Abstract This paper identifies two levels of knowledge in Du Châtelet, wherein the two axiomatic principles of knowledge, the PSR and the PC, play an entirely different role. On the first level, they give rise to certainty, on the second to probability. The two levels explain how two differing claims in the literature on Du Châtelet's account of knowledge, which seem to be in tension with each other, can both be correct.

Abstract This paper reconstructs Diderot's Encyclopédie as a project of conceptual enlightenment and moral epistemology. It argues that the Encyclopédie is more than a mere lexical compendium, as it entails epistemological affordances that promote epistemic autonomy. The paper situates the Encyclopédie between Kant's media critique of enlightenment and its own epistemic claim, showing how its hypertextual form reconciles mediated knowledge with autonomous thinking. As such, the Encyclopédie can be understood as a dynamic model of conceptual rationality—transforming concepts into reasons, and readers into responsible epistemic agents.

Abstract This paper contrasts John Locke's view of the authority of scripture with his rejection of the authority of experts. Testimony provides evidence, but because this evidence is fallible, it can be doubted when contrary evidence is available. By contrast, Locke holds that scripture is infallible and therefore cannot be doubted or rejected, even in the face of counterevidence. On this view, those who accept scripture as divine revelation are obligated to believe whatever it says, and to believe it confidently, even when other evidence conflicts with scripture. This paper uses Linda Zagzebski's account of epistemic authority to clarify this position. Locke adopts a similar view regarding scripture, and this paper explains how this is consistent with his evidentialist epistemology.

Abstract This paper offers a close reading of Georg Lukács's use of the Presocratic philosophers Heraclitus and Protagoras from History and Class Consciousness. It examines the specific reading operation Lukács provides—a materialist reading of Presocratic philosophy that Lukács calls an “energetic reinterpretation”—and how this reading neither relativizes nor historicizes the Presocratics. In his remarkably perspicuous interpretation, Lukács reads his present through the lens of the Presocratics while also offering a materialist interpretation of Presocratic philosophy. Such a materialist reading reveals specific and significant political implications of Presocratic metaphysical statements.

Abstract In his 1963 lectures Problems of Moral Philosophy, Adorno tells us that if he were pushed to make a list of the cardinal virtues, it would include only one: modesty (Bescheidenheit). But what does this mean? Building on work by J.G. Finlayson, and synthesizing a wide range of sources from throughout Adorno's authorship, this paper defines the (Adornian) virtue of modesty as the mean between “coldness” and “self-assertiveness.” After dealing with a potential objection to Adorno's enthusiasm for modesty on the score of emptiness what emerges is an understanding of modesty as the paramount virtue for those of us forced, as Adorno thought we all were, to live in a world in which it is impossible to “live rightly.”

Abstract There are two main theories of how express consent and tacit consent determine societal membership and political obligation in Locke's political philosophy. On the “Serious Stake” interpretation, all and only those who have a stake in the community (including some who only tacitly consent to membership) are members of society. On the “Express Consent” interpretation, all and only those who expressly consent to be or become members are members, and tacit consent determines political obligation. This essay articulates a version of the Express Consent interpretation on which express consent to X is given by means of conduct that has semantic meaning sufficient to count as agreement to X. It then explains how this interpretation can meet standard objections to the Express Consent interpretation while avoiding the serious textual problems that face the Serious Stake interpretation.

Abstract In the European tradition, occasionalism is strongly associated with Cartesianism. One potent challenge to Cartesian occasionalism, raised in the 17th century by Bernard de Fontenelle, goes like this: Cartesian corporeal ontology is inconsistent with occasionalism in the corporeal domain because impenetrability is conceptually derived from the material essence and a causal power. This paper, therefore, poses the question: Did Fontenelle show that Cartesians cannot be occasionalist? It also answers this question in the negative by arguing that Descartes's writings on impenetrability show that he does not understand impenetrability to be a causal power.

Abstract This paper argues that, contrary to prevalent interpretations, Aristotle thinks of the natural lifespan of human beings as a natural phenomenon admitting of a teleological account. Though humans would have benefitted from living longer lives, in principle, there are teleological reasons for them to die when they do, pertaining to the prospects of individual and political flourishing, as well as to the maintenance and improvement of the species. This reading is supported by the discussion of old age in the Rhetoric. It also has significant consequences for our understanding of Aristotle's natural teleology and his views on human experience.

Abstract Realist interpreters argue that states are real individuals and not merely metaphorical or quasi-individuals for Spinoza. This paper argues that realism conflicts with Spinoza's conatus doctrine which is indispensable for his value theory. The conatus doctrine maintains that no individual, in itself, can be destroyed except by an external cause. Yet states can be destroyed by internal causes such as defective laws, citizens, or rulers. This is evidence that not all states are real individuals for Spinoza. After responding to objections, the paper then presents a positive view, qualified realism: some states are individuals, and some are not, on Spinoza's account. To be an individual, a state must meet the conditions for having a conatus: it must have a ratio, that is, an internal structuring by which, in itself, it produces unified effects that preserve its being.

Abstract This article deals with Schelling's critique of the idealist concept of the system in his Stuttgart Seminars concerning the following points. In the first place, Schelling distinguishes between the system of the world and a system of thought in that the former cannot be invented but discovered. Every system of thought, that is, every unilaterally ideal system, can be signaled for Schelling as an invention of its author. Secondly, Schelling differentiates between the concept of identity and the real opposition which expresses itself in the system of the world. It will be analyzed here the extent to which Schelling's concept of creative identity posits the absolute as a third term that serves as a mediator between the poles of the real = A and the ideal = B. As a result of this framework concerning the system and its relation to reality, we will deal in turn with a variety of topics arising in Schelling's middle metaphysics, such as the emergence of the finite from the absolute, the status of the finite as a counter-image, as well as the relationship between system and freedom, and between God and the world to illustrate our author's gradual rejection of constructivists, that is, idealists grounding attempts of the system.