Emergence of modern science in the early modern period
This article is about a period in the history of science. For the process of scientific progress via revolutions, proposed byThomas Kuhn, seeParadigm shift.
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Great advances in science have been termed "revolutions" since the 18th century. For example, in 1747, the French mathematicianAlexis Clairaut wrote that "Newton was said in his own life to have created a revolution".[6] The word was also used in the preface toAntoine Lavoisier's 1789 work announcing the discovery of oxygen. "Few revolutions in science have immediately excited so much general notice as the introduction of the theory of oxygen ... Lavoisier saw his theory accepted by all the most eminent men of his time, and established over a great part of Europe within a few years from its first promulgation."[7]
In the 19th century,William Whewell described the revolution in science itself – thescientific method – that had taken place in the 15th–16th century. "Among the most conspicuous of the revolutions which opinions on this subject have undergone, is the transition from an implicit trust in the internal powers of man's mind to a professed dependence upon external observation; and from an unbounded reverence for the wisdom of the past, to a fervid expectation of change and improvement."[8] This gave rise to the common view of the Scientific Revolution today:
A new view of nature emerged, replacing the Greek view that had dominated science for almost 2,000 years. Science became an autonomous discipline, distinct from both philosophy and technology, and came to be regarded as having utilitarian goals.[9]
The Scientific Revolution is traditionally assumed to start with theCopernican Revolution (initiated in 1543) and to be complete in the "grand synthesis" of Isaac Newton's 1687Principia. Much of the change of attitude came fromFrancis Bacon[10] whose "confident and emphatic announcement" in the modern progress of science inspired the creation of scientific societies such as theRoyal Society,[11] andGalileo Galilei, who championedCopernican heliocentrism and developed the science of motion.[12]
The period saw a fundamental transformation in scientific ideas across mathematics, physics, astronomy, and biology in institutions supporting scientific investigation and in the more widely held picture of the universe.[12] The Scientific Revolution led to the establishment of several modern sciences. In 1984,Joseph Ben-David wrote:
Rapid accumulation of knowledge, which has characterized the development of science since the 17th century, had never occurred before that time. The new kind of scientific activity emerged only in a few countries of Western Europe, and it was restricted to that small area for about two hundred years. (Since the 19th century, scientific knowledge has been assimilated by the rest of the world).[13]
Many contemporary writers and modern historians claim that there was a revolutionary change in world view. In 1611 English poetJohn Donne wrote:
[The] new Philosophy calls all in doubt,
The Element of fire is quite put out; The Sun is lost, and th'earth, and no man's wit
Butterfield was less disconcerted but nevertheless saw the change as fundamental:
Since that revolution turned the authority in English not only of the Middle Ages but of the ancient world—since it started not only in the eclipse of scholastic philosophy but in the destruction of Aristotelian physics—it outshines everything since the rise of Christianity and reduces the Renaissance and Reformation to the rank of mere episodes, mere internal displacements within the system of medieval Christendom.... [It] looms so large as the real origin both of the modern world and of the modern mentality that our customary periodization of European history has become an anachronism and an encumbrance.[15]
HistorianPeter Harrison attributes Christianity to having contributed to the rise of the Scientific Revolution:
historians of science have long known that religious factors played a significantly positive role in the emergence and persistence of modern science in the West. Not only were many of the key figures in the rise of science individuals with sincere religious commitments, but the new approaches to nature that they pioneered were underpinned in various ways by religious assumptions. ... Yet, many of the leading figures in the scientific revolution imagined themselves to be champions of a science that was more compatible with Christianity than the medieval ideas about the natural world that they replaced.[16]
David Wootton calls the Scientific Revolution "the most important transformation in human history" since theNeolithic Revolution.[17] There continues to be scholarly engagement regarding the boundaries of the Scientific Revolution and its chronology.[18] The subsequentAge of Enlightenment saw the concept of a scientific revolution emerge in the 18th-century work ofJean Sylvain Bailly, who described a two-stage process of sweeping away the old and establishing the new.[19]
The Scientific Revolution was built upon the foundation ofancient Greek learning and science in the Middle Ages, as it had been elaborated and further developed byRoman/Byzantine science andmedieval Islamic science.[5] Some scholars have noted a direct tie between "particular aspects of traditional Christianity" and the rise of science.[20][21] The "Aristotelian tradition" was still an important intellectual framework in the 17th century, although by that timenatural philosophers had moved away from much of it.[4] Key scientific ideas dating back toclassical antiquity had changed drastically over the years and in many cases had been discredited.[4] The ideas that remained, which were transformed fundamentally during the Scientific Revolution, include:
Aristotle's cosmology that placed theEarth at the center of a spherical hierarchiccosmos. The terrestrial and celestial regions were made up of different elements which had different kinds ofnatural movement.
The terrestrial region, according to Aristotle, consisted of concentric spheres of the fourclassical elements—earth,water,air, andfire. All bodies naturally moved in straight lines until they reached the sphere appropriate to their elemental composition—theirnatural place. All other terrestrial motions were non-natural, orviolent.[22][23]
The celestial region was made up of the fifth element,aether, which was unchanging and moved naturally with uniform circular motion.[24] In the Aristotelian tradition, astronomical theories sought to explain the observed irregular motion of celestial objects through the combined effects of multiple uniform circular motions.[25]
ThePtolemaic model of planetary motion: based on the geometrical model ofEudoxus of Cnidus,Ptolemy'sAlmagest, demonstrated that calculations could compute the exact positions of the Sun, Moon, stars, and planets in the future and in the past, and showed how these computational models were derived from astronomical observations. As such they formed the model for later astronomical developments. The physical basis for Ptolemaic models invoked layers ofspherical shells, though the most complex models were inconsistent with this physical explanation.[26]
Ancient precedent existed for alternative theories and developments which prefigured later discoveries in the area of physics and mechanics; but in light of the limited number of works to survive translation in a period when many books were lost to warfare, such developments remained obscure for centuries and are traditionally held to have had little effect on the re-discovery of such phenomena; whereas the invention of the printing press made the wide dissemination of such incremental advances of knowledge commonplace. Meanwhile, however, significant progress in geometry, mathematics, and astronomy was made in medieval times.
