Morteza Mardiha

Morteza Mardiha, born August 3, 1960, in Isfahan, is a philosopher, writer, translator, journalist, and university professor. He has worked in philosophy, social sciences, political theory, communications, and literature, and is best known for his defense of rationality, liberalism, and analytic philosophy, as well as his critique of idealistic and leftist traditions.

Mardiha earned his master's degree in Islamic Theology and Philosophy at the University of Tehran, then studied philosophy and methodology in France at the universities of Toulouse and Nantes. During the Reform Era, he contributed to newspapers such as Jame'eh, Tous, and Neshat, and later taught in the philosophy department and subsequently the communications department at Allameh Tabataba'i University.

Mardiha is an advocate of analytic philosophy, empiricism, critical rationality, and liberalism. He takes a critical stance toward continental philosophies, grand ideologies, political romanticism, utopian leftism, and relativism. In his view, much of the intellectual appeal in Iran stems from ambiguity, passion, unregulated complexity, and grand promises; whereas the Anglo-Saxon tradition and philosophers such as Hume, Mill, Popper, and Quine, due to their precision, moderation, and clarity, are less exciting but far more beneficial.

He is also among the figures who have introduced and defended liberalism, utilitarianism, the philosophy of science, rational choice theory, and the critique of anti-liberal intellectualism in Persian. Alongside this theoretical dimension, Mardiha possesses a distinctive literary prose and has, in some of his works, engaged with love, classical Persian literature, Rumi, Saadi, and Hafez.