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RESEARCH PAPERS

No. 67

A metaphysical problem in the philosophy of Catharine Trotter Cockburn: space, the soul and the hierarchy of beings

DOI
https://doi.org/10.12795/themata.2023.i67.07
Submitted
November 13, 2022
Published
2023-06-30

Abstract

Catharine Trotter Cockburn’s metaphysics dissolves the necessary relationship between immateriality, immortality and thought. While in her youth this leads her to admit the possibility of thinking matter, in her mature work, it allows her to conceive space as non-thinking immaterial substance that links non-thinking material substance and thinking immaterial substance. To ground this conception of space, she draws on the thesis of the great chain of being. However, the possibility of thinking matter is not consistent with the hierarchy of beings, because within this frame matter occupies the lowest place. My aim is to evaluate whether there is any alternative within Trotter's philosophy to solve this contradiction.

References

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