The concept of "whig history" had a powerful impact on Anglo-American historiography of science. Frequently it has been used as a tool for stigmatization of the "old views" represented in the so called "traditional" historiography of the Scientific Revolution. The article covers several debates, which occurred around the topic, and assumes, that historians of science cannot stop using the "classic" categories, which provide an important tool for understanding both the past and the present developments of science.

Keywords: whig history, presentism, scientific revolution, science and religion, history of science.

When Professor Zilli said: "Break the soporific magic of narrative. Ask yourself questions, ask yourself problems" - he may have done a service to his generation. But now it's time for the pendulum to swing in the opposite direction.

George Trevelyan "Clio, The Muse" 1

The concept of "Whig history" and the history of science

In 1931, the English historian Herbert Butterfield published a short book, "Interpretation of Whig History", presenting an analysis of several works on the political history of Great Britain. In his publication, G. Butterfield sought to demonstrate the ideological character of English political history, the vision of which directly depended on the political and religious preferences of its authors. In his opinion, "the Protestant-

Trevelyan G.M. 1. Clio, a Muse, and Other Essays Literary and Pedestrian. London: Longmans Green and Co., 1913. P. 15.

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practical historiography " constructed history in accordance with its own value preferences, which determine its various characteristics: history serves to justify the political structure; history considers the political structure as the result of long-term progressive development; history treats revolutions as events that radically and positively change the course of the historical process. Ultimately, the history written by Whigs was the history of those who "study the past from the present" 2, fitting historical reality to their own theoretical concepts.

Butterfield's concept of "Whig history" became relatively popular in English-language history3. Its popularity peaked in the 1970s and 80s of the 20th century, when Butterfield's ideas were in tune with some of the post-positivist philosophy of science and postmodern philosophy of history. "Whig interpretation of history" came to be seen as one of the first attempts to deconstruct the historical "grand narrative", and the concept itself began to denote any story written in accordance with a pre-selected methodological or value position that determines the selection, structure and presentation of historical material4.

The postmodern analysis of "traditional" ideas about the essence and nature of historical work has not spared the history of science. The main subjects of criticism were such features as its progressive vision of the history of science, developing according to a predetermined scenario, the unconscious use of literary techniques in constructing a historical narrative, and its instrumental and ideological nature. The focus of criticism was directed at various theoretical issues.-

Butterfield H. 2. Whig Interpretation of History. London: G. Bell, 1931. P. 11.

Asнрlant T.G., Wilson A. 3. Whig History and Present Centered History//The Historical Journal. Vol. 31. No. 1. 1988. P. 1 - 16; Asнрlant T.G., Wilson A. Present-Centered History and the Problem of Historical Knowledge//The Historical Journal. Vol. 31. No. 2. 1988. P. 253 - 275.

4. As shown by N. Jardine, G. Butterfield's concept of "Whig history" was taken out of the historical context and "modernized" by later historians in accordance with their "special" vision of history as a science. Whigs and Stories: Herbert Butterfield and the Historiography of Science//History of Science. 2003. Vol. 41. P. 125 - 127.

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the categories used by historians primarily refer to the "scientific revolution" category, which is fundamental for the history of science.5
It was shown that the popularization of the idea of scientific revolution took place in the 40s of the XX century thanks to the historical works of A. Coire, G. Butterfield, R. Hall, M. Boas, who "did not hide their biased (whiggish) attitude to the scientific revolution as an absolutely positive event"6. Their interpretation of the scientific revolution was interlinked with the understanding of science formed in the first half of the XX century under the strong influence of the philosophical ideas of the Vienna Circle, and largely due to the influence of logical positivists, the scientific revolution of the XVII century began to be considered as a separate historical event, opening a new era of scientific knowledge development and marking a break, thinking.

A historical analysis of the concept of "scientific revolution" has shown that the idea of the "revolutionary" nature of the development of science first appears in the writings of Bernard Fontenelle, who characterized the emergence of differential calculus as a "mathematical revolution". The interpretation of the 17th century as the century of scientific revolution is definitively defined in the works of French encyclopedists, especially Jean D'Alembert, who reflected it in his famous preface to the Encyclopedia 7.

