Today we talk about postpositivism. But which positivism is it that postpositivism would leave behind? It would appear to be the neopositivism or logical positivism of the Vienna Circle more than the positivism of Auguste Comte. This way of considering positivism is emblematic of a certain bias: the history of French philosophy of science has been relatively neglected compared to that of Central Europe. Some great figures, such as Pierre Duhem or Henri Poincaré, are taken into consideration, but they are most often treated as if their philosophy were entirely their own creation, much like Athena springing from the head of Zeus. The reality is different: Duhem’s and Poincaré’s thought, each in their own way, has historical roots in the original positivism of Auguste Comte. There is a certain irony to this neglect of the Comtean tradition. While the Vienna Circle logical positivists borrowed half of their name from it, they were hardly interested in studying the source of this philosophy. This relative lack of interest in the development of positivist ideas in France is somewhat paradoxical if we consider, for example, the political dimension that scholars of Vienna Circle have claimed in the thought of Rudolf Carnap,OttoNeurath,HansHahn, and Philip Frank. Such allegations are controversial: even though logical positivists may have had a political agenda, its connection with their philosophy of science is
{"title":"Special Issue Introduction","authors":"W. Schmaus, Olivier Rey","doi":"10.1086/715974","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1086/715974","url":null,"abstract":"Today we talk about postpositivism. But which positivism is it that postpositivism would leave behind? It would appear to be the neopositivism or logical positivism of the Vienna Circle more than the positivism of Auguste Comte. This way of considering positivism is emblematic of a certain bias: the history of French philosophy of science has been relatively neglected compared to that of Central Europe. Some great figures, such as Pierre Duhem or Henri Poincaré, are taken into consideration, but they are most often treated as if their philosophy were entirely their own creation, much like Athena springing from the head of Zeus. The reality is different: Duhem’s and Poincaré’s thought, each in their own way, has historical roots in the original positivism of Auguste Comte. There is a certain irony to this neglect of the Comtean tradition. While the Vienna Circle logical positivists borrowed half of their name from it, they were hardly interested in studying the source of this philosophy. This relative lack of interest in the development of positivist ideas in France is somewhat paradoxical if we consider, for example, the political dimension that scholars of Vienna Circle have claimed in the thought of Rudolf Carnap,OttoNeurath,HansHahn, and Philip Frank. Such allegations are controversial: even though logical positivists may have had a political agenda, its connection with their philosophy of science is","PeriodicalId":42878,"journal":{"name":"HOPOS-The Journal of the International Society for the History of Philosophy of Science","volume":"23 1","pages":"421 - 427"},"PeriodicalIF":0.4,"publicationDate":"2021-09-01","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"78981169","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
{"title":"The Chemical Philosophy of Robert Boyle: Mechanism, Chymical Atoms, and Emergence, by Marina Paola Banchetti-Robino","authors":"William Eaton","doi":"10.1086/715881","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1086/715881","url":null,"abstract":"","PeriodicalId":42878,"journal":{"name":"HOPOS-The Journal of the International Society for the History of Philosophy of Science","volume":"1 1","pages":""},"PeriodicalIF":0.4,"publicationDate":"2021-07-14","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"78137009","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
In Die Zahlen (1888), Dedekind defines an infinite set as a set that is isomorphic with one of its proper parts. In The World and the Individual (1900), the American philosopher Josiah Royce relates Dedekind’s notion to Fichte’s and Hegel’s concept of Self defined as an entity that reflects itself into itself. The first aim of this article is to explain Royce’s analysis and to put it in its proper context, that of a critique of Bradley’s mystical idealism. The second aim is to urge a shift in focus in Dedekind’s scholarship: instead of addressing the question of the relationship between mathematics and philosophy in Dedekind’s work through the supposed intentions of its author, it is more fruitful to analyze the reception that philosophers have made of his texts.
