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The Scientific Revolution: A Historiographical Inquiry
In this first book-length historiographical study of the Scientific Revolution, H. Floris Cohen examines the body of work on the intellectual, social, and cultural origins of early modern science. Cohen critically surveys a wide range of scholarship since the nineteenth century, offering new perspectives on how the Scientific Revolution changed forever the way we understand the natural world and our place in it.
Cohen's discussions range from scholarly interpretations of Galileo, Kepler, and Newton, to the question of why the Scientific Revolution took place in seventeenth-century Western Europe, rather than in ancient Greece, China, or the Islamic world. Cohen contends that the emergence of early modern science was essential to the rise of the modern world, in the way it fostered advances in technology.
A valuable entrée to the literature on the Scientific Revolution, this book assesses both a controversial body of scholarship, and contributes to understanding how modern science came into the world.
Cohen's discussions range from scholarly interpretations of Galileo, Kepler, and Newton, to the question of why the Scientific Revolution took place in seventeenth-century Western Europe, rather than in ancient Greece, China, or the Islamic world. Cohen contends that the emergence of early modern science was essential to the rise of the modern world, in the way it fostered advances in technology.
A valuable entrée to the literature on the Scientific Revolution, this book assesses both a controversial body of scholarship, and contributes to understanding how modern science came into the world.
680 pages, Paperback
First published October 3, 1994
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August 31, 2014
A. Themes
1. Argues for a discontinuous view of the scientific revolution
2. Argues that science is the most important endeavor of Western society
3. Argues that historiography is essential to study. “Creative eclecticism” or a hybridization is the best way to appraoch the scientific revolution.
B. Summary: This book attempts to provide a comprehensive analysis on all material written about the Scientific Revolution. Cohen argues that the key component of the Western world (and what has set it apart from the rest of the world) has been its science. The Scientific Revolution provided the genesis of modern science. The historiographical approach taken in this book is to compare the work of past historians and find interesting inconsistencies. (For example, you cannot fully adopt all of Koyre’s theories on Galileo. Too much has become available on his life since he wrote. What should be done with Koyre is to “judiciously combine and cross-fertilize” his thought.)
C. Outline
1. What was new about science in the 17th?
a) Examination of the “Great Tradition” or the historical use of the term Scientific Revolution. The main question is one of continuity or discontinuity. The Duhem thesis is one of continuity (the Scientific Revolution emerged in the Middle Ages). Cohen is on the side of Koyre (backed by Kuhn, Butterfield, and Westfall) and ‘relative’ discontinuity.
b) Examination of some related themes to the Scientific Revolution. This includes the idea of progress, scientific method, scientific instruments, and the roles of universities and scientific societies. A recent trend is hermeticism--reconstructing the mental world of the 17th century. Finally, the contextualist trend of locating science in the breaking up of the feudal order.
2. What was the causes of the Scientific Revolution?
a) The causes of the Scientific Revolution date back to Greek, Medieval, and Renaissance thought.
b) The causes stem from specific events in Western Europe: Puritanism, capitalism, printing press, voyages, and technology.
c) What can we learn about the causes of the Scientific Revolution by looking at its ‘failure’ in other civilizations. This is Needham’s famous question about why the Scientific Revolution did not occur in China.
3. Summary and Cohen’s history of the Scientific Revolution.
D. Approaches to the history of science
1. Cross-Cultural Comparative: Compare other societies to understand why a Scientific Revolution did not occur there also. The best example of this is Joseph Needham’s study of Oriental science and its comparison with Western science.
2. Old Contextualist: Place the entire body of a scientists work against all that was known in a given period.
3. New Contextualist: The body of a scientists work is placed in the social, political, and economic context.
4. Feminist: The Carolyn Merchant thesis: the Scientific Revolution signified the death of nature; the concept of nature as a passive woman to be subdued rather than as a nurturing mother to be revered. This is also found with E.F. Keller who focuses on the triumph of ‘masculine’ power-directed science.
5. Hermeticist: Yates and her thesis that a Hermetic, magical tradition was one of the causes of the Scientific Revolution.
6. Internal/External:
7. Marxist: Examines class issues in the history of science. Example is Farrington who looked at why Greek science failed and people like Galileo succeeded. He said it was because science was studied in Greece in a slave society. It was the activity of a leisure class uninterested in combining it with the productive forces of technology.
8. Positivist: History is a progression of facts. Mach is an example.
9. Prosopographical: Collective biography. Robert Merton.
1. Argues for a discontinuous view of the scientific revolution
2. Argues that science is the most important endeavor of Western society
3. Argues that historiography is essential to study. “Creative eclecticism” or a hybridization is the best way to appraoch the scientific revolution.
B. Summary: This book attempts to provide a comprehensive analysis on all material written about the Scientific Revolution. Cohen argues that the key component of the Western world (and what has set it apart from the rest of the world) has been its science. The Scientific Revolution provided the genesis of modern science. The historiographical approach taken in this book is to compare the work of past historians and find interesting inconsistencies. (For example, you cannot fully adopt all of Koyre’s theories on Galileo. Too much has become available on his life since he wrote. What should be done with Koyre is to “judiciously combine and cross-fertilize” his thought.)
C. Outline
1. What was new about science in the 17th?
a) Examination of the “Great Tradition” or the historical use of the term Scientific Revolution. The main question is one of continuity or discontinuity. The Duhem thesis is one of continuity (the Scientific Revolution emerged in the Middle Ages). Cohen is on the side of Koyre (backed by Kuhn, Butterfield, and Westfall) and ‘relative’ discontinuity.
b) Examination of some related themes to the Scientific Revolution. This includes the idea of progress, scientific method, scientific instruments, and the roles of universities and scientific societies. A recent trend is hermeticism--reconstructing the mental world of the 17th century. Finally, the contextualist trend of locating science in the breaking up of the feudal order.
2. What was the causes of the Scientific Revolution?
a) The causes of the Scientific Revolution date back to Greek, Medieval, and Renaissance thought.
b) The causes stem from specific events in Western Europe: Puritanism, capitalism, printing press, voyages, and technology.
c) What can we learn about the causes of the Scientific Revolution by looking at its ‘failure’ in other civilizations. This is Needham’s famous question about why the Scientific Revolution did not occur in China.
3. Summary and Cohen’s history of the Scientific Revolution.
D. Approaches to the history of science
1. Cross-Cultural Comparative: Compare other societies to understand why a Scientific Revolution did not occur there also. The best example of this is Joseph Needham’s study of Oriental science and its comparison with Western science.
2. Old Contextualist: Place the entire body of a scientists work against all that was known in a given period.
3. New Contextualist: The body of a scientists work is placed in the social, political, and economic context.
4. Feminist: The Carolyn Merchant thesis: the Scientific Revolution signified the death of nature; the concept of nature as a passive woman to be subdued rather than as a nurturing mother to be revered. This is also found with E.F. Keller who focuses on the triumph of ‘masculine’ power-directed science.
5. Hermeticist: Yates and her thesis that a Hermetic, magical tradition was one of the causes of the Scientific Revolution.
6. Internal/External:
7. Marxist: Examines class issues in the history of science. Example is Farrington who looked at why Greek science failed and people like Galileo succeeded. He said it was because science was studied in Greece in a slave society. It was the activity of a leisure class uninterested in combining it with the productive forces of technology.
8. Positivist: History is a progression of facts. Mach is an example.
9. Prosopographical: Collective biography. Robert Merton.
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