The Scientific Revolution was enabled by advances in book production.[27][28] Before the advent of theprinting press, introduced in Europe in the 1440s byJohannes Gutenberg, there was no mass market on the continent for scientific treatises, as there had been for religious books. Printing decisively changed the way scientific knowledge was created, as well as how it was disseminated. It enabled accurate diagrams, maps, anatomical drawings, and representations of flora and fauna to be reproduced, and printing made scholarly books more widely accessible, allowing researchers to consult ancient texts freely and to compare their own observations with those of fellow scholars.[29] Although printers' blunders still often resulted in the spread of false data (for instance, in Galileo'sSidereus Nuncius (The Starry Messenger), published in Venice in 1610, his telescopic images of the lunar surface mistakenly appeared back to front), the development of engraved metal plates allowed accurate visual information to be made permanent, a change from previously, when woodcut illustrations deteriorated through repetitive use. The ability to access previous scientific research meant that researchers did not have to always start from scratch in making sense of their own observational data.[29]
It is also true that many of the important figures of the Scientific Revolution shared in the generalRenaissance respect for ancient learning and cited ancient pedigrees for their innovations.Nicolaus Copernicus,[30] Galileo,[31][1][2][32]Johannes Kepler[33] and Newton[34] all traced different ancient and medieval ancestries for theheliocentric system. In the Axioms Scholium of hisPrincipia, Newton said its axiomaticthree laws of motion were already accepted by mathematicians such asChristiaan Huygens, Wallace, Wren and others. While preparing a revised edition of hisPrincipia, Newton attributed his law of gravity and his first law of motion to a range of historical figures.[34][35]
Despite these qualifications, the standard theory of the history of the Scientific Revolution claims that the 17th century was a period of revolutionary scientific changes. Not only were there revolutionary theoretical and experimental developments, but that even more importantly, the way in which scientists worked was radically changed. For instance, although intimations of the concept ofinertia are suggested sporadically in ancient discussion of motion,[36][37] the salient point is that Newton's theory differed from ancient understandings in key ways, such as an external force being a requirement for violent motion in Aristotle's theory.[38]
Scientific method
Under thescientific method as conceived in the 17th century, natural and artificial circumstances were set aside as a research tradition of systematic experimentation was slowly accepted by the scientific community. The philosophy of using aninductive andmathematical approach to obtain knowledge—to abandon assumption and to attempt to observe with an open mind was championed byRené Descartes, Galileo, and Bacon—in contrast with the earlier, Aristotelian approach ofdeduction, by which analysis of known facts produced further understanding. In practice, many scientists and philosophers believed that a healthy mix of both was needed—the willingness to question assumptions, yet also to interpret observations assumed to have some degree of validity.[39]
By the end of the Scientific Revolution, the qualitative world of book-reading philosophers had been changed into a mechanical, mathematical world to be known through experimental research. Though it is certainly not true that Newtonian science was like modern science in all respects, it conceptually resembled ours in many ways. Many of the hallmarks of modern science, especially with regard to its institutionalization and professionalization, did not become standard until the mid-19th century.[citation needed]
The Aristotelian scientific tradition's primary mode of interacting with the world was through observation and searching for "natural" circumstances through reasoning. Coupled with this approach was the belief that rare events which seemed to contradict theoretical models were aberrations, telling nothing about nature as it "naturally" was. During the Scientific Revolution, changing perceptions about the role of the scientist in respect to nature, the value of evidence, experimental or observed, led towards a scientific methodology in which empiricism played a large role.[citation needed]
By the start of the Scientific Revolution, empiricism had already become an important component of science and natural philosophy.Prior thinkers, including the early-14th-centurynominalist philosopherWilliam of Ockham, had begun the intellectual movement toward empiricism.[40] The term British empiricism came into use to describe philosophical differences perceived between two of its foundersFrancis Bacon, described as empiricist, andRené Descartes, who was described as a rationalist.Thomas Hobbes,George Berkeley, andDavid Hume were the philosophy's primary exponents who developed a sophisticated empirical tradition as the basis of human knowledge.[citation needed]
An influential formulation of empiricism wasJohn Locke'sAn Essay Concerning Human Understanding (1689), in which he maintained that the only true knowledge that could be accessible to the human mind was that which was based on experience. He wrote that the human mind was created as atabula rasa, a "blank tablet," upon which sensory impressions were recorded and built up knowledge through a process of reflection.[citation needed]
The philosophical underpinnings of the Scientific Revolution were laid out by Francis Bacon, who has been called the father of empiricism.[10] His works established and popularised inductive methodologies for scientific inquiry, often called theBaconian method, or simply the scientific method. His demand for a planned procedure of investigating all things natural marked a new turn in the rhetorical and theoretical framework for science, much of which still surrounds conceptions of propermethodology today.[41]
Bacon proposed a great reformation of all process of knowledge for the advancement of learning divine and human, which he calledInstauratio Magna (The Great Instauration). For Bacon, this reformation would lead to a great advancement in science and a progeny of inventions that would relieve mankind's miseries and needs. HisNovum Organum was published in 1620, in which he argues man is "the minister and interpreter of nature," "knowledge and human power are synonymous," "effects are produced by the means of instruments and helps," "man while operating can only apply or withdraw natural bodies; nature internally performs the rest," and "nature can only be commanded by obeying her".[42] Here is an abstract of the philosophy of this work, that by the knowledge of nature and the using of instruments, man can govern or direct the natural work of nature to produce definite results. Therefore, that man, by seeking knowledge of nature, can reach power over it—and thus reestablish the "Empire of Man over creation," which had been lost bythe Fall together with man's original purity. In this way, he believed, would mankind be raised above conditions of helplessness, poverty and misery, while coming into a condition of peace, prosperity and security.[43]
For this purpose of obtaining knowledge of and power over nature, Bacon outlined in this work a new system of logic he believed to be superior to the old ways ofsyllogism, developing his scientific method, consisting of procedures for isolating the formal cause of a phenomenon (heat, for example) through eliminative induction. For him, the philosopher should proceed through inductive reasoning fromfact toaxiom tophysical law. Before beginning this induction, though, the enquirer must free his or her mind from certain false notions or tendencies which distort the truth. In particular, he found that philosophy was too preoccupied with words, particularly discourse and debate, rather than actually observing the material world: "For while men believe their reason governs words, in fact, words turn back and reflect their power upon the understanding, and so render philosophy and science sophistical and inactive."[44]
Bacon considered that it is of greatest importance to science not to keep doing intellectual discussions or seeking merely contemplative aims, but that it should work for the bettering of mankind's life by bringing forth new inventions, even stating "inventions are also, as it were, new creations and imitations of divine works".[42][page needed] He explored the far-reaching and world-changing character of inventions, such as theprinting press,gunpowder and thecompass. Despite his influence on scientific methodology, he rejected correct novel theories such asWilliam Gilbert'smagnetism, Copernicus's heliocentrism, andKepler's laws of planetary motion.[45]
There remains simple experience; which, if taken as it comes, is called accident, if sought for, experiment. The true method of experience first lights the candle [hypothesis], and then by means of the candle shows the way [arranges and delimits the experiment]; commencing as it does with experience duly ordered and digested, not bungling or erratic, and from it deducing axioms [theories], and from established axioms again new experiments.
