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Scientific Revolution (Renaissance and Reformation)

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  1. Introduction
  2.  
  3. The developments in science during the 16th and 17th centuries have traditionally been called the “Scientific Revolution.” The era that began with Nicolaus Copernicus (b. 1473–d. 1543) and ended with Isaac Newton (b. 1642–d. 1727) saw not only a change from an earth-centered to a sun-centered cosmos and a resultant mechanical universe but also advances in experimental method and changes in the life sciences. The traditional formulation saw all this as the beginnings of modern science. Yet not all was new. As scholars looked more deeply, many found that the science of the previous period looked more sophisticated, and that of the later period seemed less modern than had been acknowledged. The line of demarcation between “medieval” and “modern” science blurred. The study of nature, even among the most famous thinkers of the era, such as Francis Bacon and Isaac Newton, included subjects that today would be considered unscientific: astrology, alchemy, and magic. Though experiments were carried out, there was no professional class of scientists; most practitioners were dilettantes. Many historians are now reluctant to use the phrase “scientific revolution” when referring to this period in science. Nonetheless, important changes did occur in the physical and life sciences even if no total rupture occurred between the older and newer approaches. This entry lists works by subject and does not include monographs on specific individuals or their works, which will appear in separate entries.
  4.  
  5. General Overviews
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  7. The works of Burtt 2003 and Butterfield 1997 were instrumental in establishing the idea of the scientific revolution as a major break from the past. Duhem 1985 shows the creativity and influence of medieval thinkers and practitioners. Westfall 1971 is a traditional overview emphasizing mechanization and mathematics. Recent scholars tend to either reject the idea of an early modern revolution in science or modify it, in works such as Dear 2009 and Shapin 1996, or emphasize the developments as nonlinear and complex, such as Gal and Chen-Morris 2013.
  8.  
  9. Burtt, Edwin Arthur. The Metaphysical Foundations of Modern Science. 2d rev. ed. Mineola, NY: Dover, 2003.
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  11. Sees scientific revolution as a major philosophical shift in Western intellectual tradition from medieval to modern caused by appeal to mathematical elegance of Neoplatonic ideals. Originally published in 1932.
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  13. Butterfield, Herbert. The Origins of Modern Science. Rev. ed. New York: Simon and Schuster, 1997.
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  15. From Butterfield’s Cambridge lectures in 1948. Popularized the view of the scientific revolution as the beginning of modernity brought about by specific forward-looking individuals. Originally published in 1957.
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  17. Dear, Peter. Revolutionizing the Sciences: European Knowledge and Its Ambitions, 1500–1700. 2d ed. Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press, 2009.
  18. DOI: 10.1007/978-1-137-08958-8Save Citation »Export Citation »E-mail Citation »
  19. For general audiences. Covers material chronologically from 1500 to 1800. Greater emphasis on mathematics and physical sciences over life sciences and medicine. Good for classroom use. Originally published in 2001.
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  21. Debus, Allen G. Man and Nature in the Renaissance. Cambridge, UK: Cambridge University Press, 1978.
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  23. Part of Cambridge History of Science series for general audiences; intellectual history. Combines the idea of the progress of the exact sciences with the occult disciplines of the period.
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  25. Duhem, Pierre. Medieval Cosmology: Theories of Infinity, Place, Time, Void, and the Plurality of Worlds. Edited and translated by Roger Ariew. Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1985.
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  27. Abridgement of author’s Le système du monde: Histoire des doctrines cosmologiques de Platon à Copernic, 10 vols. (Paris: A. Hermann, 1913–1959). Looks at medieval thinkers and shows that their cosmological thinking was often more sophisticated than given credit for. Suggests that the scientific revolution was not so revolutionary.
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  29. Gal, Ofer, and Raz Chen-Morris. Baroque Science. Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 2013.
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  31. Shows developments by major players in optics and optical instruments and the mathematization of the physical sciences in the 17th century as paradoxes and results of leaps of the imagination.
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  33. Shapin, Steven. The Scientific Revolution. Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1996.
  34. DOI: 10.7208/chicago/9780226750224.001.0001Save Citation »Export Citation »E-mail Citation »
  35. For general audiences. Shapin declares, “There was no such thing as the Scientific Revolution, and this is a book about it.” Focuses mostly on England and social history; useful bibliographical essay.
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  37. Westfall, Richard S. The Construction of Modern Science: Mechanisms and Mechanics. New York: Wiley, 1971.
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  39. Cambridge History of Science Series for general audiences. Sees 17th century science as a resolution of the conflict between mathematical principles of order and mechanical philosophy. Includes development of chemistry and life sciences as well as physics and astronomy. Reprinted 1977.
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  41. Encyclopedias
  42.  
  43. While only Applebaum 2000 deals specifically with the scientific revolution, Gillespie 1970–1980 is a classic reference work and is very useful.
  44.  
  45. Applebaum, Wilbur, ed. Encyclopedia of the Scientific Revolution. New York: Garland, 2000.
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  47. Contains articles between several hundred and several thousand words on figures and concepts. Includes many lesser-known individuals and “nonscientific” subjects.
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  49. Gillespie, Charles Coulton, ed. Dictionary of Scientific Biography. 16 vols. New York: Scribner’s, 1970–1980.
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  51. One of the most important reference works in the history of science. Substantial articles on scientists from Antiquity to modern times. The new volumes in the New Dictionary of Scientific Biography (2007) also contain supplements to articles in the original work. Both are available in electronic format as well as book form.
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  53. Bibliographies
  54.  
  55. The best bibliography available is that maintained by the History of Science Society. While Isis continues to provide an annual bibliography as part of each volume, the most usable is from the website, but it is available by subscription only.
  56.  
  57. Isis (1912–).
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  59. Journal of the History of Science Society. Covers all periods and disciplines in the history and philosophy of science, medicine, and technology. Last issue of each volume is bibliographical.
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  61. Collections of Papers
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  63. Park and Daston 2006 provides as close as possible to a complete synthesis of the current state of scholarship on science in what the authors refuse to call the scientific revolution. Lindberg and Westman 1990 and Osler 2000 present useful essays expanding and questioning common assumptions. Other collections examine more specific aspects: national context (Crosland 1976), Jesuit contributions (Feingold 2002), and universities (Feingold and Navarro-Brotons 2006).
  64.  
  65. Crosland, Maurice, ed. The Emergence of Science in Western Europe. New York: Science History, 1976.
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  67. Papers from the Conference on the Emergence of Science in Western Europe in Different National Contexts at Leeds University in 1974. Articles discuss varying conditions in various western European countries that encouraged growth of science.
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  69. Feingold, Mordechai, ed. Jesuit Science and the Republic of Letters. Cambridge, MA: MIT, 2002.
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  71. Contribution to the reevaluation of the Jesuit contribution to early modern science, especially their role in education—stressing not only mathematics and experimental science but also the problems the Jesuits faced.
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  73. Feingold, Mordechai, and Victor Navarro-Brotons, eds. Universities and Science in the Early Modern Period. Dordrecht, The Netherlands: Springer, 2006.
  74. DOI: 10.1007/1-4020-3975-1Save Citation »Export Citation »E-mail Citation »
  75. Looks at studies of mathematics, medicine, and scientific disciplines from the 15th to the 18th centuries and across various countries. Concentrates on Spain and Italy.
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  77. Lindberg, David C., and Robert S. Westman, eds. Reappraisals of the Scientific Revolution. Cambridge, UK: Cambridge University Press, 1990.
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  79. Looks at new trends and expands the concept of science in the Early Modern period.
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  81. Osler, Margaret J., ed. Rethinking the Scientific Revolution. Cambridge, UK: Cambridge University Press, 2000.
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  83. Reprints challenge by B. J. T. Dobbs to the concept of a “scientific revolution” and response in favor of a traditional view by Richard Westfall. Other essays mostly favor Dobbs.
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  85. Park, Katharine, and Lorraine Daston, eds. The Cambridge History of Science. Vol. 3, Early Modern Science. Cambridge, UK: Cambridge University Press, 2006.
