History of science Books

Book SynopsisWhere are the origins of chemical ideas? How did the pioneers in chemistry recognize the fundamental intellectual issues of their time? What skills of reasoning and experiment did they use to solve these problemes? How did the circumstances of personality and competition influence their careers and scientific accomplishments? If we can answer these questions, we may be able to improve our own chances of success in research. »This is a marvelous book of people and chemical ideas! The author, Jerry Berson, is known as a chemical stylist, a physical organic chemist possessed of the highest analytical powers. In a unique approach to the history of chemistry (indeed the history of science) he brings that style, as well as his insider's knowledge and a perceptive sensivity to the societal setting of chemists, to the analysis of some key chapters in modern organic chemistry.« Roald Hoffmann, Nobel LaureateTable of ContentsINTRODUCTION The Nature of Science and the History of Science An Experiment DISCOVERIES MISSED, DISCOVERIES MADE - TWO CASE STUDIES OF CREATIVITY IN CHEMISTRY Science and the Individual Diels, Alder, Their Competitors, and the Discovery of the Diene Synthesis Thiele The Alternation Effect and the Discovery of Orbital Symmetry ERICH HÜCKEL AND THE THEORY OF AROMATICITY - REFLECTIONS ON THEORY AND EXPERIMENT Debye-Hückel Theory of Electrolytic Solutions Nature of the Double Bond Hybridization in Double Bonds Benzene Problem MO Description of Conjugated Cyclic Compounds Orbital Symmetry (Woodward-Hoffmann Rules) Extension of Cyclic p-Electron MO Theory to Transition States of Pericyclic Reactions Violation of Hund's Rule in Biradicals Reflections on Hückel's Career THE DIENONE-PHENOL MYSTERIES Isolations of Estrogens Approaches to the Estrogens by Aromatization of Ring A Alicyclic Steroids Woodward's Challenge Misgivings about the Structures Why did Woodward Undertake the Correction of the Phenolic Structures? Woodward and the Total Synthesis of Steroids Approaches and Achievements Mechanistic Motivation MEDITATIONS ON THE SPECIAL CONVICTIVE POWER OF SYMMETRIZATION EXPERIMENTS Enolization as a Mechanism of Symmetrization The Menthone Problem Tricyclene and the Wagner-Meerwein Rearrangement The Pinacol Controversy The Favorskii Rearrangement Symmetrization Racemization Machines with no Achiral Parts Direct Nucleophilic Displacement Reaction The Walden Inversion Biological and Evolutionary Attraction of Symmetry Epilogue

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Book SynopsisThis collection offers a challenging new interpretation of technical knowledge in Chinese thought and practice. Conveying technical knowledge in China through charts, plans or drawings (tu) dates back to antiquity. Earlier studies focused on specialised forms of tu like maps or drawings of machines. Here, however, tu is identified in Chinese terms, viz. as a philosophical category of knowledge production: visual templates for action, spanning a range from mandala to modernist mapping projects, inseparable from writing but with distinctive powers of communication. A distinction is made between two principal types of tu: ritual/symbolic and representational, highlighting essential issues such as historical shifts in their significance, the relations between tu and political power, media for inscribing tu and the impact of printing, and encounters with the West.Trade Review"This massive and engaging volume, edited by sinologists Francesca Bray, Vera Dorofeeva-Lichtmann, and Georges Métailié, is an important addition to the literature. Devoted mainly to the study of Chinese graphic elements, the book examines their role in society, history, and culture. The volume’s significance lies as much in its methodology as in its broad coverage.(...) These essays, and particularly Bray’s introduction, set up a framework for the study of Chinese tu and raise many questions for further study. They will appeal to students and scholars of visual culture and of the history of science, the history of art, and the history of science, in both China and the West." Jinbang Song, East Asian Science, Technology and Society: An International Journal (2011) 5 "a large and important book. We can congratulate the editors and contributors for a very useful set of essays and and introduction that goes as far as possible toward making them cohere." Nathan Sivin, China Review International 2008: 15/4.

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Book SynopsisConsisting of a series of case studies, this book is devoted to the concept and uses of salt in early modern science, which have played a crucial role in the evolution of matter theory from Aristotelian concepts of the elements to Newtonian chymistry. No reliable study on this subject has been previously available. Its exploration of natural history’s and medicine’s intersection with chemical investigation in early modern England demonstrates the growing importance of the senses and experience as causes of intellectual change from 1650-1750. It demonstrates that an understanding of the changing definitions of “salt” is also crucial to a historical comprehension of the transition between alchemy and chemistry.Trade Review"...The Salt of the Earth is a work that meets a high scholarly standard in both form and substance; it should be of interest to any student of early modern chemistry, medicine, and natural philosophy in general." Victor D. Boantza, Book Reviews - ISIS, 100: 1 (2009), 166-167 pp.Table of ContentsList of Illustrations Acknowledgements 1. The Context of Salts 2. Paracelsian Concepts of Salts 3. Van Helmont, Salts, and Natural History in Early Modern England 4. From Salts to Saline Spirits—the Rise of Acids 5. Salts and Saline Spirits in the Medical Marketplace and Literature—Patent Medicines and Chymical Satire Conclusion: From Saline Acids to Acidifying Oxygen Appendix: Translation from Latin of Martin Lister’s Exercises on the Healing Springs of England (1684) Bibliography Index

