Friedrich Paulsen, German philosopher and educator, was born at Langenhorn (Schleswig) and educated at Erlangen, Bonn and Berlin, where he became extraordinary professor of philosophy and pedagogy in 1878. In 1896 he succeeded Eduard Zeller as professor of moral philosophy at Berlin.

He was the greatest of the pupils of Gustav Theodor Fechner, to whose doctrine of panpsychism he gave great prominence by his Einleiiung in die Philosophie (1892; 7th ed., 1900; Eng. trans., 1895). He went, however, considerably beyond Fechner in attempting to give an epistemological account of the knowledge of the psychophysical. Admitting Kant's hypothesis that by inner sense we are conscious of mental states only, he holds that this consciousness constitutes a knowledge of the thing-in-itself which Kant denies.

Soul is, therefore, a practical reality which Paulsen, with Schopenhauer, regards as known by the act of will. But this will is neither rational desire, unconscious irrational will, nor conscious intelligent will, but an instinct, a will to live (Zielstrebigkeit), often subconscious, pursuing ends, indeed, but without reasoning as to means.

This conception of will, though consistent and convenient to the main thesis, must be rigidly distinguished from the ordinary significance of will, i.e. rational desire. Paulsen is almost better known for his educational writings than as a pure philosopher. His German Education, Past and Present (Eng. trans., by I. Lorenz, 1907) is a work of great value.

Among his other works are:

1. Versuch einer Entwickelunggeschichte der Kantischen Erkenntnistheorie (Leipzig, 1875);
2. Im. Kant (1898, 1899);
3. Gründung, Organisation und Lebensordnungen der deutschen Universitäten im Mittelaiter (in Sybels Histor. Zeitschr. vol. xlv. 1881);
4. Geschichte des gelehrten Unterrichts auf den deutschen Schulen unnd Universitäten (1885, 1896);
5. System der Ethik (1889, 1899; Eng. Trans.)