By revealing the historical context of the emergence of the category "scientific revolution", critics sought to show its artificial and non-obvious character.8 Using the main method

5. G. Butterfield did not undertake this kind of "deconstruction" in relation to the history of science, and therefore representatives of the" new "historiography usually point to G. Butterfield's book" The Origin of Modern Science "(1948) as a model of "Whig history". See: Dobbs B. Newton as Final Cause and First Mover// Rethinking Scientific Revolution. Cambridge: Cambridge Univ. Press, 2000. P. 30.

Porter R. 6. The Scientific Revolution: A Spoke in the Wheel // Revolution in History. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1986. P. 295.

Cohen B. 7. The Eighteenth-Century Origins of the Concept of Scientific Revolution// Journal of the History of Ideas. Vol. 37. 1976. P. 257 - 288.

8. The main ideas and arguments of the proponents of the " new " historiography are presented in the collections Revisisals of the Scientific Revolution / Ed. by Lindberg D. C., Westman R.S. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1990; Rethinking Scientific Revolution/Ed. by Osier M. J. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2000. As an example of the "new" historiography, we can use the article "Religion and the Changing Historiography of the Scientific Revolution" by Margaret Osler, translated in this collection.

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The disclosure was a demonstration of the discrepancy between the content of the category and the historical realities of the XVI-XVII centuries. The critique was based on the so-called "coherence thesis", which postulated the existence of a prehistory for any changes that seemed radical at first glance, and acted as a kind of antidote to historical bias.9
There is a consensus among historians that treating the scientific revolution as a radical break with the past is an excessive, unjustified, and possibly politically motivated simplification of history. As a result, the question was directly raised about the need to abandon the categories of "scientific revolution" and "science" when describing the historical reality of the XVII century.10 In 1996, one of the leading sociologists of science opened his short book "The Scientific Revolution" with the phrase:"There has never been such a phenomenon as the scientific revolution." 11
Criticism of the concept of "scientific revolution" has caused a wave of negative reviews from traditionally minded researchers. Most authors, in addition to general criticism of postmodern methodology and praxis12, pointed out that the rejection of the concept of "scientific revolution" inevitably leads to the disintegration of the scientific discipline. More cautious critics have insisted on the need for a precise definition of the concept of"Whig history "13, which has become a kind of" verdict " for any narrative that dared to tell the history of a phenomenon without touching on the specifics of each of its stages of development.

Henry J9 .. The Scientific Revolution and the Origins of Modern Science. Palgrave, 2002. P. 3.

Cunningham A., Perry W. 10. De-Centring the "Big Picture": "The Origins of Modern Science" and the Modern Origins of Science//The British Journal for the History of Science. Vol. 26. No. 4., 1993. P. 407 - 432.

Shapin S. 11. The Scientific Revolution. Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1996. P. 1.

Zagorin P. 12. Historiography and Postmodernism: Reconsiderations // History and Theory. 1990. Vol. 29. No. 3. P. 263 - 274; Zagorin P. History, the Referent, and Narrative: Reflections on Postmodernism Now// History and Theory. Vol. 38. 1999. P. 1 - 24.

Mayr E. 13. When Is Historiography Whiggish? // Journal of the History of Ideas. 1990. Vol. 51. No. 2. P. 301 - 309; Hall A.R. On Whiggism//History of Science. Vol. 21. 1983. P. 45-59; Harrison E. Whigs, Prigs and Historians of Science//Nature. 1987. Vol. 329. P. 213 - 214; Hull L. In Defence of Presentism//History and Theory. 1979. Vol. 18. P. 1 - 15.

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"Traditional" and " new " historiography

"New" and " old " historiography use different types of historical reasoning based on different principles of analysis of historical material. In historical science, these principles, called "presentism"and" antiquarism " 14, represent the correlation of theoretical categories and historical material in the historian's research in different ways: presentism insists on the primacy of determining the essence of the analyzed subject, antiquarism asserts the need to proceed directly from historical material.

