Intellectual history still quite commonly distinguishes between the episode we know as the Scientific Revolution, and its successor era, the Enlightenment, in terms of the calculatory and quantifying zeal of the former—the age of mechanics—and the rather scientifically lackadaisical mood of the latter, more concerned with freedom, public space and aesthetics. It is possible to challenge this distinction in a variety of ways, but the approach I examine here, in which the focus on an emerging scientific field or cluster of (...) disciplines—the ‘life sciences’, particularly natural history, medicine, and physiology —is, not Romantically anti-scientific, but resolutely anti-mathematical. Diderot bluntly states, in his Thoughts on the interpretation of nature, that “We are on the verge of a great revolution in the sciences. Given the taste people seem to have for morals, belles-lettres, the history of nature and experimental physics, I dare say that before a hundred years, there will not be more than three great geometricians remaining in Europe. The science will stop short where the Bernoullis, the Eulers, the Maupertuis, the Clairauts, the Fontaines and the D’Alemberts will have left it.... We will not go beyond.” Similarly, Buffon in the first discourse of his Histoire naturelle speaks of the “over-reliance on mathematical sciences,” given that mathematical truths are merely “definitional” and “demonstrative,” and thereby “abstract, intellectual and arbitrary.” Earlier in the Thoughts, Diderot judges “the thing of the mathematician” to have “as little existence in nature as that of the gambler.” Significantly, this attitude—taken by great scientists who also translated Newton or wrote careful papers on probability theory, as well as by others such as Mandeville—participates in the effort to conceptualize what we might call a new ontology for the emerging life sciences, very different from both the ‘iatromechanism’ and the ‘animism’ of earlier generations, which either failed to account for specifically living, goal-directed features of organisms, or accounted for them in supernaturalistic terms by appealing to an ‘anima’ as explanatory principle. Anti-mathematicism here is then a key component of a naturalistic, open-ended project to give a successful reductionist model of explanation in ‘natural history’, a model which is no more vitalist than it is materialist—but which is fairly far removed from early modern mechanism. (shrink)

This paper examines the Leibnizian influence in Deleuze's theory of the spatium. Leibniz's critique of Cartesian extension and Newtonian space leads him to a conception of space in terms of internal determination and internal difference. Space is thus understood as a structure of individual relations internal to substances. Making some Nietzschean corrections to Leibniz, Deleuze understands the spatium in terms of individuating differences instead of individual relations. Leibnizian space is thus transformed into a genetic space producing both extension (quantity) and (...) quality. (shrink)

Resumen En la siguiente discusión presento algunas objeciones al artículo de Federico Raffo Quintana “La noción de ‘espacio’ en los escritos juveniles de Leibniz”.1 Contra la interpretación de Raffo, quien considera que la concepción del espacio como lugar universal de las cosas es una idea que Leibniz abandona de manera muy temprana -según el autor en 1671-, intento mostrar que esta concepción trasciende sin duda el periodo de los escritos juveniles de Leibniz y que ciertas confusiones conceptuales en la lectura (...) de Raffo hacen que, en vez de ver una armónica continuidad en la teoría del espacio de Leibniz, vea en ella una ruptura en su evolución histórica, a la que, además, asocia algunas dicotomías discutibles o espurias.In this paper I introduce objections to Federico Raffo Quintana’s paper “The Notion of ‘Space’ in the Young Leibniz Writings”. Against Raffo, who considers that the Leibnizian conception of space as the universal place of things is an idea that Leibniz early abandons -Raffo says in 1671-, I will try to show that such a conception goes beyond the Leibniz’s young writings and that it is because of some conceptual confusions in Raffo’s survey that he, instead of seeing a harmonic continuity in Leibniz’s theory of space, sees a rupture in its historical evolution, associating to it some disputable or spurious dichotomies. (shrink)

