Uncertain chances : science, skepticism, and belief in nineteenth-century American literature / Maurice S. Lee.

Format:

Book

Author/Creator:

Lee, Maurice S.

Language:

English

Subjects (All):

American literature--19th century--History and criticism.

American literature.

Chance in literature.

Probability in literature.

Skepticism in literature.

Belief and doubt in literature.

Pragmatism in literature.

Literature and science--United States--History--19th century.

Literature and science.

Christianity and literature--United States--History--19th century.

Christianity and literature.

United States--Intellectual life--19th century.

United States.

Physical Description:

1 online resource (250 p.)

Place of Publication:

New York : Oxford University Press, 2011.

Language Note:

English

Summary:

The role of chance changed in the nineteenth century, and American literature changed with it. Long dismissed as a nominal concept, chance was increasingly treated as a natural force to be managed but never mastered. New theories of chance sparked religious and philosophical controversies while revolutionizing the sciences as probabilistic methods spread from mathematics, economics, and sociology to physics and evolutionary biology. Chance also became more visible in everyday life, as Americans attempted to control its power through weather forecasting, insurance policies, military strategy, a

Contents:

Cover; Contents; Acknowledgments; Introduction; 1. Probably Poe; Method-If Method There Is; Vast Individual Error; Things External to the Game; 2. Moby-Dick and the Opposite of Providence; The Cause of the Hunt; The Indifferent Sword of Chance; At a Venture; 3. Doubting If Doubt Itself Be Doubting: After Moby-Dick; Judge ye, then, ye Judicious; Pierre and Pragmatism; "Bartleby" and Buridan's Ass; 4. Douglass's Long Run; Providence and Improvidence; Balancing Probabilities; Give Them a Chance!; Reconstructing Black Pragmatism; 5. Roughly Thoreau; Axes and Knives; Errors and Averages

Fish and GamesAn Unfinished Life of Science; Summing Up; 6. Dickinson's Precarious Steps, Surprising Leaps, and Bounds; Romantic Embarrassments; Chances for Heaven; Precarious Gaits; Having an Experience; Coda: Lost Causes and the Civil War; Notes; Index; A; B; C; D; E; F; G; H; I; J; K; L; M; N; O; P; Q; R; S; T; U; V; W; Y

Notes:

Description based upon print version of record.

Includes bibliographical references and index.

Description based on print version record.

Description based on publisher supplied metadata and other sources.

ISBN:

0-19-020853-8

0-19-998581-2

1-283-42737-0

0-19-979767-6

9786613427373

OCLC:

769344065