The paper describes how a simple idea, that of a new foundation of moral philosophy taking Galilean new natural philosophy as a mode , lead to unforeseen developments once the competition between a Cartesian and a Newtonian paradigm emerged. Those developments are reconstructed in Hume, Smith, Ferguson.

The paper reconstructs the reception of Descartes's work by the Scottish Enlighteners, from Colin MacLaurin to Dugald Stewart. The Scots' image of Descartes was a byproduct of a scientific controversy; philosophical arguments were brought into the picture more as asides than as a primary focus of interest. As soon as the Cartesian physics withered away as a real alternative to Newtonian physics, only the philosophical arguments were left, with no memory of the context out of which they originated, and the (...) focus of the discussion shifts from physics to the philosophy of mind and the theory of knowledge. (shrink)

In this paper I reconstruct the birth, blossoming and decline of an eighteenth century program, namely “Moral Newtonianism”. I reconstruct the interaction, or co-existence, of different levels: positive theories, methodology, worldviews and trace the presence of scattered items of the various levels in the work of Hume, Adam Smith, Adam Ferguson, Dugald Stewart. I highlight how Mirowski’s reconstruction of the interaction between physics and economics may be extended to the eighteenth century in an interesting way once the outdated reconstruction of (...) Adam Smith that has been adopted by Mirowski is updated. I show how general methodological ideas, such as the distinction between ultimate causes or essences and intermediate principles, that originated in a context where the issue was the interaction between natural science and theology, proved useful when transferred to social theory in encouraging a kind of “experimental” approach to social phenomena. I discuss finally the genesis of frozen metaphors such as equilibrium, circulation, and value, arguing that Canguilhem’s lesson – namely that scientific change is produced not only by similarity but also by opposition – may be applied also to the history of economic thought. I take as an example Adam Smith’s ‘discovery’ of social mechanisms vis-à-vis his sceptical mistrust of neo-Stoic and Platonic views of a world-order. (shrink)

El presente artículo analiza la concepción de la metodología científica expresada porAdam Smith en su historia de la astronomía, algo importante para comprender el resto de su obra. Losestudiosos de este tema se han centrado en su mayor parte en la influencia de Newton y Hume sobreSmith, surgiendo una concepción en la que la dimensión epistemológica y la estética se relacionande una manera tensa. El autor identifica nuevas fuentes, de naturaleza estética, que se integran eneste debate y ayudan a aclararlo: (...) Addison, Crousaz, Hutcheson, Berkeley y Diderot, cuya obra Smithconoció y apreció. A partir de ahí llega a la conclusión de que Smith puso en práctica una metodologíarica y compleja en la que los elementos epistemológicos y culturales se relacionaron de una manera notensa ni excluyente, sino armónica e incluyente. (shrink)