http://worldcat.org/entity/work/id/138718963

The Scientific revolution in national context

The 'Scientific Revolution' of the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries continues to command attention in historical debate. What was its nature? How did it develop? Controversy still rages about the extent to which it was essentially a 'revolution of the mind', or how far it must also be explained by wider considerations, social, economic, political and cultural. In this volume, leading scholars of early modern science argue the importance of specifically national contexts for understanding the transformation in natural philosophy between Copernicus and Newton. Distinct political, religious, cultural and linguistic formations shaped scientific interests and concerns differently in Italy, France, Britain, the Germanies, Spain, and so on, and explain different levels of scientific intensity. Questions of institutional development, and of the transmission of scientific ideas, are also addressed. The emphasis upon national determinants makes this volume an entirely original contribution to the study of the Scientific Revolution. This volume forms part of a sequence of collections of essays which began with The Enlightenment in national context (1981) and has continued with Romanticism in national context (1988), Fin de siecle and its legacy (1990), and The Renaissance in national context (1991). Several other volumes are in preparation. The purpose of these and other envisaged collections is to bring together comparative, national and interdisciplinary approaches to the history of great movements in the development of human thought and action.

Open All Close All