1709 – November 11, 1751) was a French physician and philosopher, and one of the earliest of the French materialists of the Enlightenment. He is best known for his 1747 work L'homme machine (Man a Machine). La Mettrie is most remembered for taking the position that humans are complex animals and no more have souls than other animals do. He considered that the mind is part of the body and that life should be lived so as to produce pleasure (hedonism). Read more on Wikipedia

His biography is available in different languages on Wikipedia. Julien Offray de La Mettrie is the 180th most popular philosopher (up from 182nd in 2019), the 405th most popular biography from France (up from 409th in 2019) and the 18th most popular French Philosopher.

Julien Offray de la Mettrie is most famous for his philosophical work L'homme machine, in which he argues that humans are like machines and that the mind is nothing more than a function of the brain.

Memorability Metrics

Loading...

Page views of Julien Offray de La Mettrie by language

Loading...

Among PHILOSOPHERS

Among philosophers, Julien Offray de La Mettrie ranks 180 out of 1,267. Before him are Mikhail Bakhtin, Posidonius, Marquis de Condorcet, Hippias, Jean Buridan, and Ram Mohan Roy. After him are Carl Schmitt, Cesare Beccaria, Maurice Merleau-Ponty, Claude Adrien Helvétius, Jean Baudrillard, and Sextus Empiricus.

Most Popular Philosophers in Wikipedia

Go to all Rankings
Load previousLoad previous

Contemporaries

Among people born in 1709, Julien Offray de La Mettrie ranks 2. Before him is Elizabeth of Russia. After him are Samuel Johnson, Jacques de Vaucanson, Georg Wilhelm Steller, Franz Benda, Wilhelmine of Prussia, Margravine of Brandenburg-Bayreuth, Anne, Princess Royal and Princess of Orange, Gabriel Bonnot de Mably, Johann Georg Gmelin, Andreas Sigismund Marggraf, and Louise Élisabeth d'Orléans. Among people deceased in 1751, Julien Offray de La Mettrie ranks 2. Before him is Tomaso Albinoni. After him are Frederick I of Sweden, William IV, Prince of Orange, Frederick, Prince of Wales, Jean Philippe Loys de Cheseaux, Louise of Great Britain, Tokugawa Yoshimune, Jacques I, Prince of Monaco, Leonard of Port Maurice, Christopher Polhem, and Nicola Salvi.

Others Born in 1709

Go to all Rankings
Load previousLoad previous

Others Deceased in 1751

Go to all Rankings
Load previousLoad previous

In France

Among people born in France, Julien Offray de La Mettrie ranks 405 out of 6,770. Before him are Louis Antoine de Saint-Just (1767), Louis IV of France (920), Gustave Moreau (1826), Jules Rimet (1873), Albert Fert (1938), and Frédéric Auguste Bartholdi (1834). After him are Jean-Pierre Sauvage (1944), Charles, Count of Valois (1270), Patrice de MacMahon (1808), Françoise d'Aubigné, Marquise de Maintenon (1635), Jean Dubuffet (1901), and Paul Valéry (1871).

Others born in France

Go to all Rankings
Load previousLoad previous

Among PHILOSOPHERS In France

Among philosophers born in France, Julien Offray de La Mettrie ranks 18. Before him are Henri de Saint-Simon (1760), Simone Weil (1909), Charles Fourier (1772), Paul Ricœur (1913), Marquis de Condorcet (1743), and Jean Buridan (1295). After him are Maurice Merleau-Ponty (1908), Claude Adrien Helvétius (1715), Jean Baudrillard (1929), Pierre Gassendi (1592), Pierre Bayle (1647), and Ernest Renan (1823).

French born Philosophers

Go to all Rankings
Load previousLoad previous