Mid term Flashcards
What is the mythological way of thinking?
- nature is a system of cycles
- regular rituals are needed to keep the cycles moving
What is the Greek miracle?
The somewhat sudden appearance of science, art and culture in Greece
What are some possible explanations for the Greek miracle?
- causality
- intercultural contacts
- political debates in Greek cities, political debates
Do we know for certain what caused the Greek miracle?
No
What are the 5 tools in the toolkit of science?
- Observation
- Formulating ideas and hypotheses
- Testing
- Objectivity
- Rationality
What was the main factor that prevented the progress of science?
War
What were the 2 important books that Karl Popper wrote?
- The Logic of Scientific Discovery (1959)
- Conjectures and Refutations (1969)
What is Karl Popper’s philosophy on science in The Logic of Scientific Discovery?
It should be falsifiable
What is science according to Popper?
A group of theories
What are theories made up of according to Popper?
- Concepts
- Laws
- Empirical Facts/Observation
What differentiates science from non-science according to Popper?
Testing
What was the difference between Newton and Einstein’s beliefs on light?
Newton believed light had no mass, Einstein proved it did
What example proved that Einstein was right about light?
A star is located behind the sun from our perspective yet we still see the light as it warps around the sun
What is Sigmund Freud’s theory about psychoanalysis?
Your ID and SuperEgo fight eachother to create your Ego
What is the main problem with Freud’s science?
He selected his facts to form his theory ignoring contradicting other facts
What were Thomas Kuhn’s 2 important books?
- The Structure of Scientific Revolutions (1970)
- The Copernican Revolution (1957)
For how long were the theories of geocentrism and heliocentrism were equal?
150 years
What are the 4 events in the evolution of heliocentrism?
- Copernicus publishes his theory of Heliocentrism
- Galileo observes the major phases of Venus
- Kepler observes that planets go around the sun in an ellipse
- Newton publishes Mathematical Principles of Natural philosophy and establishes the law of universal gravity
What did Aristotle believe the main difference between the universe and the earth?
Universe is perfect and things go in circles
Earth is imperfect and things go up and down
What are the 2 levels of the Earth?
A: Sky
B: Earth
Which elements were in A and B?
A: Fire and air
B: Water and Earth
What is the mysterious fifth element?
Ether: the material that fills the region of the universe above the earth
What did Ptolemy add to the Aristotelian-Ptolemaic theory?
went into more detail on Aristotle’s work
What was Ptolemy’s best argument for why the Earth is in the center of the universe and why the earth isn’t spinning or moving?
Earth is so heavy it naturally ends up in the center, we don’t feel the movement of the earth
Who were the main people involved in Christian theology?
Augustine and Aquinas
What was the reason why Mars did not go around in a perfect circle from our point of view according to Ptolemy?
Mars went in little circles whilst in orbit around earth
Why was Galileo arrested?
For daring to question God
What did Galileo find out about the sun, moon and Jupiter that suggested that we are not that important?
- sun has sun spots
- moon has craters
- Jupiter has 4 moons
What is the difference between a quantified and qualified world view?
Quantified: all about the numbers, mechanical, no meaning
Qualified: adjective description, has meaning
What are the 2 realities of the world?
The World: realism, empiricism
The Mind: rationalism, idealism, there exists no world only my mind
What did Francis Bacon think was wrong with human thinking
we tend to rush to conclusions/wishful thinking
What were the 3 steps to Bacon’s induction reasoning?
- observation of facts
- general principles, laws and theories
- make predictions and explanations
What are the 2 limitations to induction?
- that you can go from a finite number of cases to a universal statement
- generalizations made are not guaranteed by the premises
What is the law of proximity?
when we see a number of similar objects we tend to see them as a group of objects close to eachother
What is the law of continuation?
We tend to see lines that have a coherent continuation or direction
What is the law of closure?
When we see a familiar pattern with missing parts we fill them in
What is the law of figure ground perception?
When we pay attention to an object we see little or nothing of the background
What is the Law of size constancy?
the mind organizes the data in term of relationships close to known objects
