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In the 1730s two expeditions set out from Paris on extraordinary
journeys; the first was destined for the equatorial region of Peru,
the second headed north towards the Arctic Circle. Although the
eighteenth century witnessed numerous such adventures, these
expeditions were different. Rather than seeking new lands to
conquer or mineral wealth to exploit, their primary objectives were
scientific: to determine the Earth's precise shape by measuring the
variation of a degree of latitude at points separated as nearly as
possible by a whole quadrant of the globe between Equator and North
Pole. Although such information had consequences for navigation and
cartography, the motivation was not simply utilitarian. Rather it
was one theme among many in an intellectual revolution in which
advances in mathematics paralleled philosophical strife, and
reputations of the living and the dead stood to be elevated or
destroyed. In particular the two expeditions hoped to prove the
correctness of Isaac Newton's prediction that the Earth is not a
perfect sphere, but flattened at the poles. In this study, the
'Figure of the Earth' controversy is for the first time
comprehensively explored in all its several dimensions. It shows
how a largely neglected episode of European science, that produced
no spectacular process or artefact - beyond a relatively minor
improvement in maps - nevertheless represents an almost unique
combination of theoretical prediction and empirical method. It also
details the suffering of the two teams of scientists in very
different extremes of climate, whose sacrifices for the sake of
knowledge rather than colonial gain, caught the imagination of the
literary world of the time.
This work is Volume 1 of an extensive two-volume monograph on the
interplay of science and literature in Europe from the eighteenth
to the early twentieth centuries. It comprises a series of some
twenty biographies raisonnees of literary figures known to have had
fascination for, at times an obsession with, science. The
linguistic base is broad, primarily French, German and English, but
with excursions into Italian, Spanish and Russian. Alongside
outstanding individuals, the work chronicles the intellectual
movements Naturphilosophie, Naturalism, Positivism, etc., which
literature gave rise to through its interaction with science.
This work is Volume 2 of an extensive two-volume monograph on the
interplay of science and literature in Europe from the eighteenth
to the early twentieth centuries. It comprises a series of some
twenty biographies raisonnees of literary figures known to have had
fascination for, at times an obsession with, science. The
linguistic base is broad, primarily French, German and English, but
with excursions into Italian, Spanish and Russian. Alongside
outstanding individuals, the work chronicles the intellectual
movements Naturphilosophie, Naturalism, Positivism, etc., which
literature gave rise to through its interaction with science.
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