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  87. Comprehensive look at the current state of scholarship. Thematic articles discuss philosophy, social and intellectual life, types of involvement, disciplines, relations with nonscientific disciplines, and science beyond Europe. Avoids “scientific revolution” terminology and concept. Chapters are listed under appropriate headings.
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  89. Journals
  90.  
  91. Many journals specialize in the history of science and/or the early modern period. This section lists some of the major journals. Early Science and Medicine covers only the premodern period in the history of science, whereas the British Journal for the History of Science, Isis, and Journal for the History of Astronomy cover all periods. Renaissance Quarterly is period-specific but covers all disciplines.
  92.  
  93. The British Journal for the History of Science. 1962–.
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  95. Journal of the British Society for the History of Science. Covers all periods and disciplines in the history and philosophy of science, medicine, and technology.
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  97. Early Science and Medicine. 1996–.
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  99. Covers all disciplines in the history and philosophy of science, medicine, and technology from ancient times to about 1700.
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  101. Isis. 1912–.
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  103. Journal of the History of Science Society. Covers all periods and disciplines in the history and philosophy of science, medicine, and technology.
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  105. Journal for the History of Astronomy. 1970–.
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  107. Covers all periods of astronomy and includes articles on astrology prior to 1700.
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  109. Renaissance Quarterly. 1948–.
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  111. Journal of the Renaissance Society of America. Covers the period from 1300 to 1700. Includes articles and book reviews on the science of the time.
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  113. Historiography of Revolutions in Science
  114.  
  115. The issue of whether there was a scientific revolution in the early modern period, or whether there were many scientific revolutions, has been a focus of debate among scholars. Kuhn 2003 (originally published in 1957) suggests that Copernicus was a model of a scientific revolution, and Kuhn 1996 went further to try to establish all scientific breakthroughs as revolutions, whereas Cohen 1985 and Cohen 1994 try to establish specific criteria for calling a specific breakthrough a revolution. Toulmin 1972 debunks the possibility of any revolution in ideas. Park and Daston 2006 prefers the designation “early modern science” to “scientific revolution.”
  116.  
  117. Cohen, I. Bernard. Revolution in Science. Cambridge, MA: Belknap, 1985.
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  119. Expands on Kuhn’s idea of revolution in science and tries to establish what was or was not truly a revolution. Examines scientific developments in the 17th through the 20th centuries.
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  121. Cohen, H. Floris. The Scientific Revolution: A Historiographical Inquiry. Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1994.
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  123. Starts with the assumption that modern science began in the scientific revolution and separates the West from the rest of the world. Examines 20th-century historiography regarding what brought scientific revolution about.
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  125. Kuhn, Thomas S. The Structure of Scientific Revolutions. 3d ed. Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1996.
  126. DOI: 10.7208/chicago/9780226458106.001.0001Save Citation »Export Citation »E-mail Citation »
  127. Posits the idea that scientists follow a paradigm until it does not work anymore. Although that idea is controversial, it reinforced the idea of science as social activity. Originally published in 1962.
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  129. Kuhn, Thomas S. The Copernican Revolution: Planetary Astronomy in the Development of Western Thought. Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 2003.
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  131. Sees Copernicus’s work as “transformative” in the Western intellectual tradition. Emphasizes the influence of Renaissance Neoplatonism. Originally published in 1957.
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  133. Park, Katharine, and Lorraine Daston. “Introduction: The Age of the New.” In The Cambridge History of Science. Vol. 3, Early Modern Science. Edited by Katharine Park and Lorraine Daston, 1–17. Cambridge, UK: Cambridge University Press, 2006.
  134. DOI: 10.1017/CHOL9780521572446.002Save Citation »Export Citation »E-mail Citation »
  135. Rejects calling early modern science a scientific revolution.
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  137. Toulmin, Stephen. Human Understanding. Vol. 1, General Introduction and Part 1. Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press, 1972.
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  139. Chapter 1.4, “The Revolutionary Illusion,” deals with the concept of a scientific revolution, specifically as suggested by Kuhn, and denies that such a thing existed at any time in history.
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  141. Social Issues
  142.  
  143. Works on social issues have focused mostly on England. Merton 1938 suggests the importance of social issues in the pursuit of science, and Webster 1976 focuses on scientific pursuits among Puritans, though, as Cohen 1990 shows, assertions of the importance of Puritans in particular has been debated. Recent scholars, particularly the work of Shapin 1994 (see also Experiment) have emphasized social issues, though Shapiro 2000 questions the extent to which ideas are governed by social matters. Jacob 1988 gives a general look at society and science, and Shapin 2006 gives an overview of the types of people involved in scientific studies. Harkness 2007 importantly suggests that scientific achievement transcended class but at times has been attributed on the basis of class.
  144.  
  145. Cohen, I. Bernard, ed. Puritanism and the Rise of Modern Science: The Merton Thesis. New Brunswick, NJ: Rutgers University Press, 1990.
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  147. Brings together articles and book chapters responding to the Merton thesis, including articles by Merton himself.
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  149. Harkness, Deborah E. The Jewel House: Elizabethan London and the Scientific Revolution. New Haven, CT: Yale University Press, 2007.
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  151. Shows how scientific pursuits in London cut across different social groups and different sites. Suggests activities attributed to particular “founders” of modern science were much more widespread.
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  153. Jacob, Margaret C. The Cultural Meaning of the Scientific Revolution. New York: Alfred A. Knopf, 1988.
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  155. Covers the 17th and 18th centuries. Looks at the social and cultural background and how scientific knowledge became an integral part of Western culture. Sees the scientific revolution as background to the industrial revolution.
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  157. Merton, Robert K. “Science, Technology, and Society in Seventeenth Century England.” Osiris 4.2 (1938): 360–632.
  158. DOI: 10.1086/368484Save Citation »Export Citation »E-mail Citation »
  159. Sociology of science. Concentrates on institutional settings and how the interplay among society, culture, and science effected change. Looks at religious, economic, and military influences as they affect science. What came to be known as the Merton thesis is the idea that English experimental science in the 17th century was a product, in part, of Puritanism. Reprinted in 1970.
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  161. Shapin, Steven. A Social History of Truth: Civility and Science in Seventeenth-Century England. Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1994.
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  163. Claims that because knowledge is based on testimony, the issue arises concerning whom to trust. The gentleman, because of birth, wealth, and behavior, became the guarantor of truth. Focuses on Boyle.
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  165. Shapin, Steven. “The Man of Science.” In The Cambridge History of Science. Vol. 3, Early Modern Science. Edited by Katharine Park and Lorraine Daston, 179–191. Cambridge, UK: Cambridge University Press, 2006.
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  167. Discusses classes of people who engaged in scientific activity in the 16th and 17th centuries: university scholars, physicians, and gentlemen.
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  169. Shapiro, Barbara J. A Culture of Fact: England, 1550–1720. Ithaca, NY: Cornell University Press, 2000.
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  171. Examines concepts of fact in various areas. Chapters 5 and 6 deal with nature. Questions the extent to which Shapin’s idea of facts as socially conditioned is correct.
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  173. Webster, Charles. The Great Instauration: Science, Medicine, and Reform, 1626–1660. New York: Holmes and Meier, 1976.
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  175. Important revision of traditional view of English science as a movement toward modernity from Bacon to Newton. Focuses on social and religious background. Explores the pursuit of science among Puritans in the 17th century and shows that they concentrated on Paracelsian medicine, alchemy, and natural history in the Baconian tradition. Reprinted 2002.
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  177. Women and Gender
  178.  
  179. As with all historical subjects, scholars began studying the issue of women’s contributions to scientific work during the last few decades. Merchant 1980 is instrumental in this development for early modern science, though the author’s general thesis is extremely controversial. Park 2006 shows that gender played an important role in anatomy. Ray 2015 discusses contributions by women to alchemy. Cooper 2006 shows that women played a very important role in the household in advancing the study of nature, and Schiebinger 2006 discusses women in various settings. Outram 2006 concentrates on issues of gender.
  180.  
