In Memoriam Christoph J. Scriba (6 October 1929-26 July 2013)

Academic tools are seldom seen by others, but can be most revealing. During a stay of over two years in Oxford in the early 1960s, working towards his habilitation thesis, Christoph Scriba prepared a personal card catalogue of all the letters of John Wallis (1616–1703) he had unearthed in, amongst other places, the Bodleian and various college libraries, in the Royal Society and the British Museum. On each card he noted details of date, manuscript and printed sources, and any other relevant bibliographic information. This was not all. He also produced two further catalogues: one of all manuscripts containing Wallis’s papers and letters, listing systematically the content of each of the folio sheets, and one of all the books formerly in the Library of the Savilian professors, now part of the Bodleian, giving precise details of when he had ordered each of the books and when they had been returned to the stacks, after inspection for underlining, marginalia, and so on. Nor did he buy neat new cards specifically for this purpose, as they would have been available from Oxford stationers at the time. Instead, he re-cycled the insides of envelopes used for sending him letters, some white, some brown, some grey, cutting them down to a uniform size. And these cards, carefully inscribed, were not housed in a varnished wooden box such as could then be found in libraries or offices up and down the country, but rather in re-used cartons, one for coffee filters here, one for a presentation table lighter there. The appearance does not diminish the content or the value in any way. These painstakingly produced catalogues and records of scholarly practice were not only accurate and reliable, but also contained a wealth of information which has only very rarely been superseded. Historical research instruments born of the shortages of post-war Europe and prepared by a careful mind averse to wastefulness, they are still in use today

Physical arguments and moral inducements: John Wallis on questions of antiquarianism and natural philosophy

In his posthumously published work Chartham News (1669), the antiquary William Somner tentatively sought to link the discovery of fossilized remains near Canterbury to the prehistoric existence of an isthmus connecting Britain and France, before calling on natural philosophers to pursue his explanation further. This call was eventually heeded by the Oxford mathematician John Wallis, but only after more than thirty years had elapsed. The arrival in England of a catalogue of questions concerning the geology of the Channel led to the republication of Chartham News in the Philosophical Transactions, prompting Wallis to develop a physical explanation based on his intimate knowledge of the Kent coastline. Unbeknown to Wallis at the time, that catalogue had been sent by G. W. Leibniz, who had in turn received it from G. D. Schmidt, the former Resident of Brunswick-Lüneburg in Sweden. Wallis's explanation, based on the principle of establishing physical causes both for the rupturing of the isthmus and for the origin of fossils, placed him in a camp opposed by Newtonian authors such as John Harris at a time when the priority dispute over the discovery of the calculus led to the severing of his ties with the German mathematician and philosopher Leibniz

Physical arguments and moral inducements: John Wallis on questions of antiquarianism and natural philosophy

In his posthumously published work Chartham News (1669), the antiquary William Somner tentatively sought to link the discovery of fossilized remains near Canterbury to the prehistoric existence of an isthmus connecting Britain and France, before calling on natural philosophers to pursue his explanation further. This call was eventually heeded by the Oxford mathematician John Wallis, but only after more than thirty years had elapsed. The arrival in England of a catalogue of questions concerning the geology of the Channel led to the republication of Chartham News in the Philosophical Transactions, prompting Wallis to develop a physical explanation based on his intimate knowledge of the Kent coastline. Unbeknown to Wallis at the time, that catalogue had been sent by G. W. Leibniz, who had in turn received it from G. D. Schmidt, the former Resident of Brunswick-Lüneburg in Sweden. Wallis's explanation, based on the principle of establishing physical causes both for the rupturing of the isthmus and for the origin of fossils, placed him in a camp opposed by Newtonian authors such as John Harris at a time when the priority dispute over the discovery of the calculus led to the severing of his ties with the German mathematician and philosopher Leibniz

Early Physics

This chapter discusses Leibniz’s earliest work on physical questions. It begins with how his discovery of contemporary publications on the laws of motion prompted him to investigate the topic for himself, leading him to make a fundamental distinction between pure theory and natural phenomena. From this distinction emerged his two tracts Theoria motus abstracti and Hypothesis physica nova, the latter of which played an important role in his admission to the fellowship of the Royal Society in 1673. Salient parts of these two tracts are outlined, as are some of the more important physical ideas Leibniz developed from them during his stay in Paris

Roberval, Gilles Personne de (1602–1675)

The Cambridge Descartes Lexicon is the definitive reference source on René Descartes, "the father of modern philosophy" and arguably among the most important philosophers of all time

Early Physics

This chapter discusses Leibniz’s earliest work on physical questions. It begins with how his discovery of contemporary publications on the laws of motion prompted him to investigate the topic for himself, leading him to make a fundamental distinction between pure theory and natural phenomena. From this distinction emerged his two tracts Theoria motus abstracti and Hypothesis physica nova, the latter of which played an important role in his admission to the fellowship of the Royal Society in 1673. Salient parts of these two tracts are outlined, as are some of the more important physical ideas Leibniz developed from them during his stay in Paris

Roberval, Gilles Personne de (1602–1675)

The Cambridge Descartes Lexicon is the definitive reference source on René Descartes, andquot;the father of modern philosophyandquot; and arguably among the most important philosophers of all time

G. W. Leibniz, Interrelations between Mathematics and Philosophy

Drawing on the extensive number of letters and papers published in recent years, the volume investigates the interconnections between mathematics and philosophy in Leibniz's thought