In this paper I look at a particular narrative, famously articulated by Reid, that holds that Descartes’s ‘Way of Ideas’ leads inevitably to Berkeley’s immaterialism. In the service of examining this narrative more closely, I consider Andrew Baxter’s early 18th century criticisms of Berkeley, and especially Baxter’s view that immaterialism begins with a dream hypothesis and is therefore self-undermining. I suggest that a careful consideration of Baxter’s criticism is illuminating in a number of ways: in so far as it anticipates (...) future criticisms of and engagements with Berkeleyan immaterialism, in so far as it helps to reveal the actual structure of Berkeley’s appeal to dreams, and in so far as it helps to uncover the roots of this narrative tying Berkeleyan idealism to Cartesian scepticism. (shrink)

Some scholars have understood that Spinoza’s extreme rationalism, nominalism, conventionalism, and rejection of a semantic theory of truth make his philosophy incapable to use language for philosophical and scientific purposes; insofar he considered language a source of inadequate knowledge, falsity, and error. Thus Spinoza finds contradiction in his inevitable use of language to express his philosophy. This paper has four aims: first, propose an explanation on why language is inadequate knowledge for Spinoza; second, present differences between inadequacy, falsity, and error (...) in language; third, argue on the Spinozian use of the geometrical method as a solution for the adequate use of language in philosophical and scientific work; finally, show the problems and limits of this solution for metaphysical discussions. (shrink)

Forty two years before Descartes’ birth, in his Antoniana Margarita, Spanish physician and philosopher Gómez Pereira explicitly argues the following assertions: Animals lack reason Animals lack understanding Animals do not think Animals cannot feel Animals cannot see as we do Animals are machines Animals have no rational soul Animals have no indivisible soul Animals have no language The above claims on animal automatism are commonly thought to have originated with Descartes. In this paper I will expound Gómez Pereira’s arguments, contra (...) the School and common sense, in favor of animal automatism and discuss their possible influence on Descartes’ so-called bêtemachine doctrine. (shrink)

During the Mexico-Canda Conference in October 2020 at Western University (Canada) I submitted a draft of a future paper.

We propose to show that, although we think of Descartes as a "modern Parmenides" or as the "father of Modernity", otherwise for excellent reasons, this condition is at least as ambiguous as different are the cultures or societies that arose from the breakdown of Christianity. Where the Protestant Reformation triumphed, the dominant conception of philosophy is manifestly anticartesian, although they recognize, curiously, a debt to Cartesian philosophy; for example, we recognize this due in Wittgenstein and Heidegger. Neither empiricist nor rationalist, (...) neither analytical nor continental, nor national or identitarian either, more than a "French", "European" or "Western" philosopher, Descartes would be a philosopher of ours, that is, a philosopher of the universalist Counter-Reformation or Catholic Reformation. Also, even if we stick to what the professional and hegemonic practice of "philosophy" means today, Descartes would be known as a pre-or paramodern philosopher, that is, an “filósofo del arrabal”, an outskirt philosopher. (shrink)

The concept of the highest good is an important but hardly uncontroversial piece of Kant’s moral philosophy. In the considerable literature on the topic, challenges are raised concerning its apparently heteronomous role in moral motivation, whether there is a distinct duty to promote it, and more broadly whether it is ultimately to be construed as a theological or merely secular ideal. Yet comparatively little attention has been paid to the context of a doctrine that had enjoyed a place of prominence (...) in the ethical systems of the ancients, where these systems provided a key critical foil for the development of Kant’s own conception of the highest good in terms of “happiness distributed in exact proportion to morality” (cf. 5:110). Indeed, these ethical systems prove important for Kant not only in his initial presentation of his account in the Canon of Pure Reason in the first Critique, where he sought to redress the errors of the Epicurean and Stoic conception in particular, but also and importantly in the course of his development towards the second Critique. As I argue in this paper, Christian Garve’s defense of a revised but recognizably Stoic conception of the highest good in his translation of and commentary on Cicero’s De officiis (On Duties), helps to account for Kant’s renewed attention to that doctrine, and specifically to the errors attending the Stoic version, in the Dialectic of Pure Practical Reason. (shrink)

