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Robert Grosseteste and the Origins of Experimental Science 1100-1700
... En la identificación histórica de las distintas formas de prácticas asociadas con la experimentación, y en la discusión sobre los distintos criterios que permiten definir qué es un experimento, algunos estudios históricos y filosóficos han jugado un papel fundamental. Específicamente, el estudio de Crombie (1971): Robert Grosseteste and the origins of Experimental Science 1100-1700, sobre el origen temprano de las reflexiones sobre la experimentación en el siglo XII, o su texto sobre la experimentación como estilo de pensamiento (1994): Styles of Scientific Thinking in the European Tradition; el estudio de Shapin y Shaffer (1985): Leviathan and the Air Pump: Hobbes, Boyle and the Éxperimental Lije, sobre el debate en el siglo XVII entre dos formas de comprender el trabajo experimental; el estudio de Peter Dear (1995): Discipline and Experience: The Mathematical Way in the Scientific Revolution, sobre las dificultades de ubicar el inicio del trabajo experimental en la ciencia galileana; el texto de Ian Hacking (1983): Representing and Intervening, que le dio inicio al nuevo campo de estudio de la filosofía del trabajo experimental; el escrito de Latour y Woolgar (1986): Laboratory Lije: The Construction of Scientific F acts, sobre la construcción de los hechos en el trabajo experimental; y los textos sobre la caracterización de la denominada "experimentación exploratoria", de Burian (1997): Exploratory experimentation and the role of histochemical techniques in the work of Jean Brachet, 1938Brachet, -1952y el de Steinle (1997): Entering new .fields: Exploratory uses of experimentation. ...
... El primer tipo de análisis experimental tuvo sus antecedentes en las concepciones de ciencia demostrativa de Platón y Aristóteles, pero se planteó como una instancia de análisis empírico especial diferente a la experiencia, desde el siglo XII, con Robert Grosseteste y Roger Bacon (Crombie, 1971), y no como se ha creído, desde el siglo XVII. Inicialmente, en la Edad Media solo se le asignó una función y un sentido metodológico y epistemológico ideal, y a partir de la nueva ciencia del siglo XVII, con Galileo, Descartes, Hobbes, etc., se asumió como una instancia de contrastación empírica fundamental en el proceso de la demostración teórica. ...
En el texto se cuestiona la idea firmemente establecida de una concepción monista de la experimentación, y se muestra, en contraste, la heterogeneidad de las prácticas experimentales, evidenciada por algunos estudios históricos recientes. Como aporte, se proponen algunos criterios comunes a los distintos tipos de prácticas experimentales, fundamentales para poder ofrecer una definición general amplia, compatible con las expresiones heterogéneas de esas prácticas. Específicamente, se propone comprender el experimento como un tipo de análisis empírico que interviene su objeto de estudio con el propósito de objetivarlo, precisarlo, analizarlo o contrastarlo, y que involucra necesariamente un sentido especial de control y de evidencia. Frente a la idea tradicional de experimento, se argumenta que la función de servir de instancia empírica para la contrastación de las teorías, heredera de la concepción galileana-kantiana, no es una condición esencial para definir el experimento. Los análisis contemporáneos de las prácticas experimentales han mostrado que esta concepción es pertinente solo a un tipo de práctica experimental, y que es necesario plantear criterios más amplios, comunes a las distintas prácticas experimentales.
... He claimed that there may be several causes that at least appear to cause the same effect. 18 Going on Crombie's (1953) reading of Grosseteste, when we are trying to find what the correct cause is for a particular effect, we need to rely on experimental verification and some sort of falsification. ...
... Whereas Aristotle's focus was on appealing to everyday experience to justify beliefs, if we are to use Crombie's reading of Grosseteste, then Grosseteste appealed to some form of experiments to justify beliefs rather than everyday sense experience (Allen, 2021, p111). He was also the first Medieval writer to systematically analyse and discuss mirrors, lenses, and the rainbow (Allen, 2021, p113) (Crombie, 1953). ...
There are two main aims of this thesis: the first is to demonstrate that there is an important version of empiricism — “methodological empiricism” — which is a central part of the empiricist tradition but has been neglected in current philosophy of science. The second aim is to develop methodological empiricism in light of current science. The first aim is met by first articulat- ing what I take methodological empricism to mean, alongside articulating the more dominant version of empiricism — “epistemic empiricism”. I explicate both via several characteristics for each, and then trace a history of both positions from Ancient Western philosophy up until current times. Finally, I give evidence of the neglect of methodological empiricism in current philoso- phy of science. The second aim is met by, first, presenting four criteria for a current version of methodological empiricism that are directly derived from the characteristics of methodological empiricism through its history. I then consider three topics within recent philosophy of science that prima facie pose a challenge to methodological empiricism, all of which can be broadly characterised as appearing to be non-empirical in some way — analogue confirmation, philosophy of computer simulations, and non-empirical theory confirmation. It is argued that, ultimately, analogue confirmation and com- puter simulation are compatible with methodological empiricism, but that non-empirical theory confirmation is not. I argue that this should gives us good reason to reject non-empirical theory confirmation.
... 8 British philosopher Bishop Robert Grosseteste proposed the fantastic idea that the refracted angle is half the incident angle. 10 Polish scientist Witelo provided data for refraction in various media, but appeared to have made incorrect inferences based on Ibn al-Haytham's data, since he includes refraction angles greater than 90° in contradiction with total internal reflection, likely extrapolating from smaller angles. 10 Students can be asked to comment on the validity of these observations, and while they are obviously incorrect in hindsight, students themselves will sometimes end up with physically impossible data because of a lack of understanding of the theory, which is a natural step in the learning process. ...
... 10 Polish scientist Witelo provided data for refraction in various media, but appeared to have made incorrect inferences based on Ibn al-Haytham's data, since he includes refraction angles greater than 90° in contradiction with total internal reflection, likely extrapolating from smaller angles. 10 Students can be asked to comment on the validity of these observations, and while they are obviously incorrect in hindsight, students themselves will sometimes end up with physically impossible data because of a lack of understanding of the theory, which is a natural step in the learning process. ...
A popular introductory physics laboratory experiment is one focusing on Snell’s law. This is straightforward to complete with lasers and prisms, but here we present an alternative version that guides the students through some of the major historical developments, recreating and analyzing significant experiments. The discovery of Snell’s law has a fascinating, winding, global history, and the sine relationship eluded some of the greatest minds in optics for more than a thousand years.