Gilbert was an early advocate of this method. He passionately rejected both the prevailing Aristotelian philosophy and thescholastic method of university teaching. His bookDe Magnete was written in 1600, and he is regarded by some as the father ofelectricity and magnetism.[47] In this work, he describes many of his experiments with his model Earth called theterrella. From these experiments, he concluded that the Earth was itself magnetic and that this was the reasoncompasses point north.[citation needed]
De Magnete was influential because of the inherent interest of its subject matter as well as for the rigorous way in which Gilbert describes his experiments and his rejection of ancient theories of magnetism.[48] According toThomas Thomson, "Gilbert['s]... book on magnetism published in 1600, is one of the finest examples of inductive philosophy that has ever been presented to the world. It is the more remarkable, because it preceded theNovum Organum of Bacon, in which the inductive method of philosophizing was first explained."[49]
Galileo Galilei has been called the "father of modernobservational astronomy,"[50] the "father of modern physics,"[51] the "father of science,"[52] and "the Father of Modern Science."[53] His original contributions to the science of motion were made through an innovative combination of experiment and mathematics.[54] Galileo was one of the first modern thinkers to clearly state that the laws of nature are mathematical. InThe Assayer he wrote "Philosophy is written in this grand book, the universe ... It is written in the language of mathematics, and its characters are triangles, circles, and other geometric figures;...."[55] His mathematical analyses are a further development of a tradition employed by late scholastic natural philosophers, which Galileo learned when he studied philosophy.[56] He ignored Aristotelianism. In broader terms, his work marked another step towards the eventual separation of science from both philosophy and religion; a major development in human thought. He was often willing to change his views in accordance with observation. In order to perform his experiments, Galileo had to set up standards of length and time, so that measurements made on different days and in different laboratories could be compared in a reproducible fashion. This provided a reliable foundation on which to confirm mathematical laws using inductive reasoning.[citation needed]
Galileo showed an appreciation for the relationship between mathematics, theoretical physics, and experimental physics. He understood theparabola, both in terms ofconic sections and in terms of theordinate (y) varying as the square of the abscissa (x). Galilei further asserted that the parabola was the theoretically idealtrajectory of a uniformly accelerated projectile in the absence offriction and other disturbances. He conceded that there are limits to the validity of this theory, noting on theoretical grounds that a projectile trajectory of a size comparable to that of the Earth could not possibly be a parabola,[57] but he nevertheless maintained that for distances up to the range of the artillery of his day, the deviation of a projectile's trajectory from a parabola would be only very slight.[58][59]
Mathematization
Scientific knowledge, according to the Aristotelians, was concerned with establishing true and necessary causes of things.[60] To the extent that medieval natural philosophers used mathematical problems, they limited social studies to theoretical analyses of local speed and other aspects of life.[61] The actual measurement of a physical quantity, and the comparison of that measurement to a value computed on the basis of theory, was largely limited to the mathematical disciplines of astronomy andoptics in Europe.[62][63]
In the 16th and 17th centuries, European scientists began increasingly applying quantitative measurements to the measurement of physical phenomena on the Earth. Galileo maintained strongly that mathematics provided a kind of necessary certainty that could be compared to God's: "...with regard to those few [mathematicalpropositions] which the human intellect does understand, I believe its knowledge equals the Divine in objective certainty..."[64]
Galileo anticipates the concept of a systematic mathematical interpretation of the world in his bookIl Saggiatore:
Philosophy [i.e., physics] is written in this grand book—I mean the universe—which stands continually open to our gaze, but it cannot be understood unless one first learns to comprehend the language and interpret the characters in which it is written. It is written in the language ofmathematics, and its characters are triangles, circles, and other geometrical figures, without which it is humanly impossible to understand a single word of it; without these, one is wandering around in a dark labyrinth.[65]
In 1591,François Viète publishedIn Artem Analyticem Isagoge, which gave the first symbolic notation of parameters inalgebra. In 1637,René Descartes greatly improved the scope and formalization ofalgebra inLa Géométrie. Newton's development ofinfinitesimal calculus opened up new applications of the methods of mathematics to science. Newton taught that scientific theory should be coupled with rigorous experimentation, which became the keystone of modern science.[citation needed]
Aristotle recognized four kinds of causes, and where applicable, the most important of them is the "final cause". The final cause was the aim, goal, or purpose of some natural process or man-made thing. Until the Scientific Revolution, it was very natural to see such aims, such as a child's growth, for example, leading to a mature adult. Intelligence was assumed only in the purpose of man-made artifacts; it was not attributed to other animals or to nature.
In "mechanical philosophy" no field or action at a distance is permitted, particles or corpuscles of matter are fundamentally inert. Motion is caused by direct physical collision. Where natural substances had previously been understood organically, the mechanical philosophers viewed them as machines.[66] As a result, Newton's theory seemed like some kind of throwback to "spookyaction at a distance". According to Thomas Kuhn, Newton and Descartes held theteleological principle that God conserved the amount of motion in the universe:
Gravity, interpreted as an innate attraction between every pair of particles of matter, was an occult quality in the same sense as the scholastics' "tendency to fall" had been.... By the mid eighteenth century that interpretation had been almost universally accepted, and the result was a genuine reversion (which is not the same as a retrogression) to a scholastic standard. Innate attractions and repulsions joined size, shape, position and motion as physically irreducible primary properties of matter.[67]
Newton had also specifically attributed the inherent power of inertia to matter, against the mechanist thesis that matter has no inherent powers. But whereas Newton vehemently denied gravity was an inherent power of matter, his collaboratorRoger Cotes made gravity also an inherent power of matter, as set out in his famous preface to thePrincipia's 1713 second edition which he edited, and contradicted Newton. And it was Cotes's interpretation of gravity rather than Newton's that came to be accepted.[citation needed]
The first moves towards the institutionalization of scientific investigation and dissemination took the form of the establishment of societies where new discoveries were aired, discussed, and published. The first scientific society to be established was theRoyal Society of London. This grew out of an earlier group, centered aroundGresham College in the 1640s and 1650s. According to a history of the college:
The scientific network which centered on Gresham College played a crucial part in the meetings which led to the formation of the Royal Society.[68]
These physicians and natural philosophers were influenced by the "new science", as promoted by Bacon in hisNew Atlantis, from approximately 1645 onwards. A group known asThe Philosophical Society of Oxford was run under a set of rules still retained by theBodleian Library.[69]
On 28 November 1660, the "1660 committee of 12" announced the formation of a "College for the Promoting of Physico-Mathematical Experimental Learning", which would meet weekly to discuss science and run experiments. At the second meeting,Robert Moray announced thatKing Charles approved of the gatherings, and aroyal charter was signed on 15 July 1662 creating the "Royal Society of London", withLord Brouncker serving as the first president. A second royal charter was signed on 23 April 1663, with the king noted as the founder and with the name of "the Royal Society of London for the Improvement of Natural Knowledge";Robert Hooke was appointed as curator of experiments in November. This initial royal favour has continued, and since then every monarch has been the patron of the society.[70]
The society's first secretary wasHenry Oldenburg. Its early meetings included experiments performed first by Hooke and then byDenis Papin, who was appointed in 1684. These experiments varied in their subject area and were important in some cases and trivial in others.[71] The society began publication ofPhilosophical Transactions from 1665, the oldest and longest-running scientific journal in the world, which established the important principles ofscientific priority andpeer review.[72]
The French established theAcademy of Sciences in 1666. In contrast to the private origins of its British counterpart, the academy was founded as a government body byJean-Baptiste Colbert. Its rules were set down in 1699 by KingLouis XIV, when it received the name of 'Royal Academy of Sciences' and was installed in theLouvre in Paris.
New ideas
As the Scientific Revolution was not marked by any single change, the following new ideas contributed to what is called the Scientific Revolution. Many of them were revolutions in their own fields.
