A01=Mario Biagioli
astronomy
Author_Mario Biagioli
authority
book of nature
Category=DNBT
Category=PG
communication
copernicanism
court philosopher
credibility
culture
discovery
distance
doctrine
epistemology
eq_bestseller
eq_biography-true-stories
eq_isMigrated=1
eq_isMigrated=2
eq_nobargain
eq_non-fiction
eq_science
exchange
florence
galileo
heresy
history
holy office
inquisition
invention
mathematician
medicean stars
nonfiction
padua
patronage
religion
renaissance
science
scientific instruments
scripture
sunspots
telescope
theology
theory
university
visual studies
Product details
- ISBN 9780226045610
- Weight: 624g
- Dimensions: 17 x 24mm
- Publication Date: 14 Apr 2006
- Publisher: The University of Chicago Press
- Publication City/Country: US
- Product Form: Hardback
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In six short years, Galileo Galilei went from being a somewhat obscure mathematics professor running a student boarding house in Padua to a star in the court of Florence to the recipient of dangerous attention from the Inquisition for his support of Copernicanism. In that brief period, Galileo made a series of astronomical discoveries that reshaped the debate over the physical nature of the heavens: he deeply modified the practices and status of astronomy with the introduction of the telescope and pictorial evidence, proposed a radical reconfiguration of the relationship between theology and astronomy, and transformed himself from university mathematician into court philosopher. "Galileo's Instruments of Credit" proposes radical new interpretations of several key episodes of Galileo's career, including his early telescopic discoveries of 1610, the dispute over sunspots, and the conflict with the Holy Office over the relationship between Copernicanism and Scripture.
Galileo's tactics during this time shifted as rapidly as his circumstances, argues Mario Biagioli, and the pace of these changes forced him to respond swiftly to the opportunities and risks posed by unforeseen inventions, further discoveries, and the interventions of his opponents. Focusing on the aspects of Galileo's scientific life that extend beyond the framework of court culture and patronage, Biagioli offers a revisionist account of the different systems of exchanges, communication, and credibility at work in various phases of Galileo's career. "Galileo's Instruments of Credit" will find grateful readers among scholars of science studies, historical epistemology, visual studies, Galilean science, and late Renaissance astronomy.
Mario Biagioli is professor of history of science at Harvard University and the author of Galileo, Courtier: The Practice of Science in the Culture of Absolutism, also published by the University of Chicago Press.
