Propædia
The one-volume Propædia is the first of three parts of the 15th edition of Encyclopædia Britannica, the other two being the 12-volume Micropædia and the 17-volume Macropædia. The Propædia is intended as a topical organization of the Britannica's contents, complementary to the alphabetical organization of the other two parts. Introduced in 1974 with the 15th edition, the Propædia and Micropædia were intended to replace the Index of the 14th edition; however, after widespread criticism, the Britannica restored the Index as a two-volume set in 1985. The core of the Propædia is its Outline of Knowledge, which seeks to provide a logical framework for all human knowledge; however, the Propædia also has several appendices listing the staff members, advisors and contributors to all three parts of the Britannica.
The last edition of the print Britannica was published in 2010.[1]
Outline of Knowledge
Like the Britannica as a whole, the Outline has three types of goals:[2]
- Epistemological: to provide a systematic, hierarchical categorization of all human knowledge, a 20th-century analog of the Great Chain of Being and Francis Bacon's outline in Instauratio magna.
- Educational: to lay out a course of study for each major discipline, a "roadmap" for learning a whole field.
- Organizational: to serve as an expanded Table of Contents for the Micropædia and Macropædia.
According to Mortimer J. Adler, the designer of the Propaedia, all articles in the full Britannica were designed to fit into the Outline of Knowledge.[2]
The Outline has ten Parts, each with an introductory essay. The authors of these essays are listed below in the final column of Table 1. The same ten men were responsible for developing the outline for their Part, in consultation and collaboration with a handful of other scholars; in all, 86 men and one woman were involved in developing the Outline of Knowledge (see Table 2 below).
Each of the ten Parts contains from 2 to 7 Divisions, which in turn contain from 2 to 11 Sections. These Sections form the basic categories of knowledge in the schema, and each one is given a special three-part numerical code to encode its place in the Outline's hierarchy. For example, the section "Military Technology" has the code "736" indicating that it is the 6th Section of the 3rd Division ("Major Fields of Technology") of the 7th Part ("Technology"). Forward slashes are used when a Part, Division or Section has more than one digit; for example, the Section "History and Philosophy of Logic" has the code "10/11" indicating that it is the 1st section of the 1st Division ("Logic") of the 10th Part ("The Branches of Knowledge").
10 Parts | 41 Divisions | 167 Sections | Lead Author | Introduction |
---|---|---|---|---|
1. Matter and Energy | 1.1 Atoms | 1.1.1 Structure and Properties of Atoms 1.1.2 Atomic Nuclei and Elementary Particles | Nigel Calder | "The Universe of the Physicist, the Chemist, and the Astronomer" |
1.2 Energy, Radiation, and States of Matter | 1.2.1 Chemical Elements: Periodic Variation in Their Properties | |||
1.3 The Universe | 1.3.1 The Cosmos | |||
2. The Earth | 2.1 Earth's Properties, Structure, Composition | 2.1.1 The Planet Earth 2.1.2 Earth's Physical Properties 2.1.3 Structure and Composition of the Earth's Interior 2.1.4 Minerals and Rocks | Peter John Wyllie | "The Great Globe Itself" |
2.2 Earth's Envelope | 2.2.1 The Atmosphere | |||
2.3 Surface Features | 2.3.1 Physical Features of the Earth's Surface | |||
2.4 Earth's History | 2.4.1 Origin and Development of the Earth and Its Envelopes | |||
3. Life | 3.1 The Nature and Diversity of Life | 3.1.1 Characteristics of Life 3.1.2 The Origin and Evolution of Life 3.1.3 Classification of Living Things | René Dubos | "The Mysteries of Life" |
3.2 The Molecular Basis of Life | 3.2.1 Chemicals and the Vital Processes | |||
3.3 The Structures and Functions of Organisms | 3.3.1 Cellular Basis of Form and Function | |||