Astronomy
Heliocentrism
For almost five millennia, thegeocentric model of the Earth as the center of the universe had been accepted by all but a few astronomers. In Aristotle's cosmology, Earth's central location was perhaps less significant than its identification as a realm of imperfection, inconstancy, irregularity, and change, as opposed to the "heavens" (Moon, Sun, planets, stars), which were regarded as perfect, permanent, unchangeable, and in religious thought, the realm of heavenly beings. The Earth was even composed of different material, the four elements "earth", "water", "fire", and "air", while sufficiently far above its surface (roughly the Moon's orbit), the heavens were composed of a different substance called "aether".[73] The heliocentric model that replaced it involved the radical displacement of the Earth to an orbit around the Sun; sharing a placement with the other planets implied a universe of heavenly components made from the same changeable substances as the Earth. Heavenly motions no longer needed to be governed by a theoretical perfection, confined to circular orbits.
Copernicus' 1543 work on the heliocentric model of theSolar System tried to demonstrate that the Sun was the center of the universe. Few were bothered by this suggestion, and the pope and several archbishops were interested enough by it to want more detail.[77] His model was later used to createthe calendar ofPope Gregory XIII.[78] However, the idea that the Earth moved around the Sun was doubted by most of Copernicus' contemporaries. It contradicted not only empirical observation, due to the absence of an observablestellar parallax,[79] but more significantly at the time, the authority of Aristotle. The discoveries of Kepler and Galileo gave the theory credibility.
Kepler was an astronomer who is best known for hislaws of planetary motion, and Kepler´s booksAstronomia nova,Harmonice Mundi, andEpitome Astronomiae Copernicanae influenced among othersIsaac Newton, providing one of the foundations for his theory ofuniversal gravitation.[80] One of the most significant books in the history of astronomy, the Astronomia nova provided strong arguments for heliocentrism and contributed valuable insight into the movement of the planets. This included the first mention of the planets' elliptical paths and the change of their movement to the movement of free floating bodies as opposed to objects on rotating spheres. It is recognized as one of the most important works of the Scientific Revolution.[81] Using the accurate observations ofTycho Brahe, Kepler proposed that the planets move around the Sun not in circular orbits but in elliptical ones. Together with Kepler´s other laws of planetary motion, this allowed him to create a model of the Solar System that was an improvement over Copernicus' original system.
Galileo's main contributions to the acceptance of the heliocentric system were his mechanics, the observations he made with his telescope, as well as his detailed presentation of the case for the system. Using an early theory ofinertia, Galileo could explain why rocks dropped from a tower fall straight down even if the Earth rotates. His observations of themoons of Jupiter, the phases ofVenus, the spots on the Sun, andmountains on the Moon all helped to discredit the Aristotelian philosophy and the Ptolemaic theory of the Solar System. Through their combined discoveries, the heliocentric system gained support, and at the end of the 17th century it was generally accepted by astronomers.
This work culminated in the work of Newton, and hisPrincipia formulated the laws of motion and universal gravitation which dominated scientists' view of the physical universe for the next three centuries. By deriving Kepler's laws of planetary motion from his mathematical description of gravity, and then using the same principles to account for the trajectories ofcomets, thetides, the precession of theequinoxes, and other phenomena, Newton removed the last doubts about the validity of the heliocentric model of the cosmos. This work also demonstrated that the motion of objects on Earth and of celestial bodies could be described by the same principles. His prediction that the Earth should be shaped as an oblate spheroid was later vindicated by other scientists. His laws of motion were to be the solid foundation of mechanics; hislaw of universal gravitation combined terrestrial and celestial mechanics into one great system that seemed to be able to describe the whole world in mathematical formulae.
Newton also developed the theory of gravitation. In 1679, Newton began to consider gravitation and its effect on the orbits of planets with reference to Kepler's laws of planetary motion. This followed stimulation by a brief exchange of letters in 1679–80 with Hooke, opened a correspondence intended to elicit contributions from Newton to Royal Society transactions.[82] Newton's reawakening interest in astronomical matters received further stimulus by the appearance of a comet in the winter of 1680–81, on which he corresponded withJohn Flamsteed.[83] After the exchanges with Hooke, Newton worked out proof that the elliptical form of planetary orbits would result from acentripetal forceinversely proportional to the square of the radius vector. Newton communicated his results toEdmond Halley and to the Royal Society inDe motu corporum in gyrum in 1684.[84] This tract contained the nucleus that Newton developed and expanded to form thePrincipia.[85]
ThePrincipia was published on 5 July 1687 with encouragement and financial help from Halley.[86] In this work, Newton states thethree universal laws of motion that contributed to many advances during theIndustrial Revolution which soon followed and were not to be improved upon for more than 200 years. Many of these advancements continue to be the underpinnings of non-relativistic technologies in the modern world. He used the Latin wordgravitas (weight) for the effect that would become known asgravity and defined the law of universal gravitation.
Newton's postulate of an invisibleforce able to act over vast distances led to him being criticised for introducing "occult agencies" into science.[87] Later, in the second edition of thePrincipia (1713), Newton firmly rejected such criticisms in a concluding "General Scholium," writing that it was enough that the phenomena implied a gravitational attraction, as they did; but they did not so far indicate its cause, and it was both unnecessary and improper to frame hypotheses of things that were not implied by the phenomena. (Here Newton used what became his famous expression "hypotheses non fingo").[88]
Biology and medicine
Vesalius's intricately detailed drawings of human dissections inFabrica helped to overturn the medical theories ofGalen.
The writings of Greek physicianGalen had dominated European medical thinking for over a millennium. The Flemish scholarAndreas Vesalius demonstrated mistakes in Galen's ideas. Vesalius dissected human corpses, whereas Galen dissected animal corpses. Published in 1543, Vesalius'De humani corporis fabrica[89] was a groundbreaking work ofhuman anatomy. It emphasized the priority of dissection and what has come to be called the "anatomical" view of the body, seeing human internal functioning as an essentially corporeal structure filled with organs arranged in three-dimensional space. This was in stark contrast to many of the anatomical models used previously, which had strong Galenic/Aristotelean elements, as well as elements ofastrology.
Besides the first good description of thesphenoid bone, Vesalius showed that thesternum consists of three portions and thesacrum of five or six; and he described accurately thevestibule in the interior of thetemporal bone. He verified the observation of anatomistCharles Estienne on the valves of thehepatic veins, described thevena azygos, and discovered the canal which passes in the fetus between theumbilical vein and the vena cava, since namedductus venosus. He described theomentum and its connections with the stomach, thespleen and thecolon; gave the first correct views of the structure of thepylorus; observed the small size of the caecalappendix in man; gave the first good account of themediastinum andpleura and the fullest description of the anatomy of the brain yet advanced.
Before Vesalius, the anatomical notes byAlessandro Achillini demonstrate a detailed description of the human body and compare what he had found during his dissections to what others like Galen andAvicenna had found and notes their similarities and differences.[90]Niccolò Massa was an Italian anatomist who wrote an early anatomy textAnatomiae Libri Introductorius in 1536, described thecerebrospinal fluid and was the author of several medical works.[91]Jean Fernel was a French physician who introduced the term "physiology" to describe the study of the body's function and was the first person to describe thespinal canal.
Image ofveins fromWilliam Harvey'sExercitatio Anatomica de Motu Cordis et Sanguinis in Animalibus. Harvey demonstrated that blood circulated around the body, rather than being created in the liver.