... In Grosseteste's Commentary on the Posterior Analytics (of Aristotle) he places a more sophisticated philosophy of science within the overarching Christian narrative of Creation, Fall and Redemption. Employing a common medieval metaphor for the effect of the Fall on the higher intellectual and spiritual powers (in descending hierarchy those of understanding, memory, imagination) as a 'lulling to sleep' by the weight of fallen flesh, he maintains that the lower faculties, including critically the senses, are less affected by fallen human nature than the higher (Crombie 1953). Human understanding, (aspectus) always inseparable from human emotions and loves (the affectusthe disposition to be affected), is now reduced and dulled through the inward turning of the latter. ...
... However, there is an avenue of hope that the oncefallen higher faculties might be re-awakened: engaging the affectus, through the still-operable 6 lower senses, in the created external things of nature allows it to be turned outward once more, and met by a remainder (vestigium) of other, outer light. So a process of re-illumination can begin once more with the lowest faculties and successively re-enlighten the higher (Rossi 1981 p.405): moves (Crombie 1953). With Aristotle he insists that all knowledge of particulars and universals comes through the senses, but against Aristotle he allows this, and in fact makes it necessary, to be met with divine illumination. ...
Scientists today are surprised when confronted by the sophistication of natural philosophy of the thirteenth century. Although clearly of a former age and holding very different perceptions of material structure, its mathematical and imaginative exploration of nature is striking. It also finds a natural theological and contemplative framing; because of this it can work as a resource for contemporary projects constructing ‘theology of science’ and constructing different approaches to the relation of science and religion. Taking the work of the English polymath Robert Grosseteste from the 1220s as an example, I exemplify these claims in more detail through three aspects of medieval physics: 1) a teleological narrative for science; 2) a fresh apprehension of scientific imagination; and 3) a christological and incarnational metaphysics.
... My position here, leading on from Crombie (1953), is to discuss different normative procedures in play when knowledge is produced, as ways we can access accepted social norms of 'knowledge production'. Any academic or scholar is aware, from experiences with draft research outlines, seminars etc., of such norms, and here I look at them as being defined procedurally: what 'needs to have been done' for a piece of produced knowledge to be deemed, in the specific context, acceptable. ...
... And if some people feel that the world has turned out contrary to one's theory, and this has led to Trump, a 'post-fact' world and a weakening of the politics of persuasion, more overt scepticism would seem a useful strategy. Crombie (1953) usefully illuminates this by rehearsing the Aristotelian conception of knowledge production as involving interaction between two 'moments'-induction and deduction. The former involves, he says, interaction between what we would now call theorisation and observation until, based upon a psychological feeling-nous-the theorizer comes to realise the value of their theory, and it can then be used to deduce specifics that can be related to new observations. ...
The paper discusses issues raised in Perl et al. (Policy Sci, 2018. https://doi.org/10.1007/s11077-018-9334-4), specifically the tensions between policy sciences’ search for ways reliably to link results to inputs and activities and the evidence they present for their conclusions that the three main approaches to analysis of policy processes do not focus upon this aspect of policy-making and are so well placed to cope with the ‘post-fact’ political era. The paper disagrees, arguing that this argument rather suggests that a main prop of modern political legitimacy—that policy can be reasonable and rational, and so not necessarily partisan—is under serious challenge, threatening a retreat to a politics of force and manipulation. The paper argues that this is best understood by appreciating that any empirical foundations of policy logics are not and never have been derived through a search for predictive power, no matter what is believed and taught, and told to those who pay for policy work, but are rather evidentially founded metaphors: theories. Correspondingly, in the norms of mainstream policy science, we cannot find any attempt to establish for a given empirical field whether there is or not adequate regularity to support assertions of (albeit with uncertainty) known outcomes. Given this, recent major failures of policy science’s expectations to bear fruit, despite assertions that evidentially based policy is reliably predictive, suggest that (amplified by academic interest in subjective aspects of knowledge construction) populist and popular shifts to reckless treatment of ‘facts’ appear as a not unreasonable reaction to ‘bad situations that policy-makers said would not happen’. The apparent success, reported by Perl et al. of the three main approaches to analysis of policy processes, then appear as somewhat irrelevant to those who pay for policy advice, if policy science is seen, not as a predictive science, but as one amongst many sources of political authority and so political order. The wise response by policy workers is then to reduce the ‘over-sell’ so as to restore their authority, in part by arguing that predictive power may be impossible (or would spend too much of the limited budget), so the mode of engagement should be non-instrumental action, and/or place far greater emphasis upon ensuring that those who are the objects of policy work are given adequate voice (lest they vote for Trump or Brexit). In that these options would imply less inconsistency, it would increase the authority of policy analysts, ceteris paribus.
... ?, ?, 16, ?, 36, ?, 64, ?, ?, ?, … and surmise that these observations reflect the following underlying pattern of squares: 4,9,16,25,36,49, 64, 81, … -again a parsimonious account of the data (arguably 'the simplest'). It turns out that both observers have partially observed the very same phenomenon: 4,9,16, 0, 36, 32, 64, 0, … and both have come up with incorrect inter-and extrapolations of the fragmentary data. ...
... ?, ?, 16, ?, 36, ?, 64, ?, ?, ?, … and surmise that these observations reflect the following underlying pattern of squares: 4,9,16,25,36,49, 64, 81, … -again a parsimonious account of the data (arguably 'the simplest'). It turns out that both observers have partially observed the very same phenomenon: 4,9,16, 0, 36, 32, 64, 0, … and both have come up with incorrect inter-and extrapolations of the fragmentary data. The above is the start of a well-defined mathematical sequence with its own underlying regularity as well as a physical meaning, viz the number of coincidence site lattices of index n in the Z 4 lattice (see ref. 1). ...
The principle of parsimony, also known as 'Occam's razor', is a heuristic dictum that is thoroughly familiar to virtually all practitioners of science: Aristotle, Newton, and many others have enunciated it in some form or other. Even though the principle is not difficult to comprehend as a general heuristic guideline, it has proved surprisingly resistant to being put on a rigorous footing - a difficulty that has become more pressing and topical with the 'big data' explosion. We review the significance of Occam's razor in the philosophical and theological writings of William of Ockham, and survey modern developments of parsimony in data science.