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Book SynopsisThe studies in this volume present early science in its rich and divergent complexity. Many historians of the Scientific Revolution have used early modern scholasticism to represent pre-seventeenth century science as a whole, but a close look at ancient, medieval, and even early modern scientific writers shows that before the Scientific Revolution - and not only in Europe - there were many and diverse traditions of interpreting the natural world. This book provides a broad range of historical evidence concerning early science, which may be used as a basis for new and more complex historical interpretations. Originally published as Volume XIV, Nos. 1-3 (2009) of Brill's journal Early Science and Medicine.Trade Review"Evidence and Interpretation in Studies on Early Science and Medicine is an excellently edited volume that includes sixteen contributions [...] of high quality and will make significant contributions to their respective fields" - Gad Freudenthal, ISIS, 103: 1 (2012), pp. 164-166Table of ContentsIntroduction, William R. Newman & Edith Dudley Sylla ANCIENT Modes of Explanation in the Aristotelian Mechanical Problems, Jean De Groot Structures of Argument and Concepts of Force in the Aristotelian Mechanical Problems, Mark Schiefsky ISLAMIC/ARABIC The Simple Ontology of Kalām Atomism: An Outline, A. I. Sabra The Footprints of “Experiment” in Early Arabic Optics, Elaheh Kheirandish THE LATIN MIDDLE AGES The “Experience-Based Medicine” of the Thirteenth Century, Michael McVaugh The Intellect Naturalized: Roger Bacon on the Existence of Corporeal Species within the Intellect, Yael Raizman-Kedar Magic and the Physical World in Thirteenth-Century Scholasticism, Steven P. Marrone The Debate over the Nature of Motion: John Buridan, Nicole Oresme, and Albert of Saxony. With an Edition of John Buridan’s Quaestiones super libros Physicorum, secundum ultimam lecturam, Book III, q. 7, Johannes M.M.H. Thijssen John Buridan and Critical Realism, Edith Dudley Sylla LATE MEDIEVAL, RENAISSANCE, AND EARLY MODERN The Significance of “Chymical Atomism”, William R. Newman Conjecture, Probabilism, and Provisional Knowledge in Renaissance Meteorology, Craig Martin Setting up Copernicus? Astronomy and Natural Philosophy in Giambattista Capuano da Manfredonia’s Expositio on the Sphere, Michael H. Shank Copernicus’s Mereological Vision of the Universe, André Goddu From “Dragonology” to Meteorology: Aristotelian Natural Philosophy and the Beginning of the Decline of the Dragon in China, Qiong Zhang Baroque Fire (A Note on Early-Modern Angelology), Anne A. Davenport Words, Lines, Diagrams, Images: Towards a History of Scientific Imagery, Christoph Lüthy & Alexis Smets Index

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Book SynopsisThis book is about medical beliefs and practices for animals in early modern England. Although there are numerous texts on human health, this is the first to focus exclusively on animals during this period. For most academics, the foundation of the London Veterinary College in 1791 marks the beginning of 'modern' veterinary medicine, with the period before unworthy of serious study. In fact, there is ample evidence of how the importance of animals resulted in a highly complex system of both preventative and remedial care. This book is divided into sections which start by 'setting the scene' with an overview of animals in early modern England and the contemporary principles behind health and illness. It moves onto an examination of the medical marketplace and printed literature on animal health care, followed by an in-depth look at preventative and remedial methods. It ends by addressing the question of what impact, if any, new colleges had on veterinary beliefs and practices.Trade Review"The Care of Brute Beasts merits attention from any scholar of animals in early modern Europe. Its focus on the practical care of ordinary livestock, horses, and pets offers a fresh approach to thinking about the ways humans encountered other species in early modern Europe." Suzanne J. Walker, TulaneUniversity (Renaissance Quarterly, Vol. 64, No. 1 (Spring 2011), pp. 323-325)Table of ContentsList of illustrations Introduction PART I: SETTING THE SCENE 1. Animals in early modern England 2. The principles behind health and illness PART II: STRUCTURES OF PRACTICE AND KNOWLEDGE 3. The medical marketplace for animals 4. Popular medical literature PART III: STRUCTURES OF PRACTICE AND KNOWLEDGE 5. Preventative medicine 6. Remedial Medicine Epilogue Index