Further groundbreaking work was carried out byWilliam Harvey, who publishedDe Motu Cordis in 1628. Harvey made a detailed analysis of the overall structure of theheart, going on to an analysis of thearteries, showing how their pulsation depends upon the contraction of the leftventricle, while the contraction of the right ventricle propels its charge of blood into thepulmonary artery. He noticed that the two ventricles move together almost simultaneously and not independently like had been thought previously by his predecessors.[92]
Harvey estimated the capacity of the heart, how much blood is expelled through each pump of the heart, and the number of times the heart beats in half an hour. From these estimations, he demonstrated that according to Gaelen's theory that blood was continually produced in theliver, the absurdly large figure of 540 pounds of blood would have to be produced every day. Having this simple mathematical proportion at hand—which would imply a seemingly impossible role for the liver—Harvey went on to demonstrate how the blood circulated in a circle by means of countless experiments initially done on serpents and fish: tying their veins and arteries in separate periods of time, Harvey noticed the modifications which occurred; indeed, as he tied the veins, the heart would become empty, while as he did the same to the arteries, the organ would swell up. This process was later performed on the human body: the physician tied a tightligature onto the upper arm of a person. This would cut off blood flow from the arteries and the veins. When this was done, the arm below the ligature was cool and pale, while above the ligature it was warm and swollen. The ligature was loosened slightly, which allowed blood from the arteries to come into the arm, since arteries are deeper in the flesh than the veins. When this was done, the opposite effect was seen in the lower arm. It was now warm and swollen. The veins were also more visible, since now they were full of blood.
Various other advances in medical understanding and practice were made. French physicianPierre Fauchard starteddentistry science as we know it today, and he has been named "the father of modern dentistry". SurgeonAmbroise Paré was a leader in surgical techniques andbattlefield medicine, especially the treatment ofwounds,[93] andHerman Boerhaave is sometimes referred to as a "father of physiology" because of his exemplary teaching inLeiden and his textbookInstitutiones medicae (1708).
Chemistry
Title page fromThe Sceptical Chymist, a foundational text of chemistry, written by Robert Boyle in 1661
Chemistry, and its antecedentalchemy, became an increasingly important aspect of scientific thought in the course of the 16th and 17th centuries. The importance of chemistry is indicated by the range of important scholars who actively engaged in chemical research. Among them were the astronomerTycho Brahe,[94] the chemical physicianParacelsus,Robert Boyle,Thomas Browne and Isaac Newton. Unlike the mechanical philosophy, the chemical philosophy stressed the active powers of matter, which alchemists frequently expressed in terms of vital or active principles—of spirits operating in nature.[95]
Practical attempts to improve the refining of ores and their extraction tosmelt metals were an important source of information for early chemists in the 16th century, among themGeorgius Agricola, who published his great workDe re metallica in 1556.[96] His work describes the highly developed and complex processes of mining metal ores, metal extraction and metallurgy of the time. His approach removed the mysticism associated with the subject, creating the practical base upon which others could build.[97]
ChemistRobert Boyle is considered to have refined the modern scientific method for alchemy and to have separated chemistry further from alchemy.[98] Although his research clearly has its roots in the alchemical tradition, Boyle is largely regarded today as the first modern chemist and therefore one of the founders of modern chemistry, and one of the pioneers of modern experimental scientific method. Although Boyle was not the original discoverer, he is best known forBoyle's law, which he presented in 1662:[99] the law describes the inversely proportional relationship between the absolute pressure and volume of a gas, if the temperature is kept constant within aclosed system.[100]
Boyle is also credited for his landmark publicationThe Sceptical Chymist in 1661, which is seen as a cornerstone book in the field of chemistry. In the work, Boyle presents his hypothesis that every phenomenon was the result of collisions of particles in motion. Boyle appealed to chemists to experiment and asserted that experiments denied the limiting of chemical elements to only the classic four: earth, fire, air, and water. He also pleaded that chemistry should cease to be subservient to medicine or to alchemy, and rise to the status of a science. Importantly, he advocated a rigorous approach to scientific experiment: he believed all theories must be tested experimentally before being regarded as true. The work contains some of the earliest modern ideas ofatoms,molecules, andchemical reaction, and marks the beginning of modern chemistry.
Physical
Optics
In 1604 Johannes Kepler publishedAstronomiae Pars Optica (The Optical Part of Astronomy). In it, he describes the inverse-square law governing the intensity oflight, reflection by flat and curved mirrors, and principles ofpinhole cameras, as well as the astronomical implications of optics such asparallax and the apparent sizes of heavenly bodies.Astronomiae Pars Optica is generally recognized as the foundation of modernoptics.[101]
Willebrord Snellius found the mathematical law ofrefraction, now known asSnell's law, in 1621. It had been published earlier in 984 AD byIbn Sahl. Subsequently René Descartes showed, by using geometric construction and the law of refraction (also known as Descartes' law), that the angular radius of a rainbow is 42° (i.e. the angle subtended at the eye by the edge of the rainbow and the rainbow's centre is 42°).[102] He also independently discovered thelaw of reflection, and his essay on optics was the first published mention of this law.Christiaan Huygens wrote several works in the area of optics. These included theOpera reliqua (also known asChristiani Hugenii Zuilichemii, dum viveret Zelhemii toparchae, opuscula posthuma) and theTraité de la lumière.
Newton investigated the refraction of light, demonstrating that aprism could decompose white light into aspectrum of colours, and that alens and a second prism could recompose the multicoloured spectrum into white light. He also showed that the coloured light does not change its properties by separating out a coloured beam and shining it on various objects. Newton noted that regardless of whether it was reflected or scattered or transmitted, it stayed the same colour. Thus, he observed that colour is the result of objects interacting with already-coloured light rather than objects generating the colour themselves. This is known asNewton's theory of colour. From this work he concluded that any refractingtelescope would suffer from thedispersion of light into colours. The interest of the Royal Society encouraged him to publish his notesOn Colour. Newton argued that light is composed of particles orcorpuscles and that are refracted by accelerating toward the denser medium, but he had to associate them withwaves to explain thediffraction of light.
In hisHypothesis of Light of 1675, Newton posited the existence of theether to transmit forces between particles. In 1704, Newton publishedOpticks, in which he expounded his corpuscular theory of light. He considered light to be made up of extremely subtle corpuscles, that ordinary matter was made of grosser corpuscles and speculated that through a kind of alchemical transmutation "Are not gross Bodies and Light convertible into one another, ...and may not Bodies receive much of their Activity from the Particles of Light which enter their Composition?"[103]
Antonie van Leeuwenhoek constructed powerful single lens microscopes and made extensive observations that he published around 1660, paving the way for the science of microbiology.
