Agenda

12 Mar 2024 10:30

Fertile Uncertainties II: Experimentation between Ambiguity and Objectivity in the Early Modern Time

Università degli Studi di Milano - Aula “Elena Brambilla”, via Festa del Perdono 7, Milano

Despite the major role played by experimentation in the many fields of knowledge during the early modern period, questions and problems frequently surfaced. Objectivity, certainty, sistematicity, reproducibility, failures and errors were some of the issues that characterized the experiential approach to nature and the methodological debate, this being an essential facet of human inquiry. While experiments (and experimentalism) gained momentum in the engagement with nature, criticism and limitations persisted. Heatedly debated themes, for example, were the opposition between artificiality and naturality, somehow concerning not only technical features, but also revealing philosophical and theoretical issues; the uniformity of natural laws across time and space, a crucial theme for those who aimed to achieve a unified understanding of the natural world; the overlapping between ignorance and experimentalism; or, finally, the interpretive and methodological strain caused by the extension of the experimental method from a discipline to another. During the second and last day of this workshop series (which will take place at the University of Milan and is organized in collaboration with the Department of Philosophy and Cultural Heritage of Ca' Foscari University), we aim to discuss such critical issues in diverse fields, while investigating: - The role of observation and visualization in anatomical dissections; - The reproducibility of chymical experiments; - The utility of microscopes and telescopes in the study of nature; - The restrictions of microscopic observations in plant anatomy; - The challenges of experimentation in shaping the new physics; - The epistemological study of errors, uncertainty and ignorance; - The opposition to contrived experiments.

Language

The event will be held in Italian

Organized by

Dipartimento di Filosofia e Beni Culturali; Dipartimento di Studi Storici, Università degli Studi di Milano

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