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Book SynopsisAn hommage to Gad Freudenthal, this volume offers twenty-two chapters on the history of science and the role of science in Jewish cultures. Written by outstanding scholars from all over the world it is a token of appreciation for Freudenthal's accomplishments in this discipline. The chapters in this volume include editions and translations of source texts in different languages and focus on topics that reflect the problématiques Gad Freudenthal often tackled in his own research: aspects of knowledge transfer, translation processes and the appropriation of knowledge from one culture to another. They are contributions to a better understanding of the cross-cultural contacts in the field of science between Jews, Muslim and Christians in the Middle Ages and early modern times.Table of ContentsTexts: Editions, Translations, and Commentaries Roshdi Rashed, Le pseudo al-Ḥasan ibn al-Hayṯam: sur l’asymptote Charles Burnett, Al-Qabīsī’s Introduction to Astrology: from Courtly Entertainment to University Textbook Y. Tzvi Langermann, A Different Hue to Medieval Jewish Philosophy: Four Investigations into an Unstudied Philosophical Text Mauro Zonta, Aristotle’s De anima and De generatione et corruptione in the Medieval Hebrew Tradition: New Details Regarding Textual History Coming from a Neglected Manuscript Tony Lévy, La mesure du cercle d’Archimède au moyen age : le témoignage des textes hébreux Paul B. Fenton, Un traité judéo-arabe sur les vertus du tabac rédigé dans la main du Šayḫ Sufī ‘Abd al-Ġani an-Nabulusī Studies Herbert A. Davidson, Maimonides and Samuel Ben Ali Josep Puig Montada, Ibn Rušd and the Almohad Context Carlos Fraenkel, Legislating Truth: Maimonides, the Almohads and the Thirteenth-Century Jewish Enlightenment Judith Olszowy-Schlanger, The Money language: Latin and Hebrew in Jewish Legal Contracts from Medieval England Reimund Leicht, Naḥmanides on Necromancy Resianne Fontaine, The First Survey of the Metaphysics in Hebrew Hagar Kahana-Smilansky, Solomon ben Moses Melguiri and the Transmission of Knowledge from Latin into Hebrew Sara Klein-Braslavy, Dialectic in Gersonides’ Biblical Commentaries José Luis Mancha, Demonstrative Astronomy: Notes on Levi ben Geršom’s answer to Guide II.24 Warren Zev Harvey, Nicole Oresme and Ḥasdai Crescas on Many Worlds Ruth Glasner, The Peculiar History of Aristotelianism among Spanish Jews Early Modern Cultural History and Historiography Bernard R. Goldstein and Giora Hon, Duhem’s Continuity Thesis: The Intrusion of Ideology into History of Science Gideon Freudenthal, Enlightenment in Gold Shlomo Berger, A Bestseller in Context: Referring to the Tsene Rene in Early Modern Yiddish Books Charles Manekin, On Humanist Logic Judaized—Then and Now: Two Models for the Appropriation of Gentile Science Irene E. Zwiep, Hebrew “Sociolinguistics”

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Book SynopsisIn Hellenistic Astronomy: The Science in Its Contexts, new essays by renowned scholars address questions about what the ancient science of the heavens was in the ancient Near East and Mediterranean worlds, and the numerous contexts in which it was pursued. Together, these essays will enable readers not only to understand the technical accomplishments of this ancient science but also to appreciate their historical significance by locating the questions, challenges, and issues inspiring them in their political, medical, philosophical, literary, and religious contexts. Winner of the 2020 Choice Outstanding Academic Title AwardTrade Review"This is an absolutely wonderful book, well-written and a pleasure to read. It is generally based on the most recent research and very informative without being inaccessible to the layman. That the field of ancient astronomy is under rapid development is evident from the bibliography alone. [...] It is generously supplied with interesting and relevant illustrations and its structure and composition take the reader by the hand so that it can be read easily from cover to cover. The individual chapters can also be read on their own, and the “Historical Glossary” and indices make it an excellent handbook as well. It provides a status quaestionis in a way which is at the same time accessible to the interested layman and contains a brilliant survey and much new to be learnt for the specialist in any parts of the vast topic covered as well." - Ulla Koch, in: BMCR 2021.04.23 "This is an excellent and eminently useful volume, surveying and advancing the state of the field in a very welcome, cross-cultural and interdisciplinary format. Corners of this field seem to have been developing rather quickly in the last decade or two, and scholars will be grateful to the editors and authors for the timely appearance and impressive scope of this large book." - Daryn Lehoux, in: The Classical Review 71.2 442–444Table of ContentsPreface Acknowledgments List of Illustrations and Tables List of Abbreviations 0 Prolegomena to the Study of Hellenistic Astronomy  Alan C. Bowen and Francesca Rochberg Part A Technical Requirements 1 The Celestial Sphere  Clemency Montelle 2 Methods of Reckoning Time  Robert Hannah Chapter 3 Quantitative Tools 3.1 Techniques of Measurement and Computation  Mathieu Ossendrijver 3.2 Planar and Spherical Trigonometry  Glen Van Brummelen Chapter 4 Theory of the Sun, Moon, and Planets 4.1 Fundamentals of Planetary Theory  Nathan Sidoli 4.2 Hypothesis in Greco-Roman Astronomy  Alan C. Bowen 4.3 Some Early Hypotheses in Greco-Roman Astronomy  Alan C. Bowen 4.4 The Ptolemaic Planetary Hypotheses  James C. Evans 4.5 The Hellenistic Theory of Eclipses  Clemency Montelle 4.6 Hellenistic Babylonian Planetary Theory  Mathieu Ossendrijver 4.7 The Babylonian Contribution to Greco-Roman Astronomy  Francesca Rochberg 4.8 Hellenistic Egyptian Planetary Theory  Micah T. Ross Part B Observations, Instruments, and Issues Chapter 5 Observational Foundations 5.1 The Observational Foundations of Babylonian Astronomy  Lis Brack-Bernsen 5.2 Experience and Observation in Hellenistic Astronomy  Richard L. Kremer Chapter 6 Astronomical Instruments 6.1 Hellenistic Surveying Instruments  Tracey E. Rihll 6.2 Hellenistic Maps and Lists of Places  Klaus Geus 6.3 Star-Lists from the Babylonians to Ptolemy  Gerd Graßhoff 6.4 Ptolemy’s Instruments  Dennis W. Duke Chapter 7 Thematic Questions 7.1 Issues in Hellenistic Egyptian Astronomical Writings  Anthony Spalinger 7.2 The Texts and Aims of Babylonian Astronomy  Hermann Hunger 7.3 Issues in Greco-Roman Astronomy of the Hellenistic Period  Alan C. Bowen Part C Contexts 8 The Professional ἀϲτρολόγοϲ  Wolfgang Hübner Chapter 9 Hellenistic Astronomy in Public Service 9.1 The Sundial and the Calendar  Robert Hannah 9.2 The Antikythera Mechanism  James C. Evans 9.3 Hellenistic Astronomy in Medicine  Dorian Gieseler Greenbaum Chapter 10 Hellenistic Astronomy in Literature 10.1 Aratus and the Popularization of Hellenistic Astronomy  Stamatina Mastorakou 10.2 The Authority of the Roman Heavens  Alfred Schmid Chapter 11 Hellenistic Astronomy in the Training and Work of Priests 11.1 Hellenistic Astronomy and the Egyptian Priest  Alexandra von Lieven 11.2 Hellenistic Astronomy and the Babylonian Scribal Families  Mathieu Ossendrijver Chapter 12 Astral Divination and Natal Astrology 12.1 The Hellenistic Horoscope  Dorian Gieseler Greenbaum 12.2 Hellenistic Babylonian Astral Divination and Nativities  Francesca Rochberg 12.3 Hellenistic Horoscopes in Greek and Latin: Contexts and Uses  Stephan Heilen 12.4 Demotic Horoscopes  Micah T. Ross Chapter 13 Theological Contexts 13.1 Hellenistic Astronomy in Early Judaic Writings  James C. VanderKam 13.2 Astral Divination in the Dead Sea Scrolls  Helen R. Jacobus 13.3 Hellenistic Astronomy in Early Christianities  Nicola Denzey Lewis 13.4 Cosmology in Mandaean Texts  Siam Bhayro 13.5 Astral Discourse in the Philosophical Hermetica (Corpus Hermeticum)  Christian Wildberg Chapter 14 Hellenistic Astronomy in the Philosophical Schools 14.1 Astronomy and Divination in Stoic Philosophy  Giuseppe Cambiano 14.2 Plotinus on the Motion of the Stars  James Wilberding Historical Glossary of Important Terms in Hellenistic Astronomy Bibliography Index of Passages Index of Names Index of Subjects

