Abstract
The Divine Author wrote two books: the Bible and the Book of Nature. This last title, “the Book of Nature”, is obsolete. Galileo Galilei used it in a very significant way. Usually historians use it in connection with Galileo. Obviously, they find it exciting. No one explains this excitement. The title itself is puzzling: the Book of Nature is not a book proper. Some read the expression as a synonym for “Nature”. They are in error. Galileo asserted that the language of the Book of Nature is mathematical. The Book of Nature then is not a set of natural phenomena. It is a set of natural laws. It is, strictly, a book of laws. Alternatively, “The Book of Nature” is a loose metaphor. It stands then for reason and its products. I propose that the right reading includes both the strict and the loose sense of the title. “The Two Books” is a metaphor on the uneasy relations between faith and reason.
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Note
See my “On Explaining the Trial of Galileo”, reprinted in my Science and Society,1981, esp. p. 329.
See also Michael Segre, “La ‘rehabilitaciòn’ de Galileo: un panto de vista popperiano”, Galileo, 13, 1996, 3–7;
See also Michael Segre, “Light on the Galileo Case?” Isis, 88, 1997, 484–504;
See also Michael Segre, “Galileo: a ‘rehabilitation’ that has never taken place.” Endeavour, 23, 1999, 20–23;
See also Michael Segre, “Hielt Johannes Paul II. sein Versprechen?”,in M. Segre and E. Knobloch eds., Der ungebändigte Galilei,Stuttgart, 2001,107–111.
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© 2003 Joseph Agassi
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Agassi, J. (2003). The Two Books. In: Science and Culture. Boston Studies in the Philosophy of Science, vol 231. Springer, Dordrecht. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-94-017-2946-8_20
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/978-94-017-2946-8_20
Publisher Name: Springer, Dordrecht
Print ISBN: 978-90-481-6234-5
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