'Creed of Science' in Victorian England

Roy M. MacLeod, University of Sydney, Australia

• Contents: Introduction; The X-Club: a social network in late-Victorian England; The scientists’s declaration: reflections on science and belief in the wake of Essays and Reviews, 1864-1865; The ’bankruptcy of science’ debate: the ’creed of science’ and its critics, 1885-1900; Evolutionism, internationalism and commercial enterprise in science: the international scientific series, 1871-1910; Education - scientific and technical; Fathers and daughters: reflections on women, science and Victorian Cambridge; The ’naturals’ and Victorian Cambridge: reflections on the anatomy of an elite, 1851-1914; Breaking the circle of science: the natural sciences tripos and the ’examination revolution’; Scientific careers of 1851 exhibition scholars; The genesis of Nature; The social framework of Nature in its first fifty years; Science, progressivism and ’practical idealism’: reflections on efficient imperialism and federal science in Australia, 1895-1915; Index.

'He has done more than most to facilitate our understanding of the debates around scientific naturalism...An extremely readable collection', British Journal for the History of Science, vol.34, no.1 'This most instructive volume provides a fascinating backdrop to some of the current controversies surrounding the science-religion field... there is a great deal of general interest in this book, especially for students of the science/religion interface.' Network '... a valuable collection. The convenience of having all of these essays collected together in one place makes it more likely that they will be read as a group, allowing the reader to consider their impact as a whole and come to a greater appreciation of MacLeod's anticipations of so many themes that now command the attention of historians of Victorian science.' ISIS