Language, Mind and Nature

Artificial Languages in England from Bacon to Locke

Rhodri Lewis

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English

CAMBRIDGE UNIVERSITY PRES
24 August 2012

Philosophy; History of ideas

Series: Ideas in Context

In the attempt to make good one of the desiderata in Bacon's Advancement of Learning, a cohort of seventeenth-century philosophers, scientists, schoolmasters, clergymen and virtuosi attempted to devise artificial languages that would immediately represent the order of thought. This was believed directly to represent the order of things and to be a universal characteristic of the human mind. Language, Mind and Nature is a 2007 text which fully reconstructs this artificial language movement. In so doing, it reveals a great deal about the beliefs and activities of those who sought to reform learning in seventeenth-century England. Artificial languages straddle occult, religious and proto-scientific approaches to representation and communication, and suggest that much of the so-called 'new philosophy' was not very new at all. This study broke important ground within its field, and will interest anyone concerned with early modern intellectual history or with the history of linguistic thought in general.

By: Rhodri Lewis
Imprint: CAMBRIDGE UNIVERSITY PRES
Country of Publication: United Kingdom
Volume: 80
Dimensions: Height: 229mm, Width: 152mm, Spine: 17mm
Weight: 430g
ISBN: 9780521294133
ISBN 10: 0521294134
Series: Ideas in Context
Pages: 288
Publication Date: 24 August 2012
Audience: Professional and scholarly , Undergraduate
Format: Paperback
Publisher's Status: Active

Reviews for Language, Mind and Nature: Artificial Languages in England from Bacon to Locke

Review of the hardback: '... Rhodri Lewis ably tells the story of efforts in seventeenth-century England to produce an 'artificial language'. Review of Politics 'Superseding its predecessors, this erudite and nuanced work provides the empirical, theological, and philosophical baseline for all future study of early modern artificial languages.' Matthew Jones, Isis