LEADER 03826nam 22006735 450 001 9910154289003321 005 20230124193919.0 010 $a0-226-40627-X 024 7 $a10.7208/9780226406275 035 $a(CKB)3710000000971586 035 $a(MiAaPQ)EBC4519341 035 $a(StDuBDS)EDZ0001615189 035 $a(DE-B1597)522655 035 $a(OCoLC)967882697 035 $a(DE-B1597)9780226406275 035 $a(EXLCZ)993710000000971586 100 $a20200424h20172016 fg 101 0 $aeng 135 $aurcnu|||||||| 181 $2rdacontent 182 $2rdamedia 183 $2rdacarrier 200 10$aBefore Nature $eCuneiform Knowledge and the History of Science /$fFrancesca Rochberg 210 1$aChicago : $cUniversity of Chicago Press, $d[2017] 210 4$dİ2016 215 $a1 online resource (380 pages) $cillustrations, maps 300 $aPreviously issued in print: 2017. 311 $a0-226-40613-X 320 $aIncludes bibliographical references and index. 327 $tFrontmatter -- $tContents -- $tIntroduction. The Ancient Near East, Science, and Nature -- $tPart I. Historiography -- $tPart II. Cuneiform Knowledge and Its Interpretive Framework -- $tPart III. Rationality, Analogy, and Law -- $tPart IV. The Cuneiform World of Observation, Prediction, and Explanation -- $tAcknowledgments -- $tAbbreviations -- $tNotes -- $tBibliography -- $tIndex 330 $aIn the modern West, we take for granted that what we call the "natural world" confronts us all and always has-but Before Nature explores that almost unimaginable time when there was no such conception of "nature"-no word, reference, or sense for it. Before the concept of nature formed over the long history of European philosophy and science, our ancestors in ancient Assyria and Babylonia developed an inquiry into the world in a way that is kindred to our modern science. With Before Nature, Francesca Rochberg explores that Assyro-Babylonian knowledge tradition and shows how it relates to the entire history of science. From a modern, Western perspective, a world not conceived somehow within the framework of physical nature is difficult-if not impossible-to imagine. Yet, as Rochberg lays out, ancient investigations of regularity and irregularity, norms and anomalies clearly established an axis of knowledge between the knower and an intelligible, ordered world. Rochberg is the first scholar to make a case for how exactly we can understand cuneiform knowledge, observation, prediction, and explanation in relation to science-without recourse to later ideas of nature. Systematically examining the whole of Mesopotamian science with a distinctive historical and methodological approach, Before Nature will open up surprising new pathways for studying the history of science. 606 $aAssyro-Babylonian literature$xHistory and criticism 606 $aScience$zAssyria 606 $aPhilosophy of nature$zAssyria 606 $aLearning and scholarship$zAssyria 606 $aAstronomy, Assyro-Babylonian 610 $aBabylonian. 610 $aastrology. 610 $aastronomy. 610 $acuneiform. 610 $adivination. 610 $aknowledge. 610 $anature. 610 $ascience. 610 $ascientific imagination. 610 $ascientific models. 615 0$aAssyro-Babylonian literature$xHistory and criticism. 615 0$aScience 615 0$aPhilosophy of nature 615 0$aLearning and scholarship 615 0$aAstronomy, Assyro-Babylonian. 676 $a509.35 700 $aRochberg$b Francesca, $4aut$4http://id.loc.gov/vocabulary/relators/aut$0647286 801 0$bDE-B1597 801 1$bDE-B1597 906 $aBOOK 912 $a9910154289003321 996 $aBefore Nature$91934343 997 $aUNINA