The Copernican Revolution From Below

哥白尼革命从下面这个项目旨在通过检查来自欧洲各地的各种各样的数学从业者的工作，基本上没有被以前的历史学家研究，来颠覆传统的“哥白尼革命”。在哥白尼之后的世纪里，这些印刷工、内科医生、外科医生、占星家、仪器制造商、市政官员和“天文爱好者”（他们这样称呼自己）制作了数以百计的年历、图解和惯例。为了重新计算这些行星位置，作者们必须决定是从中世纪的阿方辛表还是从哥白尼、第谷·布拉赫或开普勒的近代表中计算行星位置。他们中的许多人明确地讨论了他们所面临的选择。从这个Vantage的角度来看，哥白尼革命变得不那么是一个在大学里争论的自然哲学、宗教或现实主义的问题，而更多的是一个计算能力、对天文预测的经验评估、医疗实践的问题，时钟-在从伦敦到维也纳的城镇中，制造业和印刷业的竞争。下面，这个项目的专题论文将提供另一个故事，说明普通人是如何帮助16和17世纪的科学革命的。在延续威廉·埃蒙（William Eamon）、哈罗德·库克（Harold Cook）、保拉·芬德伦（Paula Findlen）、帕梅拉·史密斯（Pamela Smith）、威廉·纽曼（William Newman）和马里奥·比亚焦利（Mario Biagioli）等历史学家的工作的基础上，我的书将调查400多名边缘天文学从业者的生活，他们获得权威和合法性，不是因为他们的精英（拉丁语）学习、宫廷地位或贵族出身，而是因为他们的计算技能和年度报告的可靠性。因此，这个项目将扩大我们对现代科学起源的看法，把天文学知识的使用者和创造者都考虑在内，并把天文学知识的内容看作是由计算实践和理论组成的。PI希望这本书不仅能吸引科学史学家，也能吸引普通大众和（作为教科书）研究生和本科生。通过从下往上看，PI希望培养一种科学意识，即科学是一种活动，在这种活动中，外行和博学的人都塑造了企业的内容、价值观和社会合法性。

The Copernican Revolution From BelowThis project seeks to turn upside down the traditional account of the "CopernicanRevolution" by examining the work of a wide variety of mathematical practitioners fromacross Europe that has remained essentially unstudied by previous historians. Theseprinters, physicians, surgeons, astrologers, instrument makers, city officials, and "loversof astronomy" (as they called themselves) produced hundreds of editions of annualcalendars, prognostications and practica in the century following Copernicus. To preparethese periodica, the authors had to decide whether to compute planetary positions fromthe medieval Alfonsine Tables or from more recent tables derived from Copernicus,Tycho Brahe, or Kepler. Many of them explicitly discussed the choices they faced.From this vantage point, the Copernican Revolution becomes less a matter of naturalphilosophy, religion or realism debated at universities and more a matter of numeracy,empirical evaluation of astronomical predictions, medical practice, clock-making and thecompetitive business of printing in the everyday bustle of towns from London to Vienna.Intellectual MeritWith its approach to mathematical astronomy from below, the monographresulting from this project will provide yet another story of how ordinary people helpedmake the Scientific Revolution of the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries. Extending thework of historians like William Eamon, Harold Cook, Paula Findlen, Pamela Smith,William Newman and Mario Biagioli, my book will investigate the lives of more than400 rather marginal practitioners of astronomy who gained authority and legitimacy notby their elite (Latin) learning, place at courts or noble birth but rather by theircomputational skills and the perceived reliability of their annual prognostications. Thisproject will thus expand our view of the origins of modern science by considering usersas well as makers of astronomical knowledge, and by viewing the content of astronomicalknowledge as comprised by computational practice as well as theory.Broader ImpactsBy writing a monograph of modest length, in non-technical language, the PIhopes to produce a book that will appeal not only to historians of science but also to thegeneral public and (as a textbook) to graduate and undergraduate students. And by takinga perspective from below, the PI hopes to foster an awareness of science as an activity inwhich both lay and learned people have shaped the content, values and social legitimacyof the enterprise.