Research on the Emergentistic Conception of Nature In the Eighteenth Century in France

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We have examined the emergentistic conception of nature in the 18^<th> Century, especially, that of Boyle, Haller and the Montpellier School and got the following results:Though there are some differences between the conceptions of nature of these three scholars, Boyle's being a chemical corpuscular theory of matter, Haller's a physiological stratificational structuro-functional conception of living beings and that of the Montpellier School also a physiological stratificational but vitalistic conception of living beings consisting of smaller living beings, we have found the following common points: 1) they presuppose something atomic as basic unity in order to consider a whole, 2) they consider the whole as an stratificational order composed of structures of structures or lives of lives, 3) there exists an upper operation corresponding to an upper structure, 4) they are conscious of the need to explain why an new operation which didn't exist on the lower level of structure emerges on t … More he upper level, 5) Ther refer to "emergence", to some "occult quality" or to soul in order to explain it; 6) they develop an emergentistic logic, if they don't refer to something mysterious but continue to rely on a structuro-functional logic. Their mutual conception of nature could be characterized as corpuscular stratificational structuro-functional emergentistic (for abbreviation, we use afterwards emergentistic conception)..Normally it is said that, concerning the conception of nature in the 17^<th> and 18^<th> centuries, mechanism considering the universe as a machine (a clock) was very popular and vitalism opposed to it but finally the former conquered the latter. But this vision of the history of thought tends to lose sight of emrgentistic conceptions of nature. In reality, however, modern science was not totally mechanistic. On the occasion of the revival of atomism, appeared the said modern emergentistic conception of nature and it would develop a holistic and complex vision. A conception of nature obliged to question "emergence" without the word existed in that period and continued to develop and to form an important part of the conception of nature supporting modern science. The corpuscular theory, therefore, isn't a mechanism, either. Because it resulted in a kind of holistic conception of nature. Less