3.4 The Behavior of Organisms | 3.4.1 Nature and Patterns of Behavior | |||
3.5 The Biosphere | 3.5.1 Basic Features of the Biosphere | |||
4. Human Life | 4.1 The Development of Human Life | 4.1.1 Human Evolution 4.1.2 Human Heredity: the Races | Loren Eiseley | "The Cosmic Orphan" |
4.2 The Human Body: Health and Disease | 4.2.1 The Structures and Functions of the Human Body | |||
4.3 Human Behavior and Experience | 4.3.1 General theories of human nature and behavior | |||
5. Society | 5.1 Social Groups: Ethnic groups and Cultures | 5.1.1 Peoples and Cultures of the World 5.1.2 The Development of Human Culture 5.1.3 Major Cultural Components and Institutions of Societies 5.1.4 Language and Communication | Harold D. Lasswell | "Man the Social Animal" |
5.2 Social Organization and Social Change | 5.2.1 Social Structure and Change | |||
5.3 The Production, Distribution, and Utilization of Wealth | 5.3.1 Economic Concepts, Issues, and Systems | |||
5.4 Politics and Government | 5.4.1 Political Theory | |||
5.5 Law | 5.5.1 Philosophies and Systems of Law; the Practice of Law | |||
5.6 Education | 5.6.1 Aims and Organization of Education | |||
6. Art | 6.1 Art in General | 6.1.1 Theory and Classification of the Arts 6.1.2 Experience and Criticism of Art; the Nonaesthetic Context of Art 6.1.3 Characteristics of the Arts in Particular Cultures | Mark Van Doren | "The World of Art" |
6.2 Particular Arts | 6.2.1 Literature | |||
7. Technology | 7.1 Nature & Development of Technology | 7.1.1 Technology: Its Scope and History 7.1.2 The Organization of Human Work | Lord Peter Ritchie-Calder | "Knowing How and Knowing Why" |
7.2 Elements of Technology | 7.2.1 Technology of Energy Conversion and Utilization | |||
7.3 Fields of Technology | 7.3.1 Agriculture and Food Production | |||
8. Religion | 8.1 Religion in General | 8.1.1 Knowledge and Understanding of Religion 8.1.2 Religious Life: Institutions and Practices | Wilfred Cantwell Smith | "Religion as Symbolism" |
8.2 Particular Religions | 8.2.1 Prehistoric Religion and Primitive Religion | |||
9. History | 9.1 Ancient Southwest Asia, North Africa, and Europe | 9.1.1 Ancient Southwest Asia and Egypt, the Aegean, and North Africa 9.1.2 Ancient Europe and Classical Civilizations of the Mediterranean to AD 395 | Jacques Barzun | "The Point and Pleasure of Reading History" |
9.2 Medieval Southwest Asia North Africa and Europe | 9.2.1 The Byzantine Empire and Europe from AD 395–1050 | |||
9.3 East, Central, South, and Southeast Asia | 9.3.1 China to the Beginning of the Late T'ang AD 755 | |||
9.4 Sub-Saharan Africa to 1885 | 9.4.1 West Africa to 1885 | |||
9.5 Pre-Columbian America | 9.5.1 Andean Civilization to AD 1540 | |||
9.6 The Modern World to 1920 | 9.6.1 Western Europe 1500–1789 | |||
9.7 The World Since 1920 | 9.7.1 International Movements, Diplomacy and War Since 1920 | |||
10. Branches of Knowledge | 10.1 Logic | 10.1.1 History and Philosophy of Logic 10.1.2 Formal Logic, Metalogic, & Applied Logic | Mortimer J. Adler | "Knowledge Become Self-conscious" |
10.2 Mathematics | 10.2.1 History and Foundations of Mathematics | |||
10.3 Science | 10.3.1 History and Philosophy of Science | |||
10.4 History and The Humanities | 10.4.1 Historiography | |||
10.5 Philosophy | 10.5.1 History of Philosophy | |||
10.6 Preservation of Knowledge | 10.6.1 Institutions and Techniques for the Collection, Storage, Dissemination and Preservation of Knowledge |
The Outline was an eight-year project of Mortimer J. Adler, published 22 years after he published a similar effort (the Syntopicon) that attempts to provide an overview of the relationships among the "Great Ideas" in Adler's Great Books of the Western World series. (The Great Books were also published by the Encyclopædia Britannica Inc.) Adler stresses in his book, A Guidebook to Learning: For a Lifelong Pursuit of Wisdom, that the ten categories should not be taken as hierarchical but as circular.
