1.

Record Nr.

UNINA9910783316003321

Autore

Reill Peter Hanns

Titolo

Vitalizing nature in the Enlightenment [[electronic resource] /] / Peter Hanns Reill

Pubbl/distr/stampa

Berkeley, : University of California Press, c2005

ISBN

9786612357497

0-520-93100-9

1-282-35749-2

1-59875-547-1

Descrizione fisica

1 online resource (402 p.)

Classificazione

TB 2360

Disciplina

509/.4/09033

Soggetti

Vitalism

Science - History - 18th century

Lingua di pubblicazione

Inglese

Formato

Materiale a stampa

Livello bibliografico

Monografia

Note generali

Description based upon print version of record.

Nota di bibliografia

Includes bibliographical references and index.

Nota di contenuto

Front matter -- Contents -- Acknowledgments -- Introduction -- Prologue: The Humboldt Brothers Confront Nature's Sublimity -- I. Storming "the Temple of Error": Buffon, the Histoire naturelle, and the Midcentury Origins of Enlightenment Vitalism -- 2. Learning to "Read the Book of Nature": Vitalizing Chemistry in the Late Enlightenment -- 3. "Within the Circle of Organized Life" -- 4. The Metamorphoses of Change -- 5. From Enlightenment Vitalism to Romantic Naturphilosophie -- Notes -- Bibliography -- Index

Sommario/riassunto

This far-reaching study redraws the intellectual map of the Enlightenment and boldly reassesses the legacy of that highly influential period for us today. Peter Hanns Reill argues that in the middle of the eighteenth century, a major shift occurred in the way Enlightenment thinkers conceived of nature that caused many of them to reject the prevailing doctrine of mechanism and turn to a vitalistic model to account for phenomena in natural history, the life sciences, and chemistry. As he traces the ramifications of this new way of thinking through time and across disciplines, Reill provocatively complicates our understanding of the way key Enlightenment thinkers viewed nature. His sophisticated analysis ultimately questions



postmodern narratives that have assumed a monolithic Enlightenment-characterized by the dominance of instrumental reason-that has led to many of the disasters of modern life.