  181. Cooper, Alix. “Homes and Households.” In The Cambridge History of Science. Vol. 3, Early Modern Science. Edited by Katharine Park and Lorraine Daston, 224–237. Cambridge, UK: Cambridge University Press, 2006.
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  183. Shows how domestic spaces facilitated natural knowledge not as places of study but because they provided partners in its pursuit.
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  185. Merchant, Carolyn. The Death of Nature: Women, Ecology, and the Scientific Revolution. San Francisco: Harper and Row, 1980.
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  187. Sees the scientific revolution as establishing masculine dominion over nature, a mechanistic model as opposed to an organic model, alienation from and exploitation of nature. Includes discussion of Anne Conway and other female authors. Revised edition published in 1989.
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  189. Outram, Dorinda. “Gender.” In The Cambridge History of Science. Vol. 3, Early Modern Science. Edited by Katharine Park and Lorraine Daston, 797–817. Cambridge, UK: Cambridge University Press, 2006.
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  191. Explores the gendering of natural inquiry as a masculine pursuit and the feminization of nature.
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  193. Park, Katharine. Secrets of Women: Gender, Generation, and the Origins of Human Dissection. Cambridge, MA: Zone, 2006.
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  195. Study of dissection of women in the 14th to 16th centuries. Suggests continuity with the Middle Ages as corporeal signs of holiness were sought in dissections of women.
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  197. Ray, Meredith K. Daughters of Alchemy: Women and Scientific Culture in Early Modern Italy. Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 2015.
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  199. Looks at works by five Italian women and discusses their contributions to experiment and to the discourse on women’s roles in the scientific community.
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  201. Schiebinger, Londa. “Women of Natural Knowledge.” In The Cambridge History of Science. Vol. 3, Early Modern Science. Edited by Katharine Park and Lorraine Daston, 192–205. Cambridge, UK: Cambridge University Press, 2006.
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  203. Discusses the roles women played in natural knowledge is the 16th and 17th centuries and their changing relationships to the institutions that fostered it.
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  205. Places of Study and Activity
  206.  
  207. Grafton 2006 and Grendler 2002 discuss how universities (see Collections of Papers) taught medicine (see Medicine) and natural philosophy (see Philosophical Foundations), and how they tended to be rather conservative. Findlen 1994, Findlen 2006, and Smith 2006 deal with places of experiment and observation, while Johns 2006 discusses how coffeehouses and print shops afforded new sites for exchange of information, and Eamon 2006 shows such exchanges in town meeting places. Moran 2006 focuses on the effects of client and patronage relations in fostering knowledge, while DeVries 2006 discusses new technologies because of military needs.
  208.  
  209. DeVries, Kelly. “Sites of Military Science and Technology.” In The Cambridge History of Science. Vol. 3, Early Modern Science. Edited by Katharine Park and Lorraine Daston, 306–319. Cambridge, UK: Cambridge University Press, 2006.
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  211. Discusses the changes in technology as a result of the almost constant warfare in the period, both on the battlefield and in other sites.
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  213. Eamon, William. “Markets, Piazzas, and Villages.” In The Cambridge History of Science. Vol. 3, Early Modern Science. Edited by Katharine Park and Lorraine Daston, 272–289. Cambridge, UK: Cambridge University Press, 2006.
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  215. Discusses town meeting places as arenas for acquiring natural knowledge.
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  217. Findlen, Paula. Possessing Nature: Museums, Collecting, and Scientific Culture in Early Modern Italy. Berkeley: University of California Press, 1994.
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  219. Important work that looks at transformation of collections of natural curiosities into museums and centers of learning about natural life in Italy.
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  221. Findlen, Paula. “Anatomy Theaters, Botanical Gardens, and Natural History Collections.” In The Cambridge History of Science. Vol. 3, Early Modern Science. Edited by Katharine Park and Lorraine Daston, 272–289. Cambridge, UK: Cambridge University Press, 2006.
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  223. Discusses the development of specialized sites in the 16th century for close, concentrated study of natural objects.
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  225. Grafton, Anthony. “Libraries and Lecture Halls.” In The Cambridge History of Science. Vol. 3, Early Modern Science. Edited by Katharine Park and Lorraine Daston, 238–250. Cambridge, UK: Cambridge University Press, 2006.
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  227. Discusses contributions of traditional places of learning to the study of nature in the 15th through 17th centuries.
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  229. Grendler, Paul F. The Universities of the Italian Renaissance. Baltimore: Johns Hopkins University Press, 2002.
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  231. Overview of the organization and curricula of Italian universities. Chapters 8, 9, and 12 cover natural philosophy, medicine, and mathematics, respectively.
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  233. Johns, Adrian. “Coffeehouses and Print Shops.” In The Cambridge History of Science. Vol. 3, Early Modern Science. Edited by Katharine Park and Lorraine Daston, 320–340. Cambridge, UK: Cambridge University Press, 2006.
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  235. Discusses the communication that took place in two meeting places new to the period: coffeehouses that were the result of the introduction of coffee drinking into Europe and print shops that arose because of the new technology in book publishing.
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  237. Moran, Bruce T. “Courts and Academies.” In The Cambridge History of Science. Vol. 3, Early Modern Science. Edited by Katharine Park and Lorraine Daston, 251–271. Cambridge, UK: Cambridge University Press, 2006.
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  239. Discusses the importance of political patronage and clientage networks in fostering natural knowledge in the period.
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  241. Smith, Pamela. “Laboratories.” In The Cambridge History of Science. Vol. 3, Early Modern Science. Edited by Katharine Park and Lorraine Daston, 290–305. Cambridge, UK: Cambridge University Press, 2006.
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  243. Shows the development over the course of the 17th century of the laboratory from a model based on an artisan’s workshop to a site where theories were tested by experiment and discoveries were made.
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  245. Experiment
  246.  
  247. One of the biggest changes in the Renaissance was increasing reliance on experiment to develop natural knowledge. Shapin and Schaffer 1989 shows how the decision to rely on experiment was affected by the social order. Smith 2004 combines an interdisciplinary approach with social history in examining the use of experiment. Dear 2006 gives an overview on experiment. See also works on alchemy in Social Issues and Places of Study and Activity.
  248.  
  249. Dear, Peter. “The Meanings of Experience.” In The Cambridge History of Science. Vol. 3, Early Modern Science. Edited by Katharine Park and Lorraine Daston, 106–131. Cambridge, UK: Cambridge University Press, 2006.
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  251. Discusses changes in ideas of experience and experiment during the early modern period.
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  253. Shapin, Steven, and Simon Schaffer. Leviathan and the Air-Pump: Hobbes, Boyle, and the Experimental Life. Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press, 1989.
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  255. Pathbreaking book in the social history of science. Focuses on debates between Hobbes and Boyle over the value of experiment. Suggests solutions to issues of knowledge are affected by political order.
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  257. Smith, Pamela H. The Body of the Artisan: Art and Experience in the Scientific Revolution. Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 2004.
  258. DOI: 10.7208/chicago/9780226764269.001.0001Save Citation »Export Citation »E-mail Citation »
  259. Shows how the knowledge about natural materials and ability to use them among artists and artisans affected attitudes toward nature and experiment.
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  261. Books and Print Culture
  262.  
  263. Debates have been widespread on the effect of printing, especially since the appearance of Eisenstein 1979. Johns 1998 disputes the claim that early printed editions were reliable, while Eamon 1994 and Kavey 2007 discuss uses of books and changes in their focus in understanding nature. See also Technical Arts.
  264.  
  265. Eamon, William. Science and the Secrets of Nature: Books of Secrets in Medieval and Early Modern Culture. Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press, 1994.
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  267. Examines the explosion in the 16th century of books that claimed to divulge esoteric knowledge and shows how they became books of nature without the esoteric element.
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  269. Eisenstein, Elizabeth L. The Printing Press as an Agent of Change. 2 vols. Cambridge, UK: Cambridge University Press, 1979.
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  271. Pioneering work on the importance of the printing press in disseminating knowledge. Part 3 is on printing’s role in science.
