The Royal Society of London, the English scientific society founded in 1660, was involved in a number of disputes in the seventeenth century concerning who was the first person to make an invention or discovery. These priority disputes had a significant effect on the careers of most of the prominent figures in the early Royal Society, including Newton, Boyle and Hooke. Inventions and discoveries were the foundation of the Royal Society?s reputation, and thus needed to be claimed and protected in priority disputes. The subjects of these disputes ranged from solutions to mathematical problems to high-profile experiments. Such disputes frequently pitted Fellows of the Royal Society against intellectuals from the Continent. They were occasions for polemics framed in nationalistic terms, despite the collaborative spirit with which the transnational Republic of Letters purported to operate. This thesis examines how the Royal Society?s priority disputes began, how they functioned once underway, and how they concluded. It focuses on disputes between the Royal Society and its continental rivals, seeking to determine the extent to which nationalism was a factor. It argues that Society members, who were always guided by multiple loyalties, valued their loyalties to themselves, to the Society and to the English nation more than their loyalty to the Republic of Letters. Other social factors that motivated the disputants are also explored, including honour, credibility, and the Society?s ideal of aversion to conflict. This thesis highlights patterns in the behaviour of the participants of seventeenth-century priority disputes. It draws on methodology used in the sociology of science to analyze these patterns, examining the social construction involved in invention and discovery. Case studies are used to illustrate how the participants in priority disputes redefined several entities in ways that suited their own claims to priority: the invention or discovery being disputed, the etiquette of the Republic of Letters, the distinction between invention and innovation, and priority itself. Particular attention is paid to the activities of Henry Oldenburg, Secretary of the Royal Society, who communicated on behalf of the Royal Society through his correspondence network and the journal he edited, the Philosophical Transactions. This thesis argues that the Royal Society valued Oldenburg in part for his role in instigating priority disputes with non-English intellectuals, a role to which he was well-suited on account of his many contacts in England and on the Continent, his rhetorical skills, and his experience as a diplomat. It also analyzes the roles of experts like John Wallis and Timothy Clarke in priority disputes, arguing that Oldenburg could call upon them to defend English priority. However, it is noted that these figures (especially Wallis) sometimes abandoned the façade of English unity in favour of causes that affected them more personally, including their own priority claims. Accordingly, they employed the same polemical style in domestic priority disputes that they did in international ones. This study concludes with the suggestion that the polemics of figures like Oldenburg, Clarke and Wallis were crucial to the program of the seventeenth-century Royal Society because conflict, the idea of aversion to conflict notwithstanding, was an acknowledged and valued part of early Royal Society culture.

Submitted by Automa??o e Estat?stica (sst@bczm.ufrn.br) on 2017-04-17T22:47:12Z No. of bitstreams: 1 GabrielaLuchezeDeOliveiraLopes_TESE.pdf: 6049374 bytes, checksum: 3515f5da06487f76c77ce277db17c307 (MD5) / Approved for entry into archive by Arlan Eloi Leite Silva (eloihistoriador@yahoo.com.br) on 2017-04-19T23:33:36Z (GMT) No. of bitstreams: 1 GabrielaLuchezeDeOliveiraLopes_TESE.pdf: 6049374 bytes, checksum: 3515f5da06487f76c77ce277db17c307 (MD5) / Made available in DSpace on 2017-04-19T23:33:36Z (GMT). No. of bitstreams: 1 GabrielaLuchezeDeOliveiraLopes_TESE.pdf: 6049374 bytes, checksum: 3515f5da06487f76c77ce277db17c307 (MD5) Previous issue date: 2017-02-24 / A pesquisa que originou este texto de tese de doutorado teve como objetivo examinar de que forma as ideias de John Wallis, emergentes na obra Arithmetica Infinitorum, datada de 1656, apresentou inova??es que podem contribuir para o encaminhamento conceitual e did?tico de no??es b?sicas da componente curricular de C?lculo Diferencial e Integral, no curso de Licenciatura em Matem?tica. Nesse sentido, avaliamos o potencial pedag?gico da referida obra para subsidiar o ensino de conceitos matem?ticos, em particular as no??es de integrais, com vistas ao melhoramento do entendimento dos estudantes acerca dessas ideias matem?ticas, tratadas nos Cursos de Forma??o de Professores de Matem?tica. Por admitirmos que os alunos necessitam ampliar o n?mero de trajet?rias que levam ao desenvolvimento de uma ideia Matem?tica ? que, neste trabalho, nos propusemos a responder a seguinte quest?o: como a explora??o did?tica do exerc?cio criativo de um matem?tico na hist?ria pode contribuir na abordagem pedag?gica para o ensino de conte?dos de C?lculo e An?lise na Licenciatura em Matem?tica? Para tal, apoiamo-nos em princ?pios de criatividade elaborados por Mihaly Csikszentmihalyi, que prop?s um modelo para criatividade que leva em considera??o o contexto social e cultural. Por considerarmos fundamental a explica??o do ciclo do pensamento referente ? inven??o matem?tica, associamos a esses princ?pios os processos do Pensamento Matem?tico Avan?ado, proposto por Tommy Dreyfus, de modo que destacamos como esses processos se conectam com as no??es de criatividade. Assim, formulamos um modelo para examinarmos a obra Arithmetica Infinitorum, indicando seus potenciais pedag?gicos para subsidiar o ensino de conceitos matem?ticos baseado em um car?ter investigativo. De maneira que foi poss?vel estabelecermos uma proposta de conex?o entre conhecimento matem?tico desenvolvido historicamente por diferentes matem?ticos e seus potenciais conceituais epistemol?gicos, com a possibilidade de ser implementada na a??o do professor de Matem?tica formador de professores de Matem?tica, com vistas a desenvolver compet?ncias e habilidades para uma futura atua??o do professor em forma??o. / The research which arose this doctorate?s thesis had as purpose examining in which ways John Wallis? ideas, emerging in Arithmetica Infinitorum, dated 1656, has presented contributing innovations for the didactic and conceptual guiding of Differential and Integral Calculus? curricular components basic notions, in Mathematics Licentiate course. For that matter, we evaluated the production?s pedagogical potential to subsidize mathematical concepts? teaching, mainly integral notions, aiming theim provement of students? understanding about these mathematical ideas, which are contemplated in the Mathematics Teachers training course. Acknowledging that the students need to expand the number of paths which lead to the development of a Mathematical idea, in this study we propose to answer the following question: how can the didactic exploration of a mathematician?s creative exercise contribute to the pedagogical approach for the Calculus and Analysis teaching, in Mathematics Licentiate course? For that we leaned on the creativity criteria discussed by Mihaly Csikszentmihalyi, due to considering it substantial in the thinking cycle explanation regarding the Mathematics creation. We relate to these principles the processes developed by Advanced Mathematical Thinking, suggested by Tommy Dreyfus, in order to highlight how these processes attach to creativity notions. Therefore, we formulated a model to examine the writing Arithmetica Infinitorum pointing its pedagogical potential to subsidize mathematical concepts? teaching, based on aninvestigative character. This way, it was possible to establish a connection proposal between mathematical knowledge historically developed by different mathematicians and their conceptual and epistemological potentials, with a possibility of being implemented in Mathematics teacher?s actions, Mathematics teacher?s trainer, in order to grow expertise and abilities for a forthcoming actuation of the training teacher.

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