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ROMANTICISM IN BOSTON STUDIES IN THE PHILOSOPHY OF SCIENCE

Editor

ROBERT S. COHEN, Boston University

Editorial Advisory Board

THOMAS F. GLICK, Boston University ADOLF GRONBAUM, University of Pittsburgh SAHOTRA SARKAR, Dibner Institute M.1. T. SYLVAN S. SCHWEBER, Brandeis University JOHN J. STACHEL, Boston University MARX W. WARTOFSKY, Baruch College of the City University of New York

VOLUME 152 IN SCIENCE

Science in Europe, 1790-1840

Edited by

STEFANO POGGI Department of Philosophy, University of Florence, Italy

and

MAURIZIO BOSSI Centro Romantico, Gabinetto Scientifico Letterario G.P. Vieusseux, Florence, Italy

With the editorial assistance of Berendina van Straalen

Under the auspices of the Centro Romantico of the Gabinetto Scientifico Letterario G.P. Vieusseux

SPRINGER-SCIENCE+BUSINESS MEDIA, B.V. Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data

Romanticism in sCience: science in Europe, 1790-1840 I edited by Stefano Poggi and Maurizio Bossi: with the editorial assistance of Berendina van Straalen. p. cm. -- (Boston studies in the philosophy of science) Includes index. ISBN 978-90-481-4284-2 ISBN 978-94-017-2921-5 (eBook) DOI 10.1007/978-94-017-2921-5 1. Sctence--Europe--History--18th century. 2. SCience--Europe• -History--. 3. Science--Philosophy--History. 4. RONanticism--History. I. Poggi, Stefano. II. Bassi. Maurizio. III. Series. 0127.E8R66 1993 509.4' 09' 033--dc20 93-1728

ISBN 978-90-481-4284-2

Printed on acid-free paper

All Rights Reserved © 1994 Springer Science+Business Media Dordrecht Originally published by Kluwer Academic Publishers in 1994 No part of the material protected by this copyright notice may be reproduced or utilized in any form or by any means, electronic or mechanical, including photocopying, recording or by any information storage and retrieval system, without written permission from the copyright owner. TABLE OF CONTENTS

ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS vii PREFACE ix INTRODUCTION xi

GERHARD H. MULLER I Wechselwirkung in the Life and Other : A Word, New Claims and a Concept Around 1800 ... and Much Later 1 UMBERTO BOTTAZZINI I Geometry and "Metaphysics of Space" in Gauss and Riemann 15 FERDINANDO ABBRI I Romanticism versus Enlightenment: Sir 's Idea of Chemical Philosophy 31 GmLIo BARSANTI I Lamarck and the Birth of Biology 1740-1810 47 ILSE JAHN I On the Origin of Romantic Biology and Its Further Development at the University of Jena Between 1790 and 1850 75 FREDERICK GREGORY I "Nature Is an Organized Whole": J.E Fries's Reformulation of Kant's Philosophy of Organism 91 STEFANO FABBRI BERTOLETTI I The Anthropological Theory of Johann Friedrich Blumenbach 103 LUIGI MARINO I Soemmerring, Kant and the Organ of the Soul 127 STEFANO POGGI I Neurology and Biology in the Romantic Age in Germany: Carus, Burdach, Gall, von Baer 143 WILLIAM R. WOODWARD and REINHARDT PESTER I From Romantic to a Theory of Scientific Method for the Medical Disciplines 161

v vi TABLE OF CONTENTS

H.A.M. SNELDERS / Romanticism and Dutch Scientists 175 RUDOLF STICHWEH / The Unity of Teaching and Research 189 HANS HELMUT CHRISTMANN / Linguistics and Modem Philology in Germany 1800-1840 as 'Scientific' Subjects and as University Disciplines 203 MICHAEL HEIDELBERGER / The Unity of Nature and Mind: Gustav Theodor Fechner's Non-Reductive Materialism 215 INDEX 237 ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS

This volume has been promoted by the Centro Romantico of the Gabi• netto Scientifico Letterario G.P. Vieusseux of Florence in collaboration with the University of Florence, through the work of a committee con• sisting of: Paolo Bagnoli (director of the Gabinetto G.P. Vieusseux, Florence), Maurizio Bossi (Centro Romantico of the Gabinetto G.P. Vieusseux), Paolo Galluzzi (director of the Istituto e Museo di Storia della Scienza, Florence), Giuliano Pancaldi (University of Bologna), Stefano Poggi (University of Florence), Paolo Rossi (University of Flo• rence). English translations by Donatella Baggio Betti, James Bradley, Alice Scott and Stephen Tobin. Stefania Marogna of the Centro Romantico of the Gabinetto Scien• tifico Letterario G.P. Vieusseux has assisted in copy-editing. M.B.

