Task 2 - scientific revolution Flashcards
Scientific revolution
- started around 1543
- series of intellectual developments that enhanced the status of science in society
3 critical insights:
1) earth not Centre of universe
2) many things can be understood as machines
3) movements on earth can be described using laws of physics
Aristoteles view
- finite universe
- earth at its Centre
- empiricism
- deductive reasoning
Destroyers of the old world view
- Galilei
- Descartes
- bacon
- newton
Newtonian worldview
-early 1600s
- new evidence that earth moved about the sun
-
Copernicus
- sun as Centre of universe
- 1514, published only shortly before his death 1543
- was afraid of Roman Catholic Church
- first person to take this model seriously was Johannes Kepler
Galileo Galilei - his observations (4)
1) more starts than visible
2) surface of moon wasn’t smooth
3) Jupiter had four moons
4) size of mars and Venus changed and Venus had phases just like moon
Descartes
- body mind problem
- mechanistic view
- reflex action theory
- rationalism
- deductive reasoning
- skeptical method
- cogito ergo sum
Francis bacon and the Novum organum (1620)
-interaction between perception and reasoning is required
-inductive reasoning
-perception is limited due to:
Peoples bias
People do not observe everything correctly
- > systematic observations
- > adoption of bacons research method was reason why science became so successful
Experimenta Lucifera -bacon
- use clarifying experiments to determine true causes
- light-bringing experiments
Bacon - experimenta frutifera
- fruit bearing experiments
- go beyond experiments mechanics set up to solve practical problems
Inductive reasoning
- making generalizations based upon behavior observed in specific cases
- conclusions may be incorrect even if the argument is strong and the premises are true
- needed in science to turn observed phenomena into scientific laws
- > Bacon
Factors that contributed scientific revolution ( 6)
- demographic changes
- absence of pressure from religion or authority
- new inventions
- existence of universities and patronage
- Massive enrichment form Greek to arab civilizations
- natural philosophy became detached from the big philosophical questions
Deductive reasoning
- starts with a general statement
- uses given information, premises or accepted general rules to reach a proven conclusion
- conclusions can be valid if premises are known to be true
- reasoning of Plato, Aristotle, Descartes, Catholic Church
Experimental history
- introduced by bacon
- clarifying experiments to examine truth of axioms to get higher axioms (Grundsatz)
- extracting the truth from nature by manipulation and examination of the consequences
- natural philosophers had to tale active role to find most likely interpretation
Factors helped fledgling science grow (3)
- absence of disasters in 15-19th centuries
- a benevolent (gültig) religion
- establishment of learned societies
Impact of science on daily life
-19th century: scientific revolution
- > increased production of goods
- > people live longer
- > people became more literate
- > they knew more about the world
4 factors of modern science
1) acknowledge of no authorities except the authority of Nature itself
2) its experimental: built upon direct observation AND artificial experiments
3) favoring of mechanistic world picture
4) description/explanation of natural things/events in mathematical terms
Johannes Kepler (1571)
- studied theology
- excellent mathematical understanding -> taught him work of Nicolaus Copernicus
- believed in his heliocentric hypothesis
- lecturer in astronomy and mathematics in Austria (1594)
- ‘mystery of the cosmos’
- 3 laws of planetary motion
Johannes Kepler, relation to Galileo
- lived at same time
- both astronomers
- heliocentric
- had problems with church
- Galileo believed in circular orbits, contrary to Keplers theory of ellipses
- Galileo might have seen Kepler as a rival, not a partner -> he refused to send him his new designed telescope
Galileo and Descartes
- immense gap between reality and appearance
- reality hides behind the appearances
how can we know this hidden word?
Galileo and Descartes: by abstract mathematical thinking = mathematical (classical) sciences
Bacon: by forcing nature to reveal her secrets by torturing her and putting her on the rack of the experiment = experimental (or Baconian) science
=> rejecting Aristotle
Galileo - objective reality
-size, shape, motion, rest, number
Galileo - subjective appearances
- color
- oder
- taste
- sound
- tactile properties
Epistemological problem
Why should we believe modern science and reject Aristotle?
skeptical method
-philosophical questioning of everything to find basic truths (=undeniable facts)
Descartes - matter
- extension in space
- infinitely divisible
- Mechanism
- laws of nature
- determinism
Descartes - mind
- not extended in space
- not divisible (unity)
- reason and language
- not determined (free will)
Descartes ontological problem
What is the mind?
Ontology= about ‘stuff’ -> so what stuff is mind, what stuff is matter
- where does it come from?
-what is the relationship between mind and matter?
-mind is always thinking ( conscious)
3 levels of consciousness
1) functional: state of info processing that allows subsequent (folgend) behavior/processing
2) phenomenal: what the states feels like, ‘what it is like to be’ in that stat
3) physical: ‘stuff’ the state is made of, e.g. neural firing, electrical impulses
Monism
It’s all just the same ontological stuff
Phenomenal = physical = functional
Dualism
Phenomenal ‘stuff’
Physical/functional stuff p
Problem of interaction
- problem of interaction
- > deadly for interactionsist dualism(Descartes)
- > boost for materialism
- > stimulates parallelism as well