... While universities of that period were primarily religious institutions, they also provided the groundwork for the development of the first scientific and philosophical faculties. The creation of new teaching methods, emphasizing the analysis and study of ancient texts, promoted the dissemination of skills related to philosophy, logic, mathematics, and theology (Crombie, 1994). ...
Education in Europe has a long historical tradition as a tool for social structuring and cultural progress. Over the centuries, the skills cultivated in schools have continuously adapted to the prevailing cultural, economic, and technological needs. From the ancient societies of Greece and Rome to the Renaissance and the Industrial Revolution, the skills integrated into education have reflected the demands of each era. However, modern Europe faces new challenges, such as digital transformation, climate change, and social inequalities, which shape the strategic direction of the European Union’s (EU) education policies. The EU recognizes the importance of education as a driver of development, not only in terms of professional adaptation but also in fostering active citizens capable of participating in society and advancing democratic processes. Education policies focus on strengthening fundamental skills, such as communication and critical thinking, while also emphasizing new, contemporary skills, such as digital and environmental competencies, to meet the demands of the 21st century. The Digital Compass 2030 initiative serves as a key tool in preparing citizens for emerging technological challenges, while the Sustainable Development Strategy promotes environmental awareness and sustainability. This study aims to examine the evolution of knowledge and skills in European education, emphasizing how modern educational strategies integrate technological and social challenges. Specifically, it highlights the significance of school years as a foundation for developing skills that foster collaboration, critical thinking, and social responsibility. This study adopts a multidimensional approach that encompasses social, economic, and environmental dimensions, identifying the role of skills in preparing students for the challenges of the future.
... Una actitud posible ante semejante hallazgo en las fuentes sería descartar a Grosseteste como un autor relevante a considerar en un estudio de historia de la ciencia "seria", tal como Kuhn (1977b) confiesa que casi hace con Aristóteles luego de leer su Física. Este error historiográfico infantil, por otro lado, no permitiría entender por qué historiadores de la talla de Allistar Crombie (1953) consideran al Obispo Lincolnense una pieza necesaria y fundamental de la Revolución Científica galileana. ...
En el presente trabajo nos proponemos destilar las herramientas historiográficas propuestas por Thomas Kuhn en las Conferencias Notre Dame de 1980, las cuales al día de la fecha permanecen inéditas. No todo lo allí teorizado permaneció entre los recursos defendidos por el autor en su obra posterior, por lo que las herramientas aquí extraídas señalan hitos novedosos para una exégesis de su trayectoria intelectual. Esperamos aquí entonces colaborar con tal exégesis arrojando luz sobre una etapa poco explorada de su pensamiento.
... On the other hand, what have been called 'natural science' criteria do by contrast include a comparative criterion -prediction -which requires that theories be tested against each other on so-called predictive grounds (Crombie 1953). This advocates an approach to knowledge that seeks a single truth. ...
The paper develops an argument for the criteria that a theory of ignorance should meet. It starts from the distinction between instrumental and non-instrumental action. Usually, the latter is considered irrational and the former rational as being based upon known cause-effect relations whilst the latter is not. I argue that the former requires a reasoned basis in predictive knowledge of cause and effect, without which good council is either for inaction or noninstrumental action. The argument proceeds by exploiting mainstream statistical methods to explore an example of a 'metric of advised ignorance' to guide explicit reasoned choice allowing rejection of instrumental action in favour of inaction or non-instrumental action. The argument then explores a case study of how such rejection is disallowed by official requirements in International Development Assistance (aid) that contexts must always be believed predictive and so action organised as instrumental. This shows the basic irrationality of mainstream policy rationality. The paper then discusses wider social epistemological issues of this irrationality and concludes with a list of criteria a theory of ignorance should meet.
... Kαι µια απ' αυτές, νοµίζουµε η σπουδαιότερη, είναι το γεγονός πως οι Σχολαστικοί, πολύ πιο µπροστά από τον Kοπέρνικο και το Γαλιλαίο κατάφεραν να επεξεργαστούν, όπως έδειξε η νεότερη έρευνα, τις απαρχές της καινούριας αντίληψης για την επιστήµη. O A. Koyre 74 αναφέρει τον A. Combie 75 , ο οποίος δείχνει πως έχουµε «συνεχή εξέλιξη» στην πορεία της σκέψης από την αρχαιότητα µέχρι σήµερα και πως η επιστήµη του Mεσαίωνα µετέτρεψε τη γεωµετρική µέθοδο των Eλλήνων στην µοντέρνα επιστήµη. Eδώ γίνεται, διατυπώνει ο A. Combie, η απαρχή για το προοδευτικό πέρασµα προς τη µοντέρνα αντίληψη, µε το συνδυασµό της εµπειρίας µε τη λογική και τα µαθηµατικά. ...
Introduction
The work "Epistemology of Logic" by the Greek philosopher author Epameinondas Xenopoulos approaches the issue of logic from a dialectical perspective. Through an extensive historical review, the book explores the evolution of logical ideas, starting from the beginnings of dialectical thought in ancient Greek philosophy and proceeding to later developments, such as the logic of Aristotle, Leibniz, and other influential philosophers.
A central theme of the book is the revelation of the dialectical nature of logic, in contrast to traditional formal logic. The author examines the fundamental principles and categories of dialectical logic, as well as its methods and problems.
Furthermore, the work addresses the historical formation of logic, tracing its evolution up to contemporary trends, such as the development of formal-static and dynamic-dialectical logic. The author delves into the epistemological and ontological foundations of these logical approaches.
Overall, the book "Epistemology of Logic" is an innovative and comprehensive scientific study of the evolution and foundations of logic, offering a holistic and dialectical perspective in this field. It is a profound and multi-layered work, aimed at readers interested in philosophy and the theory of knowledge.
Summary of Contents
Introduction: Presents the goals and significance of the study.
Part One: Fundamental Problems of Thought
Examines the methods and contemporary research conditions, seeking the causes of failure and proposing pathways to solutions.
Analyzes the historical trajectory of thought and the distinction between formal and dialectical thinking, as well as the phases of its evolution.
Part Two: Historical Formation of Logic
Examines the pre-Aristotelian logical traditions and the work of Aristotle.
Analyzes the evolution of logic from Aristotle to Leibniz, as well as the influences of Kant and other philosophers.
Part Three: Epistemological Correspondence and Axioms of Logic
Explores the epistemological correspondence between subject and object, and the interpretation of the axioms of logic.
