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Thinkers of the Scientific Revolution and Enlightenment

Lecture Essential Question:

How do thinkers challenge and change society?

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Background What:

The Scientific Revolution: A period that saw a revolutonary transformation in scientific ideas in physics, astronomy, and biology, in institutions supporting scientific investigation, and in the more widely held picture of the universe generally accepted today.

The Enlightenment: A period of time that slightly overlapped the Scientific Revolution during which European thinkers applied the scientific method to analyzing society, government and religion. EXTREMELY influential on modern government systems.

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Background Where: Europe—very

important because these scientific and social theories were influential in allowing Europeans to achieve world domination between the 16th and 19th Centuries.

When: Scientific Revolution:

16th and 17th Centuries

Enlightenment: : 17th and 18th

Centuries

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Background How:

New knowledge transmitted from Muslim regions after Crusades

That knowledge inspired the Renaissance in Italy which spread North

As feudalism declined and Absolute Monarchs took over, people relied less on the Church

Church sees challenges during Protestant Reformation

Reformation allows people to question authority

More people become literate due to translation of Bible and printing press.

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Background Why:

As the Catholic Church lost power and influence people began to think for themselves and challenge tradition.

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Background

Who Thinkers of the

Scientific Revolution

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The Original Theorists Ptolemy:

First envisioned the geocentric model in ancient Egypt

Aristotle: Supported

Ptolemy’s theory through deduction (thinking)—not observation

Quote: “The only good is knowledge and the only evil is ignorance.”

Theories of both were incorporated into the Bible and supported by Catholic Church

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Copernicus

1473-1543 (15th-16th Centuries Heliocentric (sun-centered theory) Studied planetary motion for 25 years

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Galileo Galilei 1564-1642 Telescope Experimented with

acceleration (Challenged Aristotle)

Observed Jupiter’s moons and the rings on Saturn

Publicized heliocentric theory

Persecuted by Church Recants (Eppur si muove) Dies under house arrest

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Lectures Multimedia\Hammer and Feather.mp4

Hammer and Feather On the Moon

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Francis Bacon 1561-1626 Spelled out the

Scientific Method Suggested that

because men have to shave daily, throughout life they suffer just as much as women do during pregnancies

Quote: “Knowledge is power.”

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Descartes 1596-1650 Articulated

(explained) the position that we define our own existence.

Quote: “Es cogito ergo sum”

Suggested that our brains and our bodies are two separate things: Dualism Challenged by

modern science

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Isaac Newton 1643-1727 Universal Laws of

Gravitation Gravity Prisms contain the

colors of the rainbow Demonstrated that

gravity explains planetary motion

Quote: “Ouch!” (Hahahahaha—get it?)

“Plato is my friend—Aristotle is my friend—but my greatest friend is Truth.”

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Background

Who Thinkers of the

Enlightenment Philosophes

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Thomas Hobbes 1588-1679

Born the same year as…?

Leviathan (1651) Believed in Social

Contract between leader and led

But Absolute Monarch

Why? Quote: “Life in the state of nature is solitary, poor, nasty, brutish and short.”

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John Locke 1632-1704 Social contract also But with an elected

leader And Natural Rights:

Life Liberty Property Became “pursuit of

happiness” in D.O.I.

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Mary Wollstonecraft 1759-1797 Vindication of the

Rights of Woman (1792)

Theory: Women are not naturally inferior to men—they just lack education.

Sadly, died in childbirth

Quote: “It would be an endless task to trace the various sorrows into which women are plunged by the prevailing opinion that they were created to feel rather than reason, and that all the power they obtain, must be obtained by their charms and weakness.”

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Voltaire 1694-1778 Satirist—wrote

sarcastic social criticisms

Quotes: “The Holy Roman Empire

is neither holy, Roman nor an Empire”

“The secret of being a bore is to say everything you think.”

“Every man is guilty of all the good he did not do.”

“It is dangerous to be right in matters where established men are wrong.” (Think Galileo…)

“A witty saying proves nothing.”

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Montesquieu 1689-1755

Separation of Powers

Power should check power Checks and

balances Led to the U.S.

branches of government

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Rousseau 1712-1778 Although earlier

thinkers had talked about it, he finally defined the Social Contract

Rulers rule with the consent of the governed— so no more: Absolute power Divine right Hereditary rule