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Baroque Science
In Baroque Science , Ofer Gal and Raz Chen-Morris present a radically new perspective on the scientific revolution of the seventeenth century. Instead of celebrating the triumph of reason and rationality, they study the paradoxes and anxieties that stemmed from the New Science and the intellectual compromises that shaped it and enabled its spectacular success.
Gal and Chen-Morris show how the protagonists of the new mathematical natural philosophy grasped at the very far and very small by entrusting observation to the mediation of artificial instruments, and how they justified this mediation by naturalizing and denigrating the human senses. They show how the physical-mathematical ordering of heavens and earth demanded obscure and spurious mathematical procedures, replacing the divine harmonies of the late Renaissance with an assemblage of isolated, contingent laws and approximated constants. Finally, they show how the new savants, forced to contend that reason is hopelessly estranged from its surrounding world and that nature is irreducibly complex, turned to the passions to provide an alternative, naturalized foundation for their epistemology and ethics.
Enforcing order in the face of threatening chaos, blurring the boundaries of the natural and the artificial, and mobilizing the passions in the service of objective knowledge, the New Science, Gal and Chen-Morris reveal, is a Baroque deeply entrenched in and crucially formative of the culture of its time.
Gal and Chen-Morris show how the protagonists of the new mathematical natural philosophy grasped at the very far and very small by entrusting observation to the mediation of artificial instruments, and how they justified this mediation by naturalizing and denigrating the human senses. They show how the physical-mathematical ordering of heavens and earth demanded obscure and spurious mathematical procedures, replacing the divine harmonies of the late Renaissance with an assemblage of isolated, contingent laws and approximated constants. Finally, they show how the new savants, forced to contend that reason is hopelessly estranged from its surrounding world and that nature is irreducibly complex, turned to the passions to provide an alternative, naturalized foundation for their epistemology and ethics.
Enforcing order in the face of threatening chaos, blurring the boundaries of the natural and the artificial, and mobilizing the passions in the service of objective knowledge, the New Science, Gal and Chen-Morris reveal, is a Baroque deeply entrenched in and crucially formative of the culture of its time.
352 pages, Paperback
First published December 15, 2012
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November 14, 2017
Exploring the intellectual compromises in epistemology that were generated by the rise of the "new science," Baroque Science tells the story of Western philosophy's estrangement from the senses. In particular, in part one (my favorite of the three sections of the book) the authors focuses on the inevitable denigrating of human vision and the disappearing observer in natural philosophy. Of course, from ancient times philosophers had conceded that human vision cannot be trusted. It distorts and is prone to illusions. For just as the other senses mask with "tastes, odors and sounds..." so too is human vision fallible. This issue became particularly problematic with the rise of optical instruments in the 17th century, though, which allowed for the peering of the very far and the very small. The microscope and the telescope would have profound implications not just in advances in natural philosophy and art-- but in epistemology as well, leading to the creation of Descartes' "eye of the mind," whereby the eye of the mind was modeled on but completely independent from the eye of the flesh
Optics came to be considered as being concerned not with human vision but with the nature of light itself. This change, which started under Kepler, saw its fruition under Descartes who believed the eye was not only a lens, like any other lens, but a faulty one at that. So, rather than augmenting human vision through the creation of lens and mirrors, these Baroque period instruments were thought to somehow bypass the human senses to allow the eye of the mind more direct and infallible observations, which were based on reason and math alone.
Galileo famously said that philosophy is written in the book of the universe in the language of mathematics. It was the telescope more than anything else that brought this epistemological conundrum into focus so to speak--calling our sensory knowledge into question in the process. And in this way, the new instruments were considered to be a mathematic extension of reason itself. In seeking to bypass the human senses, the new science led to the disappearing observer in science and to epistemological doubt in philosophy. With regard to the latter, if we are dependent on sensory information that is by definition faulty, then how can we know anything at all, wondered Descartes. And this problem of doubt has come to dominate Western epistemology down to today.