The problem of their correlation in historical research is a central problem of historicism. Its source can be found in the historical and philosophical writings of John Herder, who first identified its main contradiction in this way: "How can there be unity in the midst of diversity, stability in the midst of change" 15. Its further formulation and interpretation was associated with the development of professional historical science, primarily within the framework of the German historical school.

"Scientific history", as presented by Leopold von Ranke, contrasted its" empirical methods " with the deductive method of philosophers and was skeptical of philosophical intuition as a means of creating an objective picture of a bygone era. The presence of a philosophical attitude in the historian was considered evidence of his bias, which was demonstrated by the example of the attitude of Enlightenment philosophers to historical facts 16. The main principle of research of the historian, in contrast to the philosopher focused on the search for patterns, turned out to be the "principle of individuality"17, and history itself was interpreted as something between science and art.

Kuznetsova N. I. 14. Presentism and antiquarianism as a dilemma of historical and scientific research//Cognition of social reality. Teoriya posnaniya [Theory of Knowledge], Vol. 4, Moscow, 1995.

Beiser F.C. 15. The German Historicist Tradition. New-York: Oxford University Press, 2011. P. 107.

Berlin 16. I. History and Theory: The Concept of Scientific History//History and Theory. 1960. Vol. i. No. 1. P. 1 - 31.

Beiser F. C. 17. The German Historicist Tradition. P. 260.

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Apparently, this attempt to separate historical and philosophical discourses became a prerequisite for the future conflict between the followers of" antiquarism "and" presentism " in the history of science. Referring to history as a purposeful process, the prezentist historian sought to identify the logic of the development of the historical phenomenon under study. Before starting his research, he inevitably had to determine the content of the categories of the conceptual apparatus he used: the characteristics of the phenomenon were set "from the present" by the researcher himself in accordance with his needs, interests and values.

For the antiquarian historian, historical work was primarily reduced to reconstructing the integrity of the interrelationships of a particular historical event. Being unique in its nature, a historical fact considered in a historical context was placed at the center of the historian's attention and made it impossible to tell about its development over any long period of time. In addition, if there was no prior agreement on what exactly historians were interested in, the historical material acquired the ability to raise new questions for the new researcher.

Presentism and antiquarianism recognized the possibility of creating an "objective" view of a historical phenomenon, but they presented different ways of achieving it. If the first approach claimed, due to the unity of concepts accepted by historians, the possibility of equal access of all people to historical "reality", then the second approach proceeded from the vision of the world by the subject of history, who entered into a unique and unique dialogue with the historian. In the first approach, it was possible to create a global vision of history, while the second, on the contrary, promised a detailed understanding of it, albeit within a rather limited historical period.

The" traditional "historiography of the scientific revolution has a pronounced "presentist" character. The scientific revolution is considered as an event that separates the culture of the Middle Ages and the culture of the Art Nouveau era, during which the foundations of "modern" science were formed.18 Tell us about " on-

18. Traditional historiography includes the works of historians of science, which F. Cohen brings together under the heading "The Great Tradition": Cohen H. F. The Scientific Revolution: A Historiographical Inquiry. Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1994. P. 21 - 151.

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scientific revolution " means to tell about its causes, about the phases of the emergence, development and completion of this integral process, as well as about its consequences.

The" new "historiography is characterized by criticism of the "presentist" attitude and the associated form of presentation of historical material: "new" historians are usually critical of the" grand narrative " of the history of science and prefer separate case studies to it, placing them within a broad cultural context.19 Rejecting the existence of" science "in the seventeenth century, they prefer to speak of"a diverse range of cultural practices aimed at understanding, explaining, and controlling the natural world, each with its own set of characteristics and changing in different ways." 20
"New" historiography, practicing contextual analysis of the phenomenon, calls into question the conceptual categories of the Art Nouveau era.21 Within its framework, the "scientific revolution", inscribed in the cultural and historical context, acts as one of the stages of"scientific evolution". Under the influence of external factors, science is not so much born as something new, but rather transformed from other, pre-scientific, forms of knowledge, and later separates from them and opposes itself to them.

