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10Merchants of Light and Lamps: John Evelyn’s Transition from Descriptive to Experimental Natural HistoryPerspectives on Science 1-55. forthcoming.This paper discusses the methodological relation between natural history and natural philosophy in the case of John Evelyn (1620–1706). I propose to examine Evelyn’s tree cultivation projects and to identify relevant aspects of his attempt to move from descriptive natural history to experimental natural history. My central argument is that Evelyn’s intention in this endeavour was to develop a series of experimental natural history projects that could provide general laws and axioms of nature as …Read more
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6Husbandry Tradition and the Emergence of Vegetable Philosophy in the Hartlib CirclePhilosophia: International Journal of Philosophy (Philippine e-journal) 16 (1): 35-52. 2015.The aim of this paper is to analyze the transformation of a tradition of husbandry from moral and political philosophy to natural magic and technology. In the early 1640s there was a shift of approach in the Hartlib circle from the ecclesiastical peace projects to the more experimental and practical projects of husbandry. The discipline of vegetable philosophy defined a new field of interest which could connect the Baconian tradition of experimentation, the desire to compile natural histories, a…Read more
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10Marco Storni, Maupertuis. Le philosophe, l'académicien, le polémiste, ParisCentaurus 64 (3): 783-788. 2022.
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21Treating plants as laboratories: A chemical natural history of vegetation in 17th‐century E nglandCentaurus 62 (3): 542-561. 2020.This paper investigates the emergence, in the second part of the 17th century, of a new body of experimental knowledge dealing with the chemical transformations of water taking place in plants. We call this body of experimental knowledge a “chemical history of vegetation.” We show that this chemical natural history originated, in terms of recipes and methods of investigation, in the works of Francis Bacon and that it was constructed in accordance with Bacon's precepts for putting together natura…Read more
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11Sur le progres des sciences: Maupertuis and Bacon on the Advancement of KnowledgeJournal of Early Modern Studies 8 (2): 81-101. 2019.This paper investigates the Baconian roots of Maupertuis’s Lettre XIX. Sur le Progrès des Sciences. The Letter was published almost a decade after Maupertuis had accepted Frederick II’s invitation to move from Paris to Berlin and become the new President of the Prussian Academy of Sciences. Contrary to the secondary literature that identifies a distinction between Maupertuis’s Parisian and Berliner phases, this paper argues that there is in fact greater continuity between the two. Based on a rea…Read more
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22Experimenting with Matter in the Works of Gabriel PlattesPerspectives on Science 28 (3): 398-420. 2020.This paper investigates the relation between Gabriel Plattes’ cosmology and theory of matter, on the one hand, and his method of experimentation, on the other. In my view Plattes based his cosmology and theory of matter on specific “principles of nature” expressed as alchemical qualitative relations between bodies, and these principles formed the theoretical framework for his experimental method and technologies. I also claim that Plattes’ method of experimentation has heuristic purposes, acting…Read more
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45Gabriel Plattes, Hartlib Circle and the Interest for Husbandry in the Seventeenth Century EnglandProlegomena 11 (2): 207-224. 2012.
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49Revenge Against Tyrants. The Political Theory of French Protestantism (review)Cultura 7 (1): 261-263. 2010.
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27Reconstructing Sylva sylvarum: Ralph Austen’s Observations and the Use of ExperimentJournal of Early Modern Studies 6 (1): 91-115. 2017.Bacon’s projects of natural history were extremely popular in the mid-seventeenth century, especially for a group of people devoted to experimental activities, namely the Hartlib Circle. Ralph Austen, one member of the Hartlib Circle, tried to construct his own project of natural history using Bacon’s Sylva sylvarum as a pattern and following the Baconian scheme with particular interest for the methodological aspects entailed by such an endeavor. This paper provides an account of Austen’s attem…Read more
Oana Matei
Vasile Goldis Western University of Arad
University of Bucharest
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Vasile Goldis Western University of AradRegular Faculty
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University of BucharestOther
Areas of Specialization
History of Western Philosophy |
Areas of Interest
History of Western Philosophy |