In the following pages, we will explore the proximity of Marin Mersenne and Pierre Gassendi’s arguments against Descartes’ "Meditations." We will study how, in some of their objections, both Mersenne and Gassendi adopted a nominalist and an empiricist view regarding central topics in Cartesian epistemology, such as the idea of God, and the origin and classification of ideas in the mind. We propose that the assessment of the confrontation between the two objectors and Descartes may provide us a better picture (...) of the complex intellectual debates that took place at the very beginnings of modern philosophy. (shrink)

One of the most puzzling features of Leibniz’s deep metaphysics is the apparent contradiction between his claims that the law of continuity holds everywhere, so that in particular, change is continuous in every monad, and that “changes are not really continuous,” since successive states contradict one another. In this paper I try to show in what sense these claims can be understood as compatible. My analysis depends crucially on Leibniz’s idea that enduring states are “vague,” and abstract away from further (...) changes occurring within them at a higher resolution—consistently with his famous doctrine of "petites perceptions." As Leibniz explains further in a recently transcribed unpublished manuscript, these changes are dense within any actual duration, which is conceived as actually divided by them into states that are syncategorematically infinite in number and unassignably small. The correspondence between these unassignably small intervals between changes and the differentials of his calculus allows processes to be conceived as continuous, despite the discontinuity of the changes that occur in actuality. (shrink)

For Spinoza’s epistemology, an image is an idea that represents an external body as actually existent. This kind of knowledge is the only source of inadequate knowledge, falsity, and error. On the contrary, reason is adequate knowledge because it comprehends common notions, i.e, properties of different things. Intuition is also adequate knowledge because it conceives formal essences of singular things. The main example is the genetic definition of a sphere, an adequate knowledge form by the power of thinking of the (...) mind, without regard to existing extramental spheres. From these differences, some scholars conclude that imagination is always negative and should not deal with reason and intuition. But this conclusion will ban Spinoza’s epistemology from having adequate knowledge of existing individuals, such as Moses and the Hebrew State. In front of this view, this paper defends three theses: firstly, that the difference between the three kinds of knowledge is of genus, not of degree. Secondly, that adequate knowledge for Spinoza is a generic knowledge, i.e., insofar as S knows P insofar S deduces the effects, consequences, or properties of P. Thirdly, that adequate knowledge can include imagination through the proper use of the geometric method. In this case, imagination offers data to reason and intuition for having adequate knowledge of singular things that actually existed. (shrink)

Berkeley’s appeal to a posteriori arguments for God’s existence supports belief only in a God who is finite. But by appealing to an a priori argument for God’s existence, Berkeley emphasizes God’s infinity. In this latter argument, God is not the efficient cause of particular finite things in the world, for such an explanation does not provide a justification or rationale for why the totality of finite things would exist in the first place. Instead, God is understood as the creator (...) of the total unity of all there is, the whole of creation. In this a priori argument, we should not focus on the specific objects that God creates, for that requires that we think that God knows each finite thing as distinct from every other. Rather, we should recognize how God creates all things in creating the complex, infinite totality of finite perceivings, each of which exists in virtue of the distinctions and relations it expresses. (shrink)

In this paper I present a novel view of the ontological status of possible objects for Descartes. Specifically, I claim that possible objects just are innate ideas considered objectively. In the act of creation, God creates possibilities—in all its richness—in the form of innate ideas. Thus, in acts of thinking, one may clearly and distinctly perceive, via one’s innate ideas, that such and such is possible. To argue this, I first analyze and critique two competing views—one from Calvin Normore who (...) claims that innate ideas represent an independent realm of possibilia, and another from David Cunning and Alan Nelson who claim that Descartes had no theory of modality. I then move on to the defense of my view, both giving a positive account of my argument and noting how my interpretation enjoys certain advantages over my interlocutors. (shrink)

