Galilei als Methodologe

Galileo did not develop a systematic methodology but rather a methodical form which represents an essential part of the development of modern scientific thought. Keywords to the methodical form of Galileo's thought are: 1) The geometrization of the sciences (‘mathematization of nature’) - this refers especially to the explication of the methodological priority of a theory of measurement. 2) Argomento ex suppositione, that is, the coupling of the originally proof-theoretical distinction between analysis and synthesis to elements of a methodology of empirical science. 3) The axiomatic structure of mechanics that corresponds to the modern semantic theory conception and to constructivist conceptions of the philosophy of science. 4) A constructive (or instrumental) concept of experience, which replaces the Aristotelian concept of a phenomenal experience in the construction of physics.     

Natur-Wissenschaft und Gotteserkenntnis: Das jüdische Modell

The thesis proposed here is that in Judaism creation is seen as a unique act of God at a specific point in time. In medieval philosophy the act of creation is interpreted as natural science, which concerns itself only with products of divine creation. This is contrasted with theology, which is concerned not with creation but with God. Francis Bacon takes this model from Moses Maimonides for his work Nova Atlantis. Natural science replaces theological studies for Bacon.     

Der Naturwissenschaftler und sein Körper. Naturwissenschaftsgeschichte aus anthropologischer Perspektive

Since it's early days modern science is confronted with the following dilemma: Scientific investigation of nature requires the availability of the scientist's body in nearly all of its activities, though on the other hand science feels obliged to minimalize any influence of this body for methodological reasons. How has science dealt with this dilemma? How has it managed to keep the balance between using the body in favour of knowledge and keeping the required distance to it? In answering these questions the paper tries to reconstruct the history of early modern science from an anthropological perspective.     

Zur Pluralisierung im Luthertum des 17. Jahrhunderts und ihrer Bedeutung für die Deutungen von ‚Natur’︁

Building on methodological considerations in cultural history and historical anthropology, the following contribution proceeds from the concept of ?nature’? rather than from ?natural science’?, with the former understood here as the object of culturally determined projections, values and practices. This ?constructive’?, practice‐oriented concept of nature exposes perceptions of and attitudes towards nature that, owing to the usual reduction of nature to natural science, would otherwise have remained hidden, but which may well be essential to its constitution. To a certain extent, the term ?nature’? continues the terminological extension from ?natural science’? to ?natural philosophy’?, but as a heuristic device it more strongly implies the significance of culturally mediated practices and dynamics. The essay raises the following questions: Which religious conceptions entered into which attitudes towards nature and which religious expectations and interpretive matrices were the motivating forces behind which studies of nature? The figures within seventeenth‐century Lutheranism who shaped and promoted nature‐oriented attitudes and practices were not the ?orthodox’? scholars more strongly tied to academic and controversialist theology, but rather reform‐oriented theologians critical of the church. In the context of the inner differentiation and pluralization of seventeenth‐century Lutheranism, these reform‐oriented groups not only inspired innovate theological projects but also assumed a leading role, along with liked‐minded Christian laypersons, in interpreting and studying ?nature’?.     

Die Rezeption der humanistischen Gedächtnislehre bei Luther: Natur,Kunst und Konfessionen

Iconoclasm is one of the central characteristic of the reformation movement. In several books it was argued that there was a connection between iconoclasm and the interpretation of nature as a language and as a text since about 1600. This article discusses the artist as a creator in Renaissance culture. It shows the reaction of Luther to this concept and to iconoclasm, focussing on the connection between the Lutheran control of pictures and images and his conception of the mind and of memory on the one hand and of creatures as images and natural history on the other. In Lutheran context the book of nature was a book made of images as signs of the word of God.