Baroque Science ends somewhat unexpectedly (and the ending is the best part of the book, I think!) with a discussion of Descartes. Here, the authors discuss the philosopher's absolutely charming correspondence with Princess Elisabeth of Bavaria.
"But how can a scholar and a moral person preserve constancy and integrity in the face of a chaotic and corrupt political world?”
One wonders whether the answer to this wouldn't also be a good answer to her other question:
“What is the cure for annoyance and boredom?”
One doesn't often think of Descartes as being playful or charming --and yet he is somehow reminiscent of Voltaire in the witty and erudite exchanges he had with the princess concerning mind-body duality. Cartesian dualism is simply not something the lady can abide with. And not just that either--for not only isn't she buying it, but she is no push-over in an argument, and the princess gives the philosopher a real run for his money! In the end, the authors of Baroque Science describe the very surprising move back to the senses that Descartes makes, persuaded no doubt by his princess.
Coming to see that knowledge gained from the senses if in fact more reliable (assuming that there is no evil deceiving demon at play), he then posits that a suitable ethical stance for scholars and savants such as themselves is to be fully ensconced in the world as an "involved, attentive and compassionate citizen of nature and society." That is, Descartes concedes that knowledge found by pure reason alone is less likely to capture real truth and therefore in epistemology as well as in ethics, one should be engaged in the world with knowledge mediated by body and creative imagination. That is, one has to walk the walk and make it real.
This book remains my favorite history of science book, hands down. I have read and re-read the book and find that I refer to it a lot as well. Since it is my favorite book in the genre of history of science, I give it 10 stars!
Optics came to be considered as being concerned not with human vision but with the nature of light itself. This change, which started under Kepler, saw its fruition under Descartes who believed the eye was not only a lens, like any other lens, but a faulty one at that. So, rather than augmenting human vision through the creation of lens and mirrors, these Baroque period instruments were thought to somehow bypass the human senses to allow the eye of the mind more direct and infallible observations, which were based on reason and math alone.
Galileo famously said that philosophy is written in the book of the universe in the language of mathematics. It was the telescope more than anything else that brought this epistemological conundrum into focus so to speak--calling our sensory knowledge into question in the process. And in this way, the new instruments were considered to be a mathematic extension of reason itself. In seeking to bypass the human senses, the new science led to the disappearing observer in science and to epistemological doubt in philosophy. With regard to the latter, if we are dependent on sensory information that is by definition faulty, then how can we know anything at all, wondered Descartes. And this problem of doubt has come to dominate Western epistemology down to today.
Baroque Science ends somewhat unexpectedly (and the ending is the best part of the book, I think!) with a discussion of Descartes. Here, the authors discuss the philosopher's absolutely charming correspondence with Princess Elisabeth of Bavaria.
"But how can a scholar and a moral person preserve constancy and integrity in the face of a chaotic and corrupt political world?”
One wonders whether the answer to this wouldn't also be a good answer to her other question:
“What is the cure for annoyance and boredom?”
One doesn't often think of Descartes as being playful or charming --and yet he is somehow reminiscent of Voltaire in the witty and erudite exchanges he had with the princess concerning mind-body duality. Cartesian dualism is simply not something the lady can abide with. And not just that either--for not only isn't she buying it, but she is no push-over in an argument, and the princess gives the philosopher a real run for his money! In the end, the authors of Baroque Science describe the very surprising move back to the senses that Descartes makes, persuaded no doubt by his princess.
Coming to see that knowledge gained from the senses if in fact more reliable (assuming that there is no evil deceiving demon at play), he then posits that a suitable ethical stance for scholars and savants such as themselves is to be fully ensconced in the world as an "involved, attentive and compassionate citizen of nature and society." That is, Descartes concedes that knowledge found by pure reason alone is less likely to capture real truth and therefore in epistemology as well as in ethics, one should be engaged in the world with knowledge mediated by body and creative imagination. That is, one has to walk the walk and make it real.
This book remains my favorite history of science book, hands down. I have read and re-read the book and find that I refer to it a lot as well. Since it is my favorite book in the genre of history of science, I give it 10 stars!
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