Among the readers of Swedenborg, the Swedish thinker’s ‘theory of correspondences’ is often interpreted as treating empirical realities as only imperfect manifestations of spiritual realities. This interpretation that ascribes idealism to Swedenborg was originally proposed by Kant in the Dreams of a Spirit-Seer. Although Kant criticizes Swedenborg’s theory, he considers it no inferior to the theories of Leibniz and Wolf, which can entice a reader of Swedenborg to take Kant’s interpretation at face value: even if Kant did not agree with (...) Swedenborg, at least he took him to be on par with these ‘serious’ philosophers. However, this paper attempts to show that unless a reader of Swedenborg is willing to endorse Kant’s disdain towards ‘enthusiasm’, Swedenborg should not be interpreted as a Platonic idealist, because he devised his theory of correspondences precisely in order to avoid such idealism. As few scholars have recently pointed out, Swedenborg, like Kant, thinks that all our cognitive abilities operate in the limits of time and space, i.e. in the empirical world, but for Swedenborg, as opposed to Kant, this does not imply that we cannot acquire knowledge of the spiritual world. According to these scholars, Swedenborg thinks that such knowledge can only be acquired mystically, which would render him a Platonic idealist, just as Kant claimed. However, this paper claims that pace the aforementioned scholars, this is not the only or even the default way of coming to know the spiritual world according to Swedenborg. The paper argues that when positing that every empirical and spiritual reality ‘correspond’ with one another, Swedenborg uses the Latin word correspondere in a technical sense. In other words, he thinks that any human cognition is both spiritual in the sense of involving a logical relationship between extension and spirit, and empirical by occurring in time and space. Thus, by cognising something in the empirical world, we also cognise something in the spiritual world, even if we were not capable of knowing spiritual realities in themselves. This element of Swedenborg’s theory distances him from Platonic idealism. The paper concludes with a suggestion that Kant might have perceived the limitations of his interpretation of Swedenborg later on, as signalled by the fact that in the early 1780s, Kant extended his conception of Platonism to include all philosophy other than his own. However, taking this road would make Platonic idealism an uninformative concept for an interpreter of Swedenborg and apt to be replaced by the term ‘enthusiasm’–the concept that Kant used when describing those with whom he disagreed. (shrink)

Among the readers of Swedenborg, the Swedish thinker’s ‘theory of correspondences’ is often interpreted as treating empirical realities as only imperfect manifestations of spiritual realities. This interpretation that ascribes idealism to Swedenborg was originally proposed by Kant in the Dreams of a Spirit-Seer. Although Kant criticizes Swedenborg’s theory, he considers it no inferior to the theories of Leibniz and Wolf, which can entice a reader of Swedenborg to take Kant’s interpretation at face value: even if Kant did not agree with (...) Swedenborg, at least he took him to be on par with these ‘serious’ philosophers. However, this paper attempts to show that unless a reader of Swedenborg is willing to endorse Kant’s disdain towards ‘enthusiasm’, Swedenborg should not be interpreted as a Platonic idealist, because he devised his theory of correspondences precisely in order to avoid such idealism. As few scholars have recently pointed out, Swedenborg, like Kant, thinks that all our cognitive abilities operate in the limits of time and space, i.e. in the empirical world, but for Swedenborg, as opposed to Kant, this does not imply that we cannot acquire knowledge of the spiritual world. According to these scholars, Swedenborg thinks that such knowledge can only be acquired mystically, which would render him a Platonic idealist, just as Kant claimed. However, this paper claims that pace the aforementioned scholars, this is not the only or even the default way of coming to know the spiritual world according to Swedenborg. The paper argues that when positing that every empirical and spiritual reality ‘correspond’ with one another, Swedenborg uses the Latin word correspondere in a technical sense. In other words, he thinks that any human cognition is both spiritual in the sense of involving a logical relationship between extension and spirit, and empirical by occurring in time and space. Thus, by cognising something in the empirical world, we also cognise something in the spiritual world, even if we were not capable of knowing spiritual realities in themselves. This element of Swedenborg’s theory distances him from Platonic idealism. The paper concludes with a suggestion that Kant might have perceived the limitations of his interpretation of Swedenborg later on, as signalled by the fact that in the early 1780s, Kant extended his conception of Platonism to include all philosophy other than his own. However, taking this road would make Platonic idealism an uninformative concept for an interpreter of Swedenborg and apt to be replaced by the term ‘enthusiasm’–the concept that Kant used when describing those with whom he disagreed. (shrink)

