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Back in thirteenth-century Europe, in the early years of the great universities, learning was spiced with the danger of mob violence and a terrifyingly repressive religious censorship. Roger Bacon, a humble and devout English friar, seems an unlikely figure to challenge the orthodoxy of his day - yet he risked his life to establish the basis for true knowledge. Born c.1220, Bacon was passionately interested in the natural world and how things worked. Such dangerous topics were vetoed by his Order, and it was only when a new Pope proved sympathetic that he began compiling his encyclopaedia on everything from optics to alchemy - the synopsis took a year and ran to 800,000 words and he was neve...
This volume deals with the philosophy and thought of Roger Bacon. It is an effort to bring Roger Bacon studies up to date. Attention is given to a wide range of topics: Bacon's life and works, Bacon's contribution to the trivium (language studies) and the quadrivium (scientific-mathematical studies), his notion of a science, his moral philosophy, Bacon's contribution to medicine, alchemy, astrology, Bacon's positions in physics and metaphysics, an up dated bibliography of Bacon studies and a review of the state of Bacon Manuscripts. The volume situates Roger Bacon in the context of 13th century philosophy and thought, as well as demonstrating his importance for later thinkers. It is expected that it will be a major new contribution to Medieval and Renaissance Studies.
David Lindberg presents the first critical edition of the text of Roger Bacon's classic work Perspectiva, prepared from Latin manuscripts, accompanied by a facing-page English translation, critical notes, and a full study of the text. Also included is an analysis of Bacon's sources, influence, and role in the emergence of the discipline of perspectiva.
The English Franciscan Roger Bacon (c.1214–92) holds a controversial but important position in the development of modern science. He has been portrayed as an isolated figure, at odds with his influential order and ultimately condemned by it. This major study, the first in English for nearly sixty years, offers a provocative new interpretation of both Bacon and his environment. Amanda Power argues that his famous writings for the papal curia were the product of his critical engagement with the objectives of the Franciscan order and the reform agenda of the thirteenth-century church. Fearing that the apocalypse was at hand and Christians unprepared, Bacon explored radical methods for defending, renewing and promulgating the faith within Christendom and beyond. Read in this light, his work indicates the breadth of imagination possible in a time of expanding geographical and intellectual horizons.
The Philosophy and Science of Roger Bacon offers new insights and research perspectives on one of the most intriguing characters of the Middle Ages, Roger Bacon. At the intersections between science and philosophy, the volume analyses central aspects of Bacon’s reflections on how nature and society can be perfected. The volume dives into the intertwining of Bacon’s philosophical stances on nature, substantial change, and hylomorphism with his scientific discussion of music, alchemy, and medicine. The Philosophy and Science of Roger Bacon also investigates Bacon’s projects of education reform and his epistemological and theological ground maintaining that humans and God are bound by wisdom, and therefore science. Finally, the volume examines how Bacon’s doctrines are related to a wider historical context, particularly in consideration of Peter John Olivi, John Pecham, Peter of Ireland, and Robert Grosseteste. The Philosophy and Science of Roger Bacon is a crucial tool for scholars and students working in the history of philosophy and science and also for a broader audience interested in Roger Bacon and his long-lasting contribution to the history of ideas.
Published in 1897, this was the first complete edition of Roger Bacon's influential thirteenth-century encyclopedia of science.
Legend may have transformed the thirteenth-century English friar Roger Bacon into the Faust-like sorcerer Doctor Mirabilis, but he stands today in high regard as Europe's first great pioneer in the field of science. Bypassing the vicissitudes of Bacon's reputation, this definitive new biography by science writer Brian Clegg places the medieval monastic firmly in the turbulent and contentious intellectual atmosphere of his day. It also finds in Bacon's attempt to reconcile, or at least acknowledge, the variant methods and means of science and theology a quest that places him well ahead of his intellectual times. For Bacon brought to his inquiry into the nature of things his gifts not only as ...