RENAISSANCE NATURAL PHILOSOPHY, ALCHEMY, ASTROLOGY AND MAGIC

This course will prepare students to understand the development of the history of science in relation to institutional, social, religious, and intellectual contexts of the Renaissance. To do this the course will focus on the scientific career of Girolamo Cardano, allowing students to understand the broader settings of his astrological, medical, mathematical, natural philosophical, and auto-biographical writings. The formal objectives include applying the methods of the history of science to build a deeper understanding of Renaissance science while producing research on Cardano and his contemporaries.

1. Understanding methods of the history of science.
Understanding major themes in Renaissance thought about the natural world.
Understanding the context of Girolamo Cardano’s career and writing.
Understanding the historiography related to these themes.
2. The ability to analyze Renaissance writings about natural world and place these writings in their social, intellectual, and institutional contexts.
3. The ability to research and write about Renaissance ideas about nature.
4. The ability to communicate ideas about Renaissance thought in oral presentations, written exercises, and oral exams.
5. The ability to participate in and contribute group discussions on the history of science in seminars.
6. The ability to understanding developments in the historiography of Renaissance thought.

There are no prerequisites for this course.

The course covers the career and writings of Girolamo Cardano. In particular the course will exam his works on astrology, medicine, natural philosophy, mechanics, and mathematics, in addition to his autobiography. The course will look at the significance of these writings not only for developments in these fields but also in regard to the changing religious climate of the sixteenth century and the various controversies that engaged Cardano and his legacy.

Anthony Grafton, Cardano’s Cosmo: The Worlds and Works of a Renaissance Astrologer, Harvard University Press, 1999.

Nancy G. Siraisi, The Clock and the Mirror: Girolamo Cardano and Renaissance Medicine, Princeton University Press, 1997.

Girolamo Cardano, The ‘De subtilitate’ of Girolamo Cardano, 2 vols., translated by John M. Forrester, Tempe, Arizona, 2013

Girolamo Cardano, The Book of My Life, New York, 1930.

Oral exam based on research paper and in class presentation

The course will be based on seminars.

English

written and oral