Art and the Ordered Cosmos:
The Mechanistic Universe: European Views of Nature and the Cosmos in the 18th Century
unit by Dr. Deborah Vess
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Philosophy in the Age of Reason
Descartes
Descartes site focuses on Descartes's mathematical contributions
References for Descartes a bibliography
Rene Descartes and the Legacy of Mind/Body Dualism
Philosopher All Stars: Descartes
Mind and Body: Descartes to William James
Leibniz
Bacon
Voltaire
Science in the Age of Reason
Galileo
An Astronomical Instrument of Galileo's Age
Galileo's drawings of the sun spots
Galileo's observations of the moons of Jupiter
Newton
Newtonia at The Newton Institute very nice set of references, from biography to maps of locations associated with Newton.
Newton: Biography from Men of Mathematics
The Life,Times and Achievements of Sir Isacc Newton from The World's 100 Greatest people audiocassette collection. You can read and listen to this text.
Newton: Hyperlinked Biography fromEric's Treasure Trove of Scientific Biographies.
General Resources
Museum of the History of Science: Oxford
Images, online exhibits and loads of other information
Eric's Treasure Trove of Scientific Biography
General Astronomy Information fromThe Royal Greenwich Observatory
WWW History of Science and Medicine
History and Philosophy of Western Astronomy
Contains a number of interesting links to explore
Music and the Ordered Cosmos
Music reflected the Enlightened belief in the mathematical predictability and order of the universe. In music of the Classical Age, phrases are generally a predictable and regular length throughout a composition, there are predictable patterns of tonal progression, regular rhythms, and certain forms, such as symphonic form or sonata-allegro form which were also very orderly in their obedience to formal rules and structures. Listen to the Mozart concerto below for an example. Follow the links below for other examples.
Mozart Piano Concerto in d minor, K. 466. Click on the poster to start the performance.
Performance by Dr. Deborah Vess in 1985 with the Penn State Symphony Orchestra. Dedicated with love to my teacher, Mrs. Betty Lief Sims of Dallas, Texas, who introduced me to the wonders of interdisciplinary learning, and to Dr. Steven Smith, under whose direction I performed this piece. All rights reserved; copyright 1999.
Click here to read the chapter on 18th century music by Dr. Greg Pepetone.
Other Links to explore:
Haydn: Classical Midi Archives
Mozart: Classical Midi Archives
Eighteenth-Century Landscape Gardens
The belief that the universe was a mathematically ordered place is also manifested in eighteenth-century gardens. Nature was sculptured and made to fit an orderly mold of human creation. Descartes had argued that one could enter the chambers of one's own mind, and discover the one thing that one could know absolutely for certain: I think, therefore I am. From there, one could construct knowledge of the universe. Later thinkers criticized Descartes from arguing that one need not look at the universeto know what it must be like, for he argued that an examination of the contents of one's own mind was all that was necessary to know certain truths about the universe.
Similarly, landscape architects were unwilling to see nature as wild or untamed, and created artificial environments in which nothing was left to chance. in which nature obeyed the laws which humans said it must obey.
Viewers may want to explore some examples of eighteenth-century landscape gardens through Dr. Rob Viau's WWW site.
copyright © Dr. Deborah Vess 1998-2001, Georgia College & State University and the Board of Regents of the University System of Georgia. All rights reserved. Rights to chapters authored by contributing faculty members reserved to Georgia College & State University, to the Interdisciplinary Studies Program at GC&SU, and to the individual faculty authors.