Introduction. Controversies and the dialectical texture of the Scientific Revolution

Chapters in this book

1. Prelim pages i
2. Table of contents v
3. Introduction. Controversies and the dialectical texture of the Scientific Revolution 1
4. Part I. Astronomy and mechanics
5. Honoré Fabri S. J. and Galileo’s law of fall 13
6. Galileo, the Jesuits, and the controversy over the comets 33
7. Fair-mindedness versus sophistry in the Galileo affair 53
8. Part II. Light and gravity
9. From cohesion to pesanteur 77
10. Leibniz versus Newton on the nature of gravity and planetary motion 101
11. The argumentative use of methodology 123
12. Part III. Physiology and vitalism
13. Salient theories in the fossil debate in the early Royal Society 151
14. Were the arguments of William Harvey convincing to his contemporaries? 171
15. Why was there no controversy over life in the Scientific Revolution? 187
16. Part IV. Human sciences and theology
17. The pre-Adamite controversy and the problem of racial difference in seventeenth-century natural philosophy 223
18. Scientific revolution in the moral sciences 251
19. Contributors 277
20. Index 283