The Rise of Modern Philosophy: The Tension Between the New and Traditional Philosophies from Machiavelli to LeibnizClarendon Press, 1993 - 352 pages "Modern" philosophy in the West is said to have begun with Bacon and Descartes. Their methodological and metaphysical writings, in conjunction with the discoveries that marked the seventeenth-century scientific revolution, are supposed to have interred both Aristotelian and scholastic science and the philosophy that supported it. But did the new or "modern" philosophy effect a complete break with what preceded it? Were Bacon and Descartes untainted by scholastic influences? The theme of this book is that the new and traditional philosophies have much more in common than the orthodox account suggests. The contributors consider not only modernity in metaphysics and the sciences but also the claims of Machiavelli, Hobbes, and Spinoza to have invented "modern" ethics and politics. These two aspects of "modernity" in philosophy are connected for the first time. The book offers a broad view of the early modern philosophers, covering not only the much-studied major figures but also relatively neglected writers: Mersenne, Gassendi, White, and Sergeant. |
Contents
Scepticism and Modernity | 15 |
The Vitality and Importance of Early Modern | 33 |
Modern Scholastic or Renaissance | 63 |
Francis Bacon Authority and the Moderns | 71 |
The Debate over | 89 |
The Compromise | 107 |
A New Start? Cartesian Metaphysics and the Emergence | 145 |
Descartes and Some Cartesians | 167 |
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according argued argument Aristotelian philosophy Aristotle Aristotle's atomism authority Bacon believed body Cambridge Cartesian causal cause Christian claims conception Copernican critical CSMK Descartes Descartes's Diogenes Laertius Discourse discussion disputation distinction divine doctrine early modern Epicurean Epicurus Essay Ethics example explain fact Francis Bacon Galileo Harmonie universelle Heereboord history of philosophy Hobbes human humanists Ibid important intellectual interpretation judgement knowledge learning Leibniz Leiden letter Locke London Machiavelli Malebranche Marin Mersenne mathematical mechanical philosophy medieval Meditations Mersenne's metaphysics method modern philosophy moral natural philosophy notion Oxford Paris passions perfect philo physics Pierre Gassendi Plato political Popkin preface principles Pyrrhonism Querelle question Raey rational real essence reason reform rejected religion Renaissance scepticism scholastic scholasticism scientific sense Sergeant seventeenth century sophy soul Spinoza Stoic Stoicism substance texts theology theory things Thomas Thomas Hobbes thought tradition true truth understanding universe virtue virtuous White