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Astrologia i Naturphilosophie – casus Johanna Wilhelma Andreasa Pfaffa (1774-1835)

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Rodzeń J.

Roczniki Filozoficzne

2014

vol. 62

issue 4

163-180

Johann Wilhelm Andreas Pfaff (1774-1835) był obiecującym niemieckim matematykiem i astronomem, należącym do bogatej w tradycje akademickie rodziny Pfaffów – miał dwóch starszych powszechnie znanych braci. Niniejszy artykuł przedstawia życie najmłodszego z Pfaffów – od czasu jego studiów teologicznych w Getyndze do okresu działalności w Uniwersytecie Erlangeńskim. Krocząc śladami Klaudiusza Ptolemeusza i Johanna Keplera, Johann Wilhelm Andreas Pfaff usiłował promować astrologię w pierwszych dekadach XIX wieku. Jego wysiłki umocnienia astrologii jako pełnoprawnej dyscypliny akademickiej, zamiast oczekiwanego skutku, spotkały sią z opozycją, drwiną i marginalizacją samego Pfaffa w ówczesnej społeczności akademickiej. Jednakże jego osobisty dramat powinno się umiejscowić w szerokim kontekście nurtu tzw. Naturphilosophie – romantycznego ruchu myślowego, niezwykle popularnego w kręgach intelektualnych ówczesnych krajów niemieckich (także w państwach skandynawskich).

Johann Wilhelm Andreas Pfaff (1774-1835) was a promising German mathematician and astronomer belonging to the rich in academic traditions family—he had two well-known older brothers. The present paper describes life of the youngest of Pfaffs since his theological studies in Göttingen to the time of his activity at the University of Erlangen. Following the footsteps of Claudius Ptolemy and J. Kepler, Johann Wilhelm Andreas Pfaff tried to promote astrology in the first decades of the 19th century. His efforts to strengthen astrology as a full-fledged academic discipline, instead of the expected effect, have resulted in opposition, mockery and his marginalisation in contemporary academic community. However, such personal drama of this scholar should be considered in a wider context of so-called Naturphilosophie—romantic intellectual movement, extremely popular in the contemporary intellectual circles of the German states (as well as in the Scandinavian countries).

Johann Wolfgang Goethe (1749-1832). The Genetic Method and the French Aphorism. The 180th anniversary of the poet-naturalist’s death

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Bednarczyk A.

Kwartalnik Historii Nauki i Techniki

2012

vol. 57

issue 3-4

7-65

The present-day scientific issues (participation in a dispute between G. Cuvier and É. Geoffroy Saint-Hilaire in 1830 in the form of a two-part article written on this topic - 1830, 1832) and also the editorial activities connected with the scientific field – such as, participation in the editing and publishing (1831) of a French translation of his former botanical study Versuch die Metamorphose der Pflanzen zu erklären (1790), which he recently provided with revised additional materials (the autobiography of the poet as a naturalist and the course of reception of the concept of metamorphosis) were matters which imported Goethe nearly until the last years of his life. It was in Versuch die Metamorphose der Pflanzen zu erklären where a detail previously absent from his natural writings appeared there for the first time, namely a French motto opening a part containing these additional materials: Voir venir les choses est le meilleur moyen de les expliquer. This only one sentence, maintained in the aphoristic form, whose author was, a little known at that time, French botanist and illustrator, Pierre-Jean-François Turpin (1775-1840), explains in the most concise way possible the very essence of the genetic method. This said method, widely practiced by Goethe in the natural studies from the early age, constituted an important component of his methodological set of instruments and gave a special expression to his way of understanding the world. The article analyses the German translation of Turpin’s aphorism, as made by Goethe, in which a certain teleological nuance was noticed, not existing in the original French version; as such, it remains in an apparent contradiction with the general and antiteleological scientific attitude of Goethe. The mentioned aphorism was compared in terms of accuracy to several translations into European languages. Furthermore, the question of Turpin’s aphorism being allegedly assigned to Aristotle was also taken into consideration. In the article, the proper genetic method based on textual evidences, drawn from Goethe's scientific works, was reconstructed and its extensive and varied applications familiar to the poet natural sciences. It was noted that the developed by Goethe genetic method (similarly as presenting it Turpin’s aphorism) had its origins in the same morphology, was used to solve specific epistemological problems of biology at that time, and was not the product of - contrary to what many historians of biology claim - influential in those days German Naturphilosophie. In the article, above all, however, a lot of attention was paid to the position which the genetic method occupied in morphology, interpreted by Goethe in a physiological and typological way. Particularly great importance was paid to it in the developed by Goethe theory of morphological type associated with a comparative method and introducing there the principle of continuity, to which he assigned a special theoretical and philosophical importance. Finally, the relations of the genetic method with contemporary typological morphology and the used here concept of homology were presented.

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Astrologia i Naturphilosophie – casus Johanna Wilhelma Andreasa Pfaffa (1774-1835)

Johann Wolfgang Goethe (1749-1832). The Genetic Method and the French Aphorism. The 180th anniversary of the poet-naturalist’s death