Matters Of Exchange: Commerce, Medicine, And Science In The Dutch Golden Age

The author of the text is Harold J. Cook, Professor of History at Brown. Prior to Brown, Cook was the director of the Wellcome Trust Centre for the History of Medicine and a Professor of the History of Medicine at University College London. He also served as a Professor at the University of Oklahoma, the University of Wisconsin-Madison, and Harvard University.2 Cook researches the 17th century scientific revolution through a medical perspective, examining the relationships between medicine, science, and commerce.2 His book, Matters of Exchange: Commerce, Medicine and Science in the Dutch Golden Age, explores how commerce stood as a catalyst for the science and medical fields during the Dutch Golden Age1. The book won several awards, consisting

This sentence encompasses all components of Cook’s argument—the discoveries that emerged during the scientific revolution were results of commerce, global interaction among different people, and curiosity about nature and the world. The rise of modern science was a society-wide effort.
The main arguments of the text include how the ideals that created the foundation of the scientific revolution emerged from a shared curiosity and drive to understand nature and the world. This understanding was formed through collaborative insights given from contributors in fields that dominated the Dutch Golden Age—ship captains, philosophers, botanists, anatomists, merchants, and more—who gathered information regarding their experiences. Those insights, combined with the booming economy from commerce in The Netherlands, created an environment that contributed to the scientific

The historical context introduces important figures in the scientific revolution that hail from different fields of study, giving specific insight on the Netherlands; this reveals a connection between historical literature and the history of commerce and science. In the next section, “Consumption and Taste”, Cook depicts the increase of consumer goods and how “taste” shaped societal values. He connects “taste” and consumption/trade with specifics such as the spice trade, showing how a global network formed. In “Taste and Objectivity”, Cook introduces “curiosity” and “facts” as new standards, showing how the correlation between commerce and nature with these standards allowed people to contribute ideas. “Collecting Objects and Specimens” depicts how fact-driven mindsets blossomed to documentation. Historians translated ancient texts, physicians noted their findings, gardens were planted for demonstrations and pleasure, travelers wrote down their discoveries which further developed trade, and a new curiosity surrounding nature formed. This curiosity called into question the role God played in the natural world. In “Objectivity in Anatomy and Medicine”, Cook describes the battle between theology and nature, which was leveled with a common excitement for facts regarding the natural world. Curiosity about the human body was fostered in society through concrete details and facts as opposed to