Perception and Analogy: Poetry, Science, and Religion in the Eighteenth Century

Perception and Analogy explores how sensory experience is conceptualized in the eighteenth century, drawing connections between perception and the creative methods employed by natural philosophers. It argues for the significance of analogies for conceptualizing and explaining new scientific ideas and their use in religious and topographical poetry, as well as in material culture. It also claims that scientific concepts become intertwined with Christian discourse through reinterpretations of origins and signs, the scope of the created universe, and the limits of embodied knowledge.

\n Format: Hardback
\n Length: 296 pages
\n Publication date: 19 October 2021
\n Publisher: Manchester University Press
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Perception and analogy delves into the scientific exploration of vision in the eighteenth century. This comprehensive book examines the conceptualization of sensory experience during this time, forging innovative connections between the treatment of perception as an embodied phenomenon and the creative approaches employed by natural philosophers. Spanning a wide range of literary, theological, and pedagogical texts that engage with astronomy, optics, ophthalmology, and the body, the book advocates for the importance of analogies in conceptualizing and explaining novel scientific ideas. In addition to identifying their usage in religious and topographical poetry, the book also addresses how analogies manifest in material culture through objects such as orreries, camera obscuras, and aeolian harps. It makes a crucial assertion that scientific concepts intertwine with Christian discourse through reinterpretations of origins, the scope of the created universe, and the boundaries of embodied knowledge.

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Dimension: 216 x 138 (mm)\n
ISBN-13: 9781526157041\n \n