The Scientific Revolution (roughly 1500 to 1700) is considered to be the central episode in the history of science, the historical moment when "modern science" and its attendant institutions emerged. This book challenges the traditional historiography of the Scientific Revolution. Starting with a dialogue between Betty Jo Teeter Dobbs and Richard S. Westfall, whose understanding of the Scientific Revolution differs in important ways, the papers in this volume reconsider canonical figures, their areas of study, and the formation of disciplinary boundaries during this seminal period of European intellectual history.

Introduction: the canonical imperative: rethinking the scientific revolution Margaret J. Osler; Part I. The Canon in Question: 1. Newton as final cause and first mover Betty Jo Teeter Dobbs; 2. The scientific revolution reasserted; Part II. Canonical Disciplines Reformed: 3. The role of religion in the Lutheran response to Copernicus Peter Barker; 4. Catholic natural philosophy: alchemy and the revivication of Sir Kenelm Digby Bruce Janacek; 5. Vital spirits: redemption, artisanship, and the new philosophy of Early Modern Europe Pamela Smith; 6. 'The terriblest eclipse that hath been seen in our days': Black Monday and the debate on astrology during the Interregnum William E. Burns; 7. Arguing about nothing: Henry More and Robert Boyle on the theological implications of the void Jane E. Jenkins; Part III. Canonical Figures Reconsidered: 8. Pursuing knowledge: Robert Boyle and Isaac Newton Lawrence M. Principe; 9. The alchemies of Robert Boyle and Isaac Newton: alternative approaches and divergent deployments; 10. The Janus faces of science in the seventeenth century: Athanasius Kircher and Isaac Newton; 11. The nature of Newton's 'holy alliance' between science and religion: from the scientific revolution to Newton (and back again); 12. Newton and Spinoza and the Bible scholarship of the day Richard H. Popkin; 13. The fate of the date: the theology of Newton's Principia revisited; Part IV. The Canon Reconstructed: 14. The truth of Newton's science and the truth of science's history: heroic science at its eighteenth-century formulation.