Instructor: Hoover (Spring 2008)

Readings for this course will be a mix of short, focused selections from primary sources—Plato, Aristotle, Petrarch, Leonardo, Copernicus, and Galileo, etc.— along with selections from secondary sources. All primary sources and some of the secondary sources will be in the form of photocopied materials which will be distributed to students in the course at the beginning of the semester:
    •  Re-Visioning the Cosmos (collection of photocopied material)             [available from the instructor]

In addition two secondary texts are required as well:
    • Dear, Peter.   Revolutionizing the Sciences
    • Lindberg, David.  The Beginnings of Western Science

The character of this course will resemble what some might call a “history of ideas” approach in which the focus tends to be more on the developments within the cultural and intellectual frameworks of a society, and the relation of successive artistic and philosophical movements to each other rather than on the explanations of these changes in terms of the details of economic, political and social realities. This history of ideas emphasis is a matter of degree and will not entirely exclude a study of historical causal explanations. But as a result of this approach, students will become familiar with such general movements as scholasticism, humanism, neoplatonism, mechanism, etc. However, the course will also be informed by the sensibilities of recent scholarship on the history of renaissance Europe which caution against the periodization and reductionist accounts that typify a more traditional history of ideas approach. We will discover that the conceptions of the natural world both before and during the early modern era are complex and do not adhere to any single orthodoxy and that there exist continuities of thought between the views of medievals and that of the early moderns. Yet there is also some justice in regarding the intellectual changes that occur in the conception of the natural world from 1500 to 1700 as “revolutionary”. A rapid transformation in the kind of explanations that are given for natural events occurs during these years. We will seek to come to some understanding of the intellectual and cultural developments that anticipate these changes. We will seek to understand which catalysts within European culture provide the ingredients for the revolution within the sciences. This course will focus on the Italian Renaissance as furnishing important clues to these concerns

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This course is not designed with the intent to simply “download” as much information as possible from instructor to student. Rather, the course will aim for an interactive classroom environment, in which material will be presented with the expectation that students will have questions and will feel free to pursue those questions in class. Accordingly, students will be expected to work through the assigned readings, both primary and secondary, prior to class meetings. There will also be occasional short writing exercises or quizzes that pertain to the readings and which will check the level of students’ engagement with the material and also serve as a springboard for class discussions. Performance on these exercises will be included as an element in class participation. A class participation grade will be assigned and will count for 20% of the course grade. Class participation will be graded on the basis of student performance in four areas: atten¬dance; prep¬aration; the quality of in-class participation; and performance on any short writing assignments.

As an honors course this class will meet the requirements for writing emphasis and stress the development of writing skills. Three papers of four to five pages in length will be required (see syllabus for tentative due dates). The topics for these papers will be assigned at least one week prior to their due date. These papers may be rewritten and resubmitted (and on occasion rewrites may be required). There will be no specific due dates for voluntary rewrites (although none will be accepted after the last class day) and there is no maximum number of times that a student may submit a rewritten paper. When submitting rewrites, please include the previously submitted versions (only significantly revised papers, please). The grade for rewritten papers will replace the previous grade if the new grade is higher. The two paper grades will be weighted equally (each counts one-sixth of the course grade).

Each student will also be required to complete two examinations over the course of the semester. These exams will all include a significant essay component. Each exam will be weighted equally (one-sixth of course grade). 
   
The final course grade is broken down as follows: 1/6th = class participation grade; 3/6ths = three exam grades; 2/6ths = two paper grades.

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