Man a Machine and 18th century Automata
- De Motu Animalium
- De Motu Animalium, 1680
On the Motion of Animals
G.A. Borelli
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Swan Study Week
Bowes Swan Automaton 2021 Study week - Silver Swan at The Bowes Museum
Julien Offray de la Mettrie (1709-1751) L’Homme Machine (first published anonymously in Leyden, 1748).
To have access to the text in French L’Homme Machine and to its translation, Man a Machine, you can go to Project Gutenberg:
Here on the same screen you will be able to read the text in French and its translation in English.
Man a Machine is a work of materialist philosophy by the eighteenth-century French physician and philosopher Julien Offray de La Mettrie. In this work, he extends Descartes’ argument that animals are mere automata, or machines, to human beings.
Does man possess anything that would differentiate him from animals?
Related links:
- Man a Machine (Wikipedia)
- La Mettrie, Julien Offray de la Mettrie
As an introduction, to place it in its context, read Professor Simon Schaffer’s Enlightened automata,
Listen to Professor Simon Schaffer’s presentation on The Silver Swan at the Bowes Museum
and to Mechanical Marvels: Clockwork dreams
Visit the website Georgian Cities: Birmingham
To have access to the text in French L’Homme Machine and to its translation, Man a Machine, you can also go to ECCO, (Eighteenth- Century Collections Online) for the first translation in English :
- Man a machine. Translated from the French of the Marquiss d’Argens
Author: Julien Offray de La Mettrie
Date: MDCCXLIX. (1749)
Publisher: printed for W. Owen, at Homer’s Head, near Temple-Bar (London)
You can also visit.... and find more information...
Read the definition of « Automates » in d’Alembert’s Encyclopédie.
See also « âme » (p.344-45-46) and « androïde » (p.448)
The Encyclopedia of Diderot and d’Alembert, Collaborative Translation Project, University of Michigan :
Exposition « Top modèles » Une leçon princière au XVIIIe siècle du 16 Octobre 2020 au 7 mars 2021 (prolongation jusqu’au 27 juin 2021).
Les savoirs au XVIIIe siècle, documentaires numériques, en ligne.
Science Museum London: The golden age of automata
« These mechanical masterpieces provoked questions about the differences and similarities between people and machines »
The self-acting mule for spinning cotton thread was described by industrial commentator Andrew Ure as ’the Iron Man’:
Another interesting website: medicine, science history and horology
- Digesting Duck
- Digesting Duck (Wikipedia)
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Rodama: a blog of 18th century & Revolutionary French trivia (not all links work on the following website but there are reliable descriptions:)
Also read the books :
- The Lunar Men The Friends who made the Future, Jenny Uglow (Faber and Faber, 2002).
- Thomson, Ann. Materialism and Society in the Mid-Eighteenth Century: La Mettrie’s “Discours préliminaire.” Geneva: Droz, 1981. Excellent critical edition. The text is in French and the monograph-length introduction in English.
The text of de la Mettrie’s L’Homme Machine, in French here
La Mettrie, Julien Offray de. Œuvres philosophiques. Chez Jean Nourse, 1751. Eighteenth Century Collections Online,(ECCO)
La Mettrie, Julien Offray de. Man a machine. Translated from the French of the Marquis D’Argens. Printed for W. Brien, Bookseller, in Dame-Street, MDCCXLIX. [1749]. ECCO (Eighteenth Century Collections Online)
Man a machine. Translated from the French of the Marquiss D’Argens. Page 72
Gale Document Number:GALE|CW0119626549
De Motu Animalium, 1680
On the Motion of Animals
The text is also accessible from The British Library
- Title: Man a Machine. Translated from the French of the Marquiss d’Argens [or rather from “L’Homme machine” by J. J. Offray de la Mettrie].
Author: Jean Baptiste de BOYER, Marquis d’Argens.
Contributor: Julien Offray de La Mettrie 1709-1751.
Rights: Terms governing use: Terms of use for Google books.
Access restrictions: No restrictions.
Publication Details: Dublin : W. Brien, 1749.
Language: English
Identifier: System number: 017479581
Physical Description: 72 pages ; (8º)
Shelfmark(s): General Reference Collection DRT Digital Store 1607/412.
UIN: BLL01017479581