The whole of the Propædia's synoptic outline of knowledge deserves to be read carefully. It represents a twentieth-century scheme for the organization of knowledge that is more comprehensive than any other and that also accommodates the intellectual heterodoxy of our time.
— Mortimer J. Adler, in A Guidebook, pp. 91–2
Similar works
Other encyclopedias have provided analogous outlines of knowledge. In the Preface to the famous Encyclopédie (published 1751–1772), d'Alembert provides a roadmap to the knowledge of his time. Inspired by that example, in a letter dated 15 November 1812, Dugald Stewart proposed to Archibald Constable, the owner and publisher of the Britannica, that the supplement to its 5th edition should begin with a series of dissertations that outlined and organized the knowledge of their time.
Contributors to the Outline of Knowledge
Name | Date of birth | Date of death | Part of Outline | Description | Index |
---|---|---|---|---|---|
Mortimer J. Adler | 1902 | 2001 | All Parts | Editor | 1 |
Charles Van Doren | 1926 | 2019 | All Parts | Associate editor; Editorial Vice President of Encyclopædia Britannica Inc. (1973–1982) | 2 |
William J. Gorman | 1982 | All Parts | Associate editor; Senior Fellow of the Institute for Philosophical Research | 3 | |
A. G. W. Cameron | 1925 | 2005 | Matter and Energy | Professor of Astronomy, Harvard University | 4 |
Farrington Daniels | 1889 | 1972 | Matter and Energy | Professor of Chemistry, University of Wisconsin–Madison, Madison | 5 |
Morton Hamermesh | Matter and Energy | Professor of Physics, University of Minnesota, Minneapolis (1975–1986) | 6 | ||
Vincent E. Parker | Matter and Energy | Emeritus Professor of Physics, California State Polytechnic University, Pomona; Dean, School of Science (1967–1977) | 7 | ||
Richard J. Chorley | 1927 | 2002 | The Earth | Professor of Geography, University of Cambridge; Fellow of Sidney Sussex College, Cambridge | 8 |
William Stelling von Arx | The Earth | Senior Scientist, Woods Hole Oceanographic Institution (1968–1978) | 9 | ||
Peter John Wyllie | 1930 | The Earth | Professor of Geology and Chairman, Division of Geological and Planetary Sciences, California Institute of Technology | 10 | |
N. J. Berrill | 1903 | 1996 | Life on Earth | Strathcone Professor of Zoology, McGill University (1946–1965) | 11 |
Vincent Dethier | 1915 | 1993 | Life on Earth | Gilbert L. Woodside Professor of Zoology, University of Massachusetts Amherst (1975–1993) | 12 |
Louis S. Goodman | 1906 | 2000 | Life on Earth | Distinguished Professor of Pharmacology, University of Utah, Salt Lake City | 13 |
Garrett Hardin | 1915 | 2003 | Life on Earth | Emeritus Professor of Human Ecology, University of California, Santa Barbara | 14 |
Ernst Walter Mayr | 1904 | 2005 | Life on Earth | Alexander Agassiz Professor Emeritus of Zoology, Harvard University | 15 |
John Alexander Moore | 1915 | 2002 | Life on Earth | Emeritus Professor of Biology, University of California, Riverside | 16 |
Theodore T. Puck | 1916 | 2005 | Life on Earth | Professor of Biology, Biophysics and Genetics; Distinguished Professor of Medicine, University of Colorado, Health Sciences Center; Director, Eleanor Roosevelt Institute for Cancer Research | 17 |
Birgit Vennesland | Life on Earth | Head, Vennesland Research Laboratory, Max Planck Society (1970–1981); Director, Max Planck Institute for Cell Physiology, Berlin (1968–1970) | 18 | ||
