History of the Inductive Sciences

From the Earliest to the Present Times

Bibliographic Data

ID23780221
AuthorsWilliam Whewell (corresponding author)
Year2010
Publication date2010-09-09
Open AccessYes
TypeBOOK
VenueHistory of the Inductive Sciences : Volume 1 (SOURCE_BOOK)
PublisherCambridge University Press (PUBLISHER • US)
DOI10.1017/cbo9780511734335
OpenAlexW4300567947
ISBN9780511734335
LanguageEN
Citations received8

A central figure in Victorian science, William Whewell (1794–1866) held professorships in Mineralogy and Moral Philosophy at Trinity College, Cambridge, before becoming Master of the college in 1841. His mathematical textbooks, such as A Treatise on Dynamics (1823), were instrumental in bringing French analytical methods into British science. This three-volume history, first published in 1837, is one of Whewell's most famous works. Taking the 'acute, but fruitless, essays of Greek philosophy' as a starting point, it provides a history of the physical sciences that culminates with the mechanics, astronomy, and chemistry of 'modern times'. Volume 1 studies Greek physics and metaphysics, attributing their failure to a method that derived its principles from the common use of language. It surveys the state of the physical sciences in the middle ages, and deals with the rise of 'formal' astronomy - based on observation rather than calculation - as exemplified by Copernicus.

Art history · Astronomy · Copernicus · Epistemology · History Of Physics · History of science · Mathematics education · Metaphysics · Philosophy of physics · Philosophy of science · Physical science · Physics · Point (geometry) · State (computer science) · Theoretical physics · Classics · History · History and Philosophy of Science · History of Science and Medicine · Mathematics · Philosophy · Philosophy and History of Science

Tools

Open DOI