The Measure of Reality: Quantification in Western Europe, 1250–1600 - Softcover

Crosby, Alfred W.

Softcover

ISBN 10: 0521639905 ISBN 13: 9780521639903

Publisher: Cambridge University Press, 1998

Synopsis

This 1997 book discusses the shift to quantitative perception which made modern science, technology, business practice and bureaucracy possible.

About this title

Review

'In this thoroughly fascinating monograph, Alfred W. Crosby asks a fundamental question: How and why did it come to pass that Europeans, seemingly backward bumpkins in medieval times, became so successful as imperialists?' John Allen Paulos, LA Times

'The Measure of Reality has all the intellectual scope, vivid detail, imaginative interpretation and delicious wit that I expected from Crosby's earlier books. Here Crosby argues that Western Europeans were better imperialists than any humans before them in part because, from the thirteenth century onward, they thought about reality in quantitative terms and did so more consistently than other peoples. There is an important lesson here for today.' Joel E. Cohen, Rockerfeller University

'Crosby shows us how Europeans prepared for their world encompassing expansion after 1500 by learning how to measure, calculate and control the world around them by breaking reality into equal, arbitrary units. The Measure of Reality is a brilliant, provocative essay, as original and persuasive as his earlier Ecological Imperialism. A really significant little essay, full of new information and delightfully written as well.' William H. McNeill

'Western Europe did remake itself during that thousand years in a way that no other culture in the world did - or even attempted to do. And that is the transformation addressed in a very accessible and readable way by Crosby's stimulating, wide-ranging study of the intellectual development of the medieval West.' Richard Holt, The New York Times Book Review

Book Description

This 1997 book discusses the shift from qualitative to quantitative perception which occurred in Western Europe during the late Middle Ages and Renaissance and which was to lead to western domination of science and technology.

Edition details

• Publisher: Cambridge University Press
• Publication date: 1998
• Language: English
• ISBN 10: 0521639905
• ISBN 13: 9780521639903
• Binding: Paperback
• Number of pages: 262