Paul B. Weisz | Life on Earth | Professor of Biology, Brown University | 19 | ||
Ralph H. Wetmore | 1892 | 1989 | Life on Earth | Emeritus Professor of Botany, Harvard University | 20 |
Emil H. White | Life on Earth | D. Mead Johnson Professor of Chemistry, Johns Hopkins University | 21 | ||
Wilfrid Edward Le Gros Clark | 1895 | 1971 | Human Life | Professor of Anatomy, University of Oxford | 22 |
Russell S. Fisher | 1985 | Human Life | Chief Medical Examiner, State of Maryland; Professor of Forensic Pathology, University of Maryland Medical School, Baltimore | 23 | |
F. Clark Howell | 1925 | 2007 | Human Life | Professor of Anthropology, University of California, Berkeley | 24 |
Gregory A. Kimble | Human Life | Emeritus Professor of Psychology, Duke University | 25 | ||
Erich Klinghammer | 1930 | 2011 | Human Life | Associate Professor of Psychology, Purdue University | 26 |
Warren Sturgis McCulloch | 1899 | 1969 | Human Life | Staff member, Research Laboratory of Electronics, MIT (1952–1969) | 27 |
William J. McGuire | Human Life | Professor of Psychology, Yale University | 28 | ||
Peter Medawar | 1915 | 1987 | Human Life | Nobel Prize for Physiology or Medicine, 1960; Jodrell Professor of Zoology and Comparative Anatomy, University College London (1951–1962); Director, National Institute, Mill Hill, London (1962–1971); Scientific staff member, Medical Research Council, England (1971–1984) | 29 |
William J. Baumol | 1922 | 2017 | Human Society | Professor of Economics, New York University; Emeritus Professor of Economics, Princeton University | 30 |
Daniel Bell | 1919 | 2011 | Human Society | Henry Ford II Professor Emeritus of Social Science, Harvard University | 31 |
Guiliano H. Bonfante | Human Society | Former Professor of Linguistics, University of Turin | 32 | ||
Kenneth E. Boulding | 1910 | 1993 | Human Society | Distinguished Professor of Economics, University of Colorado, Boulder | 33 |
Lewis A. Coser | 1913 | 2003 | Human Society | Distinguished Professor Emeritus of Sociology, SUNY, Stony Brook | 34 |
Sigmund Diamond | Human Society | Giddings Professor Emeritus of Sociology, Columbia University | 35 | ||
Carl J. Friedrich | 1901 | 1984 | Human Society | Eaton Professor of the Science of Government, Harvard University (1955–1971) | 36 |
Paul Mundy | Human Society | Professor of Sociology and Chairman, Department of Criminal Justice, Loyola University Chicago | 37 | ||
Kenyon E. Poole | 1988 | Human Society | Professor of Economics, Northwestern University | 38 | |
C. Herman Pritchett | Human Society | Emeritus Professor of Political Science, University of California, Santa Barbara and University of Chicago | 39 | ||
Sol Tax | 1907 | 1995 | Human Society | Professor of Anthropology, University of Chicago (1948–1976); Director, Center for the Study of Man, Smithsonian Institution | 40 |
Charles Raymond Whittlesey | 1900 | 1979 | Human Society | Emeritus Professor of Finance and Economics, University of Pennsylvania | 41 |
Rudolf Arnheim | 1904 | 2007 | Art | Emeritus professor of Psychology of Art, Carpenter Center for the Visual Arts, Harvard University | 42 |
Robert Jesse Charleston | 1916 | 1994 | Art | Keeper, Department of Ceramics, Victoria and Albert Museum (1963–1976) | 43 |