Analyzes the formal-static and dynamic-dialectical structures of thought, as well as the dialectical character of contradiction.
Notes and Special Bibliography: Provides references and additional resources for further study.
This summary encapsulates the main thematic sections and goals of the study, highlighting the significance of the concepts of logic and thought in philosophy.
... Se fomenta un pensamiento que se inicia práctico, pero que necesita de teoría, en campos tales como la medicina, la metalurgia, la construcción, la cartografía, etc., y que en muchos casos requiere revisar la manera en que se interactúa con instrumentos novedosos y el papel que estos tienen en la adquisición de nuevo conocimiento. Es entonces cuando se representan y conceptualizan aspectos abstractos del espacio y del tiempo en mapas, calendarios y relojes (Crombie, 1953), que amplían el concepto de "realidad" que se tenía hasta el momento, introduciendo nuevas preguntas que el aristotelismo no había estudiado. ...
Se sostiene que el razonamiento abductivo, como “modo de pensamiento”, resulta central para explicar la naturaleza de la ciencia y debería ser introducido en la formación del profesorado de ciencias. La abducción ha sido lateral en la filosofía de la ciencia por mucho tiempo; consecuentemente, hacemos una “arqueología” del concepto para reconocer visiones útiles para la educación científica. El pensamiento abductivo, generador y seleccionador de hipótesis, permite caracterizar la naturaleza de la metodología científica vinculando los contextos de descubrimiento y justificación; así, nos interesa elucidar la “epistémica” de las inferencias abductivas para aplicarlas al diseño de la ciencia escolar. De este recorrido de elucidación teórica derivamos implicaciones para los docentes de ciencias y con esa base presentamos una actividad didáctica que apunta a discutir con ellos la naturaleza de la abducción basada en modelos teóricos.
... night and day, land and ocean, spreading form by distinguishing, in the double sense of dividing and making visible (Crombie 1953). But the divine radiance is of another quality to the ordering brought about by digitisation. ...
... However, some steps were taken towards recognizing the impossibility of finding a deductive ascent method. Faced with such recognition, it just remain to refine the inductive methods, as Roger Bacon, Duns Escoto and Occam did, or to try the hypothetico-deductive method, as, according to Crombie (2002), Grosseteste did. Medieval methodologists from Oxford and Padua established the need to assume regularity in nature for induction to be valid, and the convenience of sticking to a principle of simplicity in explanation. ...
In this article, I argue that there is philosophy of science since philosophy existed. Thus, the idea that the philosophy of science was born with neopositivism is historically wrong and detrimental to the development of the philosophy of science itself. Neopositivism tried to found the philosophy of science as an anti-philosophical discipline, as a field of study that came to replace simple philosophy. The attempt was maintained for thirty years, but failed. Now, this does not mean that we cannot make good philosophy of science today, but that the philosophy of science has returned to the common house of philosophy, it is gradually recovering the connection that it should never have lost with the main philosophical traditions and disciplines.
... According to the "Spenglerian" approach, adopted in this study, a style of thinking is a fundamental and enduring way of being-in-the-world, allowing reality the emerge in a certain manner, not only discernible in research practices, but in all other realms of culture (art, politics, religion, sexuality, etc.) as well. Thus, whereas the Spenglerian concept is decidedly more comprehensive, we should acknowledge similarities as well, for instance when it comes to emphasising continuity between medieval experimentalism and modern experimental science (Crombie 1952(Crombie /1959Crombie 1953). § 8. Methodology: discerning styles of thinking ...
The way we experience, investigate and interact with reality changes drastically in the course of history. Do such changes occur gradually, or can we pinpoint radical turns, besides periods of relative stability? Building on Oswald Spengler, we zoom in on three styles of thinking in particular, namely Apollonian, Magian and Faustian thinking, guided by grounding ideas which can be summarised as follows: “Act in accordance with nature”, “Prepare yourself for the imminent dawn and “Existence equals will to power”. Finally, we reach the present. How to characterise the new era we entered round the year 2000?
... Case (3) assumes a power ruling all reality in a certain way which cannot be changed. Finally, (4) and (5) refer to the theological reality in which grace or sin can force the human being into some state, and it is impossible for him/her to change it by his/her own, natural powers; yet the two situations are different: grace is given by God, whereas sin is in the human being, and grace not only causes the human being to be able to do good, as it is possible without grace, but it also makes deeds meritorious -thus, it is not just a simple opposition to evil done under the influence of sin. ...
In this paper, the theory of necessity proposed by Robert Grosseteste is presented. After showing the wide range of various kinds of determination discussed by him (connected with: (1) one's knowledge about the future, (2) predestination, (3) fate, (4) grace, (5) sin and temptation), a different context of Grosseteste's use of the notion of necessity is analyzed (within logical and metaphysical approaches). At the heart of his theory lie: the definition of necessity, which is that something lacks the capacity (posse) for its opposite, and the distinction between two perspectives within which we can consider necessity: (1) the one according to which the truthfulness of a dictum determines that it cannot be the opposite, (2) a pre-or atemporal one, as if something had not yet begun. On these grounds, Robert explains that God's omniscience is compatible with contingency, including human free decisions. Robert's theory is still relevant and useful in contemporary debates, as it can provide strong arguments and enrich discussions, thanks to the two-perspectives approach, which generates nine kinds of positions on the spectrum of determinism and indeterminism.
... Existe una tesis continuista en historia de la ciencia (cuyo principal exponente fue Aleistar Crombie [1953], que asevera, en la línea de Pierre Duhem, que la Edad Media fue fértil en la generación de conocimiento científico, restando importancia relativa a la revolución científica galileana. Por otra parte, existe también una tesis discontinuista defendida por Alexandre Koyré [1978] y sus seguidores, quienes marcan a Galileo como un parteaguas en la historia de la ciencia. ...
