“Man the Machine” (hard determinism) - Baron d’Holbach (1723-1789)
Determinism
-
Determinism: is the view that every event has a cause, and thus everything
Baron d’Holbach
-
For the
Encyclopedie,
Holbach authored and translated a large number of articles on
topics such as politics religion, chemistry and mineralogy.
Atheism
-
If we go back to the beginning we shall find that ignorance and fear created the gods; that
fancy enthusiasm or deceit adorned or disfigured them; that
French Materialism
-
Denied the existence of a deity.
-
Denied evidence of all a priori arguments.
Man = Machine
-
All the motion of his machine springs as a necessary consequence from his primitive
impulse
Julien Offray de La Mettrie
-
Argues that man is simply a machine, subject to the laws of motion like any mechanism
of eighteenth-century science.
Mind = Brain (Holbach)
-
“The will…is a modification of the brain” (132).
Laws of Nature
-
Pleasure-Pain Principle
-
Self-preservation
-
This
preview
has intentionally blurred sections.
Sign up to view the full version.
This is the end of the preview.
Sign up
to
access the rest of the document.
- Spring '07
- peter
- Philosophy, necessary consequence, Julien Offray de La Mettrie, Baron d'Holbach, French materialism
-
Click to edit the document details