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Book SynopsisIn Copernicus in the Cultural Debates of the Renaissance, Pietro Daniel Omodeo presents a general overview of the reception of Copernicus’s astronomical proposal from the years immediately preceding the publication of De revolutionibus (1543) to the Roman prohibition of heliocentric hypotheses in 1616. Relying on a detailed investigation of early modern sources, the author systematically examines a series of issues ranging from computation to epistemology, natural philosophy, theology and ethics. In addition to offering a pluralistic and interdisciplinary perspective on post-Copernican astronomy, the study goes beyond purely cosmological and geometrical issues and engages in a wide-ranging discussion of how Copernicus’s legacy interacted with European culture and how his image and theories evolved as a result.     Trade Review'Wer an der Astronomiegeschichte der Frühen Neuzeit interessiert ist, wird dieses Opus gerne zur Hand nehmen.' Günther Oestmann, in: Beiträge zur Astronomiegeschichte, 13, p. 321-322. Massimo Bucciantini, in Il Sole 24 Ore, 4 Ottobre 2015: 'Pietro Daniel Omodeo indaga settant'anni di cosmologia e astronomia a cavallo di due secoli decisivi per le sorti dell'umanità, dove quei saperi sono inseparabili dalle filosofie e dalle teologie del loro tempo. E procede con passo spedito, ma ben equipaggiato e ben allenato ai lunghi viaggi, facendoci conoscere non solo gli attori principali ma anche i tanti personaggi spesso a torto considerati minori, alcuni dei quali pochissimo noti in Italia.' (Pietro Daniel Omodeo investigates 70 years of cosmology and astronomy between two centuries that were crucial for the fate of humanity, years when those sciences were inseparable from philosophy and theology. He proceeds fluently, ‘well equipped’ and ‘well used’ to long journeys by getting us acquainted to the main and to the less known characters, some of them not enough known in Italy.) 'Cliò che subito colpisce è l'attenzione alla pluralità che scaturisce dai tanti modi in cui venne letto Copernico. Sono le molteplici interpretazioni a rendere peculiare questo lavoro.' (What’s remarkable is the attention to a pluralistic perspective emerging from all the different ways in which Copernicus was read. The multiple interpretations make this work special.) 'Attraverso l'esame di un numero impressionante di testi Omodeo ci restituisce la fotografia di un'epoca animata da un susseguirsi interminabile di discussioni filosofiche e controversie scientifiche.' (By examining an impressive number of texts, Omodeo gives us a picture of an age animated by a succession of never-ending philosophical discussions and scientific disputes.) 'Trai capitoli più interessanti del libro ci sono quelli dedicati ai matematici luterani allievi di Filippo Melantone.' (The chapters devoted to the Lutheran mathematicians, alumni of Filippo Melantone are among the most interesting ones.) 'Siamo di fronte a un libro per lettori esigenti che, non accontentandosi delle troppo lineari ricostruzioni manualistiche, sono disposti a inoltrarsi - e con gusto a perdersi - nell'intricata selva dei molteplici e immaginifici universi che popolano la seconda metà del Cinquecento e i primi decenni del Seicento.' (This is a book for demanding readers, who are not satisfied by the too simple/linear reconstructions of usual handbooks, and instead are willing to dive in – and be happily lost in – the intricate wood of the multiplex imaginative universes of the second half of the sixteenth century and early seventeenth century.)Table of ContentsContents Acknowledgments ix List of Illustrations xi List of Abbreviations of Journals and Reference Books xii Introduction 1 1 Copernicus between 1514 and 1616: An Overview 11 1 Copernicus’s Connection 11 2 Platonizing Humanists 15 3 Rheticus and the Printing of De revolutionibus 19 4 The Network of German Mathematicians 23 5 Italy 25 6 France 31 7 Spain and Flanders 35 8 England and Scotland 37 9 Central European Circles and Courts 43 10 The Physical-Cosmological Turn 48 11 Heliocentrism between Two Centuries: Kepler and Galileo 51 12 Geo-Heliocentrism and Copernican Hypotheses 53 13 The Difficult Reconciliation between Copernicus and the Sacred Scripture 56 14 Copernicus before and after 1616 59 15 Summary of the Main Lines of the Early Reception of Copernicus 63 2 Astronomy at the Crossroads of Mathematics, Natural Philosophy and Epistemology 66 1 A Split Reception of Copernicus 66 2 Copernicus Presents Himself as a Mathematician 70 3 Cosmology and Mathematics in Copernicus’s Commentariolus 71 4 A Clash of Authorities: Averroist Criticism of Mathematical Astronomy 76 5 Fracastoro’s Homocentrism 79 6 Amico on Celestial Motions 82 7 Osiander’s Theological Instructions 85 8 Melanchthon’s Approach to Nature 87 9 Rheticus’s Early “Realism” 92 10 The Elder Rheticus and Pierre de la Ramée against the Astronomical Axiom 94 11 Facts and Reasons in Astronomy according to Melanchthon and Reinhold 97 12 Reinhold’s Astronomy and Copernicus 100 13 Epistemological Remarks on Reinhold’s Terminology 104 14 Peucer’s Continuation of Reinhold’s Program 107 15 Wittich’s Combinatory Games 112 16 Brahe as the Culmination of the Wittenberg School 116 17 Beyond Selective Reading 120 3 Beyond Computation: Copernican Ephemerists on Hypotheses, Astrology and Natural Philosophy 124 1 A Premise: Gemma Frisius as a Reader of Copernicus 124 2 Frisius’s Cosmological Commitment in Stadius’s Ephemerides 127 3 Stadius and Copernicus 130 4 Ephemerides and Astrology 132 5 Some Remarks on Rheticus’s Challenge to Pico 134 6 Giuntini’s Post-Copernican Astrology 136 7 Magini: Copernican Ephemerides, Astrology and Planetary Hypotheses 139 8 A Dispute on the Reliability of Ephemerides in Turin 142 9 Benedetti’s Defense of Post-Copernican Ephemerides and Astrology 145 10 Origanus’s Planetary System 149 11 Origanus’s Arguments in Favor of Terrestrial Motion 151 12 Conclusions 156 4 A Finite and Infinite Sphere: Reinventing Cosmological Space 158 1 The Finite Infinity of the World Revised 159 2 Cusanus’s Two Infinities 161 3 Cusanus’s Role in the Copernican Debate 164 4 The Invention of the Pythagorean Cosmology 167 5 Pythagoreanism and Cosmological Infinity according to Digges 170 6 The Infinity of Space and Worldly Finiteness as a Restoration of the Stoic Outlook 173 7 Benedetti’s Approach to the Copernican System 175 8 Stoicism in Germany: Pegel’s Cosmology 179 9 Bruno’s Pythagorean Correction of Copernicus’s Planetary Model 183 10 Bruno’s Defense of Cosmological Infinity 186 11 Homogeneity, Aether and Vicissitude according to Bruno 188 12 Kepler’s Anti-Brunian Pythagoreanism 191 13 Conclusions: Eclectic Concepts of Cosmological Space in the Renaissance 195 5 A Ship-Like Earth: Reconceptualizing Motion 197 1 The Connection between Cosmology and Physics in Aristotle and Ptolemy 199 2 Copernicus’s Physical Considerations 203 3 Nominalist Sources on Terrestrial Motion 205 4 Calcagnini 209 5 Renaissance Variations on the Ship Metaphor 213 6 Bruno’s Vitalist Conception of Terrestrial Motion 216 7 Benedetti’s Archimedean Dynamics 219 8 Benedetti’s Post-Aristotelian Physics and Post-Copernican Astronomy 220 9 A New Alliance between Mechanics and Astronomy 223 10 Brahe’s Physical Considerations 225 11 Concluding Remarks 230 6 A priori and a posteriori: Two Approaches to Heliocentrism 234 1 Mästlin’s a posteriori Astronomy 235 2 The Young Kepler and the Secret Order of the Cosmos 238 3 Kepler Defends and Expounds the Hypotheses of Copernicus 242 4 The Distances of the Planets: Mästlin’s Contribution 243 5 Mästlin: Finally We Have an a priori Astronomy 245 6 The Sun as the Universal Motive Force 248 7 The New Astronomy 250 8 Natural Arguments in Astronomy 251 9 Gravitas and vis animalis 254 10 Celestial Messages 257 11 First Reactions to the Celestial Novelties 263 12 Kepler’s Discourses with Galilei 266 7 The Bible versus Pythagoras: The End of an Epoch 271 1 Condemnation 271 2 First Scriptural Reservations in the Protestant World 272 3 Rheticus and the Scriptures 274 4 Spina and Tolosani 278 5 Rothmann’s Opinion on the Scriptural Issue 281 6 Censorship in Tübingen 284 7 Scriptural Defense of Terrestrial Motion by Origanus 286 8 In Iob Commentaria 287 9 Bruno, Copernicus and the Bible 290 10 The Galileo Affaire 293 11 Foscarini pro Copernico 297 12 Galilei to Christina of Lorraine 303 13 Foscarini to Bellarmino 304 14 Bellarminian Zeal 307 15 Campanellan Libertas 309 16 Campanella’s Cosmologia 311 17 Apologia pro Galilaeo 314 18 Conclusions: Accommodation and Convention 318 8 Laughing at Phaeton’s Fall: A New Man 322 1 Holistic Views in the Astronomical-Astrological Culture of the Renaissance 323 2 The Ethical Question in Bruno: Philosophical Freedom and the Criticism of Religion 332 3 The Reformation of the Stars: a Metaphor for the Correction of Vices 335 4 A Copernican Sunrise 339 5 Beyond the Ethics of Balance 342 6 Heroic Frenzy 344 7 Actaeon: The Unity of Man and Nature 347 8 Bruno’s Polemics, Banishments and Excommunications 350 9 Cosmological and Anti-Epicurean Disputations at Helmstedt 352 10 Mencius against Epicurean Cosmology 354 11 Bruno’s Support of Atomistic Views 356 12 “New Astronomy” at Helmstedt 358 13 Liddel’s Teaching of Astronomy and Copernican Hypotheses 360 14 Hofmann’s Quarrel over Faith and Natural Knowledge 363 15 Franckenberg and the Spiritualist Reception of Bruno and Copernicus 365 16 Hill and the Epicurean Reception of Bruno and Copernicus 372 17 A New Imagery: Phaeton’s Fall 378 18 Conclusions: The New Humanity 382 Bibliography 387 Index of Names 425 Index of Places 432