En el presente trabajo se propone un análisis histórico, apoyado en el marco propuesto por Miguel Ángel Quintanilla en su filosofía de la técnica, de una genealogía de máquinas térmicas desde la anti-güedad hasta el siglo XVII. Se espera así trazar una línea histórica que permita mostrar una continuidad relevante entre dichos artefactos y las máquinas térmicas contemporáneas, cuya historia, afirmamos, a diferencia de lo que suele proponerse en la bibliografía al respecto, no comienza en la máquina de vapor sino mucho antes. La filosofía sistémica de la técnica de Quintanilla permitirá iluminar las estructuras de los sistemas técnicos de los cuales los artefactos a analizar forman parte, y así argumentar que son antecedentes necesarios a las máquinas térmicas contemporáneas. En tal sentido, afirmamos que los análisis históricos sobre las máquinas térmicas contemporáneas y sobre la termodinámica se verían en-riquecidos por la inclusión de la línea genealógica de artefactos aquí presentados. Abstract In the present article we present a historical analysis, supported by the framework proposed by Miguel Ángel Quintanilla in his philosophy of technique, of a genealogy of thermal machines from antiquity to 17th century. We intend to draw a historical line that allow us to show a relevant continuity between such artifacts and contemporaneous thermal machines, whose history, we argue, do not start with the steam machine but much earlier. Quintanilla's systemic philosophy of technique allows to enlighten the structures of the technical systems in which the artifacts to analyze are embedded, in order to argue that they are necessary antecedents to contemporary thermal machines. In that sense, we affirm that historical analysis about contemporary thermal machines and about thermodynamics would be enriched by the inclusion of the genealogic line of artifacts here presented. Recibido el 10 de febrero de 2020-Aceptado el 5 de junio de 2020 https://doi.
... This pharmacopeia was heavily influenced by prior works of Dioscorides and Rhazes [13]. Avicenna's tribute to Galen's work is more overt in the chapter where he outlines seven rules of new drug experimentation and clinical trials [14]. To provide context, it was widely believed that the foundations of modern clinical drug trial and experimentation were set by eighteenthcentury, Scottish physician, James Lind, and his experiments with scurvy and lime juice [1]. ...
Avicenna, to the west, and Ibn Sina to the East, is more than a historical figure often overlooked beyond his contributions to the Golden Age of Islam. While a deeper image of this multi-faceted individual can be cultivated by exploring his extensive contributions to the fields of medicine, science, philosophy, and pharmacology, his impact on medicine is often forgotten. However, it is important to shed light on the role of the ‘Prince of Physicians’ in the major advancements achieved in medicine today, especially with regards to the Western hemisphere. This report focuses on Avicenna’s advancements in the medical field, and how there is more to the history of medicine than Hippocrates and the western authorities that dominate our accounts.
KEYWORDS: Avicenna, history of medicine, influences of western medicine, Ibn Sina
... All the same, these subtle enhancers are enhancers of our sense perceptions, mostly seeing, and they are directed toward material objects in the world outside. Since the time of Roger Bacon, i.e., since the 13th century, the experiment as an active manipulation of our objects of interest has been added to the epistemological arsenal (Crombie, 1953;Bacon, 1983, Bacon, 1998Lindberg, 1992Lindberg, , 1997 1 . While in observation we purely observe, without intervening, natural developments and movement, for instance of stars, or plants and animals, in experimentation, we interfere with their normal dynamics. ...
Ontology, the ideas we have about the nature of reality, and epistemology, our concepts about how to gain knowledge about the world, are interdependent. Currently, the dominant ontology in science is a materialist model, and associated with it an empiricist epistemology. Historically speaking, there was a more comprehensive notion at the cradle of modern science in the middle ages. Then “experience” meant both inner, or first person, and outer, or third person, experience. With the historical development, experience has come to mean only sense experience of outer reality. This has become associated with the ontology that matter is the most important substance in the universe, everything else—consciousness, mind, values, etc., —being derived thereof or reducible to it. This ontology is insufficient to explain the phenomena we are living with—consciousness, as a precondition of this idea, or anomalous cognitions. These have a robust empirical grounding, although we do not understand them sufficiently. The phenomenology, though, demands some sort of non-local model of the world and one in which consciousness is not derivative of, but coprimary with matter. I propose such a complementarist dual aspect model of consciousness and brain, or mind and matter. This then also entails a different epistemology. For if consciousness is coprimary with matter, then we can also use a deeper exploration of consciousness as happens in contemplative practice to reach an understanding of the deep structure of the world, for instance in mathematical or theoretical intuition, and perhaps also in other areas such as in ethics. This would entail a kind of contemplative science that would also complement our current experiential mode that is exclusively directed to the outside aspect of our world. Such an epistemology might help us with various issues, such as good theoretical and other intuitions.
... Let us georeference the "Roberti Grosseteste Epistolae", that is, the Letters written by Robert Grosseteste, one of the most prominent thinkers of the Thirteenth Century, Bishop of Lincoln from 1235 AD till his death, on 9 October 1253 (the reader can find information on Grosseteste at [10]). His scientific work was very important for the Oxonian school [11][12][13], and of some of his treatises we have discussed in several papers (among them [14][15][16][17][18]). ...
... While sometimes described as a scientist, and undoubtedly instrumental in the conception of the scientific experimental method, 36 we must be careful when reading Grosseteste's treatises not to impute any sense of experimental or even observational basis for his theories, however elegant the logical or mathematical arguments found therein. Recent interdisciplinary research has found that the origin of such theories, though they may be wrong within the context of current scientific understanding, may still best be explained as resulting from direct observation, such as for his novel theory of rainbow formation. ...
This historical paper examines a pioneering theory of speech production and perception from the thirteenth century. Robert Grosseteste (c.1175—1253) was a celebrated medieval thinker, who developed an impressive corpus of treatises on the natural world. This paper looks at his treatise on sound and phonetics, De generatione sonorum [On the Generation of Sounds]. Through interdisciplinary analysis of the text, this paper finds a theory of vowel production and perception that is notably mathematical, with a formulation of vowel space rooted in combinatorics. Specifically, Grosseteste constructs a categorical space comprising three fundamental types of movements pertaining to the vocal apparatus: linear, circular, and dilational-constrictional; these correspond to similarity transformations of translation, rotation, and uniform scaling, respectively. That Grosseteste's space is categorical, and low-dimensional, is remarkable vis-a-vis current theories of phoneme perception. As well as his description of vowel space, Grosseteste also sets out a hypothetical framework of multisensory integration, uniting the production, perception, and representation in writing of vowels with a set of geometric figures associated with “mental images.” This has clear resonances with contemporary studies of motor facilitation during speech perception and audiovisual speech. This paper additionally provides an experimental foray, illustrating the coherence of mathematical and scientific thinking underpinning this early theory.
