McEvoy:
"Insofar as Newton's work underpinned or made possible the Industrial
Revolution it is clearly work with an empirical impact - unless someone
wishes to argue the Industrial Revolution was propelled by a set of
definitional arguments?"
That was a good one. And I'm VERY tempted to have called this post, "The
Industrial Revelation", but you may change it thus if it so pleases you.
I'm never sure what that Revelation was above. Apparently, the main thing was
this train from Liverpool to Manchester (and back) which is _hardly_ an
achievement
that the Greeks would have envied. Such a short distance. What's the fuss
about it?
Also it spoiled the already deteriorated countryside between Manchester and
the sea-coast (the pool of Liver).
"Insofar as Newton's work underpinned or made possible the Industrial
Revolution it is clearly work with an empirical impact - unless someone
wishes to argue the Industrial Revolution was propelled by a set of
definitional arguments?"
I would think the Industrial Revelation was propelled by what Plato -- in
one of his Dialogues, the Menexenos, calls, "The love of gain". This may not be
a definitional argument, but surely it's not just EMPIRICAL. You cannot get,
from an 'is' ("the distance between Manchester and Liverpool is not so big")
to an 'ought' ("Let's build a train that will help import potatoes from
Ireland quicker).
Cheers,
JL
North of the Falklands
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