Documenting the factual and the artifactual: Ole Worm and public knowledge

During the course of his life, Worm made an epistemological shift from the sometimes secretive world of the late Renaissance Neoplatonist and Paracels ian philosopher, from the chemical laborant protecting proprietary processe s, to the more open collection of natural and artificial particulars, objec ts that were stabile, public authorities, regardless of the theories that h uman minds might spin.