Spinoza stipulates in E2def2, his definition of the essence of a thing, that the essence of each particular can neither exist nor, even, be conceived, except alongside its particular. Yet a mere eight propositions later states that God maintains an idea of the essence of nonactual particulars “in the same way as the formal essences of the singular things are contained in God’s attributes”. While there are known interpretive controversies with each of these claims, I argue that according to E2def2, (...) essences of particulars can only be and can only be conceived alongside the actual existence of their particular, and that according to E2p8, the essences of nonactual particulars are conceived by God apart from their particular and that the objects of these ideas—formal essences—are things within God’s attributes whether their particulars exist or not. I argue here that Spinoza’s formal essence has two distinct modes of existing. The essence that at all times is contained within God’s attributes and comprehended by God’s intellect may be expressed also as the essence of an actual particular, and when this occurs the instance of the essence within the particular is thereby unique to and even perishes with the particular. I draw upon the corollary and scholium, as well as other important texts, to suggest that the eternal essence is a kind essence, and that instances of this in particulars are unique and durational. The key to resolving Spinoza’s seemingly inconsistent remarks on essences is to recognize the difference between the eternal kind essence and its unique and durational instances in particulars. (shrink)

What would it take for Hume to be an external world skeptic? Is Hume's position on knowledge sufficient to force him to deny that we can acquire knowledge of propositions about the external world? After all, Hume is extremely restrictive about what can be known because he requires knowledge to be immune to error. In this paper, I will argue that if Hume were a skeptic, then he must also deny a particular kind of view about what is immediately present (...) to the mind. I will argue that direct realisms—views that maintain that mind-independent things are immediately present to the mind—combine with Hume's position on knowledge to entail the negation of skepticism. So, despite his position on knowledge, Hume could still consistently reject skepticism, if he were to endorse direct realism. (shrink)

Berkeley occasionally says that we use analogy in thinking and speaking of God. However, the scholarly consensus is that Berkeley rejects the traditional doctrine of divine analogy and holds instead that words like ‘wise’ apply to God in precisely the same way as they apply to Socrates. The difference is only a matter of degree. Univocal theories of the divine attributes have historically been charged with anthropomorphism—that is, with imagining God to be too similar to human beings. Can Berkeley fairly (...) be charged with anthropomorphizing God? In one sense, the answer is clearly yes: for Berkeley, God is one spirit among many. God is, uniquely, an infinite spirit, but this is an infinity in God’s degree of knowledge, power, etc. God is a spirit in precisely the same way as you, me, and Socrates. On the other hand, Berkeley’s view differs dramatically from the kinds of anthropomorphism that were criticized by classical philosophical theologians. In the first place, the classical tradition was concerned to deny that God is a body with proper parts. Berkeley, of course, also denies this. Second, the classical tradition was concerned to deny that God was composed of form and matter. Insofar as Berkeley takes the Aristotelian concepts of form and matter to be incoherent, Berkeley clearly does not hold that God is composed of form and matter. Third, the classical tradition denied that God had a real plurality of attributes. Fourth and relatedly, the tradition denied that the distinction of substance and attribute applied to God at all. There was no consensus, in the tradition, on precisely how to analyse statements like ‘God is wise’ without admitting that there was such a thing as God’s wisdom distinct from God and God’s power. However, Aquinas held that, in this context, ‘wise’, ‘powerful’, etc. express different partial conceptions of God. Similarly, Berkeley holds that ‘will’ and ‘understanding’ are two names for “one simple, undivided, active being,” the spirit itself. Finally, the tradition held that God was ‘pure act’, denying any distinction of act and potency in God. In the notebooks, Berkeley twice affirms that spirit is ‘actus 1 Does Berkeley Anthropomorphize God? 2 purus’ before resolving not to use this ‘Scholastique’ term in print. Although there is considerable difficulty in understanding precisely what Berkeley meant by this claim and how it relates to his published views about created spirits, Berkeley is consistent in insisting that there is no passivity in God. Berkeley’s God, like the classical God, is not a body, is not composed of form and matter, does not possess a real plurality of attributes, and is purely active. However, in all of these ways, God is exactly like us. I conclude that, as compared with the classical tradition of philosophical theology, Berkeley does not anthropomorphize God—he deifies the human being. Recognizing the roots of Berkeley’s account of spirit in classical conceptions of God can help to illuminate Berkeley’s remarks about how we can, and cannot, speak and know about spirits. (shrink)