Clifton Fadiman | 1904 | 1999 | Art | Member, Board of Editors, Encyclopædia Britannica | 44 |
Francis Fergusson | 1904 | 1986 | Art | Professor of Comparative Literature, Rutgers University (1953–1969); Professor of Comparative Literature, Princeton University (1973–1981) | 45 |
John Gloag | 1896 | 1981 | Art | Novelist and writer on architecture and industrial design | 46 |
Richard Griffith | 1912 | 1969 | Art | Curator, Museum of Modern Art Film Library (1951–1965); Lecturer on Motion Pictures, Wesleyan University (1967–1969) | 47 |
Richard Hoggart | 1918 | 2014 | Art | Professor of English, University of Birmingham (1962–1973); Warden, Goldsmiths' College, University of London (1976–1984) | 48 |
Edward Lockspeiser | 1905 | 1973 | Art | Officier d'Académie, Paris; Writer and broadcaster on music. | 49 |
Roy McMullen | 1984 | Art | Author, critic, and art historian | 50 | |
Leonard B. Meyer | 1918 | 2007 | Art | Benjamin Franklin Professor of Music and Humanities, University of Pennsylvania | 51 |
Michael Morrow | 1929 | 1994 | Art | Music editor, Encyclopædia Britannica; Director, Musica Reservata, London | 52 |
Beaumont Newhall | 1908 | 1993 | Art | Director, Eastman Kodak House (1958–1971); Visiting Professor of Art, University of New Mexico (1971–1984) | 53 |
Herbert Read | 1893 | 1968 | Art | Watson Gordon Professor of Fine Art, University of Edinburgh (1931–1933); editor, The Burlington Magazine (1933–1939); Charles Eliot Norton professor of Poetry, Harvard University (1953–1954) | 54 |
Richard Roud | 1929 | 1989 | Art | Program Director, London (1959–1963) and New York (1963–1987) Film Festivals; Film critic, The Guardian (1963–1969) | 55 |
George Savage | 1982 | Art | Art consultant; author of Porcelain Through the Ages, Pottery Through the Ages, and other works | 56 | |
Wolfgang Stechow | 1896 | 1974 | Art | Professor of Fine Arts, Oberlin College (1940–1963) | 57 |
Joshua C. Taylor | 1981 | Art | William Rainey Harper Professor of Humanities and Professor of Art, University of Chicago (1963–1974); Director, National Collection of Fine Arts, Smithsonian Institution | 58 | |
Everard M. Upjohn | 1978 | Art | Professor of Fine Arts, Columbia University (1951–1970) | 59 | |
Pierre Verlet | Art | Chief Curator, Cluny Museum (1945–1965); Chief Curator, National Museum of Sèvres Porcelain (1945–1965); Chief Curator of Art Objects from the Middle Ages to the Modern Period, Louvre Museum (1945–1965) | 60 | ||
René Wellek | 1903 | 1995 | Art | Sterling Professor of Comparative Literature, Yale University (1952–1972) | 61 |
Glynne William Gladstone Wickham | Art | Emeritus Professor of Drama, University of Bristol; Dean, Faculty of Arts (1970–1972) | 62 | ||
Raymond (Henry) Williams | 1988 | Art | Professor of Drama, University of Cambridge (1974–1983); Fellow of Jesus College, Cambridge (1961–1988) | 63 | |
Paul S. Wingert | 1974 | Art | Professor of Art History and Archaeology, Columbia University | 64 | |
Bruno Zevi | 1918 | 2000 | Art | Professor of Architectural History, University of Rome (1963–1979) | 65 |
Konstantinos Apostolos Doxiadis | 1914 | 1975 | Technology | Chairman, Doxiadis Associates International; Chairman, Board of Directors, Doxiadis Associates, Inc.; Washington D.C. Chairman, Board of Directors, Athens Technological Organization; President, Athens Center of Ekistics | 66 |
