BURIDANO (BURIDANUS), GIOVANNI

BURIDAN (Buridanus), GIOVANNI. – Philosopher and scientist, born in Béthune at the end of the 13th century and the beginning of the 14th. He was rector of the Sorbonne for the second time in 1340 (the date of his first rectorate is unknown), still teaching there in 1358, and it is almost certain that he died shortly after. A disciple of Ockham, he advocated and developed his doctrines despite the disapprovals and condemnations of 1326, 1339, and 1340. He indeed emphasized the nominalistic theory of universals and upheld a singular form of voluntarism: the greater good invariably determines our choice, and the only freedom in our power is to suspend the decision for further reflection. The legend of B.’s ass, unable to make a decision, is not found in his writings. B.’s greatest merit lies in having intuited the foundations of modern dynamics (É. Gilson). Indeed, it is in the nominalist school of Paris that we find the precursors of Leonardo, Copernicus, and Galileo (P. Duhem). A special merit of B. is having broken with Aristotle’s doctrine of motion. He replaced it with the theory of impetus impressed by the mover on the moved body and intuited that, without the resistance of the medium, motion would continue indefinitely. This is what happens in sidereal rotational motion, where the impetus initially impressed by God encounters no resistance to cancel II. Thus, the motive intelligences become superfluous, and the entire astronomical construction of the ancients is shaken. Notable also are his observations on gravitation and the laws governing II.
Principal works: Summulae or Compendium logicae (Paris 1487); Quaestiones in libros politicorum Aristotelis (ibid. 1500); Quaestiones super octo physicorum libros (ibid. 1509); Quaestiones in libros de anima (ibid. 1516); In metaphysicen Aristotelis quaestiones (ibid. 1518).