Among the readers of Swedenborg, the Swedish thinker’s ‘theory of correspondences’ is often interpreted as treating empirical realities as only imperfect manifestations of spiritual realities. This interpretation that ascribes idealism to Swedenborg was originally proposed by Kant in the Dreams of a Spirit-Seer. Although Kant criticizes Swedenborg’s theory, he considers it no inferior to the theories of Leibniz and Wolf, which can entice a reader of Swedenborg to take Kant’s interpretation at face value: even if Kant did not agree with (...) Swedenborg, at least he took him to be on par with these ‘serious’ philosophers. However, this paper attempts to show that unless a reader of Swedenborg is willing to endorse Kant’s disdain towards ‘enthusiasm’, Swedenborg should not be interpreted as a Platonic idealist, because he devised his theory of correspondences precisely in order to avoid such idealism. As few scholars have recently pointed out, Swedenborg, like Kant, thinks that all our cognitive abilities operate in the limits of time and space, i.e. in the empirical world, but for Swedenborg, as opposed to Kant, this does not imply that we cannot acquire knowledge of the spiritual world. According to these scholars, Swedenborg thinks that such knowledge can only be acquired mystically, which would render him a Platonic idealist, just as Kant claimed. However, this paper claims that pace the aforementioned scholars, this is not the only or even the default way of coming to know the spiritual world according to Swedenborg. The paper argues that when positing that every empirical and spiritual reality ‘correspond’ with one another, Swedenborg uses the Latin word correspondere in a technical sense. In other words, he thinks that any human cognition is both spiritual in the sense of involving a logical relationship between extension and spirit, and empirical by occurring in time and space. Thus, by cognising something in the empirical world, we also cognise something in the spiritual world, even if we were not capable of knowing spiritual realities in themselves. This element of Swedenborg’s theory distances him from Platonic idealism. The paper concludes with a suggestion that Kant might have perceived the limitations of his interpretation of Swedenborg later on, as signalled by the fact that in the early 1780s, Kant extended his conception of Platonism to include all philosophy other than his own. However, taking this road would make Platonic idealism an uninformative concept for an interpreter of Swedenborg and apt to be replaced by the term ‘enthusiasm’–the concept that Kant used when describing those with whom he disagreed. (shrink)

Commentators are divided over whether Berkeley holds that physical objects are immediately perceived by sense. As I read Berkeley, discrimination is necessary for perceiving physical objects by sense. Berkeley says that discrimination requires perceiving motion. Since motions can only be mediately perceived according to Berkeley, physical objects can only be mediately perceived by sense. I defend this reading against the following objections. First, that perception of physical objects is non-conceptual. Second, that physical objects are divinely instituted collections of ideas rather (...) than psychologically associated collections of ideas. Third, that some physical objects are small enough to be immediately perceptually discriminated by touch. I also propose a new objection to the claim that physical objects are immediately perceived for Berkeley. I argue that immediate perception of a subset of a physical object’s sensible qualities is neither necessary nor sufficient to perceive that object by sense, according to Berkeley. (shrink)

Berkeley’s appeal to a posteriori arguments for God’s existence supports belief only in a God who is finite. But by appealing to an a priori argument for God’s existence, Berkeley emphasizes God’s infinity. In this latter argument, God is not the efficient cause of particular finite things in the world, for such an explanation does not provide a justification or rationale for why the totality of finite things would exist in the first place. Instead, God is understood as the creator (...) of the total unity of all there is, the whole of creation. In this a priori argument, we should not focus on the specific objects that God creates, for that requires that we think that God knows each finite thing as distinct from every other. Rather, we should recognize how God creates all things in creating the complex, infinite totality of finite perceivings, each of which exists in virtue of the distinctions and relations it expresses. (shrink)