The volume was also discussed and partly organized during a period of research in the Federal Republic of Germany, and thanks are due in particular to the Stiftung for making my stay in Heidelberg and Konstanz possible, and also to Professor Jiirgen Mittelstrass and to Professor Gereon Wolters for their kind support. I am also grateful for the generous support of the Committee for his• torical, philosophical and philological sciences of the Italian Consiglio Nazionale delle Ricerche. S.P.

The Editors gratefully acknowledge the financial contribution of Regione Toscana towards realization of this publication.

vii PREFACE

When we were examining the idea of this volume in our first meetings with Stefano Poggi, the title that first sprang to mind was Romanticism and the Unity of Knowledge. Science in Europe, 1790-1840. We felt it was important to emphasise exactly how much the tension between a unitary vision of the universe and increasing scientific specialisation meant for our civilisation in the period going from the end of the 18th century to the middle of the 19th. The title we finally settled on, Romanticism in Science, covers a wider field, but our initial idea, while possibly narrower in scope, nonetheless bore a more direct relation to that range of experiences which were the real backdrop to Giovan Pietro Vieusseux's Gabinetto Scientifico Let• terario. Founded in Florence in 1819, the Gabinetto, in the intention of Vieusseux, was to become a vehicle to increase Italian awareness of all that was new circulating in Europe in the fields of knowledge and social advancement. This led eventually to the publication of a monthly review, the "Antologia", the first example of a modem publication in Italy, on a par with the best periodicals being published in other coun• tries. Its subjects reflected the entire gamut of interests and problems of the period, while the variety and concision of its "scientific bulletins" showed just how keen the Gabinetto was to acquire and provide the most up-to-date information available on the most important achievements of European civilisation. The pages of the review also showed concern at the possibility that the splitting of science into many branches might lead to the over-specialisation of knowledge, thus in effect blunting the tool of scientific research for the common good. Vieusseux shared this concern himself and was among those who launched the idea of a conference of Italian scientists. The first such conference was held in Tuscany in 1839, along the lines of similar conferences which had been held throughout Europe since the early years of the century in an attempt to keep the boundaries of knowledge within a common framework. In this context the Gabinetto Vieusseux played its role in keeping open the channels of communication not only between scientists of ix

S. Poggi and M. Bossi (eds.J, Ronumticism in Science, ix-x. x PREFACE different branches but also between scientists in general and men from other fields who were working for the "good of mankind". This was not unlike the work being done by similar institutions in other parts of Europe in the early part of the century. Where this volume, the result of the unstinting co-operation with the University of Florence, comes closest to the line of research of the Centro Romantico of the Gabinetto Vieusseux is in its presentation of the role and functions within society of science. In fact the Centro Romantico's line of study centres on the interplay between ideals and practicality in the early 19th century, in an awareness of the direct relevance of the experiences of that period to those of our own day.

MAURIZIO BOSSI Centro Romantico Gabinetto G.P. Vieusseux, Florence INTRODUCTION

1. For quite a few years now, has been devoting considerable attention to the 19th century and indeed, most European and American science historians are presently engaged in studying the development of sciences in the 19th century. The reasons for such an orientation are fairly clear. Once that the philosophical reflection upon science has explicitly recognized the importance of historical knowl• edge, the least remote stages of development of scientifical theories have obviously become the focus of attention. A large number of important results have been thus achieved. Just think of the innovative studies on the "sciences of life"; just consider what emerged from the analysis of the evolution of physical sciences on the one hand and from the study of the origins of scientifical psy• chology on the other. In general, much attention was devoted to the by now commonly called "Baconian sciences". Therefore the traditional image of the development of sciences in the last century has signifi• cantly changed; and such changes help us to understand not only the philosophical ideas but also many other aspects of the more general cultural context of that age.

