The Good Life in the Scientific Revolution

The Good Life in the Scientific Revolution PDF Author: Matthew L. Jones
Publisher: University of Chicago Press
ISBN: 0226409562
Category : Science
Languages : en
Pages : 809

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Book Description
Amid the unrest, dislocation, and uncertainty of seventeenth-century Europe, readers seeking consolation and assurance turned to philosophical and scientific books that offered ways of conquering fears and training the mind—guidance for living a good life. The Good Life in the Scientific Revolution presents a triptych showing how three key early modern scientists, René Descartes, Blaise Pascal, and Gottfried Leibniz, envisioned their new work as useful for cultivating virtue and for pursuing a good life. Their scientific and philosophical innovations stemmed in part from their understanding of mathematics and science as cognitive and spiritual exercises that could create a truer mental and spiritual nobility. In portraying the rich contexts surrounding Descartes’ geometry, Pascal’s arithmetical triangle, and Leibniz’s calculus, Matthew L. Jones argues that this drive for moral therapeutics guided important developments of early modern philosophy and the Scientific Revolution.

The Good Life in the Scientific Revolution

The Good Life in the Scientific Revolution PDF Author: Matthew L. Jones
Publisher: University of Chicago Press
ISBN: 0226409562
Category : Science
Languages : en
Pages : 809

Get Book

Book Description
Amid the unrest, dislocation, and uncertainty of seventeenth-century Europe, readers seeking consolation and assurance turned to philosophical and scientific books that offered ways of conquering fears and training the mind—guidance for living a good life. The Good Life in the Scientific Revolution presents a triptych showing how three key early modern scientists, René Descartes, Blaise Pascal, and Gottfried Leibniz, envisioned their new work as useful for cultivating virtue and for pursuing a good life. Their scientific and philosophical innovations stemmed in part from their understanding of mathematics and science as cognitive and spiritual exercises that could create a truer mental and spiritual nobility. In portraying the rich contexts surrounding Descartes’ geometry, Pascal’s arithmetical triangle, and Leibniz’s calculus, Matthew L. Jones argues that this drive for moral therapeutics guided important developments of early modern philosophy and the Scientific Revolution.

The Scientific Revolution

The Scientific Revolution PDF Author: Steven Shapin
Publisher: University of Chicago Press
ISBN: 022639848X
Category : Science
Languages : en
Pages : 255

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Book Description
This scholarly and accessible study presents “a provocative new reading” of the late sixteenth- and seventeenth-century advances in scientific inquiry (Kirkus Reviews). In The Scientific Revolution, historian Steven Shapin challenges the very idea that any such a “revolution” ever took place. Rejecting the narrative that a new and unifying paradigm suddenly took hold, he demonstrates how the conduct of science emerged from a wide array of early modern philosophical agendas, political commitments, and religious beliefs. In this analysis, early modern science is shown not as a set of disembodied ideas, but as historically situated ways of knowing and doing. Shapin shows that every principle identified as the modernizing essence of science—whether it’s experimentalism, mathematical methodology, or a mechanical conception of nature—was in fact contested by sixteenth- and seventeenth-century practitioners with equal claims to modernity. Shapin argues that this contested legacy is nevertheless rightly understood as the origin of modern science, its problems as well as its acknowledged achievements. This updated edition includes a new bibliographic essay featuring the latest scholarship. “An excellent book.” —Anthony Gottlieb, New York Times Book Review

Ingenious Pursuits

Ingenious Pursuits PDF Author: Lisa Jardine
Publisher: Anchor
ISBN: 0385720017
Category : History
Languages : en
Pages : 466

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Book Description
In this fascinating look at the European scientific advances of the seventeenth and early eighteenth centuries, historian Lisa Jardine demonstrates that the pursuit of knowledge occurs not in isolation, but rather in the lively interplay and frequently cutthroat competition between creative minds. The great thinkers of that extraordinary age, including Isaac Newton, Johannes Kepler, and Christopher Wren, are shown in the context in which they lived and worked. We learn of the correspondences they kept with their equally passionate colleagues and come to understand the unique collaborative climate that fostered virtuoso discoveries in the areas of medicine, astronomy, mathematics, biology, chemistry, botany, geography, and engineering. Ingenious Pursuits brilliantly chronicles the true intellectual revolution that continues to shape our very understanding of ourselves, and of the world around us.