The project of this paper is to rebut John Turri’s arguments against Thomas Reid’s thesis concerning the priority of natural language. Human language, as Reid professes, is chiefly aimed at the communication of ones thoughts, purposes, intentions, and desires, whereby communication is accomplished through signs. For Reid, signs are either natural or artificial, and by extension, language is also either natural or artificial. While artificial language has no meaning absent some settled upon compact or agreement, every person knows, by their (...) own nature — and prior to any compact or agreement, the meaning of natural language. Equipped with this distinction, Reid argues that natural language is a prior and necessary condition for the invention of artificial language. In his paper “Reid on the Priority of Natural Language,” Turri objects to Reid’s priority thesis on three distinct, but interwoven points. Firstly, he contends that Reid is not concerned with the interpersonal use of artificial language and its dependence upon natural language. Taking the previous conclusion in hand, he argues that natural language is likewise unnecessary for merely inventing artificial language. Thirdly, Turri argues that even if we were to hypothetically grant that Reid was concerned with the interpersonal use of natural language in his priority thesis, Reid has not sufficiently established that its successful employment also depends upon natural language antecedently. The success of Turri’s arguments would implicate the cohesion in Reid’s heterodoxical shift from his contemporaries concerning perception, epistemology, and linguistics. My contention with Turri takes root in my aim to preserve Reid’s priority of natural language for the sake of the cohesion, and therefore the heterodox novelty in Reid’s work. For Reid, we must each enjoy some mode of understanding each other for it to be possible to meaningfully communicate. The means by which we have the aforementioned access to others’ thoughts, purposes, intentions, and desires owes to natural language — that which, allegedly, each person has the capacity to recognize by our own nature. It is precisely because we successfully employ language to communicate that we can recognize that we have such access. We can see then that our capacity to have knowledge of one another is implicated, foundationally, by natural language. Herein my first objection to Turri takes shape. In order to have knowledge of one another, indeed, to carry out our aims with one another, depends essentially on the interpersonal use of language; if Reid were only concerned with the invention of artificial language’s antecedent dependence on natural language, he would not have iterated that the purpose of language is to communicate, whereby successful communication entails successfully using language. As I will argue, Turri is not careful enough with these passages. To Turri’s second objection, I argue that for Reid, the capacity to merely ‘invent’ artificial language individualistically (that is, to coin a phrase one’s self without employing is interpersonally) is entirely beside the point, and entirely futile. When Reid speaks of our capacity to invent artificial language, he implies our usage; for simply coining a word, and uttering it in circumstances under which the hearer has no basis for understanding its signification serves no efficacious communicative purpose. Concerning his third objection, the example that Turri provides to undermine Reid’s priority thesis can be met with satisfactory retort once we consider the various ways in which natural language, and natural signs more generally, underscore our capacity to understand one another prior to compact or agreement about artificial language. In Turri’s example, he suggests that onomatopoeia (a person howling “owoo” like a Wolf), as an artificial bit of language, can be successfully employed and understood interpersonally without prior compact or agreement between the speaker and hearer. I argue that the success of Turri’s counterexample is entirely contingent upon characterizing onomatopoeia as artificial language. As such, I aim to show two things. Firstly, we ought instead understand onomatopoeia as an instance of a Reidian first class natural sign. Secondly, the hearer’s capacity to successfully understand the speaker in the example depends upon both this aforementioned type of natural sign, as well as other relevant features of the speaker’s outward demeanor, which ought be understood as sorts of natural language. (shrink)

