George Berkeley: Religion and Science in the Age of Enlightenment

George Berkeley was considered "the most engaging and useful man in Ireland in the eighteenth century". This hyperbolic statement refers both to Berkeley’s life and thought; in fact, he always considered himself a pioneer called to think and do new things. He was an empiricist well versed in the sciences, an amateur of the mechanical arts, as well as a metaphysician; he was the author of many completely different discoveries, as well as a very active Christian, a zealous bishop and the apostle of the Bermuda project. The essays collected in this volume, written by some leading scholars, aim to reconstruct the complexity of Berkeley’s figure, without selecting "major" works, nor searching for "coherence" at any cost. They will focus on different aspects of Berkeley’s thought, showing their intersections; they will explore the important contributions he gave to various scientific disciplines, as well as to the eighteenth-century philosophical and theological debate. They will highlight the wide influence that his presently most neglected or puzzling books had at the time; they will refuse any anachronistical trial of Berkeley’s thought, judged from a contemporary point of view.

Introduction: Berkeley’s Philosophy between the Analytics and the Historians: beyond the "Standard Interpretation". Part I: Interpretations of Berkeley’s Philosophy. How Berkeley’s Works Are Interpreted, S.H. Daniel, Berkeley’s Metaphysical Instrumentalism, M.A. Hight; Causation, Fictionalism and Non-Cognitivism: Berkeley and Hume, P.J.E. Kail; Berkeley, The Space of Our Lives, and the Space of Physics, R. Brook. Part II: Neglected Works and Aspects of Berkeley’s Thought. Berkeley and His Contemporaries: the Question of Mathematical Formalism, C. Schwartz; Locke, Berkeley and Hume as Philosophers of Money: An Apology and Synopsis, C.G. Caffentzis; Berkeley and Chemistry in the Siris: the Rebuilding of a Non-Existent Theory, L. Peterschmitt; Berkeley and Newton on Gravity in Siris, T. Airaksinen;  "Scire per causas" vs. "scire per signa": Berkeley and Scientific Explanation in Siris, S. Parigi. Part III: Towards a Wider Historical Perspective. Berkeley, Theology and Bible Scholarship, D. Bertini; The Distrustful Philosopher: Berkeley between the Devils and the Deep Blue Sea of Faith, D. Berman; Berkeley, Spinoza and Radical Enlightenment, G. Brykman; Was Berkeley a Spinozist? An Historiographical Answer (1718-1751), C. Menichelli; The Animal According to Berkeley, S. Charles

Silvia Parigi, Ph. D. in Philosophy and History of Science, is Professor in charge of History of Science at the University of Cassino. She is the author of Il Mondo visibile. George Berkeley e la "perspectiva" (1995), editor/translator of a wide Italian collection of Berkeley’s works, (1996) and co-editor of Studi sull’entusiasmo (2001). Her articles include studies on the history of theories of vision and perception from the Middle Ages to the eighteenth century, Giacomo Leopardi’s epistemology, ancient and modern views on oculus fascinans. Currently working on the modern history of the concepts of spirit and effluvium, she is also in the editorial board of Berkeley Studies.