Cambridge University Press 978-0-521-76376-9 - The Mechanical Hypothesis in Ancient Greek Natural Philosophy Sylvia Berryman Table of Contents More information
Contents
List of illustrations page vii Acknowledgements viii
Introduction 1 1 Mechanics and the mechanical: some problems of terminology 9 The critics of prevailing usage 11 Some candidate definitions of the ‘mechanistic’ 15 2 ‘Mechanistic’ thought before mechanics? 21 Divine versus human technology 24 Working artifacts before the fourth century 29 Ancient atomism and the machine analogy 34 The ‘shortfalls’ of ancient technology 39 The ‘exclusion’ of ancient mechanics 43 3 Mechanics in the fourth century 54 The scope of ancient Greek mechanics 55 Archytas and the foundation of mechanics 87 Aristotle’s ‘mechanics’ of motion 97 Conclusion 104 4 The theory and practice of ancient Greek mechanics 105 The Aristotelian Mechanica 106 Ctesibius 115 Archimedes 117 Philo of Byzantium 123
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© Cambridge University Press www.cambridge.org Cambridge University Press 978-0-521-76376-9 - The Mechanical Hypothesis in Ancient Greek Natural Philosophy Sylvia Berryman Table of Contents More information
vi Contents Vitruvius 130 Hero of Alexandria 134 Pappus of Alexandria 143 Models of the heavens 146 5 Ancient Greek mechanics continued: the case of pneumatics 155 Pneumatic technology in the post-classical period 157 Ancient Greek pneumatic theory 165 The status of mechanics revisited: natural or artificial? 170 6 The philosophical reception of mechanics in antiquity 177 Mechanical theory in natural philosophy 179 The theory of pneumatics in natural philosophy 191 Pneumatics and medical theory 197 Working artifacts and the notion of a self-mover 201 Mechanical analogies for the functioning of organisms 205 Working artifacts in astronomy 216 Mechanical analogies in cosmology 220 Conclusion 231
Appendix: Ancient mechanics and the mechanical in the seventeenth century 236 Bibliography 250 Index of passages 274 General index 282
© Cambridge University Press www.cambridge.org