Rethinking the Scientific Revolution

by Edited by Margaret J. Osler

• ISBN13: 9780521661010
• ISBN10: 0521661013
• Format: Hardcover
• Copyright: 2000-03-13
• Publisher: Cambridge University Press

Summary

This book challenges the traditional historiography of the Scientific Revolution, probably the single most important unifying concept in the history of science. Usually referring to the period from Copernicus to Newton (roughly 1500 to 1700), the Scientific Revolution is considered to be the central episode in the history of science, the historical moment at which that unique way of looking at the world that we call 'modern science' and its attendant institutions emerged. It has been taken as the terminus a quo of all that followed. Starting with a dialogue between Betty Jo Teeter Dobbs and Richard S. Westfall, whose understanding of the Scientific Revolution differed in important ways, the papers in this volume reconsider canonical figures, their areas of study, and the formation of disciplinary boundaries during this seminal period of European intellectual history.

Author Biography

Margaret J. Osler is Professor of History and Adjunct Professor of Philosophy at the University of Calgary.

Table of Contents

List of Contributors	ix
Preface	xi
Introduction
The Canonical Imperative: Rethinking the Scientific Revolution	3	(22)
Margaret J. Osler
Part I The Canon in Question
Newton as Final Cause and First Mover	25	(16)
B.J.T. Dobbs
The Scientific Revolution Reasserted	41	(18)
Richard S. Westfall
Part II Canonical Disciplines Re-Formed
The Role of Religion in the Lutheran Response to Copernicus	59	(30)
Peter Barker
Catholic Natural Philosophy: Alchemy and the Revivification of Sir Kenelm Digby	89	(30)
Bruce Janacek
Vital Spirits: Redemption, Artisanship, and the New Philosophy in Early Modern Europe	119	(18)
Pamela H. Smith
``The Terriblest Eclipse That Hath Been Seen in Our Days'': Black Monday and the Debate on Astrology during the Interregnum	137	(16)
William E. Burns
Arguing about Nothing: Henry More and Robert Boyle on the Theological Implications of the Void	153	(30)
Jane E. Jenkins
Part III Canonical Figures Reconsidered
Pursuing Knowledge: Robert Boyle and Isaac Newton	183	(18)
Jan W. Wojcik
The Alchemies of Robert Boyle and Isaac Newton: Alternate Approaches and Divergent Deployments	201	(20)
Lawrence M. Principe
The Janus Faces of Science in the Seventeenth Century: Athanasius Kircher and Isaac Newton	221	(26)
Paula Findlen
The Nature of Newton's ``Holy Alliance'' between Science and Religion: From the Scientific Revolution to Newton (and Back Again)	247	(24)
James E. Force
The Fate of the Date: The Theology of Newton's Principia Revisited	271	(26)
J. E. McGuire
Newton and Spinoza and the Bible Scholarship of the Day	297	(18)
Richard H. Popkin
Part IV The Canon Constructed
The Truth of Newton's Science and the Truth of Science's History: Heroic Science at Its Eighteenth-Century Formulation	315	(18)
Margaret C. Jacob
Index	333