Revolution and Enlightenment

The Scientific Revolution

Background to Revolution

• Medieval scientists only relied on ancient authorities, Aristotle, for knowledge. 14 & 15 hundreds forced changes in views.

• Renaissance humanists studied newly discovered works of Ptolemy and Plato who disagreed with Aristotle and others.

• How much weight can a ship hold? This stimulated scientific activity. Telescope and microscope invented. Printing press helped spread ideas.

• Copernicus, Kepler, Galileo, Newton and others developed new theories

Revolution in Astronomy

• Born in 2nd century, Ptolemy was greatest astronomer of time. Medieval philosophers constructed geocentric model of universe called Ptolemaic system. Motionless Earth in center.

• Matched teaching of the church

• Copernicus of Poland, 1543, thought heliocentric more accurate

• Many rejected

• All human knowledge might be called into question

• Kepler supported view and each planet had own special orbit

Johannes KeplerCopernicus

• Galileo, Italian scientist, first to make regular observations with telescope

• Got into trouble with Catholic Church since it contradicted idea of Bible. Most scientists however sided with Galileo.

• 1633 tried for his ideas and forced to recant

Scientific Method

• People concerned about how to best understand physical universe. Francis Bacon created this method.

• Emphasized arriving at conclusions using inductive reasoning, or making generalizations from particular observations and experiments organized to test hypotheses

• Believed science was to give human kind new discoveries and power to serve human purpose by conquering “nature in action”

Descartes and Reason

• Rene Descartes, French philosopher, asserted he can rationally be sure of only one thing- his own existence

• Bacon and Rene Descartes rejected Aristotle • Descartes (day kahrt) emphasized human

reasoning to understanding• “I think, therefore I am”, material

world different from mental world• Father of modern rationalism,

reason chief source of knowledge

• Isaac Newton, Englishman, mathematics professor at Cambridge University

• Universal law of gravitation: everyobject is attracted to every otherobject by a force called gravity

• Created calculus• Same force helps control the planets• Ideas dominated until Einstein’s theory of

relativity

Medicine and Chemistry

• Late Middle Ages, ideas of medicine still dominated by Greek Galen (2nd century). Views on anatomy wrong due to using animals

• 16th century based on work of Andreas Vesalius. Dissected human bodies as a professor of surgery at University of Padua

• William Harvey showed heart center of blood’s circulation, showed same blood runs through veins and arteries with complete circuit of body

• Robert Boyle, chemist, Boyle’s Law about gases- volume of gas varies with pressure exerted on it

• 18th century Antoine Lavoisier, founder of modern chemistry made system of naming chemical elements

Boyle Vesalius

William Harvey

Antoine Lavoisier

• Ambroise Pare, French physician, ointment for preventing infection and closing wounds with stitches

• Dutch inventor Anthony van Leeuwenhoek perfected microscope and first to see cells and microorganisms

Women and Origins of Modern Science

• Margaret Cavendish, criticized belief that humans, through science, were maters of nature

• Maria Winkelmann, astronomer, assisted husband- famous Prussian astronomer Gottfried Kirch, she discovered a comet

• 17th century most people thought scholarship conflicted with domestic roles women were expected to fulfill