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Book SynopsisCabinets of Experimental Philosophy in Eighteenth-Century Europe is an ambitious contribution to the growing interest in how science came to engage the attention of a public outside the academic and professional spheres and how collections of instruments played a formative role in this development. Collections of physical instruments for research and demonstration appeared throughout Europe in the eighteenth century and the coverage of the book is correspondingly broad. While collections in different cultural and geographical locations had much in common, there were significant local modifications. The essays in this book illustrate how science, sometimes thought to be monolithic and universal, can maintain core intellectual characteristics and practical techniques while adapting to particular sites and circumstances. Contributors include: Jim Bennett, Sofia Talas, Huib J. Zuidervaart, Hans Hooijmaijers, Ad Maas, Tiemen Cocquyt, Inga Elmqvist Söderlund, Paola Bertucci, Marta C. Lourenço, David Felismino, Ivano Dal Prete, Ewa Wyka, Martin Weiss, and Paolo Brenni.Table of ContentsList of Illustrations Notes on Contributors Introduction Jim Bennett, Sofia Talas Colour Plates I-XIII Cabinets for Experimental Philosophy in the Netherlands Huib J. Zuidervaart Entrepreneurs in Experiments: The Leiden Cabinet of Physics and the Motives of its Founders (1675-1742) Hans Hooijmaijers, Ad Maas New Light on the Cabinet of Physics of Padua Sofia Talas The Lost Cabinet of Experimental Philosophy of the University of Oxford Jim Bennett Failure, Fraud, and Instrument Cabinets: Academic Involvement in the Eighteenth-Century Dutch Water Crisis Tiemen Cocquyt The Cabinet of Physics at Riddarhuset in Stockholm in the Eighteenth Century Inga Elmqvist Söderlund Designing the House of Knowledge in Eighteenth-century Naples: The Ephemeral Museum of Ferdinando Spinelli, Prince of Tarsia Paola Bertucci Between Teaching and Collecting: The lost Cabinet of Physics of Princes José and João of Portugal (1777-1808) Marta C. Lourenço, David Felismino The Gazola Family’s Scientific Cabinet: Politics, Society and Scientific Collecting in the Twilight of the Republic of Venice Ivano Dal Prete Collections of Experimental Natural Philosophy in Eighteenth-century Poland Ewa Wyka “Monuments of Science”: How the Teyler Museum’s Instrument Collection Became Historical Martin Weiss The Physics Cabinet of the Istituto Tecnico Toscano Paolo Brenni General Index

