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London Review of Books

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Ian Hacking

  • The Veil of Isis: An Essay on the History of the Idea of Nature by Pierre Hadot, translated by Michael Chase  Buy this book

‘The word “nature” is encountered everywhere,’ notably in the writing and talk of poets, scientists, ecologists and even politicians. ‘But though they frequently employ the word, they seem not to have much considered what notion ought to be framed of the thing, which they suppose and admire, and upon occasion celebrate, but do not call in question or discuss.’ Thus Robert Boyle, progenitor of English science, in A Free Inquiry into the Vulgarly Received Notion of Nature, 1686.

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Ian Hacking is the author of Historical Ontology. He teaches philosophy at the University of Toronto.