十七世紀科學觀察與藝術想像的之視覺文化競合

Interactions and Competitions between Scientific Observation and Artistic Imagination in Terms of Visual Culture in the 17th Century Europe

在科技迅速擴張視覺感官範圍的現代，圖像理解似乎代替了論述式的知識脈絡。視覺經驗的擴張歷史可以推回十七世紀的科學和人文甦醒的時代。十七世紀的天文學發現改變了創世紀的詮釋，造成天文學與信仰的衝突，產生了圖像(image)和論述(Discourse)的競爭。天文學和其他學科有不一樣的發展，其一是天文學的想像和象徵作用，其二是天文學豐富的圖像文化。天文學家和藝術家在中世紀便開始觀察自然，到了伽利略天文發現的十七世紀，觀察對科學和藝術都產生了重要的影響，也突破了教會勢力對自然宇宙詮釋的限制。從十七世紀的幾件天文學圖像和藝術作品來看，在天文學觀察和藝術想像之間產生了模型推理、觀察證據、科學真理和符號象徵、神學詮釋、創新想像的競合。這種競合在十七世紀留下了有趣豐富的視覺文化紀錄，也讓我們發現圖像不只是柏拉圖眼中的自然模仿，而可以是探討知識的一種方式。

In the modern epoch with technique advancements that have greatly extended our visual sensation, image realization seems to have largely replaced the traditional way of gaining knowledge through reasoning and elaboration. However, the history of the extension of visual sensation can be tracked back to the 17th century of the renaissance of science and humanity. The discovery of astronomy changed the interpretation of the genesis of the universe and created not only the conflict between astronomy and religion belief but also the competition between image and discourse. Astronomy is different from other academic subjects with its ample imagination, its symbolism aspects and its culture of abundant images. Astronomers and artist started to observe nature in the Middle Ages. Observations began to have significant influence on both science and arts in the 17th century when Galileo first made the important discoveries in astronomy, which also broke the bound constrained by the Catholic Church on the interpretation of the natural universe. From the art works and astronomy images hi the 17th century, we can see that astronomy observations and art imagination have significant competition and interaction among several different aspects, including model reasoning, observational evidence, scientific truths and symbolism, theological interpretation, and artistic Creation. Such competition and interaction have given us abundant interesting historic records in visual culture. This also suggests that the use of images is more than a imitation of nature as viewed from Plato; but, in fact, it also has epistemological potential.