Although the origins of this" scientific evolution "can be traced back to the first written monuments of the Ancient world, the" new "historiography prefers not to do this, so as not to fall under the spell of another" great narrative "based on the"presentist attitude". A natural consequence of the prevalence of the contextual approach in historical research is the rejection of the holistic history of science and the interpretation of the main stages of its development as independent historical phenomena, for example, the medieval "philosophy of nature" and the "science" of Modern times. Another consequence is the appeal to the biographical method of presenting the material: to tell about the scientific revolution means to tell about specific scientists of that time, showing in what a bizarre way

Osier M. J. 19. The Canonical Imperative: Rethinking the Scientific Revolution//Rethinking Scientific Revolution. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2000. P. 4.

Shapin S. 20. The Scientific Revolution. P. 3.

Harrison P. 21. "Science" and "Religion": Constructing the Boundaries//The Journal of Religion. 2006. Vol. 86. No. 1. P. 81 - 106.

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in their research and practice, "scientific" (what is now considered scientific) and "non-scientific" ideas are intertwined, forming an indissoluble amalgam

Natural Philosopher or Scientist: The case of Newton

The figure of Isaac Newton is of fundamental importance for the history of science. His name occupies a key position in any "traditional" narrative about the history of the scientific revolution, and the story about him is usually the resulting and culminating point of the narrative. According to traditional historiography, after Newton, the scientific revolution ends, and, to use T. Kuhn's terminology, the period of "normal" science begins.

The appearance of previously unknown manuscripts of Newton in 1936 partly called into question the established image of Newton as the creator of a new science: they were found texts devoted to the problems of numerology and alchemy. McGuire wrote in their now-classic article: "It is difficult for us to imagine that the mechanics and cosmology of the Principia were seriously influenced by Newton's theological views and his belief in the existence of 'ancient knowledge'. However, Sir Isaac Newton was not a scientist, he was a natural philosopher. " 22
An attempt to deal with Newton's legacy, which includes, in addition to the scientific and occult, a vast theological layer, led to the creation of a separate scientific direction that comprehensively studies his work. However, the longer the research went on and the deeper it became, the more historians were inclined to conclude that the grand narrative of the history of science, which considered Newton's work as the culmination of a drama that began either in the late Middle Ages or in the Renaissance, greatly simplifies and even distorts our ideas about him: "We are still meeting with the idea that despite Newton's interest in religion and natural theology, he somehow separated his physics from his faith. From this point of view, Newton appears to us as a kind of protopositivist and model for

McGuire J.E., Rattansi P.M. Newton and the "Pipes of Pan" 22. //Notes and Records of the Royal Society of London. 1966. Vol. 21. No. 2. P. 138.

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modern secular science. Recent research in Newton's historiography shows that both statements are untenable. " 23
This "selective" approach, which separated the scientific and religious ideas of the English scientist, was natural for traditional historiography, which thus could find a place for Newton in the global narrative of scientific ideas. In a famous letter to Robert Hooke, Newton said that he owed his discoveries to "standing on the shoulders of giants", and traditional historiography, following this principle, generally sought to demonstrate both his dependence on early ideas and his influence on subsequent ones. Apparently, it should be recognized that the task of assessing the place and significance of Isaac Newton's scientific work in the history of science is different from the task of reconstructing his life and determining the influence of external factors on his scientific work: by making the scientist part of the narrative of the history of science, the historian inevitably reduces his work to the ideas stories as irrelevant.

According to George Sarton, the founder of the discipline of the history of science, its goal was "to explain the interrelationship of all the sciences, their joint efforts, common goals and methods." 24 Previous works of philosophers and historians dealing with problems of the history of science, such as those of Whelwell, seemed artificial to George Sarton, because they offered instead of a single narrative many stories about the history of science. development of various sciences. J. Sarton believed that being a historian of science means, in addition to your own private research, being able to present a holistic story about the development of scientific ideas and practices that follow each other in a certain logical sequence.

