ABSTRACT
This chapter discusses the great difference of Spinoza's theory of natural right from that of Hobbes physical theory. Galileo had overturned the Scholastic theory of motions with his mathematization of kinematics, and initially felt a similar move using his method for kinematics could be made to achieve a dynamics, before abandoning these attempts and endeavouring to use the other branch of physics, the theory of static forces. The chapter focuses on the findings of Gaukroger, McLaughlin and Schuster with respect to the re-establishment of the principles of statics at the core of Descartes' theory of kinematics. Shuster has shown, Descartes' model of hydrostatics is a response, at the request of his mentor Beeckman, to the work of Flemish engineer Simon Stevin on the so-called hydrostatic paradoxes. There is a lot going on, indicative of the swirl of ideas in late seventeenth-century science.
