{"title":"Address of the President, Sir Venki Ramakrishnan, given at the Anniversary meeting on 30 November 2016","authors":"","doi":"10.1098/rsnr.2016.0055","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1098/rsnr.2016.0055","url":null,"abstract":"","PeriodicalId":49744,"journal":{"name":"Notes and Records-The Royal Society Journal of the History of Science","volume":"71 1","pages":"109 - 114"},"PeriodicalIF":0.4,"publicationDate":"2017-01-01","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"https://sci-hub-pdf.com/10.1098/rsnr.2016.0055","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"62043242","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":3,"RegionCategory":"哲学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
{"title":"Science communications","authors":"B. Marsden","doi":"10.1098/rsnr.2017.0050","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1098/rsnr.2017.0050","url":null,"abstract":"","PeriodicalId":49744,"journal":{"name":"Notes and Records-The Royal Society Journal of the History of Science","volume":"71 1","pages":"333 - 334"},"PeriodicalIF":0.4,"publicationDate":"2017-01-01","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"https://sci-hub-pdf.com/10.1098/rsnr.2017.0050","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"62043407","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":3,"RegionCategory":"哲学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
The Hungarian-born intellectual Arthur Koestler produced a wide-ranging corpus of written work throughout the mid twentieth century. Despite being the subject of two huge biographies in recent years, his long-standing engagement with numerous scientific disciplines remains unexplored. This paper situates Koestler's scientific philosophy within the context of mid-twentieth-century science and explores his relationship with key figures, including Dennis Gábor, C. H. Waddington, Ludwig von Bertalanffy and J. R. Smythies. The argument presented is threefold. First, surprisingly, serious scientists, particularly in the biological sciences, took Koestler's scientific work seriously; second, despite Koestler's best efforts, his allies could not agree on a single articulation of anti-reductionism; and third, the reductionist/anti-reductionist debates of the mid twentieth century constituted a battle for the authority to speak on behalf of ‘science’ that led Koestler into direct conflict with figures including Peter Medawar. By exploring the community associated with Koestler, the paper sheds new light on the status of scientific authority and the relationship between scientists’ metaphysical beliefs and their practices.
{"title":"Anti-reductionism at the confluence of philosophy and science: Arthur Koestler and the biological periphery","authors":"James F. Stark","doi":"10.1098/rsnr.2016.0021","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1098/rsnr.2016.0021","url":null,"abstract":"The Hungarian-born intellectual Arthur Koestler produced a wide-ranging corpus of written work throughout the mid twentieth century. Despite being the subject of two huge biographies in recent years, his long-standing engagement with numerous scientific disciplines remains unexplored. This paper situates Koestler's scientific philosophy within the context of mid-twentieth-century science and explores his relationship with key figures, including Dennis Gábor, C. H. Waddington, Ludwig von Bertalanffy and J. R. Smythies. The argument presented is threefold. First, surprisingly, serious scientists, particularly in the biological sciences, took Koestler's scientific work seriously; second, despite Koestler's best efforts, his allies could not agree on a single articulation of anti-reductionism; and third, the reductionist/anti-reductionist debates of the mid twentieth century constituted a battle for the authority to speak on behalf of ‘science’ that led Koestler into direct conflict with figures including Peter Medawar. By exploring the community associated with Koestler, the paper sheds new light on the status of scientific authority and the relationship between scientists’ metaphysical beliefs and their practices.","PeriodicalId":49744,"journal":{"name":"Notes and Records-The Royal Society Journal of the History of Science","volume":"70 1","pages":"269 - 286"},"PeriodicalIF":0.4,"publicationDate":"2016-09-20","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"https://sci-hub-pdf.com/10.1098/rsnr.2016.0021","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"62042935","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":3,"RegionCategory":"哲学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
For several decades now, many histories of science have sought to emphasize the important role of instruments and other material objects in the operation of science. Many, too, have been attentive to ideas of space and place and the different geographies which are visible in the historical practice of science. This paper draws on both traditions in its interpretation of a heretofore neglected aspect of Britain's nineteenth-century geomagnetic story: that of the British Magnetic Survey, 1833–38. Far from being a footnote to the more expansive geomagnetic projects then taking place in mainland Europe or to the later British worldwide magnetic scheme, this paper argues that the British Magnetic Survey represents an important instance in which magnetic instruments, their users and their makers, were tested, developed and ultimately proved credible.
