Science Incarnate: Historical Embodiments of Natural KnowledgeChristopher Lawrence, Steven Shapin Ever since Greek antiquity "disembodied knowledge" has often been taken as synonymous with "objective truth." Yet we also have very specific mental images of the kinds of bodies that house great minds—the ascetic philosopher versus the hearty surgeon, for example. Does truth have anything to do with the belly? What difference does it make to the pursuit of knowledge whether Einstein rode a bicycle, Russell was randy, or Darwin flatulent? Bringing body and knowledge into such intimate contact is occasionally seen as funny, sometimes as enraging, and more often just as pointless. Vividly written and well illustrated, Science Incarnate offers concrete historical answers to such skeptical questions about the relationships between body, mind, and knowledge. Focusing on the seventeenth century to the present, Science Incarnate explores how intellectuals sought to establish the value and authority of their ideas through public displays of their private ways of life. Patterns of eating, sleeping, exercising, being ill, and having (or avoiding) sex, as well as the marks of gender and bodily form, were proof of the presence or absence of intellectual virtue, integrity, skill, and authority. Intellectuals examined in detail include René Descartes, Isaac Newton, Charles Darwin, and Ada Lovelace. Science Incarnate is at once very funny and deeply serious, addressing issues of crucial importance to present-day discussions about the nature of knowledge and how it is produced. It incorporates much that will interest cultural and social historians, historians of science and medicine, philosophers, sociologists, and anthropologists. |
Other editions - View all
Science Incarnate: Historical Embodiments of Natural Knowledge Christopher Lawrence,Steven Shapin No preview available - 1998 |
Common terms and phrases
Ada Lovelace ascetic Athleticism Babbage behavior blood bodily body Boyle Bristed Calculating Passion Cambridge University Press cartes de visite century chap chapter Charles Christiaan Huygens cited claimed Coga College competitive constitution Conway Correspondence Courtesy Wellcome Institute culture cures Darwin Descartes Descartes's Desert Fathers dietetics discipline disembodied early modern England English Essays example exercise experience fols gentleman Glanvill Greatrakes Greatrakes's Harriet Martineau Henry Henry Stubbe History human Ibid idem intellectual Isaac Newton John knowledge Lady Byron learning letter Locke London Lovelace Lovelace's Mary Somerville mathematicians mathematics Medicine Melancholy mental mind moral natural philosophers Oeuvres Oldenburg Oxford photograph physical physicians Physiology portrait problem Robert Robert Boyle Roy Porter Royal Society Schaffer scholar Science scientific seventeenth Seventeenth-Century sexual Shapin Simon Schaffer social soul spirits Stubbe surgeons Thomas tion Trans transfusion Trinity Tripos truth undergraduate Valentine Greatrakes Victorian vols Wellcome Institute Library William women wrangler