The Role of Mathematics in Maupertuis’ Epistemology and Natural Philosophy Vlad DOLGHI Abstract. The aim of this paper is to pinpoint the pervasive connections between Maupertuis‟s theory of knowledge and his particular way of unifying Newtonian science by means of a physico-metaphysical principle, i.e. the Principle of Least Action (PLA). It focuses on how epistemology […]
Author: dti
Instances of Descartes’s Early Projectionism: the Correspondence with Ferrier
Instances of Descartes’s Early Projectionism: the Correspondence with Ferrier Invited editor: Ovidiu BABEȘ Abstract. This paper investigates Descartes‟s description of a lenscutting machine set forth in his early correspondence with the artisan Jean Ferrier. I argue that this episode of Descartes‟s mixed-mathematical practice goes beyond the traditional Aristotelian model of subalternation of sciences in two […]
Hume, the Problem of Content, and the Idea of the Identical Self
Hume, the Problem of Content, and the Idea of the Identical Self Anna ORTÍN NADAL* Abstract: After having presented his theory of personal identity in Book I, Part 4, Section 6 of A Treatise of Human Nature, Hume famously expressed a cryptic concern about it in the Appendix. This paper engages in the interpretative effort […]
A Skeptical View on Locke’s Theory of Personal Identity
A Skeptical View on Locke’s Theory of Personal Identity Xinghua WANG* Abstract: Locke‘s theory of personal identity has long been held to be the memory theory, or what is called the standard interpretation, i.e., a person a at t1 is identical to a person b at t2 if and only if a at 1 remembers […]
From Tranquillity to Agitation: Remedies Using the Imagination and the Passions in Early Modern Thought
From Tranquillity to Agitation: Remedies Using the Imagination and the Passions in Early Modern Thought Alexandra Ileana BACALU* Abstract: My concern in this paper is to contribute to the recovery of the therapeutic dimension of the early modern notion of imagination, which demands further interrogation despite the increased scholarly attention of recent years, by looking […]
Redeeming Enthusiasm: Enthusiasm and Reason in Shaftesbury’s The Moralists
Redeeming Enthusiasm: Enthusiasm and Reason in Shaftesbury’s The Moralists Francesca di POPPA* Abstract: In this paper, I will examine Shaftesbury‟s prima facie ambivalent attitude towards demonstrative reason, and its role in his discussion of “reasonable enthusiasm” in The Moralists. I will show that such attitude is heavily influenced by Epictetus, with whom Shaftesbury shares several […]
Inherence of False Beliefs in Spinoza’s Ethics
Inherence of False Beliefs in Spinoza’s Ethics Olivér István TÓTH* Abstract: In this paper I argue, based on a comparison of Spinoza‟s and Descartes‟s discussion of error, that beliefs are affirmations of the content of imagination that is not false in itself, only in relation to the object. This interpretation is an improvement both on […]
The Conatus of the Body in Spinoza’s Physics
The Conatus of the Body in Spinoza’s Physics Sean WINKLER* Abstract: In Part 3 of his Ethics, Baruch Spinoza identifies the conatus of the mind as „will‟ and of the mind and body together as „appetite‟/„desire,‟ but he does not identify the conatus of the body. This omission is curious, given that he describes „motion-and-rest‟ […]
Spinoza on Conatus, Inertia, and the Impossibility of Self-Destruction
Spinoza on Conatus, Inertia, and the Impossibility of Self-Destruction Filip BUYSE* Abstract: Spinoza (1632-1677) writes in the fourth proposition of the third part of his masterpiece, the Ethics (1677), the bold statement that self-destruction is impossible. This view seems to be very hard to understand given the fact that in our western world we have […]
Revitalizing Kuhn’s Philosophies of Science
Revitalizing Kuhn’s Philosophies of Science Laura GEORGESCU* In 2005, James Marcum published Thomas Kuhn’s Revolution: An Historical Philosophy of Science. That earlier book aimed to show that Kuhn was a ―a major contributor to the historiographic revolution in the mid-twentieth century,‖ a revolution that influenced ―the very understanding of science itself.‖1 In Thomas Kuhn’s Revolutions: […]