The Secrets of Alchemy

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Publisher : University of Chicago Press
ISBN 13 : 0226682951
Total Pages : 296 pages
Book Rating : 4.2/5 (266 download)

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Book Synopsis The Secrets of Alchemy by : Lawrence Principe

Download or read book The Secrets of Alchemy written by Lawrence Principe and published by University of Chicago Press. This book was released on 2013 with total page 296 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Alchemy, the Noble Art, conjures up scenes of mysterious, dimly lit laboratories populated with bearded old men stirring cauldrons. Though the history of alchemy is intricately linked to the history of chemistry, alchemy has nonetheless often been dismissed as the realm of myth and magic, or fraud and pseudoscience. And while its themes and ideas persist in some expected and unexpected places, from the Philosopher's (or Sorcerer's) Stone of Harry Potter to the self-help mantra of transformation, there has not been a serious, accessible, and up-to-date look at the complete history and influence of alchemy until now.

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Author :
Publisher : Editions Bréal
ISBN 13 : 2749521343
Total Pages : 323 pages
Book Rating : 4.7/5 (495 download)

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Download or read book written by and published by Editions Bréal. This book was released on with total page 323 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt:

Constructing Tradition

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Publisher : BRILL
ISBN 13 : 9004216375
Total Pages : 490 pages
Book Rating : 4.0/5 (42 download)

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Book Synopsis Constructing Tradition by : Andreas Kilcher

Download or read book Constructing Tradition written by Andreas Kilcher and published by BRILL. This book was released on 2010-10-30 with total page 490 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: The question of constructing tradition, concepts of origin, and memory as well as techniques and practices of knowledge transmission, are central for cultures in general. In esotericism, however, such questions and techniques play an outstanding role and are widely reflected upon, in its literature. Esoteric paradigms not only understand themselves in elaborated mytho-poetical narratives as bearers of “older”, “hidden”, “higher” knowledge. They also claim their knowledge to be of a particular origin. And they claim this knowledge has been transmitted by particular (esoteric) means, media and groups. Consequently, esotericism not only involves the construction of its own tradition; it can even be understood as a specific form of tradition and transmission. The various studies of the present voume, which contains the papers of a conference held in Tübingen in July 2007, provide an overview of the most important concepts and ways of constructing tradition in esotericism.

The Transmutations of Chymistry

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Publisher : University of Chicago Press
ISBN 13 : 022670081X
Total Pages : 481 pages
Book Rating : 4.2/5 (267 download)

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Book Synopsis The Transmutations of Chymistry by : Lawrence M. DeMartino

Download or read book The Transmutations of Chymistry written by Lawrence M. DeMartino and published by University of Chicago Press. This book was released on 2020-10-09 with total page 481 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: This book reevaluates the changes to chymistry that took place from 1660 to 1730 through a close study of the chymist Wilhelm Homberg (1653–1715) and the changing fortunes of his discipline at the Académie Royale des Sciences, France’s official scientific body. By charting Homberg’s remarkable life from Java to France’s royal court, and his endeavor to create a comprehensive theory of chymistry (including alchemical transmutation), Lawrence M. Principe reveals the period’s significance and reassesses its place in the broader sweep of the history of science. Principe, the leading authority on the subject, recounts how Homberg’s radical vision promoted chymistry as the most powerful and reliable means of understanding the natural world. Homberg’s work at the Académie and in collaboration with the future regent, Philippe II d’Orléans, as revealed by a wealth of newly uncovered documents, provides surprising new insights into the broader changes chymistry underwent during, and immediately after, Homberg. A human, disciplinary, and institutional biography, The Transmutations of Chymistry significantly revises what was previously known about the contours of chymistry and scientific institutions in the early eighteenth century.

Theosophy, Imagination, Tradition

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Publisher : SUNY Press
ISBN 13 : 9780791444351
Total Pages : 310 pages
Book Rating : 4.4/5 (443 download)

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Book Synopsis Theosophy, Imagination, Tradition by : Antoine Faivre

Download or read book Theosophy, Imagination, Tradition written by Antoine Faivre and published by SUNY Press. This book was released on 2000-02-17 with total page 310 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: A historical and interpretive study of three aspects of Western esotericism from the Renaissance to the twentieth century.

Descartes and the Ingenium

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Publisher : BRILL
ISBN 13 : 9004437622
Total Pages : 253 pages
Book Rating : 4.0/5 (44 download)

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Book Synopsis Descartes and the Ingenium by : Raphaële Garrod

Download or read book Descartes and the Ingenium written by Raphaële Garrod and published by BRILL. This book was released on 2020-11-23 with total page 253 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: A historically-informed account of the lasting importance of embodied thought in the intellectual trajectory of René Descartes, still remembered today as the founding father of dualism.