After J. R. R. Tolkien, According to J. Sarton, "traditional" historians, guided by a modern understanding of what constitutes scientific activity, sought to reconstruct its past in the form of a holistic scientific biography consisting of the achievements of people who contributed to its development. However, since the 1960s, not only in the history of science, but also in the history of-

Snobelen S. 23. Isaac Newton: His Science and Religion//Science, Religion, and Society: An Encyclopedia of History, Culture, and Controversy. Vol. 1. P. 356. New York: M. E. Sharpe, 2007.

Sarton G.A 24. Guide to the History of Science. Waltham, 1952. P. 51.

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As a whole, historical science began another process of disintegration, which was expressed in the differentiation of various historical trends and eventually led to the total historicization of concepts that served as the basis for the holistic narrative of traditional historiography: "As a broad community united by a common discourse, common goals, and common standards, history as a discipline has ceased to exist."25. The very idea of a" scientific revolution "as an important event in the global process of scientific development has lost its meaning, breaking up into separate" cases " that have independent meaning. Not the least role in this criticism was played by the biographical approach, which considered scientific knowledge in the context of its era and focused on the "principle of individuality".

Apparently, the consistent application of the biographical method inevitably leads to the destruction of any epic narrative. Therefore, the argument about whether Newton was a "scientist" or actually a " philosopher of nature "does not seem meaningful, since it expresses, respectively, the methodological positions of" presentism "and"antiquarism". Even if Newton called himself a "philosopher of nature", he did not know and could not have known about the consequences of his activity and the extent to which it affected the subsequent development of what later became known as "scientific"knowledge. Even if the very idea of" scientific " knowledge arises in the XVIII century, when encyclopedists started talking about it, or in the XIX century, when W. Welwell coined the word scientist ("scientist" - V. R.), this does not mean that scientists themselves did not exist before the conversation about "scientists" began.

Reconstruction of the image of Newton as a kind of integral and independent phenomenon requires, in fact, the dissolution of the history of science in the history of culture, as some representatives of the "new" historiography pointed out, speaking about the decline of the history of science as an independent discipline 26.

Novick P. 25. That Noble Dream: The "Objectivity" Question and the American Historical Profession. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1988. P. 628.

26. "If the history of science becomes the history of different contexts, if we emphasize the permeation of time boundaries indicated by the word 'science', does not its subject matter break down into separate fragments of socio-cultural history?" (Brooke J. H. Presidential Address: Does the History of Science Have a Future?//The British Journal for the History of Science. 1999. Vol. 32. No. 1. P. 2).

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to define one not only as a "hero" of the scientific revolution, but also as "one of the greatest losers in history who lost the great battle between the forces of religion and atheism,"27 but to consider such a "reassessment" as the only correct one means to consciously make a choice in favor of highlighting a certain fragment of historical reality. Of course, Newton played a role not only in the history of science, but also in the history of religion, but the confusion of these roles not only casts doubt on the existence of the history of science as a discipline, but also deprives researchers of the opportunity to create a complete history of the development of science.

Grant's dispute with Cunningham

A rather interesting example of the debate about the applicability of the conceptual apparatus developed in the Modern era in historical research is the controversy between the old-school historian Edward Grant and the representative of the "new" historiography, Andrew Cunningham. The controversy was about whether the historian has the right to use the" modern "category" science "in relation to the realities of the XVII century and whether historians should not replace it with the category"philosophy of nature". This controversy developed around Newton's writings, primarily in connection with an attempt to reveal the significance of the idea of God for his philosophy of nature.

Cunningham's central thesis was that "science" and "philosophy of nature" are two different entities. While we may ignore the idea of God for understanding the former, this idea is extremely important for understanding the latter. Since the "philosophy of nature" was a cultural phenomenon in its own right, involving many different ideas and practices that were organically synthesized, "we should look not at the 'influence' of their [scientists'] religion on their philosophy of nature (or vice versa), but at how their individual religious views and goals were shaped." an integral part (author's italics - V. R.) of their philosophy of nature"28. Cunningham specifically states that the "philosophy of nature" is not allowed.-

Dobbs B.J.T. 27. Newton as Final Cause and Prime Mover//Rethinking Scientific Revolution. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2000. P. 39.

