Cardano, Girolamo
Publié le 22/02/2012
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the first moves towards the theory of probability.
In mechanics 'Cardano's suspension' is still regarded as a
success.
He wrote on music and on dreams, believed in demons, and was regarded as a reliable astrologer, who
even cast the horoscope of Jesus Christ.
3 Metaphysics
Cardano claimed that Plotinus and Aristotle were his main inspiration in philosophy, and though he argued
explicitly against Aristotle, his theory is implicitly based on the Aristotelian tradition.
While he was not a
systematic thinker, his work rests on some basic assumptions which allow for a systematic understanding of his
main philosophical teaching, and which are themselves of major philosophic interest.
His notion of unity is fundamental.
It was developed in a little treatise De uno (On the One) , written around 1560
and published in Basle in 1562.
Cardano himself recommended it as an introduction to his natural philosophy.
In it
he argued that everything that exists is one, so that the structure of unity is identical to the structure of reality.
Analysis of a given real being, a human being for example, shows that its unity consists both in the single principle
behind its various operations and in the organic structure of its corporeal basis, which guarantees that its various
parts cooperate in the effort to achieve self-conservation.
Thus every real being can properly be regarded as a
system constituted by a certain number of organic parts that cooperate in function.
Every organ, in so far as it is a
real being and therefore one, has necessarily to be such a system; and every real being, as part of a greater, more
comprehensive, whole, has to function as an organ of this larger unit.
As a result, reality is reduced to a system of
functions, in which every individual being is at the same time an organ or subsystem of its supersystem, and the
superior unit of its subsystems.
This kind of ordering is also to be found in the sphere of history, which is governed
by fate.
4 Physics
In Cardano's treatise De natura (On Nature) , written at the same time as De uno (though not published in his
lifetime) and like De uno recommended as introductory reading, Cardano developed his concept of nature in
accordance with his basic ontological principle of unity.
The single principle which coordinates the various
operations of natural beings and causes the organic order of their unity is called the soul.
As a result the whole of
the material world is animated, and Aristotle's distinction between organic and non-organic nature is abandoned.
Different souls are systematically ordered in the same way as the different natural beings which they animate.
Their principal task is to care for the self-preservation of the bodies which correspond to them, so they are
endowed with whatever means of cognition are necessary for that task.
They act in accordance with the principles
of sympathy and antipathy.
The intellectual soul, being supernatural, is one and the same for all human beings, as
Averroes had held ( Ibn Rushd §3 ).
Bodies themselves are constituted by the heat of the heavens.
This heat is the active principle that serves the soul,.
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Liens utiles
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- Frescobaldi Girolamo, 1583-1643, né à Ferrare, compositeur et organiste italien.