The Architecture of Matter: Galileo to Kant
Thomas Holden
Abstract
Examines the debate in early modern philosophy over the composition and internal architecture of matter, focussing on problems concerning the structure of continua, the metaphysics of parts and wholes, and the individuation of material beings. Are the parts of material bodies actual or potential entities? Is matter divisible to infinity? Do material bodies resolve to atoms? All the leading figures of the period address this cluster of issues, including Galileo, Descartes, Hobbes, Leibniz, Newton, Hume, Boscovich, Reid, and Kant. Presents a historical and critical study of these discussions, an ... More
Keywords: atoms, composition, continua, divisibility, early modern, individuation, matter, ontology, parts, wholes
Bibliographic Information
| Print publication date: 2004 | Print ISBN-13: 9780199263264 |
| Published to Oxford Scholarship Online: January 2005 | DOI:10.1093/0199263264.001.0001 |
