The concept of contingency and its significance in the philosophy of Emile Boutroux

Abstract

The article examines the concept of contingency of nature and scientific laws, put for­ward and set forth in a number of works by the French spiritualist philosopher Emile Boutroux (1845–1921). The principle of contingency became for him an important tool in solving complex interrelated problems: 1) to substantiate spiritualism, including its key idea of ​​freedom, based on the scientific knowledge of the era in which issues of phi­losophical epistemology were becoming increasingly important; 2) thereby contribute to the revival of metaphysics, which was threatened with marginalization due to the pro­motion of the ideas of positivism and scientism. Considering the hierarchy of genera, or levels of being, as well as the laws corresponding to them, Boutroux sought to prove that the world is not dominated by rigid necessity, but by contingency. Accordingly, in scientific laws there is a certain amount of convention, which increases as one moves from the lower stages of being, those closest to matter, where determinism manifests it­self most strongly, to the highest levels, where the main role is played by the spiritual principle with its inherent freedom. It is this freedom, which cannot be comprehended in experience, that is expressed in contingency, which is a characteristic feature of being. Thus, the principle of contingency appears in Boutroux’s concept as the main principle of knowledge and explanation in philosophy, which allows metaphysics to return its meaning, denied by positivism, and to substantiate human freedom.