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Book SynopsisThe first of its kind, this collection of critical essays opens up new venues in the comparative study of science and culture by focusing on the formative decades of modern China in the late nineteenth and first half of the twentieth century. It provides a wide-ranging examination of the cultural and intellectual history of science and technology in modern China.From anti-imperialism to the technology of Chinese writing, the commodification of novelties to the rise of the modern professional scientist, new lexica and appropriations of the past, the contributors map out a transregional and global circuitry of modern knowledge and practical know-how, nationalism and the amalgamation of new social practices. Contributors include: Iwo Amelung, Fa-ti Fan, Shen Guowei, Danian Hu, Joachim Kurtz, Eugenia Lean, Thomas S. Mullaney, Hugh Shapiro, Grace Shen, and Jing Tsu.

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Book SynopsisTwo remarkable Iranian world-maps were discovered in 1989 and 1995. Both are made of brass and date from 17th-century Iran. Mecca is at the centre and a highly sophisticated longitude and latitude grid enables the user to determine the direction and distance to Mecca for anywhere in the world between Andalusia and China. Prior to the discovery of these maps it was thought that such cartographic grids were conceived in Europe ca. 1910. This richly-illustrated book presents an overview of the ways in which Muslims over the centuries have determined the sacred direction towards Mecca (qibla) and then describes the two world-maps in detail. The author shows that the geographical data derives from a 15th-century Central Asian source and that the mathematics underlying the grid was developed in 9th-century Baghdad.Trade Review'Science historian David King wrote a monumental book about [a] cartographical miracle.' Dirk van Delft, NRC Handelsblad, 2000. '…impressive volume…This is an important reference book full of suggestions for further studies.' Roser Puig, ISIS, 2001. ‘…King has written a fascinating, beautifully illustrated book that should be read by any person interested in Islamic science or the history of mathematical geography.’ Benno van Dalen, Royal Asiatic Society, 2002.

