Awards

• Winner of *Choice* Outstanding Academic Book 2007.

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9780199296446

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Reviews

Gaukroger's book is a historical reconstruction that brackets historical context (social, practical, political etc.) and offers a plethora of studies on intellectual history on a variety of subjects that deserve attention in any investigation of the emergence of the scientific culture of the West. Wolfgang Lefevre ISIS d The thesis of his substanial and impreesive book is that Christianity indeed played a major, not, as often proposed, through the dissociation of science from religious concerns, but through a reconstituted partnership between Christianity and (a reconstructed) natural philosophy...I am not aware of any other treatment of these themes that combines so magisterially a discerning account of changing boundaries between disciplines with a dispassionate analysis of the changing relations between theology and the sciences. The result is a scholarly exploration on a grand scale. John Hedley Brooke British Journal for the History of Science Gaukroger's book is a historical context (social, practical, political, etc.) and offers a plethora of studies in intellectual history on a variety of subjects that deserve attention in any investigation of the emergence of the scientidic culture of the West. Wolfgang Lefevre ISIS This impressive and wide-ranging book is the first of a quintet devoted to the question: how in the (Western) world did all cognitive values come to be associated with scientific ones?... Gaukroger's grand beginning of an even grander five-volume narrative is an exceptional book. Its structure of scientific authority, as it were, is certain to stimulate long and lively discussions among academics of every stripe. Michael H. Shank, Renaissance Quarterly [A] substantial and impressive book...I am not aware of any other treatment of these themes that combines so magisterially a discerning account of changing boundaries between disciplines with a dispassionate analysis of the changing relations between theology and the sciences. The result is a scholarly exploration on the grand scale. John Hedley Brooke, British Journal for the History of Science especially useful to philosophers looking for the historical context of particular arguments. Few historians have the ambition to attempt a synoptic treatment of the entire history of Western science at anything more than an introductory level. Certainly, no one has undertaken such a project in recent years, when so much has been added to the secondary literature. Gaukroger's book is a comprehensive, narrative overview of the state of the art...[this book] and its companion volumes will fill an empty niche on scholars' bookshelves. David Marshall Miller, Notre Dame Philosophical Reviews A careful reading of this outstanding treatise by Gaukroger brings to life not only 500 crucial years that yielded the emergence of science in the west, but also the religious ferment and motivations that forwarded the new scientific culture. T. Eastman, Choice Gaukroger provides an insightful analysis...[and] the book's...content also reminds us of its author's accomplishments as a historian of philosophy. Peter Dear, Nature, Vol. 446 a project of breathtaking ambition... an impressive performance...and synthesizes a lot of difficult material into a coherent body. Times Literary Supplement

Gaukroger's book is a historical reconstruction that brackets historical context (social, practical, political etc.) and offers a plethora of studies on intellectual history on a variety of subjects that deserve attention in any investigation of the emergence of the scientific culture of the West. Wolfgang Lefevre ISIS d The thesis of his substanial and impreesive book is that Christianity indeed played a major, not, as often proposed, through the dissociation of science from religious concerns, but through a reconstituted partnership between Christianity and (a reconstructed) natural philosophy...I am not aware of any other treatment of these themes that combines so magisterially a discerning account of changing boundaries between disciplines with a dispassionate analysis of the changing relations between theology and the sciences. The result is a scholarly exploration on a grand scale. John Hedley Brooke British Journal for the History of Science Gaukroger's book is a historical context (social, practical, political, etc.) and offers a plethora of studies in intellectual history on a variety of subjects that deserve attention in any investigation of the emergence of the scientidic culture of the West. Wolfgang Lefevre ISIS This impressive and wide-ranging book is the first of a quintet devoted to the question: how in the (Western) world did all cognitive values come to be associated with scientific ones?... Gaukroger's grand beginning of an even grander five-volume narrative is an exceptional book. Its structure of scientific authority, as it were, is certain to stimulate long and lively discussions among academics of every stripe. Michael H. Shank, Renaissance Quarterly [A] substantial and impressive book...I am not aware of any other treatment of these themes that combines so magisterially a discerning account of changing boundaries between disciplines with a dispassionate analysis of the changing relations between theology and the sciences. The result is a scholarly exploration on the grand scale. John Hedley Brooke, British Journal for the History of Science especially useful to philosophers looking for the historical context of particular arguments. Few historians have the ambition to attempt a synoptic treatment of the entire history of Western science at anything more than an introductory level. Certainly, no one has undertaken such a project in recent years, when so much has been added to the secondary literature. Gaukroger's book is a comprehensive, narrative overview of the state of the art...[this book] and its companion volumes will fill an empty niche on scholars' bookshelves. David Marshall Miller, Notre Dame Philosophical Reviews A careful reading of this outstanding treatise by Gaukroger brings to life not only 500 crucial years that yielded the emergence of science in the west, but also the religious ferment and motivations that forwarded the new scientific culture. T. Eastman, Choice Gaukroger provides an insightful analysis...[and] the book's...content also reminds us of its author's accomplishments as a historian of philosophy. Peter Dear, Nature, Vol. 446 a project of breathtaking ambition... an impressive performance...and synthesizes a lot of difficult material into a coherent body. Times Literary Supplement

Author Information

Stephen Gaukroger has a BA (Philosophy) from the University of London and a Ph.D (History and Philosophy of Science) from the University of Cambridge. He was Research Fellow in the Philosophy of Science, Clare Hall, Cambridge, 1977-1978; Research Fellow, Department of History and Philosophy of Science, University of Melbourne, 1978-1980. Since 1981 he has been in the Philosophy Department at the University of Sydney where he is currently Professor of History of Philosophy and History of Science.

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