History 30B, Spring 2000 Science and Society since the Scientific Revolution

Study Questions for the Midterm Exam

The midterm will be given on Thursday, March 2, and will cover material up through Tuesday, February 29.  The following examples should give you an idea of the sorts of questions that will appear.  Each should be answered in a paragraph of 6 to 8 sentences, preferably no more and certainly no less.  In framing your answers you should aim at two things:  to give a coherent and well-argued answer to the specific question, and to include enough detail (e.g., names of major figures, time location by quarter-century or so) to demonstrate your knowledge.  On the exam you will be given a good choice of questions from which to select the ones you want to answer.  Obviously, the topics of these preparatory questions will not limit the topics on the exam.

Note that some of the questions are judgment calls:  they can be answered in more than one way.  What matters is that you make a good argument.
 

1.  What was the mechanical philosophy, and where did it make itself felt?  Describe its origins and tenets and give two examples of its deployment in different scientific disciplines.

2.  What were the key issues in classification over which Linnaeus and Buffon divided?  Identify their conflicts and comment on their significance.

3.  Is Humboldtian science Baconian?  Explain both Bacon's program for scientific knowledge and the research activities of Humboldt and his followers.  Then make an argument for how you see the connection.

4.  Claim:  The French Academy of Sciences and the Royal Society of London were the two most important sites for science in the eighteenth century.  Take a stand for or against and support your case with examples from lecture, section, or reading.

5.  "Morphology" is a term coined by Johann Wolfgang von Goethe.  Explain what he intended it to mean and how it fit into his broader worldview.  Did morphology remain within the Goethean framework?

6.  What was the significance of Spallanzani's work on frogs?  In answering this question you should situate his work amidst the eighteenth-century debates on life and generation.
 

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