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Book SynopsisIn Elegant Anatomy Marieke Hendriksen offers an account of the material culture of the eighteenth-century Leiden anatomical collections, which have not been studied in detail before. The author introduces the novel analytical concept of aesthesis, as these historical medical collections may seem strange, and undeniably have a morbid aesthetic, yet are neither curiosities nor art. As this book deals with issues related to the keeping and displaying of historical human remains, it is highly relevant for material culture and museum studies, cultural history, the history of scientific collections and the history of medicine alike. Unlike existing literature on historical anatomical collections, this book takes the objects in the collections as its starting point, instead of the people that created them.Trade Review'They [the images] form a provocative source that, along with the case studies, can be put to use by scholars interested in the history of science, scientific instruments, material culture, museums and the history of science in public. It joins a growing literature that reveals a desire to bring such studies together for their mutual benefit.' Rebekah Higgitt in: The British Journal for the History of Science, Volume 48, Issue 04, December 2015, pp. 697-699. DOI: 10.1017/S0007087415000771, Published online: 02 December 2015. In Elegant Anatomy Marieke Hendriksen sees the mixture of wonder and disgust that seems to be at work in Cox’s sketches as derived from an eighteenth-century “epistemic culture” distinct from our own. Her first chapter is on trying to create a specimen (of a sheep’s heart) by imitating eighteenthcentury injection methods. The experiment served to instruct her and her friends about the difficulties of getting any usable results without learning from a master. But while she cannot duplicate their techniques, she does get at their aims by invoking a term occasionally used in the period, “aesthesis.” [...] For Hendriksen, aesthesis has five interlinked characteristics: what can be known through sensory perception; scrutiny and manipulation of the elegance of the material world; dealing with disgust; the tactile processes of commodification, domestication, and objectification; and tacit knowledge. The commodification of bodies in the period is important; but for people like the anatomist Albinus, she sees the main goal as knowledge of the “perfection of nature.” She is especially good on the “aesthesis” evident in covering the limbs of babies in bottles with lace sleeves and related phenomena; and there is an excellent chapter here on the babies in bottles sent from Africa and Asia (another version of it appears in The Fate of Anatomical Collections). In a nonpositivistic account of the period one will struggle to find information about new anatomical findings, which the actors thought were important too. But her work on the cultural history of the anatomical aethesis of the eighteenth century makes excellent use of information about the intentions and practices of anatomical preparators, along with a close study of some of the items themselves. It is good to try to get past “aesthetics.” Harold J. Cook, in: Isis, Volume 107, Number 1, March 2016, pp. 149-152.Table of ContentsAcknowledgments List of Illustrations 1. Introduction: Understanding Eighteenth-Century Leiden Anatomy 2. Elegant Anatomy: Aesthesis 3. Quicksilver Anatomy: Exploring the Lymphatic System with Mercury 4. Hands, Lace, and Plants: Meaningful Embellishments 5. Beautiful Monsters: How Deformity Can Be Elegant 6. Colonial Bodies: Collecting the Exotic Other 7. Back to the Bone: The End of Aesthesis 8. Conclusion: Aesthesis and the Future of Historical Anatomical Collections Bibliography

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Book SynopsisThe well-illustrated articles in Observing the World through Images offer insights into the uses of images in astronomy, mathematics, instrument-making, medicine and alchemy, highlighting shared forms as well as those peculiar to individual disciplines. Themes addressed include: the processes of image production and communication; the transformation of images through copying and adaptation for new purposes; genres and traditions of imagery in particular scientific disciplines; the mnemonic and pedagogical value of diagrams; the relationship between text and image; and the roles of diagrams as tools to think with. Contributors include: Isabelle Pantin, Jennifer Rampling, Samuel Gessner, Renee Raphael, Karin Ekholm, Hester Higton, and Katie Taylor.Table of ContentsIntroduction: New Light on Visual Forms in the Early-Modern Arts and Sciences, Isla Fay and Nicholas Jardine Analogy and Difference: A Comparative Study of Medical and Astronomical Images in Books, 1470–1550, Isabelle Pantin Depicting the Medieval Alchemical Cosmos: George Ripley’s Wheel of Inferior Astronomy, Jennifer M. Rampling Anatomy, Bloodletting and Emblems: Interpreting the Title-Page of Nathaniel Highmore’s Disquisitio (1651), Karin Ekholm The Use of Printed Images for Instrument-Making at the Arsenius Workshop. Samuel Gessner Reconstructing Vernacular Mathematics: The Case of Thomas Hood’s Sector, Katie Taylor Instruments and Illustration: The Use of Images in Edmund Gunter’s De Sectore et Radio, Hester Higton Teaching through Diagrams: Galileo’s Dialogo and Discorsi and his Pisan Readers, Renée Raphael