Rousseau, Nature, and the Problem of the Good Life

Rousseau, Nature, and the Problem of the Good Life PDF Author: Laurence D. Cooper
Publisher: Penn State Press
ISBN: 0271029889
Category : Philosophy
Languages : en
Pages : 241

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Book Description
The rise of modern science created a crisis for Western moral and political philosophy, which had theretofore relied either on Christian theology or Aristotelian natural teleology as guarantors of an objective standard for &"the good life.&" This book examines Rousseau's effort to show how and why, despite this challenge from science (which he himself intensified by equating our subhuman origins with our natural state), nature can remain a standard for human behavior. While recognizing an original goodness in human being in the state of nature, Rousseau knew this to be too low a standard and promoted the idea of &"the natural man living in the state of society,&" notably in Emile. Laurence Cooper shows how, for Rousseau, conscience&—understood as the &"love of order&"&—functions as the agent whereby simple savage sentiment is sublimated into a more refined &"civilized naturalness&" to which all people can aspire.

The Charles Colson Collection: The Good Life / How Now Shall We Live?

The Charles Colson Collection: The Good Life / How Now Shall We Live? PDF Author: Charles Colson
Publisher: Tyndale House Publishers, Inc.
ISBN: 1496425057
Category : Religion
Languages : en
Pages : 919

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Book Description
This collection bundles two of popular author Chuck Colson’s classics into one volume for a great value! The Good Life What constitutes “the good life?” Chuck Colson explores the ways in which people define and live “the pursuit of happiness.” Colson uses fascinating real-life stories to illustrate the philosophies and worldviews by which individuals seek the good life. Colson speaks directly and revealingly about his Watergate years, and he examines the beliefs and assumptions that make up the fabric of our lives. The Good Life searches for answers to the questions we all ask: Who am I? Why am I here? How can I make my life count? How Now Shall We Live? True Christianity goes far beyond John 3:16—beyond private faith and personal salvation. It is nothing less than a framework for understanding all of reality. It is a worldview. In How Now Shall We Live?, the 2000 Gold Medallion winner for best book about Christianity and society, Chuck Colson and Nancy Pearcey show that the great spiritual battle today is a cosmic struggle between competing worldviews. Through inspiring true stories and compelling teaching, they demonstrate how to Expose the false views and values of modern culture Live a more fulfilling life the way God created us to live Contend for the faith by understanding how nonbelievers think Build a society that reflects biblical principles In short, How Now Shall We Live? will give you the confidence you need to make a difference in the world today and most of all in the lives of people around you.

What Galileo Saw

What Galileo Saw PDF Author: Lawrence Lipking
Publisher: Cornell University Press
ISBN: 0801454840
Category : Science
Languages : en
Pages : 366

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Book Description
The Scientific Revolution of the seventeenth century has often been called a decisive turning point in human history. It represents, for good or ill, the birth of modern science and modern ways of viewing the world. In What Galileo Saw, Lawrence Lipking offers a new perspective on how to understand what happened then, arguing that artistic imagination and creativity as much as rational thought played a critical role in creating new visions of science and in shaping stories about eye-opening discoveries in cosmology, natural history, engineering, and the life sciences.When Galileo saw the face of the Moon and the moons of Jupiter, Lipking writes, he had to picture a cosmos that could account for them. Kepler thought his geometry could open a window into the mind of God. Francis Bacon's natural history envisioned an order of things that would replace the illusions of language with solid evidence and transform notions of life and death. Descartes designed a hypothetical "Book of Nature" to explain how everything in the universe was constructed. Thomas Browne reconceived the boundaries of truth and error. Robert Hooke, like Leonardo, was both researcher and artist; his schemes illuminate the microscopic and the macrocosmic. And when Isaac Newton imagined nature as a coherent and comprehensive mathematical system, he redefined the goals of science and the meaning of genius.What Galileo Saw bridges the divide between science and art; it brings together Galileo and Milton, Bacon and Shakespeare. Lipking enters the minds and the workshops where the Scientific Revolution was fashioned, drawing on art, literature, and the history of science to reimagine how perceptions about the world and human life could change so drastically, and change forever.

Baroque Science

Baroque Science PDF Author: Ofer Gal
Publisher: University of Chicago Press
ISBN: 022621298X
Category : Art
Languages : en
Pages : 348

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Book Description
Presents a perspective on the study of early modern science. This title examines science in the context of the baroque, analyzes the tensions, paradoxes, and compromises that shaped the New Science of the seventeenth century and enabled its spectacular success.

