Stillman Drake is well recognized as a scholar who devoted practically his whole academic and scientific life to the study of Galileo, his thought and influence upon the further developments of science and the philosophy of science. Drake tarnslated works of Galileo but also wrote several important books about him. The three volumes here reviewed contain Drake's most important papers on the topic. The three volumes are a very great tribute to the memory of Drake, one of Canada's most outstanding scholars. In this review, I shall offer a synthesis of the content of each volume.
Volume 1 is divided into four parts and is preceded by the Drake's speech on the occasion of his receipt of the International Prize Galileo Galilei for History of Italian Science. Part I is about "Galileo: Biographical and General". In "Galileo: A Biographical Sketch" we read a synthesis of the life and achievements of Galileo, a great scientist who combined an inherent gift of observing Nature with a deep and free reasoning. "The Scientific Personality of Galileo" is based upon the strong sense of independence in Galileo that explained in some sense the hostility of Urban VIII and the Holy Office towards him. As Drake assessed rightly, we here find the foundations of modern science. The personality of Galileo, as both man and scientist, was and still is (as Drake said) controversial.
"Galileo's Explorations in Science" shows how Galileo, as a true scientific explorer, did great work directly on astronomy and physics. Based upon logical reasoning, Galileo stated the incoherence of some Aristotelian principles about motion. The great difference was the experimental method used by Galileo, rather than just the logical categories that Aristotle used to understand the phenomena he watched: this is the shift between a logical science (like Greek science) and a science based upon the experiments (not only sense experience) and logical scientific method. "Galileo's Language: Mathematics and Poetry in a New Science": the sensible world was the scope of Galileo as researcher and his key to desciphering it was mathematics, but the goal of mathematical Research was a scientific discourse in intelligible terms.
Other essays in this volume include "Mathematic, Astronomy and Physics in the Work of Galileo", "Measurement in Galileo's Science", and "Exact Sciences, Primitive Instruments, and Galileo". In "The Accademia dei Lincei" Drake discusses how this great scientific society played a key role not only in the progress of the European Science as such but also in the insights of many scientists and their particular projects. Galileo joined the Accademia when he was already a well knowed scientist and furtherly he shared with the "Accademia" very interesting scientific papers. In "On the Conflicting Documents of Galileo's Trial", Drake discusses how on February 26, 1616 Cardinal Robert Bellarmine, SJ, informed Galileo that the doctrines of earth's motion and the sun's stability were forbidden doctrines because did not agree with the official Interpretation of the Scriptures. Drake stresses the equanimity and greatness of Galileo opposed to the fanaticism of the Holy Office. "Galileo and the Church" argues that, after a careful examination it is easy to assert the irregularities and errors in the sentence against Galileo. Drake says rightly that after that time (1616 and 1633) official Catholic policy was one of any interest in an authentic and free Science. Citing the words of Pope John Paul II in 1979, Drake recognizes the great change, obviously a little later in the history of ideas and science, but change at least, in the Holy See.
Part II of the first volume covers "Galileo: Bibliographical and Textual Studies". "Galileo Gleanings-XXI. On the Probable Order of Galileo's Notes on Motion" studies Volume 72 of the Mss Galileani at the Biblioteca Nazionale in Florence and its 162 leaves of notes about motion. After a careful study Drake sets up a possible order of the Notes. "Dating Unpublished Notes, Such as Galileo's on Motion" arranges Galileo's notes between 1602 and 1637. "Galileo Pre-Paduan Writings: Years, Sources, Motivations" takes seriously the previous efforts of Wallace to determine the years, sources and motivations of Galileo's works before his Padua time, from 1584 to 1590-91.
Part III deals with "Galileo: Scientific Method and Philosophy of Science". The first essay, "Galileo and the Career of Philosophy" affirms that the Paduan Aristotelian School was a strong influence in the development of Galileo (cf. his use of the concept cause) but Galileo himself didn't agree, especially after 1600, with the Aristotelian Insights about Science, searching his own way and scientifical Methodology. It also includes "Ptolemy, Galileo and Scientific Method", "Galileo's Procedures,and Metaphysics", and "Theory and Practice in Early Modern Physics".
Part IV is about "Galileo: Astronomy Beginning with Copernicanism in Bruno, Kepler, and Galileo". Drake distinguishes rightly between the Copernicanism of Giordano Bruno, another famous victim of the Holy Office, and that of Galileo. Galileo established a clear distance between Religion and Science and never tried -- unlike Descartes and Newton -- to integrate both. Bruno believed in the eternity of the world but Galileo certainly did not share that belief. "Kepler and Galileo", with its references to Simon Stevin, William Gilbert, Francis Bacon, Rene Descartes, Kepler and Galileo, allows Drake to affirm the plurality of methods in early modern physics. We also find "Galileo's Steps to Full Copernicanism, and Back", "Galileo's Platonic Cosmogony and Kepler's Prodromus", "Galileo's First Telescopic Observations", "Galileo, Kepler and Phases of Venus", "Galileo and Satellite Prediction", "Galileo Sighting of Neptune", "A Neglected Galilean Letter", and "Galileo Gleanings III: A Kind Word for Sizzi". This last concerns Francesco Sizzi, a tragic scholar who suffered the violence of the French Louis XIII but also was a critic of Galileo, especially of his first telescopic discovery (the AB Dianoia astronomica, 1611). His criticisms were judged by Kepler and others to be truly absurd. Also absurd was the rest of the story: Galileo spoke not too badly to the Jesuit Fathers of the "Collegio Romano" about Sizzi, which they seem to have found offensive. Thereafter, Fr. Scheiner SJ and other Jesuit astronomers bacame the main antagonists of Galileo.
