preview

Adam Smith Biography

Decent Essays

The influence that philosophers have upon each other no intellectual historian will doubt. I don’t think it would be erroneous to say that Adam Smith admired Isaac Newton and imitated his method. In discussing Isaac Newton’s mechanical system of the universe, Smith praised Newton for scientifically proving irregular and regular planetary motion by connecting celestial and terrestrial phenomena with the principle of gravity. Smith writes, it was “the greatest and most admirable improvement that was ever made in philosophy.” Furthermore he writes that Newton’s principles “have a degree of firmness and solidity that we should in vain look for in any other system.” In Skinner and Campbell’s biography of Adam Smith, they argue that Smith would …show more content…

In his early work on the origin of languages, published as an appendix to the third edition TMS in 1767, Smith used the analogy of a machine to explain the structure and formation of language. John Rae writes, “Smith turns to the machine, as he often does in seeking explanatory help when describing systems, to provide an analogy for the ‘progress of language.’” Smith compares the simplification of primitive language into a modern language to the process of a machine. Smith …show more content…

Again, in his criticism, Smith stresses that all systems even systems of thought are like machines. Smith writes: Systems in many respects resemble machines. A machine is a little system, created to perform, as well as to connect together, in reality, those different movements and effects which the artist has occasion for. A system is an imaginary machine invented to connect together in the fancy those different movements and effects which are already performed. Also, Smith appears to be pleased with the ability of Newton to explain phenomena that appeared unexplainable, by deducing it from one principle known to mankind. Contrasting the methods of Aristotle with the methods of Newton in his lectures on rhetoric and lettres Smith

Get Access