Over the span of eleven years, Nicolas Malebranche and Antoine Arnauld, two prominent sympathizers of the Cartesian tradition, engaged in a rigorous debate. In his initial set of criticisms, Arnauld objects that a natural consequence of Malebranche’s theory of ideas is idealism.1 This charge of idealism has puzzled scholars: why did Arnauld believe this? Han Adriaenssen2 has convincingly argued that Arnauld’s charge of idealism is founded on the representationality of Malebranchean ideas. According to Arnauld, ideas represent for Malebranche in much (...) the same way that portraits do—by inciting a perceiver to form a conception of whatever they pertain to. The portrait of Louis XIV, for example, represents the French monarch by inciting a conception that pertains to him in a perceiver. However, a portrait will only represent Louis XIV to a perceiver that is already familiar with the king. Only then will the conception of Louis XIV arise in a perceiver that actually pertains to him. Similarly, then, an idea of the sun will only represent it to a perceiver with a previous conception of the sun. But, for Malebranche, the conception of an object requires the perception of the idea which represents that object. Thus, a perceiver cannot have a conception of the sun prior to the perception of its idea. Malebranchean ideas accordingly fail to function as representations of their objects. In failing to represent external objects, moreover, the ideas in the divine intellect are not just the immediate objects of our perception, but the only objects of our perception. Consequently, Arnauld concludes that Malebranche’s view leads to idealism. Arnauld’s objection, however, presupposes a particular account of representation, namely, resemblance. For a prior conception of what an idea represents would be required in order for the idea to actually represent its object only if ideas represented by resembling their objects as portraits do. This paper will challenge the traditional3 characterization of the representationality of Malebranchean ideas in terms of resemblance. I argue that a careful examination of Malebranche’s texts, and of the Neoplatonic-Augustinian sources upon which Malebranche bases his theory of ideas, reveals that Malebranche is not steadfastly committed to the view that ideas represent by means of resemblance, but instead, by archetypal participation. On this view, Malebranchean ideas are divine archetypes wherein the essences of objects participate by being the exemplary causes of these essences. And it is in virtue of this causal relation that ideas represent the essences of objects. So, as regards external bodies, the idea of intelligible extension is the archetype of bodies which represents their essence, viz., extension, in virtue of being the exemplary cause of extension in bodies. When we interpret Malebranche’s view of ideational representation this way, the charge of idealism broached by Arnauld, and some recent commentators4, dissipates. This is because Malebranchean ideas, in conjunction with particular sensations, can direct a perceiver to the cognition of individual bodies that participate in the idea of intelligible extension without a prior conception of these bodies. (shrink)

In this paper, I compare Margaret Cavendish’s argument for the view that colours of objects are inseparable from their ‘physical’ qualities with George Berkeley’s argument for the view that secondary qualities of objects are inseparable from their primary qualities. By reconstructing their respective arguments, I show that both thinkers rely on the ‘inconceivability principle’: the claim that inconceivability entails impossibility. That is, both premise their arguments on the claim that it is impossible to conceive of an object that has size (...) and shape but no colour. I argue that Cavendish, like Berkeley, accepts the inconceivability principle on the grounds that it is impossible to conceive of something that could not, in principle, be perceived and, in turn, that something imperceptible could not possibly exist. As such, I argue that both Cavendish and Berkeley are committed to an ‘empiricist’ modal epistemology: one wherein our knowledge of what it is possible to perceive informs us about what could possibly exist. For this reason, I conclude that there is more empiricism in Cavendish’s epistemology than secondary literature to date suggests. (shrink)

In this paper I present a novel view of the ontological status of possible objects for Descartes. Specifically, I claim that possible objects just are innate ideas considered objectively. In the act of creation, God creates possibilities—in all its richness—in the form of innate ideas. Thus, in acts of thinking, one may clearly and distinctly perceive, via one’s innate ideas, that such and such is possible. To argue this, I first analyze and critique two competing views—one from Calvin Normore who (...) claims that innate ideas represent an independent realm of possibilia, and another from David Cunning and Alan Nelson who claim that Descartes had no theory of modality. I then move on to the defense of my view, both giving a positive account of my argument and noting how my interpretation enjoys certain advantages over my interlocutors. (shrink)

“What skills and capacities do you think the next generation of early modern scholars most need to advance the field?