The analytical method in higher studies: José de Caldas and René Just Haüy in teaching physics (1790-1826)

Abstract

The problem of the method in higher studies in New Granada, today Colombia, has been a constant search for professors and study plans in relation to the teaching of the new science. Towards the end of the 18th century and the beginning of the 19th century, the tension between Goudin's (scholastic) method and José Félix de Restrepo's synthetic-analytical method in the teaching of physics, and in particular in the teaching of light, was still alive; each of these methods established criteria to determine the truth of things, it was the commitment to truth in making known the ways of proceeding in science. But, the limitations to Restrepo's method were immediate, one of his disciples such as Francisco José de Caldas in 1810 was familiar with the analytical method in higher studies through the text of René Just Haüy for the teaching of physics. Haüy proposes in his book the analytical method as the fruitful path for physics itself in the construction of its theories and laws through experimentation and, therefore, the way to follow in teaching; in other words, Haüy makes analysis the main means of teaching. In the end, the analytical or invention method is institutionalized in the Santander Plan of 1826 for higher studies at the beginning of the republic.