ABSTRACT

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A grasp of the notion of quality is essential to an understanding of the Scientific Revolution, for a radically new attitude to such entities constituted the core of the mechanical philosophy. The basic idea had been articulated in the Categories, in which Aristotle (384-322 B.C.E.) distinguished qualities from substances-things capable of independent existence. Qualities, by contrast-colors, heaviness, the attractive power of a magnet, or the redemptive virtue in holy water, for instance-exist only in association with a substance.