Description

• Title:
  The Rise of Teleological Explanation in Early Modern Thought
• Creator:
  Euler, Werner
• Description:
  The aim of the present article is to consider some aspects of and reasons for the renaissance of the teleological mode of explaining nature in Western European philosophy and science at the time when strong mechanistic thought in combination with mathematical (geometrical) prove was still predominant since the birth of early modern thought in 16th century.This development was dependent on the reformation of metaphysics that was centred on the new concept of substance created by Leibniz around 1685. Taking argument with Descartes, Leibniz reverts to the original meaning of concepts as adopted from Aristotelian natural philosophy. Consequently Leibniz prefers a dynamical, purposive interpretation of substance and natural beings, consisting of spontaneous activity, living force and final cause. This teleological project struggles with the predominance of mechanistic principles in metaphysics and natural philosophy and, moreover, with the widespread elimination of Aristotelian physics. Leibniz, however, conceived the Aristotelian concept of “entelechy”, which he translated into “substantial form”, to be productive.I would like to show that from the viewpoint of the history of philosophy and scientific theory there were irrefutable factual reasons, which made the search for teleological principles a matter of concern in the study of nature in the 17th century. Such factual reasons are given not only by experiments and discoveries through biological research, but also by the renovation of adequate concepts of explanation. At the same time, that should not be taken to mean that those same factual reasons would still be scientifically relevant today and would be suitable as justifiable grounds for the use of teleological principles in natural science. Nevertheless, I will proceed by analysing concepts of causation and their preconditions sketching in a first step the origin of teleological thinking in the natural philosophy of Aristotle (II); in a second step, I will cite references from modern philosophical thought, from which it should follow that the upswing of mechanism pushed aside the achievement of Aristotle on the one hand, but on the other hand aroused the need for a conception of purposive causality in order to explain nature completely (III); in a further step, I will show that this development, which took place in the conflict between scientific-philosophical self-understanding and objective deficits of explanation within mechanism, led to a revival of the Aristotelian understanding of teleology in Leibniz (IV). Finally, I try to describe the ambitious step of natural research to the origins of life sciences through the post-Leibnizian and post-Wolffian periods of metaphysics in 18th century and the ambiguous references to ancient approaches to teleological explanatory conceptions of nature involved in that advancement (V).
• Object availability:
  free access
• Rights:
  Prawa autorskie (c) 2020 Ruch Filozoficzny
• Date:
  2020.12.07
• Type:
  info:eu-repo/semantics/article;
  info:eu-repo/semantics/publishedVersion
• Language:
  English
• Source:
  Ruch Filozoficzny; Vol. 76 No. 2 (2020); 7-48;
  Ruch Filozoficzny; Tom 76 Nr 2 (2020); 7-48;
  2545-3173;
  0035-9599
• Format:
  application/pdf
• Publisher:
  Uniwersytet Mikołaja Kopernika w Toruniu
• Relation: https://apcz.umk.pl/RF/article/view/RF.2020.021/27310
• Subject:
  teleology;
  Leibniz;
  Aristotle;
  science;
  metaphysics
• Identifier: https://apcz.umk.pl/RF/article/view/RF.2020.021
• Data provider:
  Akademicka Platforma Czasopism
• Can I use it?:
  seek permission
• Type:
  text