I hadn't known about Margaret Cavendish writing SF in 1666, back when Newton was a teenager inventing classical mechanics.
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RE: https://universeodon.com/@lovableweirdo/116222224444635795
I hadn't known about Margaret Cavendish writing SF in 1666, back when Newton was a teenager inventing classical mechanics. For more, check out the whole conversation here and also Wikipedia:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Margaret_Cavendish,_Duchess_of_Newcastle-upon-Tyne
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RE: https://universeodon.com/@lovableweirdo/116222224444635795
I hadn't known about Margaret Cavendish writing SF in 1666, back when Newton was a teenager inventing classical mechanics. For more, check out the whole conversation here and also Wikipedia:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Margaret_Cavendish,_Duchess_of_Newcastle-upon-Tyne
@johncarlosbaez I teach her in my History of Modern Philosophy class, but haven't read her SF yet!
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@johncarlosbaez I teach her in my History of Modern Philosophy class, but haven't read her SF yet!
@victorgijsbers - what about her philosophy do you teach?
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@victorgijsbers - what about her philosophy do you teach?
@johncarlosbaez We read a selection from the part of the Philosophical Letters that criticises Descartes. A little about the physics (e.g., his account of density in terms of pores), but most of all the letters in which Cavendish defends her own theory of matter as always a mixture of inanimate, animate and rational; which she then uses to criticise, among other things, Descartes' claim that animals have no feelings.
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@johncarlosbaez We read a selection from the part of the Philosophical Letters that criticises Descartes. A little about the physics (e.g., his account of density in terms of pores), but most of all the letters in which Cavendish defends her own theory of matter as always a mixture of inanimate, animate and rational; which she then uses to criticise, among other things, Descartes' claim that animals have no feelings.
@johncarlosbaez "That one man expressing his mind by speech or words to an other, doth not declare by it his excellency and supremacy above all other Creatures, but for the most part more folly, for a talking man is not so wise as a contemplating man. But by reason other Creatures cannot speak or discourse with each other as men, or make certain signs, whereby to express themselves as dumb and deaf men do, should we conclude, they have neither knowledge, sense, reason, or intelligence?"
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RE: https://universeodon.com/@lovableweirdo/116222224444635795
I hadn't known about Margaret Cavendish writing SF in 1666, back when Newton was a teenager inventing classical mechanics. For more, check out the whole conversation here and also Wikipedia:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Margaret_Cavendish,_Duchess_of_Newcastle-upon-Tyne
@johncarlosbaez I like the post but I don't like the picture. She is much more lovely in her Wikipedia page, not only in pictures but in her life.
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@johncarlosbaez I like the post but I don't like the picture. She is much more lovely in her Wikipedia page, not only in pictures but in her life.
@MartinEscardo Not too surprising, given that the picture is AI slop...
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RE: https://universeodon.com/@lovableweirdo/116222224444635795
I hadn't known about Margaret Cavendish writing SF in 1666, back when Newton was a teenager inventing classical mechanics. For more, check out the whole conversation here and also Wikipedia:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Margaret_Cavendish,_Duchess_of_Newcastle-upon-Tyne
@johncarlosbaez My late philosopher-friend Helen De Cruz wrote a very cool paper called "Cosmic Horror and the Philosophical Origins of Science Fiction" https://helendecruz.net/docs/DeCruz_horror.pdf, in which Cavendish's Blazing-world is a key example (in addition to Fontenelle’s Conversations on the Plurality of Worlds (1686)). They also illustrated the Blazing-world here: https://helendecruz.substack.com/p/illustrated-edition-of-margaret-cavendish
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