This book explores the notions of space and extension of major early modern empiricist philosophers, especially Locke, Berkeley, Hume, and Condillac. While space is a central and challenging issue for early modern empiricists, literature on this topic is sparse. This collection shows the diversity and problematic unity of empiricist views of space. Despite their common attention to the content of sensorial experience and to the analytical method, empiricist theories of space vary widely both in the way of approaching the issue and in the result of their investigation. However, by recasting the questions and examining the conceptual shifts, we see the emergence of a programmatic core, common to what the authors discuss. The introductory chapter describes this variety and its common core. The other contributions provide more specific perspectives on the issue of space within the philosophical literature. This book offers a unique overview of the early modern understanding of these issues, of interest to historians of early modern philosophy, historians and philosophers of science, historians of ideas, and all readers who want to expand their knowledge of the empiricist tradition.

The first book entirely devoted to empiricist theories of space Recasts questions and conceptual shifts relating to space Highlights the rarely discussed works of authors such Destutt de Tracy or Maine de Biran

Autorentext
LAURA BERCHIELLI is lecturer (maître de conférences) at the University of Clermont Auvergne. Her field of interest is the history of 17th and 18th century philosophy. Her research focuses particularly on the relationship between sensible qualities and spatial contents, the notions of space and extension, and the notion of meaning within the empiricist tradition. She is the author of a number of articles on different philosophers and themes in these areas.

Inhalt
Preface (Laura Berchielli).- Chapter 1. Introduction (Laura Berchielli).- Chapter 2. Hobbes on Space as Imaginary Space (Martine Pécharman).- Chapter 3. Space and Substance in Locke's Essay (Martha Bolton).- Chapter 4. Spacious Mind and Spatial Spirits. Locke on Space and Thought (Philippe Hamou).- Chapter 5. Berkeley's Theological Challenge of Absolute Space in the Principles of Human Knowledge (Luc Peterschmitt).- Chapter 6. The Consequences of the Consequences of the Principles for the Theory of the Principles (Margaret Atherton).- Chapter 7. Berkeleian Instrumentalism: From Substance to Space (Robert Schwartz).- Chapter 8. Berkeley's two Notions of Extension (Laura Berchielli).- Chapter 9. The Ideality of Space in Enlightenment Empiricism: The Idéologues' Contribution (Elizabeth Schwartz).