2. We usually consider the years 1840-1880 as the space of time during which the impact of sciences produced some profound modifications in the "conceptions of the world". During the same period, emerged and developed in Europe. This latter has recently been the object of many studies that highlighted its main features: a central issue of contemporary philosophy, i.e. the relationship between science and philosophy seems to have some important presuppositions in the 19th century debate on Positivism. Our knowledge of the science-philosophy relationship in the 19th century is not limited to the 1840-1880 period. More and more attention is being devoted to the very rich and complex situation that characterizes the years of the so-called "crisis" of Positivism, starting from 1880. As to the first half of the century our know ledge is much more limited. In fact, also the scientifical work of the beginning of the century (but, in xi

S. Poggi and M. Bossi (eds.), Romanticism in Science, xi-xv. © 1994 Kluwer Academic Publishers. xii INTRODUCTION reality, we should go further back to the last decade of the 18th century) is anything but routine work. It introduces significant new ideas and leads to the creation of really new disciplines. Just think of the results of the studies on electricity, magnetism and optical and chemical phenom• ena, on the one hand and, on the other, of the formulation of a scientifical programme covering all living beings - that is "biology" - just when the observation of the structure of living organisms started giving place to the analysis of their functions. And it is in the first decades of the 19th century that the question of the so-called "Baconian sciences" arises and draws considerable attention, mainly deriving from the conviction that the Newtonian model of physics - deemed too abstract and schematic - is no longer sufficient.

3. The space of time going from 1790 to 1840 was not however totally neglected by historiography. But it is also true that most historiograph• ical studies on that period - which, from many points of view, are extremely rich and articulated, and indeed refined - focus on the devel• opment of philosophical and artistic ideas in general and literary ones in particular, without obviously neglecting the evolution of political and religious concepts. But the scientifical debate as a whole is not tackled or, at least, it is not analyzed properly. In most cases we only find a num• ber of commonplaces. Therefore several integrations and corrections are needed. Undoubtedly, many European scientists of the first decades of the century strongly aspired to a global, yet profound vision of knowledge. Such an aspiration was supported by the firm belief that observing nature means understanding ourselves too and that the answers that nature can give us should not be obtained by force: experimentation can too often become true "torture". This mental habit is so widespread that we can definitively say that some sort of "Romantic consciousness" accompanies and characterizes a large part of European science at the very beginning of the century. To be true, this habit is particularly relevant in the area of German language and culture, where it is closely related to philosophical ideas and artistic concepts. Let's first try to clarify this issue. The fundamental feature of what we usually define the Romantic con• ception of science is - as we already mentioned - the thesis according to which science must not bring about any split between nature and man - the microcosm reflecting the macrocosm. This thesis essentially derives from the concepts of 18th and 19th century German Naturphilosophie; INTRODUCTION xiii and Germany is indeed the country where the Romantic conception of science flourishes. But it is wrong to believe such speculative "philos• ophy of nature" completely overlaps with the Romantic conception of science of nature: this is rather the view of those who, though convinced that science must be knowledge of nature as a whole, do not intend (as many Naturphilosophen on the contrary often do) to assign a secondary role to the collection and observation of facts. More precisely: it is certainly true that a markedly speculative "philosophy of nature" rep• resents a powerful factor of aggregation in the process of renewal of scientifical research in Germany; but it is also true that within a few years (at the end of the lOs at the latest) this "philosophy of nature" gets rid of many of its more decidedly speculative aspects while more and more importance is devoted to the observation of facts. The German scientists of the first decades of the century will continue to feel the need of providing a common end to the various lines of scientifical research. This requirement is a typical feature of the scientifical debate which - for reasons that it is impossible to analyze here - established and main• tained a much closer relationship with the philosophical arguments in Germany than it did in the rest of Europe.

