Causation and laws of nature in early modern philosophy /
Walter Ott.
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| Summary: | Some philosophers think physical explanations stand on their own: what happens, happens because things have the properties they do. Others think that any such explanation is incomplete: what happens in the physical world must be partly due to the laws of nature. Causation and Laws of Nature in Early Modern Philosophy examines the debate between these views from Descartes to Hume. Ott argues that the competing models of causation in the period grow out of the scholastic notion of power. On this Aristotelian view, the connection between cause and effect is logically necessary. Causes are 'intrinsically directed' at what they produce. But when the Aristotelian view is faced with the challenge of mechanism, the core notion of a power splits into two models, each of which persists throughout the early modern period. It is only when seen in this light that the key arguments of the period can reveal their true virtues and flaws. To make his case, Ott explores such central topics as intentionality, the varieties of necessity, and the nature of relations. Arguing for controversial readings of many of the canonical figures, the book also focuses on lesser-known writers such as Pierre-Sylvain Régis, Nicolas Malebranche, and Robert Boyle. |
| Format: | Book |
| Language: | English |
| Published / Created: |
Oxford ; New York :
Oxford University Press,
2009.
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| Subjects: | |
| Notes: | Includes bibliographical references (pages 251-258) and index. Physical description: xii, 260 pages ; 24 cm more |
| ISBN: | 9780199570430 0199570434 9780199664689 0199664684 |
Table of Contents:
Introduction
Themes
The origin and status of laws of nature
The ontology of powers
Necessity
Models of causation
Plan of the book
The Aristotelian background
Necessity
The ontology of relations
Manifest and occult qualities
The Cartesian predicament
What mechanism isn't
The rejection of Aristotelianism
The nude wax : Cartesian ontology
The laws of nature
Force
Occasionalism
The concurrentist reading
The argument from laws of nature
Thoroughgoing occasionalism
The problem of mental causation
The dialectic of occasionalism
Malebranche and the cognitive model of causation
The argument from nonsense
The argument from elimination
The divine concursus argument
'Little souls' revisited
The 'no necessary connection' argument
The epistemic argument
Laws and divine volitions
The content of divine volitions
The problem of efficacious laws
Causation and explanation
A scholastic mechanism
Régis against the occasionalists
Power and necessity
A dead cadaverous thing
Relations and powers
Boyle's paradox
Boyle and the concurrentists
Locke on relations
Locke on powers : the geometrical model
Locke's mechanisms
Hume
The two Humes
Intentionality
Meaning
Against the positivist reading
Signification
Judgment and belief
Semiotic empiricism
Relative ideas
The argument from nonsense
Necessity
Finding Hume's target
Against the cognitive and geometrical models
The neighboring fields
The practicality requirement
Relations
The status of relations
Two kinds of relations
The nature of necessity
The definition of causation
The problem
Subjectivism or projectivism?
Conclusion.
Introduction
Themes
The origin and status of laws of nature
The ontology of powers
Necessity
Models of causation
Plan of the book
The Aristotelian background
Necessity
The ontology of relations
Manifest and occult qualities
The Cartesian predicament
What mechanism isn't
The rejection of Aristotelianism
The nude wax : Cartesian ontology
The laws of nature
Force
Occasionalism
The concurrentist reading
The argument from laws of nature
Thoroughgoing occasionalism
The problem of mental causation
The dialectic of occasionalism
Malebranche and the cognitive model of causation
The argument from nonsense
The argument from elimination
The divine concursus argument
'Little souls' revisited
The 'no necessary connection' argument
The epistemic argument
Laws and divine volitions
The content of divine volitions
The problem of efficacious laws
Causation and explanation
A scholastic mechanism
Régis against the occasionalists
Power and necessity
A dead cadaverous thing
Relations and powers
Boyle's paradox
Boyle and the concurrentists
Locke on relations
Locke on powers : the geometrical model
Locke's mechanisms
Hume
The two Humes
Intentionality
Meaning
Against the positivist reading
Signification
Judgment and belief
Semiotic empiricism
Relative ideas
The argument from nonsense
Necessity
Finding Hume's target
Against the cognitive and geometrical models
The neighboring fields
The practicality requirement
Relations
The status of relations
Two kinds of relations
The nature of necessity
The definition of causation
The problem
Subjectivism or projectivism?
Conclusion.