Pascal : Adversary and Advocate / Robert J. Nelson.

Format:

Book

Author/Creator:

Nelson, R. J. (Robert J.), author.

Language:

English

Subjects (All):

PHILOSOPHY / General.

Pascal, Blaise, 1623-1662.

RELIGION / General.

Local Subjects:

PHILOSOPHY / General.

Pascal, Blaise, 1623-1662.

RELIGION / General.

Physical Description:

1 online resource (292 p.)

Edition:

Reprint 2014

Place of Publication:

Cambridge, MA : Harvard University Press, [2014]

Language Note:

English

Summary:

The life of the paradoxical seventeenth-century philosopher and mathematician is examined here along three axes--psychological, theological, and linguistic--to present the first rounded portrayal of the querulous, intense, ever-committed Pascal. In drawing this portrait, the author restores Pascal to the general reader after twenty years of scholarship that has embroiled this historic thinker in academic quarrels. Robert Nelson confronts the contradictions in Pascal's life and personality: intensely religious according to the demands of his time, yet simultaneously committed to rigorous scientific inquiry, no matter where it led; fascinated by rebellion, yet deeply dependent on the authority of father, spiritual adviser, church, and science. Mr. Nelson sees the resolution of these personal dilemmas in Pascal's growing interest in language--the essential relation between word and object, signifier and signified, which form a style of "Pascalian linguistics" different from those of Descartes or Port Royal. Through the scrutiny of Pascal's biography and analysis of the entire body of his writing, Nelson reveals Pascal the man, the scientist, the theologian, and the literary genius.

Contents:

Frontmatter

ACKNOWLEDGMENTS

CONTENTS

INTRODUCTION

PART I. The Adversary

1. ADVERSARIAL BELIEVER, ADVERSARIAL MAN OF SCIENCE

2. THE ADVERSARIAL BELIEVER AND HIS FAMILY

3. THE ADVERSARIAL BELIEVER AND THE WORLD

P A R T II. Transition

4.THE CONVERT1

5. THE CONVERT'S AGONY

6. THE CONVERT AS PRIVATE ADVERSARY

7. THE CONVERT AS PUBLIC ADVERSARY: PROVINCIAL LETTERS 1-16

PART III. The Advocate

8. THE FINAL PROVINCIAL LETTERS

9. THE LETTERS TO THE ROANNEZ

10. THE THOUGHTS

CONCLUSION: ADVERSARY AND ADVOCATE IN THE FINAL WRITINGS

NOTES

BIBLIOGRAPHY

INDEX

Notes:

Bibliographic Level Mode of Issuance: Monograph

Description based on online resource; title from PDF title page (publisher's Web site, viewed 23. Mai 2019)

Description based on publisher supplied metadata and other sources.

ISBN:

0-674-18291-X

OCLC:

1024049730