Women During The Scientific Revolution

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Rosalind Franklin, chemist and X-ray crystallographer, once said: “Science and everyday life cannot and should not be separated.” Franklin is one of the few women scientists I ever learned about in school, and it is a shame that it is such. There is much more to women in scientific fields than the few names we learn. Their history and struggles to get where they are today is something hardly ever talked about. Although they are hardly mentioned in schooling, women in scientific careers are important and through their hardships theses fields would not be the same without them. To begin, women have always been involved in science, even if it was not allowed or accepted in society. One of the first woman scientists known by name dates back to ancient Egypt. “Merit-Ptah …show more content…

2700 BCE,” (Mark). Although at this time in history it was mostly male-dominated fields such as politics, science, and education. Moving forward toward the Scientific Revolution in 1550-1700 was still very male-dominated, with notable scientists such as Copernicus and Newton. The Scientific Revolution was a shift in thinking involving the interpretation of cosmology and astronomy, and later shifted to physics as well (Hatch). One women of note is Maria Winkelmann, who “became the first woman to discover a previously unknown comet,” (Epigenesys). Winkelmann, although not university educated, helped set the grounds for women at this time that they can be scientists and rebel against what society may tell them about their limit in learning. Especially because women in the time were not allowed to be apart of England’s Royal Society, an academy of sciences. Winkelmann,

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