The first treatise about optics byJohannes Kepler,Ad Vitellionem paralipomena quibus astronomiae pars optica traditur (1604)
William Gilbert, inDe Magnete, invented theNeo-Latin wordelectricus fromἤλεκτρον (elektron), the Greek word for "amber". Gilbert undertook a number of careful electrical experiments, in the course of which he discovered that many substances other than amber, such as sulphur, wax, glass, etc.,[104] were capable of manifesting electrical properties. Gilbert discovered that a heated body lost its electricity and that moisture prevented theelectrification of all bodies. He noticed that electrified substances attracted all other substances indiscriminately, whereas a magnet only attracted iron. The many discoveries of this nature earned Gilbert the titlefounder of the electrical science.[105] By investigating the forces on a light metallic needle, balanced on a point, he extended the list of electric bodies and found that many substances, including metals and natural magnets, showed no attractive forces when rubbed. He noticed that dry weather with north or east wind was the most favourable atmospheric condition for exhibiting electric phenomena—an observation liable to misconception until the difference betweenconductor andinsulator was understood.[106]
Robert Boyle worked frequently at the new science of electricity and added several substances to Gilbert's list of electrics. He left a detailed account of his researches under the title ofExperiments on the Origin of Electricity.[106] In 1675 Boyle stated that electric attraction and repulsion can act across a vacuum. One of his important discoveries was that electrified bodies in a vacuum would attract light substances, this indicating that the electrical effect did not depend upon the air as a medium.[104][105][107][108][109]
This was followed in 1660 byOtto von Guericke, who invented an earlyelectrostatic generator. By the end of the 17th century, researchers had developed practical means of generating electricity by friction with an electrostatic generator, but the development of electrostatic machines did not begin in earnest until the 18th century when they became fundamental instruments in the studies about the science of electricity. The first usage of the wordelectricity is ascribed toThomas Browne in his 1646 workPseudodoxia Epidemica. In 1729Stephen Gray demonstrated that electricity could be "transmitted" through metal filaments.[110]
Mechanical devices
As an aid to scientific investigation, various tools, measuring aids and calculating devices were developed in this period.
John Napier introducedlogarithms as a powerful mathematical tool. With the help ofHenry Briggs their logarithmic tables embodied a computational advance that made calculations by hand much quicker.[111] HisNapier's bones used a set of numbered rods as a multiplication tool using the system oflattice multiplication. The way was opened to later scientific advances, particularly in astronomy anddynamics.
AtOxford University,Edmund Gunter built the firstanalog device to aid computation. The 'Gunter's scale' was a large plane scale, engraved with various scales, or lines. Natural lines, such as the line of chords, the line ofsines and tangents are placed on one side of the scale and the corresponding artificial or logarithmic ones were on the other side. This calculating aid was a predecessor of theslide rule. It wasWilliam Oughtred who first used two such scales sliding by one another to perform direct multiplication and division and thus is credited as the inventor of the slide rule in 1622.
Blaise Pascal invented themechanical calculator in 1642.[112] The introduction of hisPascaline in 1645 launched the development of mechanical calculators first in Europe and then all over the world.[113][114]Gottfried Leibniz, building on Pascal's work, became one of the most prolific inventors in the field of mechanical calculators; he was the first to describe apinwheel calculator in 1685,[115] and he invented theLeibniz wheel, used in thearithmometer, the first mass-produced mechanical calculator. He also refined thebinary number system, the foundation of virtually all modern computer architectures.[116]
Denis Papin was best known for his pioneering invention of thesteam digester, the forerunner of thesteam engine.[117][118] The first working steam engine was patented in 1698 by the English inventorThomas Savery, as a "...new invention for raising of water and occasioning motion to all sorts of mill work by the impellent force of fire, which will be of great use and advantage for drayning mines, serveing townes with water, and for the working of all sorts of mills where they have not the benefitt of water nor constant windes."[119] The invention was demonstrated to the Royal Society on 14 June 1699, and the machine was described by Savery in his bookThe Miner's Friend; or, An Engine to Raise Water by Fire (1702),[120] in which he claimed that it could pump water out of mines.Thomas Newcomen perfected the practical steam engine for pumping water, theNewcomen steam engine. Consequently, Newcomen can be regarded as a forefather of the Industrial Revolution.[121]
Abraham Darby I was the first, and most famous, of three generations of the Darby family who played an important role in the Industrial Revolution. He developed a method of producing high-grade iron in ablast furnace fueled bycoke rather thancharcoal. This was a major step forward in the production of iron as a raw material for the Industrial Revolution.
Telescopes
Refracting telescopes first appeared in the Netherlands in 1608, apparently the product of spectacle makers experimenting with lenses. The inventor is unknown, butHans Lipperhey applied for the first patent, followed byJacob Metius ofAlkmaar.[122] Galileo was one of the first scientists to use this tool for his astronomical observations in 1609.[123] Thereflecting telescope was described byJames Gregory in his bookOptica Promota (1663). He argued that a mirror shaped like the part of aconic section, would correct thespherical aberration that flawed the accuracy of refracting telescopes. His design, the "Gregorian telescope", however, remained un-built.
In 1666, Newton argued that the faults of the refracting telescope were fundamental because the lens refracted light of different colors differently. He concluded that light could not be refracted through a lens without causingchromatic aberrations.[124] From these experiments Newton concluded that no improvement could be made in the refracting telescope.[125] However, he was able to demonstrate that the angle of reflection remained the same for all colors, so he decided to build areflecting telescope.[126] It was completed in 1668 and is the earliest known functional reflecting telescope.[127] 50 years later, Hadley developed ways to make precision aspheric andparabolicobjective mirrors for reflecting telescopes, building the first parabolic Newtonian telescope and a Gregorian telescope with accurately shaped mirrors.[128][129] These were successfully demonstrated to the Royal Society.[130]
Other devices
Air pump built byRobert Boyle. Many new instruments were devised in this period, which greatly aided in the expansion of scientific knowledge.