... Although the arguments put forth by Gula and Theuerkauf (2018) are useful and thoughtprovoking, they suggest a misunderstanding of key points made by Sells et al. (2018) regarding the logical strengths of hypothesis testing, the relative merits of a posteriori hypotheses, and why a priori hypotheses are useful for wildlife management. Sells et al. (2018) presented nothing novel about the contribution of hypothesis testing to scientific rigor, drawing instead on the thinking of eminent scientists and philosophers over the centuries of scientific practice (Crombie 1962, Platt 1964, Romesburg 1981, Losee 1993, Gauch 2003. As Sells et al. (2018) noted, scientific methodology has deep roots dating to Ancient Greece and has been "basically correct and complete" for >700 years (Gauch 2003:163). ...
In this chapter, we try to reconstruct the history of the Principle of Virtual Work (PVW) in mechanics to find its original formulation. This task is not pursued because of its intrinsic interest only. Actually, when we intend to formulate new models in the mechanics of metamaterials for instance, we need to understand which is now and was in the past the most powerful conceptual tool that favors innovation and creativity in the conception of novel mathematical models. We believe that giving evidence about the historical priority of the PVW will help to establish an agreement among today’s and future researchers in mechanical sciences about the most suitable methodology to be used. Another important question that we will address in this chapter regards the origin of the concept of kinematics as distinguished from the one of dynamics. The birth of dynamics, obviously, is a consequence of the formulation of a principle from which one can deduce the algorithm that allows, for a given physical system, the prediction of the actual motion over time among those chosen as admissible by the preliminary kinematic study. It is well-established that the formulation of the Principle of Virtual Velocities (later called Principle of Virtual Work) is already present in the Greek textbook Mechanica Problemata (The Mechanica Problemata) which surely precedes the works by Hipparchus and Seleucus of Seleucia credited to be the inventors of dynamics. Moreover, the known later texts by Archimedes give the first known examples of the postulation of mechanics based on Balance Laws: we, therefore, conjecture that the first Principle used for formulating Dynamics was exactly the Principle of Virtual Velocities. Using logical methods, the philological work of the many scholars who studied Mechanica Problemata before us, and carefully exploiting the basic ideas on which Mechanics is founded, we conjecture the original ancient formulation of the PVW as reconstructed from our fragmentary sources. We also conjecture that this formulation was due to Archytas of Tarentum and his early successors.
El presente artículo destaca aportaciones que, desde la Baja Edad Media, desembocan en la revolución científica. Se parte del desarrollo de la óptica en la escuela franciscana de Oxford durante el siglo XIII, para pasar a mostrar el influjo de la misma en el surgimiento de la perspectiva en la pintura y la geometrización del espacio físico que esta técnica pictórica comportaba. Se finaliza indicando cómo tanto la revolución copernicana como la científica son herederas de un giro visual, involucrado en la perspectiva, que conlleva profundas consecuencias epistemológicas y transfiere la centralidad al sujeto intensificando el dominio sobre la naturaleza
Abstrakt Stať seznamuje se dvěma koncepcemi stylů – „styly vědeckého myšlení“ historika Alistaira C. Crombieho a „styly uvažování“ filozofa Iana Hackinga – a vyplňuje tak určitou mezeru v českém prostředí, kde jim zatím nebyla věnována patřičná pozornost. Na úvod bude představena historická koncepce Crombieho, která styly používá jako organizující kategorie pro výklad dějin západní vědy, a následně jejich Hackingova transformace ve filozofické kategorie uplatnitelné i v současné vědě. V návaznosti na to budou stručně nastíněny okolnosti jejich vzniku, vzájemné odlišnosti a recepce dalšími autory. Těžiště statě spočívá v uvedení stylů do souvislosti s objektivitou, protože pro Crombieho i Hackinga jsou právě styly tím, co konstituuje vědeckou objektivitu. Odlišné pojetí objektivity v různých disciplínách je pak výsledkem ontologické mnohosti zkoumaných objektů i teoretické a metodologické plurality, mající původ právě v historicky odlišných stylech vědy. To bude ilustrováno na příkladu pravděpodobnostního a statistického stylu, který Hacking v několika svých prací detailně rozpracoval.
In Posterior Analytics 1.13, Aristotle introduced a distinction between two kinds of demonstrations: of the fact (quia), and of the reasoned fact (propter quid). Both demonstrations take a syllogistic form, in which the middle term links either two facts (in the case of quia demonstrations) or a proximate cause and a fact (in the case of propter quid demonstrations). While Aristotle stated that all the terms of one demonstration must be taken from within the same subject matter, he admitted some exceptions in which the fact and the reasoned fact are instantiated by terms from different sciences, as when mathematics provides the reason and another science the empirical fact. This was the methodological foundation of the “mixed sciences”, a subject of varying interpretations in the thirteenth century. Roger Bacon (C. 1220–1292), adhering to Robert Grosseteste’s (C. 1168–1563) commentary on Posterior Analytics, presented a unique interpretation of this exception. He replaced propositional demonstrations with geometrical considerations and diagrams, thus producing geometrical arguments for theorems in natural philosophy. I focus on Bacon’s propter quid arguments, as applied in three case studies: (1) the heat caused by a body moving to its natural place; (2) the motion of the scale; (3) and the contraction of water. Based on an analysis of these demonstrations, I argue that Bacon’s interpretation of propter quid demonstration reflects his application of a scientific methodology that imbues geometrical objects with causal power over material bodies.
Despite the scientific revolutions of the twentieth century, mechanistic explanations show a striking methodological continuity from early modern science to current scientific practice. They are rooted in the traditional method of analysis and synthesis, which was the background of Galileo’s resolutive-compositive method and Newton’s method of deduction from the phenomena. In early modern science as well as in current scientific practice, analysis aims at tracking back from the phenomena to the principles, i.e., from wholes to parts, and from effects to causes. Vice versa, synthesis aims at explaining the phenomena from the parts and their interactions. Today, mechanistic explanations are atomistic in a generalized sense. They have in common to explain higher-level phenomena in terms of lower-level components and their causal actions or activities. In quantum physics, the lower-level components are subatomic particles, and the causes are their quantum interactions. After the quantum revolution, the approach continues to work in terms of the sum rules which hold for conserved properties of the parts and the whole. My paper focuses on the successes and limitations of this approach, with a side glance at the recent generalization of mechanistic explanations in cognitive neuroscience.