{"title":"Infinity and the Self: Royce on Dedekind","authors":"S. Gandon","doi":"10.1086/715874","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1086/715874","url":null,"abstract":"In Die Zahlen (1888), Dedekind defines an infinite set as a set that is isomorphic with one of its proper parts. In The World and the Individual (1900), the American philosopher Josiah Royce relates Dedekind’s notion to Fichte’s and Hegel’s concept of Self defined as an entity that reflects itself into itself. The first aim of this article is to explain Royce’s analysis and to put it in its proper context, that of a critique of Bradley’s mystical idealism. The second aim is to urge a shift in focus in Dedekind’s scholarship: instead of addressing the question of the relationship between mathematics and philosophy in Dedekind’s work through the supposed intentions of its author, it is more fruitful to analyze the reception that philosophers have made of his texts.","PeriodicalId":42878,"journal":{"name":"HOPOS-The Journal of the International Society for the History of Philosophy of Science","volume":"20 1","pages":"354 - 382"},"PeriodicalIF":0.4,"publicationDate":"2021-06-28","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"73600087","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
{"title":"Erich H. Reck and Georg Schiemer, editors, The Prehistory of Mathematical Structuralism","authors":"A. Sereni","doi":"10.1086/715882","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1086/715882","url":null,"abstract":"","PeriodicalId":42878,"journal":{"name":"HOPOS-The Journal of the International Society for the History of Philosophy of Science","volume":"76 1","pages":""},"PeriodicalIF":0.4,"publicationDate":"2021-06-28","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"88574759","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
Recent research has brought to light numerous facts that go against received views of the development of philosophy of science. One encounters several concepts, claims, or projects much earlier than is generally acknowledged. Auguste Comte was careful to distinguish each major science with respect to method and object, speaking of mathematical philosophy, biological philosophy, sociological philosophy, and so forth. He thereby in a sense anticipated the regionalist turn: philosophical analysis should be carried out with respect to a specific body of knowledge. He also adopted a general perspective, a scientific philosophy. In the light of new discoveries, later thinkers such as Pierre Duhem, Gaston Milhaud, and Abel Rey endeavored to reformulate Comte’s doctrine as a neopositivism, a logical positivism, or an absolute positivism. The aim of this article is to examine the constitutive concepts mentioned and the controversies that hinge on them, in an effort to reach a precise understanding of the aim, scope, and import of philosophy of science in the context of nineteenth-century France.
{"title":"How Did Philosophy of Science Come About?","authors":"Anastasios Brenner","doi":"10.1086/715875","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1086/715875","url":null,"abstract":"Recent research has brought to light numerous facts that go against received views of the development of philosophy of science. One encounters several concepts, claims, or projects much earlier than is generally acknowledged. Auguste Comte was careful to distinguish each major science with respect to method and object, speaking of mathematical philosophy, biological philosophy, sociological philosophy, and so forth. He thereby in a sense anticipated the regionalist turn: philosophical analysis should be carried out with respect to a specific body of knowledge. He also adopted a general perspective, a scientific philosophy. In the light of new discoveries, later thinkers such as Pierre Duhem, Gaston Milhaud, and Abel Rey endeavored to reformulate Comte’s doctrine as a neopositivism, a logical positivism, or an absolute positivism. The aim of this article is to examine the constitutive concepts mentioned and the controversies that hinge on them, in an effort to reach a precise understanding of the aim, scope, and import of philosophy of science in the context of nineteenth-century France.","PeriodicalId":42878,"journal":{"name":"HOPOS-The Journal of the International Society for the History of Philosophy of Science","volume":"81 1","pages":"428 - 445"},"PeriodicalIF":0.4,"publicationDate":"2021-06-28","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"72723690","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
{"title":"Stefano Bordoni. When Historiography Met Epistemology: Sophisticated Histories and Philosophies of Science in French-speaking Countries in the Second Half of the Nineteenth Century.","authors":"W. Schmaus","doi":"10.1086/715580","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1086/715580","url":null,"abstract":"","PeriodicalId":42878,"journal":{"name":"HOPOS-The Journal of the International Society for the History of Philosophy of Science","volume":"57 1","pages":""},"PeriodicalIF":0.4,"publicationDate":"2021-06-28","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"87554585","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
Henri Poincaré’s philosophy of science has been widely studied and has been related to other important scientific and philosophical figures such as Einstein, Hilbert, Helmholtz, Duhem, and even Bergson. Poincaré refers to many people in his works, but there is one name that appears repeatedly in his texts, in particular when he develops his general views on the value of science. That is Édouard Le Roy. There is a lack of secondary sources on Le Roy’s work and, when compared to Poincaré, references are usually given to Poincaré’s interpretation of his works and not to Le Roy himself. When writing on the value of science, Poincaré structures his discourse as a reply to Le Roy’s views. This paper aims at clarifying why it was so important for Poincaré to reply to Le Roy. To do that, we will discuss the figure of Le Roy in the context of the time, his philosophy (which he called nouveau positivisme), and the relation between Poincaré’s philosophical position and Le Roy’s. This will make Le Roy’s work more familiar to contemporary audiences but will also clarify some controversial aspects in Poincaré’s position.
