ORDERING THE WORLD IN THE EIGHTEENTH CENTURY by Frank O'Gorman, Diana Donald ( 9781403938206 )

Item Details

Title:

ORDERING THE WORLD IN THE EIGHTEENTH CENTURY

By:

Format:

Hardback

List price:	£89.99
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ISBN 10:

1403938202

ISBN 13:

9781403938206

Publisher:

PALGRAVE USA

Pub. date:

16 December, 2005

Series:

Studies in Modern History

Pages:

251

Description:

The Eighteenth century is often represented as 'The Age of Reason', but this claim was always open to troubling doubts and was intensely debated. This book explores the tensions and conflicts in these debates through a series of essays from international scholars, each challenging the idea that the Eighteenth century was an age of order.

Synopsis:

The Eighteenth century is often represented, applying Tom Paine's phrase, as 'The Age of Reason': an age when progressive ideals triumphed over autocracy and obscurantism, and when notions of order and balance shaped consciousness in every sphere of human knowledge. Yet the debates which surrounded the development of Eighteenth-century thought were always open to troubling doubts. Was nature itself truly an ordered entity, as Newton had argued, or was it a mass of chaotic, randomly moving atoms, as some materialist thinkers believed? This book explores the tensions and conflicts in these debates through a series of interdisciplinary essays from leading international scholars, each challenging the idea that the Eighteenth century was an age of order.

Illustrations:

5 Illustrations, black and white; XII, 251 p. 5 illus.

Publication:

Imprint:

Palgrave Macmillan

Returns:

Returnable

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