A current and very positive movement in ‘science-engaged theology’ is a change of emphasis from questions of apologetics in the light of the persistent but illusory ‘conflict narrative,’ towards the positive development of sets of ideas, narratives and exegeses under the heading of a ‘Theology of Science.’ So, rather than ask questions around how, for example, epistemological methodologies in science and theology can be reconciled, the programme asks how the capacities, imagination, and results of science can be understood within theological analyses of the human condition, and what this implies for the framing of, and interaction with, science by the wider community. The present contribution asks in what ways this fresh and theologically-informed reframing of science might be recruited in the service of a church, or of religious communities generally, to be more effective in catalysing a practical transformation to a sustainable global economy.
In aansluiting by en betekenisvol bydraend tot die internasionale navorsing op hierdie terrein, bied hierdie groot werk (in twee volumes) ’n deeglike oorsig oor en oorspronklike insig in die Middeleeuse denke. Toeganklik ook vir die algemene leser, is dit van onskatbare betekenis vir die Afrikaanse teologie en filosofie, taal en kultuur.
In aansluiting by en betekenisvol bydraend tot die internasionale navorsing op hierdie terrein, bied hierdie groot werk ’n deeglike oorsig oor en oorspronklike insig in die Middeleeuse denke. Toeganklik ook vir die algemene leser, is dit van onskatbare betekenis vir die Afrikaanse teologie en filosofie, taal en kultuur.
In the Sociology of Scientific Knowledge, it is asserted that science is merely another belief system, and should not be accorded any credibility above other belief systems. This assertion shows a complete misunderstanding of how both science and philosophy work. Not only science but all logic-based philosophies become pointless under the belief system hypothesis.
Science, formerly known as natural philosophy, is not a set of facts or beliefs, but rather a method for scrutinising ideas. In this it is far closer to a philosophical tool set than to an ideology. Popper’s view, widely endorsed by scientists, is that science requires disprovable propositions which can be evaluated using available evidence. Science is therefore not a system of belief, but a system of disbelief, which is a very different thing indeed.
This paper reviews the origins of the Sociology of Scientific Knowledge, discusses the numerous flaws in its fundamental premises and revisits the views of Michael Polanyi and Karl Popper who have been falsely cited as supporters of these premises. Two appendices are included for reference: one on philosophies of science and one on history of scientific methods. A third appendix on ethics and science has been published separately.
Disquisiciones sobre la automotricidad equívoca y el contacto en la transmisión de la acción dinámica en la estela del comentario de Roberto Grosseteste al libro VII de la Physica de Aristóteles. El estudio testa un patrón de animismo integral distributivo, no partitivo, postulando la discontinuidad esencial de segunda especie en la concatenación de motores, vestigios de la embrionaria ciencia insular, atenta a la causalidad eficiente que inerva la matriz fenoménica en una apuesta por la ejemplaridad de la medida y el rastreo de la realidad sobre objetivas cualidades mensurables en detrimento de las claves eidéticas que lastran a la emergente metafísica continental del quod est, anclada en la esencia como ratificación intencional del existible o en el esse essentiae como expresión de esse extra animam ab alio (índice de creaturalidad atenuada) en la línea causal ejemplar.
The emergence of experimental philosophy was one of the most significant developments in the early modern period. However, it is often overlooked in modern scholarship, despite being associated with leading figures such as Francis Bacon, Robert Boyle, Isaac Newton, Jean Le Rond d'Alembert, David Hume and Christian Wolff. Ranging from the early Royal Society of London in the seventeenth century to the uptake of experimental philosophy in Paris and Berlin in the eighteenth, this book provides new terms of reference for understanding early modern philosophy and science, and its eventual eclipse in the shadow of post-Kantian notions of empiricism and rationalism. Experimental Philosophy and the Origins of Empiricism is an integrated history of early modern experimental philosophy which challenges the rationalism and empiricism historiography that has dominated Anglophone history of philosophy for more than a century.
The popular field of 'science and religion' is a lively and well-established area. It is however a domain which has long been characterised by certain traits. In the first place, it tends towards an adversarial dialectic in which the separate disciplines, now conjoined, are forever locked in a kind of mortal combat. Secondly, 'science and religion' has a tendency towards disentanglement, where 'science' does one sort of thing and 'religion' another. And thirdly, the duo are frequently pushed towards some sort of attempted synthesis, wherein their aims either coincide or else are brought more closely together. In attempting something fresh, and different, this volume tries to move beyond tried and tested tropes. Bringing philosophy and theology to the fore in a way rarely attempted before, the book shows how fruitful new conversations between science and religion can at last move beyond the increasingly tired options of either conflict or dialogue.
This chapter analyzes how some spaces or places become distributors of cultural values. The relevance of these places lies in the fact that, together with a direct relationship with their activities, they become structures of irradiation of values considered positive. This emphasizes how these activities are carried out when they occur in these places, where the most important thing is represented by the synergies that make possible the transformation of the environment through modifying the habits of the people who go there. The public library is taken as an example. The modern library is the result of the evolution of reading and writing. These activities have a very high cultural value that influences the moral perception we have of the people who perform them. For this reason, the library occupies a very prominent place in society, not only because of the importance given to the activities that can be carried out there but also because wanting to go there implies adopting an attitude. In the same way, certain behaviors are assumed by the simple fact of being near them. This phenomenon is approached from an eco-cognitive perspective: libraries are distributive ethical mediators that allow the application of cognitive strategies to interact morally with the environment. Likewise, the design of the building itself also acts as a moral distributor because it incites us to behave correctly within socially and culturally accepted patterns. Abductive reasoning is presented as the ideal mechanism to represent this complex process of imbrication between values, facts, expectations, and emotions.
Abstrakt Stať seznamuje se dvěma koncepcemi stylů – „styly vědeckého myšlení“ historika Alistaira C. Crombieho a „styly uvažování“ filozofa Iana Hackinga – a vyplňuje tak určitou mezeru v českém prostředí, kde jim zatím nebyla věnována patřičná pozornost. Na úvod bude představena historická koncepce Crombieho, která styly používá jako organizující kategorie pro výklad dějin západní vědy, a následně jejich Hackingova transformace ve filozofické kategorie uplatnitelné i v současné vědě. V návaznosti na to budou stručně nastíněny okolnosti jejich vzniku, vzájemné odlišnosti a recepce dalšími autory. Těžiště statě spočívá v uvedení stylů do souvislosti s objektivitou, protože pro Crombieho i Hackinga jsou právě styly tím, co konstituuje vědeckou objektivitu. Odlišné pojetí objektivity v různých disciplínách je pak výsledkem ontologické mnohosti zkoumaných objektů i teoretické a metodologické plurality, mající původ právě v historicky odlišných stylech vědy. To bude ilustrováno na příkladu pravděpodobnostního a statistického stylu, který Hacking v několika svých prací detailně rozpracoval.
