How Did The Renaissance Lead To The Scientific Revolution

The Renaissance in Italy was from the 1350s to 1600s, the word renaissance is a French word that means “rebirth”. Historians marked the beginning of the Renaissance in the era of the Black Death in Europe and some view it as a transitional period between the medieval age, known as “The Dark Ages”, and modern age. Central Italy was controlled by the Catholic Church and was divided into a number of small principalities called the Papal States. Florence was often called the birthplace of the Renaissance; it was over taken by Rome during the High Renaissance in the beginning of the 16th century. In the 15th century, Florence had a population of 60,000. Their economy was strong because of its wool and textile trade. “Florence was a place where writers,

painters, architects, and philosophers could thrive” (Florence in the Reniassance). Cosimo de Medici gained power in Florence and was a member of an influential banking family. He was the first of three generations of Medici to run the affairs of Florence. “The beginning of the High Renaissance, artistic momentum move from Florence to Rome. There a succession of Roman Catholic popes was intent on a major rebuilding and revitalizing of the headquarters of the Church” (Florence in the Reniassance).
Humanism is linked to the era known as the Renaissance. “Humanism refers to a renewed interest in human life on earth, as distinct from a concentration on the prospects of life in the hereafter, as understood in religious terms” (Reniassance Humanism).This movement started in Italy and later spread to Low Countries such as France, England, and Germany. The intellectual life in Europe was based on three areas: theology, law, and medicine. Theology is a term encompassing religious studies and philosophical issues.
Francesco Petrarca, known as Petrarch, was a poet and scholar born near Florence. He is considered one of the fathers of Humanism, the Renaissance, and modern Italian language. Petrarch had a passion for ancient Greece and Rome literature and “unearthed vast stores of knowledge in the lost text he discovered” (Petrarch). In 1341 he was crowned poet laureate of Rome.
Niccolo Machiavelli supported the Republic and threw out the Medici family. When they returned to power in 1512 Machiavelli was dismissed and was briefly imprisoned and was “tortured for his alleged complicity in a plot against the Medici” (Niccolo Machiavelli). He then wrote The Prince, a handbook for politicians on the use of ruthless, self-serving cunning, inspiring the term “Machiavellian”. The ideal prince is “a supremely adaptable, amoral, calculating tyrant who would be able to establish a unified Italian state.” (Niccolo Machiavelli)
The Renaissance encourages individualism and more people questioned the authority of the Church, people began to encourage scientist to prove theories and their research had was evidence enough that their theories were true, this is how the Renaissance lead to the Scientific Revolution.

The Scientific Revolution, from 1500 to 1700s, was a time during the early modern period that science emerged along with the developments in mathematics, physics, astronomy, biology, chemistry, and human anatomy that transformed views of society and nature. Various philosophers became famous during this time and are still know today. Rene Descartes was a French philosopher, scientist, and mathematician and also known as the “Father of Modern Philosophy” (René Descartes). He is remembered by his well known phrases “matter in motion”, “I think, therefore I am”, and “we must doubt or question everything”.

Sir Francis Bacon was an English Renaissance states man and philosopher. His is also known as the father of scientific method. He was a lawyer, member of Parliament, and had this dream of reengineering the science of knowledge. Bacon wrote on questions of the “law, state, and religion as well as on contemporary politics” (Klein) but he also published texts such as “The Great Instauration”. “The Great Instauration” was a project that was about how mankind was innocently ignorant in the original paradise, in the future paradise all human souls will have reached a state of knowledge of

truth.
Galen was a Greek sports doctor, physician, who demonstrated that arteries carried blood instead of air and added to the knowledge of the brain, nerves, spinal cord, and pulse.

He compared earlier medical knowledge in all fields with his own discoveries by experimenting on animals. “His work in anatomy and physiology is considered notable” (Galen).

Andreas Vesalius was a Renaissance physician who revolutionized the study of biology and the practice of medicine. He taught anatomy and used human cadavers for his teachings. He also based his observations on dissections he made himself and compiled everything he learned into a book called “On the Fabric of the Human Body”. “After Vesalius, anatomy became a scientific discipline, with far-reaching implications not only for physiology but for all of biology” (Marcel).

Nicholas Copernicus was highly respected and always carried out his duties in a competent manner. He worked in the Catholic Church and had an important job there. He later wrote a book that was considered “one of the most important books in the history of science almost never published” (11) called Revolution of the Heavenly Spheres. It almost did not get publish because Copernicus did not want to start a controversy with the Church. When he was on his death bed he had a friend publish it for him. The book explained Copernicus theory that “the planets, including Earth, orbit around the sun, and that the Earth also spun on its axis every twenty-four hours”

(11).
Galileo Galilei was an Italian scientist who was born in Pisa, Italy that was a Duchy of Florence. He studied and taught at the University of Pisa. Galileo was a mathematics professor who made “pioneering observations of nature with long-lasting implications for the study of physics” (Bio) and supported Copernicus theory. He was accused of heresy multiple times by the church for his beliefs and wrote a book called Starry Messanger on this ideas. This brought him great fame. He discovered sun spots, the mountains and craters on the moon, and four of Jupiter’s moons with a telescope he built himself.