How to Live the Good Life:

How to Live the Good Life: PDF Author: Arthur Jackson
Publisher: iUniverse
ISBN: 1532071426
Category : Philosophy
Languages : en
Pages : 448

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Book Description
Preposterous, challenging, stimulating. “A note of caution: this is not an easy read. Nor is it for the detached, uninvolved person. The author invites readers to accompany him on a journey of self-discovery and provides a road map to boot, rarely presented in such a clear and comprehensive way. The breadth and depth of Arthur Jackson’s knowledge and experience become obvious early on as he presents a plethora of views from well-known and lesser-known philosophers, psychiatrists, psychologists, mathematicians, and others who influenced modern Western ideologies . . . This is a compendium of knowledge and insight nonpareil—truly a masterwork!” —Adrienne Juliano, member, Foundation for Mind-Being Research Arthur Jackson’s book is the product of his lifelong struggle to find a naturalistic alternative to traditional folk religions (like Christianity, Judaism, Hinduism) capable of providing comparable emotional support. This effort led to what is now recognized as a science of religion and ethics—a religion of wisdom providing guidance to any person interested in making moral and ethical choices. I believe that until a concrete science of religion and ethics exists and organizes to apply its findings, humanity will continue to struggle to create these things. How to Live the Good Life: A User’s Guide for Modern Humans is a fascinating and eye-opening guide aimed at helping people experience more joy and achieving their full, positive potential.

Literary Knowing in Neoclassical France

Literary Knowing in Neoclassical France PDF Author: Ann T. Delehanty
Publisher: Rowman & Littlefield
ISBN: 1611484898
Category : Literary Criticism
Languages : en
Pages : 221

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Book Description
Literary Knowing in Neoclassical France analyzes the work of several literary critics in France and England, at the end of the seventeenth and beginning of the eighteenth centuries, who were inspired by the idea that literature - especially the literary sublime - might offer us the deepest kind of knowledge. Dominique Bouhours, Nicolas Boileau, Ren Rapin, John Dennis, and the abb Dubos believed that literature could deliver truths that transcend our world and were analogous or even equal to the truths of divine revelation. Ann Delehanty argues that this shift towards the transcendental realm pushed the definition of the literary work away from describing its objective properties and towards its effects on the mind of the reader. After placing these ideas about literature in the context of the religious and philosophical thinking of Blaise Pascal, Delehanty traces the evolution of a debate about literature in the writings of the critics in question. They embraced theories of sentiment and the passions as the epistemological means of identifying and knowing the transcendental aspects of a literary work that eventually came to be known as aesthetics. By tracing the historical evolution of the relationship between transcendentalism and aesthetics in French and English neoclassical thought, Literary Knowing in Neoclassical France provides new and engaging insights into an important moment in our literary history.

The Science of Modern Virtue

The Science of Modern Virtue PDF Author: Peter Lawler
Publisher: Cornell University Press
ISBN: 1609090977
Category : Philosophy
Languages : en
Pages : 325

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Book Description
The Science of Modern Virtue examines the influence that the philosopher Rene Descartes, the political theorist John Locke, and the biologist Charles Darwin have had on our modern understanding of human beings and human virtue. Written by leading thinkers from a variety of fields, the volume is a study of the complex relation between modern science and modern virtue, between a kind of modern thought and a kind of modern action. Offering more than a series of substantive introductions to Descartes', Locke's, and Darwin's accounts of who we are and the kind of virtue to which we can aspire, the book invites readers to think about the ways in which the writings of these seminal thinkers shaped the democratic and technological world in which modern human beings live. Thirteen scholars in this volume learnedly explore questions drawn from the diverse disciplines of political science, philosophy, theology, biology, and metaphysics. Let the reader be warned: The authors of these essays are anything but consensual in their analysis. Considered together, the chapters in this volume carry on a lively internal debate that mirrors theoretical modernity's ongoing discussion about the true nature of human beings and the science of virtue. Some authors powerfully argue that Locke's and Darwin's thought is amenable to the claims made about human beings and human virtue by classical philosophers such as Aristotle and classical Christian theologians such as Thomas Aquinas. Others make the opposite case, drawing attention to the ways in which Descartes, Locke, and Darwin knowingly and dialectically depart from central teachings of both classical philosophy and classical Christian theology.