Mente, materia e pensiero. La strategia anti-lockiana di Mary Astell

novitàdigital Mente, materia e pensiero.
La strategia anti-lockiana di Mary Astell

Articolo

Rivista

RIVISTA DI FILOSOFIA NEO-SCOLASTICA

Fascicolo

RIVISTA DI FILOSOFIA NEO-SCOLASTICA - 2023 - 2. Matter and Its Semantic Correlations Some Ancient and Modern Examples

Titolo

Mente, materia e pensiero. La strategia anti-lockiana di Mary Astell

Mind, Matter, and Thought. Mary Astell’s Strategy against Locke

Autore

Emilio Maria De Tommaso

Editore

Vita e Pensiero

Formato

Articolo |

Pdf

Online da

07-2023

Doi

10.26350/001050_000358

Issn

0035-6247 (stampa) | 1827-7926 (digitale)

€ 6,00

Ebook in formato Pdf leggibile su questi device:

Computer
con Software:
- Adobe PDF Reader
Android
iPhone/Ipad
con App:
- Adobe PDF Reader
E-Book Reader
Ibs Tolino
Kobo

Descrizione

In The Christian Religion, As Profess’d by a Daughter of the Church of England (London 1705) by Mary Astell, the author challenges many aspects of John Locke’s philosophy concerning theology, politics, ethics and religion. This manuscript focuses on one of her main criticisms against Locke, that is, her rejection of his view on thinking matter. Adopting a dualistic ontology, clearly inspired by Descartes, Astell contests Locke’s substantial agnosticism, and its potentially heretical implications, including materialism and soul’s mortality.
She detects a sort of repugnancy between matter and thought, and, consequently, she argues that thought exclusively pertains to immaterial and immortal beings, such as minds. Following Astell’s reasoning, this paper aims to spotlight her argumentative strategy, which makes use of Locke’s language and philosophy against him, showing the inconsistency of his hypothesis. Interestingly, she comes to justify her ontology of mind on the basis of Lockean epistemology.