Edward Grant's The Foundations of Modern Science in the Middle Ages

THE FOUNDATIONS OF MODERN SCIENCE IN THE MIDDLE AGES Their religious, institutional, and intellectual contexts EDWARD GRANT Indiana University

CAMBRIDGE UNIVERSITY PRESS

Contents

Preface

page xi 1. THE ROMAN EMPIRE AND THE FIRST SIX CENTURIES OF CHRISTIANITY

Christianity and pagan learning Hexaemeral literature: Christian commentaries on the creation account in Genesis Christianity and Greco-Roman culture The state of science and natural philosophy during the first six centuries of Christianity The seven liberal arts \ 2. THE NEW BEGINNING: THE AGE OF TRANSLATION IN THE TWELFTH AND THIRTEENTH CENTURIES

Education and learning in the twelfth century Latin translations from Arabic and Greek The translation of the works of Aristotle The dissemination and assimilation of Aristotle's natural philosophy , The contributions of Greek commentators The contributions of Islamic commentators Pseudo-Aristotelian works Reception of the translations 3. THE MEDIEVAL UNIVERSITY

Students and masters Teaching in the arts faculty

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2 5 7 9 14

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20 22 26 27 28 29 30 31 33

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The curriculum of the arts faculty Logic The quadrivium The three philosophies The higher faculties of theology and medicine The social and intellectual role of the university The manuscript culture of the Middle Ages 4. WHAT THE MIDDLE AGES INHERITED FROM ARISTOTLE

The terrestrial region: Realm of incessant change Motion in Aristotle's physics Natural motion of sublunar bodies Violent, or unnatural, motion The celestial region: Incorruptible and changeless 5. THE RECEPTION AND IMPACT OF ARISTOTELIAN LEARNING AND THE REACTION OF THE CHURCH AND ITS THEOLOGIANS

The Condemnation of 1277 The eternity of the world The doctrine of the double truth Limitations on God's absolute power Two senses of the hypothetical in medieval natural philosophy The theologian-natural philosophers 6. WHAT THE MIDDLE AGES DID WITH ITS ARISTOTELIAN LEGACY

The terrestrial region The causes of motion Internal resistance and natural motion in a vacuum Violent motion in a vacuum and impetus theory • The kinematics of motion Motion as the quantification of a quality: The intension and remission of forms The celestial region The three-orb compromise The number of total orbs Celestial incorruptibility and change The causes of celestial motion External movers Internal movers Internal and external movers combined Does the earth have a daily axial rotation?

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The world as a whole, and what may lie beyond Is the world created or eternal? On the possible existence of other worlds Does space or void exist beyond our world?

117 117 119 122

7. MEDIEVAL NATURAL PHILOSOPHY, ARISTOTELIANS, AND ARISTOTELIANISM

The questions literature of the late Middle Ages Natural philosophy in other literary modes The cosmos as subject matter of natural philosophy The big picture The operational details What is natural philosophy? The questions in natural philosophy The techniques and methodologies of natural philosophy Abstract methodology Methodologies that were actually used The role of mathematics in natural philosophy The use of natural philosophy in other disciplines Theology Medicine Music Characteristic features of medieval natural philosophy Aristotelians and Aristotelianism

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8. HOW THE FOUNDATIONS OF EARLY MODERN SCIENCE WERE LAID IN THE MIDDLE AGES

The contextual pre-conditions that made the Scientific Revolution possible The translations The universities The theologian-natural philosophers Religion and natural philosophy in medieval Islam A comparison of natural philosophy in Islam and the Christian West The other Christianity: Science and natural philosophy in the Byzantine Empire The substantive pre-conditions that made the Scientific Revolution possible The exact sciences Natural philosophy: The mother of all sciences Medieval natural philosophy and the language of science

127 131 133 133 135 135 137 141 142 144 148 152 152 156 158 158 161

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171 171 172 174 176 182 186 191 192 192 198

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Medieval natural philosophy and the problems of science Freedom of inquiry and the autonomy of reason On the relationship between medieval and early modern science On the relationship between early and late medieval science Greco-Arabic-Latin science: A triumph of three civilizations

198 199 203 205 205

Notes Bibliography Index

207 217 239