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  273. Johns, Adrian. The Nature of the Book: Print and Knowledge in the Making. Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1998.
  274. DOI: 10.7208/chicago/9780226401232.001.0001Save Citation »Export Citation »E-mail Citation »
  275. Disagreeing with Eisenstein’s claim that print “fixed” books, this volume follows the history of early printing and suggests that authors and publishers had to figure out how to establish a text that the reader could trust as authentic.
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  277. Kavey, Allison. Books of Secrets: Natural Philosophy in England, 1550–1600. Urbana: University of Illinois Press, 2007.
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  279. Taking off from Eamon 1994, this examines the audience for books of secrets in 16th-century England.
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  281. Philosophical Foundations
  282.  
  283. At the beginning of the Renaissance, university-educated theorists were Aristotelians. Over the course of the 16th and 17th centuries, the foundations of natural philosophy expanded, as Blair 2006 shows, and the mechanical philosophy was adopted, as Garber 2006 notes. Joy 2006 discusses how theorists added the idea of a universe following laws of nature, while Serjeantson 2006 concentrates on experimental and mathematical demonstrations. Gaukroger 2006 attempts to understand how this led to the glorification of science in the West.
  284.  
  285. Blair, Ann. “Natural Philosophy.” In The Cambridge History of Science. Vol. 3, Early Modern Science. Edited by Katharine Park and Lorraine Daston, 365–406. Cambridge, UK: Cambridge University Press, 2006.
  286. Save Citation »Export Citation »E-mail Citation »
  287. Overview of ideas of the study of nature as it developed from the bookish Aristotelian philosophy of the universities to the acceptance of new ideas and authorities over the course of the 16th and 17th centuries.
  288. Find this resource:
  289. Garber, Daniel. “Physics and Foundations.” In The Cambridge History of Science. Vol. 3, Early Modern Science. Edited by Katharine Park and Lorraine Daston, 21–69. Cambridge, UK: Cambridge University Press, 2006.
  290. Save Citation »Export Citation »E-mail Citation »
  291. Discusses the philosophical foundations of early modern science, starting with the Aristotelian background and the reactions against Aristotelianism and setting the scene for the mechanical philosophy.
  292. Find this resource:
  293. Gaukroger, Stephen. The Emergence of a Scientific Culture: Science and the Shaping of Modernity, 1210–1685. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2006.
  294. DOI: 10.1093/acprof:oso/9780199296446.001.0001Save Citation »Export Citation »E-mail Citation »
  295. A study from the triumph of Aristotelian natural philosophy in the high Middle Ages to the period before the appearance of Newton’s Principia that attempts to discover how science overwhelmed other cognitive and intellectual values in the West.
  296. Find this resource:
  297. Joy, Lynn S. “Scientific Explanation from Formal Causes to Laws of Nature.” In The Cambridge History of Science. Vol. 3, Early Modern Science. Edited by Katharine Park and Lorraine Daston, 70–105. Cambridge, UK: Cambridge University Press, 2006.
  298. Save Citation »Export Citation »E-mail Citation »
  299. Discusses the changes in ideas of causality in nature during the Early Modern period, starting with the Aristotelian foundations and the movement toward cause and effect.
  300. Find this resource:
  301. Serjeantson, Richard W. “Proof and Persuasion.” In The Cambridge History of Science. Vol. 3, Early Modern Science. Edited by Katharine Park and Lorraine Daston, 132–175. Cambridge, UK: Cambridge University Press, 2006.
  302. Save Citation »Export Citation »E-mail Citation »
  303. Overview of the development of ideas of proof, starting with the Aristotelian view of proof as demonstration through reason to the view of science as mathematical or experimental description.
  304. Find this resource:
  305. Disciplines
  306.  
  307. During the 16th and 17th centuries the classifications of the disciplines and their relationship to each other in the study of nature changed. Important discoveries were also made in many of the fields.
  308.  
  309. Astronomy
  310.  
  311. Astronomy is one of the oldest sciences. It was studied in the universities, and Renaissance humanism saw the mastery of Greek texts. The evolution of astronomy in the 16th and 17th centuries is the best known and most dramatic of the other scientific disciplines, starting with Copernicus’s proposal that the sun was the center of the universe in the De revolutionibus of 1543 and ending with Newton’s successful description of the Copernican system in the Principia mathematica of 1687. Equally important was the realization first promoted by Kepler that the universe was physical. Thus, Donahue 2006 does not change the view of astronomy significantly from Kuhn 2003 (originally published in 1957) and Koyré 1973, though Donahue 2006 does include a section on astrology and is less apt to claim that the period was the beginning of modern science. Westman 2011 gives an overview of developments in astronomy and shows the importance of astrology in those advances. Koestler 1989 maintains a less exalted view of the achievements of the noted astronomers. See also Physics.
  312.  
  313. Donahue, William. “Astronomy.” In The Cambridge History of Science. Vol. 3, Early Modern Science. Edited by Katharine Park and Lorraine Daston, 562–595. Cambridge, UK: Cambridge University Press, 2006.
  314. Save Citation »Export Citation »E-mail Citation »
  315. Discusses the evolution of astronomy from a mathematical discipline to a physical science, with emphasis on contributions by Kepler, Galileo, Descartes, and Newton.
  316. Find this resource:
  317. Koestler, Arthur. The Sleepwalkers: A History of Man’s Changing Vision of the Universe. London: Arkana, 1989.
  318. Save Citation »Export Citation »E-mail Citation »
  319. Western astronomy to Newton, concentrating on Copernicus, Kepler, and Galileo. Claims that great discoveries of various thinkers were accidental. Popular account. Highly readable but idiosyncratic and unreliable. Originally published in 1959.
  320. Find this resource:
  321. Koyré, Alexandre. The Astronomical Revolution: Copernicus, Kepler, Borelli. Translation by R. E. W. Maddison. Ithaca, NY: Cornell University Press, 1973.
  322. Save Citation »Export Citation »E-mail Citation »
  323. Traditional view but important focus on the development of a celestial physics by Kepler and its further development by Borelli.
  324. Find this resource:
  325. Kuhn, Thomas S. The Copernican Revolution: Planetary Astronomy in the Development of Western Thought. Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 2003.
  326. Save Citation »Export Citation »E-mail Citation »
  327. Sees Copernicus’s work as “transformative” in the Western intellectual tradition. Emphasizes influence of Renaissance Neoplatonism. Originally published in 1957.
  328. Find this resource:
  329. Westman, Robert. The Copernican Question: Prognostication, Skepticism, and Celestial Order. Berkeley: University of California Press, 2011.
  330. Save Citation »Export Citation »E-mail Citation »
  331. While the author’s suggestion that Copernicus developed the heliocentric system as a reaction against Giovanni Pico della Mirandola’s attack on astrology is controversial, this volume looks at major and minor characters in astronomy and establishes the centrality of astrology in fostering astronomical advances from the end of the 15th century through the early 16th century.
  332. Find this resource:
  333. Mathematics
  334.  
  335. Renaissance humanists absorbed the classical and Arabic traditions in mathematics. The 17th century saw major new developments in mathematics, most notably the development of calculus by Newton and Leibniz (discussed in Boyer 2010, Boyer and Merzbach 1991, and Mancosu 1996) and Descartes’s analytic geometry by which geometry came to be expressed in algebraic terms (examined in Boyer and Merzbach 1991 and in Mancosu 1996). Dear 1995 is a general account that concentrates on the mathematization of science.
  336.  
  337. Andersen, Kirsti, and Henk J. M. Bos. “Pure Mathematics.” In The Cambridge History of Science. Vol. 3, Early Modern Science. Edited by Katharine Park and Lorraine Daston, 696–723. Cambridge, UK: Cambridge University Press, 2006.
  338. Save Citation »Export Citation »E-mail Citation »
  339. Discusses absorption of Greek and Arab mathematics and developments resulting in the merging of algebra and geometry and the invention of calculus.
