Cambridge Companion To Pascal, The

Blaise Pascal (1623-1662) occupies a position of pivotal importance in many domains: philosophy, mathematics, physics, religious polemics and apologetics. A team of leading scholars surveys the range of his achievement and intellectual background as well as the reception of his work. New readers and nonspecialists will find a convenient and accessible guide to Pascal and advanced students and specialists, a conspectus of recent developments in the interpretation of his works. Contents - Introduction; 1. Pascal’s life and times Ben Rogers; 2. Pascal’s reading and the inheritance of Montaigne and Descartes Henry Phillips; 3. Pascal’s work on probability A. W. F. Edwards; 4. Pascal and decision theory Jon Elster; 5. Pascal’s Physics Daniel Fouke; 6. Pascal’s Philosophy of Science Desmond M. Clarke; 7. Pascal’s theory of knowledge Jean Khalfa; 8. Grace and religious belief in Pascal Michael Moriarty; 9. Pascal and Holy Writ David Wetsel; 10. Pascal’s Lettres provinciales: from flippancy to fundamentals Richard Parish; 11. Pascal and the social world Hélène Bouchilloux; 12. Pascal and philosophical method Pierre Force; 13. Pascal’s Pensées and the art of persuasion Nicholas Hammond; 14. The reception of Pascal’s Pensées in the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries Antony McKenna.