Defending Descartes in Brandenburg-Prussia [Elektronische Ressource] The University of Frankfurt an der Oder in the seventeenth century

This volume is a study of the many dimensions of the early reception of Cartesianism in German-speaking Europe during the seventeenth century based on the case of the University of Frankfurt an der Oder. It investigates the broad context of that discussion, which was at once scientific, cultural, political and socio-institutional. Chapter by chapter, the book sheds light on every aspect of the environment of the time. It is aimed at historians of science and philosophy, as well as scholars investigating German-speaking Europe of the 17th century. A Brandenburg Star in a Cartesian Constellation References Acknowledgments A Summary of This Book Contents Abbreviations List of Figures Chapter 1: Cartesianismus-Streit in Frankfurt an der Oder: Johannes Placentinus and His Opponents, 1653–1656 1.1 Placentinus’s Education 1.2 The Conditions for the Appointment at Frankfurt an der Oder 1.3 Controversies over Terrestrial Motion, Tides, and Cartesian Philosophy 1.4 The 1654 Censoring of the Disputation on the delatio of the Earth 1.5 Placentinus’s Cartesio-Copernicanism 1.6 The Cartesian Offensive of 1655 1.7 Can a Cartesian Become Dean of the Philosophical Faculty? 1.8 An International Network of Cartesians 1.9 An Extreme Attempt to Ban Cartesianism from Frankfurt 1.10 Epilogue: The Rise and Fall of a Cartesian Mathematician References Chapter 2: Nature and Scripture: Confessional Networks and Cross-Confessional Exegetical Problems 2.1 Institutional and Confessional Networks of Higher Education 2.2 Placentinus’s Mental-Bodily Path to Natural Theology 2.3 Confessional Questions in the Background of Placentinus’s Dissertation 2.4 Concluding Remarks: The Problem of Cartesian Natural Theology References Chapter 3: A Cartesian-Scholastic Controversy over the Origin of Life Opposing Frankfurt and Wittenberg, 1659–1660 3.1 Disputations on the Origins of Life 3.2 The Philosophical Disputations Promoted by Kirchmayer in Wittenberg 3.3 Cosmos and Life: Anti-Cartesian Criticism in Kirchmayer’s Disputations 3.4 The Cartesian Astro-Biological Theses Defended at Frankfurt an der Oder 3.5 Against Kirchmayer: Placentinus’s Disputatio Philosophica of September 1659 3.6 Wittenberg Against Frankfurt (1659–1660): The Radicalization of the Debate on the Level of Philosophical Foundations 3.7 Extra-Academic Legitimacy: A Courtly Dissertation of 1660 as the Conclusion of the Controversy over the Origins of Life 3.8 Concluding Remarks References Chapter 4: The Mechanization of Astrology, 1661–1665 4.1 Placentinus, the Court Advisor 4.2 Cosmic Meteorology: Novae, the Origin of Windstorms, and Their Astrological Interpretation 4.3 Cartesian Comet Horoscopes 4.4 Concluding Remarks: A ‘Scientific’ Astrology Accorded to Cartesian Principles References Chapter 5: Placentinus’s Cometary Correspondence with Hevelius and Lubieniecki as a Display of Symbolic Capital 5.1 Hevelius’s Indiscreet Correspondent, Placentinus 5.2 Hevelius’s Precarious Position in the Republic of Letters 5.3 The Inclusion of Placentinus in Lubieniecki’s ‘Philosophical Senate’ 5.4 Concluding Remarks References Chapter 6: Medical and Demonological Approaches to Descartes’s Psychophysical Dualism: Andreae and Brecht 6.1 The Problem of Descartes’s Substance Dualism 6.2 The Foundations of Descartes’s Philosophy for Medicine 6.3 Cartesian Dualism in Medicine 6.4 Healing the Mind Through the Body 6.5 Healing the Body Through the Mind 6.6 Demonological Concerns 6.7 Concluding Remarks References Chapter 7: Cartesian Bodies: Experiments on Embalmment 7.1 The Rise of the Medical Practitioner, De Bils 7.2 Bilsian Controversies and the Emergence of Cartesian Physiology 7.3 Andreae’s Association with De Bils 7.4 Bilsian Experiments in Frankfurt an der Oder 7.5 Clauder’s Methodus Balsamandi (1679) 7.6 Andreae’s Reaction to Clauder 7.7 A Cartesian Framework for Anatomical Experimentation References Chapter 8: The Cultural Politics of Cartesianism: Conclusions and Perspectives 8.1 The Introduction of Cartesian Philosophy into Brandenburg-Prussia 8.2 Theological Controversies and the Withering of the Cartesian Flower 8.3 The Question of Cartesian Rationality: Placentinus’s Middle Way 8.4 The Social Circulation of Cartesian Philosophy as a Prefiguration of Enlightenment Universalism 8.5 The Contest of the Faculties from Humanism to the Enlightenment References Appendix Placentinus’s Disputation on the Two Books of God Transcription Translation Index of Places Name Index This volume is a study of the many dimensions of the early reception of Cartesianism in German-speaking Europe during the seventeenth century based on the case of the University of Frankfurt an der Oder. It investigates the broad context of that discussion, which was at once scientific, cultural, political and socio-institutional. Chapter by chapter, the book sheds light on the most relevant aspects of the environment of the time. It is aimed at historians of science and philosophy, as well as scholars investigating German-speaking Europe of the 17th century.