Introduction : Philosophy and operationalism
"What was worth knowing" in 1500
Humanism and ancient wisdom : how to learn things in the sixteenth century
The scholar and the craftsman : Paracelsus, Gilbert, Bacon
Mathematics challenges philosophy : Galileo, Kepler, and the surveyors
Mechanism : Descartes builds a universe
Extra-curricular activities : new homes for natural knowledge
Experiment : how to learn things about nature in the seventeenth century
Cartesians and Newtonians
Conclusion : What was worth knowing by the eighteenth century?