Eugene S. Ferguson | 1916 | 2004 | Technology | Emeritus Professor of History, University of Delaware; Curator of Technology, Hagley Museum, Greenville Delaware | 67 |
Melvin Kranzberg | 1917 | 1995 | Technology | Callaway Professor of the History of Technology, Georgia Institute of Technology (1972–1988) | 68 |
Harvey G. Mehlhouse | Technology | Vice President, Western Electric Company, New York City (1965–1969); President (1969–1971); Chairman of the Board (1971–1972) | 69 | ||
Robert Smith Woodbury | 1983 | Technology | Professor of the History of Technology, MIT | 70 | |
Arthur Llewellyn Basham | 1914 | 1986 | Religion | Professor of Asian Civilizations, Australian National University | 71 |
James T. Burtchaell | Religion | Professor of Theology, University of Notre Dame; Provost (1970–1977) | 72 | ||
J. V. Langmead Casserley | 1978 | Religion | Professor of Apologetics, Seabury-Western Theological Seminary | 73 | |
Ichiro Hori | 1974 | Religion | Professor of the History of Religions, Seijo University and Kokugakuin University | 74 | |
Jaroslav Jan Pelikan | 1923 | 2006 | Religion | Sterling Professor of History, Yale University; President, American Academy of Arts and Sciences | 75 |
Jakob Josef Petuchowski | 1925 | 1991 | Religion | Sol and Arlene Bronstein Professor of Judeo-Christian Studies, Hebrew Union College, Jewish Institute of Religion, Cincinnati (1981–1991) | 76 |
Jacques Barzun | 1907 | 2012 | The History of Mankind | University Professor Emeritus, Columbia University; Dean of Faculties and Provost (1958–1967) | 77 |
Otto Allen Bird | The Branches of Knowledge | Emeritus Professor of Arts and Letters, University of Notre Dame | 78 | ||
Wing-Tsit Chan | 1901 | 1994 | The Branches of Knowledge | Professor of Chinese Philosophy and Culture, Dartmouth College (1942–1966); Anna R. D. Gillespie Professor of Philosophy, Chatham University (1966–1982) | 79 |
William Herbert Dray | 1921 | 2009 | The Branches of Knowledge | Emeritus Professor of Philosophy and of History, University of Ottawa | 80 |
Norwood Hanson | 1924 | 1967 | The Branches of Knowledge | Professor of Philosophy, Yale University (1963–1967) | 81 |
J. H. Hexter | 1910 | 1996 | The Branches of Knowledge | Charles L. Stillé Professor of History, Yale University, (1967–1978); Distinguished Historian in residence, Washington University (1978–1986) | 82 |
Ernan V. McMullin | The Branches of Knowledge | Professor of Philosophy, University of Notre Dame | 83 | ||
Karl Menger | 1902 | 1985 | The Branches of Knowledge | Professor of Mathematics, Illinois Institute of Technology (1946–1971) | 84 |
Arthur Norman Prior | 1914 | 1969 | The Branches of Knowledge | Fellow, Balliol College, University of Oxford; Professor of Philosophy, Manchester University (1959–1966) | 85 |
Nicholas Rescher | 1928 | The Branches of Knowledge | University Professor of Philosophy, University of Pittsburgh; editor, American Philosophical Quarterly | 86 | |
Seymour Schuster | The Branches of Knowledge | Professor of Mathematics, Carleton College | 87 |
References
- Encyclopaedia Britannica's Transformation Bloomberg, cited 6 February 2014 Archive
- Adler, Mortimer J. (2007). "Circle of Learning". The New Encyclopædia Britannica, 15th edition. Chicago: Encyclopædia Britannica Inc.
- The dates of death in Table 2 were taken from the 2007 version of the Propædia, except recent (post-1999) deaths which were not noted.