{"title":"Proving instruments credible in the early nineteenth century: The British Magnetic Survey and site-specific experimentation","authors":"M. Goodman","doi":"10.1098/rsnr.2016.0023","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1098/rsnr.2016.0023","url":null,"abstract":"For several decades now, many histories of science have sought to emphasize the important role of instruments and other material objects in the operation of science. Many, too, have been attentive to ideas of space and place and the different geographies which are visible in the historical practice of science. This paper draws on both traditions in its interpretation of a heretofore neglected aspect of Britain's nineteenth-century geomagnetic story: that of the British Magnetic Survey, 1833–38. Far from being a footnote to the more expansive geomagnetic projects then taking place in mainland Europe or to the later British worldwide magnetic scheme, this paper argues that the British Magnetic Survey represents an important instance in which magnetic instruments, their users and their makers, were tested, developed and ultimately proved credible.","PeriodicalId":49744,"journal":{"name":"Notes and Records-The Royal Society Journal of the History of Science","volume":"70 1","pages":"251 - 268"},"PeriodicalIF":0.4,"publicationDate":"2016-09-20","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"https://sci-hub-pdf.com/10.1098/rsnr.2016.0023","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"62043009","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":3,"RegionCategory":"哲学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
The mathematician, physicist and philosopher W. J. 's Gravesande is particularly known for his adherence to ‘Newtonian philosophy’. Currently, it is widely held that 's Gravesande got his main inspiration for his scholarly calling from Newton himself, whom he met in 1715 during a first career as a lawyer; and that it was mainly Newton's own intervention that ensured the appointment of the unqualified 's Gravesande at Leiden University. I challenge these views by bringing together all currently known information about 's Gravesande, including a number of as yet unused documents. I show that 's Gravesande's appointment resulted from a very carefully built up reputation in scholarly circles rather than from accidental meetings and patronage. 's Gravesande had written several innovative papers and was in contact with both leading mathematicians and local political and patrician figures already before 1715. This article therefore explains the rationale behind his appointment in Leiden.
{"title":"The impeccable credentials of an untrained philosopher: Willem Jacob 's Gravesande's career before his Leiden professorship, 1688–1717","authors":"Jip van Besouw","doi":"10.1098/rsnr.2016.0020","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1098/rsnr.2016.0020","url":null,"abstract":"The mathematician, physicist and philosopher W. J. 's Gravesande is particularly known for his adherence to ‘Newtonian philosophy’. Currently, it is widely held that 's Gravesande got his main inspiration for his scholarly calling from Newton himself, whom he met in 1715 during a first career as a lawyer; and that it was mainly Newton's own intervention that ensured the appointment of the unqualified 's Gravesande at Leiden University. I challenge these views by bringing together all currently known information about 's Gravesande, including a number of as yet unused documents. I show that 's Gravesande's appointment resulted from a very carefully built up reputation in scholarly circles rather than from accidental meetings and patronage. 's Gravesande had written several innovative papers and was in contact with both leading mathematicians and local political and patrician figures already before 1715. This article therefore explains the rationale behind his appointment in Leiden.","PeriodicalId":49744,"journal":{"name":"Notes and Records-The Royal Society Journal of the History of Science","volume":"7 1","pages":"231 - 249"},"PeriodicalIF":0.4,"publicationDate":"2016-09-01","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"87396921","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":3,"RegionCategory":"哲学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
For my final Presidential Address I have decided to discuss the guidelines and principles used for ‘Ensuring a successful research endeavour’ that I recently presented to the government. My first question is: Why do we do research? Research in the sciences, medicine, mathematics, technologies, the arts and the humanities produces knowledge that enhances our culture and civilization and can be used for the public good. It is aimed at generating knowledge of the natural world and of ourselves, knowledge that can be developed into useful applications, including driving innovation for sustainable economic growth, improving health, prosperity and the quality of life, and maintaining the environment. This has always been the case since the beginning of modern science in the seventeenth century, when Francis Bacon argued that science improved learning and knowledge, which ‘leads to the relief of man’s estate’. Today, for advanced nations such as the UK to prosper as knowledge economies, scientific research is essential—to produce both that knowledge and also the skills and people to use it. That is why science should occupy a central place in government thinking, if the UK is to thrive in our increasingly sophisticated scientific and technological age. However, scientific research is not solely utilitarian. It generates knowledge that enhances humanity more generally. In the words of Robert Wilson, Director of the Fermilab particle accelerator: when asked by the US Congressional Joint Committee on Atomic Energy whether the accelerator in any way involved the security of the country, he replied, ‘It has to do with the dignity of men, our love of culture . . . it has nothing to do directly with defending our country except to help make it worth defending.’ Research and development in the UK is funded by government, by private companies, and by charitable organizations. Government-funded research usually generates openly available knowledge, trains the scientific workforce and develops the skills necessary for the effective running of the country. It is also able to monitor research being carried out throughout the world. Research funded by private companies is most often aimed at developing knowledge into useful commercial applications, and is usually restricted in accessibility to maintain commercial advantage. Charitable organizations support research into specific objectives of interest to philanthropic organizations, often with an emphasis on biomedicine. The research funded in these different ways often overlaps and is carried out in diverse sectors and in different research disciplines, forming a network of discovery science acquiring new knowledge, of translation of knowledge into innovation, and of developments for applications. It is a complex interactive system, with knowledge generated at different
{"title":"Address of the President, Sir Paul Nurse, given at the Anniversary meeting on 30 November 2015","authors":"P. Nurse","doi":"10.1098/rsnr.2016.0015","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1098/rsnr.2016.0015","url":null,"abstract":"For my final Presidential Address I have decided to discuss the guidelines and principles used for ‘Ensuring a successful research endeavour’ that I recently presented to the government. My first question is: Why do we do research? Research in the sciences, medicine, mathematics, technologies, the arts and the humanities produces knowledge that enhances our culture and civilization and can be used for the public good. It is aimed at generating knowledge of the natural world and of ourselves, knowledge that can be developed into useful applications, including driving innovation for sustainable economic growth, improving health, prosperity and the quality of life, and maintaining the environment. This has always been the case since the beginning of modern science in the seventeenth century, when Francis Bacon argued that science improved learning and knowledge, which ‘leads to the relief of man’s estate’. Today, for advanced nations such as the UK to prosper as knowledge economies, scientific research is essential—to produce both that knowledge and also the skills and people to use it. That is why science should occupy a central place in government thinking, if the UK is to thrive in our increasingly sophisticated scientific and technological age. However, scientific research is not solely utilitarian. It generates knowledge that enhances humanity more generally. In the words of Robert Wilson, Director of the Fermilab particle accelerator: when asked by the US Congressional Joint Committee on Atomic Energy whether the accelerator in any way involved the security of the country, he replied, ‘It has to do with the dignity of men, our love of culture . . . it has nothing to do directly with defending our country except to help make it worth defending.’ Research and development in the UK is funded by government, by private companies, and by charitable organizations. Government-funded research usually generates openly available knowledge, trains the scientific workforce and develops the skills necessary for the effective running of the country. It is also able to monitor research being carried out throughout the world. Research funded by private companies is most often aimed at developing knowledge into useful commercial applications, and is usually restricted in accessibility to maintain commercial advantage. Charitable organizations support research into specific objectives of interest to philanthropic organizations, often with an emphasis on biomedicine. The research funded in these different ways often overlaps and is carried out in diverse sectors and in different research disciplines, forming a network of discovery science acquiring new knowledge, of translation of knowledge into innovation, and of developments for applications. It is a complex interactive system, with knowledge generated at different","PeriodicalId":49744,"journal":{"name":"Notes and Records-The Royal Society Journal of the History of Science","volume":"70 1","pages":"287 - 291"},"PeriodicalIF":0.4,"publicationDate":"2016-01-01","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"https://sci-hub-pdf.com/10.1098/rsnr.2016.0015","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"62043248","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":3,"RegionCategory":"哲学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
This article concerns the earliest evidence for Isaac Newton's use of Hebrew: a manuscript copy by Newton of part of a work intended to provide a reader of the Hebrew alphabet with the ability to identify or memorize more than 1000 words and to begin to master the conjugations of the Hebrew verb. In describing the content of this unpublished manuscript and establishing its source and original author for the first time, we suggest how and when Newton may have initially become acquainted with the language. Finally, basing our discussion in part on an examination of the reading marks that Newton left in the surviving copies of Hebrew grammars and lexicons that he owned, we will argue that his interest in Hebrew was not intended to achieve linguistic proficiency but remained limited to particular theological queries of singular concern.