Promethean Ambitions

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Publisher : University of Chicago Press
ISBN 13 : 0226577139
Total Pages : 358 pages
Book Rating : 4.2/5 (265 download)

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Book Synopsis Promethean Ambitions by : William R. Newman

Download or read book Promethean Ambitions written by William R. Newman and published by University of Chicago Press. This book was released on 2005-10-01 with total page 358 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: In an age when the nature of reality is complicated daily by advances in bioengineering, cloning, and artificial intelligence, it is easy to forget that the ever-evolving boundary between nature and technology has long been a source of ethical and scientific concern: modern anxieties about the possibility of artificial life and the dangers of tinkering with nature more generally were shared by opponents of alchemy long before genetic science delivered us a cloned sheep named Dolly. In Promethean Ambitions, William R. Newman ambitiously uses alchemy to investigate the thinning boundary between the natural and the artificial. Focusing primarily on the period between 1200 and 1700, Newman examines the labors of pioneering alchemists and the impassioned—and often negative—responses to their efforts. By the thirteenth century, Newman argues, alchemy had become a benchmark for determining the abilities of both men and demons, representing the epitome of creative power in the natural world. Newman frames the art-nature debate by contrasting the supposed transmutational power of alchemy with the merely representational abilities of the pictorial and plastic arts—a dispute which found artists such as Leonardo da Vinci and Bernard Palissy attacking alchemy as an irreligious fraud. The later assertion by the Paracelsian school that one could make an artificial human being—the homunculus—led to further disparagement of alchemy, but as Newman shows, the immense power over nature promised by the field contributed directly to the technological apologetics of Francis Bacon and his followers. By the mid-seventeenth century, the famous "father of modern chemistry," Robert Boyle, was employing the arguments of medieval alchemists to support the identity of naturally occurring substances with those manufactured by "chymical" means. In using history to highlight the art-nature debate, Newman here shows that alchemy was not an unformed and capricious precursor to chemistry; it was an art founded on coherent philosophical and empirical principles, with vocal supporters and even louder critics, that attracted individuals of first-rate intellect. The historical relationship that Newman charts between human creation and nature has innumerable implications today, and he ably links contemporary issues to alchemical debates on the natural versus the artificial.

India and Beyond

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Publisher : Routledge
ISBN 13 : 1136821074
Total Pages : 711 pages
Book Rating : 4.1/5 (368 download)

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Book Synopsis India and Beyond by : Dick van der Meij

Download or read book India and Beyond written by Dick van der Meij and published by Routledge. This book was released on 2013-09-13 with total page 711 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: First published in 1997. The International Institute for Asian Studies (lIAS) is pleased to introduce a new series 'Studies from the International Institute for Asian Studies'. This present volume, India and Beyond; Aspects of Literature Meaning, Ritual and Thought, contains more than 30 contributions from well-established scholars from different disciplinary backgrounds. These essays are in honour of one of the founding fathers of the lIAS, Frits Staal, Professor Emeritus of Philosophy and South Asian Languages, University of California at Berkeley. This volume is edited by Dick van der Meij, editor of the Indonesian-Netherlands Cooperation in Islamic Studies Programme at Leiden University.

Esotericism and the Academy

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Publisher : Cambridge University Press
ISBN 13 : 0521196213
Total Pages : 479 pages
Book Rating : 4.5/5 (211 download)

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Book Synopsis Esotericism and the Academy by : Wouter J. Hanegraaff

Download or read book Esotericism and the Academy written by Wouter J. Hanegraaff and published by Cambridge University Press. This book was released on 2012-01-19 with total page 479 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: The neglected history of how intellectuals since the Renaissance have approached ideas of the occult which challenged biblical religion.

Shakespeare and the supernatural

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Publisher : Manchester University Press
ISBN 13 : 1526109131
Total Pages : 312 pages
Book Rating : 4.5/5 (261 download)

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Book Synopsis Shakespeare and the supernatural by : Victoria Bladen

Download or read book Shakespeare and the supernatural written by Victoria Bladen and published by Manchester University Press. This book was released on 2020-02-05 with total page 312 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: This edited collection of twelve essays from an international range of contemporary Shakespeare scholars explores the supernatural in Shakespeare from a variety of perspectives and approaches.

