"Was there truly such a thing as Science in those times? (p1)"
"We would not be responding to the past as it existed, but examining it throught a modern grid. If we wish to do justice to the historical enterprise, we must take the past for what it was (p2)"
"We must respect the way earlier generations approached nature, acknowledging that althourgh it may differ from the modern way, it is nonetheless of interst because it is part of our intellectual ancestry. The is the only suitable way of understanding how we become what we are. (p3) I will distinguis"
"The word "know", seemingly so clear and simple, is almost as tricky as the term "science"; indeed, it brings us back to the distinction between technology and theoretical science. it is one thing to know how to do things, another to know why they behave as they do. (p4)"
"It shold be clear, then, that in pratical or technological terms, the knowledge of prehisotrical humans was great and growing. But what about theoretical knowledge? What did prehistoric people "know" or believe about the origins of the world in which they lived, its nature, and the causes of its num"
"It is clear that preliterate people, no less than those of us who live in modern scientific culture, need explanatory principles capable of bringing order, unity, and especially meaning to the apparently random and chaotic flow of events. (p5)"
"Our view of causality ... would not satisfy primitive man because of the impersonal character of its explanations. It would not satisfy him, moreover, because of its generality. We understand phenomena, not by what makes them peculiar, but by what makes them manifestations of general laws. But a gen"
"Knowledge of mathematics of Greece benifited from Egyptian and Babylonian mathematical knowledges.(p10) There is no doubt that the Greeks were aware of the work of their Egyptian and Mesopotamian predecessors, and benefited from it.(p20)"
作者简介
戴维·林德伯格(David C. Lindberg),1935年生,美国著名科学史家,威斯康星大学科学史系教授,主要研究领域为中世纪和近代早期科学史以及宗教与科学的关系。曾任科学史学会主席,1999年获得科学史研究的最高奖萨顿奖章。其代表作有:《从金迪到开普勒的视觉理论》、《罗吉尔·培根的自然哲学》、《罗吉尔·培根与透视法在中世纪的起源》、《西方科学的起源》;编著或合编有《中世纪的科学》、《上帝与自然》、《重新评价科学革命》、《当科学与基督教相遇时》等等。目前与南博斯(Ronald Numbers)担任尚未出齐的8卷本《剑桥科学史》的总主编。
张卜天,中国科技大学物理学学士,北京大学科技哲学博士,清华大学科学史系教授,研究方向为西方中世纪和近代科学思想史。精通科学史、科学普及与哲学翻译,译有著作近五十部。其译文优美流畅,广受读者好评。