History of Philosophy as a History of Systems: Insights From Martial Gueroult's Dianoematics

During a climate of strong disenchantment toward systematic thought, the French philosopher Martial Gueroult (1891-1976) applied the concept of a system to the field of history of philosophy. His `dianometics' is, among other aspects, a philosophy of the history of philosophy that considers each philosophical work as an autonomous system. This article proposes a critical reading of Gueroult's work (which is rarely discussed outside of the French-speaking community) and aims to demonstrate that his dianoematics offers a new insightful method for approaching and understanding the history of philosophy. First, I will reconstruct Gueroult's argument to demonstrate how he justifies the possibility of a philosophical history of philosophy. I will then present Gueroult's conception of system and how it can be used as an analysis technique for the history of philosophy. However, Gueroult's project sometimes betrays some of its promises. A critical account will be presented as well.