Science In The Romantic Era

First published in 1998. The Romantic Era was a time when society, religion and other beliefs, and science were all in flux. The idea that the universe was a great clock, and that men were little clocks, all built by a divine watchmaker, was giving way to a more dynamic and pantheistic way of thinking. A new language was invented for chemistry, replacing metaphor with algebra; and scientific illustration came to play the role of a visual language, deeply involved with theory. A scientific community came gradually into being as the 19th century wore on. The papers which compose this book have appeared in a wide range of books and journals; together with the new introduction they illuminate science and its context in the Romantic Era and follow its effects in the 19th century.

Examines the massive impact of colonial exploration on British scientific and literary activity between the 1760s and 1830s.

Romanticism in all its expression communicated a vision of the essential interconnectedness and harmony of the universe. The romantic concept of knowledge was decidedly unitary, but, in the period between 1790 and 1840, the special emphasis it placed on observation and research led to an unprecedented accumulation of data, accompanied by a rapid growth in scientific specialization. An example of the tensions created by this development is to be found in the scientists' congresses which attempted a first response to the fragmentation of scientific research. The problem concerning the unitary concept of knowledge in that period, and the new views of the world which were generated are the subject of this book. The articles it contains are all based on original research by an international group of highly specialized scholars. Their research probes a wide range of issues, from the heirs of Naturphilosophie, to the `life sciences', and to the debate on `Baconian Sciences', as well as examining many aspects of mathematics, physics and chemistry. History of philosophy and history of science scholars will find this book an essential reference work, as well as all those interested in 19th century history in general. Undergraduate and graduate students will also find here angles and topics that have hitherto been largely neglected.

This book presents a series of essays which focus on the role of Romantic philosophy and ideology in the sciences.

In the years immediately following Napoleon’s defeat, French thinkers in all fields set their minds to the problem of how to recover from the long upheavals that had been set into motion by the French Revolution. Many challenged the Enlightenment’s emphasis on mechanics and questioned the rising power of machines, seeking a return to the organic unity of an earlier age and triggering the artistic and philosophical movement of romanticism. Previous scholars have viewed romanticism and industrialization in opposition, but in this groundbreaking volume John Tresch reveals how thoroughly entwined science and the arts were in early nineteenth-century France and how they worked together to unite a fractured society. Focusing on a set of celebrated technologies, including steam engines, electromagnetic and geophysical instruments, early photography, and mass-scale printing, Tresch looks at how new conceptions of energy, instrumentality, and association fueled such diverse developments as fantastic literature, popular astronomy, grand opera, positivism, utopian socialism, and the Revolution of 1848. He shows that those who attempted to fuse organicism and mechanism in various ways, including Alexander von Humboldt and Auguste Comte, charted a road not taken that resonates today. Essential reading for historians of science, intellectual and cultural historians of Europe, and literary and art historians, The Romantic Machine is poised to profoundly alter our understanding of the scientific and cultural landscape of the early nineteenth century.

Although "romantic science" may sound like a paradox, much of the romance surrounding modern science—the mad scientist, the intuitive genius, the utopian transformation of nature—originated in the Romantic period. Romantic Science traces the literary and cultural politics surrounding the formation of the modern scientific disciplines emerging from eighteenth-century natural history. Revealing how scientific concerns were literary concerns in the Romantic period, the contributors uncover the vital role that new discoveries in earth, plant, and animal sciences played in the period's literary culture. As Thomas Pennant put it in 1772, "Natural History is, at present, the favourite science over all Europe, and the progress which has been made in it will distinguish and characterise the eighteenth century in the annals of literature." As they examine the social and literary ramifications of a particular branch or object of natural history, the contributors to this volume historicize our present intellectual landscape by reimagining and redrawing the disciplinary boundaries between literature and science. Contributors include Alan Bewell, Rachel Crawford, Noah Heringman, Theresa M. Kelley, Amy Mae King, Lydia H. Liu, Anne K. Mellor, Stuart Peterfreund, and Catherine E. Ross.

Joseph Berzelius (1779-1848), one of the world's leading scientists in the first half of the nineteenth century, dominated the field of chemistry, animated the cultural life of his native Sweden, and served for three decades as secretary of the Royal Swedish Academy of Sciences. Despite his immense stature, modern studies have underestimated his significance. This volume remedies the scarcity of accessible, modern assessments of Berzelius by bringing to a broad audience the results of recent scholarship, and it offers an enhanced assessment of his originality and influence.

Innovative, alternative account of romanticism, exploring how art and science together contested the evidentiary authority of the human body.