The authors begin their review of the 17th-century Hobbes-Boyle controversy by declaring their intent to take a strongly pro-Hobbes stance, so it is not surprising that they end by concluding that "Hobbes was right". (About what, is not clear.)

Their stated reason for adapting this biased perspective is that the opposite view (that Hobbes was wrong) has been so thoroughly documented that not much new could be added. Only by adopting a "charitable" view of Hobbes, and a critical view of his opponents, could they make a significant new contribution. In other words, they wanted to make a splash, not a ripple.

Their bias is expressed by selective omission of information unfavorable to Hobbes. For example, in Hobbes's "Dialogus Physicus", his fallacious solution of the cube-duplication problem has been deleted, without mentioning that it was fallacious. Also, the reader is not informed that a "Torricelli apparatus" and a "mercury barometer" are functionally identical; the height of the mercury column varies with weather conditions. This variability was a problem for Hobbes, but not for Boyle. But it is not mentioned, except in connection with a suggestion that the experimentalists may have fudged their data.

Also, the authors should have noted that Hobbes's a-priori rationalist philosophy is not a viable alternative to experimentalism, because it is based on an elementary logical fallacy: you cannot make up definitions and postulates arbitrarily AND claim that deductions from them give certainty about the real world.

Many popular books about science (especially about evolution) set scientists up as skeptics who argue for knowledge based on experience and facts, rather than authority. If you think science is about being skeptical, you might find this book interesting because it argues for the importance of trust and belief in authority in all scientific work. I found the history interesting as well, including descriptions of several of Boyle's eperiments, a debate about the path of a comet, and a 17th century nondisclosure agreement. The main downside for the layman is that book can be slow going and is not an easy read. There's a lot of generalizing about what 17th century gentleman and scientists were like that I think would have been more entertainingly done through narrative and anecdote rather than bland quotations. Still, all in all this is an informative book about the philosophy of science.

If you are looking for an account of the complex chain of events, discoveries and philosophies leading to the emergence of the modern scientific worldview, this is the wrong book. It is heavily influenced by post-modernist views, whereas science is seen as a "discourse" no more or less valid than "alternative" modes of knowledge. Since this is plainly incorrect, the book fits the facts to the Procustean bed of "theory" to support its thesis. For instance, never is the book is the development of Calculus mentioned, clearly an essential step in the development of classical mechanics and the foundation of most modern scientific theories. The same may be said for countless other developments which are cavalierly ignored. There was a scientific revolution and its effects are all around us, including the medium on which this review is written.

Shapin opens his 'Scientific Revolution' with the paradoxical statement, "there was no such thing as the Scientific Revolution, and this is a book about it." Shapin proceeds to use the next 150 or so pages to explain himself. The book is firmly structured in three sections, addressing the what, how, and why of scientific knowledge in the seventeenth century; the contents of each section are similarly well-structured, but seem to discuss more than the simple titles suggest. Examining the very foundations of scientific thought and the manner in which the modern distinction between legitimate science and voodoo came about, Shapin uses the Scientific Revolution as a venue for introducing his and other scholars' views on both the essential nature of modern science and the way in which ideas evolve. Explanatory notes where appropriate make the reading accessible to those unfamiliar with science history or philosophy.

I am amazed by the review written by the reader from Sydney. This book does not pretend to give a chronological narrative of who did what when in the making of modern science. There are many books that do that job. Instead, Shapin is interested in what difference the Scientific Revolution made to how people at the time, and how we, think about the natural world. The major changes may have been the new idea that nature could be investigated and understood, not merely regarded with awe and fear; that careful, repeatable experiments could yield information about how nature works; and that this new approach to nature changed how human beings regarded our relation to the natural world and our place in it. If nature is something that we can explore and understand, then we have a new power; we are no longer on a par with the natural world, because we can see into it. The ways in which knowledge is acquired, or made, and why it matters that we pursue and develop this knowledge are part of Shapin's central theme. These are not small questions, and to my mind they are addressed elegantly in this short but very substantial book.