ABSTRACT

This volume brings together a collection of new essays by leading scholars on the subject of causation in the early modern period, from Descartes to Lady Mary Shepherd. Aimed at researchers, graduate students and advanced undergraduates, the volume advances the understanding of early modern discussions of causation, and situates these discussions in the wider context of early modern philosophy and science. Specifically, the volume contains essays on key early modern thinkers, such as Descartes, Hobbes, Spinoza, Leibniz, Hume, Kant. It also contains essays that examine the important contributions to the causation debate of less widely discussed figures, including Louis la Forge, Thomas Brown and Lady Mary Shepherd.

chapter |12 pages

Introduction

chapter |18 pages

Galileo

Reflections on Failure

chapter |17 pages

Causation and the Cartesian Reduction of Motion

God's Role in Grinding the Gears

chapter |17 pages

Are Mind-Body Relations Natural and Intelligible?

Some Early Modern Perspectives

chapter |22 pages

Pouring New Wine into Old Skin

The Meaning of Hume's Necessary Connexions

chapter |19 pages

Kant on Causal Knowledge

Causality, Mechanism, and Reflective Judgment

chapter |22 pages

Regularities All the Way Down

Thomas Brown's Philosophy of Causation

chapter |20 pages

Causality and Causal Induction

The Necessitarian Theory of Lady Mary Shepherd