In the early modern period, thinkers began to suggest that philosophy abjure the ideal of dispassionate contemplation of the natural world in favor of a more practically minded project that aimed to make human beings masters and possessors of nature. Humanity would seize control of its own fate and overthrow the rule by hostile natural or imaginary forces. The gradual spread of liberal democratic government, the Enlightenment, and the rise of technological modernity are to a considerable extent the fruits of this early modern shift in intellectual concern and focus. But these long-term trends have also brought unintended consequences in their wake as the dynamic forces of social reason, historical progress, and the continued recalcitrance of the natural world have combined to disillusion humans of the possibility-even the desirability-of their mastery over nature.
The essays in Mastery of Nature constitute an extensive analysis of the fundamental aspects of the human grasp of nature. What is the foundation and motive of the modern project in the first place? What kind of a world did its early advocates hope to bring about? Contributors not only examine the foundational theories espoused by early modern thinkers such as Machiavelli, Bacon, Descartes, and Hobbes but also explore the criticisms and corrections that appeared in the works of Rousseau, Kant, Nietzsche, and Heidegger. Ranging from ancient Greek thought to contemporary quantum mechanics, Mastery of Nature investigates to what extent nature can be conquered to further human ends and to what extent such mastery is compatible with human flourishing.
Contributors: Robert C. Bartlett, Mark Blitz, Daniel A. Doneson, Michael A. Gillespie, Ralph Lerner, Paul Ludwig, Harvey C. Mansfield, Arthur Melzer, Svetozar Y. Minkov, Christopher Nadon, Diana J. Schaub, Adam Schulman, Devin Stauffer, Bernhardt L. Trout, Lise van Boxel, Richard Velkley, Stuart D. Warner, Jerry Weinberger.
In the early modern period, thinkers began to suggest that philosophy abjure the ideal of dispassionate contemplation of the natural world in favor of a more practically minded project that aimed to make human beings masters and possessors of nature. Humanity would seize control of its own fate and overthrow the rule by hostile natural or imaginary forces. The gradual spread of liberal democratic government, the Enlightenment, and the rise of technological modernity are to a considerable extent the fruits of this early modern shift in intellectual concern and focus. But these long-term trends have also brought unintended consequences in their wake as the dynamic forces of social reason, historical progress, and the continued recalcitrance of the natural world have combined to disillusion humans of the possibility-even the desirability-of their mastery over nature.
The essays in Mastery of Nature constitute an extensive analysis of the fundamental aspects of the human grasp of nature. What is the foundation and motive of the modern project in the first place? What kind of a world did its early advocates hope to bring about? Contributors not only examine the foundational theories espoused by early modern thinkers such as Machiavelli, Bacon, Descartes, and Hobbes but also explore the criticisms and corrections that appeared in the works of Rousseau, Kant, Nietzsche, and Heidegger. Ranging from ancient Greek thought to contemporary quantum mechanics, Mastery of Nature investigates to what extent nature can be conquered to further human ends and to what extent such mastery is compatible with human flourishing.
Contributors: Robert C. Bartlett, Mark Blitz, Daniel A. Doneson, Michael A. Gillespie, Ralph Lerner, Paul Ludwig, Harvey C. Mansfield, Arthur Melzer, Svetozar Y. Minkov, Christopher Nadon, Diana J. Schaub, Adam Schulman, Devin Stauffer, Bernhardt L. Trout, Lise van Boxel, Richard Velkley, Stuart D. Warner, Jerry Weinberger.
Preface
—Ralph Lerner
Introduction
—Daniel A. Doneson, Svetozar Y. Minkov, and Bernhardt L. Trout
PART I. THE PROJECT FOR MASTERY
Chapter 1. Machiavelli and the Discovery of Fact
—Harvey C. Mansfield
Chapter 2. The Place of the Treatment of the Conquest of Nature in
Francis Bacon's On the Wisdom of the Ancients
—Svetozar Y. Minkov
Chapter 3. Hobbes on Nature and Its Conquest
—Devin Stauffer
Chapter 4. Devising Nature: An Essay on Descartes's Discourse on
Method
—Stuart D. Warner
Chapter 5. Montesquieu, Commerce, and Science
—Diana J. Schaub
Chapter 6. Bacon and Franklin on Religion and Mastery of Nature
—Jerry Weinberger
PART II. ANCIENT ALTERNATIVES AND ANTICIPATIONS
Chapter 7. On the Supremacy of Contemplation in Aristotle and
Plato
—Robert C. Bartlett
Chapter 8. Xenophon and the Conquest of Nature
—Christopher Nadon
Chapter 9. Lucretius on Rebelling Against the "Laws" of Nature
—Paul Ludwig
PART III. CONSEQUENCES, CRITIQUES, AND CORRECTIONS
Chapter 10. Jean-Jacques Rousseau: Return to Nature vs. Conquest of
Nature
—Arthur Melzer
Chapter 11. Kant on Organism and History: Ambiguous Endings
—Richard Velkley
Chapter 12. Beyond the Island of Truth: Hegel and the Shipwreck of
Science
—Michael A. Gillespie
Chapter 13. Separating the Moral and Theological Prejudices and
Taking Hold of Human Evolution
—Lise van Boxel
Chapter 14. Mastery of Nature and Its Limits: The Question of
Heidegger
—Mark Blitz
Chapter 15. What Is Natural Philosophy? The Perspective of
Contemporary Science
—Adam Schulman
Chapter 16. Quantum Mechanics and Political Philosophy
—Bernhardt L. Trout
Notes
List of Contributors
Index
Acknowledgments
Ranging from ancient Greek thought to contemporary quantum mechanics, Mastery of Nature investigates to what extent nature can be conquered to further human ends and to what extent such mastery is compatible with human flourishing.
Svetozar Y. Minkov is Associate Professor of Philosophy at Roosevelt University. Bernhardt L. Trout is the Raymond F. Baddour, ScD, (1949) Professor of Chemical Engineering at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology.
"Addressing a mix of technology, politics, culture, and philosophy
of science, the essays in Mastery of Nature connect the
intellectual stages of philosophical and scientific development
with unusual precision and depth. The collection amounts to a rare
exchange between philosophical critics of the modern scientific
project and its serious defenders."
*Robert Faulkner, Boston College*
"This volume is an ambitious undertaking made possible by an
impressive group of contributors whose essays, while diverse, work
together to create a whole greater than the sum of its parts.
Mastery of Nature is a significant contribution to several fields,
including political philosophy, intellectual history, and
philosophy of science."
*Ronna Burger, Tulane University*
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