Pierre Gassendi

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Publisher : Taylor & Francis
ISBN 13 : 1315521717
Total Pages : 502 pages
Book Rating : 4.3/5 (155 download)

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Book Synopsis Pierre Gassendi by : Delphine Bellis

Download or read book Pierre Gassendi written by Delphine Bellis and published by Taylor & Francis. This book was released on 2023-04-21 with total page 502 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Pierre Gassendi (1592–1655) was a major figure in seventeenth-century philosophy and science and his works contributed to shaping Western intellectual identity. Among “new philosophers,” he was considered Descartes’s main rival, and he belonged to the first rank of those attempting to carve out an alternative to Aristotelian philosophy. In his writings, he promoted a revival of atomism and Epicureanism within a Christian framework, and advocated an empiricist and probabilistic epistemology which was to have a major impact on later thinkers such as Locke and Newton. He is moreover important for his astronomical work, for his defense of Galileo’s mechanics and cosmology, and for his activity as a biographer. Given the importance of Gassendi for the history of science and philosophy, it is surprising to see that he has been largely ignored in the Anglophone world. This collection of essays constitutes the first book on Gassendi in the English language that covers his biography, bibliography, and all aspects of his work. The book is divided into three parts. Part I offers a reconstruction of the genesis of Gassendi’s Epicurean project, an overview of his biography, and analyses of Gassendi’s early attacks on Aristotle, of his advocacy of Epicurean philosophy, and his relation to the skeptical tradition and to Cicero’s thought. Part II addresses Gassendi as a participant in seventeenth-century philosophical and scientific debates, focusing especially on his controversies with Descartes and Fludd. Part III explores Gassendi’s contributions to logic, theories of space and time, mechanics, astronomy, cosmology, and the study of living beings, and presents the reception of Gassendi’s thought in England. This book is an essential resource for scholars and upper-level students of early modern philosophy, intellectual history, and the history of science who want to get acquainted with Pierre Gassendi as a major philosopher and intellectual figure of the early modern period.

The Jesuits

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Publisher : Princeton University Press
ISBN 13 : 0691226199
Total Pages : 872 pages
Book Rating : 4.6/5 (912 download)

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Book Synopsis The Jesuits by : Markus Friedrich

Download or read book The Jesuits written by Markus Friedrich and published by Princeton University Press. This book was released on 2022-03-01 with total page 872 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: The most comprehensive and up-to-date exploration of one of the most important religious orders in the modern world Since its founding by Ignatius of Loyola in 1540, the Society of Jesus—more commonly known as the Jesuits—has played a critical role in the events of modern history. From the Counter-Reformation to the ascent of Francis I as the first Jesuit pope, The Jesuits presents an intimate look at one of the most important religious orders not only in the Catholic Church, but also the world. Markus Friedrich describes an organization that has deftly walked a tightrope between sacred and secular involvement and experienced difficulties during changing times, all while shaping cultural developments from pastoral care and spirituality to art, education, and science. Examining the Jesuits in the context of social, cultural, and world history, Friedrich sheds light on how the order shaped the culture of the Counter-Reformation and participated in the establishment of European empires, including missionary activity throughout Asia and in many parts of Africa in the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries. He also explores the place of Jesuits in the New World and addresses the issue of Jesuit slaveholders. The Jesuits often tangled with the Roman Curia and the pope, resulting in their suppression in 1773, but the order returned in 1814 to rise again to a powerful position of influence. Friedrich demonstrates that the Jesuit fathers were not a monolithic group and he considers the distinctive spiritual legacy inherited by Pope Francis. With its global scope and meticulous attention to archival sources and previous scholarship, The Jesuits illustrates the heterogeneous, varied, and contradictory perspectives of this famed religious organization.

Atoms and Alchemy

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Publisher : University of Chicago Press
ISBN 13 : 0226577031
Total Pages : 265 pages
Book Rating : 4.2/5 (265 download)

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Book Synopsis Atoms and Alchemy by : William R. Newman

Download or read book Atoms and Alchemy written by William R. Newman and published by University of Chicago Press. This book was released on 2010-05-05 with total page 265 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Since the Enlightenment, alchemy has been viewed as a sort of antiscience, disparaged by many historians as a form of lunacy that impeded the development of rational chemistry. But in Atoms and Alchemy, William R. Newman—a historian widely credited for reviving recent interest in alchemy—exposes the speciousness of these views and challenges widely held beliefs about the origins of the Scientific Revolution. Tracing the alchemical roots of Robert Boyle’s famous mechanical philosophy, Newman shows that alchemy contributed to the mechanization of nature, a movement that lay at the very heart of scientific discovery. Boyle and his predecessors—figures like the mysterious medieval Geber or the Lutheran professor Daniel Sennert—provided convincing experimental proof that matter is made up of enduring particles at the microlevel. At the same time, Newman argues that alchemists created the operational criterion of an “atomic” element as the last point of analysis, thereby contributing a key feature to the development of later chemistry. Atomsand Alchemy thus provokes a refreshing debate about the origins of modern science and will be welcomed—and deliberated—by all who are interested in the development of scientific theory and practice.

