Much ado about nothing : theories of space and vacuum from the Middle Ages to the scientific revolution / Edward Grant

Grant, Edward

ISBN 10: 0511895321 / ISBN 13: 9780511895326

Published by Cambridge : Cambridge University Press, 1981

About this Item

Near fine cloth copy in a very good if slightly edge-nicked and dust-dulled dust-wrapper, now mylar-sleeved. Remains particularly well-preserved overall; tight, bright, clean and strong. Physical Description: xiii, 456 pages ; 24 cm. Subjects: Science History; Space and time History; Vacuum History; Science. 1 Kg.

Seller Inventory # 417020

Bibliographic Details

• Title: Much ado about nothing : theories of space and vacuum from the Middle Ages to the scientific revolution / Edward Grant
• Publisher: Cambridge : Cambridge University Press
• Publication Date: 1981
• Language: English
• ISBN 10: 0511895321
• ISBN 13: 9780511895326
• Binding: Hardcover
• Edition: First Edition.

About this title

Synopsis

The primary objective of this study is to provide a description of the major ideas about void space within and beyond the world that were formulated between the fourteenth and early eighteenth centuries. The second part of the book - on infinite, extracosmic void space - is of special significance. The significance of Professor Grant's account is twofold: it provides a comprehensive and detailed description of the scholastic Aristotelian arguments for and against the existence of void space; and it presents (again for the first time) an analysis of the possible influence of scholastic ideas and arguments on the interpretations of space proposed by the nonscholastic authors who made the Scientific Revolution possible. The concluding chapter of the book is unique in not only describing the conceptualizations of space proposed by the makers of the Scientific Revolution, but in assessing the role of readily available scholastic ideas on the conception of space adopted for the Newtonian world.