  340. Find this resource:
  341. Boyer, Carl B. The History of the Calculus and Its Conceptual Development. New York: Dover, 2010.
  342. Save Citation »Export Citation »E-mail Citation »
  343. Originally published in 1949. Still an important work on the invention of calculus.
  344. Find this resource:
  345. Boyer, Carl B., and Uta C. Merzbach, eds. A History of Mathematics. 2d ed. Revised by Uta C. Merzbach. New York: Wiley, 1991.
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  347. Update of Boyer 2010 (1949). A standard and still-valuable work. Chapters 15–19 cover Renaissance and mathematics in the early modern period.
  348. Find this resource:
  349. Dear, Peter. Discipline and Experience: The Mathematical Way in the Scientific Revolution. Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1995.
  350. DOI: 10.7208/chicago/9780226139524.001.0001Save Citation »Export Citation »E-mail Citation »
  351. Combines social and intellectual approaches to advances in astronomy, optics, and mechanics in the 17th century. Discusses how experiments were integrated into natural philosophy, particularly through the work of Jesuit mathematicians, Galileo, Pascal, Boyle, and Newton.
  352. Find this resource:
  353. Mancosu, Paolo. Philosophy of Mathematics and Mathematical Practice in the Seventeenth Century. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1996.
  354. Save Citation »Export Citation »E-mail Citation »
  355. Examines the philosophical background driving the great mathematical developments: algebraization, generation of curves by motion, mathematical certainty, and debates on indivisibles and infinite magnitudes.
  356. Find this resource:
  357. Medicine
  358.  
  359. The study of medicine in the universities was conservative and concentrated on the works of Galen and Avicenna, as shown in Siraisi 1987 and Cook 2006. The introduction of the Paracelsian use of alchemical ideas was the biggest source of change in medicine, as Debus 1977 shows. See also Women and Gender regarding dissection.
  360.  
  361. Cook, Harold J. “Medicine.” In The Cambridge History of Science. Vol. 3, Early Modern Science. Edited by Katharine Park and Lorraine Daston, 407–434. Cambridge, UK: Cambridge University Press, 2006.
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  363. Looks at the change in the science of “physic” between 1600 and 1800 brought about by new geographical and medical discoveries and the tendency toward greater materialism.
  364. Find this resource:
  365. Debus, Allen G. The Chemical Philosophy: Paracelsian Medicine and Philosophy in the Sixteenth and Seventeenth Centuries. 2 vols. New York: Science History, 1977.
  366. Save Citation »Export Citation »E-mail Citation »
  367. Important study of the medical and alchemical ideas of Paracelsus and his followers. Stresses scientific outlook. Revised edition published in one volume in 2002.
  368. Find this resource:
  369. Siraisi, Nancy G. Avicenna in the Renaissance: The Canon and Medical Teaching in Italian Universities after 1500. Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press, 1987.
  370. Save Citation »Export Citation »E-mail Citation »
  371. Shows the prevalence of Avicenna’s Canon in the medical education of the 16th century.
  372. Find this resource:
  373. Siraisi, Nancy G. Medieval and Early Renaissance Medicine: An Introduction to Knowledge and Practice. Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1990.
  374. DOI: 10.7208/chicago/9780226761312.001.0001Save Citation »Export Citation »E-mail Citation »
  375. Overview of European medicine from the 12th to the 15th centuries by a leading scholar. Good for classroom use.
  376. Find this resource:
  377. Natural History
  378.  
  379. Natural history was one of the new disciplines in the period and was encouraged by voyages of discovery and collecting (see also Beyond Europe). Reeds 1991 shows botany becoming a science. Daston and Park 1998 isolates wonder as a motivation to study nature. Ogilvie 2006 is an in-depth look at developments in natural history, while Findlen 2006 gives an overview. See Places of Study and Activity.
  380.  
  381. Daston, Lorraine, and Katharine Park. Wonders and the Order of Nature, 1150–1750. Cambridge, MA: Zone, 1998.
  382. Save Citation »Export Citation »E-mail Citation »
  383. Discusses how feelings of wonder promoted the investigation of nature.
  384. Find this resource:
  385. Findlen, Paula. “Natural History.” In The Cambridge History of Science. Vol. 3, Early Modern Science. Edited by Katharine Park and Lorraine Daston, 435–468. Cambridge, UK: Cambridge University Press, 2006.
  386. Save Citation »Export Citation »E-mail Citation »
  387. Discusses the development of collecting natural objects and its effects, particularly its emphasis on evidence of the senses and the struggle with new knowledge.
  388. Find this resource:
  389. Ogilvie, Brian W. The Science of Describing: Natural History in Renaissance Europe. Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 2006.
  390. DOI: 10.7208/chicago/9780226620862.001.0001Save Citation »Export Citation »E-mail Citation »
  391. Most thorough treatment to date on the development of natural history from the late 15th to the early 17th centuries.
  392. Find this resource:
  393. Reeds, Karen. Botany in Medieval and Renaissance Universities. New York: Garland, 1991.
  394. Save Citation »Export Citation »E-mail Citation »
  395. Shows how engagement of classical texts during the 16th century transformed the study of botany, leading to illustrated herbals, greater interest, botanical gardens, and university lectures.
  396. Find this resource:
  397. Optics
  398.  
  399. Optics was also one of the sciences that interested the ancients, but major contributions came from the Muslim world and during the Middle Ages. Medieval thinkers connected the study of light to theology. Optics changed in the 17th century, particularly when Kepler began to view the eye as an optical instrument subject to physical laws. Lindberg 1976 shows how some of his work continued the medieval tradition. Later theoreticians aimed for a mechanical theory of light that focused on matter and motion and culminated in Newton’s optical theories, as shown in Sabra 1981. Mancosu 2006 gives a general overview of both optics and acoustics.
  400.  
  401. Lindberg, David C. Theories of Vision from Al-Kindi to Kepler. Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1976.
  402. Save Citation »Export Citation »E-mail Citation »
  403. Discussion of ancient, medieval, and Renaissance optical theory shows how Kepler’s discoveries emerged from them. Best one-volume survey of optics through the early 17th century.
  404. Find this resource:
  405. Mancosu, Paolo. “Accoustics and Optics.” In The Cambridge History of Science. Vol. 3, Early Modern Science. Edited by Katharine Park and Lorraine Daston, 596–631. Cambridge, UK: Cambridge University Press, 2006.
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  407. Overview of development of acoustics and optics into experimental sciences. Optics also made tremendous theoretical strides in the work of Kepler and Newton and others.
  408. Find this resource:
  409. Sabra, A. I. Theories of Light from Descartes to Newton. 2d ed. Cambridge, UK: Cambridge University Press, 1981.
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  411. Covers optical theories of Descartes, Fermat, Huygens, Hooke, and Newton on propagation, reflection, and refraction. Originally published in 1967.
  412. Find this resource:
  413. Physics
  414.  
  415. The science of motion was at the heart of early modern developments in physics, and classical physics of this period is often identified with the mechanical philosophy that came out of the study of motion. Aristotelian physics divided motion into natural and violent components, the latter requiring force. Classical dynamics was impelled by Copernicus’s placement of the sun at the center, though Barbour 2001 sees his contribution to physics as merely setting the stage for Kepler, while Cohen 1985 disparages Kepler’s contributions and focuses on Galileo and Newton. Galileo’s studies were crucial for bringing change, and classical physics culminated in the work of Newton. Jammer 1999 looks at the changing concepts of force. Bertoloni Meli 2006a gives an overview of the development of mechanics into a science of motion; this is further developed in Bertoloni Meli 2006b. See also Astronomy.
  416.  
  417. Barbour, Julian B. The Discovery of Dynamics: A Study from a Machian Point of View of the Discovery and the Structure of Dynamical Theories. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2001.
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  419. Reprint of Volume 1 of Absolute or Relative Motion (Cambridge, UK: Cambridge University Press, 1989) by a theoretical physicist and specialist on Mach. Starts with a description of Newton’s principles of dynamics as the culmination of classical physics and then has a flashback of ancient and medieval background, based on Aristotelian principles of motions, moves into Copernicus, and sees the beginning of modern dynamics with Kepler and Galileo and contributions by Descartes and Huygens.
