1.

Record Nr.

UNINA9910819924003321

Autore

Lee Maurice S

Titolo

Uncertain chances : science, skepticism, and belief in nineteenth-century American literature / / Maurice S. Lee

Pubbl/distr/stampa

New York, : Oxford University Press, 2011

ISBN

0-19-020853-8

0-19-998581-2

1-283-42737-0

0-19-979767-6

9786613427373

Descrizione fisica

1 online resource (250 p.)

Disciplina

810.9/384

Soggetti

American literature - 19th century - History and criticism

Chance in literature

Probability in literature

Skepticism in literature

Belief and doubt in literature

Pragmatism in literature

Literature and science - United States - History - 19th century

Christianity and literature - United States - History - 19th century

United States Intellectual life 19th 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

Cover; Contents; Acknowledgments; Introduction; 1. Probably Poe; Method-If Method There Is; Vast Individual Error; Things External to the Game; 2. Moby-Dick and the Opposite of Providence; The Cause of the Hunt; The Indifferent Sword of Chance; At a Venture; 3. Doubting If Doubt Itself Be Doubting: After Moby-Dick; Judge ye, then, ye Judicious; Pierre and Pragmatism; "Bartleby" and Buridan's Ass; 4. Douglass's Long Run; Providence and Improvidence; Balancing Probabilities; Give Them a Chance!; Reconstructing Black Pragmatism; 5. Roughly Thoreau; Axes and Knives; Errors and Averages

Fish and GamesAn Unfinished Life of Science; Summing Up; 6.



Dickinson's Precarious Steps, Surprising Leaps, and Bounds; Romantic Embarrassments; Chances for Heaven; Precarious Gaits; Having an Experience; Coda: Lost Causes and the Civil War; Notes; Index; A; B; C; D; E; F; G; H; I; J; K; L; M; N; O; P; Q; R; S; T; U; V; W; Y

Sommario/riassunto

The role of chance changed in the nineteenth century, and American literature changed with it. Long dismissed as a nominal concept, chance was increasingly treated as a natural force to be managed but never mastered. New theories of chance sparked religious and philosophical controversies while revolutionizing the sciences as probabilistic methods spread from mathematics, economics, and sociology to physics and evolutionary biology. Chance also became more visible in everyday life, as Americans attempted to control its power through weather forecasting, insurance policies, military strategy, a