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Throughout the Late Babylonian Period, Mesopotamian astronomers made nightly observations of the planets, Moon and stars. Based on these observations, they developed several different techniques for predicting future astronomical events. The present study aims to improve our understanding of a particular empirical method of prediction, which made use of planetary periods – a period of time over which a planet‘s motion recurs very closely – to predict that planet‘s future motion. Various planetary periods are referred to in many Late Babylonian astronomical texts. By collecting together these periods and analysing their effectiveness, it was found that, generally, the most effective of the planetary periods were those which were used in the production of a particular type of text known as a Goal-Year Text. The Goal-Year Texts contain excerpts of astronomical observational records, with the planetary records having been taken from particular observation years with these planetary periods in mind – such that each planet‘s motion will recur during the same, specific, future year. It has been suggested that they form an intermediate step towards the compilation of the non-mathematical predictive texts known as Almanacs and Normal Star Almanacs. An analysis of theoretically calculated dates of planetary events showed that, if the Goal-Year Texts were to be used as a source for making empirical predictions, particular corrections (specific to each planet) would need to be applied to the dates of the planetary records found in the Goal-Year Texts. These corrections take the form of regular corrections to the day of an event (a ―date correction‖), and more irregular corrections of ±1 month (a ―month shift‖). An extensive investigation of the Babylonian non-mathematical texts demonstrated that the observed differences in the dates of events, when comparing equivalent records in all known extant Almanacs and Normal Star Almanacs with those in the Goal-Year Texts, were extremely consistent with theoretical expectations. This lends considerable support to the theory that the Goal-Year Texts‘ records formed the ―raw data‖ used in the compilation of the Almanacs and Normal Star Almanacs. It was also possible to analyse several other aspects of Late Babylonian non-mathematical astronomy during the course of this study. These topics include the usage of particular stars in the predictive texts, the meaning of certain terminology found in records of the Babylonian zodiacal signs, and the specific issues related to the planet Mercury‘s periods of visibility and invisibility. Therefore, this investigation enhances many aspects of our knowledge of Late Babylonian astronomical practices.

The thesis explores medical perceptions and treatments of children, and argues that a concept of 'children's physic' existed amongst doctors, medical authors, and the literate laity. 'Children's physic' denotes the idea that children were physiologically distinct beings, whose medicines needed to be adapted to suit their unique temperaments. The thesis also examines the family's experience of the child's illness, demonstrating that parents devoted considerable time and energy to the care of their sick offspring. The illness or death of a child was one of the saddest occasions in parents' lives, eliciting feelings of profound grief, fear, and guilt. It is shown that gender did not have much impact on the nature of parents' experiences: both mothers and fathers were involved in the practical tasks of tending their ill offspring, and both parties recorded emotions of extreme anguish at this time. Finally, the thesis attempts to reconstruct the experiences of the ailing children themselves, exploring what it was like being ill, in pain, and near death. It asserts that children's experiences were characterised by striking ambivalence: on the one hand, children were often tormented by feelings of guilt, the fear of hell, and physical pain, but on the other hand, illness could be emotionally and spiritually uplifting.

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The thesis assembles a substantial body of evidence from archaeological and documentary sources, in particular from western illuminated manuscripts and English manorial records, to investigate the development of land transport from prehistoric times to the end of the Middle Ages and to trace the origin, chronology and transmission of major improvements in vehicle construction, harnessing, breeding and draught, wheelwrighting and farriery. It asserts that while there is general continuity in vehicle morphology and function throughout the period, the major innovations and sophistications of carriage design were the products of the skills of western European wagonwrights. Moreover, it presents evidence for a rational harnessing system as early as the Roman period. Such conclusions challenge the chronological and classificatory schema previously advanced by historians of technology. If one accepts these conclusions, it is also necessary to accept that the belief in the degenerate and uninventive nature of Roman and medieval society is largely mistaken, that a more efficient form of land carriage may no longer be considered a post eleventh century development and that a thorough reevaluation of the assessment of the viability of wheeled transport and its relationship to sea and fluvial carriage in western medieval Europe is necessary.

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It has been argued that science is generated and validated through processes of controversy, and that controversies are 'closed' through 'rhetorical' processes of 'enrolment of heterogeneous allies and resources.' It has also been argued that, once a controversy is closed, it is increasingly difficult for the 'losing' position to maintain the plausibility of its views, arguments, and interpretations (words like 'reification,' 'inertia,' and 'institutionalisation' have been used to refer to this). Controversies have shaped neural network research throughout its history, from the 1950s to the 1980s. In this dissertation I analyse the history of neural network research using a 'controversy/rhetorical tactics/enrolment of allies and resources/closure' scheme. I claim that the result is a useful and powerful interpretation of the main developments of the evolution of neural network research. The neural network controversy is especially interesting because it was once (in the late 1960s) closed against neural networks, and twenty years later (in the late 1980s) it was reopened. The history of neural network research can be seen as the history of the closure and reopening of the neural network controversy.

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The thesis is concerned with the philosophy of several prominent characters during the reign of King Jamas VI and I. The first part deals with the period from the birth of James up to the Union of the Crowns in 1603, and the second part with his reign in England. 'Science' at this time did not necessarily imply the absence of irrational supernatural ideas. In Scotland the keen interaste in alchemy, astorology and the occult arts was not confined to the uneducated classes---it was afashionable pursuit for wealthy noblemen, and one which interested scientists such as John Napier. Even in England, where a strong Flizabothan tradition of navigation and related practical subjects had flourished, number mystiolan and other magical belief's affected the tradition. The attitude towards magic had undergone a transition since the Middle ages, when magic had been disapproved of because of the danger to religion, although its importance and reality had not been denied. The work of Neoplatonists of the Florentine Academy helped to restore the concept of magic to favour, and in the sixteenth conture it became even more prominent. Few cultured people entirely dissociated themselves from magic. The great enthusiasm for the occult sciences arose partly from the feeling that in them was the core of 'ancient' wisdom, and that a return to the sources might bring a solution to many intellectual problems. The influence of these "ancient' revelations of Hernes Trisnegistus and others had a very far-reaching effect on many branches of natural philosophy. The aim of this thesis has been to investigate the part played by the Hormetic and magical. Traditions during the development of sixteenth and seventeenths century science.

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