The Scientific RevolutionThe Universe seen as a Mechanism

1543-1687

Mechanism

The re-discovery of Archimedes and his theories proposing that the natural world operated on the basis of mechanical forces , like a great machine.

Aristotle384-322 bc

• His views on the cosmos and physics shaped scientific thought for a thousand years- turns out he was wrong!

From Aristotle to Thomas Aquinas

Aristole believed everything in motion had been moved by another object that was itself in motion- continuing a chain of movers.

By inference, this belief led back to some object or being that began the motion - Aristotle’s Unmoved Mover.

To Aquinas and the medieval Scholastics, Aristotle’s Unmoved Mover was the God of Christianity.

The Bible

Ptolemy produced

The Almagest

(150 bc) a handbook of

Greek astronomy based on Aristotle:

The geocentric theory

Galen -

a follower of Aristotle was the accepted authority on the human body and its ills - he too was wrong!

From Galen’s medical text:

• As everyone knows, when food is digested it is processed into chyle and turned into blood by the liver. This blood then flows to the lungs where it releases any impurities into the air. Flowing from the lungs into the left ventricle of the heart the blood then mixes with air and is charged with animal spirit – where it changes from dark purple to bright red. This charged blood then passes through the arteries and throughout the body...

Origins of the SciRev

• A revived interest in the natural world

• The re-discovery of ancient manuscripts

• Traditional authorities and theories were being questioned

• The study of alchemy and astrology

• A general interest in technology – the compass, gunpowder, optics and printing

Alchemy

astrology

Nicolaus Copernicus (1473 – 1543)

• proposed the heliocentric theory in his book “On the Revolution of Heavenly Orbs”

Johann Kepler (1571 – 1630) –

Laws of planetary motion

• Planets move in elliptical orbit around the sun

• A planets’ velocity varied according to its distance from the sun.

Galileo Galilei (1564 – 1642)

• Using his telescope, he concluded that heavenly bodies were not crystalline or transparent

• Theory of Inertia – things in motion stay in motion unless acted upon by another force

Isaac Newton (1642 – 1727) brought together all the previous works in his masterpiece, The Principia and introduced the concept of gravity.

Sir Francis Bacon.1591-1626

• Advanced

Empiricism (a.k.a. inductive reasoning) in his works:

Novum Organum, 1620 and The Advancement of Learning, 1623

• Rationalism advocated by Rene Descartes wrote The Discourse on the Method.

• “I think, therefore I am”

• These discoveries helped the scientific method develop. The scientific method, a new theory on how to obtain and verify knowledge, stressed experience, reason, and doubt and rejected all unsubstantiated authority.

• Codified as a method by Robert Boyle in 1661

Andreas Vesalius, The Structure of the Human Body, 1543

Anton von Leeuwenhoek- discovered bacteria, also cell structure of tissue and blood

• 1628- William Harvey – circulation of the blood

1661 Robert Boyle- laws on gases

Positive effects of the Sci Rev

• Huge gains in knowledge - less superstition and more scientific answers …

• and freedom to deviate from established theories, which opened the door for new, further developments.

Negative effects of the Sci Rev

• loss of traditional faith,

• loss of faith in heaven, earth is no longer regarded as the center (God’s pet project), skepticism,

• loss of a belief in a personal/caring God.

• Overall, however, the SciRev was an era of optimism that gave way to an Age of Reason in the 18th century. People living during the Sci Rev felt that they had surpassed even the ancients and were at the peak of human knowledge, and ideas of progress dominated intellectual discussions.

Any Questions?