In the second Volume, Part V deals with "Galileo: Dialogue Concerning the Two Chief World Systems". The translation of the Dialogue was Drake's second work on Galileo (in 1953) and he tried to offer a new translation though this was sadly not possible. Instead, in "The Title Page and Preface of Galileo's Dialogue"; "The Organizing Theme of the Dialogue" and "Reexaminig Galileo's Dialogue", Drake studied several aspects of this important work. He assessed his differences with the famous A. Koyre. Other essays in this section include "Semicircular Fall in the Dialogue", "The Question of Circular Inertia", "The Tower Argument in the Dialogue", and "History of Science and Tide Theories".
Part VI contains "Galileo: Motions and Mechanics, Including the Discourses on Two New Sciences", "Galileo and the Law of Inertia" and "The Concept of Inertia", which are devoted to the early mathematical-theoretical reflexions of Galileo about facts surrounding inertia. These facts are neither natural nor violent, i.e. neutral motions without obtained impetus which assumed a natural tendency of the bodies to rest. Drake grants that Galileo elaborated only a limited law of inertia, a real advance for the further development of physics, though Newton later formulated the Law of Inertia. Also in this section are "Galileo's Experimental Confirmation of Horizontal Inertia: Unpublished Manuscripts", "Galileo's Discovery of the Parabolic Trajectory", "Galileo's Accuracy in Measuring Horizontal Projections", "Uniform Acceleration, Space and Time (Galileo Gleanings XIX)", "Galileo's 1604 Fragment on Falling Bodies (Galileo Gleanings XVIII)", "The Uniform Motion Equivalent to a Uniformly Accelerated Motion from Rest", "Galileo's Discovery of the Law of Free Fall", "Galileo's Work on Free Fall in 1604", and "Galileo's New Science of Motion", in which Drake's main thesis is resumed: Galileo did not base his theories of motion on the Scholastic doctrines on uniform acceleration but rather on his own discoveries and experiments about natural acceleration in fall. This section continues by offering "Galileo Gleanings--XXIII. Velocity and Eudoxian Proportion Theory", "Mathematics and Discovery in Galileo's Physics", "The Role of Music in Galileo's Experiments", "New Light on a Galilean Claim about Pendulums", "Galileo's Accuracy in Measuring Horizontal Projections", "Galileo and Mathematical Physics", "Galileo's Physical Measurements", and "Galileo's Gravitational Units".
Volume 3, Part VII is about "Galileo's Instruments". Drake here deals with highly technical issues that he studied early in 1978 while publishing a translation of the Geometric and Military Compass. Essays include "Galileo and the First Mechanical Computing Device", "Tartaglia's Squadra and Galileo Compasso", "Galileo's First Telescopes at Padua and Venice", and "An Unpublished Letter of Galileo to Peiresc". Part VIII treats "History of Science: Ancient, Medieval, Renaissance, Seventeenth Century" and is thus devoted to the Drake's great love, not only Galileo and his foundational work but also the history of science from antiquity to our own times. It includes "Euclid Book V from Eudoxus to Dedekind", "Hipparcus, Geminus, Galileo", "Bradwardine's Function, Mediate Denomination, and Multiple Continua", "Medieval Ratio Theory vs. Compound Medicines in the Origins of Bradwardine's Rule", "Early Science and the Printed Book: The Spread of Science beyond the Universities", "The Pseudo-Aristotelian--Questions of Mechanics in Renaissance Culture", "An Agricultural Economist of the Late Renaissance", "Renaissance Music and Experimental Science", "Music and Philosophy in Early Modern Science", "Impetus Theory and Quanta of Speed before and after Galileo", "Free Fall vom Albert of Saxony to Honore Fabri", "Impetus Theory Reappraised", "A Further Reappraisal of Impetus Theory: Buridan, Benedetti, and Galileo", "The Rule behind Mersenne's Numbers", and "Newton's Apple and Galileo Dialogue".
Part IX covers "Philosophy of Science and Language", the last part of the whole work and most revealing of the personal and intellectual queries of Drake, contains "Back from Limbo: the Rediscovery of Alexander Bryan Johnson", "A.B. Johnson and His Works on Language", "Literacy and Scientific Notations", and "J.B. Stallo and the Critique of Classical Physics". The volume concludes with a Bibliography of Stillman Drake.
Having briefly laid out the essays contained in each of the three volumes, one can say that Drake's work -- particularly about Galileo but more widely about philosophy and the history of science -- is one of the great achievements in these disciplines. It is no exaggeration to say that Stillman Drake is one of the greatest historians of science of our time, fully as important as Pierre Duhem and Alexander Koyre.