Cunningham A. 28. How the Principia Got Its Name or Taking Natural Philosophy Seriously//History of Science. 1991. Vol. 29. P382.

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It can be reduced to a "synthesis of science and religion", since this would be an excessive "simplification" and "modernization" of historical reality.

By the time the discussion began, Cunningham had already published a well-known article in which he called on historians of science to reconsider the existing conceptual framework, in particular, to abandon the use of the concept of "scientific revolution" in relation to the events of the early Modern period, since the concept of "scientific revolution should not be so much rewritten as erased"29. The focus of his criticism in this controversy was directed against what he saw as Grant's uncritically using the science/religion opposition as a tool for analysis.30 Obviously, he fully shared the widespread view that the analytical categories that had developed in the modern era were artificial, was sympathetic to the demands for their rejection, 31 and was deeply convinced that science, as an enterprise with certain specific characteristics, had emerged in Modern times. If historians do not use their own categories to describe the epoch, they will not be able to understand the specific nature of the "philosophy of nature", reducing its characteristics to those of Modern science.

Grant's response was that Cunningham's position does not involve talking about the essence of science and the philosophy of nature, and the approach that Cunningham practices "can be described as' context over text 'or maybe even' context without text '" .32 Using a classic metaphor for positivist ideas, Grant compared history Science is associated with the process of gradual maturation of the human body, which remains the subject of research, despite the fact that it is undergoing a new stage of development.-

Cunningham A., Williams P. 29. De-Centring the "Big Picture": "The Origins of Modern Science" and the Modern Origins of Science//The British Journal for the History of Science. 1993. Vol. 26. No. 4. P. 417.

Cunnigham A. 30. The Identity of Natural Philosophy. A Response to Edward Grant//Early Science and Medicine. 2000. Vol. 5. No. 3. P. 268.

Osier M.J. 31. Mixing Metaphors: Science and Religion or Natural Philosophy and Theology in Early Modem Europe // History of Science. 1998. Vol. 36. P. 91 - 113; Wilson D.B. On the Importance of Eliminating Science and Religion from the History of Science and Religion // Facets of Faith and Science. Vol. 1. The Pascal Centre for Advanced Studies in Faith and Science: University Press of America, 1996. P. 27 - 47.

Grant E. 32. God and Natural Philosophy: The Late Middle Ages and Sir Isaac Newton// Early Science and Medicine. 2000. Vol. 5. No. 3. P. 282.

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it makes significant changes in the course of its development. If Cunningham reproached Grant for acting selectively in history, ignoring a broad cultural layer, Grant replied that he was only taking from history what he needed to solve his problem.

The controversy between scientists reflected the conflict of the two methodological principles mentioned above. Antiquarianism required Cunningham to consider historical materials based on the logic and interests of the creators of these materials: one can only understand the meaning of a particular historical event by becoming congenial to the event itself, that is, by trying to recreate in his text the completeness of the thinking of the acting subject of history. This approach called into question the possibility of independent existence of any "narrow", private histories, for example, the history of religion or the history of science.

Presentism forced Grant to look not for differences that objectively exist between different epochs, but for similarities, based on a certain "essentialist" view of"science." In fact, Grant's goal was different from Cunningham's: to identify elements of scientific knowledge, especially "knowledge about nature," to trace their evolution and offer the reader a coherent narrative. If he needed a cultural, social, and religious context for the development of science, it was only to identify the causes that led to the scientific revolution: "The present study, while not refuting the old, narrow interpretation, offers a broader context for discussion." 33
While accusing each other of inconsistency, the historians were actually quite consistent. One of them was a proponent of the" new " historiography, which strongly rejected great narratives and sought to speak the language of the historical era under study. Another was a proponent of the "old" historiography, which preferred to talk about the development of the phenomenon of interest to him, having previously formed an idea of what exactly he was going to study. At the same time, the controversy between the two scientists, in my opinion, highlights the central

33. E. Grant - on the relationship between his new book and the previous "internalist" study "Physical Science in the Middle Ages" (1971): Grant E. Grant, author of the book. The Foundations of Modern Science in the Middle Ages. Their Religious, Institutional and Intellectuals Contexts. New York: Cambridge University Press, 1996. P. XIII.