{"title":"Poincaré, Le Roy, and the Nouveau positivisme","authors":"M. Paz","doi":"10.1086/715880","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1086/715880","url":null,"abstract":"Henri Poincaré’s philosophy of science has been widely studied and has been related to other important scientific and philosophical figures such as Einstein, Hilbert, Helmholtz, Duhem, and even Bergson. Poincaré refers to many people in his works, but there is one name that appears repeatedly in his texts, in particular when he develops his general views on the value of science. That is Édouard Le Roy. There is a lack of secondary sources on Le Roy’s work and, when compared to Poincaré, references are usually given to Poincaré’s interpretation of his works and not to Le Roy himself. When writing on the value of science, Poincaré structures his discourse as a reply to Le Roy’s views. This paper aims at clarifying why it was so important for Poincaré to reply to Le Roy. To do that, we will discuss the figure of Le Roy in the context of the time, his philosophy (which he called nouveau positivisme), and the relation between Poincaré’s philosophical position and Le Roy’s. This will make Le Roy’s work more familiar to contemporary audiences but will also clarify some controversial aspects in Poincaré’s position.","PeriodicalId":42878,"journal":{"name":"HOPOS-The Journal of the International Society for the History of Philosophy of Science","volume":"105 1","pages":"446 - 460"},"PeriodicalIF":0.4,"publicationDate":"2021-06-28","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"86962062","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
Anne Conway’s philosophy has been categorized as “vitalism,” “vital monism,” “spiritualism,” “monistic spiritualism,” “immaterial vitalism,” and “antimaterialism.” While there is no doubt that she is a monist and a vitalist, problems arise with the categories of “spiritualism,” “immaterial vitalism,” and “antimaterialism.” Conway conceives of created substances as gross and fixed spirit, or rarefied and volatile matter. While interpreters agree that Conway’s “spirit” shares characteristics traditionally attributed to matter (e.g., extension, divisibility, impenetrability), and that she is critical of Henry More’s immaterial spirit, Conway’s spirit is still conceived as an immaterial soul-like or mind-like entity. I argue that Conway’s vitalism is material, and is best understood in the tradition of Renaissance vital naturalism. First, Conway does not criticize materialism per se, only mechanical materialism, which characterizes matter as lifeless. Her vitalism has to be materialistic in some sense, since only God is an immaterial substance. Second, Conway’s conceptions of matter and spirit, the language she uses, and the fact that she attributes thinking to extended, divisible, and impenetrable substances all place her within the tradition of Renaissance vital naturalism, wherein Bernardino Telesio, Tommaso Campanella, and Francis Bacon used “spirit” to account for all natural processes.
{"title":"Anne Conway’s Exceptional Vitalism: Material Spirits and Active Matter","authors":"Doina‐Cristina Rusu","doi":"10.1086/715883","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1086/715883","url":null,"abstract":"Anne Conway’s philosophy has been categorized as “vitalism,” “vital monism,” “spiritualism,” “monistic spiritualism,” “immaterial vitalism,” and “antimaterialism.” While there is no doubt that she is a monist and a vitalist, problems arise with the categories of “spiritualism,” “immaterial vitalism,” and “antimaterialism.” Conway conceives of created substances as gross and fixed spirit, or rarefied and volatile matter. While interpreters agree that Conway’s “spirit” shares characteristics traditionally attributed to matter (e.g., extension, divisibility, impenetrability), and that she is critical of Henry More’s immaterial spirit, Conway’s spirit is still conceived as an immaterial soul-like or mind-like entity. I argue that Conway’s vitalism is material, and is best understood in the tradition of Renaissance vital naturalism. First, Conway does not criticize materialism per se, only mechanical materialism, which characterizes matter as lifeless. Her vitalism has to be materialistic in some sense, since only God is an immaterial substance. Second, Conway’s conceptions of matter and spirit, the language she uses, and the fact that she attributes thinking to extended, divisible, and impenetrable substances all place her within the tradition of Renaissance vital naturalism, wherein Bernardino Telesio, Tommaso Campanella, and Francis Bacon used “spirit” to account for all natural processes.","PeriodicalId":42878,"journal":{"name":"HOPOS-The Journal of the International Society for the History of Philosophy of Science","volume":"20 1","pages":"528 - 546"},"PeriodicalIF":0.4,"publicationDate":"2021-06-28","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"85413872","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
Jan Baptist van Helmont’s development of the Paracelsian theory of the Archeus is often considered uncomfortably close to the animist theory that the specificity of organic bodies is largely due to the soul. In this paper, I argue that the historical assimilation of these two positions is mistaken. I show that van Helmont introduced his theory of the Archeus on the grounds that it guaranteed that natural processes are properly natural, and that his theory was driven by a specific conception of what it means for a process to be properly natural. I also argue that the specific way in which van Helmont developed his theory of the Archeus put him at odds with the more animist positions defended in his own time, and that he stressed rather than downplayed the efficacy of natural secondary causes. This analysis runs counter to both the long tradition of reading van Helmont’s theory as a species of animism, and the more recent tendency to stress those Christian dimensions of his thought that seem to imply the inefficacy of natural causes.
