| Budget Amount *help |
¥1,100,000 (Direct Cost: ¥1,100,000)
Fiscal Year 1999: ¥500,000 (Direct Cost: ¥500,000)
Fiscal Year 1998: ¥600,000 (Direct Cost: ¥600,000)
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| Research Abstract |
The purpose of this research is to place the political philosophy of Thomas Hobbes in the context of scientific revolution in the 17th century which brought about the paradigm change of science from Aristotelian and Scholastic philosophy to modern science, and to throw new light on the formation of modern political philosophy and its characteristics through it. For that, I attempted to examine the formation of the concept of science and scientific method of Hobbes in the context of the decline of the idea of civic science of Humanism and the formation of the idea of modern science in the scientific revolution that brought it.
Firstly , I considered the meaning of rhetoric in the political philosophy of Hobbes, in order to reexamine the influence of the tradition of Humanism on his thought, taking seriously the question brought up by the resent important study of Quentin Skinner. Secondly, I attempted to compare the conceptions of science in the scientific revolution in the 17th century and Hobbes's conception of it from various points of view. Especially, to reconsider the modernity of the system of the mechanistic philosophy of Hobbes and his conception of science in it, I analyzed the controversy between Hobbes and Descartes on optics, whose importance has been suggested by R.Tuck, and the contraoversy between Hobbes and R.Boyle on the Air-pump, whose meaning has been demonstrated by S.Shapin and S.Schaffer. Finally, in order to specify the subject of Hobbes's political philosopy in the context of transformation of political thought in early modern Europe, I tried to make clear the moment of the formation of his conception of "social contract" with reference to the formation of his mechanical concept of nature.
The results obtained lead us to reconsider the significance of modernization of political philosopy by Hobbes and to understand the nature of his political philosopy in terms of his total system of philosophy founded on his mechanistic picture of nature.
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