Thomas Hobbes

2014 ◽  
Vol 27 (1) ◽  
pp. 1-12
Author(s):  
Peter Machamer
Keyword(s):  
Early Modern ◽  
Human Nature ◽  
Natural Philosophy ◽  
Thomas Hobbes ◽  
Early Modern Period ◽  
Modern Period ◽  
And Function

In this essay, I present an overview of Hobbes as a consistent philosopher, perhaps the most consistent in the Early Modern period. First, I sketch how his endeavors have a cogency that is unrivalled, in many ways even to this day. Section 2 outlines Hobbes’s conception of philosophy and his causal materialism. Section 3 deals briefly with Hobbes’s discussion of sensation and then presents his views on the nature and function of language and how reason depends upon language. Section 4 treats human nature, and section 5 discusses the artificial body of the Commonwealth. All of this will move rather quickly, so that hopefully the sketch of the overall structure of Hobbes’s thought will be clear. At the end, I will try to correct a few misconceptions, and briefly to say why it was that Hobbes’ natural philosophy has been so unduly neglected.

Introduction

2017 ◽  
Author(s):  
Paul Cefalu
Keyword(s):  
Early Modern ◽  
Human Nature ◽  
Early Modern Period ◽  
Eternal Life ◽  
Synoptic Gospels ◽  
Fourth Gospel ◽  
Modern Period ◽  
Saint John ◽  
Pauline Theology

The introductory chapter argues that, during the early modern period in England, the Fourth Gospel and First Epistle of Saint John the Evangelist were as influential as Pauline theology and, in many respects, more influential than the Synoptic Gospels of Matthew, Mark, and Luke. The chapter outlines several features of a distinctive, post-Reformed, English Johannine devotionalism: a high Christology that emphasizes the divine rather than human nature of Christ; the belief that salvation is achieved more through revelation than objective atonement and expiatory sin; a realized eschatology according to which eternal life has been achieved and the end-time has already partially arrived; a robust doctrine of assurance and comfort, usually tied to Johannine eschatology and pneumatology; and a stylistic and rhetorical approach to representing these theological features that often emulates John’s mode of discipleship misunderstanding and irony not found to a comparable degree in the Synoptic writings.

scholarly journals Adjectival Agreement in Middle and Early Modern Welsh Native and Translated Prose

2020 ◽  
Vol 21 (1) ◽  
pp. 1-28
Author(s):  
Marieke Meelen ◽  
Silva Nurmio
Keyword(s):  
Early Modern ◽  
Early Modern Period ◽  
Systematic Analysis ◽  
Modern Period ◽  
And Function

This paper investigates adjectival agreement in a group of Middle Welsh native prose texts and a sample of translations from around the end of the Middle Welsh period and the beginning of the Early Modern period. It presents a new methodology, employing tagged historical corpora allowing for consistent linguistic comparison. The adjectival agreement case study tests a hypothesis regarding position and function of adjectives in Middle Welsh, as well as specific semantic groups of adjectives, such as colours or related modifiers. The systematic analysis using an annotated corpus reveals that there are interesting differences between native and translated texts, as well as between individual texts. However, zooming in on our adjectival agreement case study, we conclude that these differences do not correspond to many of our hypotheses or assumptions about how certain texts group together. In particular, no clear split into native and translated texts emerged between the texts in our corpus. This paper thus shows interesting results for both (historical) linguists, especially those working on agreement, and scholars of medieval Celtic philology and translation texts.

Bacon’s Novum organum

2021 ◽  
Vol 58 (3) ◽  
pp. 38-46
Author(s):  
Elodie Cassan ◽  
Keyword(s):  
Early Modern ◽  
Scientific Reasoning ◽  
Natural Philosophy ◽  
Early Modern Period ◽  
Direct Access ◽  
Modern Period ◽  
The World ◽  
Two Sides ◽  
The Way

Dan Garber’s paper provides materials permitting to reply to an objection frequently made to the idea that the Novum Organum is a book of logic, as the allusion to Aristotle’s Organon included in the very title of this book shows it is. How can Bacon actually build a logic, considering his repeated claims that he desires to base natural philosophy directly on observation and experiment? Garber shows that in the Novum Organum access to experience is always mediated by particular questions and settings. If there is no direct access to observation and experience, then there is no point in equating Bacon’s focus on experience in the Novum Organum with a rejection of discursive issues. On the contrary, these are two sides of the same coin. Bacon’s articulation of rules for the building of scientific reasoning in connection with the way the world is, illustrates his massive concern with the relation between reality, thinking and language. This concern is essential in the field of logic as it is constructed in the Early Modern period.