  420. Find this resource:
  421. Bertoloni Meli, Domenico. “Mechanics.” In The Cambridge History of Science. Vol. 3, Early Modern Science. Edited by Katharine Park and Lorraine Daston, 632–672. Cambridge, UK: Cambridge University Press, 2006a.
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  423. Discusses the development of mechanics into a “science of motion.” Focuses particularly on the work of Galileo, Descartes, and Newton.
  424. Find this resource:
  425. Bertoloni Meli, Domenico. Thinking with Objects: The Transformation of Mechanics in the Seventeenth Century. Baltimore: Johns Hopkins University Press, 2006b.
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  427. Starts with Guido dal Monte at the end of the 16th century and shows how the science of mechanics progressed through the use of simple machines, such as the lever and the inclined plane as well as the pendulum, beam, and spring.
  428. Find this resource:
  429. Cohen, I. Bernard. The Birth of a New Physics. Rev. ed. New York: Norton, 1985.
  430. Save Citation »Export Citation »E-mail Citation »
  431. For general audiences. Discusses the progress toward discovering the physics for a moving earth from Copernicus to Newton but dismissive of Kepler’s role. Revised edition has supplemental material that goes into greater depth on certain topics, especially regarding Galileo and Newton. Originally published in 1960.
  432. Find this resource:
  433. Jammer, Max. Concepts of Force: A Study in the Foundations of Dynamics. Rev. ed. Mineola, NY: Dover, 1999.
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  435. Historical view by a physicist of important ideas in mechanics. Although the book covers ancient to modern times, the Early Modern period is critical to the author’s analysis. Originally published in 1957.
  436. Find this resource:
  437. Technical Arts
  438.  
  439. Technical or mechanical arts, techne, which involved working with one’s hands, traditionally had less prestige than scientia. But as works cited under Experiment show, artisanal culture was important for promoting experimental methodologies that affected the progress of science during the Renaissance. The mechanical arts also provided the model for mechanical philosophy, and they often underwent mathematization in the Early Modern period; Bennett 2006 concentrates on those developments that reinforced this. Long 2001 sees technical arts as crucial for the development of the experimental method.
  440.  
  441. Bennett, Jim. “The Mechanical Arts.” In The Cambridge History of Science. Vol. 3, Early Modern Science. Edited by Katharine Park and Lorraine Daston, 673–695. Cambridge, UK: Cambridge University Press, 2006.
  442. Save Citation »Export Citation »E-mail Citation »
  443. Concentrates on improvements in clocks and astronomical instruments, mathematical and optical instruments, and instruments for navigation.
  444. Find this resource:
  445. Long, Pamela O. Openness, Secrecy, Authorship: Technical Arts and the Culture of Knowledge from Antiquity to the Renaissance. Baltimore: Johns Hopkins University Press, 2001.
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  447. Study of artisanal practices and writings starting with ancient times, particularly in mining and metallurgy, military inventions, painting, and architecture. Chapters 5–7 are on the Renaissance. Suggests technical arts were critical for experimental methods; issues of openness and secrecy were complex; and science was not necessarily open, nor craft necessarily closed.
  448. Find this resource:
  449. Occult Sciences
  450.  
  451. Alchemy, astrology, and magic were as much a part of the study of nature to the early modern scholar as those subjects that modern scholars consider scientific—and thus should not be classified as “pseudosciences.” Although earlier scholars dismissed them derisively and wondered why the “heroes” of the scientific revolution engaged in them, Thorndike 1923–1958 shows that they were too pervasive to be ignored or dismissed. Thomas 1997 tries to integrate them into a traditional view of the rise of modern science. Yates 1972 sees them as the basis of the science of the period. Shumaker 1972 gives an overview of the various occult sciences. Boudet 2006 gives an overview that integrates them into the intellectual and social milieu.
  452.  
  453. Boudet, Jean-Patrice. Entre science et nigromance: Astrologie, divination et magie dans l’Occident médiéval, XIIe–XVe siècle. Paris: Publications de la Sorbonne, 2006.
  454. Save Citation »Export Citation »E-mail Citation »
  455. Relatively in-depth for a survey that treats astrology, divination, and magic as an integrated whole from the 12th-century transmission of Arabic science to the West to their normalization in the 14th and 15th centuries, especially focusing on their promotion by universities and courts. Extensive bibliographical references in notes, including manuscript sources.
  456. Find this resource:
  457. Shumaker, Wayne. The Occult Sciences in the Renaissance: A Study in Intellectual Patterns. Berkeley: University of California Press, 1972.
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  459. Looks at astrology, witchcraft, magic, alchemy, and hermetism. Mostly descriptive. Looks at Renaissance writings for and against various subjects starting with Pico’s attack on astrology. Deals with both readily available and obscure works and authors.
  460. Find this resource:
  461. Thomas, Keith. Religion and the Decline of Magic. 3d ed. New York: Oxford University Press, 1997.
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  463. Classic work on the occult in England in the 16th and 17th centuries. Attributes its decline to the rise of mechanical philosophy. Originally published in 1971.
  464. Find this resource:
  465. Thorndike, Lynn. History of Magic and Experimental Science. 8 vols. New York: Columbia University Press, 1923–1958.
  466. Save Citation »Export Citation »E-mail Citation »
  467. Pioneering discussion of natural thought from early Christian times through the 17th century, detailing both readily available and obscure works and authors. Although written in part to debunk the Burckhardtian view of the Renaissance, it shows how endemic astrology, alchemy, and magic were to Renaissance thought, even in the period of the scientific revolution.
  468. Find this resource:
  469. Yates, Frances A. The Rosicrucian Enlightenment. London: Routledge, 1972.
  470. DOI: 10.4324/9780203166017Save Citation »Export Citation »E-mail Citation »
  471. Building on her work on hermetism (see Yates 1999, cited under Magic), this work sees all science in the Early Modern period as an outgrowth of a European 17th-century occult movement.
  472. Find this resource:
  473. Alchemy
  474.  
  475. The aims of alchemy were to turn base metals into valuable metals and to prolong life. Herbert Butterfield (see Butterfield 1997, cited under General Overviews) suggested that there was a “delayed” revolution in chemistry, but Newman 2004, Newman 2006a, and Newman 2006b show that it was not only a precursor to chemistry but also important in the development of matter theory in the early modern period. Moran 2005 gives an introduction to alchemy. See also Medicine for the influence of alchemy on medical practice and theory. Nummedal 2007 puts alchemy into a social context in keeping with contemporary trends in looking at the sciences.
  476.  
  477. Moran, Bruce T. Distilling Knowledge: Alchemy, Chemistry, and the Scientific Revolution. Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 2005.
  478. Save Citation »Export Citation »E-mail Citation »
  479. Good overview of alchemy from 1400 to 1700. For general audiences and classroom use.
  480. Find this resource:
  481. Newman, William R. Promethean Ambitions: Alchemy and the Quest to Perfect Nature. Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 2004.
  482. DOI: 10.7208/chicago/9780226577135.001.0001Save Citation »Export Citation »E-mail Citation »
  483. Examines the line between art and nature as exemplified in debates from about 1200 to 1700 over alchemy.
  484. Find this resource:
  485. Newman, William R. Atoms and Alchemy: Chymistry and the Experimental Origins of the Scientific Revolution. Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 2006a.
  486. DOI: 10.7208/chicago/9780226577036.001.0001Save Citation »Export Citation »E-mail Citation »
  487. This overview of alchemy by a leading historian of the subject concentrates on matter theory and shows that alchemy gave corpuscularists the tools to overthrow scholastic matter theory.
  488. Find this resource:
  489. Newman, William R. “From Alchemy to ‘Chymistry.’” In The Cambridge History of Science. Vol. 3, Early Modern Science. Edited by Katharine Park and Lorraine Daston, 497–517. Cambridge, UK: Cambridge University Press, 2006b.
