Matters of Exchange: Commerce, Medicine, and Science in the Dutch Golden AgeA new and unexpected history of the Dutch pursuit of commerce in the 16th and 17th centuries and how it triggered the Scientific Revolution In this wide-ranging and stimulating book, a leading authority on the history of medicine and science presents convincing evidence that Dutch commerce—not religion—inspired the rise of science in the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries. Harold J. Cook scrutinizes a wealth of historical documents relating to the study of medicine and natural history in the Netherlands and elsewhere in Europe, Brazil, South Africa, and Asia during this era, and his conclusions are fresh and exciting. He uncovers direct links between the rise of trade and commerce in the Dutch Empire and the flourishing of scientific investigation. Cook argues that engaging in commerce changed the thinking of Dutch citizens, leading to a new emphasis on such values as objectivity, accumulation, and description. The preference for accurate information that accompanied the rise of commerce also laid the groundwork for the rise of science globally, wherever the Dutch engaged in trade. Medicine and natural history were fundamental aspects of this new science, as reflected in the development of gardens for both pleasure and botanical study, anatomical theaters, curiosity cabinets, and richly illustrated books about nature. Sweeping in scope and original in its insights, this book revises previous understandings of the history of science and ideas. |
From inside the book
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... mind-body dualism, with the history of ''ideas'' affecting the history of ''society'' or vice versa, but as an integrated whole that represented united lives. My first attempt at such an account used printed and manuscript documents ...
... mind, reminding me that few working historians get a chance to expand their horizons much beyond the limits of ... minds but in bodies, and not only in individual persons but in all things. I can only hope that the results produced from ...
... minds but from the passions and interests of mind and body united. And by examining how natural knowledge was changed in one place we can glimpse the larger canvas on 1 which the human experience of our own age still exhibits. Worldly.
... mind from the world but from keenly interested engagement with it. Among the figures who appear below are some of the most eminent natural investigators of their age, although today they are not well known outside the Dutch-speaking ...
... minds'' of people alone but to how their experiences involved them in finding out about the myriad things around them. Curiosity about particular things even gave rise to a new word: ''fact,'' or ''a matter of fact,'' a term (as we now ...
Contents
1 | |
42 | |
82 | |
Four Commerce and Medicine in Amsterdam | 133 |
Five Truths and Untruths from the Indies | 175 |
Descartes in the Republic | 226 |
Seven Industry and Analysis | 267 |
Eight Gardens of the Indies Transported | 304 |
The Medicine of East Asia | 339 |
Sticking to Simple Things | 378 |
Eleven Conclusions and Comparisons | 410 |
Notes | 417 |
Bibliography | 473 |
Index | 537 |
Other editions - View all
Matters of Exchange: Commerce, Medicine, and Science in the Dutch Golden Age Harold John Cook No preview available - 2007 |