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the conflict around which the "old" and "new" historiography was debated: it concerns the place occupied by the idea of progress in historical research.

Returning to the "scientific revolution"

For a long time, historians did not pay enough attention to the broad cultural context of the development of science, adhering to the internalist attitude, according to which science develops from itself thanks to the efforts of individual outstanding personalities. Initially, the critical concept of "Whig history" within the framework of the "new historiography" referred to works that did not take into account the influence of extra-scientific, primarily religious, factors in the development of science.34 However, later this concept became a tool for stigmatizing any long and holistic narrative that claims to describe the past as a process of consistent development.35
It is my deep conviction that the condemnation of the" presentist attitude "of" old "historiography, with which many books by supporters of" new " historiography begin, plays the role of a polemical tool designed to assert one's own - new - identity. In the case of the "new" historiography, which relies on the writings of sociologists and philosophers who deconstructed the Western intellectual tradition, 36 we are dealing with a new version of the old seventeenth-century dispute about "ancient and new": "In Modern culture, in order to be heard, the intellectual must claim that he is saying something completely new"37.

The "new" historiography is actively trying to overcome its dependence on science, which was expressed in following the methodological guidelines of the positivist philosophy of science. As a

Wilson D.B. 34. The Historiography of Science and Religion//Science & Religion: A Historical Introduction/Ed. FerngrenG. Baltimore: Johns Hopkins University Press, 2002. P. 4.

35. The fact that any linear history inevitably turns out to be a "Whig history" is convincingly written by Hall: Hall A. R. On Whiggism/ / History of Science. 1983. Vol. 21. P 52.

Latour B. 36. Constitution or structure of the New time //There was no new time. Essay on Symmetric Anthropology, St. Petersburg: European University Press, 2006, pp. 74-85.

Evans R. 37. In Defence of History. New York: W. W. Norton and Company, 2000. P. 174.

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The critical history of science highlights such attitudes, for example, the myth of autonomy, the myth of progressive development, and the myth of the objectivity of scientific knowledge. 38 Moreover, some radical representatives of the "new" historiography point out that historians, unlike scientists, are obliged to take a critical position, not to speak on behalf of the "last reality", and to overcome the imposed restrictions imposed on them. they have scientific stereotypes that make them perceive the history of science as the history of gradual progressive development of scientific ideas and practices 39.

It seems to me that, falling into the revolutionary pathos of overcoming big narratives, the representatives of the " new "historiography fall into a trap set up by themselves: their "contextual" approach turns out to have no alternative, and the word "bias" serves only as a convenient slogan for rejecting any great narrative that claims to tell about the progressive nature of the development of a particular genre. a different phenomenon. The" new " historiography of the scientific revolution was part of a huge stream of texts aimed at debunking the "myth" of progress and the associated "Eurocentrism" as ideologies that provide a cover for the struggle for power; and its deconstruction of "concepts" as the main tool for criticizing the narrative appealed to a linguistic turn in history and philosophy. In this case, the fight against "bias"is largely political in nature and, apparently, is connected with the cultural trends of post-war Europe. 40
An attempt to abandon the idea of progress usually forces the historian to limit himself to complex research aimed at working with "narrow", local historical material. However, the rejection of the" grand narrative " is internally contradictory: the idea of linear history still penetrates the work of a historian, even in the case of a specific biographical description, bringing to it a fair share of the very "pre-narrative".-

Schuster J. 38. The Problem of Whig History in the History of Science//The Scientific Revolution: An Introduction to the History and Philosophy of Science. Wollongong, 1995. P. 17.

