Work Classification Layer
Compare Works
Pick two or more works to set their attribute fingerprints, dimension-by-dimension passages, and shared school embodiments side by side. Especially useful for author-stage comparisons (Wittgenstein early vs late) and for setting a single tradition's foundational texts against each other.
Micrographia
Hooke's 1665 Micrographia — first major illustrated microscopic survey and the coining of 'cell'
Attribute Fingerprint
Rows where works disagree are highlighted in gold. The full ontology grid is shown.
| Attribute | Micrographia (Early-career (career-defining)) |
|---|---|
| Time · Extent | Infinite |
| Time · Ontological Status | Substantival |
| Time · Grain | Continuous |
| Time · Freedom | Deterministic |
| Time · Traversability | Linear |
| Time · Dimensionality | One |
| Time · Direction | Uni-directional |
| Space · Extent | Infinite |
| Space · Ontological Status | Substantival |
| Space · Curvature | Flat |
| Space · Dimensionality | Three |
| Space · Locality | Local |
| Matter · Extent | Finite |
| Matter · Ontological Status | Substantival |
| Matter · Conservation | Conserved |
| Matter · Dimensionality | Three |
| Matter · Locality | Local |
| Observer · Time Instance | Single |
| Observer · Space Instance | Single |
| Observer · Knowledge Extent | Immediate |
| Observer · Knowledge Retainment | Total |
| Observer · Physicality | Embodied |
| Observer · Agency | Active |
| Observer · Number | Plural |
| Observer · Metaphysical Agency | Personal |
| Observer · Moral Authority | Reason |
| Observer · Theological Method | — |
| Energy · Extent | Finite |
| Energy · Ontological Status | Substantival |
| Energy · Conservation | Conserved |
| Energy · Dispersibility | Irreversible |
| Information · Ontological Status | Substantival |
| Information · Cosmic Conservation | Conserved |
| Information · Personal Conservation | Conserved |
| Information · Granularity | Continuous |
Dimension-by-Dimension Evidence
What each work's passages reveal about its stance on each of the six dimensions.
Time
Micrographia
1665. Hooke was 30 and had been Royal Society Curator of Experiments since 1662 (a position created for him to demonstrate weekly experiments at the Society's meetings).
Space
Micrographia
London — the Royal Society's early years at Gresham College, and Hooke's lodgings at Gresham where he ground his own lenses and built his own microscopes.
Matter
Micrographia
Illustrated folio of microscopic observations (~250 pages with extensive foldout engravings). Form is observation-by-observation: each observation has a heading, a description, and an engraved illustration.
Observer
Micrographia
Early Hooke as Curator of Experiments. The observer-experimentalist is the principal Royal Society experimental philosopher of the 1660s — Hooke's relationships with Newton, Boyle, Wren, and the entire Royal Society scientific establishment all centered on his role as experimentalist.
Energy
Micrographia
Founding-experimental energies of the Royal Society. Micrographia was the Royal Society's most successful single early publication — read across Europe, translated, and continuously reissued.
Information
Micrographia
Sixty observations with large-format engravings. The engravings (Hooke's own) are themselves a major scientific-historical document — they shaped the visual culture of early modern science.
Internal Tensions
Where each work's argument pulls against itself.
Hooke's career-defining publication; coined 'cell' in biology and supplied iconic engravings of the microscopic world. The book's reception was immense: Pepys's all-night reading, the Royal Society's circulation, the popular reception of Restoration experimental philosophy through Micrographia's accessible-illustrated format.