The logic and methodology of science in early modern thought. Seven studies (Q2706550)

During the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries, Aristotelian notions of logic and causation came under serious attack. Traditional philosophy speaks of this period as marking a revolution in scientific thought. In this book Fred Wilson reinstates and extends the traditional conception of the scientific revolution and its significance, and explores the goals and directions of the new science according to the differing interpretations of rationalist and empiristic thinkers.NEWLINENEWLINENEWLINEWilson argues for an empiristic approach to scientific method and explanation, and defends an empiristic as opposed to an Aristotelian account of logic. Calling of an impressive range of intellectual history, he examines the evolution of the empiristic account of science through a number of early modern figures: Bacon, Descartes, Locke, Hobbes, Berkeley, and Hume. He shows that the new science was characterized not just by its methodology and the kinds of explanations it engendered, but also by a new epistemology and a new understanding of being.