Book contents
- The Cambridge History of Philosophy of the Scientific Revolution
- The Cambridge History of Philosophy of the Scientific Revolution
- Copyright page
- Contents
- Tables and Figures
- Contributors
- Preface
- Introduction The Disciplinary Revolutions of Early Modern Philosophy and Science
- Part I The Disciplines
- Part II Disciplinary Activities
- Part III Problems and Controversies
- 17 Galileo’s Sidereus Nuncius and Its Reception
- 18 Instruments and the Senses
- 19 Science of Mind
- 20 Circulation and the New Physiology
- 21 From Metaphysical Principles to Dynamical Laws
- 22 The Debate About Body and Extension
- 23 Space and Its Relationship to God
- 24 The Vis Viva Controversy
- Bibliography
- Index
17 - Galileo’s Sidereus Nuncius and Its Reception
from Part III - Problems and Controversies
Published online by Cambridge University Press: 14 January 2022
- The Cambridge History of Philosophy of the Scientific Revolution
- The Cambridge History of Philosophy of the Scientific Revolution
- Copyright page
- Contents
- Tables and Figures
- Contributors
- Preface
- Introduction The Disciplinary Revolutions of Early Modern Philosophy and Science
- Part I The Disciplines
- Part II Disciplinary Activities
- Part III Problems and Controversies
- 17 Galileo’s Sidereus Nuncius and Its Reception
- 18 Instruments and the Senses
- 19 Science of Mind
- 20 Circulation and the New Physiology
- 21 From Metaphysical Principles to Dynamical Laws
- 22 The Debate About Body and Extension
- 23 Space and Its Relationship to God
- 24 The Vis Viva Controversy
- Bibliography
- Index
Summary
Sidereus Nuncius was a seminal text of the Scientific Revolution. It reported celestial observations whose implications upended the geocentric cosmology few had ever doubted. But Galileo’s treatise also combined topics and methodologies that traditionally had been assigned separately to mixed mathematics and natural philosophy. Whereas the bounds between these disciplines had been weakened by earlier controversies, particularly about the regressus method and about the certainty of mathematics (i.e., the Quaestio de Certitudine), Sidereus Nuncius broke them down altogether, to the delight and dismay of readers. Galileo’s application of mathematical methods—empiricism and quantification—to natural philosophy framed the ensuing discussions, such that even those who disagreed with his conclusions responded on those grounds. Thus, the book was pivotal in the process of disciplinary admixture that reorganized the study of nature into modern science.
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- The Cambridge History of Philosophy of the Scientific Revolution , pp. 315 - 330Publisher: Cambridge University PressPrint publication year: 2022