Religion, Science, and Worldview. Essays in Honor of Richard S. Westfall (review)

BOOK REVIEWS ~69 belief that "the time for petty politics is over. The next century will bring the struggle for the mastery of the earth: the compulsionto great politics." DANIEL BREAZEALE University of Kentucky Margaret J. Osler and Paul Lawrence Farber, editors. Religion, Science,and Worldview. Essays in Honor of Richard S. WestfaU.Cambridge and New York: Cambridge University Press, 1985. Pp. xv + 35o. $49.5o. The editors of this welcome Festschrift note that the contributors are either former doctoral students of Sam Westfall, have worked closely with him, or "have been deeply influenced by his work" (xii). In the case of the latter category, at least, the editors must have had a tough time deciding on their final list of invitees, since there cannot be many historians of seventeenth-century science who have not enriched their understanding of the field through a study of the extensive writings of Professor Westfall, the 1985 recipient of the History of Science Society's prestigious Sarton Medal. By the same token, there cannot be many who are not a mite jealous not to be among the thirteen participants in this excellent initiative. In keeping with Westfall's interests and influence, the (surprisingly small) collection divides into three parts: 1. Newtonian Studies, z. Science and Religion, 3- Historiography and the Social Context of Science. This division reflects the expected range of thematic interest, but the location of certain contributions within it is more procrustean than natural, suggesting an editorial taxonomic quandary. Thus Ron Millen's iconoclastic essay on "The manifestation of occult qualities in the scientific revolution" has been classified as "Science and Religion," where it does not belong. One of the best contributions in the volume, Millen follows Keith Hutchinson's pioneering 198~ Isis article ("What happened to occult qualities in the scientific revolution?") with a generally persuasive argument that contrary to received interpretations of the mechanical philosophy , "the program for manifesting occult qualities.., flourished in the writings of the mechanical philosophers;.., occult qualities took their place at the foundations of modern science" (216). This is fine stuff, but it has nothing to do with religion. Also inappropriately consigned to Part ~ is Edward Grant's "Celestial perfection from the Middle Ages to the late seventeenth century," an exposure of the myth of reactionary Scholasticism in the face of Copernicanism. In Part 1, BettyJ. T. Dobb's modestly sub-titled "preliminary study" of"Conceptual problems in Newton's early chemistry" underscores the importance of distinguishing between what Newton called common or "mechanical chemistry" (e.g., metallurgy, tanning) and "vegetable chemistry" (alchemy, transmutation). Also, the misclassification of his chemical papers as indiscriminately "alchemical" has obscured his development as a chemist before he immersed himself in alchemy. Ernan McMullin argues that "The significance of Newton's Principia for empiricism " lies in the relation between its formalized network of concepts, definitions, and laws, and the experience in which Newton claimed they were grounded. Meaning and 17o JOURNAL OF THE HISTORY OF PHILOSOPHY 26:1 JANUARY 1988 assessment referred to the system as a whole: "the older empiricist notions of abstraction and induction (which related to single terms and single generalizations) no longer would suffice" (58). This is an interesting thesis, but some of the supporting arguments seem unexpectedly shaky, and it presents the Principia as a retrospectively constructed source of actual historical influence for post-Newtonian moves away from classical empiricism. Bruce Brackenridge shows the value of "The defective diagram as an analytical device in [checking the accuracy of successive editions of] Newton's Principia," the chosen diagram in question being that for the "Kepler ellipse," Prop. XI of Bk. I. The article carries a cash bonus: a postscript on the "Newton design" British pound note, which first appeared in 1978 with an inaccurate Kepler ellipse diagram, to be replaced in 1981 with the inaccuracy corrected. Rod Home steers a difficult path through the twists and turns of"Force, electricity, and the powers of living matter in Newton's mature philosophy of nature" to conclude (rightly, I suspect) that for Newton universal natural powers, whether inanimate or vital, were instances of inexplicable immaterial forces of divine origin, particular powers and forces being (in principle) explicable mechanically and...