1st Edition
Before Science The Invention of the Friars' Natural Philosophy
312 Pages
by
Routledge
312 Pages
by
Routledge
Also available as eBook on:
The opposition of science and religion is a recent phenomenon; in the middle ages, and indeed until the middle of the nineteenth century, there was almost no conflict. In the Middle Ages the objective study of nature - the activity we now call science - was largely the province of religious men. This book looks at the origins of western science and the central role played by the Dominican and... Read more
Introduction; Philosophy and true philosophy; Town air; Sapienta and scientia: the cloister and the school; Nature and the twelfth century; Heresy and Dominic; The evil and good world; Conquest and re-education; Dominican re-education; Fiat lux! Let there be light!; Et facta est lux! And there was light; Epilogue.
Biography
Roger French, Andrew Cunningham
'the central ideas in this book are worked out in scholarly detail, and there is much here that is of a stimulating nature.' EHR 'an important book which will stimulate considerable rethinking of issues that many historians and philosophers of science have been taking for granted for a long time...will cause historians and philosophers of science to re-evaluate some of their most deeply held assumptions.' Studies in the History and Philosophy of Science, Vol.29, No. 2 'there is much to be gained from French and Cunningham’s study. It offers a vivid reminder that neither investigations of nature nor deliberations about doctrine can be divorced from their context.'