While the links between history of science and materialist epistemology are widely discussed (and divergently interpreted), this chapter explores the relationships between history of science and ontology. Its main goal is to vindicate the coordination between constructivism and (critical) realism as one of the main open problems in current ontology. My proposal is thus a contribution to the current conversation in History and Philosophy of Science (HPS), which I roughly review in the introduction. The first section attempts to gauge the philosophical import of the growing presence of “matter”, “materialism”, and “ontology” in history of science and related disciplines. Section 8.2 argues that, in order to enhance their philosophical productivity, discussions on matter and materiality ought to be accompanied by ontological discussion. Following Gustavo Bueno’s discontinuous (non-reductive) materialism, I suggest that sciences result from bodily operations with chunks of the world which are pre-organized according to both ontological and historical scales. These operations include semantic and syntactic transformations that imply different degrees of continuity between objects and signs. What is specific to the sciences is that necessary relationships can emerge between signs in propositional theories which imply unforeseen relationships between objects. One of the main open problems in philosophy of science is to account for this objective necessity given science’s historically contextual and operational dimension. Although in a rather schematic form, I put this categories to work in an analysis of physical oceanography (this analysis also reveals ways in which the history of a science is relevant to science’s current structure). In the last section, I explain how the proposed operational notion of truth serves to reconstruct the distinction between natural and human sciences, but I also show the complexity and nuances of that distinction. Again through the example of oceanography, I show that the earth and environmental sciences have turned towards history in search for anthropogenic change.
Despite the central presence of materialism in the history of philosophy, there is no universal consensus on the meaning of the word “matter” nor of the doctrine of philosophical materialism. Dictionaries of philosophy often identify this philosophy with its most reductionist and even eliminative versions, in line with Robert Boyle’s seventeenth century coinage of the term. But when we take the concept back in time to Greek philosophers and forward onto our own times, we recognize more inclusive forms of materialism as well as complex interplays with non-materialist thought about the place of matter in reality, including Christian philosophy and German idealism. We define philosophical materialism in its most general way both positively (the identification of reality with matter understood as changeability and plurality) and negatively (the negation of disembodied living beings and hypostatized ideas). This inclusive approach to philosophical materialism offers a new light to illuminate a critical history of the concept of matter and materialism from Ancient Greece to the present that is also attentive to scientific developments. By following the most important connections and discontinuities among theoretical frameworks on the idea of matter, we present a general thread that offers a rich and plural, but highly cohesive, field of investigation. Finally, we propose building on rich non-reductionist materialist philosophies, such as Mario Bunge’s systemic materialism and Gustavo Bueno’s discontinuous materialism, to elaborate powerful theoretical alternatives to both physicalism and spiritualism.
Variaciones sobre la automotricidad equívoca en la estela del comentario de Roberto Grosseteste al libro VII de la Physica de Aristóteles. Ensayo de un patrón de psiquismo distributivo y escolio de discontinuidad esencial de segunda especie en la concatenación de motores, fermentos de la emergente ciencia insular, atenta a la causalidad eficiente regente del orden fenoménico en una apuesta por la ejemplaridad de la medida y el rastreo de la realidad sobre objetivas cualidades mensurables.
The grammatization of languages first occured through a transfer of the model developed for Latin and Greek, and its application to different object languages. However, this model barely considers prosody, seen at its origin, among the Greeks, as an accompanied song with a melodic movement of the voice, noted by the different accents. In the Latin tradition, the study of intonation, stress and quantity is integrated into rhetorics, and reflections on vocal efficiency in poetries. For a long time, the French authors interested in prosody were concerned with versification, and not grammar. The introduction of the new theoretical program of general grammar, with the aim of writing the universal bases of languages, triggers a new interest among grammarians in the prosody of languages in general, and that of French in particular. Slowly, the discipline found its autonomy and a place within French grammar. In this process, the new conception of time and movement, which emerged throughout the seventeenth century in other fields such as physics, philosophy or even music, played a significant role: movement was viewed as being in close connection with the soul, and time became the measure of movement.
A methodology of historical or higher criticism and of stylometry/stylochronometry known from Biblical and literary studies is applied to the examination of Nicolaus Copernicus’s writings. In particular, his early work Commentariolus is compared at the level of the Latin language with his later ones (Meditata, Letter against Werner and De revolutionibus) as well as the texts of some other authors. A number of striking stylistic dissimilarities between these works have been identified and interpreted in the light of stylometry/stylochronometry, historical criticism and the history of Copernican research. The conducted research allowed to draw some plausible conclusions about the Sitz im Leben (historical context), the dating of Commentariolus and related matters.
The paper examines matters arising from the recent Mariotti’s article. It argues that the social epistemological practices of engineering and economics are different, in ways that must creation tensions as and when they try to work together. However, the details of these differences, and aspects of economics, combine to suggest that Mariotti’s article can be read as suggesting what will be needed for economists’ epistemic power to be deployed into new areas, to address crises facing ‘the planet’, and how engineering can accompany them as they do this.
The physician and physiologist Dr William Harvey is known for having discovered that the heart pumps arterial blood round the whole body and receives venous blood from the periphery, which it forwards to the lungs for reoxygenation. Harvey’s discovery was based on anatomical and physiological evidence and experiments using ligatures of varying tensions. As a clinician, however, Harvey does not appear to have appreciated the value of experiments in assessing treatment effects. Although he criticised Galenic views about the clinical value of experience and authority in the absence of accompanying empirical evidence, two handwritten prescriptions that he wrote for his friend and future biographer John Aubrey provide evidence that he conformed with Galenic theory when it came to drug therapy in clinical practice. This was consistent with his senior position in the College of Physicians, whose Pharmacopoeia Londinensis was based on Galenic principles, an appreciation of which was required for entry into the College. Harvey’s prescriptions reflect this and open a window onto 17th-century therapeutic practice and the personal elements on which such practice was sometimes based.
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