The invention of thevacuum pump paved the way for the experiments ofRobert Boyle and Robert Hooke into the nature ofvacuum andatmospheric pressure. The first such device was made byOtto von Guericke in 1654. It consisted of a piston and anair gun cylinder with flaps that could suck the air from any vessel that it was connected to. In 1657, he pumped the air out of two conjoined hemispheres and demonstrated that a team of sixteen horses were incapable of pulling it apart.[131] The air pump construction was greatly improved by Hooke in 1658.[132]
Evangelista Torricelli invented the mercurybarometer in 1643. The motivation for the invention was to improve on the suction pumps that were used to raise water out of the mines. Torricelli constructed a sealed tube filled with mercury, set vertically into a basin of the same substance. The column of mercury fell downwards, leaving a Torricellian vacuum above.[133]
Materials, construction, and aesthetics
Surviving instruments from this period[134][135][136][137] tend to be made of durable metals such as brass, gold, or steel, although examples such as telescopes[138] made of wood, pasteboard, or with leather components exist.[139] Those instruments that exist in collections today tend to be robust examples, made by skilled craftspeople for and at the expense of wealthy patrons.[140] These may have been commissioned as displays of wealth. In addition, the instruments preserved in collections may not have received heavy use in scientific work; instruments that had visibly received heavy use were typically destroyed, deemed unfit for display, or excluded from collections altogether.[141] It is also postulated that the scientific instruments preserved in many collections were chosen because they were more appealing to collectors, by virtue of being more ornate, more portable, or made with higher-grade materials.[142]
Intact air pumps are particularly rare.[143] The pump at right included a glass sphere to permit demonstrations inside the vacuum chamber, a common use. The base was wooden, and the cylindrical pump was brass.[144] Other vacuum chambers that survived were made of brass hemispheres.[145]
Instrument makers of the late 17th and early 18th centuries were commissioned by organizations seeking help with navigation, surveying, warfare, and astronomical observation.[143] The increase in uses for such instruments, and their widespread use in global exploration and conflict, created a need for new methods of manufacture and repair, which would be met by the Industrial Revolution.[141]
The idea that modern science took place as a kind of revolution has been debated among historians.[146] A weakness of the idea of a scientific revolution is the lack of a systematic approach to the question of knowledge in the period comprehended between the 14th and 17th centuries,[147] leading to misunderstandings on the value and role of modern authors. From this standpoint, thecontinuity thesis is the hypothesis that there was no radical discontinuity between the intellectual development of the Middle Ages and the developments in the Renaissance and early modern period and has been deeply and widely documented by the works of scholars like Pierre Duhem, John Hermann Randall, Alistair Crombie and William A. Wallace, who proved the preexistence of a wide range of ideas used by the followers of the Scientific Revolution thesis to substantiate their claims. Thus, the idea of a scientific revolution following the Renaissance is—according to the continuity thesis—a myth. Some continuity theorists point to earlier intellectual revolutions occurring in the Middle Ages, usually referring to either a EuropeanRenaissance of the 12th century[148][149] or a medievalMuslim scientific revolution,[150][151][152] as a sign of continuity.[153]
Another contrary view has been recently proposed by Arun Bala in hisdialogical history of the birth of modern science. Bala proposes that the changes involved in the Scientific Revolution—themathematical realist turn, the mechanical philosophy, theatomism, the central role assigned to the Sun in Copernican heliocentrism—have to be seen as rooted in multicultural influences on Europe. He sees specific influences inAlhazen's physical optical theory,Chinese mechanical technologies leading to the perception of the world as a machine, theHindu–Arabic numeral system, which carried implicitly a new mode of mathematical atomic thinking, and the heliocentrism rooted in ancient Egyptian religious ideas associated withHermeticism.[154] Bala argues that by ignoring such multicultural impacts we have been led to aEurocentric conception of the Scientific Revolution.[155] However, he states: "The makers of the revolution—Copernicus, Kepler, Galileo, Descartes, Newton, and many others—had to selectively appropriate relevant ideas, transform them, and create new auxiliary concepts in order to complete their task... In the ultimate analysis, even if the revolution was rooted upon a multicultural base it is the accomplishment of Europeans in Europe."[156] Critics note that lacking documentary evidence of transmission of specific scientific ideas, Bala's model will remain "a working hypothesis, not a conclusion".[157]
A third approach takes the term "Renaissance" literally as a "rebirth". A closer study ofGreek philosophy andGreek mathematics demonstrates that nearly all of the so-called revolutionary results of the so-called Scientific Revolution were in actuality restatements of ideas that were in many cases older than those of Aristotle and in nearly all cases at least as old asArchimedes. Aristotle even explicitly argues against some of the ideas that were espoused during the Scientific Revolution, such as heliocentrism. The basic ideas of the scientific method were well known to Archimedes and his contemporaries, as demonstrated in the discovery ofbuoyancy. This approach to the Scientific Revolution reduces it to a period of relearning classical ideas that is very much an extension of the Renaissance. This view does not deny that a change occurred but argues that it was a reassertion of previous knowledge (a renaissance) and not the creation of new knowledge. It cites statements from Newton, Copernicus and others in favour of thePythagorean worldview as evidence.[158][159]
In more recent analysis of the Scientific Revolution during this period, there has been criticism of the dominance of male scientists of the time.[160] Female scholars were not given the opportunities that a male scholar would have had, and the incorporation of women's work in the sciences during this time tends to be obscured. Scholars have tried to look into the participation of women in the 17th century in science, and even with sciences as simple as domestic knowledge women were making advances.[161] With the limited history provided from texts of the period we cannot know the extent of women's roles in developing the scientific ideas and inventions. Another idea to consider is the way this period influenced even the women scientists of the periods following it.Annie Jump Cannon was a 20th century astronomer who benefitted from the laws and theories developed from this period; she made several advances in the century following the Scientific Revolution. It was an important period for the future of science, including the incorporation of women into fields using the developments made.[162]
^abMoody, Ernest A. (1951). "Galileo and Avempace: The Dynamics of the Leaning Tower Experiment (I)".Journal of the History of Ideas.12 (2):163–93.doi:10.2307/2707514.JSTOR2707514.
^abClagett, Marshall (1961)The Science of Mechanics in the Middle Ages. Madison, Univ. of Wisconsin Pr. pp. 218–19, 252–55, 346, 409–16, 547, 576–78, 673–82
^Maier, Anneliese (1982) "Galileo and the Scholastic Theory of Impetus", pp. 103–23 inOn the Threshold of Exact Science: Selected Writings of Anneliese Maier on Late Medieval Natural Philosophy. Philadelphia: Univ. of Pennsylvania Pr.ISBN0-8122-7831-3
^Clairaut, Alexis-Claude (1747). "Du système du Monde, Dans Les Principes de la gravitation universelle".{{cite journal}}:Cite journal requires|journal= (help)
^Donne, JohnAn Anatomy of the World, quoted in Kuhn, Thomas S. (1957)The Copernican Revolution: Planetary Astronomy in the Development of Western Thought. Cambridge: Harvard Univ. Pr. p. 194.
^Wootton, David.The Invention of Science: A New History of the Scientific Revolution (Penguin, 2015) . xiv + 769 pp.ISBN0-06-175952-X
^Cohen, I. Bernard (1976). "The Eighteenth-Century Origins of the Concept of Scientific Revolution".Journal of the History of Ideas.37 (2):257–88.doi:10.2307/2708824.JSTOR2708824.
^Lindberg, David C.;Numbers, Ronald L. (1986), "Introduction",God & Nature: Historical Essays on the Encounter Between Christianity and Science, Berkeley and Los Angeles: University of California Press, pp. 5, 12,ISBN978-0-520-05538-4,It would be indefensible to maintain, withHooykaas andJaki, that Christianity was fundamentally responsible for the successes of seventeenth-century science. It would be a mistake of equal magnitude, however, to overlook the intricate interlocking of scientific and religious concerns throughout the century.
^Eastwood, Bruce S. (1982). "Kepler as Historian of Science: Precursors of Copernican Heliocentrism according toDe revolutionibus, I, 10".Proceedings of the American Philosophical Society.126:367–94. reprinted in Eastwood, B.S. (1989)Astronomy and Optics from Pliny to Descartes, London: Variorum Reprints.
^Newton, Isaac (1962). Hall, A.R.; Hall, M.B. (eds.).Unpublished Scientific Papers of Isaac Newton. Cambridge University Press. pp. 310–11.All those ancients knew the first law [of motion] who attributed to atoms in an infinite vacuum a motion which was rectilinear, extremely swift and perpetual because of the lack of resistance... Aristotle was of the same mind, since he expresses his opinion thus...[inPhysics 4.8.215a19-22], speaking of motion in the void [in which bodies have no gravity and] where there is no impediment he writes: 'Why a body once moved should come to rest anywhere no one can say. For why should it rest here rather than there ? Hence either it will not be moved, or it must be moved indefinitely, unless something stronger impedes it.'
