1. The Scientific Revolution and the Enlightenment
Toward a New Worldview
The Scientific Revolution and the Enlightenment

2. Introduction
Profound change in the European world-view in the late 16th and 17th centuries
Primary cause was the Scientific Revolution (1543-present)
The most profound change in human history?
New intellectual climate differed from medieval & early modern world-view:
Rejection of authority
“Best” knowledge was practical
Demystification of the universe
Scientists of this era differed from predecessors in combining mathematics and experiment
-rejection of authority. Mostly Church authority, several crises contributed to this.
-”best” authority was practical. Bacon: “purpose of knowledge was to ease man’s estate” Descartes: purpose of knowledge “to make us, as it were, masters and possessors of nature”
Demystification of the universe: e.g., heavenly realm above the moon was no longer of eternal bodies that had no matter or weren’t physical
Experiment was different from Observation, which the ancient did.

3. Scientific Thought in 1500 The Aristotelian/Ptolemaic Universe
Geocentric
10 separate, transparent, crystal spheres
First 8 held the moon, sun, planets, stars
Heaven lay beyond the 10th sphere
Angels kept the spheres moving
Common sense backs this up. The sun appears to move around the Earth
The Church invested greatly in this world-view
God had deliberately placed earth at the center of the universe
Earth was special
The Church invested greatly in this world-view: put man in the center of the universe, most important part of God’s creation

4. The Geocentric (Ptolemaic) Universe
                                                                                                  
The Geocentric (Ptolemaic) Universe
The Geocentric Universe

5. Nicolaus Copernicus (1473-1543)
Polish monk
Observed patterns of star and planet movement for 25 years
On the Revolutions of Celestial Bodies (1543)
Heliocentric Theory
Called into question the literal truth of the Scriptures
Copernicus waited until he was near death to publish his findings.
Called into question the literal truth of the Scriptures. There are a few passages where God, for example, makes the sun stand still. This implies that the earth is still and the sun moves around it.

6. The Heliocentric (Copernican) Universe

7. C. Johannes Kepler ( )
Mathematical laws govern the motion of the planets
Elliptical orbits
Planets do not move at uniform speeds in their orbits