Papers by francesca rochberg
The Heavenly Writing, 2004
Forum on Public Policy a Journal of the Oxford Round Table, Dec 22, 2007
In the Rede lecture of 1959, C.P.Snow speaks in terms of two cultures, one of science, the other ... more In the Rede lecture of 1959, C.P.Snow speaks in terms of two cultures, one of science, the other of literary intellectuals. Snow's discussion presupposes that science represents a culture of its own, independent of and superior to the arts and humanities, and unified within itself. At our present distance from this claim, Snow's point of view can be seen as a product of the philosophical orientation to science as an embodiment of universal truths about nature as well as cold war pressures on the West to improve educational standards in science. As the terms in which science is discussed have changed in the last nearly half-century, so has our response to the terms of Snow's "Two Cultures"altered with time. The fields of history and sociology of science have shown the degree to which science is both fully enmeshed in society and conditioned by history, making it more difficult to support the idea of a separate "culture" of science immune from the effects of society and history. That the viability of a culture of science as an independent entity is contested in contemporary academic circles furthermore affects the mode in which students of science and the humanities are inculcated. This paper discusses the historical perspective on science as a culture and considers the impact of changing views about the nature, aims, and methods of science on the teaching of science and its history.
Hellenistic Astronomy, 2020
In the Path of the Moon, 2010
Hellenistic Astronomy, 2020
Babylonian Celestial Divination and Its Legacy
Journal of Ancient Near Eastern History, 2018
This paper considers Babylonian astronomical predictive schemes as a source for the study of reas... more This paper considers Babylonian astronomical predictive schemes as a source for the study of reasoning and representing via modeling. Two principal questions are addressed: first, whether Babylonian astronomical modeling can be usefully included in the conversation about scientific reasoning with models, and second, how and what the representational value of the practice of astronomical modeling was in ancient Babylonia. It is found that the Babylonian astronomical schemes demonstrate the adaptability and various capabilities of the process of modeling as a powerful tool of representation for scientific knowledge and theorizing.
Journal of Ancient Near Eastern History, 2014
This paper views the relevance of cuneiform texts to the history of science from inside, i.e., fr... more This paper views the relevance of cuneiform texts to the history of science from inside, i.e., from the perspective of the available sources, as well as from outside, i.e., from the perspective of historians of science outside the field of Assyriology. It reviews some of the methodological problems that beset the reconstruction of science in the ancient Near East as well as a way forward, which acknowledges localism and pluralism as well the compelling continuity from cuneiform traditions of knowledge to later counterparts (astronomy, astrology, magic, astral-medicine). Cuneiform texts will not instantiate a universal or transcultural science but are essential if science is to be seen as embedded in culture and history.
The Cambridge History of Science
How the study of physical phenomena in ancient Mesopotamia relates to the history of science is a... more How the study of physical phenomena in ancient Mesopotamia relates to the history of science is a question as important for the study of ancient Mesopotamia as it is for the history of science. It addresses both the nature of knowledge in the oldest literate culture as well as the historical reach of what we call science. If the essence of science is to be found in its systematization of knowledge about phenomena and in the various practices associated with such knowledge systemspractices such as celestial observation, prediction, and explanationthen science was a central part of cuneiform intellectual culture. Divination, magic, and medicine were integral parts of what the scribes termed "scholarship" (ṫ upsarrūtu, literally "the art of the scribe") as well as "wisdom" (nēmequ). Scholarship and wisdom were classified as a "secret of the great gods" (pirišti ilāni rabûti), referring to a conception of the origins of knowledge with the divine. Cuneiform knowledge was thus reserved for initiates, and injunctions against scribes who were not among the privileged few with access to texts classified as "secret" (pirištu) or "guarded" (niṡ irtu) are known from the Middle Babylonian (ca. sixteenth to eleventh centuries bce) to the Late Babylonian (ca. fourth to first centuries bce) periods. 2 The classification of knowledge as secret applied to divinatory texts, incantations, apotropaic rituals against ominous signs, medical texts, scholarly commentaries on divinatory texts, and astronomical texts, and by the late first millennium the interrelations among these forms of knowledge become more apparent. A Late Babylonian astronomical text giving rules for calculating month lengths and intervals of lunar visibility around the full moon,
Journal of the American Oriental Society, 1988
Journal of Near Eastern Studies, 1984
... THE association made in the Greco-Roman world between the profession "astrol... more ... THE association made in the Greco-Roman world between the profession "astrologer" and the name "Chaldean" is abundantly attested to in Hellenistic litera-ture, and the renown of the "Chaldeans" as expert practitioners of astrology that emerged in the Hellenistic period ...
Divination, Horoscopy, and Astronomy in Mesopotamian Culture, 2004
Studying the Near and Middle East at the Institute for Advanced Study, Princeton, 1935–2018, 2018
Journal of the American Oriental Society, 1996
... For example, a lunar eclipse is referred to as "the moon god in mourning." Metaphor... more ... For example, a lunar eclipse is referred to as "the moon god in mourning." Metaphor and its implications for abstract relational thought in the language of Babylonian divination can be established on the basis of the function of the attested metaphorical expressions, which was to ...
Aestimatio: Sources and Studies in the History of Science, 2021
One of the daunting challenges involved in reviewing a 750-page standard tome on a subject like a... more One of the daunting challenges involved in reviewing a 750-page standard tome on a subject like astronomy is being able to evaluate all aspects of the volume, covering technical data as well as any possible impact of subject matter on other disciplines. The editors, mindful of their readership consisting of both “insiders” and “outsiders”, have taken decisive steps towards making Hellenistic astronomy accessible and comprehensible, with an appropriate balance between complex graphs and arithmetic equations and more general topics, as well as a glossary of technical terminology. The present reviewer, an unrepentant “outsider”, will attempt to focus on some key issues involving the connections between Babylonian and Greek astronomy in the period in question, as well as the impact of astronomy as a whole. Reviewed by: M. J. Geller, Published Online (2021-08-31)Copyright © 2021 by M. J. GellerThis open access publication is distributed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-...
Journal of the American Oriental Society, 2013
Claroscuro. Revista del Centro de Estudios sobre Diversidad Cultural, 2021
Over the course of many centuries, cuneiform scribe-scholars produced a textual culture of learni... more Over the course of many centuries, cuneiform scribe-scholars produced a textual culture of learning that organized knowledge of the phenomenal world as defined by their particular interests. The ancient term for this culture was ṭupšarrūtu “the art of the scribe.” That we grant this culture the designation scientific is not without problems from the perspectives both of modern philosophy of science and of conventional historiography of science. This essay reflects on the anachronisms entailed in transposing such ideas about science to the premodern cuneiform world and the consequences these ideas have on a historiography of science inclusive of cuneiform scientific texts.
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Papers by francesca rochberg