Philosophy 46 Flashcards
What had Empedocles posited?
The notion of an attractive force acting between all material bodies
What two fundamental questions remained?
Why did the earth and other planets continually fall toward the sun? Why did terrestrial objects fall to earth at all?
What fell to Isaac Newton?
The task of completing the Copernican revolution by quantitatively establishing gravity as a universal force
What did the educated person know at the beginning of the 18th century?
That God had created the universe as a complex mechanical system
What governed the celestial and terrestrial?
A single set of physical laws
What seemed reasonable?
That after the creation of the universe, God removed himself from further active involvement and allowed it to run on its own according to perfect immutable laws
