Abstract:

Marin Cureau de la Chambre’s (1594-1669) proposal is this: life is a form of thinking: „On peut dire que tout ce qui est vivant connoist, et que tout ce qui connoist est vivant.“ (Système 3, 3, 4, 144) Everything that lives cognizes and everything that cognizes is alive. The principal functions of life are cognitive. One kind of cognition is cognition by instinct. Cognition by instinct means, that an animal (or part of an animal or a living being) cognizes in virtue of an innate collection of images (i.e. representations) which are teleologically structured. Three points of interest emerge from this interpretation of Cureau: (i) Cureau bridges the gap between a (broadly speaking) Aristotelian and a Cartesian Conception of the soul. (ii) He is one of the first philosophers actually explaining what instinct is. (iii) He may be viewed as advocating a teleosemantic theory of innate content.