  490. Save Citation »Export Citation »E-mail Citation »
  491. Discusses the development of alchemy as a mainstream science between 1500 and 1800, when it furnished a theory of matter and changes in medicine; maintains that its fundamental hermetic underpinnings remained throughout the period.
  492. Find this resource:
  493. Nummedal, Tara. Alchemy and Authority in the Holy Roman Empire. Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 2007.
  494. DOI: 10.7208/chicago/9780226608570.001.0001Save Citation »Export Citation »E-mail Citation »
  495. Attempt to reconstruct the social context of the practice of alchemy using criminal court records, laboratory inventories, contracts, and building designs.
  496. Find this resource:
  497. Astrology
  498.  
  499. The oldest of the occult sciences, premodern authors often used the terms “astrology” and “astronomy” interchangeably. Astrology was taught in the universities, and most astronomers were practicing astrologers until the middle of the 17th century. Garin 1983 concentrates on humanist writings on astrology, while Schechner 1997 looks at one facet of popular belief and its effect on astronomy. Rutkin 2006 gives an overview of astrology.
  500.  
  501. Garin, Eugenio. Astrology in the Renaissance: The Zodiac of Life. Translated by Carolyn Jackson and June Allen. Revised by Clare Robertson and Eugenio Garin. London: Routledge and Kegan Paul, 1983.
  502. Save Citation »Export Citation »E-mail Citation »
  503. Translation of lectures on astrology in the Italian Renaissance by the author. Concentrates on humanists’ attitudes, particularly Ficino and Pico. Sees humanist critique as a major cause for decline. There are serious problems with the translation; scholars are advised to consult the original Italian: Lo zodiaco della vita (Bari, Italy: Editori Laterza, 1976).
  504. Find this resource:
  505. Rutkin, H. Darrel. “Astrology.” In The Cambridge History of Science. Vol. 3, Early Modern Science. Edited by Katharine Park and Lorraine Daston, 541–561. Cambridge, UK: Cambridge University Press, 2006.
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  507. Overview of the centrality of astrology during this period. Though its decline as an accepted part of the study of nature is documented, the author does not tackle the causes.
  508. Find this resource:
  509. Schechner, Sara J. Comets, Popular Culture, and the Birth of Modern Cosmology. Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press, 1997.
  510. Save Citation »Export Citation »E-mail Citation »
  511. Shows how popular view of comets as omens was absorbed into the ideas of Newton and Halley.
  512. Find this resource:
  513. Magic
  514.  
  515. Magic can be seen as a way to manipulate nature. Although it was often seen in a negative light in the Middle Ages, Ficino’s translation of the Hermetic corpus, as Yates 1999 shows, gave it intellectual respectability. Yates’s work spurred much research into magic, though Thorndike 1923–1958 and Walker 2000 precede it. Kieckhefer 2010 and Copenhaver 2006 give overviews of magic as science, but the former deals more with the Middle Ages.
  516.  
  517. Copenhaver, Brian P. “Magic.” In The Cambridge History of Science. Vol. 3, Early Modern Science. Edited by Katharine Park and Lorraine Daston, 518–540. Cambridge, UK: Cambridge University Press, 2006.
  518. Save Citation »Export Citation »E-mail Citation »
  519. Discusses the flowering of Renaissance magic from Ficino’s revival of hermetism and its use as an explanation of hidden phenomena to its decline because of the mechanical philosophy and new instruments.
  520. Find this resource:
  521. Kieckhefer, Richard. Magic in the Middle Ages. 2d ed. Cambridge, UK: Cambridge University Press, 2010.
  522. Save Citation »Export Citation »E-mail Citation »
  523. Overview of medieval magic to about 1500. Good for classroom use. Originally published in 1989.
  524. Find this resource:
  525. Thorndike, Lynn. History of Magic and Experimental Science. 8 vols. New York: Columbia University Press, 1923–1958.
  526. Save Citation »Export Citation »E-mail Citation »
  527. Pioneering discussion of natural thought from early Christian times through the 17th century detailing both readily available and obscure works and authors. Although written in part to debunk the Burckhardtian view of the Renaissance, it shows how endemic astrology, alchemy, and magic were to Renaissance thought, even in the period of the scientific revolution.
  528. Find this resource:
  529. Walker, D. P. Spiritual and Demonic Magic: From Ficino to Campanella. Rev. ed. University Park: Pennsylvania State University Press, 2000.
  530. Save Citation »Export Citation »E-mail Citation »
  531. Pioneering work on the relationship between Renaissance Neoplatonism and magic. New introduction by Brian P. Copenhaver. Originally published in 1958.
  532. Find this resource:
  533. Yates, Frances A. Giordano Bruno and the Hermetic Tradition. Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1999.
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  535. Chapters on history of hermetism, Ficino, Pico, Agrippa, and science in addition to Bruno. Criticized for overstating influence of hermetism and for not understanding Bruno in relationship to how Renaissance thinkers understood natural philosophy; it was, however, influential in encouraging the study of Renaissance hermetism. Originally published in 1964.
  536. Find this resource:
  537. Religion
  538.  
  539. Despite the Galileo affair (see McMullin 2009), the scientific establishment and the religious establishment in the early modern period were not at each other’s throats. Funkenstein 1986 shows that theological concepts informed scientific thinking; Howell 2002 shows how both opponents and supporters of the new astronomy, both Protestants and Catholics, turned to the Bible for support; and Harrison 1998 suggests that the Protestant way in particular of reading the Bible affected views of nature. Barnes 2016 represents astrology as an essential component of early Lutheran theology. Jesuits, as Hellyer 2005 demonstrates, incorporated the various sciences into their curricula (see also Collections of Papers); Heilbron 2001 shows how Catholic astronomical observers proved Keplerian ellipses. Feldhay 2006 gives an overview of the issues concerning the relationship of science and religion. Ruderman 1995 looks at Jewish thinkers of the period.
  540.  
  541. Barnes, Robin B. Astrology and Reformation. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2016.
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  543. Places astrology at the center of the Protestant Reformation, both in helping to create the atmosphere that brought it about and in formulating Lutheran theology, especially concepts of the place of the divine in history and the universe, in the first century of the Reformation.
  544. Find this resource:
  545. Feldhay, Rivka. “Religion.” In The Cambridge History of Science. Vol. 3, Early Modern Science. Edited by Katharine Park and Lorraine Daston, 727–755. Cambridge, UK: Cambridge University Press, 2006.
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  547. Discusses the ways in which religion fostered science in the period as well as conflicts with the new knowledge and the separation of religion from scientific learning.
  548. Find this resource:
  549. Funkenstein, Amos. Theology and the Scientific Imagination: From the Middle Ages to the Seventeenth Century. Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press, 1986.
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  551. Important work that shows how discussions of divine omnipresence, omnipotence, and providence affected scientific thought in such areas as scientific discourse and the belief in natural law.
  552. Find this resource:
  553. Harrison, Peter. The Bible, Protestantism, and the Rise of Natural Science. Cambridge, UK: Cambridge University Press, 1998.
  554. DOI: 10.1017/CBO9780511585524Save Citation »Export Citation »E-mail Citation »
  555. Suggests that the literal reading of the Bible brought about by the Protestant Reformation caused thinkers in the 17th century to abandon antiquated ideas of nature.
  556. Find this resource:
  557. Heilbron, J. L. The Sun in the Church: Cathedrals as Solar Observatories. Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 2001.
  558. Save Citation »Export Citation »E-mail Citation »
  559. Shows how meridian lines, which were put in Catholic churches to track the “sun’s course” to try to pinpoint the date for Easter, gave observational proof of Keplerian ellipses and helped overturn Aristotelian/Ptolemaic astronomy.
  560. Find this resource:
  561. Hellyer, Marcus. Catholic Physics: Jesuit Natural Philosophy in Early Modern Germany. Notre Dame, IN: University of Notre Dame Press, 2005.
  562. Save Citation »Export Citation »E-mail Citation »
  563. Shows how Jesuits, who controlled higher education in Catholic Germany, incorporated new scientific ideas into their curriculum.
