George Sarton

George Alfred Leon Sarton (; ; 31 August 1884 – 22 March 1956) was a Belgian-American chemist and historian. He is considered the founder of the discipline of the history of science as an independent field of study. His most influential works were the Introduction to the History of Science, which consists of three volumes and 4,296 pages, and the journal Isis. Sarton ultimately aimed to achieve an integrated philosophy of science that provided a connection between the sciences and the humanities, which he referred to as "the new humanism". He was a founder of the History of Science Society and is the namesake of its George Sarton Medal, a prestigious lifetime achievement award for historians of science.

Early life and education George Alfred Leon Sarton was born to Léonie Van Halmé and Alfred Sarton on August 31, 1884, in Ghent, Belgium. However, within a year of his birth, Sarton's mother died. Sarton attended school first in his hometown before later attending school for a period of four years in the town of Chimay. During his time at the University of Ghent Sarton received several honors. In 1908, the four Belgian universities gave him a gold medal for chemistry, and the city of Ghent gave him a silver laurel for a memoir he wrote. He graduated with his doctorate in 1911 with a thesis in celestial mechanics, titled "Les Principes de mécanique de Newton". He worked for the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace and lectured at Harvard University, 1916–18. While at Harvard, Sarton lectured in philosophy in the academic year of 1916–1917 and in history of science in the academic year of 1917–1918. He supervised just two PhD students in Harvard's history of science program to completion, the first two such PhDs in the US: Aydin M. Sayili and I. Bernard Cohen. His other two students, Louise Diehl Patterson and Helen L. Thomas, finished their PhDs at Harvard under Cohen. He coined the term Medical Humanities in an obituary in 1948.

Isis & Osiris Sarton founded the journal Isis in 1912. It was the first English language history of science journal. The first issue was published in March 1913. Sarton edited the journal for 40 years till 1953, seeking to connect sociology, methodology, and philosophy with historical inquiry in one holistic project.

The complementary journal Osiris was founded by Sarton in 1936 as a companion journal to Isis. It was created as a place for longer, more technically demanding work that did not fit Isis's format.

History of Science Society Sarton, along with other scholars from major universities, founded the History of Science Society in 1924 as a financial and institutional support structure for the journal Isis which Sarton debuted in Belgium in 1912 and first published in March 1913. For many years after its founding the HSS functioned as a subscription service for Isis and later Osiris, founded by Sarton in 1936. To honor Sarton the HSS created the George Sarton Medal their most prestigious award, given annually since 1955 to honor an outstanding historian of science for lifetime scholarly achievement.

Sarton began working with the school of Spanish Arabists in 1928, then led by Julian Ribera y Tarrago and Miguel Asin Palacios.

Sarton acknowledged that Julian Ribera was the leading Spanish Arabist. Sarton also was interested and wrote articles on Ribera's research on the transition of Eastern music to the West. Sarton later associated his interest in scientific diffusion with Ribera's interest in the transmission of music because in medieval times, music was commonly associated with mathematics and a part of the quadrivium. Sarton believed that the Islamic contribution to science was the most "progressive" element in medieval learning and was outraged when Western medieval studies ignored it.

Selected publications Articles 1924: 1927–48: Introduction to the History of Science (3 v. in 5), Carnegie Institution of Washington Publication # 376, Baltimore: Williams and Wilkins, Co. 1951: "The Incubation of Western Culture in the Middle East: a George C. Keiser Foundation Lecture", March 29, 1950, Washington, D.C.

Books 1927: Introduction to the History of Science (I. From Homer to Omar Khayyam) 1931: Introduction to the History of Science (II. From Rabbi Ben Ezra to Roger Bacon, pt. 1–2) 1931: The History of Science and the New Humanism, New York: Henry Holt & Company 1936: The Study of the History of Mathematics & The Study of the History of Science, 1954 Dover reprint from Internet Archive 1947/8: Introduction to the History of Science (III. Science and learning in the fourteenth-century, pt. 1–2, 1947–48). Baltimore: Williams & Wilkins. 1948: The Life of Science: Essays in the History of Civilization. Edited by Max H. Fisch. New York: Henry Schuman. 1952: A History of Science. Ancient science through the Golden Age of Greece, Cambridge, Massachusetts: Harvard University Press 1959: A History of Science. Hellenistic science and culture in the last three centuries B.C., Cambridge, Massachusetts: Harvard University Press 1965: The Study of the History of Science (German: Das Studium der Geschichte der Naturwissenschaften, Frankfurt am Main: Klostermann)