{"title":"Isaac Newton learns Hebrew: Samuel Johnson's Nova cubi Hebræi tabella","authors":"Michael Joalland, S. Mandelbrote","doi":"10.1098/rsnr.2015.0055","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1098/rsnr.2015.0055","url":null,"abstract":"This article concerns the earliest evidence for Isaac Newton's use of Hebrew: a manuscript copy by Newton of part of a work intended to provide a reader of the Hebrew alphabet with the ability to identify or memorize more than 1000 words and to begin to master the conjugations of the Hebrew verb. In describing the content of this unpublished manuscript and establishing its source and original author for the first time, we suggest how and when Newton may have initially become acquainted with the language. Finally, basing our discussion in part on an examination of the reading marks that Newton left in the surviving copies of Hebrew grammars and lexicons that he owned, we will argue that his interest in Hebrew was not intended to achieve linguistic proficiency but remained limited to particular theological queries of singular concern.","PeriodicalId":49744,"journal":{"name":"Notes and Records-The Royal Society Journal of the History of Science","volume":"70 1","pages":"21 - 9"},"PeriodicalIF":0.4,"publicationDate":"2015-12-23","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"https://sci-hub-pdf.com/10.1098/rsnr.2015.0055","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"62043096","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":3,"RegionCategory":"哲学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
From 1930 to 1937 Lancelot Hogben FRS occupied the Chair of Social Biology at the London School of Economics and Political Science. According to standard histories of this appointment, he and R. A. Fisher FRS both applied for the position, but Hogben was selected over Fisher. The episode has received attention in large part because of the later prominence of the two figures involved. The surviving archival records, however, tell a remarkably different story. Neither Fisher nor Hogben was ever an official candidate for the chair. Indeed, Fisher seems not to have applied for the position at all, and Hogben was approached only behind the scenes of the official search. The purpose of this paper is to correct and complete the history of this episode.
从1930年到1937年，兰斯洛特·霍本在伦敦政治经济学院担任社会生物学教授。根据这一任命的标准历史，他和R. A. Fisher FRS都申请了这个职位，但Hogben被选中而不是Fisher。这一事件之所以受到关注，很大程度上是因为这两个人物后来的突出表现。然而，现存的档案记录却讲述了一个截然不同的故事。费希尔和霍格本都不是美联储主席的正式候选人。事实上，费舍尔似乎根本就没有申请过这个职位，而霍格本只是在官方搜索的幕后才接触到的。本文的目的是纠正和完善这一事件的历史。
{"title":"R. A. Fisher, Lancelot Hogben, and the ‘Competition’ for the Chair of Social Biology at the London School of Economics in 1930: Correcting the Legend","authors":"James Tabery, S. Sarkar","doi":"10.1098/rsnr.2014.0065","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1098/rsnr.2014.0065","url":null,"abstract":"From 1930 to 1937 Lancelot Hogben FRS occupied the Chair of Social Biology at the London School of Economics and Political Science. According to standard histories of this appointment, he and R. A. Fisher FRS both applied for the position, but Hogben was selected over Fisher. The episode has received attention in large part because of the later prominence of the two figures involved. The surviving archival records, however, tell a remarkably different story. Neither Fisher nor Hogben was ever an official candidate for the chair. Indeed, Fisher seems not to have applied for the position at all, and Hogben was approached only behind the scenes of the official search. The purpose of this paper is to correct and complete the history of this episode.","PeriodicalId":49744,"journal":{"name":"Notes and Records-The Royal Society Journal of the History of Science","volume":"51 1","pages":"437 - 446"},"PeriodicalIF":0.4,"publicationDate":"2015-12-20","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"https://sci-hub-pdf.com/10.1098/rsnr.2014.0065","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"62042600","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":3,"RegionCategory":"哲学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
Both contemporaries and historians have focused on the high-profile 1874 Belfast Address in which John Tyndall was widely perceived as promulgating atheism. Although some historians have instead interpreted him as a pantheist or an agnostic, it is clear that any such labels do not accurately capture Tyndall's religious position throughout his life. By contrast, this paper seeks to chart Tyndall's religious journey from 1840 (when he was in his late teens) to the autumn of 1848 when he commenced his scientific studies at Marburg. Although he had been imbued with his father's stern conservative Irish Protestantism and opposition to Catholicism, as a youth he seems for a time to have been attracted to Methodism. Later, however, he questioned and rejected his father's religious views and was increasingly drawn to the more spiritual outlook of Ralph Waldo Emerson and Thomas Carlyle, along with a more radical attitude to politics.
