Evolutionary Theism of Henryk Levittoux in Polish and International Context

Henryk Levittoux (1822-1879) is currently best known as the model of Jan Matejko who posed for him as Nicolaus Copernicus. Less known, however, is his concept of evolution, which he presented as a part of his philosophical system and which caused a heated debates among Polish intellectuals in the second half of the nineteenth century. Levittoux's theory, which was trying to combine religious dogma with the achievements of contemporary science, breaks out of the popular historical narrative, in which it is assumed that the discussions about the evolutionism were dominated by creationists and pro-Darwinian positivists. The aim of this article will be to present Levittoux's theory of evolution and to show how he combined the ideas of evolution with the concept of Divine creation. Secondary focus of the article will be to place his theory in the broader context of scientific and philosophical changes, that took place in the nineteenth century. Attention will be paid to the way in which the professionalization of science affected natural philosophers, such as Levittoux, who were refusing to accept the rigorous positivist methodology. It will also be shown how Levittoux’s evolutionism became part of the so-called "developmental evolutionism" which promoted a completely different vision of evolution than Darwinism. The non-Darwinian nature of Levittoux's evolutionism was inspired by Étienne Geoffroy Saint-Hilaire’s theory. Levittoux adopted his idea that species evolve thanks to the environmental stimulus which affects their ontogenesis. However, this idea will be extrapolated in Levittoux’s writings to the whole Earth. So, he will conclude that the Earth is the equivalent of the womb in which, like the fetus, all Life develops. All changes of species, in his opinion, are additionally controlled by a universal principle which he called the law of attraction-repulsion. This law was also the tool by which God created the world. The Levittoux’s concept is one of the first attempts to create a synthesis of evolutionism and religious thought in the Polish post-Darwinian philosophy of nature. Levittoux, as a continuator of Saint-Hilaire's thought, is also an interesting example of an attempt to instill in Polish philosophy French evolutionist thought.

Science Influences Philosophy

The claims of the new natural philosophers that their methodical reasoning and newly invented instruments produced knowledge of reality had a profound effect on contemporary mainstream philosophers. Hobbes allied himself with the rationalist pursuers of certainty but rejected the ability of experimental philosophy to reveal certain truths about nature. Gassendi defended a probabilistic theory of knowledge, while Locke’s theory of knowledge accepted “moral,” or near, certainty as a limit to knowledge of reality. Berkeley reinterpreted the materialistic ontology underlying the new science, arguing the metaphysical character played in it by the concept matter. Hume formulated an openly skeptical theory of knowledge of the world, arguing the metaphysical character of the roles played by causality and induction in the new natural philosophy. Kant responded by creating a philosophy that restored certainty to knowledge, but its object was now experience, not a reality independent of the mind.

Decoding the Urban Plan of the City of Pilsen (Plzen)

The historic centre of the city of Pilsen in western Bohemia, today a region of the Czech Republic, was constructed at the end of the thirteenth century, at a time when Gothic architecture was universal across most of western and central Europe. The Gothic style had emerged and developed during an era when social and economic changes were favouring the development of new urban settlements, and when the translation of ancient Greek natural philosophy, including astronomy, was giving rise to a new intellectual movement. This revival of the natural sciences was inevitably bound up with the Roman Catholic Church, since much of this knowledge had been preserved within monastic institutions and was now being used by theologians/natural philosophers who wanted to apply reason to theology. This paper’s analysis of the urban plan of the historic centre of Pilsen is an attempt to investigate the possible influence that the science of astronomy had on architectural thought and creativity in western Bohemia, and how this was represented in the light of scientific advancement.

“Rusticall chymistry”: Alchemy, saltpeter projects, and experimental fertilizers in seventeenth-century English agriculture

As the primary ingredient in gunpowder, saltpeter was an extraordinarily important commodity in the early modern world. Historians of science and technology have long studied its military applications but have rarely focused on its uses outside of warfare. Due to its potential effectiveness as a fertilizer, saltpeter was also an integral component of experimental agricultural reform movements in the early modern period and particularly in seventeenth-century England. This became possible for several reasons: the creation of a thriving domestic saltpeter production industry in the second half of the sixteenth century; the development of vitalist alchemical theories that sought a unified explanation for the “growth” of minerals, metals, and plants; the rise of experimental natural philosophy; and the mid-seventeenth-century dominance of the English East India Company in the saltpeter trade, which allowed agricultural reformers to repurpose domestically produced saltpeter in agriculturally productive ways. This paper argues that the Hartlib Circle – a loose network of natural philosophers and social reformers – adopted vitalist matter theories and the practical, experimental techniques of alchemists to transform agriculture into a more productive enterprise. Though their grandiose plans never came to fruition, their experimental trials to develop artificial fertilizers played an early role in the origins and development of saline chemistry, agronomy, and the British Agricultural Revolution.

