On Reading Newton as an Epicurean

2021 ◽  
pp. 80-110
Author(s):  
Eric Schliesser
Keyword(s):  
Eighteenth Century ◽  
Natural History ◽  
Immanuel Kant ◽  
Natural Philosophy ◽  
Attributes Of God ◽  
History And Theory

This chapter argues for three distinct, albeit mutually illuminating theses: first it explains why well informed eighteenth-century thinkers, e.g., the pre-critical Immanuel Kant and Richard Bentley, would have identified important aspects of Newton’s natural philosophy with Epicureanism. Second, it explores how some significant changes to Newton’s Principia between the first (1687) and second (1713) editions can be explained in terms of attempts to reframe the Principia so that the charge of “Epicureanism” can be deflected. Third, the chapter argues that there is an argument in Kant’s (1755) Universal natural history and theory of the heavens that undermines a key claim of Newton’s “General Scholium” that was used to discredit Spinozism by Clarke in A Demonstration of the Being and Attributes of God.

Nero and the Last Stalk of Silphion: Collecting Extinct Nature in Early Modern Europe

2014 ◽  
Vol 19 (5) ◽  
pp. 424-447 ◽  
Author(s):  
Vera Keller
Keyword(s):  
Eighteenth Century ◽  
Natural History ◽  
Early Modern ◽  
Political Change ◽  
Natural Philosophy ◽  
Early Modern Europe ◽  
Modern Natural ◽  
Research Agendas ◽  
Modern Europe

Many studies of early modern natural history focus upon observational, empirical techniques. Early moderns also contended with entities which could no longer be observed because they no longer existed. Although it is often assumed that extinction only emerged as a concept in the eighteenth century, the concept of natural loss appeared, often unproblematically, in areas outside natural philosophy. A survey of discussions of the extinct plant silphion across Europe in the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries shows that the possibility of natural loss was well aired. Paper technologies for collecting extinct nature ran parallel to investigations of newly found nature, and thus can place the latter in a new light. Although ideas of natural mutability often drew on ideas of historical or political change rather than philosophical concepts of natural constancy, techniques developed for extinct nature, such as the list of lost things, remained influential for the research agendas of naturalists.


Natural history books in the library of Dr Richard Richardson

2016 ◽  
Vol 43 (1) ◽  
pp. 57-75 ◽  
Author(s):  
John Edgington
Keyword(s):  
Eighteenth Century ◽  
Natural History ◽  
History Books

During the first decades of the eighteenth century the wealthy Yorkshire naturalist Richard Richardson acquired a large library, particularly strong in natural history, medicine and antiquarianism. Virtually all the natural history component was dispersed before the library was catalogued, so its contents have been unknown. Richardson's unpublished correspondence with Sir Hans Sloane and William Sherard contains many references to his books and shows that they and other leading naturalists were the source of most of them, by donation and purchase. Of about 700 books in natural history that he possessed, 425 have been identified; an Appendix lists 300 of the more significant titles. Comparison is made with other natural history libraries, and the eventual fate of Richardson's is discussed.

Dru Drury, his Illustrations of natural history (1770-82) and the European market for printed books

Quaerendo ◽  
1985 ◽  
Vol 15 (2) ◽  
pp. 83-102 ◽  
Author(s):  
William Noblett
Keyword(s):  
Eighteenth Century ◽  
Natural History ◽  
Book Trade ◽  
European Market ◽  
Printed Books ◽  
Book Illustrations ◽  
International Book

AbstractThis study attempts to show how the English entomologist, Dru Drury (1725-1804) exported his only published book, Illustrations of natural history, which appeared in three volumes between 1770 and 1782. Drury used three contacts on the European mainland: the Amsterdam bookseller, Jan Christian Sepp; the German botanist, Paul Dietrich Giseke and the Danish naturalist, Morten Thrane Brunnich. Drury's letters to these three men form the basis of the study. An examination of them reveal some of the problems encountered in the international book-trade in the eighteenth century (such as parcels going missing and the difficulties of payment) and show some of the formalities that had to be undertaken when exporting.

“The pleasure of receiving your favour”

2004 ◽  
Vol 5 (2) ◽  
pp. 313-336 ◽  
Author(s):  
Ellen Valle
Keyword(s):  
Eighteenth Century ◽  
North America ◽  
Natural History ◽  
Scientific Knowledge ◽  
Atlantic World ◽  
Raw Materials ◽  
Central Concept

The article deals with correspondence in natural history in the eighteenth century between England and North America. The corpus discussed consists of correspondence between John Bartram and Peter Collinson, and between Alexander Garden and John Ellis. The approach used in the study is qualitative and rhetorical; the main point considered is how the letters construct scientific centre and periphery in the eighteenth-century Atlantic world. A central concept is the “colonial exchange”, whereby “raw materials” from the colonies — in this case plant and animal specimens, along with proposed identifications and names — are exchanged for “finished products”, in this case codified scientific knowledge contained in publications.

Sign in / Sign up

Export Citation Format

Share Document