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Book SynopsisCold War Science and the Transatlantic Circulation of Knowledge delves into how the Cold War, as a global phenomenon, shaped local conditions and decisions for science in light of US-Europe relationships. The articles in this volume, edited by Jeroen van Dongen, show how the western network in which science was circulated and produced was strongly conditioned by the state and its international relations. The workings of secrecy, the consequences of US hegemony and decolonization, and the ambitions of post-war recovery attempts were all mediated through the interference of the state and through its relative position in the network. At the same time, hubristic expectations prefigured in the state’s relation to science.Trade Review'Like water incrementally descending a cascade, the Soviet-American affair of the Cold War trickled down deep into the cracks of Western European science. This subtle reformulation of John Krige's 'American consensual hegemony' is one of the merits of Cold War Science and the Transatlantic Circulation of Knowledge. [...] The volume's main focus is on the relation between science and national governments, both on a local and a global level. [...] this volume contains several fascinating case studies and provides interesting historiographical nuances, especially by paying serious attention to 'small' European nations.' - Jorrit Smit (Universiteit Leiden), in: Studium, volume 9, issue 3 (2016), p.181-182.Table of ContentsList of Illustrations and Tables Note on Contributors Introduction PART 1 Secrecy and Science 1 Scientists, Secrecy, and Scientific Intelligence: The Challenges of International Science in Cold War America Ronald E. Doel 2 A ‘Need-To-Know-More’ Criterion? Science and Information Security at NATO during the Cold War Simone Turchetti 3 A Transnational Approach to US Nuclear Weapons Relationships with Britain and France in the 60s and 70s John Krige PART 2 Dutch Perspectives 4 Putting a Lid on the Gas Centrifuge: Classification of the Dutch Ultracentrifuge Project, 1960–1961 Abel Streefland 5 Quid Pro Quo: Dutch Defense Research during the Early Cold War Jeroen van Dongen and Friso Hoeneveld 6 Chemical Warfare Research in the Netherlands Herman Roozenbeek 7 The Fulbright Program in the Netherlands: An Example of Science Diplomacy Giles Scott-Smith PART 3 ‘Cold War’ Science? 8 The Absence of the East: International Influences on Science Policy in Western Europe during the Cold War David Baneke 9 Colonial Crossings: Social Science, Social Knowledge, and American Power from the Nineteenth Century to the Cold War Jessica Wang PART 4 Scientific Hubris 10 Cold War Atmospheric Sciences in the United States: From Modeling to Control Kristine C. Harper 11 Small State versus Superpower: Science and Geopolitics in Greenland in the Early Cold War Matthias Heymann, Henry Nielsen, Kristian Hvidtfelt Nielsen and Henrik Knudsen 12 The Ford Foundation and the Measurement of Values Paul Erickson Index of Names

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Book SynopsisDuring their active lives, scientific instruments generally inhabit the laboratory, observatory, classroom or the field. But instruments have also lived in a wider set of venues, as objects on display. As such, they acquire new levels of meaning; their cultural functions expand. This book offers selected studies of instruments on display in museums, national fairs, universal exhibitions, patent offices, book frontispieces, theatrical stages, movie sets, and on-line collections. The authors argue that these displays, as they have changed with time, reflect changing social attitudes towards the objects themselves and toward science and its heritage. By bringing display to the center of analysis, the collection offers a new and ambitious framework for the study of scientific instruments and the material culture of science. Contributors are: Amy Ackerberg-Hastings, Silke Ackermann, Marco Beretta, Laurence Bobis, Alison Boyle, Fausto Casi, Ileana Chinnici, Suzanne Débarbat, Richard Dunn, Inga Elmqvist-Söderlund, Ingrid Jendrzejewski, Peggy A. Kidwell, Richard Kremer, Mara Miniati, Richard A. Paselk, Donata Randazzo, Steven Turner.Trade Review"Several papers in this volume present excruciating details concerning the struggles that various people have faced when trying to get historic scientific instruments onto exhibit and keeping them there. Seldom, however, do they grapple with the question of why anyone, other than the odd collector, curator or historian of technology, should want to look at these instruments." - At: http://www.erittenhouse.org/reviews/, by Deborah Jean Warner, curator at the Smithsonian Institution, National Museum of American History, Washington and the founding editor of Rittenhouse, the forerunner of eRittenhouse. “The book […] can be put to use by scholars interested in the history of science, scientific instruments, material culture, museums and the history of science in public. It joins a growing literature that reveals a desire to bring such studies together for their mutual benefit.” - Rebekah Higgit (University of Kent), The British Journal for the History of Science, 2015, 697-699 pp.Table of ContentsList of Illustrations Notes on Contributors Introduction Silke Ackermann, Richard L. Kremer and Mara Miniati Colour Plates 1. Andrea Corsini and the Creation of the Museum of the History of Science in Florence (1930-1961) Marco Beretta 2. “Not for their beauty”: Instruments and narratives at the Science Museum, London Alyson Boyle 3. “More Artistic than Scientific”: Exhibiting Instruments as Decorative Arts in the Victoria & Albert Museum Richard Dunn 4. “Of sufficient interest …, but not of such value …”: 260 Years of Displaying Scientific Instruments in the British Museum Silke Ackermann 5. Instruments on Display at the Paris Observatory Laurence Bobis and Suzanne Débarbat 6. Looking at Scientific Instruments on Display at the United States Centennial Exhibition of 1876 Richard L. Kremer 7. Permanent Demonstrations: The Science Teaching Museum at the University of Chicago Steven C. Turner 8. The Display of Twentieth-Century Instruments at Humboldt State University Richard A. Paselk 9. Slide Rules on Display in the United States, 1840-2010 Peggy Aldrich Kidwell and Amy Ackerberg-Hastings 10. “Exceedingly Ridiculous”: Telescopes on Displayon the Seventeenth-Century Stage Ingrid Jendrzejewski 11. Instruments on Movie Sets: A Case Study Ileana Chinnici, Donatella Randazzo and Fausto Casi 12. Display of Instruments on Seventeenth Century Astronomical Frontispieces Inga Elmqvist Söderlund General Index

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