The causes of tidal motions were widely debated from antiquity up to the eighteenth century. These discussions got a second wind in the early modern period, in the wake of a growing number of cosmological alternatives that challenged the dominant Aristotelian-Ptolemaic stance. The 1687 publication of Isaac Newton’s Principia Mathematica was a defining moment in the discussions and consequently made universal gravitation the most credible and generally accepted explanation. This paper investigates the aftermath of Newton’s discovery and demonstrates how his (...) understanding of tidal motion crowded out competing theories within a broader European context. My main point of reference is Roger Boscovich’s De aestu maris (1747). In his work, the leading Jesuit scholar of the time contrasted Newton’s interpretation to those of other major authorities, namely Johannes Kepler, Galileo Galilei, and René Descartes, and went on to claim the superiority of the British scientist’s achievements over anything written prior to the Principia. As this essay argues, alongside a significant body of literature produced under the umbrella of the Jesuit order, Boscovich’s De aestu maris subsequently contributed to the formation of the popular image of Newton as a “scientific hero.”. (shrink)

From the Renaissance to the seventeenth century the phenomenon of tidal motion constituted one of the principal arguments of scientific debate. Understanding the times for high and low water was of course often essential for navigation, but local variations made an inductive approach impractical and precluded the possibility of constructing a universally valid model for predicting these times. Notwithstanding the complexity of the phenomenon and its practical import, however, the early-modern theory of tidal ebb and flow, as clearly emerges from (...) Duhem's analysis, appears to be neither the result of the interpretation of empirical data, nor aimed to their prediction. Rather, the interest in tides was of a theoretical nature and was aroused particularly by their double nature, being at the same time variable and regular, terrestrial and astronomical. (shrink)

In the Pancosmia, the fourth book of his Nova de universis philosophia (first published in 1591 in Ferrara; second edition in 1593 in Venice),1 Francesco Patrizi devoted six chapters to the questio...

The doctrine of great conjunctions, first theorized by the Arab astrologer Albumasar in the De magnis coniunctionibus (Book of Religions and Dynasties), is a form of general astrology characterized by the attempt to explain events affecting the Earth as a whole or in part (e.g. cataclysms – floods of water and fire, plagues, famine, etc. – the succession of civilizations, new empires, religions and prophets) as a consequence of the mean conjunctions of Saturn and Jupiter. The paper deals with Albert (...) the Great’s remarkable contribution to the medieval debate on great conjunctions by focusing on a few passages from his De causis proprietatum elementorum and his Politica commentary (II 6 and V 9). The potential and risks posed by this all-embracing explanation of natural phenomena and the human domain did not escape Albert the Great. He grasped the subversive character of the universal determinism underlying the great conjunctions, as well as their scientific value. The first selection of his texts, mainly taken from the De causis proprietatum elementorum, establishes the scientific nature of conjunctionist theory. They elucidate its complex and sophisticated notions, describe the effects of planetary conjunctions on the sublunary world, and oppose this theory to pseudoscientific explanations of natural processes. Albert also discusses the epistemological status of conjunctionist theory, clarifying its relationship to other branches of astrology. By contrast, the texts from the Politica commentary relate the great conjunctions to human history and political processes, exploring the conflict between astral determinism and human responsibility. (shrink)