The Renaissance Conception Regarding Technology

The Renaissance creates a clear-cut distinction between mechanical arts, which will come to be considered applied science by Bacon and Descartes, and fine arts. Dealing with the Renaissance approach to technology, this paper will focus, on the one hand, on those domains that combine theoretical and practical skills in order to create artifacts or to transform materials, and, on the other hand, with authors who debate the status of technological practices and knowledge. Thus, we will look at the developments and arguments regarding mechanics, alchemy, natural magic, mining and metallurgy, and at authors such as Georgius Agricola, Paracelsus, Masilio Ficino, Nicholas of Cusa, Galileo Galilei. The aim is to reconstruct the arguments regarding technology that challenged the established Scholastic-Aristotelian framework and made possible the Modern approaches.