Category: 1600s

Any quotes or discussions about 17th century natural historians

Testing Book-smarts with Observation: John Ray (1735) on the Value of Knowledge Creation

Should professors at universities actively participate in generating and testing ideas, or should they content themselves with being teachers of established knowledge? Many higher educational institutions, including the one employing me, grapple with the ongoing challenge of balancing the encouragement of knowledge creation and the dissemination of existing knowledge. To phrase it differently, am I... Continue Reading →

Isaac Newton on the Mosaic Account of Creation

Creation chronometry was a much debated topic in the late 1600s and early 1700s among Christians with virtually no opinion expressed being of the same kind that that could be described as a literalist view held today. I often wonder what would have happened had the Westminster Confession of Faith been written after this debate rather than before it given how the landscape of the discussion changed in the 40 years after the Assembly of the Westminster Divines met.

A New Old Genesis Commentary – The Mather Project

Cotton Mather - Biblia Americana

An interesting new resource for research into 17th century natural history has been made available this year in the form of the first of what will be 10 volumes of the monumental work Biblia American by Cotton Mather (1663-1928).    The first volume coves this American puritan's commentary on Genesis.   Unfortunately the book is rather expensive... Continue Reading →

John Ray – definition of a species

What a species is has been debated for centuries but John Ray was the first person to produce a biological definition of what a species is.   In his 1686 History of plants he states: "..no surer criterion for determining species has occurred to me than the distinguishing features that perpetuate themselves in propagation from seed.... Continue Reading →

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