{"title":"John Tyndall's religion: a fragment","authors":"G. Cantor","doi":"10.1098/rsnr.2015.0017","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1098/rsnr.2015.0017","url":null,"abstract":"Both contemporaries and historians have focused on the high-profile 1874 Belfast Address in which John Tyndall was widely perceived as promulgating atheism. Although some historians have instead interpreted him as a pantheist or an agnostic, it is clear that any such labels do not accurately capture Tyndall's religious position throughout his life. By contrast, this paper seeks to chart Tyndall's religious journey from 1840 (when he was in his late teens) to the autumn of 1848 when he commenced his scientific studies at Marburg. Although he had been imbued with his father's stern conservative Irish Protestantism and opposition to Catholicism, as a youth he seems for a time to have been attracted to Methodism. Later, however, he questioned and rejected his father's religious views and was increasingly drawn to the more spiritual outlook of Ralph Waldo Emerson and Thomas Carlyle, along with a more radical attitude to politics.","PeriodicalId":49744,"journal":{"name":"Notes and Records-The Royal Society Journal of the History of Science","volume":"69 1","pages":"419 - 436"},"PeriodicalIF":0.4,"publicationDate":"2015-12-20","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"https://sci-hub-pdf.com/10.1098/rsnr.2015.0017","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"62042715","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":3,"RegionCategory":"哲学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
Our essay analyses a little-known book, Observations sur les eaux minerales des plusieurs provinces de France (1675), which is a study of French mineral waters, commissioned by and conducted at the French Royal Academy of Science (est. 1666). Its author, Samuel Cottereau Duclos (1598–1685), was a senior founding figure of the Academy, its chief chymist and one of its most influential members. We examine Observations with a focus on the changing attitudes towards chymical knowledge and practice in the French Academy and the Royal Society of London in the period 1666–84. Chymistry was a fundamental analytical tool for seventeenth-century natural historians, and, as the work of Lawrence Principe and William Newman has shown, it is central to understanding the ‘long’ Scientific Revolution. Much study has also been done on the developing norms of openness in the dissemination and presentation of scientific, and particularly chymical knowledge in the late seventeenth century, norms that were at odds with traditions of secrecy among individual chymists. Between these two standards a tension arose, evidenced by early modern ‘vociferous criticisms’ of chymical obscurity, with different strategies developed by individual philosophers for negotiating the emergent boundaries between secrecy and openness. Less well studied, however, are the strategies by which not just individuals but also scientific institutions negotiated these boundaries, particularly in the formative years of their public and political reputation in the late seventeenth century. Michael Hunter's recent and welcome study of the ‘decline of magic’ at the Royal Society has to some extent remedied these omissions. Hunter argues that the Society—as a corporate body—disregarded and avoided studies of magical and alchemical subjects in the late seventeenth century. Our examination problematizes these distinctions and presents a more complex picture.
{"title":"Mineral waters across the Channel: matter theory and natural history from Samuel Duclos's minerallogenesis to Martin Lister's chymical magnetism, ca. 1666–86","authors":"A. M. Roos, Victor D. Boantza","doi":"10.1098/rsnr.2014.0066","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1098/rsnr.2014.0066","url":null,"abstract":"Our essay analyses a little-known book, Observations sur les eaux minerales des plusieurs provinces de France (1675), which is a study of French mineral waters, commissioned by and conducted at the French Royal Academy of Science (est. 1666). Its author, Samuel Cottereau Duclos (1598–1685), was a senior founding figure of the Academy, its chief chymist and one of its most influential members. We examine Observations with a focus on the changing attitudes towards chymical knowledge and practice in the French Academy and the Royal Society of London in the period 1666–84. Chymistry was a fundamental analytical tool for seventeenth-century natural historians, and, as the work of Lawrence Principe and William Newman has shown, it is central to understanding the ‘long’ Scientific Revolution. Much study has also been done on the developing norms of openness in the dissemination and presentation of scientific, and particularly chymical knowledge in the late seventeenth century, norms that were at odds with traditions of secrecy among individual chymists. Between these two standards a tension arose, evidenced by early modern ‘vociferous criticisms’ of chymical obscurity, with different strategies developed by individual philosophers for negotiating the emergent boundaries between secrecy and openness. Less well studied, however, are the strategies by which not just individuals but also scientific institutions negotiated these boundaries, particularly in the formative years of their public and political reputation in the late seventeenth century. Michael Hunter's recent and welcome study of the ‘decline of magic’ at the Royal Society has to some extent remedied these omissions. Hunter argues that the Society—as a corporate body—disregarded and avoided studies of magical and alchemical subjects in the late seventeenth century. Our examination problematizes these distinctions and presents a more complex picture.","PeriodicalId":49744,"journal":{"name":"Notes and Records-The Royal Society Journal of the History of Science","volume":"69 1","pages":"373 - 394"},"PeriodicalIF":0.4,"publicationDate":"2015-12-20","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"https://sci-hub-pdf.com/10.1098/rsnr.2014.0066","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"62042696","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":3,"RegionCategory":"哲学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
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