Philosophy Dictionary of Arguments

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Essence, philosophy: the essence of an object is understood to mean one or more properties without which the object is inconceivable. Critics argue that such necessary properties can only be attributed to concepts, but not to empirical objects. See also features, essentialism, ultimate justification, properties, metaphysics, concepts, necessity de re, substance.
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Annotation: The above characterizations of concepts are neither definitions nor exhausting presentations of problems related to them. Instead, they are intended to give a short introduction to the contributions below. – Lexicon of Arguments.

 
Author Concept Summary/Quotes Sources

Th. Kuhn on Essence - Dictionary of Arguments

I 116
Essence/Tradition/Science/Kuhn: consequence of Newton's work: the statement that a stone falls because its "essence" drives it to the center of the universe (Aristotle) had now become a purely tautological play on words, which it had not been before! >Laws of nature
, >Tautology.
Henceforth, the whole stream of sensory phenomena, including color, taste, and even weight, had to be explained in terms of the size, shape, position, and motions of the elementary particles of basic matter. To attribute other properties to the elementary atoms was from now on something occult and out of question for science.
During this period Moliere's mockery of the doctor who believed in the "soporific power" (vis dormitiva). After that, scientists preferred to attribute the calming effect to the round shape of the opium elementary particles.
>Mysticism.

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Explanation of symbols: Roman numerals indicate the source, arabic numerals indicate the page number. The corresponding books are indicated on the right hand side. ((s)…): Comment by the sender of the contribution. Translations: Dictionary of Arguments
The note [Concept/Author], [Author1]Vs[Author2] or [Author]Vs[term] resp. "problem:"/"solution:", "old:"/"new:" and "thesis:" is an addition from the Dictionary of Arguments. If a German edition is specified, the page numbers refer to this edition.

Kuhn I
Th. Kuhn
The Structure of Scientific Revolutions, Chicago 1962
German Edition:
Die Struktur wissenschaftlicher Revolutionen Frankfurt 1973


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Ed. Martin Schulz, access date 2024-04-20
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