Teologiczna interpretacja pojęcia arché u wczesnych fi lozofów greckich: w kręgu teologii milezyjskich fi lozofów przyrody

The purpose of this article is an attempt to present one fundamental problem: identifi cation of the essential features of the arché in Milesian philosophers of nature by indicating possible relationships with theology. The theological interpretation of the Milesians indicates that arché does not merely have a material dimension, it is inherently external, going beyond, and consequently, the original principle contains a peculiar transcendence. In the concepts of natural philosophers, there is an archaic path to immortality, infi nity, and eternal existence, which are, in essence, divine attributes. There is a clear search to determine the relationship of divine sphere of existence with the world that we know from everyday experience. This means that the Milesians have found a plane on which the divine sphere and the temporal sphere can meet. There are certain frameworks within which there is an interaction between the divine element (constant and invariant) and temporal (transient and fi nite).

Passionate souls: Elisabeth of Bohemia and René Descartes

The mathematical investigations of natural phenomena in the seventeenth century led to the inventions of calculus and probability. While we know the works of eminent natural philosophers and mathematicians such as Isaac Newton (1643-1727), we know little about the learned women who made important contributions in the seventeenth century. This article features Princess Elisabeth of Bohemia (1618-1680), whose intellectual ability and curiosity left a unique mark in the history of mathematics. While some of her family members were deeply involved in politics, Elisabeth led an independent, scholarly life, and she was a close correspondent of René Descartes (1596-1650) and Gottfried Leibniz (1646-1716).

The Intellectual

Chapter 8 outlines how Franklin gained international fame for discoveries he made about electricity and the nature of lightning, not to mention the inventions he produced on the basis of this knowledge. The Philadelphian’s scientific achievements, which gained a notable place in the Enlightenment, were largely the product of a curiosity that was indefatigable, as well as a dedication to share information and learn about the discoveries of other natural philosophers. But it was also indirectly an outworking of Protestant understandings of the natural world. Although that outlook was responsible for disenchanting the Christian cosmos of medieval Christendom, it also encouraged inquiry that looked beyond spiritual significance to understanding how nature worked.

From mythology to science: the development of scientific hydrological concepts in Greek antiquity and its relevance to modern hydrology

Whilst hydrology is a Greek term, it was not in use in the Classical literature, but much later, during the Renaissance, in its Latin form, hydrologia. On the other hand, Greek natural philosophers (or, in modern vocabulary, scientists) created robust knowledge in related scientific areas, to which they gave names such as meteorology, climate and hydraulics. These terms are now in common use internationally. Greek natural philosophers laid the foundation for hydrological concepts and the hydrological cycle in its entirety. Knowledge development was brought about by searches for technological solutions to practical problems as well as by scientific curiosity. While initial explanations belong to the sphere of mythology, the rise of philosophy was accompanied by the quest for scientific descriptions of the phenomena. It appears that the first geophysical problem formulated in scientific terms was the explanation of the flood regime of the Nile, then regarded as a paradox because of the spectacular difference from the river flow regime in Greece, i.e. the fact that the Nile flooding occurs in summer when in most of the Mediterranean the rainfall is very low. While the early attempts were unsuccessful, Aristotle was able to formulate a correct hypothesis, which he tested through what appears to be the first scientific expedition in history, in the transition from the Classical to Hellenistic periods. The Hellenistic period brought advances in all scientific fields including hydrology, an example of which is the definition and measurement of flow discharge by Heron of Alexandria. These confirm the fact that the hydrological cycle was well understood in Ancient Greece, yet it poses the question why correct explanations were not accepted and, instead, why ancient and modern mythical views were preferred up to the 18th century.

Taking Newton on Tour

Although he failed in his first bid to be Royal Society President, Folkes continued to promote Newtonianism abroad. Folkes took a Grand Tour from 1732/3 to 1735, recording the Italian leg of his journey from Padua to Rome in his journal. Chapter five examines Folkes’s travel diary to analyse further his Freemasonry, his intellectual development as a Newtonian and his scientific peregrination in which he used metrology to understand not only the aesthetics but the engineering principles of antique buildings and artefacts, as well as their context and place in the Italian landscape. For Folkes, natural philosophy and antiquarianism went hand in hand. Using Folkes’s diary of his journey, and letters to/from natural philosophers such as Francesco Algarotti, Anders Celsius and Abbé Antonio Conti, this chapter analyses to what extent Folkes’s tour established his reputation as an international broker of Newtonianism as well as the overall primacy of English scientific instrumentation to Italian virtuosi.

Nascent Newtonian, 1690–1716

This chapter assesses Folkes’s early life and letters as a nascent Newtonian. We demonstrate to what extent Folkes’s education with French Huguenot scholars Abraham de Moivre and Jacques Louis Cappel, as well as with Charles Morgan, Master of Clare College, Cambridge would serve as a basis for his continued ties to Huguenot instrument makers and Cambridge natural philosophers and mathematicians throughout his professional career.