Vitalists collapsed Cartesian mind-matter dualism into a monistic union

Evidence

The vitalists, however, affirmed the life of all things through a reduction of Cartesian dualism to the monistic unity of matter and spirit. Among the proponents of a vitalist philosophy were Francis Glisson, Jean Baptiste Van Helmont and his son, Francis Mercury Van Helmont, Lady Anne Conway, and Gottfried Wilhelm von Leibniz. — Carolyn Merchant, The Death of Nature, 932

Categorization

• DEFINE: Defines vitalism against Cambridge Platonism for shared course vocabulary.
• XREF: The vitalism-mechanism polarity continues the organic-cosmos theme from chapter 4 interwoven with the ecofeminist critique. — connects to: The English Civil War revived vitalist philosophy as an alternative to mechanism — Carolyn Merchant, The Death of Nature: Women, Ecology,…, 526; Descartes’ certainty program reduced nature to quantifiable primary qualities — Carolyn Merchant, The Death of Nature: Women, Ecology,…, 795; Vitalism’s monistic worldview inherently restrains the exploitation of nature — Carolyn Merchant, The Death of Nature: Women, Ecology,…, 933 (+6 more)

Broader Connections

• Anne Conway was the most rigorous vitalist critic of Cartesian mechanism. #exemplifies (0.90) — Carolyn Merchant, The Death of Nature, 971
• Bergson’s vitalism rejects both mechanistic and finalist accounts of evolution #corroborates (0.85)
• Hegel dissolves subject-object dualism by starting before the separation occurs #expands (0.72) — Fredric Jameson, Marxism and Form, 102
• Sartre rejected Cartesian dualism by treating material givens as meaning-sedimented facticities #responds-to (0.72) — Christine Daigle, Jacob Golomb (eds.), Beauvoir and Sartre, 63