Science, Culture, and Politics in Britain, 1750-1870

Science, Culture, and Politics in Britain, 1750-1870
Author: Jack Morrell
Publisher: Routledge
Total Pages: 360
Release: 1997
Genre: History
ISBN:

From the late 1960s, Jack Morrell's articles have stimulated a reorientation of the historiography of science. He showed by example, in the studies now gathered here, how the social, political, economic, and institutional aspects of science could be integrated with its content. In his writings he assumed that science was a socially organised attempt to set and solve problems concerning the natural world, and that historians should take cognisance of everything which affected that activity - without down-grading published knowledge, its end-product. Specific topics in this volume include the institutions of British science, especially universities, laboratories, and research schools, the careers of the scientists, and the impact of science in the north of England and, especially, in Scotland.

Scientific Culture and Urbanisation in Industrialising Britain

Scientific Culture and Urbanisation in Industrialising Britain
Author: Ian Inkster
Publisher: Taylor & Francis
Total Pages: 361
Release: 2024-10-28
Genre: History
ISBN: 1040250769

Ian Inkster’s intent in these studies is to move beyond the high culture and expertise of science towards the construction of the culture of urban communities. The work draws on a mass of detailed research and focuses on Britain's social and cultural advantages over other industrialising nations in the years prior to the Great Exhibition of 1851, an advantage which was not created by any single decision, nor by any explicit investment effect. Out of urban culture emerged a public sphere and an information system within which class divisions were abrogated; at the same time the relations between information and technique became complex and decidedly non-linear. So was created a social asset drawn upon by business interests, technicians, tinkerers and inventors throughout the period, and for some considerable time beyond it. Industrial Britain was made from diverse materials, amongst which were those fabricated in the course of cultural dissent and social ambition.

The Practice of British Geology, 1750-1850

The Practice of British Geology, 1750-1850
Author: Hugh Torrens
Publisher: Taylor & Francis
Total Pages: 386
Release: 2024-10-28
Genre: History
ISBN: 1040247776

Geology is the most historical of all sciences. Yet its own history remains neglected, especially the many aspects of how geology was practised in the past. This volume analyses the careers of some important practical figures in English, Welsh, Scottish and Irish geology between 1750 and 1850. These include people who would have regarded themselves more as mining engineers (or ’coal viewers' as they were then called in the vital coal industry) or ’mineral surveyors' as today's mineral prospectors were first called (from 1808), or even inventors. Their expertise, in the land which led the industrial revolution, took them all over the world. Those included here went to Italy, and South (Peru) and North America (Virginia and Canada). The practice of geology, through the search for mines and minerals, has been much less attended to by historians than the geology which was undertaken by leisured amateurs - even though practical geology was as important in the past as the oil industry is today.

Science, Politics and Universities in Europe, 1600-1800

Science, Politics and Universities in Europe, 1600-1800
Author: John Gascoigne
Publisher: Taylor & Francis
Total Pages: 277
Release: 2024-10-28
Genre: History
ISBN: 1040234119

This book seeks to illustrate the interconnections of science and philosophy with religion and politics in the early modern period by focusing on the institutional dynamics of the university. Much of the work is devoted to one key university- that of Cambridge- and examines the major issues of the institutional setting of Newton’s work, the religious and political circumstances that favoured its dissemination, and the way in which it was dealt with in the curriculum. But the author also seeks to place the problem of the role of science in the early modern university in a larger, European context. To do so, he includes a close prosopographical analysis of the scientific community from the mid-15th TO the end of the 18th century, and discusses the complex relations between the universities and the Enlightenment.

Scientific Institutions and Practice in France and Britain, c.1700–c.1870

Scientific Institutions and Practice in France and Britain, c.1700–c.1870
Author: Maurice Crosland
Publisher: Taylor & Francis
Total Pages: 288
Release: 2023-05-31
Genre: History
ISBN: 1000944387

This second collection of studies by Maurice Crosland has as a first theme the differences in the style and organisation of scientific activity in Britain and France in the 18th and early 19th centuries. Science was more closely controlled in France, notably by the Paris Academy of Sciences, and the work of provincial amateurs much less prominent than in Britain. The most dramatic change in any branch of science during this period was in chemistry, largely through the work of Lavoisier and his colleagues, the focus of several articles here, and the dominance of this group caused considerable resentment outside France, not least by Joseph Priestley. The issue of authority in science emerges again, within France under the rule of Napoleon, in a study of the exceptional power exercised by the great mathematician Laplace both in theoretical science and in academic politics. This exploration of organisation and power is complemented by a comparative study of the practice of early 'physics' and chemistry and their different reliance on laboratories. This raises the question of whether chemistry provided a model for later experimental work in other sciences, both through the construction of pioneering laboratories and in establishing early schools of research.