Nemesius of Emesa on Human Nature

2021 ◽  
Author(s):  
David Lloyd Dusenbury
Keyword(s):  
Early Modern ◽  
Human Nature ◽  
Human Dignity ◽  
Late Antiquity ◽  
Early Modern Period ◽  
Early Christian ◽  
Christian Anthropology ◽  
European Universities ◽  
Modern Period

Nemesius of Emesa’s On Human Nature (De Natura Hominis) is the first Christian anthropology. Written in Greek, circa 390 CE, it was read in half a dozen languages—from Baghdad to Oxford—well into the early modern period. Nemesius’ text circulated in two Latin versions in the centuries that saw the rise of European universities, shaping scholastic theories of human nature. During the Renaissance, it saw a flurry of print editions, helping to inspire a new discourse of human dignity. This is the first monograph in English on Nemesius’ treatise. On the interpretation offered here, the Syrian bishop seeks to define the human qua human. His early Christian anthropology is cosmopolitan. ‘Things that are natural’, he writes, ‘are the same for all’. In his pages, a host of texts and discourses—biblical and medical, legal and philosophical—are made to converge upon a decisive tenet of Christian late antiquity: humans’ natural freedom. For Nemesius, reason and choice are a divine double-strand of powers. Since he believes that both are a natural human inheritance, he concludes that much is ‘in our power’. Nemesius defines humans as the only living beings who are at once ruler (intellect) and ruled (body). Because of this, the human is a ‘little world’, binding the rationality of angels to the flux of elements, the tranquillity of plants, and the impulsiveness of animals. This book traces Nemesius’ reasoning through the whole of On Human Nature, as he seeks to give a long-influential image of humankind both philosophical and anatomical proof.

The Concept “Fact”: Legal Origins and Cultural Diffusion

1994 ◽  
Vol 26 (1) ◽  
pp. 1-25 ◽  
Author(s):  
Barbara Shapiro
Keyword(s):  
Early Modern ◽  
Natural Philosophy ◽  
Early Modern Period ◽  
Experimental Science ◽  
Social Scientists ◽  
The Third ◽  
Legal Origins ◽  
Cultural Diffusion ◽  
Modern Period ◽  
Fact Finding

Facts are something we take for granted, at least most of the time. As ordinary individuals we assume that there are knowable facts, for instance, that the dog chewed the drapes, that England exists, that it rained yesterday, or that babies cry. If, as scholars, that is as historians, social scientists, and natural scientists, we are more aware of the problematical nature of “facts” we nevertheless tend to establish and use facts rather unselfconsciously in our work. On this occasion I want to look at the evolution of the concept of “fact,” and in particular the way “fact” entered English natural philosophy. I will attempt to show that the concept of “fact” or “matter of fact,” so prominent in the English empirical tradition, is an adaptation or borrowing from another discipline—jurisprudence, and that many of the assumptions and much of the technology of fact-finding in law were carried over into the experimental science of the seventeenth century.My paper has three parts. The first discusses the nature of legal facts and fact-finding in the early modern period, focusing on the distinction between “matters of fact” and “matters of law,” the emphasis on first hand testimony by credible witnesses, the preference for direct testimony over inference, and legal efforts to create and maintain impartial proceedings. The second portion attempts to show how legal methods and assumptions were adopted by early modern historiographers and other fact-oriented reporters. The third section attempts to show how the legally constructed concept of “fact” or “matter of fact” was transferred to natural history and natural philosophy and generalized in Locke's empirical philosophy.

Jacques Rohault and Cartesian Experimentalism

2019 ◽  
pp. 387-401
Author(s):  
Mihnea Dobre
Keyword(s):  
Early Modern ◽  
Intellectual Development ◽  
Natural Philosophy ◽  
Early Modern Period ◽  
Modern Period ◽  
Fresh Perspective ◽  
Practical Mathematics ◽  
One Year ◽  
Mature Work ◽  
Early Activity

This chapter explores the intellectual development of Jacques Rohault—although not considered one of the leading figures of the early modern period, well known among historians of science. It attempts to evaluate Rohault’s Cartesianism and to present it in a more nuanced manner than it is usually illustrated in the literature. Focusing on his mature work, published only one year before his death in 1672, but also referring to his earlier activities in Paris and to the publication of his posthumous works, the chapter argues that his “Cartesianism” came rather late in his thinking, while his early activity concerns mathematics and mechanics. The reading endorsed in this chapter opens a fresh perspective on Rohault’s experimentalism, suggesting a transition from practical mathematics to Cartesian natural philosophy.

Mundane Humility

2018 ◽  
pp. 47-70
Author(s):  
Kent Dunnington
Keyword(s):  
Early Modern ◽  
Thomas Hobbes ◽  
Early Modern Period ◽  
Liberal State ◽  
Early Christian ◽  
Modern Period ◽  
Modern Development

Christian humility was repurposed in the early modern period to suit the goals of the emerging liberal state. After sketching how Thomas Hobbes achieved this repurposing, this chapter shows how David Hume’s critique of Christian humility and Immanuel Kant’s attempt to rescue Christian humility from Hume’s critique created a new kind of “mundane” humility newly committed to the need for a counterbalancing proper pride alongside anything that could be called virtuous humility. After showing how this concern for proper pride was a modern development, the chapter then shows how it drives most contemporary theorizing about humility, including the dominant low concern account of humility. Given that early Christian sayings about humility show no regard for the proper prides, an account of Christian humility will need to confront the claim that the virtue of humility requires counterbalancing by pride.

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