Enlightenment and the Scientific Revolution: A Comparative Study

Scientific Revolution
The Enlightenment, also known as the Age of Reason, was an intellectual and cultural movement in the 17th and 18th centuries. It concentrated on reason, logic, and freedom over blind faith. During this time more and more people reject absolute authority of the church and state. The driving force of the enlightenment across Europe and England came from a small group of thinkers and writers that are known today as “philosophes.” The English Enlightenment differed from other European countries, like France. England had many discoveries in manufacturing, literature, plays, and landscaping, but the advances in sciences were probably one of the important. This period of time was coined as the Scientific Revolution. The most

important developments were in the subjects of basic science and its methods, astronomy, physics, and mathematics.
The Enlightenment developed the Scientific Revolution in England. This was a time when newly invented instruments gave scientist more accurate ways to observe natural phenomenon. There were also new methods and scientific investigation that allowed scientists to use the instrument efficiently. One of the most important English scientists was Francis Bacon. He is known for advocating the empirical method, which is the combination of inductive reasoning, which the premises seek to supply strong evidence for the conclusion, and scientific experimentation. One of his books was the called the Novum Organum Scientiarum. This book is a reference to Aristotle’s book Organon, which was a treatise on logic and syllogism. In Bacon’s work he details a new logic system that he believes is better than the older ways of syllogism. This idea is known as Baconian Method.
One other scientist that was important to the Scientific Revolution was Rene Descartes. He was opposed to Bacon’s use of inductive reasoning and used the opposite method called deductive reasoning. This is a logical process when a conclusion is based on multiple premises that are assumed to be true. The center around Descartes’ thinking was a distinction of the mind and matter. These are an opposition like the soul and the physical body. Descartes is also one of the major founders of deism, which is a brand of faith that believes god is real based off of reason and logic, not tradition. He also believed that god created the world, but does not control every day human affairs. Descartes was also a mathematician of his time, he was known for finding analytic geometry, which was a key to the invention of calculus.
Another important person in the Scientific Revolution was a German mathematician named Johannes Kepler.

The first record of the movement of the planets was produced by Nicolaus Copernicus. He proposed that the earth was the center of everything, which the term is called geocentric. Kepler challenged the theory that the sun was the center of the earth and proposed that the sun was the center of everything; this term is referred to as heliocentric. Kepler’s heliocentric theory was accepted by most people and is accepted in today’s society. One of Kepler’s friends was a famous person named Galileo. Galileo is known for improving the design and the magnification of the telescope. With improvement of the telescope Galileo could describe the craters of the moon and the moons of Jupiter. Galileo also created the number for acceleration of all free falling objects as 9.8 meters per second. Galileo’s and Kepler’s theories were not approved by all people. Their theories contradicted verses in the bible, so the protestant church was extremely skeptical of both Galileo and Kepler’s

theories.
Other scientists in the Scientific Revolution were Antoni Van Leeuwenhoek, Robert Hooke, and one of the most famous figures in the scientific revolution was Isaac Newton.

Antoni and Hook were known for the development of the microscope. Before Antoni improved the microscope, the microscope could only magnify objects 20 or 30 times their natural size. Antoni, a Dutch lens-maker, learned to grind a lens that magnified over 200 times. One of Antoni’s inspirations came from a publication by Robert Hooke’s book Micrographia. In this book the term cell was used to describe the basic unit of a structure in plants and animal life. Hooker wrote about his observations through various lenses. Newton was the most important figure in the scientific revolution because of his book the Principia. In this publication Newton describes the universe and its guidelines. In this he created the universal law of gravity and its mathematical equation. He demonstrates that every object exerts an attraction to a greater or lesser degree on all objects. The Principia led to the creation of the Royal Society in

England.
The Scientific Revolution was a flourishing in basic science, mathematics, astronomy, and physics. All of the findings from Galileo, Hooker, Antoni, Kepler, and Bacon helped develop our modern rules and regulation in all subjects of sciences. These people were the most important figures to England in the Scientific Revolution and helped develop their society profoundly. Even as time progresses these theories and philosophies will be used and taught throughout lifetime.