{"title":"Soul, Archeus, and Nature in van Helmont’s Medical Naturalism","authors":"B. Demarest","doi":"10.1086/715877","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1086/715877","url":null,"abstract":"Jan Baptist van Helmont’s development of the Paracelsian theory of the Archeus is often considered uncomfortably close to the animist theory that the specificity of organic bodies is largely due to the soul. In this paper, I argue that the historical assimilation of these two positions is mistaken. I show that van Helmont introduced his theory of the Archeus on the grounds that it guaranteed that natural processes are properly natural, and that his theory was driven by a specific conception of what it means for a process to be properly natural. I also argue that the specific way in which van Helmont developed his theory of the Archeus put him at odds with the more animist positions defended in his own time, and that he stressed rather than downplayed the efficacy of natural secondary causes. This analysis runs counter to both the long tradition of reading van Helmont’s theory as a species of animism, and the more recent tendency to stress those Christian dimensions of his thought that seem to imply the inefficacy of natural causes.","PeriodicalId":42878,"journal":{"name":"HOPOS-The Journal of the International Society for the History of Philosophy of Science","volume":"26 1","pages":"564 - 584"},"PeriodicalIF":0.4,"publicationDate":"2021-06-28","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"82473122","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
This paper explores Cavendish’s argument for what she calls “animate matter.” Her commitment to the ubiquity of animate matter, styled “Cavendish’s animism,” is presented as the conclusion of an inference to the best explanation of nature’s order. The reconstruction of Cavendish’s argument begins with an examination of the relationship between God’s creation of our world and the order produced through nature’s wise governance of her parts. Cavendish’s materialism and anti-atomism are presented as ingredients in her final account of God’s ordering of the world by making it a self-moving whole. On the present account of Cavendish’s metaphysics, this self-moving whole then freely produces the regular motions that constitute its ordering of itself, as a distinct ordering beyond God’s initial act of creating our world. The depth of Cavendish’s commitment to the animistic elements of her materialism—or in other words, the extent to which her system is genuinely animistic—is then considered.
{"title":"The Life of the Thrice Sensitive, Rational and Wise Animate Matter: Cavendish’s Animism","authors":"Jonathan L. Shaheen","doi":"10.1086/715872","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1086/715872","url":null,"abstract":"This paper explores Cavendish’s argument for what she calls “animate matter.” Her commitment to the ubiquity of animate matter, styled “Cavendish’s animism,” is presented as the conclusion of an inference to the best explanation of nature’s order. The reconstruction of Cavendish’s argument begins with an examination of the relationship between God’s creation of our world and the order produced through nature’s wise governance of her parts. Cavendish’s materialism and anti-atomism are presented as ingredients in her final account of God’s ordering of the world by making it a self-moving whole. On the present account of Cavendish’s metaphysics, this self-moving whole then freely produces the regular motions that constitute its ordering of itself, as a distinct ordering beyond God’s initial act of creating our world. The depth of Cavendish’s commitment to the animistic elements of her materialism—or in other words, the extent to which her system is genuinely animistic—is then considered.","PeriodicalId":42878,"journal":{"name":"HOPOS-The Journal of the International Society for the History of Philosophy of Science","volume":"116 1","pages":"621 - 641"},"PeriodicalIF":0.4,"publicationDate":"2021-06-28","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"87928928","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
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