The Jesuits and Science: Their Contribution to Cyclone Prediction

History of Science

Participant
Aitor Anduaga Egaña
Basque Museum of the History of Medicine and Science at the EHU, Ikerbasque
When
2026/04/23
17:00
Place
Josebe Olarra Auditorium, DIPC, Donostia / San Sebastián
Organizers
DIPC, Integrated History and Philosophy of Science (iHPS, EHU)
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The Jesuits and Science: Their Contribution to Cyclone Prediction

DIPC, together with the group Integrated History and Philosophy of Science (iHPS) of the University of the Basque Country (EHU), organizes a monthly colloquium with professional historians of science aimed at broadening the formative activities of scientific researchers as well as reaching out to the general public on matters related to the history of science.

It is often forgotten that the Society of Jesus was one of the most prolific organisations in modern science and, as such, played an essential role in its development.

This lecture delivered by Aitor Anduaga Egaña, aims to break with the historical dichotomy between ‘science’ and ‘religion’, showing how Jesuit empirical thought shaped observational sciences, from meteorology to seismology, in the 19th and 20th centuries. It will examine the "paradox" of a religious order that pioneered the establishment of the world’s first hurricane and typhoon warning services. The aim is to show the public that these services were not a chance achievement, but the result of a transnational network of knowledge which, despite secular and anti-clerical currents, managed to propel Jesuit science to the frontiers of physical knowledge.

The conference will be in Spanish.

Free entry until full capacity is reached.

 

About the speaker

Aitor Anduaga Egaña is an Ikerbasque research professor at the Basque Museum of the History of Medicine and Science at the University of the Basque Country (EHU). He has published extensively on the social history of physics, geophysics and technology. His works include Wireless and Empire. Geopolitics, Radio Industry and Ionosphere in the British Empire (Oxford University Press, 2009), Politics, Statistics and Weather Forecasting, 1840–1910. Taming the Weather (Routledge, 2019) and Ciclones y terremotos. Jesuitas, predicción, comercio y el dominio español en Cuba y Filipinas, 1850–1898 (Historiaren Euskal Museioa, 2019).