Abstract

VELAZQUEZ FERNANDEZ, Héctor. Instrumentación, ciencia y epistemología: la relevancia de la observación novohispánica del eclipse lunar de 1584. En-clav. pen [online]. 2008, vol.2, n.4, pp.113-130. ISSN 2594-1100.

Unlike the scientific instruments that used in the 17th Century, which assumed human manipulation as necessary to obtain data to show the causes of the operation of the world (air pumps, barometers, telescopes, etc.), the instruments used in the 16th Century were of so called "mathematical character": they tried to unveil an inherent regularity in nature, that the instruments would display transparently. The instruments used by the Royal cosmographers Jaime Juan and Francisco Domínguez de Ocampo, and the gunsmith Cristóbal Gudiel, sent to the New Spain by Felipe II to calculate the latitude of Mexico City, on occasion of the lunar eclipse of November 17, 1584 (solar clocks, astrolabes, or sextants) show the difference between the role ascribed to scientific instruments in the transition of the century.

Keywords : Science in America; Scientific instruments; Modernity; Experimentarion; Lunar eclipses.

        · abstract in Spanish     · text in Spanish     · Spanish ( pdf )