Early Modern Interest Group

Meeting time: Meeting time: Friday afternoons (about every other week - see the calendar below), 1:30–3:00 pm Central time
    Meeting place: Hybrid format. 737 Heller Hall and online via Zoom.

The early modern interest group (EMIG) reads and discusses primary and secondary literature focused on natural philosophy from the early modern period, especially in the work of key philosophers such as Descartes, Leibniz, and Kant. Our basis for selecting readings is to study works that are routinely ignored in the philosophy curriculum. Natural philosophical discoveries and debates are often pertinent to understanding why these philosophers adopted particular positions or rejected others, and our goal is to become familiar with a wide range of these neglected works. For more information, please contact Bennett McNulty (mcnu0074@umn.edu).

Our meetings are informal, and some participants need to arrive late or leave early because of scheduling conflicts. All faculty and graduate students from the University of Minnesota and area colleges and universities are welcome to attend whenever they would like (without invitation), and without giving advanced notice. Undergraduates can be included by invitation. If you know of an undergraduate who is well suited and possibly interested, please contact Bennett McNulty (mcnu0074@umn.edu) so an invitation can be extended.

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Fall 2024

This semester, EMIG is reading Catherine Wilson’s Kant and the Naturalistic Turn of 18th Century Philosophy (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2022). (The UMN Libraries has free access to the title through Oxford Scholarship Online.)

September 6: Wilson, C. 2022. Kant and the Naturalistic Turn of 18th Century Philosophy, (Oxford: Oxford University Press). Introduction (pp. 1–22)

September 20: Wilson, C. 2022. Kant and the Naturalistic Turn of 18th Century Philosophy, (Oxford: Oxford University Press). Chapters 1 and 2 (pp. 23–67)

October 4: Wilson, C. 2022. Kant and the Naturalistic Turn of 18th Century Philosophy, (Oxford: Oxford University Press). Chapters 3 and 4 (pp. 68–109)

October 25: Wilson, C. 2022. Kant and the Naturalistic Turn of 18th Century Philosophy, (Oxford: Oxford University Press). Chapters 5 and 6 (pp. 110–155)

November 8: Wilson, C. 2022. Kant and the Naturalistic Turn of 18th Century Philosophy, (Oxford: Oxford University Press). Chapters 7 and 8 (pp. 156–99)

December 6: Wilson, C. 2022. Kant and the Naturalistic Turn of 18th Century Philosophy, (Oxford: Oxford University Press). Chapters 9 and 10 (pp. 200–48)

Previous EMIG topics