Early modern philosophy is coined by the rise of science, and the succesive withdrawal from Aristotilian-scholastic thinking, which dominated late medieval philosophy. This process culminates in a paradigm shift, realised in the writing of René Descartes: The mecanistic and dualist worldview irreversibly succeeds neoaristotilian theory and determines the philosophical discussion until the second half of the 18th century.
Recent research has shown that this picture is too simple, even if it may not simply be false: Neither was the influence of Aristotilian-scholastic thinking simply put aside on accounts of Cartesianism, nor was the heyday of the mecanist worldview at any point in history complete.
The group of researchers "Transformations of the Mind", founded by Dominik Perler who was awarded the Leibniz Prize of the DFG in 2006, will inquire into this time of change and reconstruction with regards to its historical and systematic dimension, taking into account the aformentioned research. Central topics will in theoretical philosophy: apart from philosophical psychology, in which the paradigm shift becomes particularly evident, the theory of ideas and the role of teleology will be important. The range of authors discussed chronologically ranges from Pietro Pomponazzi to Immanuel Kant.
It is the central goal of this group of researchers to link an appropriate historical inquiry to a genuine systematic approach, thus making the systematic relevance of various conceptions explicit.
Apart from a series of naturally specific individual projects, other projects have been planned, which shall envisage greater developments, and to which all members of the research group shall contribute.
Our first collective effort is dedicated to the theory of ideas. The concept of the idea is a key concept in early modern philosophy. Allmost all early modern philosophy, ranging from Descartes' paradigmatic oevre to Thomas Reid's philosophy of common sense in the late 18th century, the discussion in theoretical philosophy is dominated by the theory of ideas. Important authors of this epoch define their systematic approaches by means of their relationship to this theory, or at least discuss it thorougly. The concept of the idea is the `lead concept' of this time, a function it does not lose until Kant.
Originally, ideas are conceived of as those mental states, which as simple representations underlie all other functions of the mind. According to the conception pertaining to the classically Cartesian theory of ideas, we would not be able to refer to something by means of our minds without ideas. Only the representationalist nature of ideas provides an understanding of the intentionality of mental states. Since ideas represent something, they can make a connection between mental states and that to which these states refer.
This brief characterisation of the basic idea opens up a range of questions, which are intenseley discussed in the philosophical literature of the 17th and 18th century. What exactly are ideas? What do they refer to? What properties enable them to exercise their representationalist function? What kinds of ideas are there? What is the relationship between simple and complex ideas? What is the relationship between complex and abstract ideas? How do ideas relate to other mental states, such as judgments or concepts?
This project is dedicated to the edition of a two-volume collection of central primary sources about ideas, which shall serve as a basis for a systematic treatment of the above and related questions in a historical context. The selection of central texts on the theory of ideas as well as a thorough commentary shall provide an overview of the early modern discussion about the concept of the idea.
Not only the most prominent apologists and critics of the theory of ideas, such as Descartes, Locke, and Hume, shall be taken into account, but also authors to whom only little attention has been paid in the German discussion, such as Nicolas Malebrache, Antoine Arnauld, Pierre Gassendi, or Thomas Reid.
Apart from this collective project, which shall be followed by others, the members of the research group pursue projects that contain a wide range of approaches to our scope of research - transformations of mind.
Dominik Perler's project, Paolo Rubini's project, and Maria Seidl's project are directly related to this scope. In his project "Transformations of Emotions", Dominik Perler will examine the transformation of the concept of emotion in early modern theories of emotions, taking into account a wide range of authors, among them Suarez, Descartes, Malebranche, and Spinoza. The project shall demonstrate in what ways different metaphysical conceptions of the mind have had direct impacts on theories of emotions. These influences shall be illustrated over the course of an analysis of the question as to whether or not we are able to influence or even control our emotions consciously. The inquiry will take into consideration contemporary analytical discussions on emotions, and thus make its results available to a systematic discussion. Paolo Rubini's research is about transformations of mind within an Aristotilian tradtion, that is, it is about the radically Aristotilian theorist Pietro Pomponazzi, and about his consequent implementation of hylemorphistic naturalsm in philosophical psychology. In his project „Pietro Pomponazzi's Theory of Knoweledge“, he examines, among other things, the impact such a view on the mind has on the theory of knowledge, taking into account Pomponazzi's handwritten comments on Aristotle's De Anima. Maria Seidl inquires into an entirely different type of transformations of mind in her project „The Intellect in Pierre Gassendi's Materialist Theory of Mind“. Gassendi's atomist materialsm seems to be incommensurable with the conception of an immaterial mind. Whether and, if so, how these two conceptions can go together is the central question in Maria Seidl's project, which constitutes an deatailed inquiry into Gassendi's conception of the mind.
As has been mentioned, the concept of the idea is central to the transformation, which the established conception of the mind experienced as a result of the Cartesian paradigm shift. In his project „Leibniz's Structuralist Theory of Cognition “, Christian Barth inquires into the systematic function of this concept in the philosopohy of two outstanding early modern authors. Central to his project is Robert Brandom's thesis that Spinoza's and Leibniz's theories of ideas should ultimately be regarded as inferentialist theories. His critical examination of this theis shall bridge the gap between the the historical content of the project and the contemporary analytical discussion about the intentional content of mental states.
Two projects by Stephan Schmid and Johannes Haag are about the transformation of the role of teleological explanations in early modern philosophy. Prima facie it seems evident that the rise of Cartesianism would put an end to teleological explanations in philosophy: the mecanist explanations of nature of science seemed to render these superfluous. However, it soon turned out that after all, teleological explanations could not easily be dispensed with. Whereas our grasp of physical processes could be improved significantly by mecanist explanations, they have contributed precious little to our understanding of the biological conception of life. In his project Final Causes in the Early Modern Period, Stephan Schmid examines how various early modern authors have done justice to the difficulties related to a materialist worldview. Ultimately, classical Aristotilian teleology of nature is substituted by a theory of action, since most explanations draw on the purposeful actions of God at the creation and preservation of the world. Why and how this version of teleology of action is finally transformed into a teleology of nature in Kantian philosophy will be the subject of Johannes Haag's project on "Teleology of Actions and Teleology of Nature" . His central question will be whether such a transformaed concept of teleology can nowadays be of systematic interest.