Humanistica Lovaniensia

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Publisher : Leuven University Press
ISBN 13 : 9789061867647
Total Pages : 620 pages
Book Rating : 4.8/5 (676 download)

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Book Synopsis Humanistica Lovaniensia by : Jozef Ijsewijn

Download or read book Humanistica Lovaniensia written by Jozef Ijsewijn and published by Leuven University Press. This book was released on 1996-02-15 with total page 620 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Volume 45

Elements, Principles and Corpuscles

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Publisher : Springer Science & Business Media
ISBN 13 : 9401594643
Total Pages : 239 pages
Book Rating : 4.4/5 (15 download)

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Book Synopsis Elements, Principles and Corpuscles by : Antonio Clericuzio

Download or read book Elements, Principles and Corpuscles written by Antonio Clericuzio and published by Springer Science & Business Media. This book was released on 2013-04-17 with total page 239 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: In Elements, Principles and Particles, Antonio Clericuzio explores the relationships between chemistry and corpuscular philosophy in the age of the Scientific Revolution. Science historians have regarded chemistry and corpuscular philosophy as two distinct traditions. Clericuzio's view is that since the beginning of the 17th century atomism and chemistry were strictly connected. This is attested by Daniel Sennert and by many hitherto little-known French and English natural philosophers. They often combined a corpuscular theory of matter with Paracelsian chemical (and medical) doctrines. Boyle plays a central part in the present book: Clericuzio redefines Boyle's chemical views, by showing that Boyle did not subordinate chemistry to the principles of mechanical philosophy. When Boyle explained chemical phenomena, he had recourse to corpuscles endowed with chemical, not mechanical, properties. The combination of chemistry and corpuscular philosophy was adopted by a number of chemists active in the last decades of the 17th century, both in England and on the Continent. Using a large number of primary sources, the author challenges the standard view of the corpuscular theory of matter as identical with the mechanical philosophy. He points out that different versions of the corpuscular philosophy flourished in the 17th century. Most of them were not based on the mechanical theory, i.e. on the view that matter is inert and has only mechanical properties. Throughout the 17th century, active principles, as well as chemical properties, are attributed to corpuscles. Given its broad coverage, the book is a significant contribution to both history of science and history of philosophy.

The Practice of Reason

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Publisher : John Benjamins Publishing
ISBN 13 : 9027218870
Total Pages : 377 pages
Book Rating : 4.0/5 (272 download)

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Book Synopsis The Practice of Reason by : Marcelo Dascal

Download or read book The Practice of Reason written by Marcelo Dascal and published by John Benjamins Publishing. This book was released on 2010 with total page 377 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Gottfried Wilhelm Leibniz (1646-1716) dedicated much of his life to some of the most central debates of his time. For him, our chance of progress towards the happiness of mankind lies in the capacity to recognize the value of the different perspectives through which humans approach the world. Controversies supply the opportunity to exercise this capacity by approaching the opponent not as an adversary but as someone from whose point of view we can enrich our own viewpoint and improve our knowledge. This approach inspired the creation of this series. The book the first in the series devoted to Leibniz presents his views through actual controversies in which he participated, in several domains. Leibniz s original theory of controversies thus appears not only as what the thinker "thinks" about how one "should use" reason in a controversy, but also how he "puts in practice" the kind of rationality he preaches."

Blood, Sweat and Tears - The Changing Concepts of Physiology from Antiquity Into Early Modern Europe

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Publisher : BRILL
ISBN 13 : 9004229183
Total Pages : 801 pages
Book Rating : 4.0/5 (42 download)

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Book Synopsis Blood, Sweat and Tears - The Changing Concepts of Physiology from Antiquity Into Early Modern Europe by : Manfred Horstmanshoff

Download or read book Blood, Sweat and Tears - The Changing Concepts of Physiology from Antiquity Into Early Modern Europe written by Manfred Horstmanshoff and published by BRILL. This book was released on 2012-06-22 with total page 801 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Drawing on the methods of a wide range of academic disciplines, this volume shifts the focus of the history of the body, exploring the many different ways in which its physiology and its fluids were understood in pre-modern European thought.