From Atoms to Molecules

From Atoms to Molecules
Author: Colin A. Russell
Publisher: Taylor & Francis
Total Pages: 331
Release: 2024-08-01
Genre: History
ISBN: 1040249914

The focus of this volume by Professor Russell is the history of organic chemistry, which arose improbably out of early speculations about the construction of chemical compounds, and in particular their electrochemical nature. The rise of electrochemistry and the work of Berzelius were critical in this regard, and receive much attention in the first few chapters in this book. Aspects of the contributions of Frankland (fully explored elsewhere) and those of Kekulê and Hofmann are considered, together with the miscellaneous functions of organic synthesis and the origins of conformational analysis. Questions of chemical organisation are germane to the whole sequence of events and are briefly summarized before the whole last hundred years of organic chemistry are placed in historical perspective.

Science, Philosophy and Religion in the Age of the Enlightenment

Science, Philosophy and Religion in the Age of the Enlightenment
Author: John Gascoigne
Publisher: Taylor & Francis
Total Pages: 299
Release: 2024-10-28
Genre: History
ISBN: 1040234224

Taking as its focus the wide-ranging character of the Enlightenment, both in geographical and intellectual terms, this second collection of articles by John Gascoigne explores this movement's filiation and influence in a range of contexts. In contrast to some recently influential views it emphasises the evolutionary rather than the revolutionary character of the Enlightenment and its ability to change society by adaptation rather than demolition. This it does by reference, firstly, to developments in Britain tracing the changing views of history in relation to the Biblical account, the ideological uses of science (and particularly the work of Newton) and their connections to developments in moral philosophy and the teaching of science and philosophy in response to Enlightenment modes of thought. The collection then turns to the wider global setting of the Enlightenment and the way in which that movement served to provide a justification for European exploration and expansion, developments which found one of their most potent embodiments in the diverse uses of mapping. The collection concludes with an exploration of the interplay between the experience of Pacific contact and the currents of thought which characterised the Enlightenment in Germany.

Evolutionary Naturalism in Victorian Britain

Evolutionary Naturalism in Victorian Britain
Author: Bernard Lightman
Publisher: Taylor & Francis
Total Pages: 347
Release: 2023-05-31
Genre: History
ISBN: 1000941574

Scholars have tended to portray T.H. Huxley, John Tyndall, and their allies as the dominant cultural authority in the second half of the 19th century. Defenders of Darwin and his theory of evolution, these men of science are often seen as a potent force for the secularization of British intellectual and social life. In this collection of essays Bernard Lightman argues that historians have exaggerated the power of scientific naturalism to undermine the role of religion in middle and late-Victorian Britain. The essays deal with the evolutionary naturalists, especially the biologist Thomas Henry Huxley, the physicist John Tyndall, and the philosopher of evolution, Herbert Spencer. But they look also at those who criticized this influential group of elite intellectuals, including aristocratic spokesman A. J Balfour, the novelist Samuel Butler, and the popularizer of science Frank Buckland. Focusing on the theme of the limitations of the cultural power of evolutionary naturalism, the volume points to the enduring strength of religion in Britain in the latter half of the 19th century.

Lacan and Fantasy Literature

Lacan and Fantasy Literature
Author: Josephine Sharoni
Publisher: BRILL
Total Pages: 245
Release: 2017-07-03
Genre: Psychology
ISBN: 9004336583

Eschewing the all-pervading contextual approach to literary criticism, this book takes a Lacanian view of several popular British fantasy texts of the late 19th century such as Bram Stoker’s Dracula, revealing the significance of the historical context; the advent of a modern democratic urban society in place of the traditional agrarian one. Moreover, counter-intuitively it turns out that fantasy literature is analogous to modern Galilean science in its manipulation of the symbolic thereby changing our conception of reality. It is imaginary devices such as vampires and ape-men, which in conjunction with Lacanian theory say something additional of the truth about – primarily sexual – aspects of human subjectivity and culture, repressed by the contemporary hegemonic discourses.

Modern Britain Third Edition

Modern Britain Third Edition
Author: Edward Royle
Publisher: Bloomsbury Publishing
Total Pages: 577
Release: 2016-05-16
Genre: History
ISBN: 1849665699

Praise for the first edition: 'Royle calls on an impressive range of materials (supported by an excellent bibliography) to offer a judicious review of most of the issues currently confronted by social historians. His agenda contains both traditional and novel elements [...] all are presented with admirable clarity and balance. [...] A volume which shows an astonishing command of such a wide range of material will long prove essential reading.' Times Literary Supplement This popular work provides an in-depth historical background to issues of contemporary concern, tracing developments over the past two and a half centuries. It promotes accessibility by adopting a thematic approach, with each theme treated chronologically. Major themes are chosen partly by their importance to an understanding of the past and partly by their relevance to students of contemporary Britain - rather than by imposing current fashions in historical study on the past. Thoroughly revised, the third edition of Modern Britain reviews and brings up to date the content to take account of developments since 1997 and reconsiders emphases and interpretations in light of more recent scholarship. It incorporates new currents in historical writing on matters such as the language of class, the position of women, and the revolution worked by the Internet and mobile technologies. Modern Britain is vital reading for students of history and the social and political sciences.