H. Floris Cohen was born in Haarlem, Netherlands in 1946. After the 'Stedelijk Gymnasium' (City College) in Haarlem, he studied history at the university of Leiden.
He completed his MA in 1970, with a major in socio-economic history and a minor in history of science.
He graduated in 1974 with a Ph.D thesis on efforts at renewal in Dutch social-democracy during the first decade upon the First World War. From 1975 to 1982 he served the Museum Boerhaave in Leiden as a curator.
In 1982 he was appointed full professor in history of science at the University of Twente.
In 2001 he took early retirement. Since December 2006 he serves as 'bijzonder hoogleraar' (honorary professor) at the Department of Humanities of the University of Utrecht.
He enjoyed three senior fellowships at institutes for advanced studies - NIAS in Wassenaar, the Wilson Center in Washington DC, and the Dibner Institute in Cambridge (Massachussetts).
He is a member of the History of Science Society (HSS) and of the Global Economic History Network (GEHN). He is corresponding member no. 594 of the International Academy of the History of Science.
Here is a list of some publications in other languages than Dutch.
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Books
Quantifying Music. The Science of Music at the First Stage of the Scientific Revolution, 1580-1650.
Dordrecht: Reidel, 1984. xvii + 308 p. ISBN: 90.277.1637.4. Western Ontario Series, Vol. 23.
The Scientific Revolution. A Historiographical Inquiry.
Chicago & London: University of Chicago Press, 1994. xviii + 662 p. ISBN gebonden: 0.226.11279.9.; paperback: 0.226.11280.2.
How Modern Science Came Into the World. Four Civilizations, One 17th Century Breakthrough. Amsterdam: Amsterdam University Press, 2010. xl + 784 p., bound, ISBN 978.90.8964.239.4. [NB click on the book title for the original language of the non-English passages quoted in the book's endnotes]>
Articles
HISTORY OF SCIENCE
'Benedetti's Views on Musical Science and their Background in Contemporary Venetian Culture'
In: Cultura, Scienze e Techniche nella Venezia del Cinquecento. Atti del Convegno Internazionale di Studio 'Giovan Battista Benedetti e il suo tempo'. Venezia (Istituto Veneto di Scienze, Lettere ed Arti), 1987, 301-310.
'Cross-culturally comparative history of science'. Essay review of: T.E. Huff, The Rise of Early Modern Science. Islam, China, and the West (piece written in 1995 and accepted by Physis, but left unpublished)
'Les raisons de la transformation: la spécificité européenne.'. In: M. Blay & E. Nicolaïdis (eds.),
L'Europe des sciences. Constitution d' un espace scientifique. Paris: Le Seuil, 2001; p. 51-94 (transl.: A. Barberousse).
'Joseph Needham's Grand Question, and How to Make It Productive For Our Understanding of the Scientific Revolution'.
In: A. Arrault & C. Jami (eds.), Science and Technology in East Asia, vol. 9: The Legacy of Joseph Needham (vol. 51 in series 'De Diversis Artibus'). Turnhout: Brepols, 2001; 21-31.
'Note about an unfinished book on Ostwald by the late Casper Hakfoort, and about its author'.
Mitteilungen der Wilhelm-Ostwald-Gesellschaft 6, 4, 2001, p. 53-57 (followed by Casper Hakfoort's introductory chapter 1, 'Paradise is here': 57-62).
'Global History of Science Comes of Age'
(essay review of: James E. McClellan III & Harold Dorn, Science and Technology in World History. An Introduction). Early Science and Medicine 6, 4, 2001, 362-368.
'The Onset of the Scientific Revolution: Three Near-simultaneous Transformations'
(to appear in a collection edited by John Schuster & Peter Anstey)
Lemma 'Scientific Revolution'
(to appear in the New Dictionary of the History of Ideas)
HISTORY OF SCIENCE & THE COMING INTO BEING OF THE MODERN WORLD
'The Coming-into-Being of Our Modern World: What Science and Technology Had To Do With It' (provisional translation of: 'Het ontstaan van onze moderne wereld: wat natuurwetenschap en techniek ermee van doen hadden'. Theoretische Geschiedenis 25, 4, 1998, 322-349)
'Inside Newcomen's Fire-Engine'
History of Technology 25, 2004; p. 111-132.
HISTORY OF SCIENCE: TRANSLATIONS
R. Hooykaas, 'Pascal: His Science and His Religion'.
Tractrix 1, 1989, 115-139 (translation of: 'Pascal. Zijn wetenschap en zijn religie'. Orgaan van de Christelijke Vereeniging van Natuur- en Geneeskundigen in Nederland, 1939, 147-178).
E.J. Dijksterhuis, 'Ad Quanta Intelligenda Condita (Designed for Grasping Quantities)'.
Tractrix 2, 1990, 111-125 (translation of: 'Ad Quanta Intelligenda Condita'. Inaugural address at Leiden University. Amsterdam: Meulenhoff, 1955).
H.A. Lorentz, On the Theory of the Reflection and Refraction of Light.
Amsterdam: Rodopi, 1997 (translation, with Nancy J. Nersessian, of Lorentz' doctoral dissertation Over de theorie der terugkaatsing en breking van het licht. Leiden, 1875).