Unit 4: The Development of Scientific Knowledge Flashcards
Babylonians and Egyptians
The first to observe and understand natural phenomena, and write down their findings using hieroglyphics.
Use of technology was for practical goals. science was used as a form of survival. Eg: By developing calendars to help them keep track of when they should cultivate their fields.
Developed the idea of the wheel and mathematical concepts that are still in use today.
Ancient Greek and Presocratic Philosophers
The Ancient Greeks and Presocratic philosophers used mythological tales to understand universal and terrestrial happenings.
The Greeks started to verge away from this idea during the democratic period of Athens in 500 B.C. : During this time natural philosophers started looking for inflexible laws.
Thales of Miletus
Natural philosopher, who believed that everything that existed had their origins in water.
He was one of the first to try and show that we should not work close mindedly on a certain aspect, but understand how the world around us is inter-connected.
Anaximenes
Believed that everything that existed was due to air
Heraclitus & Parmenides
Heraclitus: Believed that nature is constantly changing.
Parmenides: Stated that change is impossible. He thought that if one observed changes, it was only an illusion.
Democritus
Noticed that everything that exists is made of “atomos”. Quite a few centuries before Christ, he already understood that everything was made of atoms, however he did not have enough instrumentation to prove his theory.
It was Einstein (1940s) who could give concrete truth that atoms do in fact exist.
Archimedes and Euclid
Archimedes: One of the first to have calculated pi, invented fluid mechanics - pressure, gravity.
Euclid: Discusses a certain amount of shapes, what their common characteristics are and how they can be used
Science in the Ancient Greek Times
In the ancient Greek time, nature was studied to try and understand what is happening, and presenting them as a set of laws which can be studied even by others.
There were no physical experiments,
Purely logical deductions
Post Socratic Philosophers
Plato:
* One of the first students of Socrates
* Main interest was Politics and morality
* Perfect Forms: Observations are imperfect representations of its forms. Nature should exist in perfect forms.
Aristotle:
* Student of Plato, along the years of training they started disagreeing on the different aspects of nature.
* Aristotle developed his own natural philosophy independent to that of Plato.
The fall of the Roman Empire – 5th Century A.D.
Following the fall of the Roman Empire in the 5th Century AD, Europe went through a decline in culture and economy.
However, in the Middle East, Islamic scholars kept on studying Greek Texts, and were contributing to learning far more than Europeans at the time.
The Birth of Modern Science
The birth of Modern Science (also called Mechanical Philosophy) is attributed to the early Italian renaissance period (14 – 17th century A.C)
Scientists had more apparatus available to study nature, analyze results, and produce the new laws of nature.
The Scientific Revolution
Uproar brought about in the 15th and 17th century in Europe.
It is considered to have began with Copernicus, and ended with Newton.
The Scientific Revolution is Characterized by:
1. A renewed drive to understand the physical world
2. The development of experimental methods
3. The search for practical applications of scientific knowledge
4. Mathematization of nature
5. Development of Scientific Institutions
Nicolaus Copernicus
Proposed the theory of a heliocentric universe; where the Sun is at the center of the universe and the Earth, spinning around its own axis revolves around the Sun annually.
Though his model seemed to fit the astronomical records of his time better, he had little evidence to back up his claims.
The church highly opposed the Copernican theory, their belief being that God created Man in his image and so Man should be at the center of the universe.
Johannes Kepler
- Discovered the rotation of the planets is more elliptical than circular.
- He discovered that the closer a planet is to the sun, the faster the speed at which it will rotate around the sun.
Emphasized the importance of not holding any personal bias or beliefs, the main goal should be to be guided to the objective truth.
Galileo Galilei
Known as one of the pioneers of the Scientific Revolution, referred to as the Father of modern science.
Invented the first calculating compass for the practical solution of mathematical problems.
Improved the magnification of the telescope by 20x. This observations of the Earth orbiting the Sun led to the victory of the Copernican theory.
Galileo Galilei’s discoveries went against the teachings of the church, and so his works were censored.