4. The analysis of various aspects of the Romantic conception of sci• ence must therefore fundamentally refer to the scientific debate that developed in the German area of Europe all along the last century. If we adopt - as we should - this point of view, we must also consider two facts and their many implications. First of all, we must bear in mind that, starting from the 50s, German science plays a real "leading" role, from many points of view. German scientific research - systematically connected with University teaching - acquires more and more importance in Europe for a number of rea• sons already widely verified and studied. Think for instance - just to mention the best known ones - of the policy of organization of science applied in the 20s by Prussia, the strongest and most dynamic of all German states; consider the work of identification and systematization of research lines - many of which are indeed "Baconian sciences": although essentially application-oriented, yet some form of theoretical structure is formulated in order to introduce them into the context of the established disciplines. On the other hand - and this is the second fact we should think over• both the policy of promotion of scientific research based on university organization and the efforts made to open up new lines of investigation xiv INTRODUCTION appear to meet a requirement of essentially philosophical nature, that of defining a consistent picture of knowledge, that can no longer be reduced to sheer technique. These are the foundations upon which, already around the half of the century, in the area of German culture and language, a new attitude of mind develops, aiming at the renewal of the philosophical thought thanks to the new scientific perspectives made available. In the last quarter of the 19th century, this line of reasoning will help to maintain the fruitful relationship existing between philosophical thought and sci• entifical research: in this way it is possible to preserve - although after a careful re-examination - the "positive" approach of philosophical anal• ysis that emerged in the 30s and 40s in France and Great Britain. It is therefore obvious to wonder whether the maturation of such a way of thinking - that firmly claims the need of a global picture of knowledge - does in fact represent the continuity of an attitude of mind already present in the Romantic approach to science. The Romantic conception of science had in fact pointed to the need of a global, systematic and sol• id picture of knowledge of nature as knowledge of what "reflects" man; at the same time, the Romantic conception of science had recognized the importance of the non preconceived observation of phenomena. We cannot ignore this question. And the answer cannot be but affir• mative. After its triumphal period, Positivism undergoes a "crisis", in the 80s of last century, due to the expansion and increasing complication of the domain of sciences, on the one hand, and to the new and impor• tant philosophical questions, on the other. These questions concern the relationship between scientifical knowledge and man's knowledge of himself and his actions, a relationship that had been traditionally rep• resented by the split between "science of nature" and "sciences of the spirit". But, from many points of view, this "crisis" seems to be the expression of a self-critical potential present in the science-philosophy relationship that the positivist approach, on the contrary, had somehow stiffened and actually repressed. The development of this self-critical potential points to a new - even if late - awareness of some funda• mental issues of the Romantic conception of science: its aspiration to total knowledge of nature and of ourselves, of the macrocosm and the microcosm, an aspiration pervaded with the feeling of irreparable loss of the original harmony.

5. The reasons for such an interest in the various aspects of the Romantic conception of science are therefore numerous and quite evident. They INTRODUCTION xv certainly cannot be reduced to sheer learning or to mere interest in the opinions on science that developed in the years of greatest creativity of Romantic artists. All the reasons for this interest in the Romantic conception of science appear to derive from a single and decisive obser• vation: that from many points of view the Romantic age - and more essentially the Romantic age in Germany - was the last age, in the histo• ry of the Western world, during which a global vision of the knowledge of nature appeared to be possible. A vision based both on the awareness of the alienating power of scientifical knowledge and on the firm belief that only systematic observation, free from all prejudices, could defeat such negative power. Furthermore, in the Romantic age the awareness of the importance of knowledge for the sake of power and of the great responsibility of scientist was quite widespread. But this awareness did not merely bring about some sort of myth of scientists or even of men of genius, as it did happen with many other artistic creations of that period. It rather led to the foundation of societies and organizations that aimed at promoting and spreading science, which was no longer presented as the exclusive prerogative of a narrow community. In any case, we want to make it very clear that the Romantic age was a great scientifical age. It is very important to underline this and to avoid all misunderstandings in front of the widespread nostalgic attitude of those who look back to the first decades of the last century, in search of some mysterious, oracle-like, prophetic, or even catastrophical elements. Many, or even most scientists active in the Romantic age - and especially (but not only) in Germany - had a profound respect for nature, but this had nothing to do with religious worship. It rather meant being consistent in observation and research, in the development and theoretical definition of new disciplines. These scientists were consistently engaged in a work that the studies collected in this volume wish to illustrate in an innovative way, as it represents one of the starting points of many scientifical developments that were to occur not only in the 19th century but also in our century, and right now that it is approaching its conclusion.

STEFANO POGGI Department of Philosophy University of Florence