Optics in the Middle Ages: Alhacen Edition, 6

中世纪的光学：阿尔哈森版，6

• 批准号: 0521372
• 负责人: A Smith
• 金额: $ 7.78万
• 依托单位: University of Missouri-Columbia
• 依托单位国家: 美国
• 项目类别: Standard Grant
• 财政年份: 2005
• 资助国家: 美国
• 起止时间: 2005-09-01 至 2007-08-31
• 项目状态: 已结题
• 来源: https://www.nsf.gov/awardsearch/showAward?AWD_ID=0521372&HistoricalAwards=false
• 关键词: Optics; Middle; Ages; Alhacen; Edition

PROJECT SUMMARYIntellectual Merits The critical edition of book 6 of Alhacen's De aspectibus proposed here constitutes the nextstage of a long-term plan to critically edit all seven books of that treatise. Originally composedby Ibn al-Haytham in the early eleventh century and entitled Kitab al-Manazir ("Book of Optics")in Arabic, this work was translated into Latin around 1200 under the title De aspectibus andascribed to "Alhacen." A soup-to-nuts treatment of optics, from physical light-theory and ray geometry to the physiology and psychology of visual perception, it represents a grand synthesis of Aristotelian physics and psychology, Euclidean-Ptolemaic mathematical optics, and Galenic anatomy and physiology. More than that, though, it represents a significant advance beyond its Hellenic and Hellenistic sources at the level of both content and methodology. As such, it provided the dominant paradigm for optical and visual analysis in the Latin West until the early seventeenth century, when its theoretical foundations were undermined by the likes of Kepler, Descartes, and Huygens. To this point, books 1-3, which deal with visual perception ingeneral, have already been published, and books 4-5, on the basic principles of reflection, aresoon to be published. The edition of book 6 should be in print by late 2007.Broader ImpactsAside from its significance for the history of optics in particular and the history of science ingeneral, the De aspectibus has long been recognized for its importance in fields outside thetechnical limits of those disciplines. Going back at least to Erwin Panofsky, art historians havebeen aware of the crucial role Alhacen's theory of visual perception played in the developmentof medieval and Renaissance artistic norms. Likewise, Alhacen's influence on philosophicaland theological thought has come increasingly to attention, and recent literary studies havetraced his influence in the development of various tropes within medieval and Renaissancepoetry. Of increasing interest among psychologists, moreover, is Alhacen's emphasis on thepsychological aspects of spatial perception, particularly in regard to size- and distance determination.There is thus a fairly broad audience for this edition of the De aspectibus, the Latin text being of interest primarily to specialists, the English translation and commentary being of interest to both specialists and non-specialists. To ensure the widest dissemination possible, this edition, like its two forerunners, will be compiled in publish-ready format by the PI to cut down on the expense of the final printed version. In addition, the PI will explore the possibility of eventually producing the entire edition in digital format for greater accessibility and searchability.In terms, finally, of its broadest impact, this sort of study reveals how deeply grounded theWestern intellectual tradition is in medieval Arabic sources and the ideas and approaches theyconvey. These sources run the gamut from philosophical and theological to astronomical andmathematical, and the influence of some of them is already well documented. But, as lesserknown or understood sources, such as this one, are brought to the light of publication, itbecomes increasingly obvious that East-West political and cultural relations have yielded farricher fruit than the implacable hostility and rejection so commonly assumed. This study, inshort, should help put the lie to that simplistic, wrongheaded, and ultimately corrosiveassumption. It should also help put the lie to any lingering notion that Arabic culture is, andalways has been, intrinsically backward.

项目概要知识价值在这里提出的阿尔哈森的De aspectibus第6卷的批判性版本构成了批判性编辑该论文所有七卷的长期计划的下一阶段。最初组成的伊本Haytham在早期的第十一世纪和题为Kitab基地，Manazir（“光学书”）在阿拉伯语，这项工作被翻译成拉丁美洲约1200年的标题下德aspectibus和归因于“Alhacen。“从物理光理论和射线几何学到视觉感知的生理学和心理学，它对光学进行了全面的处理，代表了亚里士多德物理学和心理学，欧几里得-托勒密数学光学以及盖伦解剖学和生理学的综合。不仅如此，它在内容和方法上都超越了希腊化和希腊化的来源。因此，它为拉丁美洲的西方提供了光学和视觉分析的主导范式，直到世纪初，当它的理论基础被开普勒，笛卡尔和惠更斯等人破坏时。关于这一点，第1-3册，一般涉及视觉感知，已经出版，第4-5册，关于反射的基本原理，即将出版。第六册的版本将于2007年底出版。更广泛的影响除了它对光学史和一般科学史的重要意义外，《论方面》长期以来一直被认为在这些学科技术范围之外的领域具有重要意义。至少可以追溯到埃尔温·帕诺夫斯基，艺术史学家们已经意识到阿尔哈森的视觉感知理论在中世纪和文艺复兴时期艺术规范的发展中所起的关键作用。同样，阿尔哈岑的影响哲学和神学思想越来越受到关注，最近的文学研究追踪他的影响，在中世纪和文艺复兴时期的各种比喻的发展。此外，心理学家们越来越感兴趣的是Alhacen对空间知觉的心理学方面的强调，特别是关于大小和距离的确定。因此，这一版的De aspectibus有相当广泛的读者，拉丁文主要是专家感兴趣，英文翻译和评论对专家和非专家都感兴趣。为了确保尽可能广泛的传播，这个版本，像它的两个前身一样，将由PI以可编辑的格式编辑，以减少最终印刷版本的费用。此外，PI将探索最终以数字格式制作整个版本的可能性，以提高可访问性和可搜索性。最后，就其最广泛的影响而言，这种研究揭示了西方知识传统在中世纪阿拉伯语来源及其传达的思想和方法中的深厚基础。这些来源从哲学和神学到天文学和数学，其中一些的影响已经有了很好的记录。但是，随着不太为人所知或不为人所知的资料（比如这篇文章）被公之于众，越来越明显的是，东西方政治和文化关系产生了比通常认为的不可调和的敌意和排斥更好的结果。简而言之，这项研究应该有助于揭穿这种简单化的、错误的、最终具有腐蚀性的假设。它还应该有助于推翻任何挥之不去的观念，即阿拉伯文化是，而且一直是，本质上落后。