The Invention Of Modern Science
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The Invention of Modern Science
"The Invention of Modern Science proposes a fruitful way of going beyond the apparently irreconcilable positions, that science is either "objective" or "socially constructed." Instead, suggests Isabelle Stengers, one of the most important and influential philosophers of science in Europe, we might understand the tension between scientific objectivity and belief as a necessary part of science, central to the practices invented and reinvented by scientists."--pub. desc.
The Knowledge Machine
Author: Michael Strevens
language: en
Publisher: Liveright Publishing
Release Date: 2020-10-13
A paradigm-shifting, widely acclaimed work for our generation, The Knowledge Machine revolutionizes our understanding of the origins and structure of science. Michael Strevens’s “provocative and fascinating” (Jennifer Szalai, New York Times) investigation of science asks two fundamental questions: Why is science so powerful? And why did it take so long for the human race to start using science to learn the secrets of nature? The Knowledge Machine’s radical answer is that science, by nature, calls on its practitioners to do the irrational. By willfully ignoring religion, theoretical beauty, and especially philosophy, scientists embrace an unnaturally narrow method of inquiry, channeling unprecedented energy into observation and experimentation. Rich with vivid historical examples and widely acclaimed, Knowledge Machine overturns many of our most basic assumptions about scientific discovery.
The Invention of Science
We live in a world made by science. How and when did this happen? This book tells the story of the extraordinary intellectual and cultural revolution that gave birth to modern science, and mounts a major challenge to the prevailing orthodoxy of its history. Before 1492 it was assumed that all significant knowledge was already available; there was no concept of progress; people looked for understanding to the past not the future. This book argues that the discovery of America demonstrated that new knowledge was possible: indeed it introduced the very concept of 'discovery', and opened the way to the invention of science. The first crucial discovery was Tycho Brahe's nova of 1572: proof that there could be change in the heavens. The telescope (1610) rendered the old astronomy obsolete. Torricelli's experiment with the vacuum (1643) led directly to the triumph of the experimental method in the Royal Society of Boyle and Newton. By 1750 Newtonianism was being celebrated throughout Europe. The new science did not consist simply of new discoveries, or new methods. It relied on a new understanding of what knowledge might be, and with this came a new language: discovery, progress, facts, experiments, hypotheses, theories, laws of nature - almost all these terms existed before 1492, but their meanings were radically transformed so they became tools with which to think scientifically. We all now speak this language of science, which was invented during the Scientific Revolution. The new culture had its martyrs (Bruno, Galileo), its heroes (Kepler, Boyle), its propagandists (Voltaire, Diderot), and its patient labourers (Gilbert, Hooke). It led to a new rationalism, killing off alchemy, astrology, and belief in witchcraft. It led to the invention of the steam engine and to the first Industrial Revolution. David Wootton's landmark book changes our understanding of how this great transformation came about, and of what science is.