  564. Find this resource:
  565. Howell, Kenneth J. God’s Two Books: Copernican Cosmology and Biblical Interpretation in Early Modern Science. Notre Dame, IN: University of Notre Dame Press, 2002.
  566. Save Citation »Export Citation »E-mail Citation »
  567. Discusses how both opponents and advocates of the Copernican system in northern continental Europe used the Bible to support their arguments.
  568. Find this resource:
  569. McMullin, Ernan. “The Galileo Affair: Two Decisions.” Journal for the History of Astronomy 40 (2009): 191–212.
  570. DOI: 10.1177/002182860904000204Save Citation »Export Citation »E-mail Citation »
  571. Overview of the current state of scholarship on the most famous clash between science and religion before Darwin.
  572. Find this resource:
  573. Ruderman, David B. Jewish Thought and Scientific Discovery in Early Modern Europe. New Haven, CT: Yale University Press, 1995.
  574. Save Citation »Export Citation »E-mail Citation »
  575. Examines Jewish thought and culture from about 1600 to 1800 and shows that Jewish thinkers were aware of scientific developments and elevated the importance of scientific study as a result.
  576. Find this resource:
  577. Literature and the Arts
  578.  
  579. A great number of studies are available showing how science related to works of art and was thematized in literature. Campbell 2006 and Miekrasz and Swan 2006 give good overviews of the current state of scholarship on literature and art, respectively. Quinlan-McGrath 2013 shows the astrological and optical background in works of art. Wuidar 2008 relates astrology to music. See also Ogilvie 2006 and Reeds 1991 under Natural History.
  580.  
  581. Campbell, Mary Baine. “Literature.” In The Cambridge History of Science. Vol. 3, Early Modern Science. Edited by Katharine Park and Lorraine Daston, 756–772. Cambridge, UK: Cambridge University Press, 2006.
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  583. Discusses effects of new discoveries on literature in this period when literature and science had not yet diverged and poetry could be the means of disseminating science.
  584. Find this resource:
  585. Jardine, Lisa. Ingenious Pursuits: Building the Scientific Revolution. New York: Doubleday, 1999.
  586. Save Citation »Export Citation »E-mail Citation »
  587. Sees the scientific revolution as an extension of globalization and what she had described as a “consumer revolution” in her earlier work. Considers it a “key moment” in European progress and connects changes in scientific achievement to the arts.
  588. Find this resource:
  589. Miekrasz, Carmen, and Claudia Swan. “Art.” In The Cambridge History of Science. Vol. 3, Early Modern Science. Edited by Katharine Park and Lorraine Daston, 773–796. Cambridge, UK: Cambridge University Press, 2006.
  590. Save Citation »Export Citation »E-mail Citation »
  591. Discusses the effects of new discoveries on techniques and subjects of art and scientific illustration as a means of disseminating discoveries.
  592. Find this resource:
  593. Quinlan-McGrath, Mary. Influences: Art, Optics, and Astrology in the Italian Renaissance. Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 2013.
  594. DOI: 10.7208/chicago/9780226922850.001.0001Save Citation »Export Citation »E-mail Citation »
  595. Combines a discussion of astrology, optics, theology, and Neoplatonism to show how astrological vaults were intended to capture the celestial rays and bestow their gifts.
  596. Find this resource:
  597. Wuidar, Laurence. Musique et astrologie après le concile de Trente. Brussels: Institut Historique Belge de Rome, 2008.
  598. Save Citation »Export Citation »E-mail Citation »
  599. Focuses on the importance of astrology in the theoretical writings and musical compositions of composers.
  600. Find this resource:
  601. Beyond Europe
  602.  
  603. Two trends come into play when looking beyond Europe for sources of science. On the one hand, the explorations of new continents and hitherto unavailable areas in the 15th and 16th centuries led to advances in understanding nature, as discussed in Harris 2006 and Vogel 2006a and Vogel 2006b. Portuondo 2009 shows how cosmographical changes that came with the new knowledge could have social and political implications. On the other hand, Ragep 2007 and Saliba 2007 question the common assumption that the heyday of Islamic astronomy ended by 1300 and show that work continued beyond that date, influencing Copernican astronomy. Increasing attention has been paid to Jesuit contributions to science both within Europe (see Feingold 2002, cited under Collections of Papers) and outside Europe. Hsia 2009 and Zhang 2015 discuss Jesuits in China, while Prieto 2011 focuses on South America.
  604.  
  605. Harris, Steven J. “Networks of Travel, Correspondence, and Exchange.” In The Cambridge History of Science. Vol. 3, Early Modern Science. Edited by Katharine Park and Lorraine Daston, 341–362. Cambridge, UK: Cambridge University Press, 2006.
  606. Save Citation »Export Citation »E-mail Citation »
  607. Discusses expansion of scientific knowledge as a result of the new geographical discoveries and greater ease of travel during the period.
  608. Find this resource:
  609. Hsia, Florence C. Sojourners in a Strange Land: Jesuits and Their Scientific Missions in Late Imperial China. Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 2009.
  610. DOI: 10.7208/chicago/9780226355610.001.0001Save Citation »Export Citation »E-mail Citation »
  611. Discusses Jesuit missionaries in China who used mathematics to make inroads into Chinese society in the 17th century.
  612. Find this resource:
  613. Portuondo, María M. Secret Science: Spanish Cosmography and the New World. Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 2009.
  614. DOI: 10.7208/chicago/9780226675374.001.0001Save Citation »Export Citation »E-mail Citation »
  615. Shows how the government of Spain tried to monopolize information gathered by cosmographers to foster their rule of the empire.
  616. Find this resource:
  617. Prieto, Andrés I. Missionary Scientists: Jesuit Science in Spanish South America, 1570–1810. Nashville: Vanderbilt University Press, 2011.
  618. Save Citation »Export Citation »E-mail Citation »
  619. Describes the Jesuit experience where they often left the cities and had to adapt to local customs and languages and often compete with local shamans, which led to an emphasis on natural history and medicine.
  620. Find this resource:
  621. Ragep, F. Jamil. “Copernicus and His Islamic Predecessors: Some Historical Remarks.” History of Science 45 (2007): 65–81.
  622. DOI: 10.1177/007327530704500103Save Citation »Export Citation »E-mail Citation »
  623. Suggests that in addition to Islamic mathematical models, Copernicus was influenced by 15th-century Islamic physical hypotheses of a moving earth.
  624. Find this resource:
  625. Saliba, George. Islamic Science and the Making of the European Renaissance. Cambridge, MA: MIT, 2007.
  626. Save Citation »Export Citation »E-mail Citation »
  627. Discusses Islamic astronomy and mathematics from the beginnings to the 16th century. Argues that Islamic science and mathematics were still vibrant in the 16th century and shows how Copernicus could have been influenced by Islamic mathematical models.
  628. Find this resource:
  629. Vogel, Klaus A. “Cosmography.” In The Cambridge History of Science. Vol. 3, Early Modern Science. Edited by Katharine Park and Lorraine Daston, 469–496. Translated by Alisha Rankin. Cambridge, UK: Cambridge University Press, 2006a.
  630. Save Citation »Export Citation »E-mail Citation »
  631. Discusses changes in views of the terrestrial world as a result of global exploration.
  632. Find this resource:
  633. Vogel, Klaus A. “European Expansion and Self-Definition.” In The Cambridge History of Science. Vol. 3, Early Modern Science. Edited by Katharine Park and Lorraine Daston, 818–839. Translated by Alisha Rankin. Cambridge, UK: Cambridge University Press, 2006b.
  634. Save Citation »Export Citation »E-mail Citation »
  635. Discusses the roles the European pursuit of natural knowledge played in the contacts between European and non-European peoples.
  636. Find this resource:
  637. Zhang, Qiong. Making the New World Their Own: Chinese Encounters with Jesuit Science in the Age of Discovery. Leiden, The Netherlands: Brill, 2015.
  638. DOI: 10.1163/9789004284388Save Citation »Export Citation »E-mail Citation »
  639. Focuses on Jesuit cartography in the late Ming and early Qing dynasties and how it changed the Chinese view of China’s place in the world.
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