Édouard Louis Emmanuel Julien Le Roy (; 18 June 1870 in

Paris Paris () is the Capital city, capital and List of communes in France with over 20,000 inhabitants, largest city of France. With an estimated population of 2,048,472 residents in January 2025 in an area of more than , Paris is the List of ci ...

– 10 November 1954 in Paris) was a French philosopher and

mathematician A mathematician is someone who uses an extensive knowledge of mathematics in their work, typically to solve mathematical problems. Mathematicians are concerned with numbers, data, quantity, mathematical structure, structure, space, Mathematica ...

Life

Le Roy entered the ''

École Normale Supérieure École or Ecole may refer to: * an elementary school in the French educational stages normally followed by Secondary education in France, secondary education establishments (collège and lycée) * École (river), a tributary of the Seine flowing i ...

'' in 1892, and received the '' agrégation'' in

mathematics Mathematics is a field of study that discovers and organizes methods, Mathematical theory, theories and theorems that are developed and Mathematical proof, proved for the needs of empirical sciences and mathematics itself. There are many ar ...

in 1895. He became Doctor in Sciences in 1898, taught in several high schools, and in 1909 became professor of mathematics at the '' Lycée Saint-Louis'' in Paris. From then on, Le Roy took a major interest in

philosophy Philosophy ('love of wisdom' in Ancient Greek) is a systematic study of general and fundamental questions concerning topics like existence, reason, knowledge, Value (ethics and social sciences), value, mind, and language. It is a rational an ...

and

metaphysics Metaphysics is the branch of philosophy that examines the basic structure of reality. It is traditionally seen as the study of mind-independent features of the world, but some theorists view it as an inquiry into the conceptual framework of ...

. A friend of Teilhard de Chardin and Henri Bergson's closer disciple, he succeeded Bergson at the College of France (1922) and, in 1945, at the '' Académie française''. In 1919, Le Roy was also elected a member of the '' Académie des Sciences morales et politiques''. Le Roy was especially interested in the relations between science and morality. Along with Henri Poincaré and Pierre Duhem, he supported a conventionalist thesis on the foundation of mathematics. Although a fervent

Catholic The Catholic Church (), also known as the Roman Catholic Church, is the List of Christian denominations by number of members, largest Christian church, with 1.27 to 1.41 billion baptized Catholics Catholic Church by country, worldwid ...

, he extended this conventionalist theory to revealed truths, which did not, according to him, withdraw any of their strength. In the domain of religious dogmas, he rejected abstract reasoning and speculative

theology Theology is the study of religious belief from a Religion, religious perspective, with a focus on the nature of divinity. It is taught as an Discipline (academia), academic discipline, typically in universities and seminaries. It occupies itse ...

in favour of instinctive faith, heart and sentiment. He was one of those close to Bergson who encouraged him to turn to the study of

mysticism Mysticism is popularly known as becoming one with God or the Absolute (philosophy), Absolute, but may refer to any kind of Religious ecstasy, ecstasy or altered state of consciousness which is given a religious or Spirituality, spiritual meani ...

, explored in his later works. His conventionalism led his works, accused of

modernism Modernism was an early 20th-century movement in literature, visual arts, and music that emphasized experimentation, abstraction, and Subjectivity and objectivity (philosophy), subjective experience. Philosophy, politics, architecture, and soc ...

, to be placed on the

Index Index (: indexes or indices) may refer to: Arts, entertainment, and media Fictional entities * Index (''A Certain Magical Index''), a character in the light novel series ''A Certain Magical Index'' * The Index, an item on the Halo Array in the ...

by the

Holy See The Holy See (, ; ), also called the See of Rome, the Petrine See or the Apostolic See, is the central governing body of the Catholic Church and Vatican City. It encompasses the office of the pope as the Bishops in the Catholic Church, bishop ...

Works

*''Théorie du potentiel newtonien : leçons professées à la Sorbonne pendant le premier semestre (1894-1895)'' (1896) *''Sur l'intégration des équations de chaleur'' (1898) *''Sur les séries divergentes et les fonctions définies par un développement de Taylor (1899)'' *''Science et Philosophie'' (1899) *''Dogme et Critique'' (1907) *''A New Philosophy: Henri Bergson'' (''Une philosophie nouvelle : Henri Bergson'', 1912) *''What Is a Dogma?'' (1918) * ''Qu'est-ce-que la Science ?: réponse à André Metz'' (1926) *''L'Exigence idéaliste et le fait de l'évolution'' (1927) *''Les Origines humaines et l'évolution de l'intelligence'' (1928) *''La Pensée Intuitive. Le problème de Dieu'' (1929) * ''Introduction à l'étude du problème religieux'' (1944) *''Discours de réception'' (1946) *''Essai d'une philosophie première'' (1956) *''Bergson et Bergsonisme'' (1947) * ''Essai d'une philosophie première : l'exigence idéaliste et l'exigence morale'', 2 vol., posthumous (1956-1958)

References

External links

* *
''A New Philosophy: Henri Bergson''
{{DEFAULTSORT:Le Roy, Edouard 1870 births 1954 deaths Writers from Paris École Normale Supérieure alumni Academic staff of the Collège de France French mathematicians 20th-century French philosophers Henri Bergson Members of the Académie des sciences morales et politiques Members of the Académie Française Catholic philosophers

Life

Works

See also

References

External links