Forman P. 39. Independence, Not Transcendence, for the Historian of Science // Isis. 1991. Vol. 82. P. 78.

Osier M. 40. Religion and the Changing Historiography of the Scientific Revolution // Science and Religion. New Historical Perspectives. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2010. P. 82.

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taken", which was declared a crusade. Ultimately, any history always turns out to be teleological and ontological: the" new " historiography, while condemning the preconceived views of the "old" historiography, forgets that its own foundations can also be rationalized and criticized.

The two historiographies of the scientific revolution - "traditional" and "new" - do not fundamentally contradict each other, since presentism and antiquarianism are two inextricably linked perspectives of historical research, which seeks not only to reflect historical reality as accurately as possible, but also to show the process of development of a particular phenomenon in history. It is precisely for this reason that the question of whether a scientific revolution actually took place is incorrect: from the standpoint of antiquarianism, it did not and could not have happened, but from the standpoint of presentism, it certainly did; moreover, it was absolutely necessary from the point of view of linear history, which claims to explain the events of the history of science in the long-term historical perspective.

In the last decades of the 20th century, historians have developed a negative consensus about the usefulness and significance of "great narratives". Preference is usually given to studies devoted to individual historical episodes, presented in the form of thematic analysis: the "great picture of the past" has broken down into many separate fragments that cannot be combined into a complete picture of historical development. The task of the historian began to boil down to, on the one hand, expressing the unique character of a historical event and at the same time rejecting "Eurocentrism" and the concepts and categories that it generated.

An attempt to abandon the traditional conceptual framework leads to a crisis of scientific identity, the way out of which is usually achieved by generalizing the conceptual categories of research. The first such generalization in the history of science was the very concept of "science" in "traditional" historiography, which replaced the previously common histories of various sciences. The second generalization was the concept of "culture", which essentially dissolved the history of science and included completely different phenomena from the point of view of the Modern era: religion, science, magic, art, society, law, etc. However, such generalization, not to mention the possible subsequent-

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A theory that removes the opposition of European culture to the non-European world deprives the historian of the opportunity to build "great narratives", since there is simply nothing to build them out of - all the bricks, insofar as they are artificial, are recognized as useless.

It seems to me that a full-fledged historical study should not allow the antiquarian attitude to prevail: a dialogue between historical material and the historian is possible only when the historian clearly understands and accepts the intellectual tradition to which he belongs. Such categories as "science", "religion", and" scientific revolution " are universal tools of historical knowledge that were formed during the heyday of European civilization. The idea of their artificial character indicates a crisis of historiography, which tries, on the one hand, to speak the language of the epoch it is studying, and on the other, continues to use the same familiar conceptual apparatus, constantly making a reservation that in this way it inevitably modernizes the historical context. New Historiography, which gives undue preference to antiquarianism, forgets that a full-fledged historical study requires not only the subject of history, but also the historian himself, who uses the intellectual baggage of his own tradition.

The concept of "Whig history" as a polemical tool is useful for debunking doctrinaire theories that absolutize any single correct perception of the past. Moreover, the critique of" presentism " played an important role in shaping the position of moderate externalism, which recognizes the serious influence of external cultural factors on the development of scientific knowledge. A significant number of publications that reveal the diversity of interrelations between scientific and religious ideas in the era of the Scientific Revolution serve as a good example of criticism of traditional ideas about the conflicting nature of the relationship between science and religion.

At the same time, although religious and scientific ideas are sometimes strongly intertwined in the historical context, as any biographical studies of scientists from the era of the Scientific Revolution can probably demonstrate, this does not mean that science and religion are not two different enterprises from the point of view of the European intellectual tradition. Within the framework of this tradition, the category "scientific revolution" will continue

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It can play an important epistemological role, focusing historians ' attention on the changes that took place in the XVI-XVII centuries, and can rightly be considered "the key not only to the history of science, but also to modern history"41, and, ultimately, the key to understanding the unique specifics of European culture itself.

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