Hostname: page-component-cd9895bd7-lnqnp Total loading time: 0 Render date: 2024-12-23T13:23:41.949Z Has data issue: false hasContentIssue false
  • English
  • Français

Further Thoughts on Merton in Context

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  26 September 2008

Dirk Struik
Dirk Struik
Affiliation:
Department of MathematicsMassachusetts Institute of Technology
Get access Rights & Permissions [Opens in a new window]

Extract

Robert Merton may not remember it, but in the 1930s we met in Cambridge and took one or more walks together – 1 think they were along Trapelo Road in Waltham, then a rural lane. Our conversation must have been interesting, since I remember the episode, but I can only guess at the subject. Since Merton was working on the sociology of science in Newton's day and I had a long standing interest in the relations between mathematics and society, especially at the dawn of capitalism, it is very likely that we discussed the Hessen paper of 1931, published in Science at the Cross Roads. The paper had impressed me, as it had impressed several British scientists of the younger generation, including J. D. Bernal and Joseph Needham; Merton's dissertation, when it appeared, showed that Hessen's “provocative essay” had made its impression on his work as well. It also showed that he was aware of some of the oversimplifications of the Hessen lecture, as was G. N. Clark (see Clark 1937a; Clark 1937b, chap. 3). The almost total omission of the religious factor was one of them.

Type
Article
Information
Science in Context , Volume 3 , Issue 1 , Spring 1989 , pp. 227 - 238
Copyright
Copyright © Cambridge University Press 1989

Access options

Get access to the full version of this content by using one of the access options below. (Log in options will check for institutional or personal access. Content may require purchase if you do not have access.)

References

Bernal, J. D., 1939. The Social Function of Science. New York: Macmillan.Google Scholar
Borkenau, Franz, [1932] 1987. “The Sociology of the Mechanistic World-Picture.” Science in Context 1(1): 109–127. First published in German in Zeitschrift für Sozialforschung 1(3): 311–55.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Borkenau, Franz, 1935. Der Übergang vom feudalen zum Bürgerlichen Weltbild. Paris: Felix Alcan.Google Scholar
Bukharin, N., [1922] 1925. Historical Materialism. New York: International Publishers. Authorized translation from the third Russian ed. Theorie des historischen Materialsmus. Hamburg: Verlag der Kommunistischen Internationale, 1922.Google Scholar
Bukhann, N. et al. 1935. Marxism and Modern Thought, trans. R. Fox. London: G. Routledge.Google Scholar
Busken Huet, Conrad, 1881–1884. et Land van Rembrandt. Haarlem, Tjeenk Willink. Clark, G. N., 1937a. Economic History 3:362–79.Google Scholar
Busken Huet, Conrad, 1937b. Science and Social Welfare in the Age of Newton. Oxford: The Clarendon Press.Google Scholar
de Candolle, A., 1885. Histoire des sciences et des savants depuis deux siècles. Geneva and Basel: H. Georg.Google Scholar
Duker, A. L., 1910. Gisbertus Voetius. Leiden.Google Scholar
Durkheim, Emile, 1897. L'Année sociologique.Google Scholar
Dijksterhuis, E. J., 1956. Mededelingen Kon. Ned. Akad. Wetens. Afd. Letterkunde 19(5):171–99.Google Scholar
Filmer, R. E., 1971. Science and Society 41:303–16.Google Scholar
Grossmann, Henryk, [1935] 1987. “The Social Foundations of Mechanistic Philosophy and Manufacture” Science in Context 2(1): 129–180. First published in German in Zeitschrift für Sozialforschung 4(2): 161–231.Google Scholar
Haldane, J. B. S., 1938. The Marxist Philosophy and the Sciences. New York: Random House.Google Scholar
Hessen, Boris, 1931. “The Social and Economic Roots of Newton's Principia,” in Science at the Cross Roads, Papers presented to the International Congress of the History of Science and Technology held in London from June 29th to July 3rd. 1931, by the delegates of the U.S.S.R., 147–212. London: Kniga.Google Scholar
Hogben, Lancelot, 1936. Mathematics for the Million: A Popular Self-Educator. Ill. J. F. Horrabin. London: G. Allen and Unwin.Google Scholar
Hogben, Lancelot, 1938. Science for the Citizen: A Self-Educator Based on the Social Background of Scientific Discovery, Ill. J. F. Horrabin. London: G. Allen and Unwin.Google Scholar
Hooykaas, R., 1956–1957. “Science and Reformation” Cahiers d'histoire moderne 3: 109–39.Google Scholar
Hooykaas, R., 1974. “The Reception of Copernicanism in England and the Netherlands” Selected Studies in the History of Science, 635–663.Google Scholar
Huizinga, J., 1941. Nederland's Beschaving in de Zeventiende Eeuw. Haarlem: H. Tjeenk Willink en Zoon.Google Scholar
von Humboldt, Freiherr Alexander, 1845–1847. Kosmos; Eniwurf einer physischen Weltbeschreibung, vols. 1–4. Stuttgart: Cotter.Google Scholar
Jones, R. F., 1936. Ancients and Moderns: A Study of the Rise of the Scientific Movement in Seventeenth Century England. St. Louis: Peter Smith.Google Scholar
Kaiser, E., 1982. Science and Society 46:230–34.Google Scholar
Klein, Felix, [1926–27] 1979. Vorlesungen über die Entwicklung der Mathematik in ten Jahrhundert. Berlin: Springer.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
von Martin, A., [1932] 1941, 1945. Sociology of the Renaissance. London: K. Paul, Trench, Trubner and Co. First published in German as Soziologie der Renaissance. Stuttgart.Google Scholar
Marx, Karl, and Friedrich, Engels, [1867] 1936. Capital, trans. Moore, S., and Aveling, E. Ed. F. Engels. New York: Modern Library.Google Scholar
Merton, Robert K., 1939. “Science and the Economy of Seventeenth-Century England” Science and Society 3:3–27.Google Scholar
Merton, Robert K., 1957. Science and Society 21:7–9.Google Scholar
Merton, Robert K., [1938] 1970. Science, Technology and Society in Seventeenth-Century England. New York: Harper and Row.Google Scholar
Ovitt, G., 1986. “The Cultural Context of Western Technology: Early Christian Attitudes Toward Manual Labor” Technology and Culture 27:477–500.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Stern, Bernard, 1927. Society and Medical Progress. Princeton: Princeton University Press.Google Scholar
Struik, D. J., 1986. “The Sociology of Mathematics Revisited” Science and Society 50: 280–299.Google Scholar
Trevor-Roper, H. R., 1968. The Crisis of the Seventeenth Century. New York: Evanston.Google Scholar
Werskey, P. G., 1978. The Visible College. London: Free Association Books.Google Scholar
White, Andrew, 1896. History of the Warfare of Science with Technology in Christendom, 2. vols Saint Louis: Peter Smith.Google Scholar