Du Châtelet on Sufficient Reason and Empirical Explanation

Abstract

For Émilie Du Châtelet, I argue, a central role of the principle of sufficient reason is to discriminate between better and worse explanations. Her principle of sufficient reason does not play this role for just any conceivable intellect: it specifically enables understanding for minds like ours. She develops this idea in terms of two criteria for the success of our explanations: “understanding how” and “understanding why.” These criteria can respectively be connected to the determinateness and contrastivity of explanations. The crucial role Du Châtelet’s principle of sufficient reason plays in identifying good explanations is often overlooked in the literature, or else run together with questions about the justification and likelihood of explanations. An auxiliary goal of the article is to situate Du Châtelet’s principle of sufficient reason with respect to some of the general epistemological and metaphysical commitments of her Institutions de Physique, clarifying how it fits into the broader project of that work.

Science and the Principle of Sufficient Reason: Du Châtelet contra Wolff

“…22 "Du Châtelet's conception of a sufficient reason…seems to make what qualifies as a sufficient reason contingent on human psychology: the kind of reason that satisfies us at once time need not be the reason that satisfies us at another time" (Amijee 2021, 5; see also Brading 2019, Detlefsen 2019, and Wells 2021. 23 The 'German Metaphysics' is the work Du Châtelet knew best, by her own account.…”

“…On the limited agential scope of the PSR in Du Châtelet, in contrast withDescartes and Leibniz, see Amijee (2021) andWells (2021). Wolff's position on this issue is hard to pin down.…”

Toward a new phase of Du Châtelet scholarship: From Institutions de Physique (1740) to Institutions Physiques (1742)

“…The literature on Du Châtelet's views on causes and explanation in physics abounds. For further discussion, seeBrading (2019, 38-39) andWells (2021).…”