Benedetto Castelli's Considerations on the Lagoon of Venice: Mathematical Expertise and Hydro-geomorphological Transformations in Seventeenth-Century Venice
dc.contributor.author
Omodeo, Pietro
dc.contributor.author
Trevisani, Sebastiano
dc.contributor.author
Dhandapani, Senthil Babu
dc.date.accessioned
2021-01-14T14:07:49Z
dc.date.available
2020-12-09T12:28:12Z
dc.date.available
2020-12-16T10:25:03Z
dc.date.available
2020-12-16T10:25:43Z
dc.date.available
2020-12-16T10:28:14Z
dc.date.available
2021-01-11T11:28:22Z
dc.date.available
2021-01-11T14:26:28Z
dc.date.available
2021-01-14T14:07:49Z
dc.date.issued
2020-11-12
dc.identifier.issn
0736-623X
dc.identifier.issn
1944-6187
dc.identifier.other
10.17704/1944-6187-39.2.420
en_US
dc.identifier.uri
http://hdl.handle.net/20.500.11850/455525
dc.description.abstract
This paper deals with the geoenvironmental politics of early-modern Venice as a case study of geological agency that enlightens the entanglements of geo-history and human history. It focuses on a controversy that was sparked by Galileo’s pupil Benedetto Castelli, as he claimed that his mathematical treatment of running waters could solve all of the most urgent problems linked to the management of the Lagoon of Venice. From an epistemological viewpoint, the controversy is relevant as a case of clashing ‘styles of thought’, as it constituted a disciplinary conflict that pitted Galileian physico-mathematical abstraction (which resulted from the isolation of a set of quantifiable data) against ‘geological’ concreteness (a form of comprehensive knowledge which aimed to cope with systemic complexity). Castelli was not able to convince the Venetian authorities that his method could solve the main problems relative to the conservation of the lagoon at a time when its depth and navigability were worryingly diminishing. While the Venetian authorities invested in diverting rivers away from the lagoon to reduce sediment supply, Castelli argued, to the contrary, that it was precisely the diversion of the rivers that caused shoaling because of the loss of the great quantity of water discharged by the rivers, which he accurately calculated. His analytical approach was dismissive of the comprehensive knowledge and complex methods that Venetian water experts and engineers had developed towards a systemic understanding of the hydrogeology and the environment of the lagoon with the active involvement of citizens and fishermen in the assessment of the state of the waters.
en_US
dc.language.iso
en
en_US
dc.publisher
Museum of Natural History
en_US
dc.subject
Benedetto Castelli
en_US
dc.subject
Early Modern Science
en_US
dc.subject
Renaissance hydrogeology
en_US
dc.subject
Lagoon of Venice
en_US
dc.title
Benedetto Castelli's Considerations on the Lagoon of Venice: Mathematical Expertise and Hydro-geomorphological Transformations in Seventeenth-Century Venice
en_US
dc.type
Journal Article
ethz.journal.title
Earth Sciences History
ethz.journal.volume
39
en_US
ethz.journal.issue
2
en_US
ethz.journal.abbreviated
Earth sci. hist.
ethz.pages.start
420
en_US
ethz.pages.end
446
en_US
ethz.publication.place
Washington, DC
en_US
ethz.publication.status
published
en_US
ethz.leitzahl
ETH Zürich::00002 - ETH Zürich::00012 - Lehre und Forschung::00007 - Departemente::02045 - Dep. Geistes-, Sozial- u. Staatswiss. / Dep. of Humanities, Social and Pol.Sc.::09591 - Wagner, Roy / Wagner, Roy
en_US
ethz.leitzahl.certified
ETH Zürich::00002 - ETH Zürich::00012 - Lehre und Forschung::00007 - Departemente::02045 - Dep. Geistes-, Sozial- u. Staatswiss. / Dep. of Humanities, Social and Pol.Sc.::09591 - Wagner, Roy / Wagner, Roy
ethz.date.deposited
2020-12-09T12:28:26Z
ethz.source
FORM
ethz.eth
yes
en_US
ethz.availability
Metadata only
en_US
ethz.rosetta.installDate
2020-12-16T10:25:13Z
ethz.rosetta.lastUpdated
2021-02-15T23:15:27Z
ethz.rosetta.versionExported
true
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Journal Article [132254]