Partimos da perspectiva que nos convida a observar que a leitura que Bergson faz sobre Leibniz tanto nos seus cursos, quanto em Possível e o Real e em A Evolução Criadora participam da construção de um modelo de individuação no âmbito filosofia bergsoniana. No curso sobre o opúsculo De rerum natura originatione, Bergson propõe uma avaliação sobre o finalismo metafísico leibniziano a partir da noção do possível e sua relação com o princípio da harmonia pré-estabelecida. Neste artigo, pretende-se mostrar que (...) as implicações decorrentes da leitura de Leibniz são conservadas até as proposições sobre o elã vital e as tendências. (shrink)

RésuméCet article propose de concevoir le dissensus moins comme le constat d’un désaccord irréductible que comme le point de départ d’un processus visant à élaborer un territoire épistémique commun. Dans le travail argumentatif de confrontation des désaccords, il ne s’agit pas d’identifier le dispositif qui conduit à un accord via la délibération rationnelle. Il s’agit plutôt de comprendre comment le dissensus permet de construire des communautés plurielles. Il discute certains textes de philosophie politique, où semble centrale la question de l’accord (...) comme horizon d’attente des confrontations argumentatives. L’article utilise cette hypothèse pour analyser la diffusion de la dynamique de Leibniz dans sa correspondance avec De Volder. Cette analyse permet de montrer que le dissensus n’est pas un obstacle mais le socle à partir duquel de multiples diffusions sont possibles. (shrink)

Résumé Cet article propose de concevoir le dissensus moins comme le constat d’un désaccord irréductible que comme le point de départ d’un processus visant à élaborer un territoire épistémique commun. Dans le travail argumentatif de confrontation des désaccords, il ne s’agit pas d’identifier le dispositif qui conduit à un accord via la délibération rationnelle. Il s’agit plutôt de comprendre comment le dissensus permet de construire des communautés plurielles. Il discute certains textes de philosophie politique (Habermas, Mouffe, etc.), où semble centrale (...) la question de l’accord comme horizon d’attente des confrontations argumentatives. L’article utilise cette hypothèse pour analyser la diffusion de la dynamique de Leibniz dans sa correspondance avec De Volder. Cette analyse permet de montrer que le dissensus n’est pas un obstacle mais le socle à partir duquel de multiples diffusions sont possibles. (shrink)

O problema da corporalidade em Leibniz se vincula necessariamente à discussão sobre o estatuto da matéria em uma Metafísica cuja base são as mônadas imateriais. Veremos que, neste contexto, o material deverá ser fenomênico, mas nem por isso ilusório. O objetivo deste trabalho é mostrar como o campo fenomênico, cujo caso exemplar é o corpo, pode ganhar um suporte metafísico e racionalmente justificado, constituindo o que Leibniz chama de fenômenos bem fundados. Para tal, deverá ser feito um exame cuidadoso da (...) natureza das Forças no pensamento leibniziano e de como elas apresentam o vínculo procurado entre Física e Metafísica. Leibniz on Phenomenon and CorporalityThe problem of corporality in Leibniz is necessarily attached to the discussion on the nature of matter in a Metaphysics whose basis are the immaterial monads. We will see that, in this context, although the material must be phenomenic, it is not necessarily ilusory. The aim of this paper is to show how the phenomenic domain, whose exemplar case is the body, may be metaphysically founded and rationally justifyed, constituting what Leibniz calls well founded phenomena. In order to do it, it is necessary to examine Leibniz's conception of the nature of the Forces and how they could present the link between Physics and Metaphysics. (shrink)

L’articolo si propone di analizzare la presenza di Descartes nella Critica della ragion pura, con particolare attenzione ai paralogismi della psicologia razionale e alla confutazione dell’idealismo. L’aspetto più rilevante dell’analisi kantiana non concerne l’interpretazione del pensiero cartesiano fornita dal filosofo tedesco, data la scarsa conoscenza che Kant possedeva dei testi di Descartes. Ad essere interessante, al contrario, soprattutto se considerata alla luce della sua successiva ricezione, è l’immagine di Descartes che emerge dalle pagine della Critica. A questo riguardo, è possibile (...) affermare che Kant abbia contribuito al ritorno sulla scena del pensiero tedesco del Descartes metafisico, una maschera filosofica che svolgerà un ruolo centrale nella ricostruzione della storia della filosofia proposta dall’idealismo post-kantiano. (shrink)