At this stage one of those... «Philosophy: A Very Short Introduction»
innashpitzberg10 октября 2012At this stage one of those unfortunate little things happens. Descartes was a notable mathematician, and no mean performer in physics. True, the work of Isaac Newton (1642–1727) wiped his physics off the map towards the end of the century, though not before Newton himself had accepted it and attempted to work within it until his late thirties. But the main example he selects for Part 5 is his theory about how the human heart works, and this nowadays sounds just plain quaint and fanciful – he believes it to be much hotter than any other part of the body, and makes it sound like a distillery in action. (All it distils is blood, some readers may be disappointed to learn.) In spite (or partly because) of this glitch the Discourse is a rich and memorable work. An eminent founder of modern thought grapples with himself, Aristotelianism, scepticism, academic reaction, public and ecclesiastical opinion, physics, cosmology, and physiology, all in about fifty pages. Now that I call a real feast.
9 понравилось5