^Sorabji, R. (2005).The Philosophy of the Commentators, 200–600 AD: Physics. G – Reference, Information and Interdisciplinary Subjects Series. Cornell University Press. p. 348.ISBN978-0-8014-8988-4.LCCN2004063547.Archived from the original on 2 January 2024. Retrieved18 November 2020.An impetus is an inner force impressed into a moving body from without. It thus contrasts with purely external forces like the action of air on projectiles in Aristotle, and with purely internal forces like the nature of the elements in Aristotle and his followers.… Impetus theories also contrast with theories of inertia which replaced them in the seventeenth to eighteenth centuries.… Such inertial ideas are merely sporadic in Antiquity and not consciously attended to as a separate option. Aristotle, for example, argues inPhys. 4.8 that in a vacuum a moving body would never stop, but the possible implications for inertia are not discussed.
^Heath, Thomas L. (1949)Mathematics in Aristotle. Oxford: Clarendon Press. pp. 115–16.
^Finocchiaro, Maurice A. (2007). "The Person of the Millennium: The Unique Impact of Galileo on World History ? By Manfred Weidhorn".The Historian.69 (3): 601.doi:10.1111/j.1540-6563.2007.00189_68.x.S2CID144988723.
^Wallace, William A. (1984)Galileo and His Sources: The Heritage of the Collegio Romano in Galileo's Science, Princeton: Princeton Univ. Pr.ISBN0-691-08355-X
In the 1661 translation byThomas Salusbury: "... the knowledge of those few comprehended by humane understanding, equalleth the divine, as to the certainty objectivè ..." p. 92 (from theArchimedes ProjectArchived 12 May 2011 at theWayback Machine)
In the original Italian: "... ma di quelle poche intese dall'intelletto umano credo che la cognizione agguagli la divina nella certezza obiettiva, poiché arriva a comprenderne la necessità ..." (from the copy at theItalian Wikisource)
^Correspondence of Isaac Newton, vol. 2, 1676–1687 ed. H.W. Turnbull, Cambridge University Press 1960; at page 297, document No. 235, letter from Hooke to Newton dated 24 November 1679.
^Achillini, Alessandro (1975). "Anatomical Notes by the Great Alexander Achillinus of Bologna". In Lind, L. R. (ed.).Studies in Pre-Vesalian Anatomy: Biography, Translations, Documents. Independence Square Philadelphia: The American Philosophical Society. pp. 42–65.
^Harvey, WilliamDe motu cordis, cited in Debus, Allen G. (1978)Man and Nature in the Renaissance. Cambridge Univ. Pr. p. 69.
^Zimmer, Carl. (2004)Soul Made Flesh: The Discovery of the Brain – and How It Changed the World. New York: Free Press.ISBN0-7432-7205-6
^Hannaway, O. (1986). "Laboratory Design and the Aim of Science: Andreas Libavius versus Tycho Brahe".Isis.77 (4):585–610.doi:10.1086/354267.S2CID144538848.
^Westfall, Richard S. (1983)Never at Rest. Cambridge University Press.ISBN0-521-27435-4. pp. 18–23.
^abDampier, W.C.D. (1905). The theory of experimental electricity. Cambridge physical series. Cambridge [Eng.: University Press.
^Benjamin, P. (1895).A history of electricityArchived 8 December 2022 at theWayback Machine: (The intellectual rise in electricity) from antiquity to the days of Benjamin Franklin. New York: J. Wiley & Sons.
^Boyle, Robert (1676).Experiments and notes about the mechanical origin or production of particular qualities.
^Boyle, Robert (1675)Experiments on the Origin of Electricity
^Jenkins, Rhys (1936).Links in the History of Engineering and Technology from Tudor Times. Ayer Publishing. p. 66.ISBN978-0-8369-2167-0.{{cite book}}:ISBN / Date incompatibility (help)
^Marguin, Jean (1994).Histoire des instruments et machines à calculer, trois siècles de mécanique pensante 1642–1942. Hermann. p. 48.ISBN978-2-7056-6166-3. citingTaton, René (1963).Le calcul mécanique. Paris: Presses universitaires de France.
^Smith, David Eugene (1929).A Source Book in Mathematics. New York and London: McGraw-Hill Book Company, Inc. pp. 173–181.
^McEvoy, John G. (March 1975). "A "Revolutionary" Philosophy of Science: Feyerabend and the Degeneration of Critical Rationalism into Sceptical Fallibilism".Philosophy of Science.42 (1):49–66.doi:10.1086/288620.JSTOR187297.S2CID143046530.
^Jenkins, Rhys (1936).Links in the History of Engineering and Technology from Tudor Times. Ayer Publishing. p. 66.ISBN978-0-8369-2167-0.{{cite book}}:ISBN / Date incompatibility (help)
^Kemp, Martin (1991). "'Intellectual Ornaments': Style, Function and society in Some Instruments of Art".Interpretation and Cultural History. St. Martin's Press. pp. 135–52.doi:10.1007/978-1-349-21272-9_6.ISBN978-1-349-21274-3.
^Huff, Toby E. (2003)The Rise of Early Modern Science: Islam, China and the West, 2nd. ed., Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.ISBN0-521-52994-8. pp. 54–55.
^A survey of the debate over the significance of these antecedents is in Lindberg, D.C. (1992)The Beginnings of Western Science: The European Scientific Tradition in Philosophical, Religious, and Institutional Context, 600 B.C. to A.D. 1450. Chicago: Univ. of Chicago Pr.ISBN0-226-48231-6. pp. 355–68.
^Kuhn, Thomas (1962).The Structure of Scientific Revolutions. University of Chicago Press.ISBN978-0-226-45811-3.{{cite book}}:ISBN / Date incompatibility (help)
^Silva, Vanessa (2014). "Beyond the Academy – Histories of Gender and Knowledge".Journal of the International Committee for the History of Technology:166–67.
^Des Jardins, Julie (2010).The Madame Curie Complex. The Feminist Press. pp. 89–90.ISBN978-1-55861-613-4.
Further reading
Burns, William E. (2016).The Scientific Revolution in Global Perspective Oxford University Press. xv + 198 pp.
Cohen, H. Floris (2015).The Rise of Modern Science Explained: A Comparative History. Cambridge University Press. vi + 296 pp.
Grant, E. (1996).The Foundations of Modern Science in the Middle Ages: Their Religious, Institutional, and Intellectual Contexts. Cambridge Univ. Press.ISBN978-0-521-56762-6.
Henry, John (2008).The Scientific Revolution and the Origins of Modern Science. 176 pp.
Knight, David (2014).Voyaging in Strange Seas: The Great Revolution in Science. Yale University Press. viii + 329 pp.
Lindberg, D. C. (1992).The Beginnings of Western Science: The European Scientific Tradition in Philosophical, Religious, and Institutional Context, 600 B.C. to A.D. 1450. Univ. of Chicago Press.
Lyons, Martyn (2011).Books: A Living History. Los Angeles: The J. Paul Getty Museum.ISBN978-1-60606-083-4.
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