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Fb2 The History of Science from Augustine to Galileo ePub

by A. C. Crombie

A. C. Crombie Professionals and Academics English

Fb2 The History of Science from Augustine to Galileo ePub

Category:	Professionals and Academics
Subcategory:	Memoris and Biographies
Author:	A. C. Crombie
ISBN:	0486288501
ISBN13:	978-0486288505
Language:	English
Publisher:	Dover Publications (February 26, 1996)
Pages:	464
Fb2 eBook:	1571 kb
ePub eBook:	1297 kb
Digital formats:	lit lrf doc txt

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This book would be particularly useful for someone doing work on the history of models in science.

This book would be particularly useful for someone doing work on the history of models in science. A bold writer might write a biography of Roger Bacon or William of Ockham, either academic or semipopular (at the level of David Bodanis's "Passionate Minds"). I doubt there is enough information about their lives for a book about either of them to hang together as a typical biography, but either could be used.

Both volumes complement my books Augustine to Galileo: Medieval and Early Modern .

Both volumes complement my books Augustine to Galileo: Medieval and Early Modern Science and Robert Grosseteste and the Origins of Experimental Science 1100-1700 and lead into my Styles of Scientific Thinking in the European Tradition: The History of Argument and Explanation Especially in the Mathematical and Biomedical Sciences and Arts (3 volumes, published by Gerald Duckworth & Co. Ltd, London, 1994) .

Further Bibliography of .

Richly illuminating study of the Western scientific tradition from its decay after the collapse of the Roman Empire to its full reflowering in the 17th century

Richly illuminating study of the Western scientific tradition from its decay after the collapse of the Roman Empire to its full reflowering in the 17th century. Topics include the incorporation of Greek and Arabic learning, criticism of Aristotle in the later Middle Ages and the Scientific Revolution itself.

Home Browse Books Book details, Augustine to Galileo: The History of Science .

Home Browse Books Book details, Augustine to Galileo: The History of Science,. Augustine to Galileo: The History of Science, . Though the most obvious characteristic of science in modern civilisation is the control it has given over the physical world, even while such practical control was being acquired, and certainly for long periods before it became possible, men were trying to bring nature within the grasp of their understanding.

Crombie, A. C. (Alistair Cameron), 1915-1996.

Top. American Libraries Canadian Libraries Universal Library Community Texts Project Gutenberg Biodiversity Heritage Library Children's Library. Crombie, A.

Historia de la ciencia de San Agustín a Galileo siglos XIII – XVII. 0Pages: 9year: 19/20.

Similar books and articles. Augustine to Galileo. Bruce Eastwood - 1992 - Isis: A Journal of the History of Science 83:84-99. The Light of Nature: Essays in the History and Philosophy of Science Presented to . The History of Science 400-1650. A. Crombie - 1955 - Philosophy 30 (114):272-273. The History of Science . 400-1650 by A. Crombie. John David North, John J. Roche & A. Crombie (ed. - 1985 - Distributors for the United States and Canada Kluwer Academic Publishers. Could There Be Another Galileo Case? Gregory W. Dawes - 2002 - Journal of Religion and Society 4.

Augustine to galileo. Two volumes bound as on.DOVER PUBLICATIONS, INC. The History of Science from. Vowme I. Science in the middle ages. 5TH to 13T h centuries.

Comments to eBook The History of Science from Augustine to Galileo

Ger

I was surprised to find how few English language books there are about science in the middle ages. If you want to read about Galileo's work on inertial physics, or Descartes' work on optics, or Newton's work on astronomy, or Lavoisier's work on chemistry, there are many (i) comprehensive books by researchers completely familiar with the original work, (ii) reliable surveys, and (iii) popular less technical accounts. There are also many biographies of scientists like Kepler, Leonardo, Galileo, Descartes and Newton that are quality scholarship and are easy to read. But the literature on medieval physics is much thinner.

Crombie covers a huge amount of material and huge number of writers. Reading this book I was delighted to be introduced to a new cast of characters that I didn't already know from earlier reading in the history of science: Adelard of Bath, Albertus Magnus, Pietro d'Abano, Jacopo Zabarella, Agostino Nifo, Jordanus Nemorarius, Gerard of Brussels, Giovanni Battista Benedetti; and although I have heard the names William of Ockham (Occam's Razor), Jean Buridan (Buridan's ass) and Nicole Oresme (the harmonic series diverges), they had only been names without any ideas of when they lived or the topics they wrote about.

In Aristotelian physics there were ideas like natural and violent motion that seem strange to us. But we also have ideas that are not precise. For example, try to give a precise definition of force without merely stating Newton's second law; if you can't, then isn't Newton's second law merely a definition of force? In this case, the fact that we have what may be two equivalent notions that have no precise difference which yet we treat differently could be confusing for someone in the future who reads about our physics.

This book would be particularly useful for someone doing work on the history of models in science. In Volume I, Chapter III, Section 2, Crombie describes writing of Aquinas, Bernard of Verdun and Giles of Rome about constructing hypotheses that account for observed facts.

A bold writer might write a biography of Roger Bacon or William of Ockham, either academic or semipopular (at the level of David Bodanis's "Passionate Minds"). I doubt there is enough information about their lives for a book about either of them to hang together as a typical biography, but either could be used as a focus around which to wind a story about medieval science. ("More Than a Barber: A Biography of William of Ockham".)

"The great idea recovered during the 12th century, which made possible the immediate expansion of science from that time, was the idea of rational explanation as in formal or geometrical demonstration; that is, the idea that a particular fact was explained when it could be deduced from a more general principle."

Porgisk

This is a very widely encompassing account of the evolution and development of science through history. The considerations of the sociopolitical and philosophical climates pertaining to the times gives the reader a basis of understanding why science progressed as it did. The account is very well organised and lucid, although it fails in some aspects to consider the contributions of the Far Eastern civilizations. It makes a very valuable contribution to help appreciate acutely the value of those who contributed to science's development.

Cenneel

This is a very mediocre history. I shall illustrate its mediocrity by criticising this quotation:

"The formulation of the Aristotelian 'law of motion' metrically as a function [velocity proportional to motive power over resistance], so that it became quantitatively refutable, was an achievement of the greatest importance, even though neither Bradwardine nor any of his contemporaries discovered an expression that fitted the facts or indeed applied any empirical quantitate test." (p. II.70)

This makes no sense. Nothing is added to the verbal expression by turning it into a formula.

In what sense did the law suddenly become "quantitatively refutable" by this transformation? Obviously not because it enabled Galileo-style objections based on joining bodies of different weights, since such objections were raised already in Antiquity (p. II.65). Nor because it drew attention to the case resistance=0 or the possibility that the force caused no motion, since these cases was discussed in detail by Aristotle himself (p. II.62-63).

Crombie's answer is cryptic: "Using his metric formulation, Bradwardine was able to show" various things, most notably "Bradwardine argued that Aristotle's law meant that if a given ratio p/r produced a velocity v, then the ratio that would double this velocity was not 2p/r but (p/r)^2" (p. II.71). Why on earth would (p/r)^2 double the velocity? This claim is nowhere in Aristotle. Apparently Bradwardine "argued" that it is implicit in Aristotle, but we see no trace of this alleged "argument." It seems to me that the mistaken belief that (p/r)^2 doubles the velocity was in fact introduced by mathematics rather than eliminated by it. Crombie has no evidence that any error of this kind was ever committed in the pre-"metrical" period.

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